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Full Transcript:

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

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

Hi, I’m Angie from Courageous.

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

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

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

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

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

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

Hey guys.

This is an important topic I think right now really hit us as we were praying, thinking about what to talk to you today about. And you know, it always comes from the heart. It comes from what God’s working on through us and so forth. Uh, we don’t really look outside for what to do. We really look inside. We do get some of your requests sometimes those are very helpful. So we welcome your direct requests. But this is what we’re talking about. Perfect is the enemy of thriving. Mhm.

So right now I mean obviously this is a season. There are a few seasons within family life where there’s um a need for change. There’s a desire for change. Maybe this is a time of year when people are evaluating and looking for areas they want to grow in. Um, but there’s also the times of year when, especially for moms, usually this is more in their jurisdiction. But dads too, where you’re getting back into routines of starting up school again or you’re starting a new year in or you’re starting a new sports, or there’s something going on with your kids and you’re trying to get that routine going again. Maybe you’re starting new curriculums and it can become overwhelming for people, right. And so, you know, this element of like evaluating perfect versus important is something we’re going to talk about today. Yeah.

It’s so important to I mean as guys we might have some unfinished things that we’re hoping got done before the end of the year. We might have some things not ready for the new year, or there might be wow. In terms of provision like, wow, you know, a whole new year, how’s how’s this going to happen? What are our. And we’re walking in faith. Well, hey, I can raise my hand and go. We’re walking in faith in that category for the ministry and for our family and everything, and it’s, uh. But just remember, perfect is the enemy of thriving. There is no perfect. There is no way to achieve it. And while we all agree with that, we really have to look inside and go, are we pursuing perfection and don’t even realize it? And it’s causing us to have discontentment. It’s causing us to have comparison challenges with other people. Maybe, you know, social media, social media kind of puts things up there, uh, in a perfect way. And all the ways you can create perfection, whether it’s make your skin look better, you can you can have, you know, these screens you put across, you can edit things, you can oh.

Filters.

All the dial things where you can do a.

Video, you can change.

Your background. You could even technically we don’t do these things, but you could have I even create a whole thing. Yeah. You know, so we’re in a world where through technology, people are going to make things look more and more perfect.

Than they really are. But yeah.

It’s not real. And we know it’s not real. But sometimes we start comparing anyways. And I just want to encourage you that if you pursue perfection, you’re going to be frustrated. Yeah. And it’s going to kill your joy. And this time of year too, when you’re all together for Christmas or New Year’s and these kinds of things, even.

Summer break, if you’re listening to this in the fall.

Reality is exposed, isn’t it? Yeah. Reality about the challenge of keeping the house together with so many people or the challenge of, you know, behavior and attitudes? Uh, the challenge maybe your marriage, you’re seeing that more because you’re around each other more these kinds of things. And so I think it’s important to be encouraged. And our encouragement is get rid of perfect because it’s not real and it’s not possible. Only Jesus is perfect. And thank goodness he’s perfect to make up for our imperfect.

So good. So before we dive in here, guys, we just wanted to say thank you for joining us on this journey to impact 10 Million Legacies. We’re super excited to be starting this next year. This podcast is actually going to be going live on the 2nd of January. Can you believe that? That’s super exciting. Um, last week we talked about how we hit five years of doing the Courageous Parenting podcast. It was kind of an anniversary episode, if you will. If you haven’t listened to that, please go back and listen to it. You can find it at Be Courageous Ministry. Org where that is the host website of all the things you guys, if you didn’t know that if you’re a new listener because this title of perfect is the enemy of thriving, just really like hit you and you’re here. Thank you for joining us today. We’re Isaac and Angie, and we’re happy you’re here with us. Um, but we just wanted to encourage you guys as we’re diving into this topic. This is something this is a conversation that I think could be impactful at any point throughout the year, at any point, throughout any season in parenting. Yeah.

And you can get there through Be Courageous Ministry. Org or go straight to courageous Parenting.com for the show notes and the YouTube video of this episode. So you can see, you know, us drinking our coffee. I guess you have water.

Water today.

All these kinds of things. But also, uh, you can see the parenting mentor program there. And it’s I really believe it’s an essential thing for all parents. It is the biblical foundation. Practical insights. Get your marriage in alignment. Uh, on how to parent in a changed world. Literally, things are different. How previous generations of parented, even if it’s good, um, it’s likely not good enough for what’s going on in today’s world. There’s different threats and things, while biblical truth never changes. How? That’s. Lived out looks a little different. So it’s important to do that. So learn more. Courageous parenting.com. Of course everything someone purchases is how we’re able to do all the free stuff every single week. Free Courageous Parenting podcast, Resolute Man podcast, all the workshops and free resources and posts and everything.

Yep. So awesome. Well, let’s dive in you guys. We just want to share with you guys, um, from John chapter 15. This is when Isaac’s like most favorite verses. Well, yeah.

You know, we had a vineyard so that in the past that was kind of amazing experience. But this this is such a good verse. I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away. And every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit, more fruit. So either you’re being taken away or you’re fruitful so he prunes you. Pruning isn’t an easy thing on the plant, meaning it probably doesn’t feel so good, right? You’re cutting part of the plant off right? Part. So when we’re pruned, it’s not necessarily gonna feel good. All feeling great. And he prunes the fruitful. So God is constantly trying to refine us and help us to be more fruitful so that he is glorified through you and your family.

Yes. And this entire chapter on the vine really is about being fruitful as a Christian. And when I think of thriving and I think of the word fruitful, they really are synonymous to one another. They really, truly go together. Because if you’re desiring to be thriving as an individual in your walk with God, if you’re thriving, if you’re desiring to have a thriving marriage, if you’re desiring to have a thriving family, um, to have your, your, your family life or even your home, like if you evaluate any aspect of your life like homemaking or cooking or different things, you and you want it to be fruitful, you want it to be good fruit, right? You read through this scripture and you can evaluate any of those topics really any topic, financial health, any of those things. And this is that time of year when I think a lot of times people are really evaluating, like, what are the different areas of my life, what areas could be better, what areas are not thriving? That’s a really paying word. But biblically, God uses the word fruitful. And so one of the things that’s important to recognize is that God, in this very first verse, first two verses that Isaac shared, God is acknowledging that things are not perfect and that even good fruit is not perfect in the sense of like, oh, you want to keep that because it’s perfect.

He’s saying, I’m gonna prune it so it can have even better fruit. More. More is actually the word that’s used here. And so that’s our desire for you guys, is that you would be thriving. There would be fruitfulness in your marriages and in your families, that there would be a spiritual fruitfulness more than anything that’s coming out of your lives and shining for the glory of God and for the, the, the betterment of the kingdom of God. Right. Like the Great Commission. But really, what does that all come down to? It fizzles all down to the individual lives and the fruitfulness that’s there. But when we’re trying to pursue perfection and we’re not willing to surrender our lives to some pruning and to some hard, then we’re not actually ever going to get to a place of real fruitfulness.

You can’t you can’t have thriving without adversity. The reason is adversity is actually what helps us to thrive. Human beings without adversity fall prey to all kinds of wrong things, bad things, because we need those experiences to cause us to grow, to cause us to be refined, to think for things that we learn from. Right. And so it’s important when we face that adversity, when we’re pruned, that we respond in a godly way because we’re in the Bible, we’re praying and so forth, and we give the best response possible so God can use it for good in our lives and in others. And it becomes a testimony, too. And so it’s really important so to understand thriving, thriving isn’t this status quo thing that you reach and then you’re always at this spot. Thriving is a journey. You’re on a journey and it’s super important. And that goes into our next point, which is it’s important to embrace growth, personal development and willingness for change to happen, willingness to be pruned in an embrace that and embrace that change. Not pursuing perfection, but just pursuing what God wants for our lives and how he wants to use us, and not being so independent in in our own will that we miss the divine opportunities and what God is trying to tell us. And my experience is he’s telling me to grow when I face something challenging. I’m like, God, how do you want me to grow? What areas do I need to grow in? And it’s not to keep everything perfect, because if we try and keep everything perfect, we’re going to it’s going to be a challenge.

Well, nothing ever really is perfect, right? Like you. Can you even clean your kitchen in five seconds later? It can be a mess if you have a house that’s lived in where your kids are there, right? You know that real well. Oh yeah, real well. And we’ll talk more about that in just a few minutes. But, you know, our first point that we were talking about was that thriving isn’t perfect. I just wanted you guys to to hear that boldly for a second. And then the second point that we were talking about is that growth happens when you are actually experiencing hardship at times when you’re experiencing that pruning, whether it’s a pruning of bad fruit or a pruning of good fruit so that you can have more and that there is there is really throughout Scripture, we see lots of different encouragements for this because the reality is in life, life is not ever perfect. You may go through a season where things are well, like, you know, there’s maybe no financial struggle. Wouldn’t that be nice? We I mean, we’ve had seasons of that, right? Where it’s just like there is a financial fruitfulness that’s happening and, you know, but the reality is, is when you get older and you look back over your life, you know that that’s not like the experience of all your life, right? There were hardships that you had to overcome that grew your character, that grew the perseverance that grew, that you you learned some things, whether it was, hey, you know what? This isn’t the most important thing in life.

I need to invest over here because this is actually more important. Like, you learn those things as you are on the journey that you’re talking about. And our encouragement to you guys is to recognize that thriving doesn’t mean that life is perfect. So if you see people out there on Instagram who are portraying perfect, perfect relationships, perfect parenting, perfect marriage, oh, we’ve got it together. Listen to us like that doesn’t exist. It’s not actually real. And what is real is that in every family, there are challenges. In every single family that I’ve ever encountered. There has never been perfect. When you get down to the nitty gritty. Yeah. And I would hope that you guys would know that, like with us, that’s the that’s the reality. Like we’ve never tried to portray that there was perfect.

I feel like the older I get, the more I realize how unperfect I am. Yeah, actually. And, um, I think I’ve always known, um, imperfect. And then when I came to understand the gospel, I really that’s when I really understood I was perfect, imperfect at age 23. And it’s just been a journey. And so I, I think I’ve kind of embraced that. I also from a, my business background, I understand that, you know, there’s this state of things that’s always there’s always more to do than can be done. There’s always, you know, some things unfinished and so forth. And maybe that’s just because we’ve been open to whatever God wants to do in our lives. And so things have. There’s some things there’s always a.

Lot of things going on.

There’s a lot of a lot of things going on.

Multiple plates, multiple businesses.

It forces a trust in him and help and these kinds of things. And um, but I instead of having anxiety about it, I’ve learned to just understand that I just need to focus on whatever the most important things are. And there’s always going to be more to do, and there’s always some things not done. And I live well with that, but I think it’s because I’m not pursuing perfect well.

And also like understanding that perfect isn’t attainable, number one. And even if you can catch a glimpse of it, like you just get your car cleaned, right? Like I cleaned the car the other day and I had Solomon with me and he was like, mom, let’s take the car through the car wash. I’m like, great idea. And then we pull over and we’re in there and we’re vacuuming and I’m wiping down the windows and all the things, and I’m like, it’s still not perfect. Like it. It would take me days of complete focus to get this car perfect, but then we would get in it and it wouldn’t be perfect anymore.

And then you’d drive up our quarter mile dirt.

Road road, and then there’s mud on the back part of it from the tires. Like it’s just that’s the reality. That’s life. It’s a really good example of like how you could run yourself ragged constantly trying to keep up a perfection or an element of that and then be discontent within minutes. And I think that there’s something that we as Christians need to, and humans that we need to acknowledge about living in a fallen world and not putting expectations even on our children, children, regarding this concept of what we’re pursuing or what we want them to pursue. Right? Like, yes. Like I said earlier, stewardship is a good thing to be pursuing, right? So like for me, perfectionism is something that I’ve had to overcome over the years. And there are times when I’m in my flesh, maybe not in the word as much, or not relying on the Lord. Or you know how it is the challenge to be walking by the flesh versus walking by the spirit. There are those times where I can get agitated by mess, or by things being disorganized or jobs being undone, right? And I have a choice in those moments. I don’t always make the right choice, but I have a choice in those moments to either teach it with patience and kindness and help them to get the. Job done, remind them to get the job done, or I can be more in my flesh where I get frustrated and.

That’s the cost that we’ll talk about, which is there’s there are real costs. If you are pursuing perfection, maybe you think you’re not pursuing perfection, but listen to some of these costs. And if you see some of these costs in your life, then maybe you are a little bit shooting for something unattainable. And I think I think it’s super transparent to for you to say that that’s super cool.

Well, I mean, even when we were talking about this, I was thinking back, and I’ve shared this story in previous podcast episodes on the topic of hospitality. But there were years when I even, um, you know, when we were practicing hospitality, we were put in charge of hospitality at one of the churches that we went to for new people. And I remember at the time, I think we had two children and so super little, not really capable of helping to too much, but I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off, trying to make everything perfect and and no, don’t get those toys out. I just put those away. Go put those back and snap it at the kids left and right. And and Isaac comes home in the midst of it and he’s like, what can I what’s going on? I’m like, we have the potluck tonight, you know? And and there was that moment where you kind of held me accountable and you said, hey, this isn’t really worth it if it’s going to be like this. And, um, I just, like, took me back. And at first I didn’t, like, repent right away and change. But I thought about it as I went along, trying to vacuum and get all the things done before the first guests arrived. And I just, I what I hated more than anything was that I was grumpy and I was frustrated because I was working really hard and I wasn’t able to attain that perfection that I was striving for. And then the guests get there, and I have to change my attitude in that moment to be kind and and receiving.

And that just felt fake. And I, I’ve always hated fake. And that was actually the thing that really hit me the most was, no, I need to be the same and my kids need to see me be the same. So now I’m feeling really convicted. You put what Isaac said to me together with like the the little kid that’s got the tears because I just snapped and said, put that toy back, you know, and and I just was like, this isn’t the way I want my life to go. And we all have to get to a place right where we’re reflective of how our, um, the things that we are desiring for, um, can I just say the word idolatry? Because I think that there was an element and this was years before social media even existed, but there was this element of idolatry that I had made over having a clean home in order to practice hospitality. And I was faced with, am I going to ruin relationships within my family to have the perfect home? And I know I had to come to that realization and and literally verbalize and say, no, I don’t want this anymore. And so that was, I think, where real big change started to happen for me. It doesn’t mean that I didn’t have moments where I struggled with that because we’re all human. But I will say that over the years, I think having many kids and being married for 24 years, you start to go, you know what? This isn’t eternal. And and you open the door to the neighbor, even if the house is chaotic.

Yeah, because I’d rather have hospitality and a not perfect home than a perfect home and no hospitality. I’d rather have relationships with my children in a not perfect home than a perfect home in a poor relationship with my children when they get in the teenage years. So it’s really like, you know, and you might be thinking, well, maybe I can get both done if you can, that’s great. But you know what? Just beware of any perfectionism in you. Be diligent. Productive for sure. But there’s only so much you can do. And we’ve experienced a lot of people don’t do hospitals because their house is never good enough. Uh, and ready. Or they don’t want.

To do the cleanup because hospitality does create a mess. And so they don’t want to have to put in the work of cleaning up afterwards.

But we kind of some people look at their homes as shelter for themselves. We do look at that, but we also look at it as an embassy for God to use to impact other people through hospitality and for, you know, just building friendships and things like that. And so how do you maybe think about how you look at your home? Um, but in James one two it says, count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet various trials. Excuse me when you meet various. Uh, let me start again. Count it all, joy. My brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces steadfastness. And let steadfastness have its full effect, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. Such a good verse. I mean steadfastness. We should desire steadfastness more than perfection. Hey guys.

I just want to take a quick minute to invite you to join me in the Be Courageous app. In there, we have a group that’s exclusive for guys. The Blue Man Group. And then we also have the Courageous Mom group that’s exclusive for women. And this year I’m really excited about engaging more with people in a really authentic way. We’re going to be continuing to build community. It’s a great place for people to have a safe place to share, um, whether that’s prayer requests or things that they’re learning from the Lord. And I hope that you would consider joining me in there as I’m going to be doing lives on a regular basis I’m super excited about, but also sharing things that the Lord’s just been teaching me. And I hope that you’re encouraged by it as well. You know, it’s interesting too. Whenever I read scriptures like this, I think to myself, why would God put that verse? Why would God put this scripture passage in the Bible? Well, because it’s real. It’s the reality of life living in a fallen world. There are going to be trials of various kinds throughout a person’s lifetime, and this is how we should handle it, understanding that it’s going to actually reap growth in our life in regards to our character, our growth capacity in the future that we talk about in other podcasts.

Um, and to have that perspective of understanding, like, guys, this is the time of year where everyone is thinking about growth, like growth is like the the word growth and thriving is the word that people use in the beginning of the year to think about what they want for the next year. Right, Isaac. And so the truth is, is when you think about growth in your family, are you equating that to go, okay, so what are the challenges and hard choices that we’re going to make that are actually going to help us to pursue that journey of growth? Because if you’re not thinking about that, if you’re not thinking about the the things that you need to change, whether it’s being, um, maybe being lazy and not being, um, consistent in working out, or maybe it’s being being addicted to something, whether that’s coffee or, or, um, chocolate or, I don’t know, like, I’m just, I’m thinking of, like, random things, like, what are the changes and challenges that you are going to actually pursue hard that are going to be like a mini little trial for yourself to say no to or to say yes to that’s going to help you create growth, because growth doesn’t happen without that trial and that challenge, which is what James one is actually. And you can.

Try and preserve and protect your life completely from challenge and insulate yourself, insulate and get everything dialed in. But there is a cost to that of maybe God has more for you to do and reach out through your family and so forth. And also just remember, our kids are watching, so you don’t want your children to end up being the kind of people that only try things if they know they’re going to do extremely well at the beginning of trying it, because then they’re very limited to what they try. They pretty much only try things they’ve been raised to do from from an early childhood because they don’t because it’s comfortable, they won’t risk preventable. Wouldn’t you all agree that things are going to get harder in this world, not easier for their generation in the future? And wouldn’t you also agree that? That’s going to require more resiliency. And if it requires more resiliency, then it’s really important that they don’t pursue perfection. It’s really important they’re flexible and they have the ability to try things that they may fail at and may, uh, look, uh, like a fool sometimes, you know, and there’s this quote called your risk looking a fool or risk being a fool. And I think it’s important that our kids are willing to risk and try things and do things that.

Are new to them.

Are new to them, that they may not be great at, that they may not make them look as good as when they do something they know they’re going to be good at, because it’s going to take more resiliency. They’re going to have to shift gears and how they provide in the future, potentially more so than today. They’re going to have to shift gears and, uh, and how they respond and in relationships and things like that and things they try. So I think it’s just so important that we are modeling a resiliency. And I think that pursuit of perfection lacks experience in being resilient. It because you’re trying to insulate from from trials from trials. Yeah.

Which is where growth happens. You know, we’ve shared a lot in the past years about just journeys trials. In our past episode that we just did, we talked about the season in our marriage that we struggled the most. Right. We talked about business failure and different things. You can go listen to that. But, you know, one of our perspectives, one of the scriptures that we clung to the most during that time was that James one scripture, because it was like, okay, we know God is doing something right now. We know that God is teaching us. He is preparing us for something. And then, of course, you know, thinking about the other scriptures that talk about comforting those with the same comfort that God has comforted you with as you’ve walked through trials and and trying to partner with Christ in redeeming a hard situation. Right. And that that takes growth, that takes a calling up into a new kind of maturity, to be able to look at the trial that you’re walking through and go, God has a purpose for this. And ask him, Lord, what are you trying to teach me? And now how can I glorify you with what you’ve taught me and make it be less about me and more about you, so that other people are equipped even more? It redeems that experience. That’s part of why I wrote Deeming childbirth right? Like it’s not oh, follow what I’ve done, I birth perfectly. No, it’s not that kind of a story.

It’s a discipleship walk through chapter by chapter on the struggles that I met as a young mom over and over again, whether it was pain or fear of, of pain and, and what does the Bible say about those things? What is the encouragement that we have? Right. That’s taking an experience that’s being honest about the the heart and the mind challenges that we experience as humans, as we walk through life and going, okay, this is an opportunity for growth. This may be difficult, but Lord, what do you want to teach me? And that would be like one of our biggest encouragements for you, for thriving. Because I have to tell you, even though the circumstances may not change in whatever trial you’re going through, your perspective changes and your perspective is everything for thriving. Your perspective is everything because you’re allowing God to prune out the fear. You’re allowing God to prune out the overwhelm, the anxiety, the idolatry. You’re allowing God to prune out the unrealistic expectations that are ruining your relationships with your kids, or your husband or your neighbor. You’re allowing God to do the pruning work, and then you experience fruitfulness and that fruitfulness in your relationships, that fruitfulness of being able to have a clear conscience before God, that there isn’t any wayward way that is creating separation between you and God. And then you have joy. Mhm. And joy is the symptom of thriving regardless of circumstances.

In fact, in in Philippians 412 it says it so well, I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound in any and every circumstance. I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. That’s one verse 13 right there is one of the misquoted, misunderstood verses in the Bible. I think they take that separately and say, I can do anything because I’m a Christian and that’s not what it’s saying right there. It actually is saying, Paul is saying, right here I have I am proven and follow my example that regardless if I’m in hunger or need or abound or brought low, I joy in the Lord because I have joy in all circumstances and be like me. He’s he’s saying, this is this is an example verse here. And then that verse, I can do all things through him who strengthens me, meaning I can have joy in the challenges. Not that I can play basketball for the NBA and I’m four foot six. Okay.

So no, it’s super, super important to understand Scripture in light of its true meaning. And that means going back and reading the verses before and after you guys. And and I think to that, isn’t that verse more encouraging when you actually read the verses before it? They talk about being content whether you have or you’re in want. Mhm. Like it just it brings a totally different meaning to that scripture. That’s true to where people are.

I will say I’m very optimistic. I do believe all things are possible through God, so I do want to say that too. But I don’t think that verse is a ticket to do anything you want necessarily.

So, you know, when we were when we were getting ready for this podcast, we were talking about how there’s two kinds of people, right? And how, um, people, when they’re pursuing perfection, there’s two kind of reactions that people can potentially take. And you were talking about the type of person that, you know, when they’re pursuing perfection, if they can’t get it, it can actually lead to just complete inaction.

Oh, yeah, there’s definitely people. And I would say a lot of people that if you’re pursuing something and you can’t get, you just are having a hard time getting perfect, you will just bail on it. You’ll just move in another direction. You’ll just get depressed. You’ll just think about it. You’ll overthink their proof of this. Is anything hard in a job? Usually the hardest part of a job is what gets the most results. And people in that hardest part, they’ll procrastinate the hardest part and do all the peripheral things to do busy work. Make them look busy, feel busy, feel productive. But they’re not doing the one thing. That’s the hardest thing that actually gets the results. And therefore, um, they’re not getting it done. And so it’s so true because there’s scared, there’s fear, there’s insecurity, or they don’t want to fail because failure can be scary. And if perfect is the standard, then failure is pretty likely, right? So instead, I think we need to look at it differently. We help our children look at trying things and succeeding at things differently. We need to make sure we’re not accidentally expecting perfection out of our children, because then they might be disobedient. And you’re wondering why they’re disobedient. They might feel like you’re they literally can’t do what you’re asking them to do because you want it done in such a perfect way. Yeah. And then they might be disobedient and you’re calling them out for that, which is good, but you might not know the whole story.

Right? There might be a well, I don’t want to do it because they can’t do it the way you want to do it, or you’re going to redo it anyway, or, you know, like I think that that’s a really, really good test. But that takes parents listen, that takes being willing to set aside the expectation, being willing to set aside the, the, the fact that you ask them to do something for a moment, just suspend it for a moment and care about your child’s heart and have a conversation where you’re saying, hey, you know, I’m just I’ve been noticing that, you know, when I ask you to do this one thing, it tends to be kind of like an emotional thing, or you’re not excited about doing it, or you don’t do it all the way or you don’t do it, you know, can we talk about that? Like, what’s the deal? And if you really listen, you might find that your kids feel like they just can’t do it in a way that you’re going to feel good about. Well, if.

You’re pursuing perfection, you’re pretty hard to.

Satisfy. And that’s a that’s a really it’s an important thing for parents to ask your kids the questions, like, do you guys feel like we expect you to do everything perfect? Here’s another good example. You know, grades grades are a thing, right? Schools specifically assign grades. And, you know, for Isaac and I that that performance that that element of like having to get 100% be perfect. Um, we’ve kind of been against that in a sense and our whole parenting because and let me tell you why, you know, we’ve had kids that had tendencies towards perfectionism before. And getting good grades can be fun. I remember loving it. It was like a competition with myself when I was a kid and I loved like improving and different things. But here’s the other downside of that is that I also had a perfectionistic expectation of myself, and I would get down when I wasn’t getting perfect grades. And a huge part of my identity was kind of wrapped up in this performance based acceptance of myself. And I really, even though I was a believer and I understood the gospel and I loved Jesus and I was saved, and I’m thankful for that.

It wasn’t until I became a parent and I started really evaluating how the positive pros and the negative cons of doing grades can actually impress upon a child this performance based acceptance of themself. And then it can leave. Also this there’s this temptation for parents to maybe be more proud of their kids when they have a perfect grade, or they have a perfect GPA and and listen, you just don’t want the kind of relationship with your kids where they’re performing to get affection from you, or acceptance from you or accolades from you. There should definitely be a purposefulness with parents, even if they are doing grades to be proud of their kids for trying their best. And I know you guys already know this, right? Like, did you give your best? Well then okay, be proud of that. Be like, you know, of course most Christian parents would say, well, yeah, Angie, I get that. But this is the thing. I think it’s really important that we sit down and we have the conversation with our kids, and we go, do you feel a pressure from me to have to get.

A’s.

Or do you know, I’m just as proud of you. If you get a C and you tried your best.

I love celebrating when they finish things like finished a workbook. They finished a project. Yes. And we look at it and we celebrate. Uh, we they finished, uh, a grade. They finished, uh, their math for the year, uh, or part of their math or, you know, section.

And so understanding that they’re mastering these different things, they’re understanding them and then they move on. Yeah.

So I don’t look at the grade they got, I look at the work they did.

Did they understand it because where they’re at.

Yeah. And how it helped them and interested if this is a direction we should continue in, um, based on who they are and.

And what they enjoy and don’t enjoy. I just think that there’s this element of, like, knowing your kids versus them just performing and you knowing the outside. So like when I, when I think of like a parent. Looking at their child and they they’re reporting in the Christmas letter that was just sent out. And so and so got straight A’s or they are valedictorian or different things like but this is the thing like, do you know the nitty gritties of like, what parts of that class your kids really didn’t like or what was being taught specifically? Like, as parents, we want to call you up to a fruitfulness in your relationship with your children to where you are having the deeper conversations, where you know them. You know what they enjoy, don’t enjoy. You know what’s being taught, what they disagree with, what they what they agree with, what they’re learning. Like there’s a whole different element of parenting where you’re engaged in the nitty gritties. You’re in the messy stuff with the kids, and so you’re able to rejoice with them when they get the paper done. Not just that they got an A at the end of the year, you’re rejoicing that they did the hard work of figuring out grammar and editing, and and they’re putting in this special interest to read more on a specific topic, and you’re understanding that they the reason why is because they actually like that industry. So they’re learning more about it. And I just want to share that with you because that’s the difference between performance based parenting. It’s just an example of that difference between performance based parenting and like studying your child and and really knowing them and having a relationship based parenting.

Well, let’s talk into prior speaking to priorities here. Our last point, and it’s really important to, um, when there’s so much going on, so many pieces and we’re not pursuing perfection, we still need to pursue what’s most important. And it’s I think it’s a skill to develop. And what’s most important right now, I can’t get everything done, but what’s the most important thing and what’s the next most important thing, and what’s the next most important thing? And getting good at navigating what the priorities are and what the most important next thing is, I think is most important. If you’re if your God gives you a big life and anybody that has kids, God’s giving you a big life. You know, there’s there’s little humans you’re raising up and it’s not easy. Parenting is hard. So so, you know, and marriage can be not easy sometimes. And, you know, these kinds of things. Right. So what is the most important thing? Well, if our priorities are God, marriage, kids as most important, our relationship with God, our relationship with our wife, her husband and then our kids, then why are we letting other things if those aren’t right or they aren’t going well, why are we putting other things in front of those? Um, and or are other things hurting those relationships idols in our life of, you know, they’re keeping us from the word that are keeping us from focusing on the Lord.

You know, I even think about, like, you know, this is the time of year when people want to evaluate and they want to make change. And I would hope that more than anything, there’s an evaluation of where you’re at spiritually and spiritual maturity, spiritual relationship with God, like, um, and so those in my mind I think of like, where is my relationship with God as far as like my desire to be in the word, my understanding of the word, my my knowing of God, my surrender of him, knowing me and being surrendered to him. Like I would evaluate all of those things separately, but I would also evaluate, like if I was to walk through this hard thing, how would I respond? Because that’s going to evaluate like a maturity level and desiring to always be growing in that because we never arrive. And so having that like spiritual reflection and then leading your kids in this similar spiritual reflection, you know, obviously you’re going to kind of talk it back a little bit because your kids are not going to necessarily be able to put themselves in big situations of trials or things like that, but to say, hey, what do you want to learn in your relationship with God? Do you want to memorize scripture? Do you want to get better at knowing where the geography of the Bible and where things are, so that you can flip with us better when you’re in church with us or, you know, like, what are the things that your different kids want to get better at and then helping them to grow in spiritual maturity? You can’t do that with your kids if you’re not doing that with yourself.

So like making that a priority by evaluating is the first step. And then the second step is to then go, okay, how can I challenge myself to grow? And I would encourage you to you are married for a reason. If your spouse is following the Lord like they are your first accountability partner, share with them your desire to grow and ask them to hold you accountable in that and understand that. Like sometimes with priorities, when a trial comes or there’s weakness revealed, it’s easy to want to give up or to focus on other things. Like Isaac was using a business analogy in that. And it’s the same in life. It’s the same in family life, in home life, to like, if you’re in a fight with someone, I’ll just share a personal little tidbit. Sometimes if I am angry or I’m frustrated because I feel like people aren’t like listening or getting things done fast enough, I start working harder and I’ll just start cleaning. And I have this intensity about me that you can tell, oh, mom’s kind of mad. And I start scrubbing harder and I’m like, working harder and.

But this is the thing that would be me doing something wrong, because I’m not actually like taking time to step back, take a breather, get with God, and like, really reflect on how I’m reacting and then make my relationship right. But instead I’m just I’m deflecting and getting intense about getting clean things cleaned. And so I know a lot of women struggle with this, so I’m just throwing myself under the bus and sharing what my challenge is that I want to grow and not doing that anymore. And, you know, part of that is that I’ve evaluated. Okay, so when I get mad about the house not being tidy, for example, what do I do? My reaction is to start working as hard as possible. So instead I’m going to make myself not do that. Go be with God. Turn on some worship music and have fun doing it, and try to get other people to do it with me and have the expectation that it might not all get done. That’s a different Angie. Yeah. And so do you see how there’s like this change of, like, recognizing relationship over. The things that are not eternal. And I want to share that with you guys because that is like thriving. You may be like thinking, well, there’s not really. Yeah, I think we’re thriving. But do you do what I just described?

Because if you do.

What I just described over and over and over again, it will eventually have wear and tear on your relationships, with your kids, with your spouse. And so like, we need to evaluate the little things and go, Lord, put a spotlight on them so I can grow. But guess what that spotlight is going to be. Usually it’s going to be that there was a disagreement or there was a hurt. And then that relationship challenge is the conflict. Is the spotlight going time to grow? Do we look at that? Do we go conflict is actually a gift of an opportunity, of a spotlight, of time to grow. I know I don’t. I usually get the stomach ache and go, I don’t want to deal with the conflict.

You know, it’s funny because I think, you know, I just keep thinking of parent families driving to church together. Yes. And, uh, it’s kind of like, that’s real life. And then at church on Sunday, that’s like Instagram. And I know that’s a I know that’s a terrible example. I love the bride of Christ and so forth, but I’m talking about the behavior of people and where they can.

Be fighting and getting out the door or fighting on the way to church. And then they have a smile on their face when they walk through.

And everybody, everybody looks perfect and acts perfect and all these kinds of things.

But there’s not perfect. Yeah, there.

Is no perfect. And we all if that resonated with I think that probably resonated with just about everybody because, you know, everybody’s experienced that, you know, challenge of getting to church and, and issues with within the family and things like that. And, and then you go there and you want to put your best foot forward because you’re in God’s house. I get that, but there is a contrast there. And I think that, you know, we’re all in a journey and let’s not compare to one another. Let’s not pursue perfection, but let’s do give our best. Let’s do lead our families well. Let’s love people well, and let’s build relationships. And most importantly, our relationship with God. And God wants to use your family. God wants to use you, and he wants to be glorified through your family. And it doesn’t take perfection for him to be glorified, uh, through you. In fact, Paul says it well, it’s in his weakness that he’s most glorified.

That’s the verse that we were going to end with. It says in first or second Corinthians 12 verse nine. But he said to me, my grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weakness, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me. Here’s the deal when you are in a moment of weakness, do you boast about that? For God to be glorified, like in the moments where there’s squabbling in the car on the way to church, instead of rushing everybody in to get a seat and putting a fake smile on? Do you take the extra 5 to 10 minutes sitting in the car, talking to the kids and apologizing and being humble? Do you take the time to go? Hey, listen, our relationship is important because when there is conflict in our relationship, that means that there is separation. There’s sin, and sin separates us from God, and we can receive forgiveness and be fully reconciled to God. But we also have to be reconciled to one another. That’s what God’s Word is all about. That’s what grace is about. Can you guys forgive me for being tempered, hot tempered on the way to church? Can you guys forgive me? For what you know, whatever it is, and go and get right, especially before you take communion. You know, taking that time to really have that conversation with your kids that is real, that is God glorifying.

That’s real Christianity.

It’s not perfect. It’s actually messy. It’s hard. And in those moments at the end of this podcast, remember this thriving is not perfect. It’s imperfect. Thriving means you are going to experience adversity, and you’re going to walk with God through it and grow because of it. It does mean you’re going to be challenged, but you’re going to dig into the word as you’re being challenged, and you’re going to try to bring him glory and look at the lessons to learn so that you can grow. Yes, they’re going to be hard decisions like going to church, but you’re not going to go, oh, nope, we’re not doing it because it’s hard. Instead, you’re going to go, no, we are going to do this because it’s hard and we know that we’re experiencing adversity because God is in this and the enemy doesn’t want us doing it.

Hey, thanks for joining us.

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