
Raising Respect and Faith in a Large Family – Bill and Pam Mutz
On this FamilyLife Today episode, hosted by Dave and Ann Wilson, we feature Bill and Pam Mutz, a couple with 12 children and 37 grandchildren, known for their work with FamilyLife’s Weekend to Remember conferences and the Art of Marriage series. The episode introduces their story, starting with their meeting in Indiana and Pam’s initial reluctance to marry or have children.
Despite her plans to serve Jesus overseas, Pam agreed to marry Bill after guidance from mentors, and their perspective on children shifted after their first child, Carrie, awakened Pam’s nurturing instincts. They discuss using the family dinner table as a training ground for respect and devotions, and their decision to trust God with family size, leading to 12 children.
The episode touches on their mentoring roles, including hosting a student from Colombia, and their surrender to God’s plan, even amidst challenges like the loss of a son and granddaughter, Molly. The hosts highlight the couple’s joy, affection, and wisdom gained through decades of marriage and parenting.

Show Notes
- Learn more about Bill and Pam Mutz at their website.
- Attend a FamilyLife Weekend to Remember conference for marriage enrichment.
- Find resources from this podcast at shop.familylife.com.
- See resources from our past podcasts.
- Find more content and resources on the FamilyLife's app!
- Help others find FamilyLife. Leave a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify.
- Check out all the FamilyLife's podcasts on the FamilyLife Podcast Network
About the Guest

Bill and Pam Mutz
Bill is the President of Lakeland Automall in Lakeland, Florida. He has been involved with the ministries of FamilyLife and Promise Keepers. Bill and Pam serve in their local church and various community boards. Pam graduated as a physical education major, mentors and teaches women’s Bible studies, and is a commissioned Centurion through Prison Fellowship. Bill and Pam are the parents of 12 children.
Episode Transcript
FamilyLife Today® with Dave and Ann Wilson – Web Version Transcript
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Raising Respect and Faith in a Large Family
Guests:Bill and Pam Mutz
From the series:Richer by the Dozen (Day 1 of 2)
Air date:June 9, 2025
Bill:We use the kitchen table, where we eat—the family table, wherever that is in your home—to be the place of training. Kids stay in their chair from the beginning of the meal through devotions.
Pam:You have political discussions; you have discussions about what you’re observing in other families.
Dave:Welcome to FamilyLife Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I’m Dave Wilson.
Ann:And I’m Ann Wilson. And you can find us at FamilyLifeToday.com. This is FamilyLife Today.
Dave:Alright. We’ve had some important people in the FamilyLife Today
studio.
Ann:But not as important.
Dave:But we’ve never had a mayor.
Ann:Ohh! I never thought of that.
Dave:Have we ever had a mayor? We’ve got a mayor!
Ann:Yes!
Dave:We’ve Bill Mutz, the mayor of what?—Laketown?
Bill:Lakeland.
Dave:Lakeville?
Bill:Lakeland.
Dave:Lakeland; I knew it—Laketown; Lakeville—Lakeland.
Bill:Lakeland. It’s about 35 miles from your house.
Dave:It’s actually a really important city in central Florida.
Ann:It is, actually. That’s a big deal!
Pam:I’m looking forward to spending a lot of time laughing.
Dave:It’s where the Detroit Tigers do spring training.
Bill:Yes, forever. It’s the only home they’ve ever had. And we have it for
108 years in the current contract.
Dave:There you go.
Bill and Pam Mutz. Have you guys ever been on—
Ann:Do we need to call you Mayor Bill?
Bill:No, just call me Bill.
Dave:Do you hear how we just talk over each other? Ann asked Bill a question; I asked him a question at the same time.
Ann:We’re professionals!
Dave:That’s what we do. Welcome to FamilyLife. You’re like, “Okay; do they know what they’re doing?”
Pam:Those poor guys over there [in the control room].
Bill:And the worst part is we can handle that.
Dave:Yes, you did. I have a feeling—
Ann:You were going along with us.
Dave:—it’s going to happen again.
Ann:Well, Bill and Pam are great friends of ours, and we have known you guys
for—
Pam:Did we decide 33 years?
Ann:That’s what I think.
Dave:Well, I wrote a little song this morning.
Ann:What?!
Dave:You didn’t know that? You didn’t hear me downstairs?
Ann:Is this because Bill is a mayor? You recognize that? That’s Indiana. Recognize that at all?
[Dave sings] Here’s a little diddy about Bill and Pam,
Just an Indiana couple with 12 kids,
30 and 7 grandkids, roaming the land.
Hang with them for a minute, and you are living the dream.
They’re the oldest couple on the Weekend to Remember team.
Oh, yeah! They will make you laugh,
and they’ll sneak Jesus right into your lap.
Oh, yeah!
Pam:What talent!
[Dave sings]We’re definitely nuts.
Welcome to FamilyLife Today, Bill and Pam Mutz.
Bill:That was good. That was very good.
Dave:That’s the Indiana Fight Song.
Pam:My goodness.
Ann:That’s pretty great.
Pam:Did you realize you married such talent, Ann?
Ann:Yes, that’s why I married him.
Dave:You call that talent? That took about five minutes this morning on the couch.
Pam:That’s talent.
Dave:I’m like, “I got to write him a song!” I haven’t done that in a while.
Ann:That’s pretty fun.
Dave:But yeah, we’re so excited for our listeners to get to know you guys.
Ann:And a lot of our listeners have seen you on the Art of Marriage.
Bill:That’s true.
Ann:So they might feel like, “Hey, I know this couple!”
Dave:Yeah, it’s actually a pretty interesting thing you say on the Art of Marriage.
Pam:Well, actually, Bill and I were in Israel once. The bus had stopped at a jewelry store; and everybody was going in, looking around. Bill and I were just watching this jeweler. This man kept walking back and forth; I could see him out of the corner of my eye. Finally, he came up to me; he goes, “Are you in the Art of Marriage?” And I said, “Oh, no; that’s not me. That’s my sister.”
Ann:Did you say that?
Bill:Yes, she did.
Pam:He said, “Yes, you were; because you talk about the big ‘O’ [orgasm].”
Dave:Yeah, yeah. We talk about our ten-year anniversary, but she talks about the big “O.”
Ann:Yes, she does.
Dave:If our listeners don’t know what we’re talking about, we’re not going to tell you. Hopefully, you know what that is.
Bill:Okay; they can always look at the old Art of Marriage.
Ann:Pam and Bill, you guys, when was the last time—you’ve been on FamilyLife Today—when was that last time?
Bill:That was following our loss of Molly,—
Ann:Yeah, your granddaughter.
Bill:—our granddaughter, Molly, had passed after seven days of an arduous process that Bob Lepine really captured well in a series that he did. That would’ve been—
Ann:And the other set of grandparents were Dennis and Barbara Rainey.
Bill:Exactly.
Ann:So you guys shared a grandchild, who passed away.
Bill:It was a really interesting time to go through, as parents. We watched the tension of the fathers—particularly, Dennis and myself—in terms of how much you press in and lead, or not, to this couple, having to make the decisions of what they had to make when they’re talking about life-and-death decisions—and whether or not—the very, very grim prospects of multiple, and multiple, and maybe, 20 operations that would take place— versus a decision to be able to allow Molly to expire.
Pam:She would be 16 years old this year.
Ann:Wow! That was 16 years ago.
Bill:It was tough; very, very tough. We had lost a son earlier. I think, for us, it was probably an easier road to go through in something that is that difficult.
Pam:—and another grandchild too.
Bill:True. And it was very, very hard. It was a moment that Dennis and I talked about—how much you push in—he was in favor of pushing in harder; I said, “Not our fight there.”
Ann:That’s a tricky part of being parents of adult kids, of knowing when to step in and when to give space.
Bill: Right.
Dave:—especially, in a tragic situation like that.
Bill:You bet.
Dave:Yeah. Well, people probably thought I was joking when I’m singing about 12 kids and 37 grandchildren. But we’re not joking, right?
Bill:We’re not.
Pam:That is correct—we are nuts—Mutz nuts!
Dave:That took a lot to get that rhyme this morning: “What rhymes with Mutz?”—nuts! And they are nuts!
Ann:That works; that was pretty impressive, actually.
Dave:The first line wasn’t as good; that one came out pretty good. I’m sure it’ll be billboard-top 100 percent.
Bill:No question; no question.
Dave:Tell our listeners a little bit about your story. Even as we read Richer by the Dozen—and you don’t even know the subtitle yet—
Pam:That’s correct!
Dave:—but you have 12 kids. Meeting in Indiana—we’re Ohio people—so we get it. I think the first time—maybe, the first time we met you—was that at the Weekend to Remember that we spoke at?
Bill:That’s correct, in Indianapolis.
Dave:You were the City Directors for FamilyLife—
Bill:That’s correct.
Dave:—in Indy, right?
Bill:Right. We had just—to give them the background—we had been asked to be the directors—and that was when we started that conference in Indianapolis. But giving the background—
Dave:Oh, there was no conference before you guys?
Pam:No, no; there was no conference in Indiana. They came, and they said, “Would you all be interested in starting the FamilyLife conference?” Bill goes, “Well, I have a new job. We just had a new baby. Our dog had puppies, which—
Bill:—14.
Pam:—”was a dalmatian.” She had 19, actually, I think.
Bill:Okay; fine. We won’t argue over five puppies.
Pam:And then, people go, “Okay, we are not coming to your house or drinking your water.”
Dave:You were selling cars then, right?
Bill:No.
Pam:No, not then!
Bill:No, not in Indianapolis. I was in warehouse distribution.
Pam:Yeah. We said, “No, but here’s the name of five other people that we think would be great!” They followed up those five other people, and they came back. At that point in time, we were ministering to four couples—two, which made it; two, which didn’t—and they came to us, and they said, “Hey, these five couples recommended you guys.” And so we said, “Okay, we’ll pray about it.” That’s when we realized that God wants us—He wants us to yield our hearts to Him—it’s not so much the abilities that we have, but the availability that’s important. We have just seen God come in, time after time. Just when you’re overwhelmed—when you can’t do it—and God comes in, and He provides.
Bill:I think one of the key things that happened in that moment was they said, “Well, if you aren’t going to do it, we’re going to pass on doing the conference in Indianapolis.”
Dave:Really?
Bill:And we went, “Ugh!”
Pam:—“at least, for a year,”—they said.
Dave:It’s one of the bigger conferences in the country now.
Ann:And it was then, too; that was a big conference.
Bill:It came out of the gate at about 900; it went to 1200.
Pam:And so we said, “Well, right now, we’re in the middle of these four couples.” “How many others are there that aren’t going to make it, because they’re not getting truth?—because they’re not getting great information?”—which is what the FamilyLife conference, Weekend to Remember, is.
Bill:Pam’s right; it’s making the decision to be available. So many times we focus on our own inconveniences so much that we can’t focus on what God can do if He just has a willing hand. He’ll multiply the resources.
Ann:I remember the first time I met you guys; I was probably 31, possibly.
Pam:You were a young, cute thing, just like you are now!
Ann:Oh, no. I remember—
Dave:She is a cute thing.
Ann:—meeting you, Pam, thinking, “This woman is extraordinary.” I thought you were beautiful.
Dave:And I thought that about you, Bill.
Bill:Oh, yeah.
Dave:Just so you know.
Bill: I’m still/I’m just mesmerized by you right now.
Dave:I know you are!
Ann:No! I thought, “You have a joy.” You can probably hear it, or see it if you’re watching this on YouTube. But you have a joy that’s contagious. An enthusiasm and an energy and a love for Jesus that I thought, “I wish I lived here, because I would be her friend; and probably, weird and crazy adventures.”
Dave:You’re a little bit similar.
Ann:Yes!
Pam:Well, actually, when we’re together at the Speaker FamilyLife Conference, we go on walks together; we and catch up. We’re beach-walkers together.
Ann:We do; we do.
Dave:And we go play golf together. Remember those times?
Pam:That’s very generous of you to call it golf.
Bill:Yes, we always used your shot; otherwise, it’s crazy.
Dave:You’re the craziest golfer I’ve ever golfed with.
Pam:Well, I figured, “You might as well run in between when you hit the ball.”
Dave:She runs to the ball! It’s usually not very far. She runs to the ball.
Ann:But now, you’ve been speaking! Here, you started out kind of starting this whole conference in Indianapolis; but now, you’ve been speaking for the Weekend to Remember conferences for how many years?
Bill:Twenty-nine years.
Ann:That’s incredible.
Pam:It’s interesting; because when our first daughter got married, we were 42. I think about what we knew then, and I thought it was a fair amount that God had given us wisdom; this was our oldest daughter. What I’ve seen is—in the 40s, 50s, 60s—there’s so much wisdom/more wisdom that’s gained.
I wonder, “Hey, did I shut down my parents with the wisdom they had?—or even my grandparents?” I think that’s just a good question to ask; because it’s easy to talk over them, and for them not to be heard. I think they had so much wisdom. I just see—I am grateful—our wonderful speaker team leader has done such a great job of encouraging us to stay on and to just be available.
Ann:And I think, too, sometimes, couples can get older, and feel like, “Oh, I’m done.” And yet—as you’re saying, Pam—I say, “Whether you have a lot of victories or a lot of failures, you’ve learned a ton from those.
Dave:—and there’s wisdom.
Ann:“And God wants to use you; He always wants to use us.”
Dave:Dennis Rainey said to me—he probably said that to you guys—when I turned 60, he said, “Your best decade.” I go—I rolled my eyes—like, “Dennis, I’m getting old.” And he goes/he just looked at me, like, “Are you crazy?! This is going to be your best decade.”
Bill:It truly is; it’s a great decade.
Pam:And just think, Dave, if you weren’t getting older, what would you be?—dead!
Dave:Dead.
Pam:And so you wouldn’t have anything to say!
Dave:Took me a minute; it’s like, “I guess I’d be dead.” I remember—
Pam:So it’s a privilege! It’s a privilege to get older; —
Dave:Yeah,
Pam:—that’s what I’m saying.
Dave:I went to one of our Detroit Lion players—I did it 33 years—I bet it was like year 20. I went to one of the leaders of the ministry; he was a first-round draft pick, Luther. I said, “Hey, are we [he and Ann] too old?” He goes, “What?!” I go, “We’ve been doing this a while. When I started, I was the age of the players. Now, I’m like the age of your parents. Maybe, it’s time for somebody that you can relate better to.” He looks at me, and goes, “You don’t get it, do you?” I go, “No, I’m asking you. I really want your wisdom. You’re a player. If my time’s done, I’m good with that; I just need to know. I don’t want to be that guy hanging around.” He goes, “You’re better now than you’ve ever been. If you’re a peer, we don’t respect that; you got no wisdom. You got that now.”
Pam:That’s awesome.
Dave:“You’ve lived enough to know something, and we are looking up to you as a mentor. You’re not a peer; you’re a mentor. We need mentors.” I’m like, “Okay.” I did, but he’s right.
Bill:He is absolutely right. Mentoring is so important, and I think it is something that we have consistently done increasingly. In fact, we have a student from Colombia living in our house today, who three years ago, came up to me at a men’s conference as soon after I was done speaking, and said, “I would like you to mentor me.” I said, “Well, call my assistant and set this up.” He was there on Monday.
Dave:Really?
Pam:Well, what is cool about this kid: he said, “I waited two years for my dad to sign my visa before he’d sign it so I could come.” And then, he came to a Christian university in Lakeland, Florida. He said he joined the track team, because he had to find a way to pay for his schooling; he came with $2,000 three years ago; that was it! He moved into our house at the end of summer; and he said, “Look, Bill and Pam, I have paid off my school debt.” And we’re like, “Felipe, that’s incredible!”
Bill:He’s starting his NBA [career] now.
Pam:That guy has get up-and-go! It just shows you—I think we can feel that this is what we deserve; or our kids can feel that, because we’ve grown up in this country—and I’m telling you: it shows you that, if there’s a will, there’s a way. He’s been such an encouragement.
Bill:And we have consistently, over time, had people live in our house. Some of that bothered our kids when they were also living in our house. But some of that—these were moments in lives that we just felt was an opportunity to create a window for them of living differently—I’ve given away five daughters, who weren’t mine, in weddings that were part of the fruit of that. What a privilege it is to have filled that fathering role; because in many cases, they didn’t have one who was active in their lives.
Ann:By that point, you’ve got 13 of your own. What’s 15 or 16 in the house?!
Dave:Well, as I read—
Ann:We’re going to get into that too.
Dave:—as I read Richer by the Dozen, Pam, I was surprised in the first chapter;
you’re like, “I don’t even want kids.”
Pam:I didn’t want to get married until I was older—at least, my late 20s; maybe, early 30s—and kids: I hadn’t even thought about it. I grew up with horses—and training horses—and I loved that. I had babysat once in my life—once.
Bill:A lot of experience.
Pam:I didn’t know anything about kids. I was like: “Babies are ugly; they all look alike. Who wants one?”
Ann:We’ve been talking about what your subtitle is going to be. You’re not locked into necessarily a title—but we have it written down—”When the Life You Want Isn’t the Life You Got.” What percentage of people are living that?
Bill:A lot.
Dave:Everybody.
Ann:Exactly! And yet, you’ve taken this; I’m thinking, “If you—
Dave:Not you, Ann—you married me—
Ann:—I got everything!
Bill:Right.
Dave:But everybody else—
Bill:But wait for her next book then.
Pam:She got everything as a challenge!
Ann:But when I look at your life you never anticipated—you weren’t even
longing to have all these kids—and yet,—
Bill:—zero.
Ann:—zero.
Pam:I wasn’t expecting to have kids as early as I did. In fact, I’d gone to my doctor before we got married; you’re supposed to go to your OB, right? I went, and his name was Dr. Billie Graham; well, we all know Billy Graham tells the truth. He goes, “Pam, you’re going to have a hard time.”
Ann:That was really your doctor?!
Bill:Yes, it really was.
Pam:Yes, it was really his name! He goes, “You’re going to have a difficult time getting pregnant, so I wouldn’t really use birth control.” A month after we get back from our honeymoon, I’m like, “I am so sick. What in the world is wrong with me?” Do the test. I’m sitting there waiting; she comes up; and she’s like, “You’re pregnant.”
Ann:—a month after your honeymoon?
Bill:Yes. And I had had to encourage Pam to get married in the first place—
that was step one—just to have her willing to get married.
Pam:We went to the second FamilyLife conference, which was just for staff. It was at Dulles Airport.
Dave:So you were there.
Bill:Yes.
Pam:I was there.
Dave:—back in the ‘70s.
Bill:They had done Williamsburg two weeks before; and then, they did the Dulles Airport. It was Mick Yoder, and Dennis Rainey, and—
Ann:Oh, yes; that’s who did ours!
Bill:—and Ney Bailey, and Don Meredith.
Dave:Wow.
Bill:We were sitting there, listening to this weekend. I’m going, “Pam, what do you think?” And she goes, “Yeah, yeah; I think we should get married.” We go to meet with Ney Bailey. She’s just told me this; and Ney goes, “You guys look great on paper. What are your thoughts? Are you excited about getting married?” And Pam goes, “No!”—and starts—
Ann:You said, “No”?
Pam:I’m like, “I don’t know! I just don’t think so!” I was like a yo-yo. I was up and down and up and down. I was like, “No, I just want to serve Jesus. I want to go overseas,” and “If you get married, you can’t do that!”
Dave:You had your life mapped out.
Bill:Yes, she did.
Pam:And he is from Indiana, and God hadn’t called him into “full-time ministry.”
Bill:And she’s in Colorado, and there’s no mountains in Indiana.
Pam:It’s like, “I’m doomed.” Actually, Nancy Wilson—whom we were talking about, who was on staff with Cru for almost 50 years—she had on my cake: “Doomed to marry such a groom.”
Bill:Given that background, finally, Pam says, “Yes, I’ll marry you.” We get married with that enthusiasm level.
Pam:No, I got excited.
Bill:Yeah, you did; she got romantic later. God had really reflected to me that that was going to be my wife, and so I persisted. But had He not done that, I don’t know that I could have really; it was almost—
Pam:Well, we met with Don Meredith.
Bill:Don said to her—
Pam:—that morning of the end of the retreat.
Bill:—because of what she had said to Ney—which, minutes before, she told me she was fine about [marriage]. Then, we meet with Don. Don listened to her story; and then, turned to me. Really didn’t look at Pam again, and said, “Give her six weeks to get through this. Make a decision one way or the other in terms of whether or not she wants to get married. If she says, ‘No,’ then you don’t talk to each other for a minimum of six months; perhaps, a year,”—or fax—because those were the options back then. That’s what we agreed to do.
Pam:He said this wasn’t unusual because you have women who have the intention of serving Jesus. Marriage is an interruption to that; and later, of course, I learned marriage is part of God’s plan.
Bill:—and interruptions are part of the course.
Ann:Yes. Isn’t that a good life lesson that we learned/that you’ve learned?
Well, as I think about you two, and even that, I want to say—I don’t know if I’ve ever told you guys this—“There’s always couples in our lives that we see, married couples; and we think, ‘Oh, I want a marriage like that.’” I’ve always thought that of you two—the love that you have—you’re super affectionate. You really like each other. And you can tell—we stand in these meetings—and you know how, sometimes, it’s sickening when couples are so lovey to each other? I mean, Bill is just rubbing Pam’s back.
Pam:They actually took us to the elder board at one church we went to!
Dave:What?!
Bill:Yeah, we had somebody who wrote/said, “They’re distracting during church, because he’s always touching her back.”
Dave:Really? You ended up in front of an elder board about that.
Ann:What a compliment.
Pam:Well, no. Bill was on the elder board. One of the elders goes, “Is there a problem with too much love?” —he said that.
Bill:“That’s what we want to ban?—too much love in our church?”
Pam:—”between a married couple.”
Bill:Yeah, I know.
Ann:It’s really sweet.
Pam:Thanks, you guys.
Ann:Okay; so you have your first baby. Take us now into the next few years.
Pam:We had Cari. It was like God woke up a nurturing gene in me I didn’t even know existed.
Ann:Me too! When we had kids, Pam, I was the same: “Do I want kids?”—it was very cerebral.
Pam:Yes.
Ann:I didn’t have this longing; but I thought, “Well, we’ve been married six years; it’s probably time.” But I was—
Dave:We didn’t get pregnant on our honeymoon. Nope; I think God knew.
Ann:—which was His grace; I was only 19. But when I had that baby, it just all kicked in. You felt the same.
Pam:Yes, it was incredible. We kind of became known as child-holics. We just took our kid with us everywhere we went. We’re like, “Oh, yeah; you just train them.” So if you have to be in a meeting, or you’re going out to dinner—whatever—you got to learn how to train your kids. Because I didn’t want children to be an interruption to our life; we wanted to be the married ones who are bringing our kids along with this exciting journey.
Ann:And every mom is like, “Oh, she didn’t have any colicky babies.”
Bill:We did have colicky babies. Some of that you have to work through, obviously, as you go through stages that the children may have differently; but by and large, we use the table—the kitchen table, where we eat; the family table—wherever that is in your home, to be the place of training. Kids stay in their chair from the beginning of the meal through devotions.
Pam:What?! Even the baby in the high chair?
Bill:Yes, even the baby in the high chair.
Ann:Yeah, you did.
Bill:We also had our kids sit with us in church.
Ann:Everyone’s like, “I need these people as my mentors.”
Pam:Well, the thing is—you go into a restaurant; kids are running around, or kids whining—and it’s not our kids. We’re far from perfect, but if you just think about your dinner table being the training ground.
Bill:It’s the place.
Pam:You’re not training in the restaurant. You’re living out [in the restaurant] what you’ve trained in the [home].
Bill:And the table’s where you learn respect for each other—you hear the highs and lows of the day—where you do a devotion at the end of the meal.
Pam:You have political discussions; you have discussions about what you’re observing in other families; what we need to work on as a family.
Ann:Having a baby didn’t stop you. You’re continuing doing a lot of the things you had been doing.
Pam:Well, so then, I went to my six-week checkup. My doctor said, “Hey, Pam, you guys need to talk about what you want to do as far as birth control.” I said, “Okay.”
Bill:“Too late.”
Pam:I came home; and I was like, “Bill, we got to talk about this. What do we want to do?” He looked at me, and he goes,—
Bill:—”I think we should trust God for our kids.”
Pam:I said, “What? Did you talk to somebody, read a book, hear a podcast?”—well, there weren’t podcasts then—“a radio program? Where in the world did that come from?” I looked at him, and I said, “You are crazy! But I’ll pray about it for a month.”
You guys—I just can’t tell you—I just feel like anytime you want to discuss this, that you can go back to God’s Word. He has something to say to you. As I opened my Bible, it’s like God says, “Children are a blessing,”—I’d always thought, “Children are an interruption. They’re so noisy; and people don’t control them, and they’re just all over the place,”—and that children are fun, and children are meant to be an enjoyment for us. God really transformed my thinking in that month. What I want to say: “It wasn’t my positive thinking. It was the Word of God that I went to, that spoke to me.”
Bill:And I think, too, there’s a balance in this. That’s not to say that, if you don’t take that posture, you’re wrong. It is the fact that, had there been anything that was a health concern, anything that changed in our hearts that God was showing us, we’d respond to that.
After we had our fifth one, my father-in-law said, “I don’t appreciate you making a brood mare out of my daughter,” which is pretty strong.
Ann:Did he say that?!
Bill:Oh, yeah; he really did.
Dave:Really?
Bill: I said, “If we ever felt like Pam had any health issues, we would stop. But that’s what we are both comfortable doing.”
And that’s the other issue: it needs to be something you, in accord—strong accord—agree to be willing to do, or not, in terms of the number of kids. If one person is overwhelmed, then I think that has to be weighed in.
Pam:Well, I think—
Bill:And without them having to feel guilty that they don’t have enough faith or anything like that.
Pam:Well, I see a lot of times people, they have a two- or three-year-old and a newborn or even six months old, and they’re like, “Oh, man, I can’t handle anymore!” And it’s true; you can’t because it’s overwhelming. But it’s just like a new job—it’s something that you’re learning—you’re building skills. You don’t even realize—“Whoever thought you had to have skills to be a parent?”—I didn’t; I knew nothing.
As I was mentored by other moms—learned from other moms—start getting exposed to homeschooling, public schools, just whatever, I just began to absorb all this other information from other people that was really incredible and really helpful for me as a person.
Ann:I think the thing that stands out to me is your surrender. If there’s a theme to your lives, it’s that. The fact that you would go to God, and say, “God, what do You want us to do about our kids, about birth control? We give it to You.” We’re not all willing to go there. There are certain things that we’re allowing God to have; but there are certain things that’s easy to hold onto because, we want to control it. But your lives have been a picture of surrender, both of you.
Dave:And tomorrow, you’re going to hear about what surrender really looks like when it gets hard.
Ann:—especially, if you’ve lost a child. We’re going to talk about that tomorrow.
Dave:Well, we’ve been talking with our friends, Bill and Pam Mutz. I got to say, “Every time I’m with them, I’m just smiling.”
Ann: We’ve known them for so long, and we love them.
Dave:They bring joy. Bill and Pam Mutz have a new book called Richer by the Dozen. Get it wherever you buy your books. Go get one now; maybe, get a couple.
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