Let me start out by saying this:

I am pretty sure I have done it all. I’ve slept with a baby on my chest or in the crook of my arm– on the first night, in the hospital, in my bed at home after home births, and (accidentally) in a chair when I was trying to stay awake and nurse.

And I’ve put babies down to sleep in:

  • cribs
  • cradles
  • a wicker
    box lined with mosquito netting (that would be child #3– our daughter, born in Thailand!)
  • Rock-n-plays
  • “Moses baskets”
  • on the couch next to me
  • a separate room
  • our room
  • the closet doorway (when I couldn’t quite bear to move baby out of our room, but wanted to have them close enough for my mommy-nerves)
  • a room clear across the house when nothingnothingnothingnothingnothingnotastinkingthingItriedImeannothing would soothe the crying, and we just (pleasepleaseprettypleaseyoureasixmontholdbabyplease?) were desperate for sleep
  • pack-n-plays
  • bassinettes

I’m not kidding; I’ve done it all. Which is, I guess, what happens when you have 8 babies in various locations and methods all around the world.

So I was intrigued when I saw the headine:

“It’s OK to sleep next to your infant child. In fact, it’s beneficial” (article here)

Even though I’m not a co-sleeper in general, I was mildly enthused to see the headline. That word “OK” drew me in.

Yes! What we need LESS of in America are rigid rules that make mommies neurotic! More of telling moms that “it’s OK” to try/do XYZ… less articles out-ruling every possible mommy practice. Less severe lines in the sand. Phew! Give tired mommies a break!, I thought.

So I opened up the article with a degree of excitement… but then I came to this quote in the middle of the article:

In most of the rest of the world…parents think it’s downright cruel to put a baby in a separate room or even a separate bed. Who would be so heartless?

And my excitement gave way to anger.

Dang it. It IS an article espousing rigid rules. Pretending to be a freeing article, it’s another constraining one instead. Dang it dang it dang it.

Now, I’m not so concerned when it’s the LA Times doing it… but I am concerned when I see and hear this same attitude of judgment coming from Christian sources.

CHRISTIAN MAMAS, LET’S BE WOMEN WHO STOP THE PROLIFERATION OF MOMMY RULES.

We should be women who shut down the isolating, firmly-entrenched, know-it-all-ism prevailing around us.

Modern moms are GROANING under the weight of the rules.

  • Gotta use this strap system on your carseat.
  • No, not that one from 2 years ago. It’s unsafe now. It’s the worst. KIDS ARE DYING!!!!! Do this instead.
  • Can’t feed kids grains.
  • Gotta introduce a foreign language early.
  • All kids develop differently.
  • But you gotta catch speech pathology issues early.
  • Better teach infant-potty-training, infant-reading, infant-sign-language.
  • Wear your baby 24/7.
  • Put that baby down.
  • Can’t vaccinate.
  • Better vaccinate.
  • Stretch out vaccines longer than the suggested schedule.
  • Never spank.
  • Never yell.
  • Never say “no.”
  • But don’t always say “yes.”
  • Be a “yes” mom.
  • “Choose your nos.”
  • And on and on the made-up rules go.

Who among us can keep up with them? Meanwhile, moms grow more neurotic and less confident by the millisecond. Christian moms grow more neurotic and less confident by the millisecond.

THE BIBLICAL TRUTH ABOUT CO-SLEEPING

Christian mama, do you want the biblical truth about co-sleeping?

Here are the places where the Bible has anything that even *seems* to speak with any degree of specificity on this subject:

  • Deuteronomy 6:7, 11:19– “as you lie down“ — it can be implied, perhaps, that people slept in close proximity to their kids (which makes sense, given avg. size of homes at the time)
  • King Solomon & two mothers (who seem to be co-sleepers)–1 Kings 3:16-22– “two women who were prostitutes came to the king and stood before him. And the one woman said, “O my lord, this woman and I live in the same house; and I gave birth to a child while she was in the house. And on the third day after I gave birth, this woman also gave birth. And we were [alone] together; no one else was with us in the house, just we two. Now this woman’s son died during the night, because she lay on him [and smothered him]. So she got up in the middle of the night and took my son from [his place] beside me while your maidservant was asleep, and laid him on her bosom, and laid her dead son on my bosom. When I got up in the morning to nurse my son, behold, he was dead. But when I examined him carefully in the morning, behold, it was not my son, the one whom I had borne.” Then the other woman said, “No! For my son is the one who is living, and your son is the dead one.” But the first woman said, “No! For your son is the dead one, and my son is the living one.” [This is how] they were speaking before the king.” — it seems they slept next to, or beneath their newborn/less-than-week-old babies.
  • Mary, mother of Jesus — Luke 2:7– put the newborn Messiah in a separate manger to sleep, by Himself, from day one.
  • Parable about a man whose neighbor is knocking to ask for bread— Luke 11:7– “from inside he answers, ‘Do not bother me; the door has already been shut and my children and I are in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.’”

So what the Bible seems to say is….

YES. 

Some people over the course of time have shared a room, modern-Japanese-style, with their kids. Some women have slept with/near their nursing infants. Some mothers in the Bible appear to have placed their infants, from an early age, in a separate place to sleep.

Biblically, there doesn’t seem to be a clear preference or instruction for one of these over another. These situations appear to be factual accounts, rather than prescriptive.

[Note: although Deuteronomy is a prescriptive passage, commanded to Israelites, one could easily argue that talking about the law “as you lie down” does not equal “talk about the law as you lay down to go to sleep in the same bed/bedroom as your children” but, rather, is written in such a way that it gives an indication of a larger picture: “talk to your kids, all day, from dawn to dusk, about these things. Make it the overarching theme of your entire life.”]

CHRISTIAN MOMMIES, WE NEED TO BE CLEAR ON WHAT IS ESSENTIAL

There are too many of us running around with dogmatic views on second- and third-tier mommy topics. And all too often, our verbiage sounds like the quote from the middle of that article–

Sadly, it seems like we’d rather call each other names, and give each other negative labels, rather than call each other SISTER and give each other GRACE.

We need to get clear about what the Bible says. These are the basics:

  • Christian mothers are to LOVE our children.
  • We are to DISCIPLINE our children.
  • We are to TEACH our children.
  • We are to NOT EXASPERATE our children.

THIS should be what we are dogmatic about. THIS should be where our heartbeat is. THIS is what we are commanded to “teach” younger Christian women about.

When we are known more as “the carseat lady” or “the attached mama” or “the sleep-Nazi mama”…. we need to tread carefully. We may not be wrong, but we MIGHT be. We MIGHT be making second- and third- tier issues into main things. We MIGHT be pushing first-tier issues to the side and alienating our Sisters in Christ who do things differently.

  • Is it wrong to have an opinion about co-sleeping? No.
  • Is it wrong to talk with other moms about your opinions about co-sleeping? No.
  • Is it wrong to call names, throw negative labels around, or internally/externally be divided from a Sister in Christ because of your opinions about co-sleeping? Yes.
  • Is it wrong to have an opinion about infant sleep issues? No.
  • Is it wrong to talk with other moms about infant sleep issues? No.
  • Is it wrong to act as if there is only one biblical way to approach infant sleep issues? Yes.

We need to be clear on these things.

We should stand out.

We should stand out, not just because we do XYZ, but because of the gracious and calm and at-peace way we go about doing the XYZ. We should stand out because of the way talk about ABC (even though we’re fans of XYZ). We should stand out because of the way we give grace to moms who do ABC, even while we do XYZ.

As Christian women,

  • we should be at-peace women, who give burden-lifting, life-giving wisdom to younger women.
  • we should be first-tier women, who MAJOR on the major things, and who don’t fling mud around on the less-clear issues.
  • we should be GRACIOUS women who LOVE lavishly, and give LIFE, GRACE, & PEACE to one another in our words and the way we express our thoughts on mothering issues.

Right now, I am praying this– and invite you to join me:

Loving Father, enable me to BE this sort of woman. Help me to study diligently and be clear on what is biblical, and what is personal preference. Modify my words; constrain my impassioned views; help me to be a woman who LOVES and extends GRACE to women around me, no matter the differences in how we mother our children. Amen.

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