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What is God's will regarding the use of birth control? Does the Bible make a definitive statement?

We've been talking about the Reformer's view of birth control and I got to wondering, what kind of birth control did Reformers have? They didn't have pills or diaphragms or spermicide jellies or condoms or anything like that. So what could they be against? Maybe coitus interruptus. That's what was apparently condemned in Genesis 38, which, by the way, I think it's worthwhile to make a couple more points about. There was a comment made by the last caller that was revelatory, though he withdrew it. Let me draw your attention to it for a moment. He said, "If you are practicing birth control then you are thwarting God's sovereign will." He realized immediately that that was ludicrous because God's sovereign will, by very definition, is not something that can be thwarted. God always gets His way with regards to His sovereign will. No, it's a different kind of will that would be thwarted if we used birth control. He believes that God's moral will is being thwarted. In other words, He has a desire for men and women in their conduct, and this full set of laws and rules pertaining to the conduct makes up what is called God's moral will. God makes His moral will clear to us, and I'll tell you why. If we don't fulfill His moral will, if we violate His moral will, then we are in sin so God tells us what is wrong in order that we might be careful not to do what is wrong and instead do what is right. If we don't fulfill His moral will, if we violate His moral will, then we are in sin so God tells us what is wrong in order that we might be careful not to do what is wrong and instead do what is right. This is why when it comes to moral will, the moral will of God is clearly articulated throughout the Scriptures. It is all the things we ought to do and we ought not do, and they deal not just with our actions but with our attitudes and our motives. It is all inclusive. But the point I'm making is the same one Paul makes in 1 Corinthians 14. Speaking of tongues, though I think it applies here, he asks if the trumpet produces an indistinct sound. How is it that anyone can follow it? At that time when you had a trumpet call that calls you into battle that sound signals you to charge, and another sound has you retreat, and if somebody blows an indistinct bugle and you don't know whether it's a charge or a retreat, you don't know what to do. (This was a problem, by the way, during the Civil War when different units had different trumpeters and they'd hear the trumpet call as a form of mass communication, but they weren't sure if it was their trumpet and they weren't sure what to do. So they sometimes had specialized trumpet calls for each unit.) Paul's point is really clear, though, that if God wants us to do something, such that if we disobey that we are in sin, then He is going to make His trumpet call on this issue quite clear. That's why we can go through the Scriptures and find out what God wants us to do and not do. God's moral will is revealed and clear. Now if the suggestion is that we are violating God's will in using birth control, then which will are we violating? Clearly we can't violate His sovereign will. His sovereign will is always fulfilled. His sovereign will even entails evil actions. He takes those into consideration to accomplish His sovereign goals. So it must be His moral will that birth control allegedly violates. But His moral will is always clearly revealed so we can be careful to obey it. Well, what do we have revealed in Scriptures pertaining to birth control? Nothing, ladies and gentlemen. We have one reference in Genesis 38 that some have taken to be a reference to birth control where Onan spills his seed on the ground, coitus interruptus. He withdraws in the act of intercourse, ejaculates on the ground and God strikes him dead. Now the big question is, why does God strike him dead? I'll tell you why. I don't know. I'm not sure. I haven't studied the passage. But if someone says that God struck him dead because he practiced birth control, that strikes me as a very strong punishment for birth control. If that's what is going on, then God feels very strongly about such a thing, doesn't He? The question occurs to me, if God feels so strongly about such a thing, why are we left up to our own devices to figure this out from one verse in the book of Genesis? The question occurs to me, if God feels so strongly about such a thing, why are we left up to our own devices to figure this out from one verse in the book of Genesis? Why doesn't He confirm such a hatred for this act in the Law? You've got chapters and chapters and chapters in Exodus and Leviticus and Deuteronomy of God's feelings about the conduct of His people. We have dozens of references to sexual behavior, prohibitions and concerns, such that God's people can be careful to live and act properly in their sexual and procreative life. Yet not a single mention is made of coitus interruptus. We have the prophets speaking volumes of God's intentions about the conduct of His people, and no mention of such a thing in the prophets. We have the New Testament to clarify anything that was confusing in the Old Testament. Jesus gave His teaching, then the Apostles, Peter and James and John and Paul--volumes of information clarifying the law so that we might not be confused about proper conduct. Where is the mention against birth control--or even one form, coitus interruptus? There are none. There are no direct or even mildly indirect statements about such a thing. For this reason I conclude that birth control is not prohibited by God and there must be something else going on in Genesis 38. What it is, I'm not sure. It could be that he had an obligation under the code to raise up ancestors in his dead brother's stead. But to say that it was because of practicing birth control when there is utter silence from chapter 38 of Genesis to the last chapter of Revelation with many opportunities to speak clearly on it-- indeed speaking clearly on many sexual issues in the law and the prophets and in the teaching of Jesus and the writing of the Apostles in the New Testament-- but not doing so, it seems quite obvious to me that God is not deeply concerned about this. All of the other arguments that I've heard so far that are philosophical arguments that may have some weight--arguments from natural law, or the arguments from the nature of the soul and its creation--all of those arguments have not struck me as compelling at all and are seriously compromised. In other words, they could be right, but they certainly aren't compelling. They don't require us to adopt this position. So I think it's a jump ball, and if you have convictions about it, you follow your convictions. If you feel it's wrong, then don't do it. That certainly is a good New Testament principle. But if you don't feel it's wrong, it strikes me that this is an area of Christian liberty that we ought to allow our brothers and sisters in Christ to exercise in this area. This is a transcript of a commentary from the radio show "Stand to Reason," with Gregory Koukl. It is made available to you at no charge through the faithful giving of those who support Stand to Reason. Reproduction permitted for non-commercial use only. ©1994 Gregory Koukl For more information, contact Stand to Reason at 1438 East 33rd St., Signal Hill, CA 90807 (800) 2-REASON " (562) 595-7333 " http://www.str.org/about/mail.htm " http://www.str.org/   Sign up to receive Solid Ground free.