• Private Group for Christian Moms with weekly lives with Angie Tolpin
• Weekly podcast Q&A with episode behind the scenes content. Just type in your question!
• Exclusive biblical resources such as the Courageous Marriage and Redeeming Childbirth series.
• Exclusive access to the courageous kid’s podcast. Play it for your kids to stir up good discussions.
• Monthly LIVE Q&A with the Tolpins; ask the anything.
• Powerful Biblically minded community.
• Topic-based discussion groups.
• You get your own profile and can connect with others.
• Growing libraries of LIVE replays

All Ministry Resources: becourageousministry.org

Our Courses

• Parenting Mentor Program, self-paced online program that equips you to biblically parent during unprecedented times.
• The Homeschooling Blueprint, the online program to boost your effectiveness & help your kids thrive.
• Postpartum Course, The First-Ever Christian Postpartum Course.
• Cultivating Biblical Friendships  The course that helps women build lasting Godly friendships.

• Financial Giving, is important to support our family and expand the impact of the ministry. We aim to impact 10 million  legacies. We are in full-time ministry as a large family, so everything makes a difference. 

Thank you for being part of this movement to equip 10 million families and their legacies with Biblical truth to raise confident Christian kids in an uncertain world.

Full Transcript:

Note: This is an automated transcript and misspells or grammar errors may be present.

Welcome to Courageous Parenting Podcast, a weekly show to equip parents with biblical truth on raising confident Christian kids in an uncertain world.

Hi, I’m Angie from Courageous Mom.

And Isaac from Resolute Man Together pursuing the mission to impact 10 million families and their legacies for the Kingdom of God.

We’ve been married for 23 years and are seeing the fruit from raising our nine children biblically. Based on the raw truth found in the Bible.

We can no longer let the culture win the hearts of children, as too many from Christian families are walking away from their faith by the age of 18. And it doesn’t have to be this way. It shouldn’t be this way.

We’re praising the Lord that the ministry continues to expand and impact more legacies. We couldn’t do this without you. Whether you pray for us, give us five star reviews, or share on social.

Or even if you purchase courses and merch, or join the Be Courageous app community, enjoy the coffee or support financially. We’re so thankful you are a big part of the 10 Million Legacies movement.

If you want access to all the episodes, show notes, and other biblically based resources, go to Be Courageous Ministry.

History.org. Join us as we start another important conversation about effective parenting in a fallen world. Welcome to the show! Hi guys. So glad you’re here. Talking about family culture meeting. Of course, this stands on its own, but this is also part of the previous two episodes. So if you haven’t listened to those, catch up on those after you listen to this.

That’s right. So the first one we talked about, recalibrating family culture. The second one, we talked about the date night. That’s super crucial as far as vision planning for your family and different things like that. We have some really awesome questions and kind of they’re kind of like an audit that you do as a couple.

Hey gents, I so hope you’re tuning in and listening to these three episodes. I think there’s a unique benefit that it’s a husband and wife team here talking about these things in the dynamics of biblical roles as well. So that’s.

Right. Yeah. So today we’re going to be talking about your family culture meeting. And so we’ll just kind of do a little bit of an overview on what is important before you do that, so that people who are just listening to this episode. Have that encouragement as well. Yeah. But before we do that, guys, we just want to say thank you and. Hey, it’s Merry Christmas. You could be listening at any time of the year, but it’s December right now in 2024. And this has just been super, super exciting. This week is actually our within. The next week is our anniversary of six years. We finally hit it.

Six year anniversary doing the podcast. Never missed a week. And of course there’s so much more to the ministry. There’s two other weekly shows, there’s five courses, there’s her book. There’s all kinds of free resources, free workshops. There’s the biblical parenting free download you can get Be Courageous Ministry. Org, there’s the effort to impact 10 million legacies. This year is the biggest podcast listenership year around the world, 194 countries. And we’re so thankful for what God is doing in the ministry. And our goal is to continue to steward it well with an aim towards that mission of impacting 10 million legacy, which we couldn’t do it alone. It’s everybody helping. In fact, there’s a vital fundraising effort right now that needs to be hit by year end. If you could go check out what the plans are for next year, what is important that needs to be money spent on and how you can help it. Be courageous ministry org that mean the world to us. Even if somebody’s giving $10 or, you know, $100 or $1000 or more, it all makes a difference. And there is a great need right there. And literally when you give, you’re saying, I want more people to understand how to be more intentional and biblically parent. I want more people to have thriving marriages. I want the next generation to rise up and not walk away from the faith at age 18, but instead embrace the baton and walk forward in strength and change the culture. What’s the biggest way to change the world?

Families? Next generation? It’s a big, big deal. That’s why we started this ministry was because we were trying to be purposeful in it. We wanted to run a race with other people like you that are like minded and intentional as parents. And so if you’ve been encouraged by the be Courageous ministry at all, we would love to hear from you as well. We we always like to update our website with new testimonials and to share. And so if you have a video testimony or even just a written one or a picture of your family at Christmas time so that we can be praying over your family, it always. I love getting pictures of of families because it’s like, wow, look at that. That’s the faces. That’s why we do what we do. Um, so thank you guys so much for joining us. Um, on the note of Christmas, would you guys like a couple ideas for, like, stocking stuffers? Because I just thought of a couple.

Oh, I bet you people are interested in that.

It’s interesting. So you had talked about, you know, if people, even people who give $10 a month or whatever, but even cheaper than that would be the Be Courageous app. And not only that is, it continues to support us once a month for about the same price as a coffee at like a local coffee shop. But what you get out of that is you get access to the Courageous Marriage series, which is basically a course six hours, six hours of content. You get access to the weekly heart of the home Bible studies with the Q&A, and there’s over 38 of those because we started last February. You get access to the audio book, video book reading of Redeeming Childbirth, which is 22 hours of video. That’s amazing. Plus, you get the kids podcast, which is 75 episodes your kids get to listen to to help provoke really powerful conversations. And so what you could do is you could get that as a stocking stuffer. That would be amazing. And then you also get something out of it. Another idea is we have the Christ centered Christmas mini course and book, which you can find on Be Courageous Ministry. Org. Um, but anyway, so we’re excited to be talking about family culture meeting today. Um, and before you prepare, before you get into the meeting, there’s some things you want to do to prepare for this meeting as a couple. One of the.

Most important things is, guys, you got to get Intel, and the person that has the Intel about the real culture of your family is your wife, and the culture is what actually is happening. The real behaviors, attitudes and norms. It’s not what you think and hope for. It’s not what you maybe tell your friend because you’re telling the best version of it. It’s what actually is. And when you really are honest about that, you can actually make improvement and your wife knows it best.

So here’s here’s the thing. I mean, I think I love that you’re saying your wife knows it best. I mean, that’s really what’s been happening, like in our experience over the last 25 years. But sometimes that doesn’t mean that dads aren’t in tune. I think you’re super in tune because you’re. You work from home. Yeah. Which you didn’t for the first 15 years that we were married. And so for those who have husbands who work away from the home, I would say, let’s just be honest. Yeah, it is definitely more true because mom just simply has more time with the kids. She sees them when they’re having a bad attitude about doing homework, for example. Right. And all that. The the different interactions between siblings, how they treat each other, their attitudes about technology or even just the way that they’re influenced and how they interact with their friends versus family members, like moms see that because it really breaks our heart when we see our kids like not being kind to one another or being mean to us. And so let’s just be honest about that aspect. But one of the things I wanted to bring up is that as a homeschool mom, maybe you’re a homeschool mom. You can relate to this. Maybe you are not a homeschool mom and you can relate to this.

But as a mom, that’s with our kids a lot during the day, I do see a lot of the attitudes, whether it’s I don’t want to do this homeschool work or I don’t want to do my homework or I don’t want with just this not now attitude of like trying to assert their independence and be in charge of their day, especially as they get older. I think that with little kids, it’s not something that’s as common, but when kids start to be in high school, It’s it’s a harder thing to navigate because you do want them to start, you know, experiencing being in control of their time and utilizing their time well and planning and and being a person of initiative. And as a mom, though, here’s the deal. When it comes down to it, the things that they are learning influence their attitude towards how they’re spending their time. Like I think of video games, I think of watching movies, I think of texting friends or, um, there’s just so many of these kinds of things I hear from other moms as they’re messaging us from the ministry, and they’re asking questions like, how do I shift the family culture? I think that my kids are starting to not they’re starting to be influenced into believing things that we as a married couple don’t actually agree with things like that they’re potentially becoming indoctrinated in, whether it’s because they go to a public school or because of their friends who go to a public school.

Right. And so one of those topics we’re talking about, family culture here. One of the topics that’s become a really widely known thing is CRT, right? And this whole social justice movement, and you even see it seeping into the church and a lot of things. And so one of the things I wanted to share with you guys today is actually a book called Woke Injustice by Brian Osborne. It’s published by New Leaf Publishing, which is master Books. Um, Ken Ham does the foreword. He says Wokeism and social justice are some of today’s pervasive false teachings that threaten the church. In this book, Brian has done a skillful job exposing this compromise and returning Christians to truth and authority in God’s Word. And as I was just reading through this book, it it it literally goes over like the eight core principles of CRT. If you’re not familiar with it, I think it would be a powerful book for parents to read to evaluate the family culture.

I think the enemy’s using the CRT as an assault on the next generation, because if the enemy can get them off in one area, that goes against biblical truth, then it’s easier to get them off in all of the areas, frankly. It’s like it’s like that, uh, yarn in a sweater that you pull or you just pull, and it just kind of unravels everything over time. And so it’s super important. I would get it. Um, where do they get it?

You know? Well, you can find it at Master Books.com. They have a ton of books there. And the reason why I’m bringing this up is because today we’re talking about family culture and the things that our kids believe actually either affect or infect your family culture. Like like this kind of a teaching. This is probably one of the the newest in the last five years that’s really become more, um, it’s widely accepted within America, but I think that it’s mainly getting fed through the public education system. And so, um, it’s it’s dangerous. You know, this book actually says, what is CRT? It says it’s a new variation of atheistic, anti-Christian Marxism. Okay. So where does Marxism come from? Ultimately, it’s an offshoot of the religion of humanism, an ideology that places its focus on and supreme faith in humanity. So obviously, as believers, this is not something that we we believe in. But what’s really cool about Brian’s book is that he brings in a lot of scripture that debunks all of the eight core principles. And so the reason why I’m highlighting this is because what like as you’re evaluating and you’re doing your preparatory meeting as a couple, right? Which is what we’re talking about. Right. Like prepare for the meeting as a couple. When a wife sees an attitude and she’s not familiar with like what CRT is, maybe. But maybe the husband is for him to be in tune with what’s happening in the world and the different agendas and false teachings that are happening as the protector, which you’re so good at, like you’re just so aware of, like, what are the agendas that are being pushed on the culture in America today? And how do parents like combat that? Right. Well, like if, if, if husbands and wives were able to be tag teaming, and the wife is like, I’m going to take on my role of being observant of what are the heart attitudes. I’m going to bring them to my husband. And then the husband was like taking on his role of protector and going, that is a trademark of this. So now we need to educate our kids on this.

Biblically, I would say an artful protector. You can’t just lay down the law. You have to educate and influence towards what’s true. And that’s super important. But where do they find this so we.

Can move on? Well, yeah, I mean they can find it at Master Books.com forward slash courageous. Just go there. You can click on their menu. They have a bunch of other books which I would I would say like I do think that there are so many good resources depending on what the cultural issue is. I’m just using this as an example. Whatever the cultural issue is in your kids, that they’ve maybe started believing because of the influences. Grab a book. Um, Master Books has so many options. Grab a book and as a couple either read it or read it with your family, like at dinner time, and go through one chapter. Or there are so many ways that you could be teaching this, but it reminds me of the scripture of having an answer for why you believe the things that you believe. And we’ve done that over the years regarding like evolutionism versus creationism, right?

Yeah. So maybe, maybe we’ll invite him on the show. He looks like a great author. Great person for sure. This is because you don’t want to let the enemy seep into your culture. And you might be like, I just got a few little kids right now. You know, this is important for you to know because these things don’t just go away. They fester and grow. And and it’s important that we have an answer. And more important, it’s important that your children have an answer and that you’re ahead of it. You’re not addressing things. Once the problem exists, you’re ahead of things proactively parenting, educating on things they’re going to come in face with so that they’re not left vulnerable. They have an answer. They have a way to confront what’s coming at them now. It’s never too late. If you already have teenagers and your oldest is already kind of leading the family in some ways you don’t like, you need to work on that with them. We could do a whole episode on that, but at the same time, it’s never too late and you can talk to them about how influential they are. We get so, so as you. So just last a little overview. You and your your bride need to decide before the meeting. So we’re talking about leading up to a meeting with your family to decide what changes occur. If you just have littles then you’re just you are the meeting. Yeah, you guys are going to have a meeting, right? But if you have children old enough to start, you know, thinking about how they want to improve their year, which I would say, what age can they start doing that?

You know, I think we started with some of the kids, even at age five, where maybe they weren’t able to write paragraphs yet. Right, because they’re learning how to read or even seven, depending on the kids. Right. Um, but I found that, um, in our family, the culture is, is that most of the little kids, they want to be big, like the older kids. And so while Zander was, he was two, he wasn’t really even aware of what we were doing. He would sit there and he wanted a piece of paper, and he wanted a pencil, and he just drew scribbles, right? Because he was two. And this year I have a feeling he’s gonna be like, I want a, I want it, I want, you know, because he’s so demanding and wants to be big all the time. And so all of the kids have had that, whether they were three, 4 or 5. And so even just taking five minutes to talk to your kids and help them with the projects we’re going to go through with you guys, it makes them feel so powerful and so big and important within your family.

So it really is all ages. And, you know, children rise to the level of responsibility you give them. And so they’re in our home. I feel like they they rise up pretty fast because they’re always included in most things. And I think that we respect their intelligence and they rise up because of that. So, um, so yeah, decide what changes need to occur as a married couple before you do this meeting, decide on the culture, driving statements and words that you’re going to do. Maybe one, two, three of these culture driving statements we mentioned in previous episodes, like, you know, be generous or Eagles, not seagulls or, you know, producers versus consumers or some of the tolpin, um, you know, key statements we’ve used that have really driven our culture that impact a lot of different areas. So listen to the last episode on that. Um, but yeah, that’s that’s so important. And Proverbs six six through eight, it says, go to the ant, O sluggard, consider her ways and be wise. Without having any chief officer or ruler. She prepares her bread in summer and gathers her food in harvest.

So it’s interesting, you know, they’re talking about a she ant, a female ant, but really it’s for all of us, right? To to look at that as an example and go, we should be planning ahead. Yeah. You know, it reminds me of Proverbs 31 where it says she laughs at the days to come. Right. But why does she laugh at the days to come? She doesn’t just laugh at the days to come because she’s unprepared. It’s because she’s prepared that she’s laughing at the days to come. If you read all of the verses before that, she’d been working diligently. She trusts in the Lord. She doesn’t fear circumstances, but she also takes responsibility and is a hard worker because that’s a biblical thing. And she’s following the example of the ant, right? And so it’s this beautiful perspective of when we are doing what God has made us to do, which is to work. Mhm. Right. And we take delight in that. Then we’re able to trust him and just give God the rest. Sometimes we can’t do it all so.

Absolutely. So this meeting dads we’ve got to facilitate this meeting I think that women can be a great encouragement. I believe women are unbelievably capable in running this meeting. Unbelievably ready to do so. Probably excited to do so. Maybe more so sometimes. But I really believe God put in men this inner desire and kind of responsibility to lead, even if we’re not leading, even if we don’t know how, even if you know we’re feeling down and don’t really aren’t motivated to do so, deep down we do kind of have that feeling. And so what happens when our wife does something that we deep down know we should be doing is it’s even more demotivating. And I’m not saying that as to discourage anything. I’m just sharing what’s real.

You know, it’s interesting that you said, I’m really glad you said it, because when you first started, I started thinking about the dynamics of when a woman leads, and I was going to share something similar, which is that in if you were to observe in situations where a woman is leading or teaching, a lot of times men, some men do shut down. Now, is that something that they need to work on? Yeah, for sure. That is a sin. Like, why is it that they wouldn’t be?

I think we’re talking about two things a wife versus out there.

Right, right. Right, right. But there should be good clear communication between a couple. Right. But in like just I’m just using that as an example. But when a man leads, it doesn’t shut down women. Women pay attention. Still like there’s just there is a there is something wire wiring wise that God has put inside men and women. And we’re just different. We’re literally wired differently. Women have no problem being led by men, but there is something dynamically that can, with a lot of guys, it just because they know that they’re called to do it. That’s part of their.

Journey in the marriage, in the marriage relationship. And I want to just speak to the other for a second, since we’re talking about this, is that I can go to a conference and listen to a woman speaking about something and learn fervently and be excited about learning from them. Yeah, I think there’s a big difference in that and in the marriage relationship. Whereas deep down, when God designed a marriage a certain way, and even if it’s not coming out that way in life right now, it doesn’t mean that inside he didn’t at the core, didn’t make a man to know that he’s supposed to do that. And if he’s not doing it, yes, somebody needs to lead. I understand that statement. Somebody needs to lead. But the fastest way to hurt the current condition even more is for the wife to completely take over.

To be overbearing or bulldoze the husband.

So there is a there is. This could be a whole separate episode. Probably should be. But don’t bulldoze your husband.

That would be a great.

But there is a way, and I’ve seen Angie do this with me. There is a way to get the guy’s attention in a way that they start to lead and they start to do these things, and I think encouragement is needed. The greatest encourager in my life is my wife and if she didn’t encourage me, but instead just did everything, it would be a big hit on my masculinity that God gave me. It’s good masculinity that God gave me. Which part of that is to lead in my family? And so but I had to navigate this. I had to learn this, and I didn’t see this. So it’s important that we don’t use that as an excuse that we rise up instead. And here’s an opportunity to do this. And you don’t have to do it exactly how we’re talking about. But to do this and to lead in some ways, and even if guys aren’t that super gregarious leader in society and in what they’re doing for work and things like that and their personality, that doesn’t matter at all. What matters is initiative. So I think leadership in a marriage, a lot of it is about initiative. It doesn’t mean you’re doing the most talking even. It’s just about taking initiative, being thoughtful in moving things forward in a positive direction and facilitating. So that’s the word we used facilitate. Dads need to facilitate this meeting. It doesn’t mean even mean you’re talking the most.

Not necessarily. I mean in some of the meetings too, what’s been really cool about it is that you get when you get dad doing this, first of all, where he’s facilitating the meeting, there’s an opportunity for dad to highlight the importance of mom’s influence, leadership or authority in the home during the day because he’s gone. And if if you have run or set up your marriage to where dad is, the the the headship, which is biblical, but there’s this like spectrum of how far couples have to take things. Right. And you want to be on the biblical road, and there’s ditches on either side right where you have, like feminism would be one ditch where there’s like the woman’s wearing the pants. I’ll just say that would be like far in ditch.

Modern feminism. Right.

And then you’ve got the other end of the ditch where it’s like a lording over husbands or harsh. The women are not even, like, aware of what’s happening with banking. And there’s just like this extreme. I’m in control of everything. I’m the one kind of headship. Right? And in those kinds of situations, what happens when the dad is at work, then there’s literally no leadership happening in the home if there isn’t a mutual respect and a valuing of the wife as a co-leader in the home. And so I bring that up because it changes the dynamics when you’re running any family meeting. Yeah, we’re talking about a family culture meeting here because you’re wanting to like think about growth for the next year. But any family meeting for there to be okay, dad is facilitating the meeting and he’s the leader of the home. But he values mom and he wants to hear from her, and he values her and he brings her into it. And it’s different than if a woman is forcing her way. I’m just going to put it that way. Forcing her agenda of we need a mission statement as a family, and we need to do family visioning. And and the guy is not really into it. And the woman’s push and push and pushing and the kids are sitting there and they’re like, this is boring. And they’re not like into it because dad’s not into it. Like, how can a mom lead something to have the kids into it if the dad’s not into it?

Part doesn’t work. And part of my goal as a leader and facilitator is to bring her voice out and validate that voice in front of the children, because I want them to listen to that voice all day long, every day. And if you don’t understand that concept, if you’re not, if you as a dad, are not tuned in to what she’s saying and then trying to bring her voice out and then backing it up, yeah, then you are.

Destroying.

Your family.

Actually, actually, the family culture. Yeah. And so when your wife comes to you saying with the Intel, let’s go back a couple of seconds. If she comes to you saying the kids just won’t listen to me. I feel so disrespected or anything around that, right? Like I say the same thing three times and they’re not hearing me. Okay, so here’s the deal. We know that attitude reflects leadership. So first off, as the head of the household, like I would think this way I would go I always go, okay, are they mimicking me? Are they seeing me not listening to her and are. And if that’s not the case then it’s like go to the oldest kid or the most influential leader out of the children and and ask yourself, are they listening to mom? Yes. And if they’re not, then it’s likely that the other kids are following suit. They’re following the leader of the home. Right.

So that’s what you have to fix. You have to fix whoever is older. That’s not including dad. That’s not listening to mom, right. Because that creates weakness. It breaks the influence of mom. And mom needs to have an extraordinary amount of influence.

Well, because when you think about it, at the end of the day, after you get through all of the things we’re going to talk about, who’s going to be implementing during the day while dad’s at work?

Yeah. You want to implementation game plan, make sure your wife is revered and respected.

So because if you if you like, go, oh well, let’s be more generous. Let’s just use that example because we’ve talked about that a couple times in past two previous podcasts. There was a year that we were really focused on generosity, and that was one of our word initiatives. Well, that might be great if dad’s like, gung ho and like, yeah, our family needs to stop being so selfish. We need to be more generous with our time, with our money, with our resources, with our hearts. And he’s all into it. And he leads this meeting. But he does not elevate the influence and authority of the wife. It’s not going to happen, right? It’s literally not going to happen. Because what she leads is the rubber meets the road in the family culture. That’s true because every day you can.

Never drive forward a culture unless it’s key levers, and the essence of it is communicated consistently over and over and over and over and over again. So a meeting is useless unless there’s a commitment to back it and communicate about it often. And so that will never happen if that happens. Right. So so it is really, really important. So you have decided what your culture driving statements and words are. And then you have this meeting and dad’s facilitating. And um, you know, I think that what’s really important is everybody comes with something to write on. So a journal that could be a Christmas gift to get people’s journals.

In fact, the best journals are the Growth Roots journals, which go to Growth Roots Company online. You can find them on Instagram. She has a big sale going right now, but you can use courageous for 20% off. So we do that every year with her. That’s great. I love that we absolutely we’ve been friends. Yeah.

And their journals happen to be the best.

And Christian believers and.

They they’re organized in a neat way. I use them for giving sermons and.

For preparing Bible studies as well as journaling and organization. Yeah. And my calendar.

They didn’t ask us to do this. We’re not getting paid to do this, but we just really appreciate them. Yeah. Okay. So you got your journals and your rating things 1 to 10. So what are the areas of life? We listed a whole bunch in the last episode, but let’s just go over some basic ones. Spiritual projects. Relationships. Health. Education.

Finances.

Finances.

Projects.

Goals. So there’s some we’ll leave it at that. There’s even more an expanded list in the last episode, but you don’t need the expanded list. Too many Things isn’t good. You want to find 6 to 8 categories that kind of cover most things, and there’s a pretty good list right there. So. So when you have that, uh, personal development is one I always make sure is on there too, by the way. Um, because I count that as different than spiritual. There’s spiritual. And then the other areas we want to grow in skill set knowledge. Yes. Um, personal development experiences, things like that. Okay.

Give the gift of music this holiday season with Wartburg Music Academy’s gift card. Christmas special. Instead of learning music in isolation, Wartburg Music Academy.com encourages families to learn together. In fact, with my Code Courageous, you can get 20% off all your children learning piano, guitar, mandolin, violin and ukulele for less than $30 a month. Say goodbye to budgeting hundreds of dollars a month for just one child to take lessons. On top of that, students are given accountability, performance opportunities, seasonal challenges like the December Jingle Jam Challenge, live feedback from their instructor, and printables to help them stay on track. The Vote Berg method approaches music a little bit differently. Instead of teaching theory, note reading, and tedious technical skills. First, they skip straight to giving students a love for music so that they can’t wait to sit down and practice. With by ear training and song based learning, students will see immediate results. They can earn visual reminders of their hard work with the Vote Berg methods. Rank system that mails badges and rank pins right to your doorstep. Use my code courageous to get 20% off every month. Your family is enrolled. Go visit vote Berg music Academy.com. I’m not naturally artistic, at least not in the fine art sense. So when my kids showed early on that they loved art, I wanted to nurture that creativity. That’s why we love creating a masterpiece. Their award winning art programs are for everyone ages four ish through 104. Plus, your family gets to practice drawing, using watercolors, charcoal sculpting, painting, and so much more. And the best part? You get to do it all together. Building relationships, making memories, and letting creativity grow. Visit Creating a masterpiece.com/courageous to sign up for one low rate for your entire family that’s creating a masterpiece.com/courageous because anyone can create a masterpiece.

So you have those and you have everybody rate this last year and this is prior to the meeting. Right. So this is kind of the homework leading up to the meeting.

Right. So you have like a maybe a family morning meeting or a nighttime meeting and you say, hey, this week, can you guys please do this? And you remind them every day, if you have a family business center where you have a board like a dry erase board, you could put it on there. Just a reminder, make sure you rate last year’s rate, all these sections and you write them down so that they can do that in their journal.

And there’s certain kids you’re going to follow up with. You’re going to sit next to them. You’re helping them do it.

Especially I would say under ten for sure. You want to sit and help them over ten. They should be able to do it because they’ve been doing it for at least in our family. They’ve been doing it for a couple years. Um, and for those kids that maybe this is the first year that you’re doing this with, you may have to sit with everybody and just do it together before you have a meeting, because otherwise it’ll make the meeting way too long.

So there’s a couple of ways people are motivated, really three ways. The most important way is being compelled by God, right. The Holy Spirit in us, compelling us in a direction that’s the most important. But the reality is people are also motivated by pain and they’re also motivated by pleasure. And those are two key core motivators that motivate people. So when they’re evaluating the previous year, there’s going to be some pain potentially in some areas that wake people up and then there’s going to be the pleasure. Things like, I’d really love to save this much money or do these things because that gives me some freedom or enables me to buy my first car, right? These kinds of things. And that’s like a motivation and a pleasure way. But then there’s like, ooh, I gained all this weight or I am out of shape or whatever it is that’s a pain in sight. And so those insights help us, and then we should pray and ask God for what we want and ultimately be driven by what God wants us to do. Um, but those those are things. So that’s why this is so powerful. If you miss this step, there’s not a lot of motivation, or there might be a misfire in articulating the ratings for what we want in the new year.

That’s right. So just to reiterate, this little assignment is something you give your kids before you actually have your family culture meeting. That’s like a longer meeting that we’re going to walk you guys through. Another thing that you need to do pre that family culture meeting is that on your date night, we talked more in depth in the very last episode of the podcast, which was all about the date night, but you guys need to have already decided what changes need to occur, and you need to already have decided on what your culture, driver statement, or words are going to be. And so then you move into the assignment with the kids and having them rate, and then you set a date for when you’re going to do this fun family culture meeting, and you want to hype it up with the kids and be like, this is going to be so exciting, you guys. And maybe you make it special by making popcorn. I mean, one year I had popcorn with nutritional yeast. I had all these different flavors of popcorn on the main table, and we sat around, we all snacked and and we talked and.

And make sure there’s no time restrictions on it. Like we’re going to get this done in an hour and then we’re going to do this. That would be failure from the beginning. Yeah, this takes time. I mean, I don’t know, we spent four hours.

One well, we have a very large family. The longest meeting we had was when we had eight kids at home. And I would say seven of them were over 8 or 6 of them were over eight. Yeah. And so, yeah, we stopped for lunch.

We’ve even done it over a couple days before.

Yeah, yeah. Where we’ll do like 2 or 2 hours and then we’ll come back and do another two hours. And I would say that when you’ve done it multiple years. So like there’s the first year family culture meeting, which is super fun and exciting. And if you have little kids again, what like Isaac said, this is actually just like you could even just do a second date night to have your family culture meeting and figure out what words you’re going to focus on personal growth like initiatives and spiritual growth initiatives for you as a couple. Um, and you move forward. Right? And then once your kids start getting a little bit older and you start involving them in the process. Then you have like a previous year that you can look back on, and that changes the beginning of your meeting, right? Because the beginning of your meeting, if you’ve done it before with your kids, something that’s super fun is to pull up the year’s previous goals and have everyone participate in encouraging and exhorting that person. Because remember, they they’re sitting in the meeting, they’ve already rated last year’s goals or they’ve rated their their sections of their how how was I in spiritual growth this year? Hey, by the way.

Very important on that is dads take a picture of everybody’s journal when they’re done. If you don’t do that, you’ll never find that one couple of their journals again. It’ll be missing.

Another tip would be as soon as you take a picture of it to make a little album, if you’re using a smartphone, you can just make an album in your photos that say, 2023 Goals, family goals for the year.

And what’s part of your leadership is to remind people the things they want so they can move towards them. And you have little reminders because you have a picture for each person in your family.

Usually like for us, it’s not just a December thing, right? Like we started these podcast episodes in November before Thanksgiving with you guys, because it’s important to start recalibrating then, because this is a process. It’s not too late, but I will say, yeah, but you can do this any time. But I will say taking the pictures. One thing that’s super cool about it is when you’re on a date or you’re hanging out with that one kid and it’s like, June. Yeah, or May.

How’s this going?

August? You can go, hey, you had a goal of blah, blah, blah, blah. How’s that going? Right. And then they’re like, whoa, you remembered that? And even like, if you’re out to lunch with them, you can pull it up and go deeper with them again, one or 2 or 10 times a year, depending on, you know, how focused you are. And that teaches your kids the it’s giving them the habit and training them in the muscle of. I made this commitment to myself and I need to a rethink about that. I need to recommit or oh yeah, I did, and I don’t want to be feeling bad in two months. I, you know, I.

Just want to say something that sometimes when the way we’ve grown up or we’ve been trained or the way we live life, we miss out on a unique opportunity to be a dream leader, a dream manager, if you will. As a dad, and you know, sometimes we just gravitate towards what’s practical, okay, get a good job and pay the bills and there’s nothing wrong with that. That is honorable. That is incredible. That is important. But when they’re young, I think it’s important to help them dream about the things they want and move towards those based on the uniqueness that God made them versus the experience that God has given us. A lot of times we mix that up and we go, God has given me this experience at work, so now I’m going to influence them to do to have that same experience in life and do it the same way. And that might work sometimes, but it might not. And the sad thing is, you might get somebody, your son or in a direction or a daughter in a direction. That is not the way God wired them. And there could have been something even better for them to pursue and do get experience in. But you may have stifled that. Even though they’re saving money, they’re successful, but you may have stifled maybe even a better direction that could have been. And I just want to warn you in that, that our experiences don’t have to be our children’s experiences because they’re wired very differently, and God might have a different call for them.

And also, if you grew up not ever thinking like this, or in a family that was driving family culture or even holding people accountable to bad attitudes, can I just say that like, and you’re maybe first generation? I really hope that you guys recognize that you are not limited by your experiences of what you did watch or did witness or didn’t witness. Instead, as parents, we all have a responsibility to just keep growing. And these are things that, as we’ve been seeking the word and we’ve been just desiring more of God in all areas of our life, we just have desired more, more growth in all areas of our life. And so and that’s really the way of the Christian right, is to to be content with what God has given you, but not be so content that you’re, um, you’re disabled, right? No, he wants us to be content with what we have, but pushing towards the goal, running our race, and living on purpose for him.

And you want to prevent any negative attitudes that develop upon rating the previous year. And Philippians four is your place. That is your go to place. Philippians four six. Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And then I’m going to continue a little bit. Finally, finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there’s anything worthy of praise, think about these things. So it can be very easy to go into a negative. Even for you yourself, you might be very discouraged about parts of this year and you had wishes for things to be better. Meditate on Philippians four six through eight, six through nine and really meditate your heart on that, because that will pull you out of it. We have to be mature enough to do this and not get negative. Yeah. Okay. And you’re going to teach this is important thing for your children to to teach that we’re not going to get negative. Maybe you read the scripture to them and we’re going to be positive. We’re going to be articulate. It’s okay to have areas to grow. Nobody’s perfect. That’s why we need Jesus. Right? So we’re all on a journey and be okay with the journey you’re on. But let’s make the journey even better. And that’s what this is about. And so, so in the meeting now, you’re going to encourage everybody to identify the areas of opportunity for growth.

And so now they’re going to take each of those categories. They’re rated on this year in 2024. And they’re going to maybe write each of those categories on a journal. And they’re going to write 1 to 3 areas that they want to improve under that category. So if it’s financial, maybe each of your kids have a savings, a giving and a savings goal for the year making, giving, saving. And that would be fantastic, right? If you want them to grow up and learn to be financially solvent and capable and understanding of in a biblical way of finances, that’s a wonderful area to work on. Um, so do that for all the areas. And you might go, Isaac, that’s a lot of stuff. You know, even if they never look at their journal again for the entire year, there is power in writing things down. I know that I’ve had children that literally didn’t look at it again for the entire year, and we looked at it once the year was over and almost all of them happened. That has happened before. Yeah. That’s true. And so there is there’s something about intentions are good enough sometimes. Meaning when you write that down and your mind went through it, you start to move in those directions, even if you don’t revisit it or even remember, you couldn’t recite all those things on the page. But how did they happen? It’s because we move sometimes in our daily decisions in the direction of our overall intentions. So it’s powerful.

Yeah. So the next thing that is my favorite part of the family meeting is when each person presents to the family, their goals or their ratings. And this is the deal. So when you there’s two different times of presentation, right where they’re sharing how they rated themselves. And the reason why that’s one of my favorites is because we’re all our own worst critic. And the truth is, is that everybody generally is pretty honest about the reality of how they are with people relationally when they’re, you know, evaluating relationships, when they’re evaluating their finances, when they’re evaluating their health, when they’re they’re pretty honest about those things. But then here’s the cool part. When you’re living in close proximity with family who loves you and they’re like, whoa, wait a second, you’re being too harsh on yourself. I actually think that I would have given you a seven, not a three. Or, you know, there have been certain situations like that and you see that kid be like, oh, and then they give their why why they would have rated them higher. And they’re like, oh yeah, that’s true. I didn’t think of myself that way or I forgot about that or you know, and it’s super encouraging, super helpful. Because the truth is, is generally speaking, most of us don’t rate ourselves high enough. And so that provides an opportunity for family to come alongside and be that iron sharpens iron in like, well actually you did this to so even bump yourself up one point and it’s like way better, right?

It ends up being an encouraging thing we.

Found super cool. But then the other thing is, when they’re doing the second part of the presenting where they’re sharing about what their new goals are, then there’s accountability throughout the year, potentially. Right. Especially if it’s brought up multiple times as a family. And that is really where the rubber meets the road, because all of us need community. We all need each other. We forget about things sometimes. And so being able to just point back to, well, you had a goal of then it’s not like you’re telling them what to do. You’re reminding them of something they said they wanted to do, which is totally different. And they’re like, oh yeah.

A lot of times people just we just took you through a process. I’ve taken companies through this process before. Right? This is so powerful because a lot of times, the key result areas that you want to focus on just are you just come up with them, but instead you want to reverse engineer it. And that’s what we just taught you to do, which is to start with all the areas to to improve. And if you look at the previous episode two, we start actually with all the areas we love, because that’s really important to start with gratitude, all the things that are going well and then all the areas to improve, and then you come up with the levers, the key statements, three areas. And what you’re coming up with is things that impact this big list of things to improve. So one thing here, the impact six of those over here, because we can only actually focus on a few things to create change. And that’s part of why I think a lot of these things happen, is because the distilling process, down to what are the few things that drive all the things, and that’s what you want to help your children come up with. And maybe after they present you all help them together, or that’s something the prep before they present that they come up with. And then you hone it in together and encourage them. And then they have their one, two, three things, key things that they’re going to focus on. It could be like, I really want to read through the Bible this year and grow spiritually. Well, how many things on that list is that going to impact? Um, massive.

Everything with your little kids. Maybe it’s that they want to learn how to read so that they can read their Bible on their own, so they can read letters from mom and dad on their own. Right? Like, and if you need motivation for your kids to learn how to read, actually, that probably is a really good idea. I just thought of that. Like if you as a parent wrote your kids a letter and they couldn’t read it and you were like, oh, well, then maybe you need to save it till you can read it because it’s really special. So and then it’s like a motivation, right?

So the parents present to you by the way I present and Angie does. Everybody gets the same treatment and we do that and we do it all the way through the three year old presents. He might not have much to say.

I want to, I don’t know, I want to ride a bike this year or I don’t know. There’s I remember when Zander was two, he was pretty talkative and he was like, I’m going to wear big boy pants cause he was gonna get potty trained.

Of course you were encouraging him beforehand.

Like, do you want to do this? Do you want to do that? He’s like, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Wow. So good, so good.

So really fun. But you know, I think speaking to the family initiatives is the next part. And that’s really a mom and dad thing. And so this is a big opportunity to bring in Scripture. Yeah. To really say if maybe, maybe one of your family word initiatives is honor and I’ll be I’ll just share transparently that that’s one of the words that’s just been kind of coming up in my mind lately has just been honor. Are we honoring one another in the way we’re speaking to one another? Are we honoring God in the things that we’re doing? Honor. Just just honor. And when you think about that word and you start studying honor and all the times it’s mentioned in Scripture, it’s actually really powerful. And so you could even do this as, like, you could you could stop right there and say, okay, we’re going to finish up at dinner time, or we’re going to finish this the next day, and that’s it. Like depending on how many kids you have and how long your meetings gone, that would be a good break time. Um, that’s where we’ve done our break, is then bringing in the initiatives, and then dad will look up some scriptures and he’ll prepare a little teaching on that word, on whatever it is, like we’re going to be, um, or a mission that you as a family have. One year we had we shared with you guys last year, one year we had producers versus consumers. And so he explained, so that even the little kids understood that that meant we’re we’re just not going to be people who sit around and watch things very often. We want to we want to be learning and creating things and not just constantly watching things.

Something I will tell the kids in that vein is like, you’re all artists now. A lot of times you think of an artist as someone that just draws pictures or paintings or sculpts and things like that. No, God has given each of you unique gifts and talents, and it’s your job to explore those and develop in which direction you are an artist and your art is important to this world, and you’re cultivating that, and you can’t cultivate that. You’re going to get hurt and moved away from your real art if you’re just watching everybody else’s art all the time.

You know, what’s interesting is the year that we did I’m thinking about the year that we did the producers versus consumers. One of the things that I noticed with the kids was that that was the year that they started getting out that really old video camera, and they started dressing up and making their home movies. It’s true. And so we had this big barn on our on the property, and they would do cowboy western movies and they would dress up in their cowboy outfit.

Look up the taupin’s on YouTube.

Oh my goodness. And you’ll find it funny. It’s so funny.

It’s not even on our ministry YouTube channel. Actually, I.

Think they’re on my courageous mom. Yeah, one. But but yeah, they’re really old. You have to scroll way, way, way, way, way down to the very first videos that were uploaded. You’ll search it, but it was family vlog. So Taupin Family Vlog, I think is what it was. And they were actually edited by Austin back when he was like 13, 14 years old. Um, and so anyway, it just really funny, the really archaic technology that we were using back then. But hey, you guys like that year was really heavy for those kinds of creative projects. They made many of those. They made a Star Wars one on the trampoline and they’re fighting and it’s so funny. Megan’s Princess Leia, and she has her hair in buns and it’s, you know, just I look back at that and I go, just that one phrase said over and over and over again, look at what the focus was in that year. And it actually does reflect what your focus is. Yeah. And then like the year that we were focused on generosity, there was a lot more projects in the community that we did and a lot of like searching out people in need and searching out ways that we can serve. And and so it’s just interesting. So I share that with you.

And now we see everybody loving church at Thanksgiving, by the way. We went around and everybody shared what they’re thankful for. And was it? 3 or 4 of the kids said they’re thankful for the new church and how they love helping.

You know, and what’s interesting is, um.

Medical freedom is something we all desire. And I think we’d all agree that in the last four years, we’ve really realized just how important it is to have a trusted, like minded doctor.

You should be able to build your medical team and choose who you get care from. Knowing that where you spend your money is a matter of stewardship and a desire to support local Christian medical businesses.

Absolutely. I don’t know about you, but I prefer to help support businesses that have a biblical worldview on life and health.

Here’s the problem more often than not, you have to choose your doctor off a preferred in-network list. And if I’m really honest, those clinics usually see such mass quantities of people that it’s incredibly impersonal and you walk away feeling like a number. In addition, in most cases, in order to be seen by specialists, you’re required to get a referral from a primary care physician, which costs more time and money.

We want to introduce you to a biblical approach to health care. Samaritan Ministries you can find out more about it at Samaritan ministries.org/be courageous.

There a health sharing ministry built on biblical principles of bearing one another’s burdens practically, financially, through helping with health care costs and spiritually through praying and caring for one another.

Samaritan ministries gives you the freedom you desire to choose your doctors and health care professionals, including. This is cool alternative care providers like chiropractors and naturopathic providers as well.

The process is simple and provides us, as Christians, a way to obey Scripture and care for one another as the larger church.

Samaritan ministries is the only health care and sharing ministry with direct member to member sharing.

I love that we send our monthly share directly to another brother or sister in Christ to support someone going through a medical crisis or recovering from a medical need, rather than to some large corporation.

So if you’d like to find out more about Samaritan Ministries, go to Samaritan ministries.org forward slash be courageous. That’s Samaritan ministries. Org forward slash be courageous. To learn more.

When you sign up don’t forget to tell them that be courageous mystery or Angie and Isaac Tolpin referred.

You. The links will also be in our weekly podcast show notes at Be Courageous ministries.org.

I think that the last two years, one of the phrases that they’ve heard a lot was love Christ’s bride. That terminology of we’re going to love the.

Church of Christ.

We’re going to love the church. We are going to love the Bride of Christ over and over and over again. They’ve heard that terminology, whether it was having people over and just talking about church or whatever it is. And so I think that there’s something to be said for how that has been nurtured and played out in how we’re living our lives now.

Your words are powerful, and what you repeat has so much influence. And so you want to carefully craft those levers and key statements and say them over and over again. And unless you intrinsically believe them, unless they’re said and written down and decided in a way that you would communicate them. You’re not going to. It’s what gets repeated over and over and over and over again. And if you do repeat the same things that matter and are meaningful and impact most of the areas that you want to improve in your family and your family culture, over time, you’re going to see an abundance of good change. God is going to get Ahold of that right here in Proverbs 21 five. It says the plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance. But everyone who is hasty comes only to poverty. I think families are way too busy and way too hasty in how they come up with these things and how they talk about these things, and there’s lack of follow through, and there’s a lack of real thoughtfulness and planning and strategy and marriage alignment and all these things. And we just encourage you to move in this direction, because when, when each kid presents, when they write things down and they orate from their mouth in front of the people they love and care about the most. Talk about a powerful experience to motivate them to really want to follow through and do these things, and you’re there to help them along the way.

You know, it’s interesting, this this scripture that you were talking about, the plans of the diligent surely lead to abundance. But everyone who is hasty comes only to poverty. And, you know, it’s talking about like like.

Spiritual and financial.

You’re talking about real financial. Actually, if you continue reading, it talks about treasures, you know, not gaining things by lying tongue and, and all of these different things. But but here’s the deal. Spiritually though, like, are you is your family spiritually abundantly wealthy or is your family spiritually poor? And is there a poverty in family relationships and lacking connectedness and and enjoying one another and, and all of that kind of stuff? And, and I would say that it takes a lot of work. Can I just say it takes being diligent. This scripture is totally true because the plants of the diligently lead surely to abundance. So when you plan to have that family Thanksgiving meal and you’re working hard to provide a good meal for people to be. Able to sit and share together. And it’s a lot of work, especially as you get a bigger family. This last week we we celebrated Thanksgiving a week later. So on Friday it was on Friday and we had 16 of us because my mom was visiting and our family’s just continuing to grow, right? We only have two of nine kids married. Imagine what it’s going to be like when they’re all married and they all have kids. It’s exciting to think about, and I’m definitely not going to be able to be doing it on my own. And I’m thankful when Kelsey brings roles and when Megan makes pie and and when Caroline brings a salad and like, it helps take that that hard, hard work.

But we plan and we’re diligent and we all worked hard to get there to meet together. We had to all arrange our schedules so that it worked, and those who are diligent in pursuing relationships will have better relationships, and those who aren’t will have poor relationships. And you want your kids to grow up and pursue having relationships with one another. But here’s the deal. They’re their own people. You can’t make them get it. You can’t make people understand that investing in relationship is where you’re actually poor or wealthy. But really, at the end of the day, it’s relationships that are. It’s the relationships that lead to the eternal things in life, not the things of this world. And so working hard to, you know, be able to afford time to be able to be together, it takes diligence to prioritize that and even finding time to do a family meeting like this. It takes diligence. It takes a certain kind of like valuing the impact that a meeting like this can have on your family culture, to make a man get motivated to go, I’m going to plan this. We’re going to do this. I’m going to I’m going to assign the kids to rate themselves a week ahead of time. We’re going to figure out our words. We’re going to like it.

Take my wife out on a date and talk about this like it takes.

Understanding the importance and valuing family culture, and acknowledging that you actually have a choice in what your family culture is.

And I just want to say that I sit down as, as a, as a husband and with my journal, and I don’t just think of producers versus consumers quickly. I just want to make sure everybody understands that.

It’s not that we’re clever. And I come to us.

I write things and I work on it. And guys, if you want a real process, I do go to the Art of Clear Thinking on the Resolute Man podcast, because you can journal and you can work a problem with God’s help. And over time, it’s just amazing how something just really clever, really cool, and just hits with the family needs comes about. And then I run it by my wife and we talk about it, and sometimes she comes up with one like the be generous one. And then we talk about it and it’s just a wonderful thing to do together. So in unprecedented times tip Unprecedented times. It is more important than ever that your family know how to get focused on the right things. When there’s so much confusion in so many things, trying to get them unfocused. The enemy is the scheme of confusion going on in society, and when your kids launch, that scheme of confusion is going to be greater with technology and all the ways that that messaging can come at us. And so it’s more important than ever that your kids know how to cut through it with their focus in the areas that God wants them to make progress in and to do and to do their art that’s meaningful, that contributes to society.

Yeah. Well, thank you guys so much for joining us for today’s podcast. Just a reminder that the previous two episodes also talk about family culture, and they dive more into the things that we just barely touched on, like the date night and stuff like that. So we’re praying for you guys for this. Next year is coming right around the corner. Thank you so much for joining us, and we’ll see you next time. Hey, thanks for listening and being a part of the 10 Million Legacies movement. Go to be courageous ministry. Org for more biblically based resources, ways to switch where you spend your money that support the mission and information about the incredible Be Courageous app community for believers.

Also, we wanted to quickly tell you about our six week online Parenting Mentor program.

Isaac and I created a powerful biblical curriculum. Here’s how it works. Each week, we release a video session with a downloadable parenting packet to make it easy for you to incorporate those teachings directly into your parenting.

This is an incredible, self-paced program. We cover everything from tending to their hearts, handling obedience to overcoming mistakes most Christians are making. But more than that, it’s a supportive community. You’ll have access to our private group in the Be Courageous app, live webcast, and direct access to us.

If you’re interested in joining our next online Parenting Mentor program, secure your spot now at Be Courageous Ministry. Org that’s Be Courageous ministry.org.