We’ve all witnessed in these last two years how easily people in society can be influenced. If your kids grow up believing they can consume worldly things and not be influenced by them, they could over-expose themselves to things that do influence them away from righteous living and even from God. It’s best to start while they are young and consistently help them understand the Biblical truth that what we see influences us no matter how strong we think we are. This episode dives into this and will give you helpful insights.

Main Points in This Episode:

1. Help them understand how easily they can be influenced.
2. Pink elephant example (listen to episode 173).
3. Teach them about what can influence them and how to respond.
4. Always teach them the “why” behind decisions that impact them.
5. Ground your discussions in Biblical truth.

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Scripture in This Episode:

Ephesians 5:11 – “And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather reprove them.”

Matthew 6:22 – “The light of the body is the eye: if therefore thine eye be single, thy whole body shall be full of light.”

1 Corinthians 15:33 – “Be not deceived: evil communications corrupt good manners.”

Proverbs 13:20 – “He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.”

Psalm 1:1 – “Blessed is the man that walketh not in the counsel of the ungodly, nor standeth in the way of sinners, nor sitteth in the seat of the scornful.”

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 twenty one 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 the fall. Hey, everybody, welcome to the podcast. Hey, guys. We are so glad to be back together on the show, although that was fun. You interviewed Caroline, I interviewed Drew, and that’s right.

Yeah, we’re back now.

We’re feeling better. That’s right. Thank you for your prayers. If you even knew that we were sick a little bit. So yeah, God is good

All the time.

So today we’re talking about teaching your kids about the power of influences. And this comes from the idea that just the Holy Spirit prompted us to talk about at this morning’s family meeting. And so we’re going to dive into this because this is probably one of the more important skills and things that your kids need to know about.

Yeah, I mean, we’ve talked about certain topics, such as cultivating critical thinking in your kids, which is more about like, how do you teach them and what curriculums and what books are good for, like getting them engaged to actually be thinking about the different teachings that they are being influenced by. But this goes even deeper and really explaining to your kids and because they need to understand that their influences.

So now we’re going into season three of world weirdness. All right, so you’re three since COVID came about and all the things around all that stuff. So this isn’t a talk about that. But as we go into season three of weirdness, we have to realize the world really did change and morality is decreasing. It’s nothing to be fearful of and it’s nothing to even worry about. But we should be proactive in our response to the changes and how we lead our families.

We need to be equipping our kids and we need to teach them about and warn them. Basically, they need to be aware. We have to equip our kids so that we’re not constantly going around, trying to protect them all the time. They have to be equipped so that they can actually stand firm against the Devils attacks, against the temptations of the flesh of the corruption of the world. I mean, let’s just face it, the reality is is that there are evil people in the world. There are people who are there are people who are lost and then there are people who are actually working for the enemy. They worship Satan. There are proclaimed witches that exist. I’m just going to be bold right now and say this, and some of these people are actually your kids teachers. Yeah, some of these people are the are the are the people who are cutting your kid’s hair and cleaning your kid’s teeth at the dentist. And if you know anything or have learned anything in the last couple of years, now they these people have become more emboldened. So money to influence kids.

So as the teachers, the artists, the media, the the writers, everybody becomes more emboldened to share what they believe is true and come from their agenda. It’s more important than ever that we’re vigilant and that we’re also bold, that there’s light coming truth coming from the Christians out there. And we’re also protecting our kids appropriately. And I think if you really know deep down that you’re equipping your kids and you’re doing the right things with your kids and you’re walking strong with the Lord, you have nothing to fear about this world. You have anticipation and launching them. We just launched our first two kids this year, last year. Sorry. And what an awesome thing it was. And we still are in regular, even weekly, you know, communication and fellowship and fellowship and even seeing them, which is which is amazing. We feel blessed by that. So hey, as we dive into this about the power of influence and helping your kids understand that we are so thankful for what you helped us do last year with the ministry, the ministry had a great year. The downloads was up 17 16 percent, I believe over the previous year, three quarters of a million downloads from one hundred and seventy seven countries. We’re just so thankful. I hope you got our email into your email. You can email me, Isaac at Toll. If you want it, I’m happy to send it to you if you’re not on our list or actually even better for me would be to hit our bio in any of our social platforms and get on our email list. That would probably be best, but the one million legacies movement matters. It’s a mission to impact one million families and their legacies, which impacts way more than a million, right? Yeah. And it’s not just that somebody listened to the podcast, it’s we’re really feel God calling us to have an indelible impact to really shift

To implement biblical commands from scripture and and utilizing the guidance and the biblical wisdom that is in there that both warns us, but also exhorts us towards righteous living and teaching our kids right.

Amen to that. So let’s dive in Ephesians five 11, which is such a good Ephesians. It’s so good you got to take your kids the right. Take no part in the. Full works of darkness, but instead expose them. So sometimes Christians take the first part of that sentence. Take no part in unfruitful works of darkness, but they don’t take the last part, which is expose them. And I believe that’s a complete sentence right there because

It is not a period, it continues so.

So we are to not be part of and also expose unfruitful works. And we’re supposed to protect our family from those unfruitful works as well. And the power of influence is incredible. Like the ability for people to influence your kids is huge. Other people, the world media, anything billboards.

You guys this this whole passage of scripture like Isaac was just he just briefly dropped a bomb on you that said, Take your kids through Ephesians, and I just have to encourage you because a lot of times we will pull a verse or two out to kind of highlight within a podcast because we’re trying to teach on a specific topic. This is very different than like going and listening to a sermon at your church. Yeah, but this particular passage of scripture, if you were to even continue even further after it says take no part in unfruitful works of darkness but expose them for it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible for anything that becomes visible is light. Therefore, it says a Waco sleeper and a rise from the dead in Christ will shine on. You look carefully then how you walk not as unwise, but wise, making the best use of time because the days are evil. How relevant is that relevant? And not only that, I mean, Isaac was talking about how, you know, people will oftentimes take the beginning of that verse and then they don’t continue reading or they don’t continue teaching or they don’t continue walking out with the Bible, says ignoring that there’s a comma there thinking there’s a period there where it says exposed, because that’s actually an action word. Yeah, and sometimes it’s hard to take action. But listen, you guys, if we want our kids to be obedient to scripture, don’t we have to do that first and be that model for them? Number one, number two, they need to see what it looks like to actually obey the Bible.

So what would it look like if Christians all over the world were exposing darkness? That would be wild? Now we are seeing a lot of believers, like being one hundred percent who they are wherever they are, and that changing. What I mean is there’s a lot of times we’re only part of who we are like at work in different places like that. And then we’re different when we’re at home or different, we’re at church. We’re starting to see the whole person show up the whole Christian. And I think that is what the world needs. The whole Christian, a Bible commands. We’re supposed to be the same everywhere we are and not be tolerating now. We’re supposed to be graceful, we’re supposed to be discerning and when to talk and what to say and be what people need us to be. So they hear the gospel. That doesn’t mean deviating from any part of the Bible, though, right? That means being biblical the whole time. So it’s really important. So the first point we have for you guys is make your kids aware that they are influencing you. You’re like, Well, that’s really obvious, Isaac. Yeah, but if you don’t proactively do it and do it often, they will develop what I remember having when I was growing up in invincible spirit. An independent spirit could go along with that, which is that spirit of, I know what I believe in the Bible. I’m a Christian. Even though some of these lyrics in the song have some words in them, I don’t agree with it doesn’t affect those.

So it doesn’t won’t end up saying them.

Or even though this movie has some things, it’s not going to influence me. Or even though these friends I hang out with, you know, aren’t biblical, and they’re doing some things saying some things that have some corrupting talk. At least I don’t have corrupting talk. What you’ll develop and you have to work at this when they’re young, because if you start doing it in the teenage years when the problem starts happening, then it’s kind of too late. I hate saying too late because it’s never too late. You never stop trying. But way easier. And God can do everything, anything. But it’s way easier if you’re doing this from their little and on onward and always. And one of the ways we did this this morning in Bible time is I just made the point that, hey, I made this point, I’m making to you, to our kids. And I said, it’s prideful. If you don’t believe you’re going to be influenced by something you see us with, the Bible says, be very careful what you look at and be very careful what you see because it impacts the heart. And so I said, don’t think about a pink elephant. And then they go, what did you guys just think about? They just thought about a pink elephant, something it doesn’t even exist. And I said, that’s how easily you are influenced. I just got all of your minds

And you all started thinking about and visualizing a pink elephant all of a sudden, even though they don’t exist.

And they were like, Oh, I got that from some business book a long time ago, but it’s like, Oh, wow,

Oh yeah, I was just influenced to there. Now this is the thing we need to take everything that we teach our kids back to the word of God. And Isaac just said something a second ago, which is that our eyes are like, whatever we let come in actually does influence our soul. And Matthew, six verse twenty two, says the eye is the lamp of the body. So if your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then, the light in you is darkness. Ooh, that’s tricky. If then the light in you is darkness. How can light in you be darkness? I mean, that’s like this really deep stuff. If then the light in you is darkness. How great is the darkness? Hmm. Wow. No one can serve two masters for either. He will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. It was just this is an interesting passage, and it’s using money as an example and continues on. But you guys talking about your eye and and what goes in affecting the light that’s within you, that’s like in your soul that actually affects you in a really deep, eternal way, according to what Matthew Chapter six is say. Mm hmm. And so if we’re teaching our kids, let’s just take it for back for a second. I, you know, if you were raised by parents that say, do as I say, not as I do, and so they’re like, you can’t watch rated R movies. And then you were the kid that said, Well, why dad? Or Why Mom? Why can’t I watch them? And they said, Because I said, So that’s not good parenting.

That’s not biblical parenting. You need. You have the tools right here. I would simply go to Matthew Chapter six, and I would talk to my kids about how the eye is the lamp of their body. And so when they’re watching something, it is literally influencing the light and it’s becoming darkness. And what did we just read in Ephesians Chapter five? Taking no part of darkness have no have no part of it. Don’t even speak of it. So if we’re not supposed to speak of the darkness, why in the world will we sit and watch it in a movie? Or why in the world would we sit and listen to it over and over again in in certain music? I even think of, like when I was a teenager, I went through this phase of like listening to secular music. And then when I really committed to Christ, I stopped listening to all secular music and only listen to Christian music. And I am telling you it massively affected how I acted. It affected the light that was within me that I wasn’t even aware of. And you know how I know this. I remember walking into the high school hallways and other kids coming up to me and being like, Oh, wow, hi Angie, you look really happy today, or why are you so happy? Those were the days that I drove myself to school and was listening to the Christian radio station. The days that I did not listen to the Christian radio station, no one said anything like that to me.

Yeah, it’s

A big it literally affected the light that was shining within me. Like I was happier.

It’s a big impact. And so we’re in point two here, which is what influences. So you got to talk to your kids about what influences them and have discussions about this because you can think there’s whether you agree with this or not. Malone This doctor just had an interview with the big podcaster Rogan. I haven’t listened to it because I don’t have Spotify. The rest of the family does, but I’m not privileged like that. So and he’s only on Spotify, so I’ll have to like, borrow their phone or something. But anyways, I get the news clips about things like this and and he Malone was making the point that there was mass. There was a widespread psychosis and he called it something else. But I can’t quite remember, but basically that people were brainwashed in a way. Yeah, yeah. And this has been big in the news right now, so it’s really interesting. I was teaching the kids about that and I was just like, Wow, look at how easily people can be influenced to do certain things. And I’m going to talk about details here. But you know, you can think about the last two years and just all the ways people are influenced in.

You know, something is influenced like whole countries to shut down, like permanently almost. And people are left in their homes, like in Australia. Yeah. And it just so much fear and using fear as a tool. And then the media is complicit in this in isolation he was talking to. About how you get this done is through isolation first and then you have propaganda and you have all these things. I haven’t watched the actual interview, so you have to look at it. But I was I was talking about these concepts with the kids. And but really, this happens all the time. Everybody knows a repeated message over time influences someone to buy something, right? That’s why commercials used to work until we don’t watch TV anymore. Most people, but media is a big influence, so pay attention to what you’re watching around your kids, what you watch, what your kids are allowed to watch and pay attention to their peers. Their peers have a massive influence on them. It’s really, really important. This goes without saying, but I think we need to be even more vigilant.

You know what I was saying before about the the old school way of parenting do as I say, not as I do, this is when Isaac and I say normal Christian parenting is failing. It has not worked. When you read books like Already Gone By Ken Ham that talk about kids leaving the faith by age 18 and why that is. And you start really judging the fruit. I’m just going to be honest with you guys. There is a lie out there that Christians have been believing for far too long regarding judging. They think that the Bible and they actually go as far as to say, Well, the Bible says we’re not supposed to judge other people. Can I just say that the way that that is said is a lie from the pit of hell? Actually, the Bible says that we are not to judge those outside the church, but we are to judge those in the church. There is tons of scripture that talks about discernment. You can’t discern something if you aren’t judging it for face value. You have to make a choice. Think about Pilgrim’s Progress by John Bunyan. He has multiple choices in paths that he needs to go. He has to make a choice. What does he do? He has to discern. He has to judge, which is the safest one looks dark and gloomy. The other looks like an easy worn path. You know, there are so many examples that we could give our kids to explain this process of how they need to think critically. They need to discern. We have to understand that they are not going to have the skills to be aware and to make good judgments, to make good choices in friends if they are not empowered by you showing them where in the word it says, do not hang out with bad company.

And if and if you’re you know, as you’re getting that if your kids are in youth group or things like that, do you know what they’re being taught? Do you know if they’re leaving it at, Hey, just have grace for everybody and don’t judge anybody if they just leave it at that? What is what is that teach? What does that teach the kids? It teaches the kids to not have a critical thinking, not to make good judgments about who is good to spend time with and not. Now there’s people that are friends. We run the race with that we can trust. That would be. And you need a judge if their character, you need a judge, if they’re going the same direction, if they’re becoming more godly, these kinds of things. And then there’s people we are lights to and that we can reach out to. But those are different kinds of relationships.

So seek counsel and hang out with and do all the things with someone that you are not like minded in these things. So First Corinthians Chapter 15, Verse 33 says Do not be deceived. Bad company ruins good morals. Ok. Bad company ruins good morals. Some of you might be going, OK, oh, that’s a that’s a good scripture. And when I think about that particular scripture, I think to myself, Whoa. Not only is this a big warning that our kids need to hear, like, this is a verse that our kids should have memorized. Bad company ruins good morals. Ok? Yes, this is a warning from scripture. But just having a warning doesn’t actually affect your life at all unless you empower the person to implement this warning and saying, Hey, use wisdom, have understanding you. And what is wisdom? Wisdom is if bad company corrupts good morals, then do not hang out with bad company and then your kids might go, Well, how do I know what’s bad company? You’re going to have to tell them you’re going to have to judge that for yourself. Do you see how this process like when you read scripture, you don’t just go, Oh yeah, bad company corrupts good morals and leave it at that. No, why did God put this in the word? What is God asking me to implement in my own life? How does this verse apply to my life? And if it applies to my life and it’s something that God is warning me on, I need to teach my kids and warn my kids because God calls me to be their teacher. But just telling them bad company corrupts, good morals is not good enough in the sense you have to empower your kids and say, You know what, honey, you’re going to have to make choices. You’re going to have to judge if this group over here is bad company or good company and understand that the Bible warns you, it’s potentially going to corrupt your morals if you hang out with them.

So true. So what other influences are there? There’s teachers. So word of caution. If you don’t know who your teachers, your kid’s teachers are all in any aspect. Coaches. Music teachers. Education teachers. Swim coach. If you don’t know them, it’s that’s a problem. And the second thing is, if you don’t know what’s happening, it’s even a bigger problem.

And what you mean by happening, you mean if you don’t know what they’re teaching your kids, that is a massive problem. So, you know, over over the years, we have definitely heard a lot of things. Guys, we’ve been doing parenting ministry now for three years, so we’ve heard all kinds of stories. It really sad stories. But one of the things that I’ve been becoming aware of, even more so as people have been opening up about their experience with their kids. Being in school is that some schools are not even allowing parents on campus, and parents are not even knowing who is teaching their kids. And so in those circumstances, I would just say like, Hey, so you don’t know who your kid is spending 40 hours a week with? Let me put it in another light. You don’t know who your child is spending one hundred and sixty hours a month with. You don’t know what they’re teaching your child, and they’re spending a hundred and sixty hours a month with them. How much time are you spending with your kids, like evaluating like and I’m not this. This is not to pooh pooh anyone’s choices. Maybe this is the first time that you are actually going, Oh, a light bulb. Wow. Yeah, I never thought about it that way. But in reality, if we as parents are pushing our kids over here and we’re saying, OK, we’re dropping them off, we’re putting them in school, what are we doing? We’re putting our stamp of approval on what that teacher is teaching our children. We’re telling our kids as they get out the door. Listen carefully. Do a good job at school, but try to remember. Yeah. Obey your teacher. Take good notes. All of these things are things that I have said to my kids. It’s things I heard growing up. But you guys, how? Why are we saying this to our kids if we don’t explicitly know the person that is teaching our kids

And it’s OK if we don’t align on everything, that’s OK, but at least you need to know so you know how to combat anything they might be teaching when they get home. It’s important to understand what is going into the minds and hearts of your children and the agenda that’s being driven from anybody having access to your kids. It is super important. Proverbs 13 20 Whoever walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of fools will suffer harm. And so the Bible judges says there are fools, for example, and we need to not be companions with fools now. Do fools need to know God? Yes, absolutely. We should evangelize to people.

But is that the responsibility of a six year old? To evangelize to a forty five year old teacher that has an agenda on CRT. I don’t think so. No, I don’t think that the six year old could possibly be equipped to handle the arguments that the forty five or fifty four year old teacher is bringing at them. Nor do they have it in them to stand up against twenty nine other students that are falling for everything that the teacher is teaching them.

So there’s a big thing when you call someone teacher, that to a kid is a big deal. So just make sure no matter how you educate your kids, you don’t have to homeschool them for your kids to believe this. They should believe you’re their most important teacher. So you should think about How can I cultivate my kids? A respect for me as their teacher. You are their most important teacher.

That’s an actual relationship shift for a lot of parents who just have to say, this is a culture that has to be cultivated over a long period of time. It starts when they’re younger, and if you haven’t done it when they’re younger, it’s never too late to chase after your child’s heart. I would encourage you if you have kids that are not like super little to even just sit down with your kids and go, Hey, guys, mom screwed up, dad screwed up. I was super convicted. The other day, I realized that biblically I did not raise you in a way where we have a teacher student relationship, and that’s actually something God wants for you and I to have, and I’m sorry. Like, humility goes a really long way with kids. Can I just say that? And so there is never lost hope. You should never get to a place where you feel like up. I’ve totally screwed up. It’s all downhill from here. No, don’t believe that life from the devil. Instead, humbly pursue your kid. Go to scripture with them. Show them where you were wrong and how you want to change things. That is huge, OK? Versus saying, Oh, prayerfully, I’ve always been a Christian and I’ve always thought this, but we just never had time. And no, no, none of that. Please do not make excuses. Otherwise you are not representing being a Christ follower. Christ calls us to be humble. Hey.

Point three is always teach the why Angie had kind of alluded to this earlier, but don’t be that parent did. This says because I said so or don’t just leave it hanging. Always teach. The extra time to teach why we’re making the decisions we are. Here’s why we’re not doing this sleepover over here. Or here’s why we’re not spending time with these kids, or here’s why we’re choosing to do this. And not that the whys are incredibly important. Remember, you’re not just making decisions right now, you’re equipping them so they can make good decisions when their parents, you are equipping them, how are you going to equip them? You’re going to frustrate them if you don’t articulate the whys behind things, kids all want to know why. So you need if you’re going to make a decision that changes their life in any way, even a small way, you better be ready to tell them why. And if you’re not, you’re going to cultivate frustration with your kids. Just respect potentially, and maybe not even trusting that you can make good decisions for them,

You know, and with them, yeah. And OK, you just said a key phrase. That’s why I was going to talk about and with them. Can I just say for a second parenting? I think a big thing that authoritative parents mess up on on a regular basis is that they parent to their children. What I mean is they make decisions and they’re lay down the law, and this is just what we’re doing. You need to obey. Follow now. This authoritative approach in relationships is not a biblical one. I deeply believe that there is a potential for broken relationships down the road that need so much repair. If you are constantly just telling your kids what they have to do all the time and you’re not taking the time to actually teach them the why, which is what Isaac is talking about, but going a step further and going, Do you understand? So do you agree? And so does this make sense to you? Like asking them questions that put them in a position where they actually get to communicate their feelings about it, their understanding about it, so that they feel like they have a voice and they are part of the decision making and they own it. Let me just tell you on the topic, Isaac just brought up sleepovers. Many of you guys know that we’ve written articles and we taught on why we don’t do sleepovers for over a decade now. We have talked about this if we had just laid down the law with our kids and said No. And we didn’t tell them all the whys. Do you know how many times I would have been nagged over the years to do sleepovers? Oh yeah, by nine kids. Are you kidding? No, no, no. We have to teach them all the reasons why. And then we have this communication where we’re sitting down with them. We’re respecting them. We’re taking them to the word of God. We’re warning them about the whys and then saying, Does this all make sense to you? And they own it?

And then they also know how to articulate themselves to their friends or whoever else. Hey, you want to come over for the sleepover? Oh, actually, I don’t do sleepovers, but I’d love to come over for the first part of it and and do that. And here’s you know, and they can even share why they don’t do sleepovers, which is important if you want your kids to stand strong and not feel awkward and weak in those situations.

Right? I’ll just be honest with you guys. I mean, think about yourself if your parents had just told you, no, you can’t do sleepovers since we’re using this as an example and somebody’s a friend asks you, Hey, do you want to come over and have a sleepover? And you don’t know the reason why, but you’re just like maybe a more obedient child or or you agree with your parents or you’re you’re like, Yeah, I don’t really want to go to sleepover, so you never really question them. And you go, Well, my parents just said no, and that’s all that they say. The other kids might be like my kids kind of weak and and lose respect for them, actually. But so we have got to equip our kids. This is about equipping our kids with logical thinking and discernment and judgment and understanding truth so that when they get into those predicaments or those conversations, they can actually lead and not be tempted to follow and fall back and walk away from a conversation feeling like they were either bullied or disrespected. But instead they were like everything went great. They fully understand

Why, and if you don’t give them a voice with you, how are they going to learn how to have a voice with others? They don’t have a voice of disrespect or or disagreement or things like that, they shouldn’t sometimes kids sin and so forth, but they should have a voice. They should feel like they can voice their concerns, their ideas, their understanding of things and have a discussion with you like Angie was talking about, you

Know, as we’re talking about this too, one of the things that was really important, you guys, we shared a couple of verses that were specifically warning us about and that we should also go back to these scriptures with our kids. I just have to say that like, you need to go to First Corinthians 15 thirty three to talk to your kids about how bad company corrupts good morals you need. Go to Proverbs 13 20 so that they can see that they need to be careful with the friends that they choose and the people that they hang out with. And you know, you go to Psalm, one which says Blessed is the man who walks not in the Council of the Wicked. When you’re explaining to them the influence that teachers have in their life, whether that’s a Sunday school teacher, a youth group pastor, a regular teacher in their school, a coach, maybe even a grandparent or a friend’s parent like all of these people potentially have influence in our children’s lives, and we need to teach our kids what influences. Look up the definition if you need to, depending on their age. Explain what influences use Isaac’s example that he shared about the pink elephant and how we all are influenced at times. Get them to acknowledge that, like, ask them, So do you understand how you’re influenced? And they’re like, Oh yeah, I’m influenced.

So it’s so important that they believe they can be influenced. Otherwise, if they don’t grow up understanding that they can be, they don’t know how to protect themselves. And they will end up becoming older kids in their teenage years that are prideful and believe they can be part of the world in certain aspects and it won’t affect them. And then what happens to often the world does infect them with wrong belief.

I would encourage you guys to read scriptures that talk about running the race and having endurance, not allowing someone to snatch your crown scriptures that talk about people who have a seared conscience and understand that those scriptures God put in his word to warn us. And to for us to warn our children. With that, they need to understand that there is a level of accountability that we all have as humans to be pursuing righteousness and understanding that in the pursuit of living wholly because he is wholly in the pursuit of wanting to live, rightly, that’s what righteousness is, is living. Rightly, we want to be walking in a way where at the end of the day, at the end of our lives, whenever that day comes, Jesus looks at us and says, Well done, good and faithful servant, right? Like that is, that’s it. Like. And and part of that is that we’ve been living our lives for him, that we are about the great commission like we want our kids to to know God and want to make him known to others, understanding that that is clearly one of the main purposes for their existence here in this generation, right? But this is the thing if we don’t warn our kids with scripture because scripture is actually the why scripture? All of these Bible verses that God has given us, this is the sort of the spirit. This is the armor that protects us against the flaming arrows of the evil one as they’re darting at our kids. And if our kids don’t know it, they’re not going to know how to fight. So we have to equip our kids. That’s how they stand firm understanding that one, they are influential, but two Jesus is more powerful in them, and that the Holy Spirit can give them discernment so that they make wise decisions in the people that they actually listen to and allow to influence them.

Hey, thanks for joining us, everybody.

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