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Full Transcript:

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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.

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

Org. Join us as we start another important conversation about effective parenting in a fallen world. Hey, welcome to the podcast.

Hey guys. Today we are talking about a really important topic. It’s one that gets recommended or requested. Often it’s respect okay or the lack thereof right? Disrespect. So if you are feeling disrespected, we’re going to talk about four things that you can do today. All right. Um let’s talk about this for a second. Do you feel disrespected by your spouse?

Do you feel disrespected by your children?

Maybe when your kids are disobedient, you feel disrespect or your you hear them yelling or being mean to one another and you just feel like, man, there’s no respect in their relationships. Let me tell you, if you have said yes to any of these questions, I really want to encourage you to join us in the next Parenting Mentor program, where we are diving into six really crucial topics, and it is set up in an awesome way, where couples are sitting together or even going through the videos separately, but then coming together and going through some of the questions that we have, the date night questions that are in the parenting mentor packets, and we’re talking about topics like the heart. Do you have the heart of your child? We talk about sibling relationships in there. We talk about purity. We talk about theology, of parenting, all amazing topics. So if that’s something you’re interested in, we just want to invite you to find out more about that at Courageous Parenting.com.

And if you’re in the app, make sure you go through the Courageous Marriage series. It’s there and it’s so helpful. Uh, six hours of curriculum in there. It’s good. Oh, yeah.

I mean, we talk about oneness. We actually talk about this topic of respect and backing each other up. And so it’s free for.

Everybody that subscribes to the app. So you can get that free for a week. And maybe you could do the whole thing in a week and then cancel the app and boom, there you go. There you go.

Well you guys, let’s talk about this. Respect is a really big topic, but we are going to try to keep this succinct as we’re diving into the issue that a lot of parents have today with their kids being disrespectful. Um, I mentioned a few, um, ways that disrespect is shown to parents or ways that parents feel it. Let’s just go over that, you know, rolling eyes. You know, I think that even little kids, I’ve seen little kids at the park roll their eyes. And I know that our younger kids or our later children definitely picked it up earlier. And I think it’s because they saw it happening with their older siblings. Right. But generally speaking, I don’t think that we experienced that early on with our first few kids. It was more when they started getting older. And again, I wonder if it’s because they were exposed to things or other kids, right? Media, TV shows where that happened. Or maybe it’s just.

A lack of thank yous and things being left on the floor. And this, uh, disarray right after you clean things up, right?

I mean, that can feel disrespectful, for sure. Um, but then there’s other things, too, like say no specifically being, um, uh, deliberately, uh, in opposition against a parent that that can really feel as a parent, you can feel so disrespected when you hear a no. And I’m not talking about like, if you ask them a question, that’s a yes or no question. It’s when you ask tell them to do something and their responses. No, that can be a form of disrespect, but I think that all of those things we just mentioned, a whole lot of things we, you know, in the parenting Mentor program, in the heart section, we talk about how sin that kids are struggling with specifically or any, any, any human actually, um, are really symptoms of a deeper heart issue. And so, you know, as we’re diving into this, I just want to put that as the forefront thing as we’re talking about different things that people potentially struggle with or different, maybe as we’re discussing and sharing different things that we have either sensed or felt over the years, I just want to remind you that those are all symptoms of a heart problem. And really, at the base of this, what we would hope you would take away is a pursuit of your kids, of your spouse to have a stronger, deeper, more loving relationship because that truly is one of the the foundational things that’s going to fix this issue of disrespect.

Absolutely love each other. And the first thing we have, we have four things for you. But the first thing is to have some perspective about respect. First of all, in the world, authority doesn’t equal automatic respect. Just think about it. We don’t tend to respect things unless it’s earned in society. But what does the Bible actually say regarding parents? Right. It says it says we are to respect our parents. We’re to honor our parents. We’re to obey our parents. Right. So that is true 100%. And sometimes it can feel like, well, I have taught my children that I’ve taught them those scriptures, but yet they still disrespect me.

Well, you just brought something up. That’s really important too, because a lot of times people will start experiencing this like, um, frustration or feeling disrespected when their kids are really little. But I think having realistic expectations. Do my kids actually know what the Bible says? That’s the first thing for like moms and mommyhood, right? My encouragement like that is something that was huge for me in realizing, wait a second, do I have unrealistic expectations of my two year old and three year old in regards to how they treat me? Do they even know how they’re supposed to treat me? Have I explained it to them? Have I talked to them about how you know, how mommy talks to you with a calm voice? I would like for you to talk to me in a calm voice and realizing that sometimes we’ll take time to teach one kid and maybe even the next kid. But did we teach the third kid and.

Not additionally, you know, follies bound up in the heart of a child? The scripture says, so, you know, where is the maturity of our children? Yes. Are we expecting, uh, too much consistently? Well, we should don’t get me wrong. We should expect obedience. We should expect them to be respectful. But at the same time, on the other hand, we have to teach it, and we have to have an understanding of where they’re at, which is they’re in a maturing process and where to take them along that journey. And it can be frustrating as a parent, but having some perspective on that, I think is really important. It helps you not.

Be as frustrated because you’re actually able to go, oh, you know what? This is another opportunity, right? We talk about opportunity to teach them truth and to lead them and disciple them and point them to what the word says and what Jesus wants for them as a Christian. Right? Yeah. Um, but instead, a lot of times parents will get frustrated because they’re tired, exhausted, or they’ve dealt with the same issue over and over again throughout the day, and they’re just like, done, right. How many of you can relate to that?

So in the world, authority doesn’t earn respect unless, you know, just because someone has authority doesn’t mean we respect them. Right? But biblical truth is that we should respect our parents. So while that’s true, we should also lead in a way that makes it easier for children to respect us also. And so a lot of times, sometimes when you get frustrated, you lose your own self-awareness, you lose your own emotional self control. And then we’re expecting our children to have self-control. We’re expecting them to be respectful, but we’re losing our cool. And so we have to. We can’t be perfect. Of course not. But to the best of our ability, we have to realize that over time if we’re behaving poorly sometimes, but it’s consistently over a long period of time. As our children get older, we might be creating a wedge where it makes it hard for them to actually respect us and respect our wisdom and our words and so forth. And so you have to influence that teachable heart, right? We talked about that in the Parenting Mentor program, exactly how to do that. But you have to influence that. And part of that is actually we do need to I hate to say it this way, but we do need to influence their respect by good leadership, right? Even though it is true in the Bible, they should just respect us.

You know, one way you’ve put it in the past that I really like is that let’s make it easy for you, said gents. Let’s make it easy for our wives to respect us. Hey, parents, let’s make it easy for our kids to respect us. Yeah, and we we have a choice, right? In how we act and how we treat our kids. Um, having mutual respect, even with that scripture of having reverence for one another out of submission to the Lord. And like, as your kids get older, like recognizing they’re going to be brothers and sisters in Christ, and they are also it gives you a different perspective in how you’re communicating, and not just to be authoritatively communicating to your kids all the time, but also speaking to them in the way you would want to be spoken to. If we parent in a way that is biblical, we’re going to treat other people the way we would want to be treated. And that includes remembering back to when we were a kid sometimes and trying to go, okay, hold on a second. Did I appreciate being talked to or talked down to in such a way? And did it make me feel? How did that make me feel? I don’t want to do that to my children and like having that introspection and really like evaluating, okay, put myself in my kids shoes right now.

How might they be taking this as I’m talking to them? Yeah. And that’s that’s a hard thing for parents to do in the midst of it. But it’s an important thing for us to sit back for a second, go. You know what? Maybe I should probably try to do that more. Put myself in my kids shoes for a second just so I have some perspective and love them. Treat them the way that I would want to be treated. So that means as parents, when we’re even, when we’re disciplining or we’re correcting our children to have a calmness about us and to talk to them in a way that is respectable, right, and respectful and, and then also expecting them to speak to us respectfully. If we’re just if we’re yelling, then we shouldn’t ask, why are you yelling at me? You know what I mean?

And you might be that authoritarian kind of parent or have some of that if you respond really sharply because I said so. And that might be a sign once in a while. But if that’s a recurring thing, there might be a sign that you’re just feeling like. Your authority is there regardless of your behavior. And it is so. You’re right. Is there? Yes. You’re right. Yes. But when we’re dealing with sometimes foolish people, little people, we might be making it hard for them.

Mhm.

Well it’s interesting because you know, as biblical parents, of course we’re going to read scriptures like children obey your parents in the Lord. Right. For this is right. And we’ll get to that scripture a little bit later here. But when we, we read scriptures like even Leviticus 19 three, this is another good scripture. Like for those of you who maybe haven’t fully been discipling your children and been explaining to them, God’s Word says this. Actually, God does actually have a word for children. And it’s really simple. It says, every one of you shall Revere his mother and his father and keep my Sabbath. I am the Lord your God.

Tied it in with the Sabbath, boom, boom.

I mean, and that’s Leviticus 19 three. There’s one, one great scripture to memorize with your kids, to teach your kids. Another one would be Proverbs 13 one. It says, a wise son heeds his father’s instruction, but a scoffer does not listen to rebuke. So how many times if you’re struggling with your kids actually listening when you’re correcting them, or they’re like, not remorseful, they’re not repentant, they’re not like at that heart posture yet, like in a good time to like when you’re not in the midst of the the dealing with the situation, it would be a good thing to be memorizing this scripture. So like maybe the next morning, read Proverbs 13 one and and talk about like, hey, do you want to be wise? Well, God’s Word has some wisdom for you on how to be wise. Here’s one example A wise son heeds his father’s instruction. Do you know what heed means? And you go through these like verse, verse by verse with your kids, and you explain it to them. And then when they’re struggling, you can even like reference back. Do you remember the verse that we read yesterday morning? Do you remember the verse we read this morning? Oh yeah.

Okay. I’m struggling with that now. So it helps when you have been purposefully discipling your children and what reverence, respect and honor looks like scripturally so that you can help them to recall. And guess what’s so beautiful about this? You guys, this is actually teaching your kids that in the midst of struggling with the temptation to sin or needing to be corrected, you’re teaching them how to recall scripture, and that’s a skill that you want your kids to have when they’re older, that when they’re in the midst of conflict that they would recall Scripture when they’re in the midst of, um, making a hard decision and trying to be wise, they would remember Scripture and then maybe they would go, oh, wait, you know what? My dad actually went through something like this. I wonder what he would say. And reaching out to him. Like, there’s so many ways that this one scripture could actually be an encouragement to kids as they grow up. So this.

Is discipleship. It’s woven into the fabric of your everyday life. It’s such an important thing. We talk about extensively in the Parenting Mentor program. Exactly how to do that, resources to use, and so forth. But the Bible is so powerful using it as a tool. And it’s not about that. One time you taught them that scripture that Angie’s talking about when you wrote that scripture down. I want you to realize that it’s about the 100th time that you taught them that Scripture or more. And so parenting is a repetitious thing that God has us doing. It is a long game thing. There’s nothing short game about it. It is all long game. It takes so long to train up God’s people. And he designed it that way. He designed it so that human beings, uh, amongst the species, takes the longest or one of the longest to grow into maturity and launch. That’s his plan. Cool. But you know what? We get to be parents that have children in our nest for the longest of any of the species. So let’s take.

Advantage of that time. Right? Like here’s another verse in first Thessalonians five, verse 12. It says, and we urge you, brethren, to recognize those who labor among you and are over you in the Lord, and admonish you and to esteem them very highly in love for their work’s sake. Be at peace among yourselves. This is another scripture that like obviously, it’s talking about even within the church body, right? And that there’s people who labor and who are spiritually over you. But isn’t this also describing the role of a parent in a child’s life? I think it beautifully does. Yeah. There we labor to provide for our children. So we labor among our kids. Right? And we are over them in the Lord. And we’re called to admonish them, and they are called to esteem us very highly in love. In love not because we’re the parents, not because we have a title, but there to esteem us in love. And it’s really wonderful because it says for their work’s sake. Why would it say for the work’s sake, let me just tell you something. Like, sometimes it can be really hard to do the same mundane thing over and over and over again. If you feel unappreciated, let’s just say it. But the truth is, is when you feel appreciated, when you feel respected, esteemed very highly in love from your spouse or your child because of the work that you did and they appreciate it, don’t you feel much more like you’re willing to do it again? God knows that that’s how we function as humans, and so we need to teach this and explain it to our kids and not have expectations of them without having taught them something, but not using that as an excuse not to discipline our children.

Like a lot of parents I see out there today, they’re like using the expectations thing as an excuse for why they wouldn’t necessarily hold a kid accountable. And that’s not what we’re saying here at all. We as parents are called to train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it. We have to teach our children. It’s our responsibility. It’s not their fault if we fail on our responsibility. And so we need to do our part in teaching them and holding them accountable and correcting them and pointing them to the word, discipling them, but also having expectations in the sense of not expecting from the three year old what we would from the 13 year old that’s had 13 years of discipleship.

We just want to take a second to share the Parenting Mentor program with you. Over 3000 parents have had their legacies forever impacted. I mean, it is incredible what God’s doing with the Parenting Mentor Program, the self-paced program at Courageous Parenting.com. Let’s just listen for a moment and then we’ll get back to the podcast episode.

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

What Angie and Isaac have done in 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 the vision for not just the different things that we might focus on as parents who are trying to raise our kids biblically, like how our kids are behaving or what we’re doing with discipline, but also the things of the 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.

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 lights to be leaders for the next generation, right?

I do think, though, our word needs to be as good as gold to our children and to ourselves. I’ve said that so many times, but what I mean by that is when we say something, we follow through. And you were just talking about correction and discipline with parents who consistently follow through in correcting their children are respected and not in a fear based way, of course. I mean, sometimes that happens, right? People do it wrong and they create fear. I’m not talking about that at all. We would never prescribe to that. But what we’re talking about is a biblical approach to discipline, which includes pointing your children to Christ while also correcting them in an effective way. And that’s really, really important to do both of those in when you’re correcting your children. And that yields a respect. And the why that is, I don’t know fully why that is. We’ll have to ask God someday in heaven. But we do need to obey God and what he says to do with children. They need that. And in fact, in Hebrews 12 nine it says, furthermore, we have had human fathers who corrected us and we paid them respect.

Shall we? Not much more readily being subject to the father of spirits and live like that’s huge. Like when our kids, when we’re expecting our kids or training our kids to be obedient to us. First time obedience. We’re all for first time obedience, right? But this is why it’s not because we want them to be good at quickly obeying humans. It’s because it’s actually training them. We are pointing our kids to Christ, to God, to His Word over and over again. And if they can’t obey you, the parent who the person who in this world, no one loves them more than the parent, right? And if they know that and they can’t obey you, think of how hard it’s going to be for them to obey God, who they maybe don’t have a deep relationship with, yet they can’t. Their God isn’t physically sitting in front of them in the same kind of context that you are, and we’re trying to teach them and train them up not to be obedient to us for the rest of their lives, but to be obedient to God for the rest of their lives.

This concept of having respect is exactly the same as obedience. Like if they if your kids cannot respect you, how in the world are they going to respect God? So as parents, when we are trying to teach our children the importance of honor and reverence and esteem and respect and submission to authority, it’s actually all for one main goal. It’s so that it’s easier for our kids to do all of those things in a loving motivation towards their Heavenly Father. And so when when our heart is not like, oh, if they would just obey me, this whole getting in the car thing would be so much faster and so much easier. Do you see how that’s so different than mommy wants you to obey her? Because I love you. I want what’s best for you. I want you to be safe. You need to have your seatbelt on, but you need to obey. Mom. Why? Because you need to get good at obeying so that you can also be obedient to God. And God tells you to obey mom and.

You get to it reveals where the heart is at. Yeah, it’s a heart indication of a heart issue. And so you get a tend their hearts in those moments of correcting them. And so that has to be done. Well. We explain it as a ten steps to biblical discipline. We do that in the parenting program. So but that’s a full thing that we can’t possibly do here on the podcast. Right? So it’s so important that you do that well in a loving way and you’re consistent. You know, if you follow through six or 7 or 8 times out of ten, you might be patting yourself on the back, hey, I’m better than the other gal, I’m better than the other guy. But you know what? You can’t compare to others, and that isn’t good enough. Actually. We need to follow through. Our word needs to be as good as gold. That time where you say something’s going to happen and then you don’t follow through on it. They seem to remember that more than everything else. So it’s really, really important that you follow through where. And so that’s our tip for you is where do you need to change. What do you need to change? Something needs to be changing. If you’re feeling exasperated yourself, if you’re feeling burned out as a parent, if you’re feeling disrespected and not even valued by your family, then maybe something needs to change within you, right?

Oh wow. So we had like a list of things in regards to this topic of something changing within you. And you just made me think of something else that we don’t even have on our list. That’s so important. Maybe what needs to change inside the mom or dad is that they’re listening to the lies of feeling unappreciated when they are actually appreciated and they’re just struggling, and their walk with the Lord and having a strong identity in him and, and and actually seeing that God does value what they do in the home that’s unseen by the world. Yeah. So, so incredibly it’s so incredibly valuable. And maybe they’re believing the lies that are within them. They’re they’re their own worst critic. All of us moms are our own worst critic. I think dads probably are their own worst critic, too.

Yeah, that’s hitting me right now. I’m like, whoa, wow. Yeah. That’s how.

Many times do we feel unvalued when that wasn’t our.

Child’s.

Expectation? How many times do we feel unappreciated when that wasn’t our spouse’s intention? Mhm. And this is the thing you say something all the time to me which um well you used to we both now say it to each other but that’s expected virtue. And I think sometimes as parents we especially when we’re dealing in the trenches and we’re dealing with correcting a lot of littles over and over and over again. And you can get exhausted with that, and you can feel like it’s just all so negative. Right? And I just want to encourage you to start looking for the blessings, start looking for the good things that you can affirm in your kids. Also, because our kids don’t just need discipline and correction, they need affirmation. They need us to point them to what good, godly character. Your qualities we do see in them, and that they should be practicing and to encourage them in those things as much as they like. It’s a teeter totter. There needs to be the same amount, and when one side’s too heavy, then it’s drudgery. And so. And when one side’s the too heavy and there’s only affirmation and never any correction, then you grow a bunch of prideful kids with an entitlement attitude that think that they’re they’re perfect and they’re not good at admitting when they’re wrong. And so it’s a teeter totter, you guys. And but but yeah, what needs to change in you. Do you believe lies or hey, maybe we need to ask ourselves if there’s any, um, patterns, habits that we have that need to change. Like if we lack self-control, then we certainly can’t expect our kids to have it. Otherwise we’re a hypocrite.

Maybe something needs to change in your marriage. Maybe there’s disrespect shown towards each other in front of the children. Maybe it’s just sarcasm, but children don’t quite understand how to do their own sarcasm and it just comes across as disrespect. And maybe for the parents, it’s joking with each other, but when the kids try it, they get in trouble for it, and you’re not realizing that they’re trying to mimic a version of what they’re seeing you do. And so we have to realize that they’re not as mature. And it it might not be appropriate to joke with you like your husband jokes with you. And maybe we need to look at that. Maybe some of that is not healthy in the first place in the couple relationship, and you need to talk to each other about it, because it is so important that they see a husband and a wife that respect each other, honor each other, encourage each other, lift each other up, build each other up, back each other up. And if any of those areas aren’t there, then you definitely need to pray about that. You definitely need to talk about that. And we encourage you to also take the Courageous Marriage series, because it really goes into that, uh, Sue too. So that’s super important. And then in Ephesians right here, six one through seven, it says, children, obey your parents in the Lord. For this is right. You want to get this one down. Remember this Ephesians six one, okay.

And then it goes on to say, honor your father and mother, which is the first commandment with a promise. And the promise is right here. It’s quoting the Old Testament. I believe that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth. Don’t forget the promise. Don’t say the first part to your children. Without the promise, that’s the why. And you know it’s like that. What I said before. When they ask why, and the parent goes, because I told you so. No, no, no, no, we don’t want to be like that. We human beings want to know the reason why they’re getting in trouble, or the reason why they’re being corrected, or the reason why something happens. And so children, obey your parents in the Lord. For this is right. Well, well, why? Why does God say that? It says it right here. It says that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth. This is for the abundance of your life. This is so that your life can glorify God in the future. This is so that you can be useful for your creator, right? This is so powerful. And then it goes on to say, and you fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord. And you know, that’s not a permission for mothers to do that. No, no.

No, that word is for both mothers and fathers. Um, it kind of goes this is a very similar scripture to Colossians 321. You guys can go look that one up. But this is another thing that maybe someone needs to change in them. Maybe they are provoke their children to anger or provoke them to be discouraged and then their disrespect. The response comes across as disrespectful because they’re angry. And maybe that’s because parents are disobeying God’s word and they’re provoking their children. So that would be us as parents needing to see that and change our response or our leadership so that we’re not provoking our child to be disrespectful. And, you know, I think that it goes both ways, right? Like, so we just really held the parents accountable right there and said, hey, is there anything that you need to change? That was one of the things, one of the four things that they can do if they’re struggling with disrespect. The first thing that we talked about, just to remind you, is that the first thing you could do is you can disciple your kids about what respect and honor and reverence mean. What does the Bible say about these things? Make sure your kids are taught what the Bible says, that there’s clear expectations. This is how we are to be in relationship with one another.

Why? Because it’s loving. It’s. It’s what God’s Word says is love to be respectful of one another. And if if you’re respectful in the way you talk to me, it’s easy for me to be respectful in the way I talk to you and vice versa. Parents, it goes both ways. So there’s two of them. The third thing is to pursue relationship more. One of the things that for me as a mom, whenever I am seeing a pattern. So I’m not talking about a one instance, um, sin situation that is corrected, talked about, prayed through all the things, right? We go through the ten steps of biblical discipline, but I’m talking about a pattern. Of this same specific thing that I have, like when I do the sin diagnosis that we talk about in the Parenting Mentor program more when I go through the process and I’m really prayerful and I’m introspective and I’m examining like, what are the issues that this child is really struggling with, and it narrows down to disrespect or defiance, then I, I can easily go, okay, hold on a second. Now I need to go through this process. Have I discipled my kids? Do they know what the Word of God says? Are there clear expectations? Then? Am I doing something that needs to be changed that is causing them to lose respect for me? Like, am I provoking my kids? Or am I a hypocrite? Or am I believing a lie in their actually being respectful? But I’m messed up in my head for some reason, right? Okay.

But then I go, okay, so I already have discipled them. They. I know for sure that the ten year old knows what the Bible says. Check. I’ve already gone through this self-examination process. I’ve gone before the Lord. I have a clear conscience before him and my kiddo. Check. Then you go. Maybe it’s my relationship. Do I need to pursue my relationship? Have is there not a closeness in our relationship? And that’s really going to be the key to getting my child’s heart. Because remember what we said, all of the things are actually symptoms of a heart problem. And sometimes if there’s distance in a relationship and your kid doesn’t feel loved and all of the things, then it’s hard for them to reciprocate that, and then we start seeing them act out. So you go through this process, right? And then and you’re evaluating, is this their sin? Is this, is this my sin? Is this that they don’t know? Is this that I need to pursue relationship.

And that’s one of the best ways to know sometimes if you’re going through and you don’t really know, is there something I need to change? Maybe I need to ask them. Guess what? The best way to ask them is? When it’s one on one, you’re pursuing relationship and you go, hey, I’ve been noticing that we’re just like hitting, right? It’s like two heads butting up against each other. We’re not, like, communicating, right? And I don’t like that. I love you, and I want our communication to be better. And I miss having a close relationship with you and like, calling it out onto the table and going, I love you. Like, how can we get past this? Did I do something? Did you do something like, what’s going on here? When you pursue relationship with your kids, sometimes that’s where you hear the answer of what the breakthrough thing is, and then you find out they’re going through a hard time. Okay, I can have some compassion and understanding, but hey, you really shouldn’t be talking to mom that way. Oh yeah, I’m sorry, mom, blah blah blah. Or maybe they go, yeah, when you did this, it really offended me. And you, you can go, oh, there is something I need to change. And I didn’t even know it.

You can also coach them. You can coach them on how to handle that the next time they feel the way they feel. So you go, hey, you know, the next time you start to feel like disobeying and I want you to think back to like, what makes you feel that way. You just don’t want to do it, right. You just or you want to do the opposite when you feel that way. My encouragement to you is to pray to God real quick. You can be a silent prayer, but just God, help me to obey my mom and teach them what we have to do, right? Don’t we have to do that when we need to feel like need to be corrected? And we need to ask God for help, his strength and wisdom and so forth. And so teach them how to pray in those little moments where they feel like being disobedient and you go, hey, it’s a problem to disobey me. But the bigger issue is you’re actually disobeying God because the Bible says, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right. So you may live long and prosper in the land, right? I think there’s a little more to that last part, but we read it earlier. So you remind them of that scripture and you go, so this is kind of a big deal, you know, and it, it, it it tears on our harmony and relationship.

Right. So the next thing you do that I want you to pray. And then I want you to think to yourself, what’s the right thing to do? Not what you feel. Because there’s going to be many times in life where we have to do the right thing, even though we don’t feel like it. In fact, a success principle and this depends on how old they are. A success principle is people that are the most successful are the people that can get themselves to do the things they don’t want to do most often that are needed to do to be successful. And so that’s really important. And this is where I want to help you when you’re doing that. And if you need help with this, make sure you ask me. And if you are in a moment of being disobedient, I you can you can stop at any moment. So realize that you’re getting beside yourself where it’s harder to recognize what’s happening. But I want you to take a pause to pray after the fact, too, and ask God to help you settle down and these kinds of things, because that God’s there for you. He’s always there. He hears your prayers and he wants to help you.

That’s right. So the last thing obviously we’ve been talking about prayer here. That’s the last thing that’s on our list of four things that you can do. Right. And so to really dig in with the Lord, come before his throne, plead, intercede for your child, for your relationship, for your heart with God, that God would point out anything in you that needs to change, that God would be very clear about what is going on in your child’s heart, so that you can pray specifically, and then teaching them how to pray for themselves and pray for their relationships also. Then the other aspect of prayer, which is when two or more are gathered, right? There is power in prayer and teaching your kids this gift of prayer and communication. Even just sitting one on one and saying, Lord, we love you and our relationship has really been struggling lately. Would you please heal and mend our relationship? Help me to speak more kindly. Help my child to be more respectful in their response. Give us a heart that wants to be obedient to you. Give my child a heart that wants to obey mom and Dad. Like you’re literally teaching them how to bring their problem, their sin, their struggle. That’s a spiritual battle before the throne of God and give it to him and ask him to help. That is one of the best gifts that we can give our kids is to teach them how to pray, how to communicate with the Lord and invite them into that space when we’re doing it, when we’re experiencing the Lord, and when we are able to then go through the rest of the day with more peace, with like a more purposefulness in relationship with there being less tension because we sat and we prayed together.

That speaks volumes to your child as far as the power of prayer and faith in relationships. And so we just really want to encourage you guys, um, this is something that, you know, we’re still in the trenches of it. We have seven kids at home. Right? And it’s just like, this is an ongoing sanctification of parenting is walking through these heart issues, whether it’s your heart issue, your kids heart issue, but recognizing that sin is sin and that it separates us in our relationship with God and with other people. But God, Jesus himself, came and died on the cross so that we could be reconciled to him, to God the Father, to one another and walk in true fellowship. Thank you so much for joining us, you guys. 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.

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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 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.