[00:00:01] Steven: When we lead our homes with a bent towards what we call invitation, that is high relationship. Oh, we just want to be loving and inclusive and accepting and encouraging.
And we leave out what we call challenge. That is pushing forward, being directive, being correctional when necessary. We play into the culture's hands because the next generation expects negotiation instead of leadership. And that produces children who are not able to carry a Kingdom legacy forward in our families. So today we're talking about the quiet drift into letting our homes lead us as opposed to our being the leaders. And we're going to talk specifically about children and how they can do that and why Adam's passivity in the garden is still costing you in your home. That's today on Abraham's Wallet.
Hi, everyone, I'm Steve Manual here in Cincinnati with my co host, Mark Parrott, who's in Utah. Welcome to Abraham's Wallet. This is the podcast for family leaders who want to think multi generationally about their money, their home culture, their work, their family, and their community in God. I'll just say an introduction that we're not here to shame anybody today.
We think that most of you listening are already serious about leading your homes. But the fact is that even strong dads can drift. I feel this pressure in my own home and the culture keeps whispering that leadership is harsh and that boundaries rupture connection and that the gentle path is the godly path always.
So today we're going to look at a real piece of data that landed in my feed and we're going to connect it to the oldest leadership failure in scripture and talk about what it actually takes to raise kids who will continue and expand Kingdom legacies instead of just giving in with the cultural flow.
I have some bantery kind of questions, Mark, but before we jump in, you've raised kids. Any gut reaction just to the topic before we dive in?
[00:02:16] Mark: Well, just to preview what's coming, I. Yeah, I told you before we started recording, I said, you know, the gentle parenting thing, which is kind of what we're both responding to a little bit in this episode. It was so in vogue. It was infiltrating churches two years ago. I feel like, yes, I do think, you know, as I was even prepping for this episode, I was talking to my wife about it and she said, you know, I was listening to a podcast, Yay, verily today. And what the. It was these two liberal pagans and they were talking about, well, you know, the new thing now is called fafo parenting, which for the more pure amongst pure hearted stands for F around and find out parenting. And of course, because the, the gen zers can't do anything without including a cuss word for edginess. And yeah, they need that cultural relevance. The point is, even the people who came up with gentle parenting are starting to, I think, realize how destructive it can be.
And what I think we said we wanted to do today was not just challenge some of the precepts that might have been popular a couple years ago, but also talk about there's ways that this stuff can get its tentacles into your family, even if you're like, well, you know what, Mark? Not only are we not doing gentle parenting, we've even spanked our kids before. Okay, Whoa. Well, I, I'm just going to say that before you jump and turn off the episode because you think you're already on board with the Abrahamic lifestyle on this front. I think it might be an interesting conversation for everyone listening, regardless of where they might fall, just to kind of self audit and say, where do I.
Where do I see potential vulnerability to a unbiblical mindset when it comes to raising kids, especially small kids. But not only small kids. I've got a, I've got a daughter now driving around, she's running errands, she's taking kids to their soccer practices and God bless America.
Yeah, it's both wonderful and tragic at the same time. But yeah, that's true.
Some of this stuff still applies when you're talking about 16, 17 year olds. So that's why I think that we're getting into this and it's something I'm looking forward to talking about.
[00:04:46] Steven: Absolutely. Well, I'm ready to rock. How about you?
[00:04:50] Mark: Yeah, I think so. The only other thing I'll say by way of just keeping people posted, by the time you hear this, it'll be too late, but we are, we are gearing up for Abraham's Wallet Boot camp, which is happening the state of Indiana, which is also home to Larry Bird. But that's neither here nor there.
And man, I'm just, I'm looking at the calendar and I am going to be all over the Western hemisphere for the next few months. I'm going to be in Texas with you.
We probably are going to have to record at least a whole episode about how we have learned and grown through the college visitation process and how to think about that decision.
So there's just lots of interesting things coming up, but the most looming one is the one that by the time this comes out, we will have had a wonderful time and fellowshiped with some awesome. Abrahamic family leaders at the Abraham's Wallet.
[00:05:54] Steven: I can't wait. Yeah, it's going to be fantastic. The more that it shapes up and the more that the schedule gets dialed in and we know what all of our little fun activities are going to be and we know who's speaking and looking at the, looking at the decks for the guys are going to be talking and the getting the names in. Oh, we're going to be in small groups with these guys and having meals. It's really exciting. It's going to be great.
Well, we all want connection with our kids. I, I, I think nobody sets out to be the cold, distant dad that we imagine happened in the 1940s.
But there is a popular version of parenting, often labeled gentle parenting, that starts with good intentions, I hope, and slowly collapses into endless negotiation, boundary avoidance and emotional processing. Without enforcement.
Parents become terrified of saying no because they don't want to rupture the relationship, mustn't hurt the feelings of the kid. The result is, I mentioned this in the introduction, is a family culture that is very high in inclusion, very high in intimacy, and very low in challenge.
And that creates a kind of person who needs things to be cozy or else they cannot proceed. It does not create resilient disciples.
And I won't go on about the invitation and challenge chart, but I talk about this often with guys that I disciple. And one thing that we see so clearly in scripture is that Jesus was a high invitation and very high challenge leader.
So he created resilient disciples. And it's a good thing because they got tortured and martyred and the gospel went on because of their faithfulness.
That's the kind of children that we want to create is resilient people.
The kind of high warmth and low structure kind of environment, that cozy environment. That's not the connection that we want in our homes where we're worried will we get emotionally off center or will we upset somebody? Oh, I don't want to be the bad guy. I remember telling my wife many times in the early years of our having children that we both have to be willing to be the bad guy. We just going to have to get over that. We must be comfortable with our children being upset at us for their own sake because we're doing the things that we're doing for them.
So I reckon that we're training up kids to expect that the adults in their lives will keep moving the goalposts around them every time their emotions spike.
When our school, when I see ever that our school changes the Goal posts. Well, we said it was due Monday, but there was a storm and we know that storm was upsetting to 20% of the kids. So we're making the deadline Wednesday. Now that stuff drives me crazy because that's not how banks work, for instance, that's not how real companies work. That's not how relationships work. If you want to depend on somebody, My mom is depending on me right now at this stage of her life. And, and if I were to go, I don't know, I've had some pretty rough counseling sessions this week, Mom, I don't know that I can be there for you and take care of the bills.
That doesn't work. It's, it's not acceptable. So anyways, I, I again, I'll say I don't think that most of our listeners are passive or weak, but I think that the cultural current is real and it pulls even intentional dads towards appeasement if we're not deliberate. I want to share the sort of inciting incident that I've kept in my pocket for months wondering how can we share this with folks? And it was a chart that I came across from the IFS Survey of American Family Culture. It was from last year and this chart revealed in no uncertain terms that when you as a parent did things like strict curfews, strict bedtimes, screen limits, even device drop off times, we do that in my household, which is at 8 o'. Clock. They're here, they sit on this counter.
Sleepover restrictions. What this chart demonstrates that this Survey of American Family Culture found was that the parents communicated that the, the pressure on them, the weight of parenting rose as they enforced all of these things. Let's say that, I mean you, it's, it's a, they're bar graphs and they're all, you know, just measures of emotional, like how much did it, how much did it stress you out? 3 But what you saw was however much that the parents said that it, it was harder for me to parent around a strict curfew, a strict bedtime river, what they reported is that my relationship with my child increased by a measure of about 5x in each of these areas.
And what you also found was when they polled the children and based on the thing so bedtimes would be younger child curfews would be older children, what they found was that the children themselves reported this made my relationship with my parents better.
And so what you see in this chart is, well, a little bit of effort to do a screen limit, a little bit of effort, massive Returns as far as I feel so much better about my relationship with my child.
And to me the surprise was that the children also reported my relationship with my parents is better. So parental difficulty goes up. Yes, leadership is always harder than appeasement, but the relationship quality improves and the kids themselves report it. So in the moment you're having a little bit of tension, you're having a little static on the line and over time, oh, everyone's relieved. This is so great. And I think that comes down to a child being able to say there is someone in the household that is in charge. It's not me. I don't make all of these decisions. Someone else makes these decisions, they shoulder the responsibility and I get to find my place and settle in. Not as the leader of a household because an 8 year old is not prepared to be the leader of a household.
You, Dad, 35 years old, you're ready to be the leader of a household.
So anyways, that was the inciting incident and the reporter made several observations about that study. But I thought it was a watershed kind of learning and it was new, it's new data. So I wanted to share that with our people.
[00:13:10] Mark: It's interesting, I'm curious if, if that hits our audience as news or if everybody's just nodding along.
[00:13:21] Steven: Yeah, I'll just say, I mean I feel like as a parent all along the way, as you said, we need just pats on the shoulder. And I think this is one of the, one of God's built in affirmations about having aunts and grandparents nearby is whenever I'm with a young family, it just happened this past week. We spent a week with a young family and man, when I left them, I was sure to tell them, you're doing great. I know that it's not always easy. I know that you can feel like you're treading water when you go, we're having a strict 7:30 bedtime and here it is at 9:00 clock and you're going, why are there kids screaming upstairs?
I know that it can feel like, are we even making any ground?
But I just want our people to know it's worth it. It's worth it in the long run.
Mark, you and I, our children are at an age where we're seeing the returns on some of the effort that we put in when they were 2, 3, 4, 5 years old.
And I just want our people to know, like having a bedtime, we're communicating that your brain matters more than you being entertained. And I'm going to take Care of your brain. A screen limit says your dopamine system is not fully developed and I'm going to guard it until it is a curfew. Says your safety matters more than your social standing. To me, the social standing is temporary. Your safety is long term.
So boundaries, they create all kinds of friction. I know that. But predictability reduces anxiety in your children.
And that reduced anxiety strengthens attachment and the. The comfort and confidence they feel at home and with their family is huge.
[00:15:07] Mark: I have to insert not trying to ruffle anyone's feathers, but that's true of wives. Too high. I was going to go under high underlying levels of anxiety.
It may come across as like, I am empowering my wife to be a bold, confident boss babe, but she's just a woman in reality. If you aren't leading and providing, I promise you there's anxiety happening somewhere in your wife scene and it's causing disconnect between you and her. Now, it doesn't mean your marriage is in total crisis. It may or may not be.
But this is not just true of kids. Anywhere where there is not safety provision and like actual leadership, I am actually going to take the reins and lead you. Somewhere there tends to pop up anxiety and that breaks connection between any parts of the family.
[00:16:08] Steven: I'm so glad you went there. Because God's. God's layout, his hierarchy for the family. I use that word choicefully. His hierarchy for the family is that the buck stops with dad and that it's a man's responsibility to lead.
I have to give as an anecdote, without giving too much away, that I'm working with a couple right now.
They've been in dire straits, there's been trouble.
And the trouble could be simmered down into the wife making demands and the husband trying to be some version of the modern guy.
I just want to hear you out and tell me what you need from me and I'll do anything. Like, the more that this wife pushed, the more that the husband just filleted himself trying to appease her.
And what we found, shocker. I kept saying this to him. The more that this happens, you're not going to find that on a random Tuesday afternoon she's going to go, I'm satisfied now. Great job. You did a wonderful job. I think we're good. All it did is it just spun things up more and more and she got more and more animated, more upset, et cetera. And I kept telling him, I really appreciate your heart in wanting to hear her out. We're well past that.
And at some point you're going to have to say, the culture of our home is dying on the vine because of this dynamic and it has to stop.
It has to stop.
And lo and behold, it sounds crazy. If you knew the extremes that have been in this home, it sounds crazy. But literally the day that he had enough and he said, we're not doing this anymore. We're not going to go spinning around on the hamster wheel of emotions.
We just need to be re grounded in forgiveness, grace, and the truth of God in our home. We just kind of need to start over with the basics and we're not doing this anymore. He didn't get a wonderful response when he said that.
But within the day before the sun went down, there was peace in that house with his wife going, I've been out of step and I need to apologize. And it was just fascinating to see the simple dynamic of a man willing to face the music and going, this can't happen. I'm supposed to be in charge and this isn't happening. And it's wrong.
And it turned their household around in a day. And we're talking about months of strain, like really ugly stuff. So, yeah, I agree with you, Mark it. It matters with wives as well as children. Of course, wives aren't children. You don't treat your wife like a child, blah, blah, blah. But there's still leadership that's required in a marriage, just like there's leadership required, acquired with children. So couldn't agree more.
This dynamic isn't new of us being pushed into passivity and the whole godless culture machine using all of its power, whether it's media, advertising, entertainment, shaking its wicked finger at us, saying, you men, you need to sit down, sit in the corner and shut up and never lead because the future is female and you're not female. So stop all that stuff.
Not new. I spend time weekly with a couple of very young men. Just, they're just single dudes not far out of high school.
Loved spending time with them. And one of them taught me this week from Genesis 3, and the serpent speaks to Eve. Adam is standing right there.
He hears the whole conversation and he says nothing. He does nothing. He goes with the flow. I'm putting him at the scene. The Bible doesn't say, and there's Adam, but it looks like he's observing the whole conversation.
So I'll repeat the words of our friend Justin Wolfenberg in saying that the greatest sin of mankind, the temptation of males, is passivity.
And it's not humility. When There is the presence of a threat for your family. It's failure. It's failure to lead. And the consequences didn't stop with Adam and Eve. They rippled through the whole human family. We could just. We can look at story after story scripturally. And of course, anecdotes proliferate around us.
Going with the flow in parenting will not, as I said, produce the kind of kids who can continue and expand kingdom legacies in our families.
If they've never experienced firm, consistent, loving authority, they will struggle to submit to God's authority.
They will struggle, how could it be otherwise? They will struggle to lead their own households later.
And they will struggle to stand against a culture that constantly negotiates the truth.
So I just want to.
I know that this isn't maybe new information. I think it's a reminder. I think we need these regularly.
I just want to put my arms around Dad's and go, I'm just reminding you, you just hold the line in your home. I know there's static and pressure against you. I know that if you act passively today, your day might go better. It might be easy for you today, your years will not go better if you do passivity.
So stay consistent. I don't think we pound our fist and start jumping up and down at every sign of trouble.
I have a child who I have observed shading the truth, like giving partial truths.
And I've seen that in sort of innocuous ways, thinking, oh, that's not the whole truth of the story.
Huh. Okay, I'm not sure what to do about that. I'm going to let that sit there and, well, it's not really a lie. It's not an out and out lie.
I don't know that there's a lot of damage done. I'm just waiting. I'm waiting, collecting data. Well, something happened recently that was like, well, it's time for this to be dealt with.
And so I came in as pleasant as possible.
We talked about what God's word says.
We brought it back to, there's the ninth commandment in scripture, which is, you will not be a false witness. A false witness to someone who gives a partial testimony because they want to lead the jury. There's somewhere they're trying to manipulate the outcomes so they're partial with the information that they give.
And I levied a punishment on my child, which is, I feel that it's good and strong. I'll just put it that way.
I don't know many other dads that would do what I did. Where we ended up. And I just think I felt really good about it.
My relationship, I'm watching, I'm very sensitive. Are my relationships with my children still strong? Is there still love and trust here?
And there is, and we're constantly trying to calibrate those things.
I'll just say that Ephesians 6:4 says that we're not to provoke our children to anger.
And I think that we always think of that as a shaking fist from dad that would provoke your child to anger. But certainly we have enough data right now to tell us that another way to provoke your child to anger is to be emotionally or spiritually absent in their lives. We're just kind of going along. We just want to be another one of their feel good buddies. I want you to like dad. So I'm just kind of here along for the ride. I think that provokes them to anger. As I said, I think they get angry at authority structures. I think they definitely get angry at God if you communicate to them that any kind of authority that wants to oppose, impose something into your world, cannot be trusted, etc.
So anyways, I think this stuff revisits us in our life at every stage of parenting. I would say on into grandparenting.
Mark, you asked a question when we were talking about this episode about, okay, well, let's say that we have engaged parents that are not passive, gentle parents, but this kind of thinking can seep into other places in their lives. Did you have any thoughts about where that could be a temptation for our listeners?
[00:24:58] Mark: I mean, I think it's really caught in what you just described, which is like, okay, I don't see the open rebellion maybe that I think all of us who watch parents, whether it's strangers at the grocery store or you go to a restaurant and there's a kid who can't sit. Like, most of our people and our family too have made a real effort to train kids. And we don't have kids that are just flouting authority to our face.
And yet, I mean, I had a similar story with my youngest who developed a habit of rolling the eyes at just everything.
And it was kind of like, well, I kind of justified it to myself for a minute. Well, you know, she's doing what we ask and she's not talking back and she's obeying quickly, but she's rolling the eyes.
And then it started to just sort of come out in attitude. And I realized I hadn't nipped that early enough that it actually became a real big repentance and correction, which did involve some butt spanking at one point.
But there was.
I had. Even though I would tell you all day long how much I believe in, you know, carefully, authoritatively parenting her, I had acted like, well, a little bit afraid of correcting something and just kind of willing to go along to get along. It's not that different than what you just described with a guy who goes, well, it's gonna go easier for me if I don't challenge my wife.
[00:26:39] Steven: Yes.
[00:26:39] Mark: On this thing.
And so I think that those micro decisions, you might have a framework that is not gentle parenting, but those micro decisions, if you haven't paid attention, I think about, you know, Song of Solomon, the little foxes in the garden. It's not the. The pestilence that destroys the whole village. It's like, hey, if you don't pay attention to these small things in a. As well, then you talk about this a lot. In the Abraham's Wallet retreats that we've gone on, the alternative is that culture is going to take you down a river that is a totally. It doesn't sweep you down there fast. It's not the flooding Guadalupe in, you know, summer of 2024.
It's it. But it's a gentle current, and it leads you to a totally different place. And I think that even those of us who are actively kind of professing a different style when it comes to parenting, we will be led down the path of, you know, they're. They're going to choose for themselves where they end up.
[00:27:50] Steven: Right.
[00:27:51] Mark: If you've listened to us, you might go, well, these guys just sound like they're going to be your typical homeschool parents that completely shelter their kids and don't let them experience any choice. And then they go out into the world and they get lost. And we would say, no, that's not what we're advocating for at all. One of the big principles of our parenting cell is you must let your kids have opportunities to wildly fail to encounter the world, to do all these things while they're under your roof and give them coaching through those experiences. And yet, just to use my own example, the eye rolls. Every time they happened, I was like, well, this would be a real pain in the butt to stop our.
Whatever we were doing, attempt to get in the car for church and deal with this right now. And it's easier for me to ignore it. And I don't want to be too hyperbolic, but if I had just let that go until she was 17, I think I would have cultivated a rebellious spirit that would have been a massive thorn in her marriage. I think it would have been a problem in her ability to submit to God when he tells her to do something she does not want to do.
And it could lead to just this legalistic, well, I'll do what I'm supposed to, but I hate it approach to life. And so as a father who loves her, it was actually the loving thing for me to get up in her face, in a sense, and say, in this home, you will not do this. And we're going to tear it all down to what's going on in your heart, and we're going to hit that together as a family. And then we will build up some trust around how you obey. And it's not just the outward that we care about. It's actually what's going on in your heart and your mind. And so that's all stuff that I don't know.
My imagination of the gentle parenting movement says you just have to give her freedom to be herself and express her heart. Well, I would say her heart, just like mine, is pretty wicked, left to its own devices. And one of the tough but joyful assignments I have is crafting it and kind of partnering with the Holy Spirit and turning her into somebody who's submitted ultimately to the Lord, but for a little bit, to me as her dad.
[00:30:19] Steven: Yeah. When you mentioned, if I let this go, I can project to age 17 and having a rebellious child.
I always think of this when I'm having a hard moment to think, do I interpose myself here or do I let it go? I always think of Jordan Peterson's book 12 Rules for Life.
He's a clinic. He was a clinical psychologist and applies those to rules for life. And. And his rule number five, famously was, do not let your children do anything that makes you dislike them.
And such an interesting thought. Simply like, I want to really like my kids.
So when they're doing something that opposes mom, for instance, boy, that you want the gavel to come down to my house, oppose, or try to humiliate mom or something. I won't have it because I. I don't like it. I don't want that in my house.
And. And it's easy to. To see again from where we're standing, oh, my goodness, the benefits that I feel with my teenage children. And of course, we heard what everybody hears. Oh, you just wait till the teenage years. Oh, boy, you're really going to get it.
And I just love my children. I just love spending time with them. And they're great. And It's a funny place that we're in with the parents of teens because we are experiencing. We're eating the fruit of faithful parenting when they're young. But we're still parenting. And I can't lull back into, they're great. Oh, I enjoy them so much. They still need parenting.
So we've got to again, do this calibration thing. I have to throw in that Abraham is our model for a reason.
And in Genesis 18:19, God says that he chose him because he would command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord. The active verb there is command.
He would command his children. Not endless consensus building, but again, that high challenge. This is who we are.
So I'll just throw this in. Maybe it's helpful to somebody.
I have often said that I want because the word Christian is so misused, I have reasoned that having my children have an identity as Christians has a limited value because that can be misused.
But our family name, I get to define it. And there's nobody. They're never going to see a movie that tells them what being a manual is. I get to do that.
So in dealing with what I talked about, the half truths and being a false witness, one of the things that I enforced is that manuals are going to be faithful witnesses. That's who we are. And when you are a false witness, you. You're not acting as Emmanuel. So we have to get this character issue corrected so that you can come back into the fold as Emmanuel. I feel that dynamic when we read that Abraham would command his children and his household after him to keep the way of the Lord. This is what we do.
And nobody was a better example of being a weirdo in a pagan culture than Abraham. He was the only guy on planet Earth that we know of who was following the King of the Universe till Melchizedek came along.
So let me jump to a resource that I want to give you folks that came into my hands that I'm really excited about.
One of our listeners, Michael Di Aquino and his wife. I think that's how you say the name. DA Aquino and his wife Angela wrote and published a book called the Parenthood Primer. Here it is. Look at this attractive cover, the Parenthood Primer. It's called a Pre Parental Counseling Workbook for Expecting Christian Couples.
So the idea is that it's a workbook that you can go through with your spouse to help you prepare intentionally for parenting before the baby arrives. That's the idea, is that we can get on the same page. It does a wonderful job of just describing the Christian home, the way that God has set things up. And the idea is by the time the baby arrives, we're ready to go. We're together, we're healthy, and we're strong. But I have to say that for parents who already have children, this workbook, I think is still incredibly helpful for getting on the same page and becoming more intentional in your parenting. I would like to read one paragraph from their wonderful chapter seven, which is trusting God's design for the family. Obviously, when you get into parenting, it's like, well, we have to understand God's design for the family.
And here's. Here's what they write.
Psalm 127:1 reminds us that unless the Lord builds the house, those who try to build it on their own will find their work empty.
It's not enough to be loving or sincere or committed to your child. If your foundation is not aligned with God's design, your efforts may eventually collapse under the weight of confusion or contradiction. The patterns of this world often push us toward making children the center of the home, choosing convenience over conviction, or treating identity and roles as fluid and self determined. Romans 12:2 challenges that idea. It warns us not to confront to the cult, not to conform to the culture around us, but to allow our thinking and living to. To be reshaped by God's truth. Only then we'll be able to discern what is actually good, that not what is popular, expected, or easy.
So I'm just throwing this out at you. The Parenthood Primer. It's available on Amazon.
Michael and Angela live in Denver. They have five children. They're part of the family team's ecosystem and they are.
They're Abe's wallet listeners.
So I was very excited when Michael sent me this and want to hardly recommend it to you. I think it's helpful for kind of again, getting us all on the same page.
[00:36:46] Mark: The only other resource I wanted to just kick people is something that's been around since the, I think, late 70s called growing kids God's Way. Have you heard of this, Stephen?
[00:36:58] Steven: I went to a Growing Kids God's Way conference when our kids were young and I'm into it.
Maybe not cool, but it's true.
[00:37:06] Mark: It's good if you guys are listening and you go, we're 100% on board with you. But man, we've got all these people in our church or our school community who have no idea and we just don't know how to even like, maybe disciple our friends. In this without seeming like, know it all jerks. There's a couple that we're close to here in Utah that has brought that curriculum to our church and it wasn't easy. They had to basically pioneer it. They had to stand up on a Sunday and say, the reason we're doing this is because our parents did it and we have a great relationship with them and we've seen the fruit over the last 40 years and now we're parenting teens down to newborns. So let's bring it here. But I've found that it's a little bit.
It's not as jarring as some of the resources that would go against the spirit of the age when it comes to parenting. It. It's a nice. I mean, it will, you will hear the breaking glass at some point if you're coming from a total like gentle parenting framework into this. But it's palatable, I think, for people for whom some of these ideas are really new. So I would suggest if you're looking for a way to maybe get this into the water in your world, Growing Kids God's Way has curriculum and you could lead people through that in your community.
And I think it's a pretty nice on ramp into this way of thinking.
[00:38:36] Steven: That's great. I'm definitely a fan of Growing Kids God's Way.
Gang. If this episode has been helpful, would you do two things? One, would you consider sharing it with another dad who needs encouragement to hold the line in this culture of appeasement? And second, would you consider partnering with
[email protected] support so that we can keep equipping more biblical family leaders? And every time we ever mention that webpage, I want to just say thank you to so many of you who are already partnering with us to inspire and equip Abrahamic families, many of whom we'll see at the retreat, which is awesome. We're such a great team that God has given us guys. Your kids don't need another peer that will coddle them emotionally. They need a father and a mother strong enough to absorb the short term discomfort so that they don't pay the long term cost.
Structure and faithful structure that endures is love made visible. That leadership is harder than appeasement and it produces the stronger bond. Bond.
Don't drift into letting them lead you. You lead them. That's what the kingdom of God is like.
Thanks for listening to Abraham's wallet, guys. We'll see you next week. Until then, run your home and your dough like a biblical bottle.
