TD 9: Israel Wayne – Foundational Truths: Biblical Worldview, Education, and Discipleship

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When I look at what can we do that would make the most amount of

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change in our country? I don’t know of anything that

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is more important than parents discipling their

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children and giving them a biblical worldview. I mean, anything that I think

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of, any political activity, any kind of social movement or

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social change or whatever, I can’t think of anything more fundamental

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than just changing hearts and minds, beginning in the home

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with parents and then them discipling their children. You know, when we

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think about return on investment, it’s the best ROi I can think of

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in terms of my time. With a face for radio and a video show

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to prove it. Coming to you from a bunker in northeastern

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Oklahoma. I’m your host, GarrittHampton, and you are

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listening to the Thinking Dad. I’m so glad you’ve joined me today. We

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have a really great show for you. I have Israel Wayne on

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today, who’s a good friend, and we’ve spent about the last 15

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minutes shooting the breeze. I love Israel and I love his

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family, and I know you’re going to be blessed by him today. Um,

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we’re going to be talking about his book, Foundational Truths: A

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Modern Catechism. And we’re going to be talking about one of my

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favorite subjects, family discipleship. Uh, but

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before we get started, I want to tell you about our

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sponsor, CTCMath Guys,

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these guys are the greatest. I’ve got to tell you what they did, as we

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get started. I don’t know where this interview is fitting in the

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podcast, but this is the first one we’re recording.

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And right out of the gate, CTCMath joined us.

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These guys understand that thinking dads raise

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thinking kids. One of the most important things you can do for

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your kids, as a dad, is to raise kids with a

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great education so that they can go out into the world and make

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an impact. And CTCMath

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need, because you’re going to love them. Check

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them out at ctcmath.com. All right, guys, we’re

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here with Israel Wayne. Israel, for those of our listeners who

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may not know you, would you introduce yourself real quickly and tell them

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about yourself and your family? Yeah. So I have a unique angle

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or experience with the homeschool movement in that my mother was one of the

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founding pioneers of the homeschool movement, started homeschooling my

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older sister and I back in 1978 and she

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started publishing a national homeschool magazine in 1988. So I grew up

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in kind of the national leadership side of homeschooling. My

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wife was also homeschooled. Her family started homeschooling in 1983.

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We’ve been married for over 25 years. We have eleven children. Our

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oldest is almost 24, our baby is

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almost three. And so all of our children have been

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homeschooled from birth. So I’m kind of known somewhat in that space,

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but I’m an author, conference speaker, director and founder

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of a ministry called Family Renewal and

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have been publishing with New Leaf Press and Master Books for about

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the last decade and have had a great synergy

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relationship with them. They’re a great Christian publisher that put, they put out a lot

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of excellent resources for Christians as well

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as Christian curriculum for children. And

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I’m a conference speaker, so I travel all over the US and sometimes even around

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the world, speaking at churches, family camps,

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Christian conferences and so forth. So I love what I get to do.

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It’s a lot of fun. And I, I should also mention, I guess

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I wear kind of a volunteer hat with the state Homeschool association of

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Michigan Service vice president there and that’s keeping me busy

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lately. But yeah, a lot of,

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a lot of fun things that I get to do. Nice. Yeah. Now this

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wasn’t a part of my questions at all, but I’d love if you would take

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a minute and explain the importance of state homeschool

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orgs because this is something we’re really passionate about and

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I didn’t plan on talking about it today, but I’d love it if you would

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go there for a minute. So the modern day Christian homeschooling movement

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started in 1983 and there were about 26 different state

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associations that started that year and then other states

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joined. Almost every state in the United States has their own Christian state homeschool

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association and these folks do a variety of things. Many of them

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put on an annual conference, which if you haven’t been to your state’s homeschool conference,

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I highly recommend that. And you can find all of

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these websites for all of the state associations at

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a place called homeschoolfreedom.com

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and they have a website

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that links you to all the different state homeschool associations so you can learn what

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they do. They’ll also tell you the laws regarding homeschooling in your state.

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Oftentimes they will connect you to local or regional homeschool

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co ops or support groups. So you can plug into what’s happening with events

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and opportunities that are local to you. They will

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provide all kinds of resources, whether oftentimes, whether it’s

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special needs or encouragement, inspirational

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articles, sometimes podcasts. There’s just a lot that they

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provide. And so some of them are paid membership

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organizations. That basically is just a way for you to donate to the organization

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and fund them. But you often will get some membership perks and

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discounts on the conferences or goodies.

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So I highly recommend and encourage that you check out the state

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home school associations in your area

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and that you get plugged in and get involved because we’re stronger when we stand

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together. Yeah, totally. They’re so important. Before we

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started recording, you were actually talking about what you’re working on right now

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with your state. Would you mind telling parents what’s going on?

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So in the state of Michigan, we have a potential bill. It’s not been

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introduced yet, but supposedly it’s been written. They’re just waiting for the right

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timing to, to introduce it. That would require

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annual registration for all students in Michigan into a

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centralized education database that would probably be controlled

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by the state Department of Education. And so this will be tracking

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all children in the state of Michigan through the centralized

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database annually. And then additionally to that, of

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course, we think that’s just the foot in the door. There have been suggestions

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that because they are accusing homeschoolers of being child

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abusers and that they need to track homeschoolers,

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specifically in particular, so that they can

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protect the children. And so there’s been talk about adding additional

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legislation or regulations that may even include home

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visits or twice annual visits with some sort of government mandated

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reporter. And so our state association, Michigan Christian Home School

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Network, or M I C H N is our acronym, we pronounce that mission.

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We’ve been trying to fight that pretty aggressively here in the state of Michigan. We’re

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an all volunteer board. I serve as vice president of the Michigan State

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Homeschool association. So again, this is the kind of thing that we

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do and that your state association does many times. You may not even know that

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you have a state home school association, but these are the kinds of

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battles that we fight, and we’re stronger together. So

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make sure that you stand with your state home school association. Yeah. Thank you for

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that work. It’s so important. We regularly try

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to warn people about the danger of school choice. And

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for conservatives listening, you may hear that and go, why would you

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try to stop school choice? And I want people to understand

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that these, these school choice laws that are being pushed

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are just an open door for government control into

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homeschooling and private schools. They’re extremely dangerous

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because what the government funds, the government runs.

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So, please, parents, keep your eyes open and

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talk to your legislatures. Talk to people who are pushing

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this regulation. It’s extraordinarily dangerous for

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homeschoolers. Israel, you’ve spent most of your

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career talking to homeschool families, and your mom, of course,

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you mentioned, was kind of a groundbreaking homeschool leader.

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Um, you’ve had 30 years to figure out what you wanted to

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do. Why would you do this? I think one of the things that

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happened to me back in the 1980s and nineties

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was watching my mom, who was often a keynote speaker at these homeschool

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conferences. When she would give a presentation,

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people would often come up afterward and would just talk about

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how that message changed their hearts and minds.

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There were people who would get saved listening to my mom’s messages,

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or they would read the magazines that she published or the books she wrote

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and just talk about how life changing it was. And I started to

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see how this could have a multigenerational impact, that you’re not just impacting

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a person, but when you really see the hearts of parents

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turning to their children, that can have an impact

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that goes many generations deepen. And so

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in terms of cultural change, I really don’t know of anything that is more significant

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than being able to make an impact in seeing

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revival in the home and seeing the hearts of fathers turn to

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their children and the hearts of mothers turn to their children and couples being reunited.

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And so even as a teenager, I started

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working in her publishing business and worked there 20

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years, and have just seen that impact of

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thousands of families over the years that have said, like,

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we read your book or we heard you speak, and it just put us on

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a completely different trajectory. And so

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I think as far as when I look at what can we do that would

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make the most amount of change in our country? I don’t know

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of anything that is more important than

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parents discipling their children and giving them a biblical worldview.

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Right. I mean, anything that I think of, any political activity,

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any kind of social movement or social change or whatever, I can’t think of anything

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more fundamental than just changing hearts and

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minds, beginning in the home with parents and

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then them discipling their children. I think it’s probably the best

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investment. When we think about return on investment,

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it’s the best roi I can think of in terms of my time. Yeah.

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Amen. What you’re saying is that education is

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related to everything, right? Culture is downstream. Downstream from

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education. The church is dependent on education.

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One of the things I say all the time is it doesn’t matter how

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committed the adults are in the church, if

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their children are being discipled by the state into a

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secular worldview, the church will die in a. In a generation.

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And so, yeah, I think this is so important, and I’m. I’m really so

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thankful for your ministry. Um, our. Our viewers don’t probably

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know, but you and I met many years ago working on a

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movie called Schoolhouse rocked the homeschool Revolution,

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which is available now for streaming for free at

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schoolhouse rocked.com. but you were an important voice in that

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movie, and you’ve had a real impact on my

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thinking about education for years. In fact,

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when I started directing that movie, um, I was of the

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opinion that education was important, but

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that parents could kind of do whatever they felt was right for their

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family and, you know, trust the Lord to take care of everything else,

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and it would be fine. And as I started working on the movie and

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talking to people like you and reading your really, really powerful

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article, um, Christian education a manifesto.

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Right? I’ve shared this article dozens of times, and

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you wrote a book called education. Does God have an opinion?

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And these sort of things really shaped my opinion

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in a very important way about education. It really

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is the key to the rest of culture, and it really

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is the key to discipleship. So I want. I want you to talk a

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little bit about how education and discipleship go together, and

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that’ll bring us to why you wrote your book and kind of what you’re trying

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to get families to do. Well, Jesus said and

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taught and demonstrated something that was really radical. And it was quite

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different, really, than the approach, the socratic

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method that the Greeks had embraced.

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The idea from the Greeks was really very much that you have an information

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download and that you try to pass on

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ideas from one generation to the next. And I think sometimes when we think

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of education, we think of it in that way. But the more

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hebraic model that Jesus emulated was where

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he woke his disciples up every morning and he said, come,

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follow me. And then they just followed him around,

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and they watched what he did, and he taught them

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by how he lived. And so Jesus said that

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when a student is fully trained, he will become like his

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teacher. And so the question, I think, for us as parents

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is, do we want our children becoming like their

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teachers in terms of their worldview, in terms of their

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beliefs, their lifestyle, their practice, and really,

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the concept within the Bible that we find is that we’re the ones that are

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supposed to be the mentors. We’re the ones that are supposed to be the models,

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right? And so we’re supposed to say, like the apostle Paul, follow

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me as I follow Christ. And I think for some parents,

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especially for some dads, they think, I don’t know that I want that. I don’t

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know that I want my child becoming like me. I want my child

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to become a composite of all these wonderful,

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you know, morals or values or principles.

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I don’t think I want my child to grow up and be like me. And

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in one sense, we don’t. Right, because we know our failures and our

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imperfections. But we’re supposed to be

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modeling for our children what we want them to become. And

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so if we want our children to know how to forgive people, well,

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we need to learn how to forgive. And if we want them to know how

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to do conflict resolution, we have to model that. And if we want them to

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be good financial stewards, we have to show them how to do that.

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And we want them to have good marriages. We have to model that for

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them. And so discipleship is far more than just cramming

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their head full of information and data. It is very much us

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passing on who we are to them,

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and that’s deuteronomy six. And so many people, I

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think, think that they can fulfill deuteronomy six, which says,

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this law, which I give you this day, is to be on your heart. That’s

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where it starts. But then you teach it diligently.

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When you sit in your home, when you walk outside your home,

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when you rise up, when you lie down. And they think they can fulfill that

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by sending their children away from them all day, and you can’t.

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And so that model is really one of having your

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children close to you, being with them, and just letting them see the way that

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you live. And that requires us to have that law

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written on our heart. Right. We have to get it first. You can’t give to

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somebody else what you don’t have. And so that that principle of

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discipleship means that we have to own it first in order to be able

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to transmit it to others. And that’s a big commitment, and it scares a

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lot of people, and they run away from it. Yeah, I think you actually.

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I don’t know if you meant to do this, but I think you actually

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hit on the number one reason that

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parents don’t actually homeschool their kids. You know, we hear

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arguments like, well, my kids need to be socialized, or I want my kids

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involved in school, sports or whatever. There’s a million

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reasons that we’ll hear why parents won’t actually take

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charge of their kids education. And ultimately, I think

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it boils down to the sobering thought that, man,

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if I bring them into my home and I put them under my

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discipleship, I’m ultimately responsible. And I know

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what I am, right? I know as a dad, I’m a sinner.

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I’m, I’m prone to anger at times. I’m prone to

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speaking out of turn. And if I’m responsible for training my

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kids, then ultimately I have to take responsibility for

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the outcome. What would you say to a parent who struggles with

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that? Well, I understand that myself. I think

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we all do. I think Garritt and I both do. And so we’re sympathetic

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to it. But at the same point, so I put it

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this, a friend of mine said this back in the eighties, I remember he used

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to go around and do homeschool seminars. And when I was just a teenager, I

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used to go hear him say this, but he would say, homeschooling is a window

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and mirror into the heart. It is a window into your child’s

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heart where it gives you the context, the time,

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the ability to be with them all day and to see what’s in their

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heart. And sometimes what we see in our child’s heart, we

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don’t like. Sometimes we see laziness. Sometimes we see disobedience,

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we see rebellion, we see bad attitudes, we see lack of

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character. And he said, but homeschooling is more than just

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a window into our child’s heart, giving us the time and the opportunity

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to see what’s going on inside of them. It’s also a mirror back to our

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own heart. And so, oftentimes, we see a lot of yuck in us

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where we are impatient with them and we get frustrated how

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we’re lazy and we don’t want to put the work in. And it reflects back

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who we are, and we don’t like that. We don’t like the bad

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things that we see inside of their heart, and we don’t like the negative

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reflection that we see from the mirror that they reflect back

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to us. And so what most parents do is they just say, I’m going to

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send my child away from me, and then I don’t have to see

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that, and then I don’t have to think about that.

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And, you know, I had a lady told me one time, she said, my twelve

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year old daughter and I are homeschooling. But it’s not going well. We’re not getting

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along. She pushes back. She loves her teachers at school.

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She doesn’t like me. She just wants to go back to school.

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And she thinks that she would be happier there. And I’m thinking she would be

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happier there, too. And I think I would be happier. And so I’m thinking

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that I should just send her back to school. What do you think about that?

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And I told her, I said, so, let me ask you this question. What is

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your main goal? What are you trying to achieve? And she said, well, I

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guess just so we stopped fighting. I said, so just avoiding

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conflict. That’s your goal? And she said, yes. I said, okay,

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well, I would agree with you that if you want to avoid conflict, that that’s

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probably the best way to go about it. And she seemed really surprised

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because she knows I’m a strong homeschool advocate. And so she said, well, I’m really

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surprised to hear you say that. Like, I didn’t expect that from you. And I

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said, but, yeah, I mean, if that’s your goal, to avoid conflict, then definitely

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send your child to school. I said, now, if your goal was that you wanted

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to have a relationship with your daughter, that would be the worst possible thing you

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could do. And she said, wait, what? And I said, well,

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basically, sending people that you love away from

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you almost assures that you will not have

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relationship with them, because relationship is predominantly

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a product of time, and influence is a product of

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time. And so if you don’t want to have

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conflict, then send your child away from you. But I said, I’m going to make

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an additional suggestion that during the season where you’re avoiding conflict

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with your daughter, I would also advise that you move out of the house and

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not live with your husband anymore either, so that you can avoid even

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more conflict. Because if you don’t live with your husband, then you can’t

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have conflict with him either. Right. And she was totally confused by

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that. And just, it was like, she’s like, that seems like terrible advice.

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Like, why would you say that? And I said, well, again, I mean, if that’s

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our goal, if our goal is we just don’t want conflict, then that’s a great

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way to avoid conflict. But again, if the goal is that you want to actually

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have a relationship with your husband, then you need to run into these

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relationships, not run away from them. And so I think this. You’re

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exactly right, Garrett. I think people don’t want to face

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the hard part of doing

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relationships and doing life together. With their family.

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And so avoidance just becomes their path, and it leads

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to divorce and marriage, and it leads to our children wanting to have nothing to

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do with us when they’re adults. And so, you know, the better

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approach, rather than just sending them away for complete strangers to raise them,

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is that we have to figure this out. And I’ll say this, too, sometimes it

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actually requires bringing people, welcoming people into our

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family dynamic, you know, our church elders or maybe a biblical

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counselor and saying, we need help, like, we’re

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not surviving here. We’re not thriving here. And yet, you know what keeps people

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from doing that? Pride. People are too proud. They are

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too self reliant.

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And they think that it’s a shame on them to say that

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they need help. And men will often ask for help if it’s, you know,

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fixing their truck or solving a plumbing problem, and they

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realize they’re in over their head. But when it comes to relationships and their

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family, we don’t go outside the house for that.

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And I think people do themselves a great disservice.

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Yeah. Wow, man, that is so true. And what’s

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unfortunate is that pride is praised as a virtue.

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Now, in culture, you talked about something in

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that where you mentioned the goal of, and I think that

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brings us to a really important point. Whereas parents,

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we have to evaluate what is our ultimate goal with

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our children. I think that God has very clearly given our children to

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us to steward them and to steward them toward an

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end. So I want to talk about that a little bit after we take a

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break. We will be right back. Men, I want to ask a

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favor of you. As you know, the Thinking Dad podcast is brand

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new, and we really want to reach millions of men

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00:22:00,380 –> 00:22:04,076
with this message of encouragement. So I want to ask you to take a minute

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00:22:04,108 –> 00:22:07,956
to share this show. If you’re watching the video on YouTube or another

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00:22:08,028 –> 00:22:11,604
video platform, make sure you’re subscribed to our channel.

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00:22:11,732 –> 00:22:15,356
Go ahead and hit the like button and then leave a comment that really does

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00:22:15,388 –> 00:22:19,236
help with the algorithms. If you’re listening on a podcast app, take

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00:22:19,268 –> 00:22:22,892
a minute to go in and rate and review the show. It helps others

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00:22:22,956 –> 00:22:26,792
to know why. This shows an encouragement to you, and it really does help to

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get the word out. Also, men, take a minute, go

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00:22:30,544 –> 00:22:34,136
to ctcmath.com and just say thank you for supporting this

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00:22:34,168 –> 00:22:37,784
show. They’re such a blessing. They’ve been with the Schoolhouse Rocked

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00:22:37,832 –> 00:22:41,472
Podcast for about five years now. They’ve really been a blessing

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00:22:41,496 –> 00:22:45,200
to us, and they just believe in this mission. So they were game to

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come along with us for the first season and support us in a big way.

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If you are blessed by this show, it’s partially because

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00:22:52,394 –> 00:22:55,834
of them. I want you to take a minute and say thank you to them.

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It really does help out. All right, we are back with Israel.

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Wayne. Man, that was good stuff, Israel. We were talking about

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the goal. What do you see as the goal for dads?

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Well, we actually have a family mission statement, and I created a

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poster that hangs in the living room of our home in

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the main high traffic area that we go through all day,

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every day. It’s probably about a three foot by four foot

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poster, and it has a picture, but then the words

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say, we exist to know love

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and serve God, and love and serve others.

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And if you ask any of my children, down to at

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least my seven year old, they can all recite that. And if you ask

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them what is your purpose in life, they will say it’s to know

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love and serve God and love and serve other people. And to

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me, really, that’s the heart, that’s the bullseye of the target. That’s

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true north for us. And so we constantly

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look at that and recalibrate to that and say,

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are we fulfilling the purpose for which God has placed us here on

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the earth? And it also helps us to make wise

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choices when opportunities come up to

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ask, does this align with and help us to accomplish our mission

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on Earth? Or is this just going to be a distraction from us

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accomplishing our mission on earth? So, like, does this video game

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help us to know God better? Does it equip us to love and

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serve other people better? Wow. Okay. If it doesn’t, then it’s

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taking us off course. It’s not aligning with our mission.

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Okay, what about this opportunity to go on Saturday and help

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an older person in our church who is recovering from a surgery?

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Yes, that does align with our mission. And yes, we want to be about

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that. So it really helps us to be able to even sort through

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making wise decisions as a family. Yeah.

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Wow. Now I’m going to jump into this tool you’ve provided for

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parents, but before I do that, I want to ask you,

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how are dad’s role and mom’s role different

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in establishing the goal and working toward the goal and

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communicating the goal in the house? Well, I know

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that every family dynamic is a little bit different, and

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so it’s hard to say that, you know, every family is going to look exactly

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the same. However, in general, I think

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dads tend to be visionaries and they

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tend to be able to see the big picture. But

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oftentimes it’s the moms who are really good with the

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implementation. And so in addition to creating a

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mission statement for your family, which I highly encourage you to do,

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there can also be a mission strategy

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where you talk about, okay, so what are the ways in which we

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are going to implement our mission statement and actually functionally get it

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done? So for our home, for example, it’s my

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role as the husband to constantly remind our family

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of the main thing and keep pointing us back there and

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to make sure that we are on target and we don’t derail, we don’t go

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off course and drift from mission.

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And that’s the role, like, for a CEO in a corporation. Right. Because

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universities, nonprofits, businesses

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oftentimes experience mission drift, and you find 100 years

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later, they’re completely doing something totally opposite than what

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they started, like the YMCA or the Boy Scouts. Right.

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And so we want to make sure that we keep our family on mission. But

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then the role of the mom, I think, often, is to say, okay, now here’s

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our big picture goal. How do we get there and how do

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we implement that, and what’s the strategy that we use? And so there

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really is good teamwork. I think that God makes us, as husbands and wives, a

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little different in terms of our thought processes, our skill

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sets, our giftings. And so we work together as a

440
00:26:51,566 –> 00:26:55,142
team to make sure that we don’t just have a grandiose vision, but that we

441
00:26:55,166 –> 00:26:58,902
actually know how to practically implement it throughout the week. Right?

442
00:26:59,006 –> 00:27:02,170
Yeah. Just like in homeschooling, when the rubber meets the road,

443
00:27:02,470 –> 00:27:06,230
usually if there’s a two parent home, dad is out earning

444
00:27:06,270 –> 00:27:09,646
a living and providing for the family, and mom is at

445
00:27:09,678 –> 00:27:13,090
home with the kids during the day doing the educating.

446
00:27:13,590 –> 00:27:17,348
I think that contrary to the cultural norm, in

447
00:27:17,404 –> 00:27:21,100
most cases, um, in order to make it work,

448
00:27:21,140 –> 00:27:24,964
you have to have some level of mom being home to teach the kids.

449
00:27:25,012 –> 00:27:28,580
I know that, that, that with homeschooling, there are all sorts of

450
00:27:28,620 –> 00:27:32,468
cases, but it’s usually not dad doing

451
00:27:32,524 –> 00:27:36,044
the bulk of the teaching. However, I think there’s a biblical

452
00:27:36,092 –> 00:27:39,836
command for dad still to be the. The

453
00:27:39,908 –> 00:27:43,326
ultimate discipler, right? For sure, yeah. I think

454
00:27:43,358 –> 00:27:46,694
that when you go through the scripture, I talk about this in my book, education.

455
00:27:46,782 –> 00:27:50,326
Does God have an opinion that there are twice as many commands in

456
00:27:50,358 –> 00:27:53,926
scripture for men to teach and disciple their children as there

457
00:27:53,958 –> 00:27:57,686
are for mothers, too? And I think that’s intentional. And

458
00:27:57,718 –> 00:28:01,454
I sometimes say that the main reason for that is that women

459
00:28:01,502 –> 00:28:04,890
don’t have to be told to teach and nurture their children. And men do

460
00:28:06,070 –> 00:28:09,388
just like, love your wives, right? Yeah, exactly.

461
00:28:09,444 –> 00:28:12,812
So men have to actually be told to do these things.

462
00:28:12,956 –> 00:28:16,700
But on the other hand, I think that God

463
00:28:16,740 –> 00:28:20,404
holds us as fathers twice as responsible for the education

464
00:28:20,492 –> 00:28:23,840
of our children as our wives. And so

465
00:28:24,300 –> 00:28:28,092
this idea that we have within culture that we’re only breadwinners is

466
00:28:28,116 –> 00:28:31,900
simply not a biblically sustainable idea. Right. Boil that down

467
00:28:31,940 –> 00:28:35,764
a little bit into practical steps. What should dad

468
00:28:35,812 –> 00:28:39,620
be doing if, you know, if everything works out

469
00:28:39,660 –> 00:28:43,500
great? What would an ideal situation be for a dad

470
00:28:43,660 –> 00:28:47,476
discipling his family at home? The two most important things I’ve

471
00:28:47,508 –> 00:28:51,004
done as a dad that have benefited our family is, number

472
00:28:51,052 –> 00:28:54,636
one, insisting that we are going to homeschool all of our children

473
00:28:54,708 –> 00:28:58,532
from birth to graduation. It’s just a non negotiable. Yeah, you

474
00:28:58,556 –> 00:29:01,360
might have just lost half of our listeners there.

475
00:29:02,550 –> 00:29:06,370
I’m not fighting my wife on that. I’m actually insisting that

476
00:29:06,790 –> 00:29:10,462
this is the direction we’re going, this is the method we’re going to use.

477
00:29:10,646 –> 00:29:14,246
This is non negotiable for us. We’re not going to reconsider it. Every year

478
00:29:14,398 –> 00:29:18,158
we’ve closed the door, our children will be discipled by

479
00:29:18,214 –> 00:29:21,454
us as their parents. And so we don’t have to go back and keep revisiting

480
00:29:21,502 –> 00:29:25,142
that all the time. That’s a commitment that we’ve made. We’re as committed to that

481
00:29:25,166 –> 00:29:27,958
as we are that we’re going to love each other and stay together as a

482
00:29:27,974 –> 00:29:31,552
married couple. You know, we don’t go back and revisit that every year and say,

483
00:29:31,576 –> 00:29:35,256
like, is that something that we’re really committed to for 2025? You know,

484
00:29:35,288 –> 00:29:39,048
like, we settled that a long time ago. Yeah, so, so that. And

485
00:29:39,064 –> 00:29:42,408
then secondly, the second thing I’ve done, and I’ve done a ton of things wrong,

486
00:29:42,504 –> 00:29:46,192
I mean, I write parenting books and you can read my parenting books and

487
00:29:46,256 –> 00:29:49,720
see some of the things that I know I’ve done wrong. But the one thing

488
00:29:49,760 –> 00:29:53,224
I think I’ve done that’s really benefited our family is having daily family

489
00:29:53,352 –> 00:29:57,078
devotions or family worship time. And that was not

490
00:29:57,094 –> 00:30:00,854
something I was raised with. It was not something I was familiar with. I

491
00:30:00,862 –> 00:30:04,390
heard, knew the concept, right. I’d heard of it, but I hadn’t had it

492
00:30:04,430 –> 00:30:08,262
modeled. And I just, as a dad, had to jump in and learn

493
00:30:08,286 –> 00:30:12,046
how to do it. And that’s scary for a lot of dads, but

494
00:30:12,198 –> 00:30:15,566
it’s been one of the most rewarding things for our family,

495
00:30:15,758 –> 00:30:19,510
and it has reaped huge dividends and so just

496
00:30:19,550 –> 00:30:23,362
those two things. If I did nothing else, that

497
00:30:23,386 –> 00:30:27,110
has had an eternal impact on my childrens souls. Yeah,

498
00:30:27,450 –> 00:30:30,150
I know a little bit about your family background.

499
00:30:30,890 –> 00:30:33,938
Mine is different. I grew up in a house where my dad, when I was

500
00:30:33,954 –> 00:30:37,490
a kid, was a pastor, and we were always in church. My

501
00:30:37,530 –> 00:30:40,962
parents were committed Christians who talked about the

502
00:30:40,986 –> 00:30:44,674
Lord, and yet still we didnt do family

503
00:30:44,762 –> 00:30:48,586
discipleship as a structured thing. Um, what that looked

504
00:30:48,618 –> 00:30:51,898
like in our house was more, I think, of the deuteronomy six

505
00:30:51,954 –> 00:30:55,722
model, in that my dad especially would talk about the

506
00:30:55,746 –> 00:30:59,450
things of the Lord with us. And we, we were always

507
00:30:59,530 –> 00:31:03,274
in church because that was a part of our family dynamic and that

508
00:31:03,282 –> 00:31:06,666
was a part of our family culture. So we understood that it was

509
00:31:06,698 –> 00:31:10,162
important. But even in this house, where my dad was

510
00:31:10,226 –> 00:31:13,940
dedicated to the Lord, my mom was dedicated to the Lord, we did

511
00:31:13,980 –> 00:31:17,612
not sit down regularly and read the Bible. And so, kind of

512
00:31:17,636 –> 00:31:21,420
like you, I had to learn to do that on my own. And

513
00:31:21,500 –> 00:31:25,140
I praise God that, um, I really believe

514
00:31:25,220 –> 00:31:29,028
he just impressed that on my heart, because I don’t remember a time

515
00:31:29,084 –> 00:31:32,820
where I heard from somebody, you need to do this as a dad.

516
00:31:32,980 –> 00:31:36,588
Like when I was figuring out fatherhood with my oldest,

517
00:31:36,764 –> 00:31:40,582
it wasn’t something I understood necessarily, but I

518
00:31:40,606 –> 00:31:44,174
felt convicted that I needed to do it. So from the time she was an

519
00:31:44,222 –> 00:31:47,902
infant, we would read through, while she was a baby, we would

520
00:31:47,926 –> 00:31:51,478
read through this childrens Bible, and we went through it several times.

521
00:31:51,614 –> 00:31:55,294
And then as she got a little older, we started reading the real

522
00:31:55,342 –> 00:31:59,006
word of God. Right? And then when she had her younger sister, we broke

523
00:31:59,038 –> 00:32:02,574
back out that kids Bible and read through that a bunch of times.

524
00:32:02,742 –> 00:32:06,214
And, you know, its funny, you talk about things youve done

525
00:32:06,262 –> 00:32:09,990
wrong, and I know that as a dad, I’ve failed in so many ways,

526
00:32:10,150 –> 00:32:13,782
but I praise God that he prompted me to do that thing.

527
00:32:13,926 –> 00:32:17,654
Pretty right. And so, dads, I would encourage you,

528
00:32:17,822 –> 00:32:21,382
just, if you do nothing else, sit with your family,

529
00:32:21,486 –> 00:32:25,214
open up the word of God. It is so important and so

530
00:32:25,262 –> 00:32:29,078
powerful, and that is a great first step in

531
00:32:29,134 –> 00:32:32,782
changing this dynamic in your family, if you’re not already doing it.

532
00:32:32,886 –> 00:32:36,574
Uh, let’s move on to the tool, because Israel has

533
00:32:36,622 –> 00:32:39,966
presented a great tool to start this off. It’s called

534
00:32:40,038 –> 00:32:43,250
foundational truths, a modern catechism.

535
00:32:43,590 –> 00:32:47,382
And, uh, if you’re not Catholic, you may have never heard the

536
00:32:47,406 –> 00:32:51,094
word catechism. Um, so Israel, let’s jump into that.

537
00:32:51,142 –> 00:32:54,798
What is a catechism? So catechism really means

538
00:32:54,894 –> 00:32:58,718
question and answer format. And so it’s a tool that helps you

539
00:32:58,734 –> 00:33:02,560
to ask important Bible doctrine and theology questions and then

540
00:33:02,600 –> 00:33:06,368
hopefully answer them from the scripture. Some people

541
00:33:06,424 –> 00:33:10,216
do associate it as being something Roman Catholic because the Catholic Church

542
00:33:10,248 –> 00:33:14,032
used a catechism for centuries. But Martin Luther actually wrote the

543
00:33:14,056 –> 00:33:17,872
first protestant catechism back in the 15 hundreds. And almost every

544
00:33:17,936 –> 00:33:21,696
protestant denomination in the Reformation time had their own

545
00:33:21,728 –> 00:33:25,336
catechism, from the Presbyterians to the Methodists, the Anglicans

546
00:33:25,408 –> 00:33:29,112
to even the Baptists had what they call the keaches catechism, which

547
00:33:29,136 –> 00:33:32,948
was distinctively Baptiste. And so that really was the

548
00:33:33,004 –> 00:33:36,668
predominant way that churches taught and discipled not

549
00:33:36,684 –> 00:33:40,116
just children, but new believers to the faith for

550
00:33:40,148 –> 00:33:43,660
centuries. And then when the modern Sunday school movement started,

551
00:33:43,820 –> 00:33:47,188
publishers started to come up with Sunday school

552
00:33:47,244 –> 00:33:51,052
curriculum that was denominationally specific. And it kind

553
00:33:51,076 –> 00:33:54,200
of replaced the catechism as a methodology.

554
00:33:54,620 –> 00:33:58,132
But I wasn’t raised in a church environment that utilized the

555
00:33:58,156 –> 00:34:01,786
catechism. I was kind of typical middle of the road evangelical,

556
00:34:01,948 –> 00:34:05,250
using the Sunday school curriculum from our denomination. And

557
00:34:05,550 –> 00:34:09,158
it really was not until more recently,

558
00:34:09,254 –> 00:34:12,958
really, for me, that I began studying church history and

559
00:34:13,054 –> 00:34:16,358
wanting to understand what the catechism and the creeds and the

560
00:34:16,374 –> 00:34:19,614
confessions and confirmations and all that stuff was,

561
00:34:19,662 –> 00:34:23,494
and have really become convinced that there’s a lot of value in it.

562
00:34:23,542 –> 00:34:27,054
And the one downside, I think, which

563
00:34:27,182 –> 00:34:30,582
kind of got addressed a little in the second great awakening, was that lots of

564
00:34:30,606 –> 00:34:34,452
people had been catechized or taken through a series of questions and

565
00:34:34,476 –> 00:34:38,100
answers about Bible doctrine, answered the questions correctly, but maybe

566
00:34:38,140 –> 00:34:41,436
never got it on the inside. And so they’re just, you know,

567
00:34:41,508 –> 00:34:44,812
giving rote, repetitious answers

568
00:34:44,916 –> 00:34:48,628
to the right questions. They answer the questions right on the pop quiz, if you

569
00:34:48,644 –> 00:34:52,240
will, but it never really experienced regeneration of the heart.

570
00:34:52,700 –> 00:34:56,116
And so, you know, during the second great awakening, some of that was being

571
00:34:56,148 –> 00:34:59,566
addressed. But then we pendulum swung too far,

572
00:34:59,758 –> 00:35:03,206
where Christianity then became all about this personal,

573
00:35:03,318 –> 00:35:06,566
subjective response to an invitation and an altar

574
00:35:06,598 –> 00:35:10,254
call. And then people kind of get welcomed into the church

575
00:35:10,302 –> 00:35:13,910
or just identified as a Christian on the basis of some sort of

576
00:35:13,950 –> 00:35:17,566
a response at a concert or an evangelistic meeting.

577
00:35:17,678 –> 00:35:21,222
But they never actually got discipled into actual Bible doctrine and

578
00:35:21,246 –> 00:35:24,926
theology. And so, know, they were focused very much on the

579
00:35:24,958 –> 00:35:28,430
subjective inner heart work, but they kind of scrapped

580
00:35:28,510 –> 00:35:32,286
teaching them the basic foundational tenets of Christianity. And so

581
00:35:32,318 –> 00:35:35,054
my view is, well, we don’t have to go to one extreme or the other,

582
00:35:35,102 –> 00:35:38,758
right. We want to reach the head and the heart. And so that’s kind of

583
00:35:38,774 –> 00:35:42,294
what this resource really aims to do, is to lay that solid

584
00:35:42,342 –> 00:35:45,734
foundation of the core primary biblical

585
00:35:45,782 –> 00:35:49,502
doctrines. This is not denominational, it’s not sectarian, we’re

586
00:35:49,526 –> 00:35:53,262
nothing. Teaching divisive secondary doctrines that

587
00:35:53,286 –> 00:35:56,862
churches disagree on pretty much. You can go through this book and I think if

588
00:35:56,886 –> 00:36:00,630
you’re from a protestant evangelical theological perspective,

589
00:36:00,750 –> 00:36:03,170
you’re going to agree probably with every single

590
00:36:04,350 –> 00:36:07,902
position that’s taken within this catechism, because we’re

591
00:36:07,926 –> 00:36:11,694
focusing on the main things, not the secondary things. But I think you’ll find it

592
00:36:11,702 –> 00:36:15,486
to be a really helpful resource. Yeah. Recently

593
00:36:15,558 –> 00:36:19,006
on the Schoolhouse Rocked podcast, we talked to doctor George

594
00:36:19,038 –> 00:36:22,494
Barna and actually he booked today

595
00:36:22,662 –> 00:36:26,170
for the thinking dad podcast, so well be talking to him as well.

596
00:36:27,150 –> 00:36:30,966
And one of his main clarion calls

597
00:36:30,998 –> 00:36:34,574
is that even in the church we are missing a biblical

598
00:36:34,622 –> 00:36:38,390
worldview. And I think its so important here that you start

599
00:36:38,430 –> 00:36:42,110
at the basics and really build the foundation for a biblical

600
00:36:42,150 –> 00:36:45,326
worldview. I want to open up the book a little bit and one of the

601
00:36:45,358 –> 00:36:48,794
things that I’m struck by is that you start at

602
00:36:48,842 –> 00:36:52,514
question one with really the very basics about

603
00:36:52,562 –> 00:36:55,310
God. How can we know there is a God

604
00:36:56,010 –> 00:36:59,310
and who made God? Right?

605
00:36:59,730 –> 00:37:03,114
Why is it that it’s important to start with the very

606
00:37:03,202 –> 00:37:06,986
basics and move from there and tell me a little bit about how

607
00:37:07,018 –> 00:37:10,310
you go from there to these bigger stepping stones.

608
00:37:11,700 –> 00:37:15,480
Well, John 17 three asks the question, or

609
00:37:16,180 –> 00:37:19,492
it doesn’t put it so much in a question, it makes a statement, but it

610
00:37:19,516 –> 00:37:23,000
essentially is answering the question like, what is the most important thing in life?

611
00:37:23,860 –> 00:37:27,524
And the answer that’s given is to know God and Jesus Christ,

612
00:37:27,572 –> 00:37:30,820
whom he has sent. This is eternal life. And

613
00:37:30,860 –> 00:37:34,660
so that is the most foundational principle

614
00:37:34,700 –> 00:37:38,306
in the universe is knowing God. Not just knowing about goddess, truly knowing

615
00:37:38,338 –> 00:37:42,162
God. And so we have to then ask ourselves, well then who

616
00:37:42,186 –> 00:37:45,930
is God and how can we know God and how do we know that

617
00:37:45,970 –> 00:37:49,786
we’re worshiping the correct God? And so I think

618
00:37:49,818 –> 00:37:53,618
that that’s, there’s just nothing more basic or fundamental than that. So we start with

619
00:37:53,634 –> 00:37:57,114
the doctrine of God and then of course we move from there

620
00:37:57,162 –> 00:38:00,938
to the scriptures because you have to be able to trust that the scriptures are

621
00:38:00,954 –> 00:38:04,410
the word of God and that you know that they’re

622
00:38:04,450 –> 00:38:08,102
trustworthy. But creation, that God made everything and that

623
00:38:08,226 –> 00:38:11,878
he’s the founder of everything. So we talk about the doctrine of God, and then

624
00:38:11,894 –> 00:38:15,222
the doctrine of man, and then the doctrine of sin and our

625
00:38:15,246 –> 00:38:18,926
fallenness, and how did the world become broken and corrupt? We all agree it

626
00:38:18,958 –> 00:38:22,462
is, but how did we get here? And then moving on to the

627
00:38:22,486 –> 00:38:26,006
solution, which is Jesus Christ and who is

628
00:38:26,038 –> 00:38:29,414
Jesus and what do we need to believe about

629
00:38:29,462 –> 00:38:33,022
Jesus in order to truly

630
00:38:33,126 –> 00:38:36,838
understand him correctly and the significance of who he is and what

631
00:38:36,854 –> 00:38:40,666
he’s done for us. So there is a chronology to the

632
00:38:40,698 –> 00:38:44,058
questions in terms of how they build. They’re linear and they kind of

633
00:38:44,074 –> 00:38:47,858
build foundationally on top of one another. Yeah,

634
00:38:47,954 –> 00:38:51,230
that’s so profound because as you were talking through,

635
00:38:52,210 –> 00:38:56,018
you’re saying by learning these things we should be building

636
00:38:56,074 –> 00:38:59,842
a basic theology, right. A knowledge of God, a basic kind

637
00:38:59,866 –> 00:39:03,628
of archaeology, knowledge of man, a christology and

638
00:39:03,644 –> 00:39:07,476
a soteriology, right. A knowledge of how to be saved.

639
00:39:07,628 –> 00:39:11,340
And these are the basic building blocks of our faith. And,

640
00:39:11,420 –> 00:39:15,036
and unfortunately I think we live in a time where even

641
00:39:15,108 –> 00:39:18,868
many in the church don’t understand the basic building blocks of

642
00:39:18,884 –> 00:39:22,684
our faith. I want to take a quick left turn

643
00:39:22,732 –> 00:39:25,000
as we go there. Israel,

644
00:39:26,380 –> 00:39:30,080
what is your perception of the state of the church right now?

645
00:39:30,460 –> 00:39:34,196
Well you’re going to talk to George Barna and George Barna

646
00:39:34,348 –> 00:39:37,760
can give you stats that will depress you for weeks.

647
00:39:41,540 –> 00:39:45,132
There were a couple of stats. So I highly recommend his new book, anybody who’s

648
00:39:45,156 –> 00:39:48,440
not read it. Raising spiritual champions. Powerful,

649
00:39:48,740 –> 00:39:51,720
amazing book in a bad way.

650
00:39:52,340 –> 00:39:55,748
It’s a good book, but the information that he shares is just

651
00:39:55,804 –> 00:39:59,480
devastating. And I think that the two things that stood out to me the

652
00:39:59,520 –> 00:40:03,152
most was when he said that only 12% of children and

653
00:40:03,176 –> 00:40:06,900
youth workers within the church have a nominal biblical worldview.

654
00:40:07,800 –> 00:40:10,704
Only 12%. That blew my mind. I mean I already knew like I knew it

655
00:40:10,712 –> 00:40:13,020
was bad, but 12%.

656
00:40:14,320 –> 00:40:18,056
And by nominal biblical worldview he means basically like that would sign your church a

657
00:40:18,088 –> 00:40:21,896
statement of faith like that. Low. The bar is set super low for that

658
00:40:21,928 –> 00:40:25,756
too. And then the other one was where he said that a

659
00:40:25,788 –> 00:40:28,988
child’s worldview is essentially locked

660
00:40:29,044 –> 00:40:31,960
down by the age of twelve.

661
00:40:33,140 –> 00:40:36,908
And so that was a wake up call even to me because for many

662
00:40:36,924 –> 00:40:40,292
of us as parents, when we start thinking about doing worldview and

663
00:40:40,316 –> 00:40:43,996
theology training with our teenagers, it’s when they’re in

664
00:40:44,028 –> 00:40:47,812
adolescence. And so for us to start thinking about

665
00:40:47,876 –> 00:40:51,352
by age twelve, they’re pretty much fundamentally

666
00:40:51,416 –> 00:40:55,264
locked down in terms of what they believe in, the trajectory

667
00:40:55,312 –> 00:40:58,620
in which they’re headed. That’s frightening as a parent.

668
00:40:59,480 –> 00:41:03,152
And so that has given me more motivation with this catechism

669
00:41:03,216 –> 00:41:06,640
to encourage and try to get in the hands of parents to say let’s start

670
00:41:06,680 –> 00:41:10,232
way earlier than twelve. Let’s not start laying foundational

671
00:41:10,296 –> 00:41:14,088
building blocks at the age of 13. Let’s start doing this

672
00:41:14,144 –> 00:41:17,540
much younger. Amen. The time is so short.

673
00:41:17,960 –> 00:41:21,760
I was talking with Israel before we launched, and our

674
00:41:21,800 –> 00:41:25,384
oldest daughter is 18, and Israel has now

675
00:41:25,432 –> 00:41:29,256
kids getting married. And it goes by in a flash.

676
00:41:29,408 –> 00:41:33,032
So, parents, don’t waste this time, please. One of the

677
00:41:33,056 –> 00:41:36,780
other scary statistics that Barna brought out recently

678
00:41:37,240 –> 00:41:41,016
was the percentage of pastors who don’t

679
00:41:41,048 –> 00:41:44,842
have a fundamental biblical worldview. And so, parents, I want to

680
00:41:44,866 –> 00:41:48,714
caution you, if you don’t have one and you’re

681
00:41:48,762 –> 00:41:52,390
not instilling it in your kids and you’re trusting the church to,

682
00:41:52,970 –> 00:41:56,594
ultimately, it may be a gamble. Um, one of the things

683
00:41:56,642 –> 00:42:00,450
that strikes me, Israel, is that I, I see that in many ways,

684
00:42:00,610 –> 00:42:04,194
the broad road that we hear about in scripture

685
00:42:04,282 –> 00:42:07,378
includes a huge chunk of the church who are

686
00:42:07,514 –> 00:42:11,076
unfortunately sitting in seats, hearing, um, encouraging

687
00:42:11,148 –> 00:42:14,948
messages and Ted talks and feeling built up, and

688
00:42:14,964 –> 00:42:18,748
yet ultimately are built, being built up right to hell. And I don’t mean

689
00:42:18,764 –> 00:42:22,540
to, to be so firm on this, but unfortunately, the truth

690
00:42:22,580 –> 00:42:25,680
is that, um, as you dig into the numbers,

691
00:42:26,340 –> 00:42:29,932
real important aspects of a saving

692
00:42:29,996 –> 00:42:33,348
faith in Christ are missing, even in the church. So,

693
00:42:33,404 –> 00:42:37,228
parents, again, we’re back to these tools. I would encourage you

694
00:42:37,244 –> 00:42:40,836
to get Israel’s book, sit down with your kids and open it up and

695
00:42:40,868 –> 00:42:44,644
go question by question and teach them these truths.

696
00:42:44,772 –> 00:42:48,364
And you know what? Along with them, you’ll be learning them as well. And don’t

697
00:42:48,412 –> 00:42:52,196
stop there. Open up your word and, and read God’s word

698
00:42:52,228 –> 00:42:55,900
with your kids. Do it daily. Um, this one thing will

699
00:42:55,940 –> 00:42:59,292
be the powerful element that will change your family.

700
00:42:59,476 –> 00:43:03,238
Uh, Israel, thank you so much for your time today. Would you

701
00:43:03,254 –> 00:43:06,838
do me a favor real quick and tell people about some of your other

702
00:43:06,894 –> 00:43:10,574
books, because you’ve written several and they’ve been hugely

703
00:43:10,622 –> 00:43:14,182
impactful. Well, thank you. And I would encourage anybody, if they want to get a

704
00:43:14,206 –> 00:43:17,974
signed copy of any of my books, they can order them from our

705
00:43:18,022 –> 00:43:21,798
website, which is familyrenewal.org. and

706
00:43:21,814 –> 00:43:24,574
then there’s a store button or just forward slash store. So

707
00:43:24,622 –> 00:43:28,374
familyrenewal.org. and I’ve also written a high

708
00:43:28,422 –> 00:43:32,022
school bible doctrine and theology curriculum that is

709
00:43:32,046 –> 00:43:35,806
called foundations in faith. It’s a 36

710
00:43:35,878 –> 00:43:39,290
week course for teenagers. And so

711
00:43:40,190 –> 00:43:43,990
this foundational truths is a catechism that is

712
00:43:44,030 –> 00:43:47,822
based on. We just put the scriptures right

713
00:43:47,846 –> 00:43:50,726
in there. And we try to give the answers to each of these questions directly

714
00:43:50,758 –> 00:43:54,470
from scripture as much as possible. We reference all the scripture verses.

715
00:43:54,510 –> 00:43:57,822
So it’s not just a person’s opinion. We’re actually trying to give the answers

716
00:43:57,886 –> 00:44:01,564
directly. The verbiage directly from the word of God itself, and answering

717
00:44:01,612 –> 00:44:05,356
the different theology questions. So it’s sort of just like a

718
00:44:05,388 –> 00:44:09,212
topical Bible study, like the scripture applied topically to these most important

719
00:44:09,276 –> 00:44:12,668
issues. I’ve written a couple other theological books. One called

720
00:44:12,724 –> 00:44:16,212
questions God asks and another called questions Jesus

721
00:44:16,276 –> 00:44:19,644
asks. And the questions God asks is based on 19

722
00:44:19,732 –> 00:44:23,340
questions in the Old Testament that God asked people, and then

723
00:44:23,420 –> 00:44:27,208
20 questions in the New Testament that Jesus asked people. And

724
00:44:27,224 –> 00:44:30,864
so there’s like 39 different Bible doctrine topics

725
00:44:31,032 –> 00:44:34,840
that are addressed through those questions that God asked and that Jesus

726
00:44:34,880 –> 00:44:38,592
asked. It’s a very unique approach to Bible study. I wrote that for

727
00:44:38,616 –> 00:44:42,336
adults. They’re just kind of, you know, it’s not quite

728
00:44:42,368 –> 00:44:46,072
devotional format, but it’s just a unique twist on

729
00:44:46,096 –> 00:44:49,904
Bible study. And they’re great read alouds as a family, too. Just to

730
00:44:50,032 –> 00:44:53,652
gather in the evening and read it together brings a lot of questions. I’ve written

731
00:44:53,676 –> 00:44:57,244
two parenting books. One is called Raising Them Up: Parenting for Christians. It’s

732
00:44:57,332 –> 00:45:01,052
like the 30,000 foot view of how to disciple your children, how to get

733
00:45:01,076 –> 00:45:04,652
your child’s heart and keep your child’s heart during those years when you have them

734
00:45:04,676 –> 00:45:07,900
in your home. My wife and I co wrote a book that’s actually our bestseller

735
00:45:07,940 –> 00:45:11,040
called Pitching a Fit: Overcoming Angry

736
00:45:11,500 –> 00:45:15,180
and Stressed Out Parenting. That book, I think, is just universally

737
00:45:15,220 –> 00:45:19,056
relevant for all of us as parents. That one

738
00:45:19,088 –> 00:45:22,376
has sold the best of everything we’ve written. And then I have another book on

739
00:45:22,408 –> 00:45:26,080
homeschooling for those who are looking for answers. It’s called Answers

740
00:45:26,120 –> 00:45:29,568
For Homeschooling: The Top 25 Questions Critics Ask.

741
00:45:29,624 –> 00:45:33,408
And in that book, we deal about the questions of, am I qualified to teach

742
00:45:33,424 –> 00:45:36,464
my child? And what if I’m not patient enough? And how can we afford to

743
00:45:36,512 –> 00:45:39,736
do this? And how can we live on a single income? And what about socialization?

744
00:45:39,768 –> 00:45:43,528
And shouldn’t our children be missionaries and evangelists in the public school because

745
00:45:43,584 –> 00:45:47,132
they’re supposed to be salt and light all of the questions, what about high school?

746
00:45:47,156 –> 00:45:50,772
And what about college? And what about transcripts? And I answer every conceivable question

747
00:45:50,836 –> 00:45:54,572
about homeschooling and Answers For Homeschooling and then Education:

748
00:45:54,572 –> 00:45:58,196
Does God Have an Opinion? I think is one of the most comprehensive books

749
00:45:58,268 –> 00:46:01,868
on a biblical philosophy of education that’s on the market today. And

750
00:46:02,044 –> 00:46:05,836
so these resources and more, again, are all available at our familyrenewal.org

751
00:46:05,868 –> 00:46:08,920
store website.

752
00:46:09,260 –> 00:46:12,964
And we would encourage you, if you can, to support our

753
00:46:13,012 –> 00:46:16,640
ministry by buying them on our website. And we’ll sign any copies

754
00:46:16,680 –> 00:46:20,432
that you buy directly from us. Yeah, and we’ll put links to

755
00:46:20,456 –> 00:46:23,300
the, to all of that in the show notes today,

756
00:46:24,040 –> 00:46:27,500
I’m going to tell you, as, as a listener and a viewer,

757
00:46:27,880 –> 00:46:31,616
I’ll give you a little bit of inside baseball. When you podcast, you

758
00:46:31,648 –> 00:46:34,896
get a lot of books. Publishers send us books all the

759
00:46:34,928 –> 00:46:38,440
time. But I’m going to tell you, Israel’s

760
00:46:38,480 –> 00:46:42,328
books are excellent and I’ve actually read them.

761
00:46:42,464 –> 00:46:46,224
Um, parents, I would really encourage you. In fact, I’m going

762
00:46:46,232 –> 00:46:49,800
to brag on Israel a little bit. Israel is so careful.

763
00:46:49,960 –> 00:46:53,632
He was, when he was writing, raising them up, he was wrestling with

764
00:46:53,656 –> 00:46:57,504
an important issue. I won’t name the issue because, um,

765
00:46:57,592 –> 00:47:01,248
I don’t need to bring any unnecessary controversy into the show,

766
00:47:01,384 –> 00:47:05,192
but he was wrestling with an important issue, and I was blessed to see

767
00:47:05,216 –> 00:47:08,622
an early copy of that book and read through what he had written to. And

768
00:47:08,686 –> 00:47:12,486
I have to say, Israel addressed this with such wisdom

769
00:47:12,638 –> 00:47:16,390
and care. And ultimately, I think the book

770
00:47:16,470 –> 00:47:20,174
really reflects that. So parents, pick up Israel’s books,

771
00:47:20,302 –> 00:47:23,974
especially Foundational Truths. This is a

772
00:47:24,022 –> 00:47:27,814
great place to start as a parent. Sit down with your kids, read

773
00:47:27,862 –> 00:47:31,558
through it with them. Israel, I want to ask you one last question before

774
00:47:31,614 –> 00:47:35,104
we wrap it up. If you’re a dad

775
00:47:35,232 –> 00:47:38,904
who’s starting out and hasn’t been doing

776
00:47:38,952 –> 00:47:42,592
these things, what one piece of advice would you give that dad

777
00:47:42,736 –> 00:47:46,432
to? Just practically put this into action day.

778
00:47:46,456 –> 00:47:50,288
To day, just do something consistently. I think even if

779
00:47:50,304 –> 00:47:53,860
you spent five minutes a day opening up the word of God,

780
00:47:54,240 –> 00:47:57,728
reading a chapter from the Bible or

781
00:47:57,864 –> 00:48:00,420
half a chapter, praying with your family,

782
00:48:01,360 –> 00:48:04,752
maybe singing a song together, if you feel brave enough to try that,

783
00:48:04,896 –> 00:48:08,744
just 510 minutes a day, if you just did that consistently, it would build

784
00:48:08,832 –> 00:48:12,568
so much. It would just recenter your family to the word

785
00:48:12,584 –> 00:48:16,296
of God and to showing the importance of

786
00:48:16,328 –> 00:48:19,768
that in your life and to your children. It would reap so much

787
00:48:19,904 –> 00:48:23,616
spiritual benefit for your family. I think you can’t

788
00:48:23,648 –> 00:48:26,562
do it wrong. The main thing, the only way to do it wrong is to

789
00:48:26,586 –> 00:48:30,250
not do it. And so, you know, just, just try to do

790
00:48:30,290 –> 00:48:33,270
something with some consistency. It will bear a lot of fruit.

791
00:48:33,610 –> 00:48:37,418
Amen. Well, Israel, thank you so much for your time today.

792
00:48:37,474 –> 00:48:41,090
Man, I hope you know how much my family has been blessed

793
00:48:41,130 –> 00:48:44,890
by you and how much I appreciate your friendship. You are a blessing

794
00:48:44,930 –> 00:48:48,554
to many and I really appreciate you guys. If you’ve enjoyed this

795
00:48:48,602 –> 00:48:52,396
show, we would love your support. There’s a couple ways

796
00:48:52,428 –> 00:48:55,908
you can help out. Please share this show with your friends.

797
00:48:56,044 –> 00:48:59,780
It’s brand new. We’re just getting off the ground and we need your help to

798
00:48:59,820 –> 00:49:02,604
spread the word. Additionally, go to our website

799
00:49:02,692 –> 00:49:06,396
ThinkingDad.net. Subscribe to our newsletter to keep up with

800
00:49:06,428 –> 00:49:10,000
what’s going on and you can also pick up some great merch there.

801
00:49:10,660 –> 00:49:14,292
Through my microphone, you can see my “Think Biblically” shirt

802
00:49:14,396 –> 00:49:17,772
today. You can pick up one of those or a couple other great

803
00:49:17,836 –> 00:49:21,272
designs. Check out the merch there and

804
00:49:21,416 –> 00:49:24,984
just really spread the word. Also, if you’re watching on YouTube,

805
00:49:25,032 –> 00:49:28,776
please make sure you’re subscribed to this channel. Like comment,

806
00:49:28,888 –> 00:49:32,680
share do all the things it really does help out. I hope

807
00:49:32,720 –> 00:49:36,552
you’ve been encouraged today. Stick around to the end of the show to hear

808
00:49:36,576 –> 00:49:40,160
what’s coming up next on the thinking dad podcast. Have a

809
00:49:40,200 –> 00:49:42,700
great day and we will see you again soon.

810
00:49:46,170 –> 00:49:49,498
Jesus when he said, the greatest commandment is love, Lord your God, with all your

811
00:49:49,514 –> 00:49:53,122
heart, soul, mind and strength. The second is like unto it to love your neighbor

812
00:49:53,146 –> 00:49:56,898
as yourself. Then he said, everything in the Old Testament can be summed up

813
00:49:56,914 –> 00:50:00,578
in those two points. Everything in the Old Testament is either about how we

814
00:50:00,594 –> 00:50:03,786
love God or how we love our neighbor. All of the Bible is either about

815
00:50:03,818 –> 00:50:07,114
how we love God or how we love one another. All of the one anothers

816
00:50:07,162 –> 00:50:11,004
in scripture are, are to be applied in the marriage

817
00:50:11,052 –> 00:50:14,200
relationship. I used to read passages that would say

818
00:50:14,540 –> 00:50:18,276
encourage one another and I would think, well, I need to encourage people at church.

819
00:50:18,468 –> 00:50:21,400
And then dawned on me, well, I need to encourage my wife

820
00:50:21,940 –> 00:50:25,676
or bear one another’s burdens or exhort one another or

821
00:50:25,748 –> 00:50:29,068
greet one another with a holy kiss. They’re all these one anothers. I used to

822
00:50:29,084 –> 00:50:32,668
think, well, this is how we should get along with people at church. But the

823
00:50:32,684 –> 00:50:36,444
Bible is saying it’s how we love our neighbor and

824
00:50:36,492 –> 00:50:40,252
the neighbor is the person nearest you in need. And most often the

825
00:50:40,276 –> 00:50:42,560
person who is nearest me in need is my wife.