Like NFP Because I Am Selfish

You can’t tell that I’m selfish, right? (I hope you can’t!) Fortunately, God could tell that I was selfish, so he gave me NFP. And I am glad he did, because I would be even more selfish if I didn’t have NFP!

(I don’t think that #NFPisfortheSelfish will take off as a Twitter hashtag anytime soon, huh?)

Abstaining from sex during fertile periods can obviously be a challenge, but the issue of selfishness is way deeper than just that—yes, this is the guy speaking. Selfishness is about twisted values. It’s about a sense of entitlement. It’s about wanting to feel like intimacy is earned, or worse, deserved. It’s about wanting to make a nest in something other than God. And, thankfully, NFP is about God taking a sledgehammer to all of these false movements in my heart. NFP is about God giving me another person to choose over myself, that person being my dear wife.

If NFP is the antidote to selfishness, parenthood is the detox program. I am so grateful for my children (three boys!). They require that I focus on them all of the time. What a perfect plan for keeping selfishness in remission. I routinely have to think outside of myself, and think of them instead.

Is that too big for my little guy to eat?

Will that story/book/movie lead my boys to sin, or to Jesus?

Does my boy need me to be a coach right now, or a dad?

Do I like it when my son repeats my words?

Yes, I still enjoy the daily routine of good personal hygiene, and I get to read about (and sometimes watch!) my Green Bay Packers, but my sons’ evolving needs constantly challenge me out of my desire to be first. Didn’t Jesus say something about the last being first, and the first being last?

So thank God for NFP! Nothing else could knock me off my self-made mountain more perfectly.

Galatians 5:1 For freedom Christ set us free, so do not submit yourselves again to the yoke of slavery