Hey, producer Mike here for the Alex McFarlane Show, and I'm here with Alex in the studio. Alex, I was just thinking about the Cove and the great time I had last summer out there with my wife. It's coming up again this summer. What's going on? Oh, wow, Mike.
Well, thank you. We love the Billy Graham Conference Center in Western North Carolina. It is beautiful. The presence of God is so strong there because, you know, Billy Graham and his wife, they prayer walked over those hillsides, and a visit to the Cove will change your life forever. I'm going to be there July 17 through 19 teaching Bible prophecy.
Then I'll be back July 27 through 31 with world-renowned scholar Gary Habermas teaching apologetics how to defend the faith confidently in any situation.
So go to the website thecove.org, T-H-E-C-O-V-E, theCOVE.org, make your reservation, and we'd love to see you there in the summer of 2026. Uh The Spiritual Condition of America, Politics, Culture, and Current Events Analyzed Through the Lens of Scripture. Welcome to the Alex McFarland Show. The Bible famously says in Proverbs 22, train up a child in the way they should go, and when they are old, they will not depart from it. Hi, with that very famous verse, Alex McFarland here.
We have a very exciting show because we are going to talk about the training up of children, but I will just preemptively say, if you hear noise in the background and you think, wow, the studio is not very quiet today, it's because we're on the floor of the NRB National Religious Broadcasters Convention. And, you know, NRB, we come every year. It's great. Ministries from around the world get together and strategize and pray, talk about the Great Commission. And one of the blessings of this beehive of activity is we meet so many great people from so many great ministries, and today is no exception.
A ministry very, very near and dear to my heart is Awanas. And we have the CEO and president of Awanas with us, Matt Markins. And Matt, thank you for making time to be with us today, but really, even more importantly, thank you for what you're doing for the Great Commission. It's great to be with you, Alex.
So the name Awana, that brings so many precious memories in the lives of millions of people, myself included. I could tell you so many stories about our own family and then people around. Around the western hemisphere, that I've met, and I'll say, How did you come to the Lord? And they'll say, Well, I grew up and I did a wanna's, buttons out. I want to hear your story and what God is doing in this most exciting ministry.
So I welcome you and thank you for your time.
Well, thank you, Alex.
So one of my earliest memories is the day that my dad walked out on our family. In my mind's eye, I'm sitting on the floor and for whatever reason my bedroom door was kept open and I can see my father walking out carrying cardboard boxes and clothes draped over his arms. But to my left is my older brother of five years and he's sticking the... You remember the Disney Golden books with the golden spine? Oh yeah.
He's sticking those in front of my face. What's he doing? He's distracting me from the emotional. Upheaval of that day. And in the days and months to follow, my mom finds her way to a local church.
We were not a church family, but she starts going to church because she's brokenhearted. And I remember being in a room with four people, a man with a guitar, who I presume to be his wife, myself, and one other child. And he's singing the Jesus songs. And as a small child, I remember thinking, I want this. Jesus.
And in the years to follow, I saw Peter going across the flannel graph, walking on that water in children's ministry. I learned the Bible in children's ministry. What's the story? The story is when my parents, when my dad, my biological father, couldn't give me what I needed, the church. Discipled me.
The church reached me, taught me the Bible, and taught me to love and follow Jesus. Amen. Wow. What a great story. And you know, many children today are going through hard things, heartbreak.
And when there's not that family net and there's no sense of identity or security, the church and specifically the message of Jesus can be that.
So give your website, we'll come back to it, the website for Owana. Yeah, there's two key websites, childdiscipleship.com.
So if you're a parent or a church leader and you're looking for free resources on how do we disciple kids in today's crazy world, go to childdiscipleship.com. But if you want to learn more about the organization and our programs for churches, go to awana.org, A-W-A-N-A.org. Amen. You know, one of the first exposures I had to Owana, and it's kind of funny, this was in the late 90s. I was just traveling as a speaker, an apologetic speaker.
Well, I was in a pulpit and I quoted a verse incorrectly. And so during the break, like half a dozen children came up to me. And actually, I'll tell you, it was 1 Peter 3:15, which is a very famous apologetics verse: be ready always to give an answer. But I said, 2 Peter 3:15.
Well, half a dozen children came up to me and said, Uh-uh, it's 1 Peter. And some of the adults smiled. And I said, Wow, that's awesome. Those kids know Bible verses and they're correcting me who got one wrong. And they said, Oh, they're in Awanas.
They're learning their memory verses. And thus began my exposure to this fantastic ministry. But I know Awana has grown and changed and so fruitful. For the person who their exposure to Awana was 10 or 15 years ago, Tell us about the Iwana of the 21st century.
So anyone who's thinking, any parent or pastor who's thinking who can help us reach our kids with the gospel, or who can help me disciple the kids in my home or in my church, that's why we exist.
So we were founded in 1950 on the streets of Chicago. But about 10 years ago, we really started asking ourselves, how are we going to reach the kids in the future? How are we going to reach kids in the AI world? And so we've never moved one inch off of the Bible and we never will. We're centered on the gospel, rooted in scripture.
But we innovated around the best of our past. And so today, what's the mission of Awana? We equip leaders to reach kids with the gospel and to engage them in ongoing discipleship.
So if you're a parent or a church leader, we're here to help you. And we have a variety of programs, training, and research that do that here, but also in 140 countries around the world. Wow, that is very powerful. Very powerful.
Now, how did you get into the leadership and administration of Awana?
Well, I grew up in that small country church in central Indiana, surrounded by cornfields. And I was at 17, I just asked my pastor, I want to go into ministry. What you guys have done for me, I want to do for others. That was the best articulation I could give. And he said, you know, I went to this small Bible college in Nashville, so I followed in his footsteps, went to school here in Nashville at Welch College.
I sort of stumbled into the publishing industry, and as you know, Nashville is a Christian publishing town, Bibles and curriculum, and music. And God directed my steps to the children's ministry publishing world. And who are you going to meet in that world? Of course, you're going to bump shoulders with the Awana people being in the children's ministry publishing lane.
So that's how I met Awana. My wife and I had a local Awana experience, and God opened the doors for me to join the organization. And when I did, I started asking the question: well, what made this so successful? What made Awana successful? And what shapes faith in children?
That one question about what shapes faith in children is really what led to Owana's innovation of where we are today because we discovered the three primary factors most known to shape lasting faith in kids. And we've really, like the Intel chip, we've taken those factors and put them into new programs that we've innovated so that we can take the best of our past into this unknown future that we're all going into. You know, we've almost got a break here in a couple of minutes. We're listening to Matt Markens, president and CEO of Owana, that has touched so many millions of lives. Um maybe we'll cue this up and then have to, you know, on the other side of the break go in deeper.
But they they say Barner Research Group and others that maybe of children that make a profession of faith. Growing up, they become a Christian, but yet only about 10 percent remain resilient. consistent believers into Late teens, young adulthood, adulthood. Why is that, and what's the answer to it? That's because we're chasing after methodologies and tactics, and we're not digging deeper to the unmovable, universal, biblical objectives that form lasting faith.
We need to start there, then move into methodologies. That's the real conversation.
Okay, okay.
Well, we'll unpack what that means. And how many churches do Iwana? 101,000 in 140 countries. Wow, praise God. You know, they estimate of Protestant churches in America might be 345,000.
We need to get that number up. Yes, we do. Stay tuned, folks. We're going to come back more from National Religious Broadcasters, Alex McFarlane, Matt Markins of Awana. We're back after this.
Fox News and CNN call Alex McFarland, a religion and culture expert. Stay tuned for more of his teaching and commentary after this. Hey, producer Mike here for the Alex McFarlane Show. You know, Alex just released his 21st book. It just came out: 100 Questions on Prophecy and the End Times.
And he's here with me in the studio. Alex, tell us about it.
Well, people everywhere are telling me they love this book. I want to ask a favor of the listeners. Folks, this will help, I assure you. Would you go into your local Barnes Noble bookstore, find a Barnes Noble, and go in. If they don't have my books, would you special order yourself a copy in the Barnes Noble store?
The new book, 100 Bible Questions on Prophecy in the End Times, fresh research, published by Broadstreet. Please go into your local Barnes Noble and ask for this and all the other books I've written. It will help spread the word, grow our sales, and get the gospel in the hands of others. And I thank you for doing this to spread the gospel. Uh He's been called trusted, truthful, and timely.
Welcome back to the Alex McFarlane Show. Welcome back to the program. Alex McFarland here. You know, I think we all care about the Great Commission. And Matt Markins, our guest of Awana, a global leader in child discipleship.
The Great Commission, it really begins in the family and it begins with young people, doesn't it? Yes, it does. Yeah, you were just a moment ago mentioning this book, Faith for Exiles, which talks about the 10% of, how come only 10% are resilient disciples? It's interesting. David Kinneman and Mark Matlock are personal friends of ours.
Sure. And we were writing our book, Resilient, at the same time as them, unaware they were using that same language around resiliency. And what we discovered in our research, and by the way, we later did a research project with David Kinneman, that we discovered there's three things that form last. Faith in kids.
So, if you're a parent or a pastor, listen up. The first one is called Belong. The second is believe. The third is become. Belong is highly relational.
Believe is deeply scriptural. Become is truly experiential.
So a mom, a dad, or a children's ministry that's highly relational where kids are named, known, and loved, and kids know that they have a place to truly belong. That's what you want to exude to your children. Secondly, believe. It's deeply scriptural. We're going to memorize the Bible.
We're going to teach it. We're going to sing it. We're going to saturate our world where kids can be surrounded by the truth of the gospel and the Bible. And thirdly, become, that's about experiences. Think about what kids are experiencing today with bullying.
AI, screen culture, how do we help them walk the faith of Jesus Christ in the midst of today's world?
So when kids have all three of those for a sustained period of time, they're more likely than their peers who don't have those to persist into young adulthood faith. Do you hear stories of The children become believers, and that ultimately evangelizes the parents. We get those letters and emails every single month. Praise God. Praise God.
You know, one of the sad realities, but it's a reality. I mean, there was a time when the majority of families in America were Christian. Mom and dad were believers. The children grew up in a biblical Home and context. The inverse of that is true.
We do summer camps with youth and teenagers, and it really touches my heart.
So many children and teens, they'll say, Mr. McFarland, please pray for my mother and dad. They're not believers. I mean, it's like the middle schoolers are. Agonizing that their parents would get saved.
Yeah. But Awana is helping address that, aren't they? Yeah, you know, parents will do for their kids what they won't do for themselves.
So if a pastor can take that nugget of insight and apply that to one of his critical problems, what's his critical problem? He's looking out at his congregation and he's asking himself, why are more of the parents in my congregation not active disciples, like discipling themselves and discipling others?
Well, if you want to solve that problem, remember, Pastor, parents will do for their kids what they won't do for themselves. Therefore, if you get that parent involved in children's ministry, if you get that parent involved in helping in an Iwana ministry, they're going to be more likely to participate in discipleship activities. What does that mean? Memorizing a verse together, helping teach a Bible lesson.
So by getting parents mobilized into a children's ministry or into an Iwana ministry, you're actually discipling your congregation. How can a church begin to implement a won in its life? How many volunteers does it take? How long from the idea to the beginning of the program? What's the ramp-up time?
Well, volunteers follow vision.
So, if you're a pastor and you're thinking, hey, we want to do something like this, if you have 20 kids in your church, or 200 kids in your church, or 1,000 kids in your church, it really is a matter of what's your vision for your children.
So, by the way, we have two Awana ministries in the U.S.
now. We have Awana Clubs, which is what you're familiar with. We also have a new one for weekend ministry or Sunday ministry called Bright B-R-I-T-E. It's one of the fastest-growing children's ministries in the United States. Why did we develop this new ministry?
Because we were only helping churches with midweek. AWANA didn't have a ministry for the weekend church. And so, now we can help a church, whether you have a midweek ministry or a weekend ministry. Volunteers follow vision. You know, you need a couple of volunteers for every 10 kids to be adequately supplied, to be able to care for kids, protect them, but also adequately engage them.
Them and reach them. And so, really, it's more of a matter of what kind of vision do you have for the children in your church, and how do you want to shape their lives for generations to come?
So would the weekend ministry essentially be the Sunday school on Sunday mornings? Yeah, so Bright, our new weekend ministry, is what you would call either Sunday school children's church model or a large group small group model. Those are kind of the two big models. The Sunday school, children's church might mean you have Sunday school one hour, and then they go to the large group format, which is children's church the second hour. But other churches just do more of a 75-minute, 90-minute model.
That's called the large group, small group model. But we developed Bright to be able to fit into either one of those.
So if you're a small country church or you're a big mega church, Bright fits into any context like that. Tell me about the Iwana Clubs. Are they still kind of how many of us would think of them? Awana Clubs U.S. has grown for the last two years.
As you can imagine, COVID took a big hit on children's ministries around the country. But we have regained our footing and we are growing again. What does that mean? That means parents are coming back to church. Parents are realizing we've got to get our kids out of screens.
We've got to get our kids into a tactile, physical, healthy experience.
So parents are bringing their kids back to Owana, back to children's ministry. Why is this important? Kids get the Bible. Kids get access to loving, caring adults. Kids hear the gospel.
You want to get your kids out of screens. You want to get them in environments like an Iwana club that can help them grow in their young faith. If you're just tuning in, we're talking with Matt Markins, President and CEO of AWANA.
Now, we're not going to answer this in this segment, but in the next segment, we're going to tell you what the acronym means: AWANA. Listeners, do you know? Do you know what well uh we're gonna give that in the third segment. But in the remainder of this particular segment, and again, the noise in the background, it's exciting because what you're hearing in the background, folks, the ambient noise, is the sound of the Great Commission. Hundreds of ministries from all around the world are in Nashville.
We come every year to pray together, strategize, encourage, plan, and take the gospel to the ends of the earth. And Matt, you're certainly doing that in a fantastic way.
So for the church, you mentioned, you know, they're big urban mega churches, but there's the Little Corner Church in small town USA and the country church. Honestly, the quote-unquote small church can do this too, can't they? Yeah, and we have local advocates all around the country who can literally come sit down with you for free. We're not gonna charge you anything. We will come to your community, we'll sit down with you, we'll help you figure out how to launch a children's ministry in your church.
Or if you already have one and you wanna make it better. We have trainings. We'll come into your community. We'll train your church. We can also do it via Zoom.
We can also get several churches together.
So we are here to serve you. We're a faith-based organization, so we just really want to know how we can help equip you to reach the children in your community by training your volunteers and by training your parents. Amen. Well, stay tuned. We've got another segment.
We'll come back from the National Religious Broadcasters Convention. Alex McFarland and Matt Markins. Stay tuned. Fox News and CNN call Alex McFarland, a religion and culture expert. Stay tuned for more of his teaching and commentary after this.
Producer Mike for the Alex McFarlane Show, listen to this. Alex is the Christian voice we need right now. I love listening to him, and the guests he has on the show are just amazing. I highly recommend his podcast. Great words, Alex.
Well, we give God the glory. We thank the listeners for kind sentiments like that, but we give God all the glory. But, folks, please listen in, spread the word. You're spreading the gospel. Tell others about our programming, and we sincerely thank you.
Christian author and speaker Alex McFarland is an advocate for Christian apologetics. Teaching in more than twenty two hundred churches around the world, schools, and college campuses, Alex is driven by a desire to help people grow in relationship with God. He arms his audiences with the tools they need to defend their faith. while also empowering the unchurched to find out the truth for themselves. In the midst of a culture obsessed with relativism, Alex is a sound voice who speaks timeless truths of Christianity in a timely way.
With eighteen published books to his name, it's no surprise that CNN, Fox, The Wall Street Journal, and other media outlets have described Alex as a religion and culture expert. To learn more about Alex and to book him as a speaker at your next event, Visit alexmacfarland.com. Then click the Speaking tab up at the top. That's alexmcfarland.com. Or you can contact us directly by emailing booking.
at alexmacfarland.com. Uh He's been called trusted, truthful, and timely. Welcome back to the Alex McFarlane Show. Welcome back to the program. Alex McFarland here, and we're talking about Awana.
Before we resume this interview, I want to encourage people: if you want to listen again, of course, we're on all the social media platforms, wherever you listen to digital content, and also on the American Family Radio Network. That's where this show originates. And also, we have a live five-day-a-week show called Exploring the Word, and that is heard live 3-4 Central, 4-5 Eastern, Monday through Friday, on American Family Radio. AFR.net is that website.
Well, Matt, let me ask you this: and I know people are probably wondering: what does it cost to start an Awana ministry in a local church? Really, child discipleship, price will never become a barrier to child discipleship.
So it doesn't have to cost you anything. If your church says, We want to do this, we don't have a dollar, you pick up the phone, you email us, and we have donors who will cover the cost. Having said that, for a church that does have the resources, for an Iwana club midweek, anywhere between $25 to $50 per child, depending on how you want to scale it, scale it up, or scale it down a little bit. And then our weekend program, Bright, again, if you can't afford it, we'll give it to you free. We'll scholarship it.
But it's around $600 a year for elementary and about $500 a year for preschool.
So, what is that? $1,100 if you did both, and then obviously divide that by 12.
So it's a little bit less than $100 a month for our weekend program, and probably similar for the midweek. But the bottom line is, Don't worry about the prayer. If you can't afford it, call us. Sure, donors will help cover the cost. Yeah, and you know, having pastor churches, and I sell folks: look, small churches, big churches, you've got your budget, and no doubt you have a line item for missions.
This would fall under that. Or a line item for Sunday school. Yes. And I hesitate to say this, but I watch, I mean, you speak in 2,000 churches, you see things. And Matt, I've seen so many churches where cases of curriculum that are two years old that never got opened, they're sitting over in the corner and Church, I want to encourage you to pray.
Look through your budget, you can carve out the money for this. And I say that having pastored. Um small churches and mega churches. And one in Charlotte that was nearly 10,000 members.
So the money is there, I would suspect. One thing that makes Iwana unique is we don't lead with curriculum, we lead with training and equipping. We want to start, we want to ask you: hey, what's your vision? What are you trying to accomplish? How can we serve you?
So we're going to train your parents how to be, we're going to motivate them and inspire them how to be a disciple-making parent. We're going to do this with your volunteers, your church leaders.
So, some of the ways we do that is through books and through events. We have books we've written to help change the mindset toward child discipleship or shaping the faith of children. We also have conferences and trainings we do. Again, if you go to childdiscipleship.com, you're going to be able to look through what are the different trainings we offer to equip your church. We have nationwide trainings, local and regional trainings.
We have books and we have research. If you'll go check out all of that, start there. That will help equip you with the heart and the mentality of how we are going to approach. Biblically discipling our kids in today's crazy world. Then, once you get your core leaders, your three, four, five key people all like on the same page: okay, here's how we're gonna reach our kids.
Then we'll come alongside you with curriculum. We have that weekend program or our midweek program. That's really the best way to think about this. Start with vision, start with training, then move into the curriculum that's gonna help you week by week to reach the kids in your community.
Sociologists have a new term, digital disruption. And you know, Matt, as I was prepping for all of our interviews and things today, it was just again this morning in the news: the rise of drugs in America. But I want to tell you: there's a very potent drug that has its clutches on the lives of even toddlers, and that's the screen. How do you break loose from You know, mobile devices and screens. And the thing that weighs heavy on my heart is, you know.
Learning God's Word. hearing that still small voice of the Holy Spirit. And you know, in an age where The London Times just before uh Christmas Three or four months ago, said that the average child born today If their lifespan is 75 to 80 years, they will spend a minimum of 25 years. 30% of their life holding and staring at a screen. Mm.
Yeah, I mean that's... More pernicious than You know. Any drug you could think of.
So, how do you get God's Word? Christian truth, discipleship through to a generation that from the cradle is wedded to a screen.
Well, children are gonna mimic what their parents are gonna do. Yeah. And children are gonna only, they're gonna use the screens their parents hand them.
So we're at a crossroads as adults in this country and adults globally. What do we wanna do about this? And my sons who are 23 and 21 tell me. Dad, we are not going to give our children screens. They have to be well into high school before we're going to give them screens.
What's happening there is two words to start with, P. It's protection and preparation. We have to protect kids, but we also have to prepare them. And so that's an approach that says, I'm going to protect them. I'm going to develop a cohort with other parents who are like-minded, who are also not going to give their kids screens so that my kids don't feel like freaks of nature, right?
So we're going to develop a community of other parents who also don't give their children screens. That's one step. But secondly, you just got to delay that screen engagement. You've got to delay. It's killing our children's brains and their emotions.
It is. Oh, it really is. You know, I've got a book by Albert Einstein School of Medicine Neurosurgeon. It is not a Christian book. It's a very scientific book about the neural development of children.
And it basically, in all caps, says screen addiction is messing up the children's brains. Parents, Grandparents, caregiver, whomever, we're begging you, please divorce your children from a life of screen time. We've got to. It's a line in the sand. We've got to do it.
Yeah, and mom and dad, we're getting off topic a little bit here, but please don't let a tablet be the babysitter. You know, from birth to high school graduation, we have 18 years. It goes by in a blink. And really, wouldn't you say, Matt, that our children are our first, primary, and I would say most important stewardship?
Well, there's a saying that says it's not a matter of are we discipling our kids, it's a matter of who or what is discipling our kids.
So that screen is going to form them, it's going to shape them, it's going to disciple them into its image and all of the app providers and advertisers behind that. By the way, if this whole conversation is of interest to you, check out the Child Discipleship Forum. It's an annual conference in Nashville. You can join online and do it from the comfort of your own home or a conference room at your church. The Child Discipleship Forum, we're going to talk about the same issues that Alex and I are talking about.
What are the issues that are shaping kids? But we're also going to talk about how do we biblically reach them in light of all these complex challenges.
So I want to host this. We bring together organizations, speakers, and experts on the culture, but also on how do we biblically reach and shape your kids to give you as a parent or a pastor the Confidence and the equipping to know how to reach today's kids. Matt, thank you so much. We're out of time, but on behalf of millions of people, I just want to say thank you. You're doing a fantastic work.
One last thing. What does awanna mean? 2 Timothy 2.15, approved workmen are not ashamed of the gospel. Approved workman and not ashamed.
Well, with God's help and for God's glory, let's all aspire to that. Blessings, my friend. Folks, thanks for listening. And remember, Jesus is as close by as a prayer. Alex McFarlane Ministries are made possible through the prayers and financial support of partners like you.
For over 20 years, this ministry has been bringing individuals into a personal relationship with Christ and has been equipping people to stand strong for truth. Learn more and donate securely online at alexmacfarland.com. You may also reach us by calling 1-877-YESGOD and the number 1. That's 1-877-YESGOD1. Thanks for joining us.
We'll see you again on the next edition of the Alex McFarlane Show. Would you invest a financial contribution to see young people saved, people give their lives to Christ, and people care about God and country? If you would please make a donation securely online, you can give at alexmacfarland.com or please mail a check to TNG PO Box 485 Pleasant Garden, North Carolina, 27313. Your gift will be faithfully handled, fruitfully used, and we thank you in Jesus' name.
