Scripture In This Episode:

Ephesians 5:15-17 – “See then that you walk circumspectly, not as fools but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be unwise, but understand what the will of the Lord is.”

Proverbs 13:20 – “He who walks with wise men will be wise,
But the companion of fools will be destroyed.”

Proverbs 3:5 – “Trust in the Lord with all your heart,
And lean not on your own understanding;”

Deuteronomy 31:6 – “Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.”

Proverbs 16:9 – “A man’s heart plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.”

Philippians 4:6-7 – “Be anxious for nothing, 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 minds through Christ Jesus.

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Full Transcript:

Welcome to Courageous Parenting podcast, the 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 I’m Isaac from Resolute Man.

We’ve been married 20 years and have seen the fruit in raising our eight kids biblically. Based on the raw truth found in the Bible, we can no longer let the culture win the hearts of children. Too many children from Christian families are walking away from the faith by age 18. And it doesn’t have to be this way. It shouldn’t be this way. Join us as we start an important conversation about effective parenting in a fallen world.

Welcome to Courageous Parenting podcast. Hi, guys.

So we are back home. We had a great couple of weeks. Thanks for joining us. If you listened to the last two episodes, which, by the way, were the most downloaded ever, that’s awesome.

Yeah, it’s exciting, you guys, because we have been working really hard to keep the podcast coming to you week after week, regardless of if we’re on a family vacation or we are working hard on other projects. And so when we see new people start listening, that gets us excited.

It does. And I think this is the 91st episode from almost to 100.

Amazing.

never skipped a beat, never missed a week. And praise the Lord for that. That’s right. Now we just feel an obligation to make sure we keep putting good seeds out there so that equipping families to raise their kids in these uncertain times because it is crazy times. But that’s what the Bible says. It’s going to get crazy.

That’s right. And you guys just a you know that if you’ve been listening to us for a while, you know that we we believe that we’re in the trenches with you guys.

That’s part of why we’re doing this, is that we desire to share the things that God has taught us both through the good and the bad. Right, and we share openly. We have nothing to hide. And we’re very open about a lot of things with you guys. But we also were desiring that people would step up and stand with us.

And so it’s so exciting when we hear of people who are really there in the trenches, like they’re purposefully parenting. They’re trying to to lead their children to the Lord, their biblically parenting.

It feels good to not be running this race alone, because especially during the times that we’re in now, it’s easy to think that the world is just going to all chaos and that you’re the only one that’s doing this right. Like you feel isolated.

And so I just want you guys to remember that when you’re listening, there are thousands of other courageous parents that are in agreement with you that are doing the hard work, the hard, good work of parenting. And that is an encouragement to me. I hope that’s an encouragement to you guys. And we really appreciate that the encouragement back when you leave reviews. So or if you just do that tap tap on the iTunes and give us the five stars, that really means a lot.

You know, one of the coolest things speaking of traveling, we did a six week trip this summer and a two week trip. There’s reasons for those things.

But what’s really cool is the community. When we see people in person, while it’s just.

And so it brings it alive, doesn’t it? And it keeps us, I’ll be honest, to be able to have conversations in real life with people face to face all over the country, that they share the few things that really touch their heart most recently, or something that really impacted their marriage and changed things big time. Or, you know, when we hear those things, we’re like, wow, don’t ever underestimate sharing your story. And so, you know what? Being in community, meeting together, having fellowship together, you guys got to keep doing that.

We’re just thankful for all those that were so hospitable to us in our travels and just make us feel at home wherever we go. It’s so amazing. That’s been a really big treat. And I just want you to know you’re not alone. Sometimes when you’re going against the grain of culture in some of your parenting approaches, just by being more present as a parent is going against the grain of culture, for example. Yeah, putting your phone down and looking eye to eye with kids, respecting them so they rise to love, respect you give them is going against the grain and a lot of ways today with Occupy parents. And so sometimes you’re going to feel alone and some of the decisions you’re making about parenting, you’re going to feel alone. And we remember that. But courageous parenting is here for getting wisdom. But it’s also a reminder of you’re not alone. There’s thousands, thousands of people running the race with you and that are making the same decisions you are to be really, really diligent, awesome parents to equip your kids for an uncertain world. So that’s cool. That’s good for us.

Well, no, I mean, we do have quite a few scriptures today. We have a few. And if you’re ever listening to the podcast and you think, man, I’m driving while I’m listening, or maybe you’re working, you’re listening, you don’t have a pen and paper there to jot down the scriptures that we’re reading to you guys and you just really want to go back and study them. You can always go to CourageousParenting.com and you can hit on podcast, which is in. A little menu bar in the top left hand corner of the website and all of our scripture notes are under each of those episodes as well. So just wanted to put that out there for you guys. But today we’re talking about five marriage conversations for uncertain times.

And these are relevant to really right now. And you might be wondering, how do you think of your topics? Somebody asked us yesterday, hey, what are you going to talk about? Because we were in person with some the Cosa family, some fellow courageous parents and I don’t know, and then all say, no, it’s funny, you guys don’t seem to know us well.

And we’ll say, oh, you have a podcast coming out tomorrow, what’s it on? And we’re like, I don’t know, what should we talk about? And they’re like, Oh, I get to help influence this.

So, so but these are conversations, Angie and I are having. A lot of what we teach are things we’re going through, have gone through in the past, have dealt with and people reach out and say, we really need help on this. And so that’s a way to do that. So this is really good. We’re going to obviously, you know, a short period of time, we can only cover a little bit, five minutes or so and each of these points. But but they’re really, really important.

So and we will be expanding on them in the future. However, we do that for sure. So but we just thought that there were these we wanted to come up with five conversations that we think that right now are really relevant for couples to actually talk about whether they’re able to go on a date night or if they just talk about it after they put the kids to bed. These are conversation topics that we have talked about a lot over the course of our to over. We’re almost 21 years marriage, many weeks we. And so we want to encourage you guys that these five questions are not just for now, they’re not something that’s like new that we just came up with. These are questions we even ask ourselves regularly and reevaluate all the time.

And it’s to get you out of maintenance mode. I remember in premarital counseling, one of the things that I learned, and I know Andrew was there, too, so she probably learned it, too, is that be aware of if your marriage becomes all about maintenance conversations, that your marriage is slowly dying in some ways, like you need to have vibrant conversations beyond what we need at the state or finances maintenances talk or not, you don’t discuss those things you do, but you for sure need to also be proactively trying to grow together.

Yeah. And so hopefully these questions are questions that are going to help you to have intentional, deep, stimulating conversations. Yeah. So the first question we’re going to cover is do we have our kids hearts? Now, this is a kind of a very broad question. Yeah. So we thought that we would give you guys some mini questions underneath there that you can ask each other to test.

If you have your kids hearts. Now, you might automatically of course, I have my kids hearts. They give me a kiss at bedtime. They even though they’re a little older now, they still give me a hug and say, love you, mom, or these kinds of things. But really, I think these tests will be important. I think no matter how much you just automatically knee jerk reaction go, yeah, I have my kids hearts.

We should suspend that thought for a second so that we’re receptive of really testing how much of our kids hearts do we really have because you really want to have their hearts. A lot of parenting experts will talk about behavior modification. And although some of that’s important, really what matters is do you have the hearts? And that’s what you want because behavior follows the heart.

Mm hmm. Yeah. So we’re going to ask you guys some questions. Are you ready? Do your kids know that you love them?

And so maybe maybe even asking, like, when was the last time I told my child I love them is another good question to ask yourself and specifically why you love them, the things you love about them specifically.

Sometimes when we’re young, I remember feeling this way. It’s hard to feel valuable.

It’s hard to know if I’m actually contributing, if I’m actually a lot of people do feel a lot of people do find their identity in their contributions that they make.

And we want to make sure that our kids are not doing that because that would be performance based acceptance of themselves and performance based acceptance then goes into legalism in their relationship with God.

And it goes into always trying to please people. And so we definitely want to make sure that our kids know that why we love them, but that it doesn’t have anything to do with what they do or don’t do.

So it’s just a it’s just a spontaneous.

Yeah. You know, Johnny, I love you no matter what you do. Yeah.

You know, and with Little Littles, you know, I mean, like, I know that a lot of you guys listening have kids that are under five.

And so I just want to share a little brief story with you. This week, we were on a little trip to Idaho. We were in a really awesome little breakfast restaurant.

Our family was sitting around a table and there were a lot of older couples that were around and there the kids were to our two youngest, were playing with sticks and they were having so much fun. And some of the kids were making them like glasses and different things. And we were just the table was full of laughter and and delighting in Solomon anyway.

And like the siblings were laughing and going, You’re so cute or you’re so funny or I love you and just smiling and laughing.

And at the end of one of the couples that was sitting in the restaurant, she came up to me and just said, You have such a precious family. And I, I can tell that they all feel really loved. And that remark it struck me and for the reason that she she when she said, I can tell, they all feel really loved and see that that is not something that just comes from you going, hey, buddy.

Love you. Right, when your kids are walking out the door to go to a friend’s house, it’s like making that actual connection and telling them that you love them in random times. And it’s also like enjoying them. Right? Your kids feel loved when you’re enjoying them. Like when we’re smiling and giggling at Eli and we’re tickling or we’re saying, oh, good job. And those those are the things that our kids remember, that encouragement, that kindness, that love, that laughter is a mark of them knowing that we love them and that we like them. Yeah. And so I would say with younger kids, they do want to hear I love you, but it also comes out in all the ways you treat them and how you are delighting in them.

So another test would be, do they share personal things with you? Do they share the most personal things with you?

Mean, this is really a good test for kids out there, like, I mean, any age really. Right when they’re talking. But you especially want to see this in their teenage years when they’re spending maybe more time with friends and peers or other influences. Right. And if they’re not coming to you and asking for wisdom and they’re not sharing or they’re not asking your advice or they’re not talking to you about their feelings, their emotions, their issues that they’re having with friends, because I guarantee they’re all having them, they’re all having issues. They’re all coming across boundaries that they know, oh, this is right and that’s wrong.

And I have to make a decision in this. And if they’re never talking to you about that, then that would be a sign that maybe you don’t have your child’s heart, that somebody else actually does, or that they’re they have an independent, rebellious spirit.

And so but this is the reason why I’m bringing this up for older kids. It’s actually cultivated when they’re little. Yeah. And so you can’t just go, oh, I have little kids and, you know, so sharing this doesn’t apply to me.

No, no, no. Like, it starts out when they’re little sharing with you about all the things. Like I got hurt feelings, I got her on the play structure.

It’s about that that person looked at me. I mean, it’s it’s those kinds of things.

But it’s also I’m having a hard time reading.

Can you help me? And, you know, like do they come to you with those things when they’re younger? Because if they’re not, then chances are they’re not necessarily going to come to you when they’re older.

And you haven’t opened up communication in a way where they feel comfortable sharing with you. It’s super important. You have to diligently, proactively do that. And the other thing is, do they obey you? And I think that every single parent will probably go, well, not always, right. Every single. So if that’s you, I mean, just join the club.

Yeah, it’s that’s true for us. Yeah. We have times where we’re like, whoa, OK, what’s really going on here. Yeah.

But the first thing we always go to is we evaluate our responsibility and that and the expectations. The second thing we go to is, is there a relationship barrier? Is there something in between my relationship with that child where they’re not wanting to obey or respect or honor or whatever? And then you go to they’re like selfish Flesh.

You evaluate the scene and probe the heart. Right. And so but all of it requires discussion. You actually have to talk to your kid to kind of figure out what the issue is and not just assume the worst always. Yeah. So and then we have another question for that, too, regarding your kids hearts. And that is, do they want wisdom from you? Like, do they ask you questions?

Yeah, I want to take a moment and give you something for free if you haven’t got it already is the date night one. It is a beautiful document you can download that Will have some key questions on it for your date night. Just get in alignment about what’s most important for your family, no matter what time of year, it’s always important to recalibrate. You can get that by going to CourageousParenting.com and subscribing to our mailing list. Also, you can get all of our show notes and everything, at CourageousParenting.com. And I also just want to share real quick about the Parenting Mentor program. So many families are being transformed by going through this. It’s the six week self-paced program with live engagement for us and even direct interaction. So if you want to join us, here’s a little bit more about it and you can find out more at CourageousParenting.com.

Steve And I realized that we were getting too comfortable with the world’s vision of how to raise our children.What

What Angie and Isaac have done and creating this is literally phenomenal.

This program provided awesome scripture based teachings and just some really great practical applications. This class has just really rocked my world.

It has given me a vision for not just the different things that we might focus on as parents who are trying to raise our kids physically, like our kids are behaving or what we’re doing with discipline, but also the things of heart.

We now have a game plan to how we want to raise our children.

We have so many answers to the questions that have been in our mind, and it’s not just these hypothetical situations or it’s not just this, here’s what I think you should do. It’s let me show you where in scripture this is.

Do your legacy a favor and yourself a favor and just do it.

One of the best things that we’ve done this year. One of the best investments we’ve made this year. And I could not recommend it more.

We’re no longer fearing dark days ahead, but we’re so excited to raise the lights to be leaders for the next generation.

So for time, we have to move on. We may do a whole episode on that at some point. But are you are we analyzing the parent and parenting decisions we are making? This is so important. And I do want to say one thing about the heart. Do you guys know that the second leading cause of death for. Yeah, for kids, I think eight to 14, right. From seven to 14 is suicide. And I just wanted to touch on that. I meant to. We’re talking about the heart. And so the most important relationship they have, obviously, is with God. But second most is with you.

And those rates are going up since covid and so and we’re in uncertain times.

And it could be easy if kids are getting depressed or having a hard time with their life situations, whether it’s school or whatever it is, or missing friends or whatever it is. And if they just hear the negative news about the world, they might go, wow, is this world really worth living in? And they might just have some wrong theological perspectives and they might not know how much God loves them and how much you love them. And so just that’s just really important, especially in uncertain times. I forgot to hit on that.

Ok, point two second question that we think would be a good marriage conversation. Question is, are we analyzing parenting decisions we’re making? So obviously this question could be a huge podcast all by itself, too. Maybe we’ll touch on that in the future. But this is like what I think about all the parenting decisions that you make. There are many of them, right? There are many. And this is a question that we need to actually be evaluating on a regular basis over and over again. It’s not a one time evaluation. And so vaccinations, you might revisit this as a married couple.

I’m talking about other health issues. Are kids getting enough exercise? How’s our food? You know, things like that to education? Right. There’s a lot of disruption with education. Most of you’re probably trying some new things with kids, which is whether it’s partial home school, home school or they’re going to some school in a full time way. But it probably looks different than it used to. And you really have to analyze that. You know, is this the end of the pros and and cost of these things and really to look at and be nimble about making changes when needed. So I think that’s important.

Yeah. So we wanted to share with you guys from Ephesians five, verse 15 through 17 says it says, look carefully there how you walk, not as unwise, but as wise making the best use of the time because the days are evil.

Wow. That is pretty like right to it. The days are evil. OK, have a good day honey. The days don’t forget the days are evil.

Right. And then and then it continues to say therefore do not be foolish but understand what the will of the Lord is Amen. And so we wanted to share those three verses with you guys because right now we’re in uncertain times.

And truthfully, we need to all be seeking the Lord’s will for all of the decisions that we are constantly making.

So are we analyzing our parenting decisions, filtering them through the word of God? You know, with the warning of Romans, twelve do not be like the world.

Going with the flow is now obvious to everybody that you can’t do that in this world. You have to make concrete parenting decisions that sometimes look odd and different than the people around you. And if you’re not, then you might be going to. I think everybody’s even more aware of that. People have been shaken and we’re in uncertain times. And it’s time for us as Christians to rise up and to lead our families and to do that well as married couples. And so you have to be talking together in alignment together about these different things and get in alignment where we’re out of alignment and really make some hard decisions in sometimes the way things were. And you can have the start as you’re meeting together. You might even say to each other, I wish we could just go back to the way things were. And you know what? Stop wishing for that, because these are exciting times. It causes you to change and grow and to lead in different and new ways. And and when you when you when you wish for the past, it hurts your present. When you wish for the past, you don’t make as good of choices for the future. It’s so important to go. Okay, that was the past. God has a new plan now. Now, how are we going to conquer this thing.

That’s right. In the alignment with the Lord.

Yeah. And the other reason why I love this verse is because it’s well, first of all, it’s saying look carefully then how you walk.

So evaluate, look carefully then how you are walking. And what we’re saying is analyze the parenting decisions you’re making. Look carefully at how you are walking. Not as unwise, but as wise. How do we get wisdom through filtering through the word of God, as that says, make the best use of time? We don’t know how much time we’re going to have. Yeah, we do not know. Paul is very clear in scripture that we need to be living as if the end is today. We don’t know when Jesus is coming back, but we live as if he was coming back today. That’s exciting. Make the best use of our time because the days are evil. So we need to be aware that the days are evil. The Bible literally just said that. And do not be foolish, right? Don’t be foolish.

Don’t be so OK. I just was just reading about this from somebody else where It said, do not be so much of a pessimist that you are not seeing the world for the way that it is right. That constantly focusing on the negative can become depressing. But if you’re so much of an optimist, you’re not seeing it for what it is either. Be a realist. Right. And that just I’m like, am I reading my own words?

If you have too much optimism, what happens is and I am an optimist, actually, but I’m also a realist and I know how to temper those things. I think I’ve gotten better in my older age. But if you’re too much of an optimist, slight little changes you don’t really take action on and they accumulate, creating massive change.

But you don’t notice the massive change and you’re just comfortable with it because you’ve become comfortable with each incremental change leading up to the desensitisation, actually, and a lack of being able to truly discern the change that has occurred. Right. So if you’re being truthfully honest, taking the rose tinted glasses off, being able to evaluate the way things were and how they are today, you can see the change. Yeah, but if you don’t have that and you’re just being optimistic, maybe you you purposely forget the negative things of the past and you only remember the good.

And there’s lots of other parenting decisions. You can put your own put your own bulletpoints in.

Oh, yeah. I mean, we put like health.

We put spiritual condition of your family.

Are we over delegating the spirituality to too many friends, so much of it happening, too much breath in and not really going deep. Who are the friends that we really want to focus on yet and that are good for our kids?

And now that it goes into the third marriage conversation question, which is how are the influences? So you make parenting decisions, but then there are influences that sometimes are a reflection of the parenting decisions that you made. OK, so how are the influences on my kids impacting their character, their hearts and their family relationships? And I put relationships, not relationship. Right, because they’re siblings, there’s parents, there’s grandparents. There’s all different kinds of things you literally sit and evaluate on this one question for really, really long time.

So how are the influences that that on my kids impacting them and Influences being teacher’s and friends and I would say never sacrifice the character and fruitfulness of your kids, spiritual fruitfulness of your kids for the sake of your personal relationships.

What do you mean by that? Can you be more specific?

Yeah, I would say that if you’re getting together with other families on a regular basis and let’s say your close friends with them, but they’re not parenting effectively and their kids are a bad influence on your kids or they’re dangerous or they’re dangerous, then you need to find other ways to be friends with them without the whole family’s getting together. You need to share with them, teach them what you’re learning, see if they’re receptive to that in a gradual basis. And if they are wonderful, if your kids are old enough, they could be like those other kids. But if but if when you get home, the fruit is changing and your kids because of someone else’s influence, that’s when you start to really get more vigilant about it. And you go, OK, let’s talk about how you could be an influence better. Let’s talk about how. And then we talk as a married couple how we can be an influence better with the parents and let’s try and make this work. But in the end, if it’s not working, you might have to have some distance. You’re still friends, but just might not be as close with whole families, can you? That could be in whole episode. But it’s just really important. I’m saying, oh, I see this happen all the time. We become numb to the bad influences and a lot of times it has to do with our own agenda as parents.

You guys and I mean, I have a personal story about this. I’m not going to super, super detail, but there is a point where one of my my friendships, I really enjoyed spending time with this particular person.

And but when I would take my kids with me, they oftentimes would come back. They would either be sharing with me some really disheartening or even scary situations that they encountered. And one in particular was kind of like the last straw where I had to come to Isaac. And he said, yeah, I just don’t want the kids hanging out over there. And so maybe you can just get together her with her alone. And that was really hard for me.

I’m just going to be honest. That was hard for me. The hard marriage. That was a hard marriage meeting. And I, I didn’t want to have to make a boundary with a friend that was a believer at the time. And I just I had to I had to submit to that because I knew that, though the wisdom that my husband was sharing with me was actually true wisdom. And I needed to submit to in that regard, and I am saying that because it was it was against my flesh, like I didn’t want to have to put a boundary on that friendship because I love that friend so much.

But I also like I saw him and he didn’t have that deep connection with that friend, obviously. So all he was thinking about was just the safety of our kids. And I’m like, OK, yeah, you know what? You’re right. And that was the best decision that we ever made. And I don’t have any regrets. And this is years and years later. And so and we’ve had other situations that we’ve had to do that with.

So if you’re in a position like that and you have not talked to anybody about it and you’ve been gone, I just don’t know if I really like my kids hanging out with those kids, I would say you really need to listen to your gut. I want to empower you to to trust the spiritual discernment that God is giving you and to communicate with your spouse and share your concerns.

And I think that it’s important that the sharing of the concerns goes both ways. There have been times where I’ve come to Isaac and said, I don’t know if I really trust that guy. And he has listened to that, maybe not agreed with it fully, but then gone, OK, I’m going to honor my wife and I’m going to trust her discernment in this. And if he doesn’t spend as much time with them and then years later we’re looking back and we go, oh, praise God. Right. And so you guys, we’ve just been down the road a little bit longer in this. And so I’m just a discernment of your wife.

I do. She’s so discerning and and women trust your husbands too. It’s usually right. And what we’re not saying is that kids have to be perfect to hang out with our kids. That’s not what we’re saying. Because our kids aren’t perfect. No, nobody’s perfect. Right. So but we’re saying is over time, if you see the the character of your kids changing and becoming more like it, the bad aspects of character, even a good people, but some of the some of the challenging things are dangerous.

I’m just going to flat out say there’s drugs or guns or gangs or I could go on and on or if there’s even like sexual temptation and there’s things that are potentially there, you need to protect the safety of your child. Some extreme things.

Well, I know, but a lot of people don’t realize that there is usually an underlying really big issue behind things. You know, just a few days ago, a friend shared something about a teenage son who had taken a Percocet pill and then he never woke up. He was with another friend. He was an athlete. And they were sharing the story of their child because they wanted other parents to be warned.

Did they have that conversation with their kids to just not even do not he had I mean, according to them, he had not done drugs before. Who knows? Right. But we have to be aware of the character of the people our children are spending time with and acknowledging and being honest. Is my child a leader in this relationship or their follower? Yeah. In this relationship. Are they going to say no when nine people are saying yes to drinking? Are they going to say no?

And if they’re not openly communicating about the challenges with you, then you can’t coach them and how to be that leader that they need to be. We got to move on because we have two more points, but that is our comfort zone, holding us back from walking at God’s best path for our lives and for our kids lives. So sometimes we get in this groove of what we’re most comfortable with. So we don’t have hard conversations with people. We get in this groove of our place of comfort. So we don’t create changes about church community or adjustments there if they’re needed. We don’t create change about the neighborhood we live in or whatever. Right. There’s there’s sometimes it’s we think it’s too hard to make a change. And so our kids get sacrificed a little bit because of that. And then we put it in the guise of while there being lights and these things. Now, there can be truth sometimes if they’re older and you raised them really well, they can be like even absolutely.

Lights at times, too. But that shouldn’t be their only experience. One hundred percent of the time. They should also be able to be around like minded people where they’re being energized, challenged as iron sharpens iron. If they don’t have that, you need to evaluate where you’re at. I’m just going to be honest.

And are your kids standing firm in the people around them are becoming more like them, more godly or your kids slowly becoming more ungodly like they are?

Yeah. So there’s a couple of different verses we want to share with you guys just for food for thought, because this is God’s word. He’s the author of this. This is not our opinion. Proverbs Thirteen Twenty says whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm.

Boom like that.

You just can’t even ignore that. I mean, it continues on. Disaster pursues sinners, but the righteous are rewarded with good. I mean, there’s a lot of scriptures that talk about being wise with who you choose to hang out with. Another one that comes to mind regarding this as proverbs the. Re verse five, OK, right, five and six, trust in the Lord with all your heart and do not lean on your own understanding and all your ways acknowledge him and he will make straight your paths, be not wise in your own eyes, fear the Lord and turn away from evil.

It will be healing to your flesh and refreshment to your bones. You guys listen. This is a thing sometimes you get in places where we go, OK, I just don’t know what to do, right? My kids changing.

I don’t know if it’s my child or if it’s their environment or if there’s their school or if it’s there. If it’s the neighborhood, if it’s this, if it’s that we can’t change the neighborhood so can’t or we can’t change the church or we can’t, you know, like certain people have these things, then they’re going, what do I do?

Give me the wisdom. Right. This is the answer to that trust in the Lord with all your heart. Do not lean on your own understanding. God’s ways are sometimes so different than our ways. And we have to be seeking him to get that knowledge, to get the wisdom right. Not wise on your in your own eyes. Fear the Lord turn away from evil. Not that turning away is actually an action word. You have to physically choose to walk away.

Now, Angie and I are both still breaking out of our comfort zones. Even right now. There are things happening because of the uncertain world in just the last six months that are massively causing us to further break out of our own comfort zone and make hard decisions and things like that.

And so hard decisions that we’ve actually never made before.

Yeah, so we’re I mean, we’ve never received the level of persecution where we’ve received in the last several months. And, you know, how do you respond to that? And I yeah, I kind of realized and part of it is that we’re so outspoken on the Internet about biblical truth and our experiences and so forth. So and that’s fine. And I just I told Angie this.

I go, OK, I am going to wear that Lord. I am going to now understand that I’m in a different time and this may happen more.

Right. And I’m OK and I’m OK. I’m OK with it. It’s like being I mean, honestly, it’s like what the martyrs it’s what other Christians in other countries have been dealing with for a really long time. But in America we have first world problems. And when we haven’t experienced that and when I say OK with it, meaning I’m going to endure it and not stop, that’s what I mean.

Yeah, we can press forward in the race. We have another scripture here that’s in Deuteronomy 31:6, which is obviously this. This was one of the verses, this in Joshua nine that just really encouraged me when I was choosing courageous mom as my ministry website says, I have commanded you.

I’ve commanded you got to. I’ve commanded you.

This is a big deal. He’s commanding. It’s very clear. Be strong and courageous. So even if we’re not, yeah, God has commanded us as his followers to be strong and courageous.

It says, do not fear or be in dread of them for the for it is the Lord, your God who goes with you. He will not leave you or forsake you.

And that is a word, I believe, for everyone. God never leaves us nor forsakes us. Mm hmm.

And we do need to be strong to be able to stand firm against the devil schemes.

We do need to be strong in our minds to guard our minds and hearts in Christ Jesus. We we do need to be courageous to continue in the race, even amidst a world that hates people who claim Christ, who are trying to live biblically. Right.

And the final point is, in these uncertain times, are there any adjustments that are needed in how we make money? I, by the way, feel that that could be very encouraging from the wife. Actually, if the husband is the one that’s providing or mostly providing in that situation, I think it could be very encouraging on a date night to say, hey, I’m open to, you know, other ways we make money.

Yeah.

And I think that that kind of value, because as a provider, it’s like, OK, now this is this is what I went to school for doing.

So sometimes a wife saying that not like we should, but just saying that is like, oh, interesting.

Right, I don’t have to do this forever, I mean, the reality is that a lot of people go through career changes in their life.

Yeah, I think a lot of people during covid were kind of shocked that their maybe their career was not deemed essential and they may have struggled financially.

I know a lot of families were struggling financially with that. Right.

But there are other crises that are going to happen in the future, whether in this hundred years or in the next right, next century or beyond that, because in times it’s going to continue getting worse.

We just know this, right, 20 years is going to be a massive change.

Right. I mean, technology has been a massive change for the previous 20 years. Just sit and think on that for a second, OK? How much has our world changed in the last decade? Whoa, massive. So think another decade ahead. And so I just want to encourage you guys not I’m not saying that to scare anybody. I’m just saying how many men think once I chose this, I liked it then. But now I’ve kind of grown and I don’t know if I really want to do this right in a matter of liking it. But then there’s also this like how do I provide for my family in uncertain times? And it can be a really fun thing to dream about and to explore if the wife is on board and supportive and even willing to to make sacrifices.

And sometimes the wife might not be out of fear or I really we get this where we get our health benefits. And that would be really expensive if we didn’t get them through that. Or this is you know, I like the neighborhood we live in or, you know, these all these thoughts. I could be protectionism against the just the openness to have the conversation right to entertainment.

And so we’re wanting to encourage you guys in is having the conversation and giving each other the freedom to dream, to think and to evaluate and to be prayerful, to seek God’s word in it and potentially move forward with making some changes or adding on some things. I mean, one of the things that I would want to encourage you guys in is this concept of multiple streams of income. Yeah, I mean, I think that that especially in uncertain times, is a wise thing to not only be doing, but to be teaching your kids and to have them thinking as well.

Right. There was a there was a book on this a decade ago that I read called Multiple Streams Income I believe in. And we’ve we’ve always had that mentality, but now it’s like really becoming important. And so let’s say you have one source of income right now. I would encourage you to think about what’s another one, even if it’s very small, even if I brought in 500 bucks a month or something small. Right. But to cultivate something that’s not a distraction away from the good parenting and marriage and everything, you’re doing something you can do with your kids, maybe even.

Yeah.

You know, so but what is another source? And if you already have a couple, what’s a third one?

And it’s not just to have as many as possible, but no, I do think three is probably a number that you should be thinking about and considering.

That’s right. And so it could be it could really be a source of support. Proverbs, proverbs note.

Yeah. Proverbs 16:9, says the heart of a man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps.

And so you guys, sometimes when we’re walking in this path that maybe we’ve set for ourselves. Right. I think about when we were first married and we were just going down the path that was before us. Right. And moving forward. And we’re trying to glorify God in it. But I had a plan and my plan was to finish college and go into ministry and I got pregnant. So I had a plan. But God directed my steps to choose to be a stay at home mom. Yeah. And so the Lord, I had this I had to surrender my will to God and be willing to evaluate. be willing to maybe put some things on the back burner for a season to do what was best for my family?

By the way, these things are never coming down like Isaac decided something.

And Angie, no matter. Did you hear how I said I had to surrender to the Lord?

So I think it was actually, if I remember correctly, I think it was your idea, actually. And we had discussions about it and it just made sense. And we kind of made that decision together.

And of course, we make every decision together. Two become one. But there but I it definitely was a me having to choose to change my plan that I had always had in my mind. Right. And so and what I had been pursuing and I don’t regret it for a day. I don’t regret it a minute. And I don’t regret going to college either, because I’ve used every bit of that education and family counseling and all that. I look at what we’re doing. Yeah.

And so I, I praise God for all of it. And I, I really think that it’s been a beautiful journey with him. But my point is that you can’t compartmentalize Jesus out of parts of your life. And I think a lot of times when people start going down a road, they think that this is the path that’s been set before me. So this must be God’s will.

But. Sometimes a man plans his steps for the Lord, right, a man, a heart of a man plans his way, but the Lord establishes his steps. We have to be willing to move over here, step this way. And sometimes the way that we step is a firmer path and sometimes it’s muddy, sometimes it’s not as clear as what. Maybe we’re walking in before. But I just want to encourage you guys that it was something that I’ve said to myself over and over and over again over the last two decades. God goes with me wherever I go because he’s not just in one way. And he goes with you, too. Yeah, he does.

He goes with you guys, too. So we hope that this has been encouraging. We want to just finish up with Philippians four six through seven.

But actually we’re starting verse four start and four here. So rejoice in the Lord always again. I will say rejoice. Let your reasonableness be known by everyone. The Lord is at hand.

Do not be anxious about anything but in everything, by prayer and supplication. With Thanksgiving, let your requests be known. Be made known to God in the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Thanks for joining us.

See you next time. Hey, thanks for listening to this episode. We wanted to quickly tell you about our six week online parenting program.

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

It’s an incredible program where we cover everything from obedience training to overcoming mistakes most Christians are making. But more than that, it’s an incredible community. You’ll have access to a private online group, live webcast and the courageous parenting text message line where Angie and I can send you weekly encouragement straight to your phone .

If you’re interested in joining our next online parenting mentorship program, secure your spot now at CourageousParenting.com.

That’s CourageousParenting.com