Biblical parenting isn’t a precise equation; what works for one kid may need adjusting for the next. While there are some major areas where Christians should have commonality in their parenting based on Biblical truth, in so many other areas there’s liberty to make wise choices based on the uniqueness of your kids and your circumstances. This episode is an encouragement to discern well what’s best for your family while discouraging the comparison trap.

Main Points in This Episode:

1. Do all you can to prevent division based on parenting decisions
2. There are things we should have in common as believers in terms of: Discipleship, discipline, not exasperating our kids, love, grace…
3. Be ware of a deep rooted problem in comparing to others
4. Be careful not to let people pleasing prevent you from making the best decision for your own families
5. Know your kids well as each are different and need different things at different times
6. Don’t be swayed by others opinions when you have a strong gut feeling about doing something different that aligns with Biblical truth.

[RUMBLE]

Scripture From This Episode:

Galatians 5:1 – “Stand fast therefore in the liberty wherewith Christ hath made us free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage.”

2 Corinthians 10:12 – “For we dare not make ourselves of the number, or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves: but they measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.”

1 John 4:1 – “Beloved, believe not every spirit, but try the spirits whether they are of God: because many false prophets are gone out into the world.”

Scroll down to see other resources

Check out Angie’s Postpartum Course!

If The Spirit Prompts You to Financially Support

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 I’m Isaac from Resolute Man.

We’ve been married for 21 years and have seen the fruit from 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 their 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 and a following. Hey, welcome back to the podcast, everyone. Hey, guys. We have a unique topic today we’ve never talked about in this way. So God’s way isn’t cookie cutter parenting. Interesting.

You might be thinking, wait a second, but you guys run a parenting ministry and you have a parenting program. Are you saying that what you teach in the parenting program isn’t the same for everybody and they shouldn’t implement it?

Well, I mean, there is a desire out there for an equation, isn’t there?

Right. I mean, how many parenting courses or books are written that I mean, in a in a way, try to promise a behavior modification plan, if you will, or, you know, if you do these things, then your parenting will be easier, your kids will behave more, all those kinds of things. Well, you know, guys, a heart behind is parenting. And the mentor program is not that everybody would parent exactly the same and that you would even parent each of your children exactly the same. Because the truth is, is that God uniquely designed each of your children and uniquely designed your family. And your family is not exactly the same as the next person, right?

Yeah.

However, there are some timeless truths that are scriptural teachings that are there for us as parents to guide us in the way that we should go as parents in our parenting that are really God’s way is the best way. And so, you know, today’s podcast is we’re talking about God’s ways and cookie cutter parenting. The reality is that not everything that we do would be prescriptive for you guys, but what God’s word says is unchanging. And so we want to encourage you with God’s word. And and we recognize that a lot of people struggle today with, you know, doubting themselves as parents, doubting the decisions that they make. Because aren’t there a lot of decisions that we make in the life span of parenting? There are so many different decisions. And I think that I know for myself, especially as I look back on my younger parenting years, I was so unconfident that I would look to what other people were doing for validation of if I was doing it right or God’s way.

And we’ll talk about that. It’s so important. And, you know, we have nine kids from age one all the way to 21. And so and all of our kids are so different. And so while one thing worked with a slew of kids, it maybe didn’t work for every one of our kids in practice. And while we always are striving to stay biblical in our approach and grounded in biblical truth in how we do things, there is a different nuance to these things based on who each of our kids are, and that will be the same for you.

It’s an element called grace and understanding, and it takes intentionality and it takes time to know each of your kids, which we’ll talk about in just a few minutes. But before we do, we just want to say thank you. Yeah. Thank you for joining us in this Million Legacies movement. We’ve been so encouraged by you guys, and we just wanted to thank you for all of the donations, all of the purchases and the shop lately as as Father’s Day is approaching, it’s just been really, really encouraging. We love hearing comments and messages from you guys. So thanks so much for joining us in this and sharing the podcast.

And by the way, all show notes and free resources and the courses and things you can buy to or at courageous parenting dot com. And don’t forget to check out the Be Courageous app. There’s information about it at the website or you can just download it in your app store.

Which I don’t know if you guys know this, but in the Be Courageous app, Isaac and I do a monthly live Q&A for an hour in the app, which has been a really fun way to engage with everybody who’s in there, and it’s just been super encouraging. I love the questions that people give us. It’s been a great way for us to know what is relevant to speaking to your heart on issues in the podcast, because we’re getting questions from them there. And so if you’re in the if you’re in the app, thank you. It’s been really fun engaging with you guys there.

All right. So let’s continue on. So God’s way. Isn’t cookie cutter? Well, isn’t that true? If God’s way was cookie cutter, he would have descriptive details on every aspect of parenting, perhaps in the Bible. That’s right. But he doesn’t. But he has core principles of how were to treat people, how kids are to treat their parents, how were to approach our kids, our children marriage wisdom. There’s all of these really important things. And from that foundation, we can extrapolate, you know, what is best for this particular kid in this situation.

That’s right. So as when you’re a parent, oftentimes there’s a few different ways that you learn, right? Like reading the Bible, I would say, is the first and foremost like you want to be. In your word to understand what God is guiding you in what His wisdom is, and ask the Holy Spirit to really lead and give you wisdom. And His Word says that He will give it without reproach. The second way that you’re going to want to be approaching learning, because I know that for Isaac and I, neither of us knew what we were doing when we first started parenting and we knew what things we didn’t want to do, and we knew a few things that we did want to do. But really, it’s been a learning journey, right?

It absolutely.

Has. So having mentors in our life was super powerful for both of us, especially earlier on.

And we sharpened each other to we would go learn something from someone. We go to a church class or we’d read a book or you’d hear something from somewhere and we would discuss it together and we would test it against the biblical truth. And then we’d also discern the Holy Spirit is in you, is in us. And so we would discern whether this is good for our family or not. Right. And I think that’s really important.

Oh, super important. Just as you were sharing that, I was even thinking of a few times where I had met with someone and the wisdom, quote unquote, that that they were giving was actually not something that we decided to utilize because it would not have been a good thing for that specific child. Regarding like discipline.

I would think we said no to more things than we said yes to. Yeah. After we learned them. We’re respectful during the time. Right. But then when we talk about it, we’ve said no to more things than we said yes to. And sometimes we take a piece of it as.

Well and morph it into something that will work because sometimes it inspires creative thinking and gets us being creative, right? It can be insightful, but but we’re sharing this with you guys because that that is an element of how it’s not cookie cutter. Like, I think it’s important for you guys to hear that like from us over the years we went into parenting and we try to still be in a place with a teachable heart. Parenting is sanctifying. It’s not this. It’s not always easy. But as a friend that online says Hard does not equal bad. That’s true. We’ve also said that we’ve taught our kids we want to try to do hard things because the hard things are usually well worth it. Right? Anything worth doing is hard. That’s a motto that we’ve taught our kids over the years. And the truth is, is when you’re parenting, sometimes you have to do the hard thing to get the fruit that you want later. And the truth is, is that God calls all of us up. He calls us to to something higher at times. Right? He calls us to be holy because he is holy. And that takes self-control. It takes patience. It takes doing hard things.

Yeah. And usually the harder choice goes against our flesh. It goes against you. It takes more time, it takes more patience. It takes more diligence.

To.

Having a hard marriage conversation. It takes all of these things. And there’s a lot of decisions you have to make as parents, aren’t there? There’s actually a ton of decisions you have to make over time, and those decisions are often what can divide people. And we shouldn’t be divisive at all, in fact, but we should have agreement on some things.

Right? Right. I mean, we were even just talking about this. The first issue that we’re going to talk about is this deep rooted issue of comparison, which is what you’re leading into. Right. That decisions can become divisive when there’s comparing or when there’s a impression that in order for us to be close in friendship, you have to do things my way. Or in order for me to view you as a biblical parent, you’re going to do X, Y and Z. And when I say that, I’m always nervous to say that sort of thing, right? I was like, There are times where we both go, okay, but when it comes to like discipleship and discipline and different things like that, the Bible is actually very clear and gives some very clear guidance to parents. And we don’t want to cut corners on those things. And it is important that within the church we actually do judge. That’s a lie from the devil not to do that. We’re supposed to judge fruit to make wise decisions and friendships, for example. So as we’re talking about this, we’re not giving people like the the freedom to just go, oh, it doesn’t matter. And just, you know, because the reality is, is, as you know from other podcasts, we encourage you guys like peers have huge impression on your kids. They massively influence your children. They massively influence you. So if all the people that are in your community are nominal, how are you going to stay strong and growing in the Lord if people are nominal and digressing in their relationship with the Lord?

So what you’re saying is there’s a balance. There are certain things where we should look similar around discipleship, around discipline, around loving, well, around having. Praise fruits of the spirit that are in the Bible. We should be similar in in.

Fruit.

In expression and fruit in those things. But then there’s these other areas where there’s liberty and there’s liberty for a reason. God gives liberty because he created certain parents different than other parents. Right. First of all. And their kids are different than other kids. And there’s different dynamics happening. And while certain core things need to be should be very similar, these other things we shouldn’t create division over.

Yeah, I think that when you talk about Liberty, one of the verses that comes to mind is in Galatians five one, it says Stand fast, therefore in the liberty by which Christ has made us free and do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage. This is super important because can’t decisions that you make as a parent sometimes feel so heavy and so burdensome and so weighty that you can become overwhelmed?

Hmm.

That would be a yoke of bondage. And right here, Paul is literally saying, do not be entangled again with a yoke of bondage, because we were once under a yoke of bondage before we were saved. And then Christ set us free when we in in our relationship with him and in faith in him and being justified in him, we are set free in Jesus Christ. So why would we then again take on a yoke of bondage? It’s interesting that he’s telling us not to do that because it’s something that we actually can do. We can create a yoke of bondage. And I just think of this concept of like division and decisions and comparison trap especially. I think it’s probably a bigger issue among women, I.

Would say certainly in bombing. Right. I don’t think a lot of dads are really highly comparing each other in their dad life. Maybe, maybe actually dads need more of that sharpening and caring on that side. I’m not sure, but women definitely have that in one thing. This is a message for dads out there. You husbands out there is that one of the things I found really useful and I’m thankful for this, that I had a strength in this area when we’re young and still do, which is having a good smell test for people pleasing. And to really understand when my wife is expressing something is that coming from a place of pressure from other women around her to comply and to be doing things like them? Or is this a right thing that we should be doing and what’s best for our kids and our family? And I would say it’s gone both ways. And sometimes we have these discussions and I’m able to with grace and love, of course, hopefully, maybe not always, but but I do my best and it is to kind of talk through it. And sometimes I think the other spouse doesn’t even realize that that’s some of the motivation. Where is the motivation coming from for your decisions? It should be biblical truth, sound, wisdom, discernment, marriage conversations.

Guide and.

Guidance. The Holy Spirit because you know your kids best.

Right. So it’s interesting, you know, when it comes to liberty, what are the decisions? What are the things? Let me just give you an idea. Isaac kind of mentioned some of the things that are, you know, biblical based that should look similar. And I’m going to emphasize the word similar because similar doesn’t mean the same as same. Yeah, similar and same are not equal. And so when we say things like discipleship, discipline, different things like that, we’re not saying that there’s one way to discipline that should be used for all kids at all times, in all circumstances. That’s the opposite of what we believe. It’s the opposite of what we’ve practiced, and it’s the opposite of what we teach. And the parenting mentor program, it requires literally like this concept in John 15 of abiding in him. Just to bring that up briefly for a second, as a parent, we have to be abiding in him so that his spirit is flowing through us and we’re able to rely on him and not do things in our own strength. And part of that is this awesome creativity. God is a creator that had He’s massively creative and we can be creative as well, even in our parenting as we are seeking to love our children well in the same kind of way that Jesus loved us well when he was here.

If you think about how He preached to the masses and even to just the 12 disciples, he used parables. He gave lots of different kinds of stories. It wasn’t just like, Do this, this way. One story repeated over and over and over again. It was literally inspired because he’s God. And it was inspired. And he spoke to hearts where hearts were at in that moment. He healed and he spoke to their heart and then change occurred. And that’s what we want to try to do as parents. We want to speak to our kids hearts. We want to love to their hearts. We want to discipline to their hearts. We want to disciple to their hearts. And that’s not always going to look the same. It may look similar because it’s going to produce a similar fruit, which would be the fruit of the spirit in your child. Right. But it’s not going to be the same. So when I think of liberties and what kinds of things would be parenting liberties, I’m just going to rattle off a few. Let’s start with curriculum. For those of you who are homeschooling, you know the pressure that I’m talking about. If you’re not homeschooling, how about education choices? It’s not cookie cutter. It’s not going to be exactly the same for every single kid, for every single family. How about.

Sports? Sports is another.

One exactly where.

We have chosen for various reasons not to overly participate in sports. And in some families that becomes an important thing. And it’s good for their family.

And for some families it can become an idol because it was just a thing that a parent did when they were younger and they’re vicariously living. They’re reliving their childhood through their kids again. And so there’s this element of like, it could be different for each family, but you have to judge yourself honestly and go, Is this what’s best for my child? Not what’s best for me and not what’s best for my family. Right. And so there’s liberty in those decisions on sports, on curriculum. There’s liberty on what foods you feed your family. Right? There’s no like you have to do this this way as far as scripture goes, regarding what you eat, how you eat it, when can I say when you eat it, like what your routine is? There’s a part in our parenting mentor program where we teach mild, moderate and extensive routine for the day, and we give examples of what that’s looked like, because over the years we’ve had mild, moderate and extensively routine, structured days. While I believe that young kids really thrive in structure and some things never go for our family, but that’s that’s partially because of, like, what I’ve learned over the years. Right? And what rhythms need to stay in place, like nap time, for example, different things like that. But does your nap time need to look like our nap time at the exact same time of the day?

There’s no big difference in how you start the day and how you end the day. And all these things can can look different. We do Bible time in the morning, but you could do it at lunchtime. You could do it at evening. You could do it at bedtime. It’s I think we need to get away from the precision and of of the real minutia, of the details.

The nitty gritty.

And we need to get to the core thing. Are you actually reading the Bible to your kids? Because that’s discipleship. That should be part of everybody’s routine somewhere. And we have to have grace for one another, too, because everybody has different work, jobs and schedules and responsibilities. Some really hard working men are traveling and they’re providing for their family, and it’s a good thing and they’re serving out there in the marketplace, or they’re serving in the armed forces or doing different things that are important. And God has them doing those things. And, you know, if if you have a different schedule, we shouldn’t judge that differently. We should embrace the texture at which God has created in the creativity, in the different families and what they’re doing in their time table and all those kinds of things.

Yeah, you know, it’s interesting too, as I was thinking about like what are some other liberties and things, this concept of having grace for one another because we have liberties so that we’re not putting the yoke of bondage within this comparison trap. We need to be careful not to compare our husbands. Isaac was just talking about all the things that husbands potentially are out there doing in the marketplace. And it would be easy, especially with social media today, for a woman to become discontent with her marriage and with her family and be put under a yoke of bondage like it talked about in Galatians five one, simply because she sees other people doing other things like other dads doing things with their kids and wanting her husband to do that and not being content with what God has given her in that moment and and not understanding that it’s the husband does desire that. Right. And so I think that there is a huge need for protection within ourselves and for for those of us who are mentors. Like I look at myself as a Titus two older woman. I’ve been parenting for over 20 years. I’ve been married for over obviously almost 23 years. And I know that God placed circumstances, situations, even certain children and their temperaments and personalities in my life to yes, number one, sanctify me. But also to humble me.

And that is a really important thing when we are not honest, when we’re mentoring other people and we’re not honest with ourselves. First, remembering where God’s brought us from and what we’ve walked through. Our leadership changes and I’m saying this because I’ve struggled with it at times. You guys have even heard it within a podcast where Isaac and I will be talking and I’ll start sharing on something and he’ll go, But hey, and you also experience this ba ba ba ba. And it reminds me in the moment and I go, Oh yeah, I’m so glad you said that. And it literally changes my heart right then in, in that podcast and that moment, and I go, Oh yeah. And then I felt really bad, like actually because I was kind of chuckling before and then all of a sudden I had all this compassion for young moms, and we have to remember where we’ve come from. That’s the point. Like we as teachers, as women who are walking in each other’s lives, we have to remember humbly who we are before the Lord and where we’ve come from and what we’ve learned. And if we can’t remember what it was like even in the baby years, I remember this was a big deal when I had Solomon. There’s almost six years between our sixth and our seventh, and I thought after having had six kids and here I am a doula and I’ve written redeemed childbirth and I’ve been teaching all this stuff.

And then I have a baby and I’m like, Whoa, I forgot so much in six years. And I praise God that I’ve had five more pregnancies since then because it’s helped me to remember up front and personal what those hard, sleepless nights can be like when you have a teething baby or when they’re sick. I can remember like literally just got out of a year of postpartum with Zander and you guys. He had the tongue tie, lip tie thing and we chose to go a hard route. I’m not saying harder because getting a connectome is also hard and you have to do therapy in different things as well. But we went a hard route of not doing that and doing cranial sacral therapy and exercises and yes, triple feeding for a season, which makes it difficult to do other things right. It makes it hard on the family, but it’s a small sacrifice for a great gain that we personally as a couple had a conviction on something that’s not prescriptive for you. But we had a conviction to exclusively breastfeed because I had done that for 12 years. And so like that is just one example. We could talk about homeschool. There’s literally any there’s so many.

Or even I would say to just with Zander, our one year old, we’re learning new things with Zander, not because we could have learned them before. I guess we could have, but because Zander is different actually, than the rest of them is because some things he is responding differently to. And we’re once again made aware that every kid is unique. And just because all these things worked with other kids doesn’t mean this thing works with him.

It’s exactly right. You know, it’s funny. People will often ask me, so did you ever have a kid climb out of a crib? And I’m like, Nope. Well, I wouldn’t put it past Zander to be the first. And we’ve used the exact same crib with all nine of them. But, you know, the point is, is that, yes, every kid is different. And so when we get stuck in these comparisons, that’s when we put this yoke of bondage on. And it’s like, why? Why do we even do that as women? Why? Why do we impose extra biblical expectations on ourself and then get overwhelmed or feel bad about ourselves? Because we’re not we’re missing a mark. That’s not even something that God prescribed for us.

I think there’s too much mommy guilt happening and too much pressure. And we should go back to the simple things that the Bible talks about, the basic things, and focus, most importantly, on that discipleship of our children and loving them well. And that takes patience. And I think sometimes when we heap on too many things, it creates anxiety. And then we can’t do the core things that we really desire as well as we should in the Bible here. And of course, I’m not a mom, so I can only speak from watching Angie, so I’m not trying to be an expert.

Good encouragement, baby.

Yeah. So second Corinthians 1012 says for we dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves, but they measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise.

So it’s really we’ve got to be careful that we are not becoming these kind of people. First of all, when I read that well, whenever I read Scripture and I hope you do too, maybe this is an encouragement or an exhortation for some of you. But when I read Scripture, I always think, first, what does this mean for me? And there’s either warnings, convictions, encouragements, exhortations. And this would be like a warning, right? To not measure my success by my success. Right. And also not to measure my failings by by my feelings. And not to commend myself, not to boast, not to prop myself up. Like all of these things are warnings that Scripture talks about don’t do not boast in yourself. Do not be haughty in your own eyes. Do not. There’s so many scriptures that warn us about being humble. And and I think that especially as a Titus two teacher, for those of you who are looking for someone, this would be something that you want to look for in someone, is that they have humility enough to say, I did that wrong or I wish I would have, or this worked for this kid, but it didn’t work for these ones, but it might be worth a try. Do you see how it’s like not cookie cutter? If you do X, Y, Z, you’re going to have this success and bam like an easy fix, because that’s not necessarily true with every single child. And that’s something that we’ve learned.

I think it’s fine to give wisdom and to give it confidently with assertiveness, but we should always leave the opportunity open for, you know, trying it a little bit differently and things like that. I think that’s important if it’s not one of those core things.

Yeah. So be careful about prescriptive advice unless it’s scriptural. Like here’s a prescriptive scriptural advice that you definitely want to heed. Fathers do not exasperate your children lest they become discouraged. Write the Colossians three, 21 and Season six four. That’s for both parents. Like that would be a prescriptive biblical exhortation that we definitely all need to listen to.

That’s like, you know, we get frustrated and we kind of raise our voice and start yelling at our kids. That’s exasperating kids, right?

But here’s an example of something that’s not prescriptive. I loved using classical conversations for eight years with my kids, and it was an awesome experience. That doesn’t mean it’s prescriptive, be the right curriculum for you to use so you see the difference. Or like even when I think about you think about oils or homeopathy or any of the things that you can do as a mom. Like just because something worked in a situation with treating my child who had some similar symptoms to what your child may have, does not mean that it’s going to be the cure. Right. And so we just need to be careful as women to not like automatically think that people aren’t doing their best. But we need to expect virtue in one another and encourage one another, really be cheerleading each other on.

I think that’s when we see a challenge someone’s having with their child. We assume virtue in that moment. Yeah. Versus assuming they’re not doing this thing that, you know, you do that works. Right. And I think that while it might be true, they could do something better. We need to earn that opportunity to speak into someone’s life by being humble, by being asked, by being encouraged in that way. And that’s through relationship. And so if you want to help somebody build a strong relationship with them that’s loving and full of grace, and oftentimes I think what will happen I find this in the business world, too, is that what we first might have thought is different after we really get to know someone and we speak to them and we see more of the whole picture, and sometimes we just get little soundbites of someone’s life and what’s happening or with their kids, and we can really misunderstand what’s actually happening in the inn and not see that there really is an intentional heart behind it. Maybe it’s misapplied, maybe there’s an intentional heart that’s not applying things correctly, and they do need help. And maybe God has provided you as a person to help them. But let’s approach that in a way where we’re not just heaping mommy guilt on top or dad guilt for that matter, on top. And but maybe there needs to be a little more grace, dad. Guilt. I’m just kidding.

You’re so funny. Oh, you’re so funny. So, you guys, the second thing that we really wanted to hit home and these are going to go pretty fast is obviously you need to know your kids. You have to know your kids well. And the best way to know them well is to invest time in those relationships. To be able to decide what is best. You need to go with your gut, not with her gut, not with his gut, with your gut. And and you need to do it with confidence because of what you’ve read in Scripture. And so not just like knowing your kids and deciding what’s best without any guidance. That’s not what we’re saying. We’re saying invest time, know your kids, ask God to really guide you, decide what’s best and own it. And I think that part of this is that a lot of parents are just going about their days, like the regular rhythm, the regular routine, without actually seeking God and saying, Lord, what’s your opinion on this? And how should I be treating this specific situation? And is this kid, you know, acting out because of something else, like understanding that there are symptoms? Of a deeper heart issue and really digging in like that’s knowing your kids investing the time versus just cookie cutter boom, boom, boom, boom that leads to relationships that are not close when they’re older.

At least that’s what I’ve witnessed among the vast majority of older parents. Right. And a lot of times when I’ve sought out a mentor or something or I’ve asked someone to meet with me, a lot of times they’ll humbly go, You know what? I don’t know if I can speak to this because I don’t my kids are not close to me or they’re not walking with the Lord or this and that. And those are those are actually like the warning signs. You need to be really careful not to choose those people as mentors. Or if you do that, they are being humble enough to share with you the mistakes that they made, because sometimes that can be valuable as well. But you got to know your kids and you’ve got to understand that what works with one isn’t going to work with the.

Other or may not in May. Yeah. Yeah. And the final point is don’t be swayed by mere opinions. There’s opinions flying at us left and right. You could be looking at a real you could be in a group with other people. You can all these things, all these opinions. You could overhear a conversation in a coffee shop that puts pressure on you in some weird way and you don’t even know these people. Right? So you really have to take your thoughts captive, which is a biblical scriptural idea and not be swayed just by mere opinions. Test it by the Word of God. Test it by thinking and asking God to reveal to you, have the Holy Spirit in you. Test it by talking to your spouse and really having a conversation about this, because oftentimes we could not even realize it. And there’s a motivation building for something just because of other people’s unbiblical opinions and you don’t even realize it. And it’s building over time and pretty soon it becomes doctrine. It becomes this is super important, deep conviction. This is what we need to do. And you might be a little off the rails and you don’t even realize it, and it might not be the very best thing for your particular kids. And so just remember that that or a lot of times I think there’s a nuance to somebody saying something with power and authority. But really, if you watched it in their own life, it was more nuanced. It wasn’t always done the exact way maybe they said, but it was there was a situational awareness happening and there was an understanding of different kids and the different marriage and all these kinds of things. I think it’s super important. And first, Jon, for one, this is important. Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits whether they have God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. And yeah, that’s so important because there’s all kinds of ideas happening now and I.

Think so many parenting philosophies like so many when we’re talking about this specific topic of cookie cutter parenting that God’s Way isn’t cookie cutter, but that there is guidelines that He has in his word. We need to know what those are so that we can discern what false teachings there are in the world. Right. And so I know that just even being on social media at times, I see things promoted different movements, different parenting philosophies, different things like this. And it’s it’s very concerning for me because when they may look good on the outside and you’re like, Oh, that’s interesting. And then you dig a little deeper and you find out that they’re not Christian in root and that it actually teaches some other things that your belief system would be the humanly against, actually. And so it’s important that we do our research, we do due diligence, that we don’t fall for wayward philosophy. But part of that can’t happen unless we do know what God’s word says regarding our jurisdiction and our duty as parents.

Just remember, just because something feels good doesn’t mean it’s best. And often what feels good isn’t best. Yeah, because what is best usually.

Is.

Harder. Yeah. So I always, if something’s easier, here’s, for example, I’ll give you kind of a cheesy example. Here’s a quick way to make lots of money. You’ve seen those things all over the place, right? That’s not true. It’s hard work to make money. It takes diligence. It’s always harder than they’re saying, right?

Would be a scam. So if you see someone going, here’s a fast way to fix your kids behavior and have them be obedient all the time.

By Monday.

At 12:00 am, I think they scam. I just think that like deep down inside, we don’t want our kids to just be performing. You guys like that is truly the heart of why we’re talking about this. We shouldn’t want God doesn’t want us to be performing for anyone. We have an audience of one and it’s him. He doesn’t even want us performing for him. You guys, we. We should do things because we want to glorify him doing everything as unto the Lord right, but not from a heart attitude of Watch me Jesus, because you’re going to love me more if I do this right. No, our relationship with God doesn’t work that way. There’s nothing that we can do to make him love us more. Did you know that? And there’s nothing that we can do to make him love us less. He died on the cross. Past tense for our sins, period. Like it’s finished. And so we need to be careful not to, again, take on a yoke of bondage by burdening ourselves with extra biblical or anti biblical expectations that we see maybe out there that can I just also remind us that maybe are influenced by not seeing a reality and just hearing the good part or seeing the good part.

There’s this real out there that’s that says skip to the good part. I don’t know if you’ve seen it. I know I probably just sang that wrong, but that doesn’t exist in real life. The reality is that we need to try to operate in reality, not constantly desiring to skip to the good part. Because the good part only happens when you’ve done the hard work in them now. So I hope that you guys are encouraged by what we’ve been talking about today, that sometimes what is the best is that we personally as parents are humbled. Sometimes that’s the lesson because God loves art, loves us and wants us to be walking in good character also, and he wants to equip us, right, so that we can actually impact the kingdom of God and the edification of the whole church. So that when we’re teaching, we’re teaching with a message of grace and not prescriptive, do this, do that, but instead having compassion and empathy and understanding. And that only comes from a place of humility and being truly honest with ourselves about what we walked through as parents, what we’re walking through as parents.

And so and so if you’re like after this, okay, what do I do? Well, lean into the Lord. Read Scripture, saturate your mind with the word, because the more you do that, the more you’re going to discern what’s good and not so good, the better. You’re going to be up to stand against bad opinions and wrong opinions and wrong advice and embrace the good wisdom because you’ll have the power of God running through you more clearly. So I think that’s really important to tap into God’s wisdom, to be reading His Word, to be praying for God, to reveal to you the right thing to do for your family. And I mean, that’s the whole reason we built the parenting mentor program, is to give people the scriptures and the practical knowledge to in the education, to become these biblically minded thinkers and to sirnas about the things that really matter.

When you’re asking God for wisdom, you can pray. Lord, help me to recall the Scripture. That is what you want me to do right now, like lead me, Lord. And I think that when we saturate, when we do the work that God calls us to do in saturating ourselves and abiding in Him and learning what the Word says and educating us ourselves on like what is the theology of parenting? What is the vision? God’s vision for parenting? What like.

How do you get to.

The heart of how do you get to the heart of your kids talking about purity, whether that’s physical, spiritual, all, all different aspects of purity. When we talk about obedience, discipleship, these are like literally the main sessions in the parenting program. And that’s so that parents have a full understanding of what God’s word actually says regarding these things so that we aren’t swayed by the opinions of the world. So we can stand firm, stand strong and go, Nope, I know my identity is in Christ. I know that that is a wayward philosophy. I am not going that direction. But you can’t guard your heart or guard your family or protect your family if you don’t know. And so, yes, the first step is sinking into the word. We have the same word you guys have. The Bible is good for teaching, rebuke, exhortation, all the things. And we just want to encourage you guys more than anything to reevaluate. Like if you’re in a place where you feel heavy and overwhelmed in your parenting, maybe it’s because you’ve you’ve fallen into a comparison trap of bondage. Maybe it’s because you’ve imposed extra biblical expectations from other people. Maybe you’ve been people pleasing too much in your parenting, and maybe you need an encouragement from the Word of God to stand firm in the things that He calls all of us to as parents, but in the liberty and freedom that he also gave us as a gift when Jesus died on the cross.

Thanks for joining us.

See you next time. Hey, thanks for listening to this episode. For more resources, go to courageous parenting and courageous mom. Com for free online workshops. Blog posts and best selling courses. 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 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 where we cover everything from obedience training to overcoming mistakes most Christians are making. But more than that, it’s a supportive community. You’ll have access to our private online group, Live Webcasts, 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 mentor program, secure your spot now at CourageousParenting.com