There are not five seasons

Perhaps it is coincidence that each of my four children was born in a different season. Maybe it's some cosmic symbolism I've not yet fully understood.

At any rate, the novelty of this phenomenon is never far from my thought, especially since it means we host a birthday party once every three months. We sometimes joke that the best way to have a convenient excuse for a party is to have many children.

To that end, my husband and I have never predetermined the number of children we wanted. Some have accused us of living dangerously, envisioning us with enough children to rival the now-famous Duggar family of Arkansas with their brood of 19. Some accused us of flat out irresponsibility. After all, don't we know it takes some $5 million per child to raise them to adulthood? (Okay, I exaggerate slightly, but those stupid statistics based on crap and nonsense annoy me. I think the latest figure is about $220, 000 -- still overblown, in my opinion.) Others like to remind us that, "this isn't like the old days when they needed a lot of kids to help around on the farm," as if the only thing children are good for is unpaid labor.

Still others just shake their heads as if to say, "Whatever."

It's hard to explain in five sentences or less -- about the amount of time you usually have to hold someone's attention when you're trying to articulate your pro-child perspective -- why we love our children in such a way that we don't have an interest in prohibiting the arrival of more.

I guess the best description of our mindset comes from a book by married couple Rick and Jan Hess. Titled "Quiverfull," the book draws on the Bible verse in which a man is judged blessed not by how much money he has but by how many "arrows" or children he has in his quiver.

In short, our children don't deplete our wealth, they ARE our wealth.

At times I struggle between feelings of greed for wanting more wealth and feelings of contentment with what I've already been given.

The only thing that keeps me from feeling deprived in those moments of greed is the fact that there are not five seasons, only four, and God has graciously given them to me one by one so that every year brings a time to rest (winter), a time for renewal (spring), a time to play (summer) and a time to prepare (autumn).

To everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven.