Hey, why don't you tell everybody one of your favorite Bible verses?
Okay, I will because it's Psalm 119, 105. And that verse says, Your word is a lamp for my feet and a light on my path. I mean, what an awesome. Bible verse that reminds us how scripture lights the way in marriage and parenting and basically everything else. And we're super grateful to the Christian Standard Bible for supporting this podcast.
Yes, and just for their work in helping people read God's Word clearly and faithfully. To learn more, go to csbible.com. Uh You've got a short amount of time to connect with the hearts of your children and teenagers, even your young adult kids. And it feels like, what would they say? The days are long, but the years are short.
Don't waste your time to connect with your kids. All the influence, all the teaching, all the modeling, all the things that Jesus did, he did it to the context of relationship, whatever it takes, connect with the hearts of your kids. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Ann Wilson. And I'm Dave Wilson, and you can find us at FamilyLifetoday.com.
This is Family Life Today.
So, we're going to talk about discipling our kids today. That always feels overwhelming. It used to feel overwhelming when I heard that topic come up because I felt like, ugh, are we doing this well? And how do we do it? And, you know, do we do it right?
So today we're going to find out from Barrett and Jennifer Johnson how to do it well.
So let's go.
Okay, so if we're going to disciple like Jesus, where do we start?
Well, so let me let me talk about the model we created that God, again, I don't think I created it. I just a little house. I looked at the example of Jesus and I said, What did Jesus do with the 12? What made him so effective? And what can a parent learn from that?
And so I built it like a little house. It's a foundation and three pillars and a little roof on top. And the foundations, it's abiding. It's that, you know, walk with Jesus, stay close to the Spirit, stay close to God. It's everything.
It's everything. John 55. It's a parent abiding. Parent abiding. And Jesus, let's look at Jesus' example.
He was close to Heavenly Father. And we can debate and talk theological all day long.
Well, Jesus was God.
Okay, sure. But Jesus, as a human for his ministry time, we see in the scriptures, he pulled away time and time again to be alone with God, to make sure he was dialed in. That sense of, I need to be alone with God and hear from him. And if you don't do that, we're missing completely. Jesus said, apart from me, you can do nothing.
And I think that foundation of abiding in Christ, a mom and dad who are committed to saying, God, I want to draw close to you. I want to hear from you. I want to be in touch with what your desires are for each of my kids. If we don't do that, then we're operating out of the flesh. We can do nothing.
We're doing our best guess at what the right thing to do is, as opposed to hearing from the God who knows the hearts of our children better than we would ever know the hearts of our children. All right, before you even go to the pillars. Yeah. What's abiding look like for you guys? I think it's just walking in with God, being in the word, of sitting quietly and saying, I want to listen to God's voice and say, God, what do you want to tell me?
And show me.
So it's quiet time. It's times of meditation. You do that together? You do that separately? You do both?
It's completely separate because Barrett would always go to work. And even in recent days, I'm working from home a lot more. Our rhythms of life sometimes are a little different. And so, again, I think it's alone time where we sharpen one another, but I don't want to know exclusively what's God telling us to do, Jennifer. And Jennifer doesn't hear that, neither from me.
I need to have a sense of what God's telling me as the husband and father and leader of a home, whatever, to do. And God needs to do that from Jennifer. And so we put our heads together. We come up with what's, you know, God's leading us and where he wants us to go. I think this is so important, too, because as a parent, when Jesus is talking about if you abide in me, you'll bear much fruit.
And so even when I think about the fruit, think about this as a parent love. Am I loving my kids? Joy, love, joy, peace, and patience. Just those four changes everything. Can't go any further than that.
Now, if we don't abide, we display the opposite of those: frustration, anger, all of that. And so, I think I love that you started with that abide.
Well, it's because Jesus started with it. And again, I think remember, moms and dads, this model is not. Hey, follow Barrett and Jennifer. They've got to figure out. No, we don't.
Please don't. But we look to the example of Jesus. I mean, I can confess, and anybody who knows my parenting style for the last three years, my closest friends, my bride, my children. We could make a long list of the failings of Barrett Johnson as a father. And even as adults, our kids have told us the mistakes that we've made.
We own that. We want to own that. But we want to own it. But we also want to walk in grace and say, but there's a better way. Let's look at Jesus.
So there's that foundation of abiding. Hey, couple of questions. I don't know which one to ask first because the second one came to me when you just said that. Your adult kids have told you, because ours have too. And all you young parents, guess what?
It's coming. Yeah. Even if you did a great, great job. As they become adults, there's going to be things they're going to bring up and hurt them or write them down. Yes.
And don't get defensive. And I mean, so you've been there. But, you know, when you said Jesus. lived this. I thought, well, Jesus wasn't married, so When your spouse isn't abiding in a way you wanted or hoped for, or just maybe they're just, they don't want to.
And maybe they're not a believer. Yeah. Talk to that couple. What do you do when you feel like it's just you? I feel like sometimes the partner who's walking with God.
And maybe senses their partner is not. That person has a tendency sometimes to become Preachy and judgmental. Judgmental. And naggy. If only a naggy.
It's great. Naggy, is that a word? For a mom who says, I wish my husband would lead a better. There's certainly examples of a husband who's being spiritually deficient in a severe way. And that wife needs to prayerfully.
Tenderly, gently nudge and guide and pray for and all those things. But yeah, no, I don't think any spouse ever nagged their partner towards godliness. Yeah, it's never happened. And I've heard many, many stories of spouses saying, you know, all he does, the only times he brings up scripture is when he's mad at me and trying to correct me. And nobody receives that.
So again, I think it's a patient through the spirit, love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faith, all those things, long-suffering, those come out of patiently saying, I'm going to be diligent to do the right thing. And I hope and pray my spouse, my partner, sees my example.
Well, I remember, you know, when I, we had three boys, all married now with seven grandkids, but when they were little boys, Anne's picture of me leading spiritually was a family, what do we call it? Family altar. Family devotions. Once a week, we're all going to come together. And at one point, she said, you know, the sermon you gave this morning at church, why don't you just do it tonight with the boys?
Oh, my goodness. And that was not my vision. It was not the way I was. Thinking of new. And I think what she really wanted was Dennis Rainey.
She wanted me to be Dennis. And I heard that a few times, too. Back then, you know, Dennis was our sort of role model, but I saw it differently. And I saw it, and I even learned this in seminary, believe it or not, the Hebrew model versus the Greek model of teaching, where the Greek model is sort of our education system. Like, you're going to read this book.
And in five weeks, we're going to have a final, and you're going to be, you're going to have to remember everything that's in that book. And the Hebrew model was apprenticeship. It was walk along the road. Living life together is the same thing. And so I was always thinking, I'm going to teach them along the road, even as they became teenagers, when they have issues that they're wondering about.
What a moment to teach rather than, hey, Sunday night. It is absolutely a lot of people. But we walk along the way. We had conversations about that where we had to adjust to one another, right? I was just wanting anything.
And you did, but you're right. I had a picture of how it should be right. And my picture was intentional. Intimidating for Dave. He never saw it done, and it's not who he is.
So to say, that's not my guy, I don't want, but I didn't marry the pastor. I married this man, and God put me with him, and he gave us these children because my husband has something to offer them. Right, right, exactly. But I do think, you know, before we go on to the next pillar, that abiding foundation, if you're not doing that, you don't have power. Nothing.
You have your own strength, and it's so, it's worthless. It'd be like this microphone, which is a probably high-quality product. The tools are all there, but it's not plugged into anything that's going to make it work. Yeah, you don't have the power to be the husband, to be the mom that they need. The other thing that I will add to that, and I wonder if it's what you're going to say.
I went to a book, y'all, that was this sick and had, I remember the binder was those rings. And I was going to sit down and do that with my kids. And God said, no. Oh, a big discipleship manual. It was a big discipleship manual that everyone was using.
And that is when I started an in-home Bible study with new moms from my church in Texas. Shout out to all those precious ladies. And my kids were in the house listening to everything I said. I wasn't like, let's get out this big old spiral notebook that everyone else I know is doing. God said, live it and live it in front of them.
Don't you? Pillar modeling?
Well, let's do this.
So, yeah, we have foundation of walking with God, abiding. And then I think teaching what Jesus did with the disciples to teach for life transformation, not for knowledge like the Greek ones, but for life transformation. There are kind of three pillars to his process, and that's what we created in this model for parents to embrace. And it's modeling, teaching, and then applying. Those are three things of what Jesus did.
And so the modeling is the first one. We have to give our kids a picture of what it looks like to walk with God. And that's the most humbling, challenging thing in the world. That's where we have messed up. But every parent does as long as there's repentance with it.
And I have said I'm sorry five million times raising children. That's modeling. But it is that thing that convicts us of, kids, if you want to know how to walk with God, watch how I walk with God. You want to study your Bible? Watch how I study my Bible.
You want to know how pray? Watch how I do it. It's that modeling element. Jesus did that. He said, hey, do what I do.
Watch what I do and live life the way I do it in the kingdom. That's probably the most scary pillar because I would look at my kids and say, I am so sorry. I have been a three-headed mommy moment today. I mean, this was my three-headed mommy moment. I said that to them.
Were there moments when they were teenagers or even adults where they called you out? No, definitely. We just did our best unto God, and that's who I answer to is the Lord. And I believe he is full of grace. And if I had to elevate.
Pitch for someone. Why do you believe in Jesus? I would say because he is grace. And I have made so many mistakes in my life that could have gotten me in so much trouble. And God's grace just covered me.
I'm going to mess up. I'm not perfect. And I want people to know it's okay. It's okay. And I think, too, with teenagers, I think it's a great question.
Guys, what am I doing that you think I'm saying it, but I'm not living it? Teenagers will tell you, but I think it's a great mirror. Yes. And say, like, to be for them, it's okay. All of this is teaching them to be married, teaching, you know, I love that my kids watched us date a lot, you know, and now I'm watching my kids go on little trips.
So it's kind of fun to see a few things we did right maybe and modeled correctly that you get to see in our married kids. But we have disappointed our kids and I'm so sorry. Everybody who knows us knows that we are not perfect. Or do you think there's a sense as parents sometimes when your kids turn out well? You take too much credit.
And I don't. You take too much blame. It's like, you're not that good. You're not that bad. We're just joining God and what he's doing.
So back to the model here. We're teach for life. We're modeling. Modeling. Giving example.
Jesus did that. The second thing is we're teaching. Jesus obviously was a teacher, and he communicated what it would look like to live in the kingdom under God's leadership. He taught nonstop. We saw that.
At some point, moms and dads, we do have to teach our kids what it looks like to live in the kingdom. We have to open up the scripture. And it might look like, hey, we're going to have a family time. We're going to open the Bible together and talk about it. Or it just looks like, hey, what's God teaching your son?
What's God teaching your daughter? Here's what God's teaching me. Here's what I was reading the word today was meaningful. It's talking about what the truth says. Or driving home from that great sermon from Pastor Dave.
What did you learn in the sermon today? It's those kinds of things. You're critiquing that sermon. Or critiquing the sermon. Whatever.
Teaching your kids to have a biblical worldview. Of course. I mean, having those conversations. What did it look like in your home?
Well, I get it. It's as you go more than anything else. Really? Jennifer, was she home? We homeschooled for a season, and Jennifer would certainly do some.
With that, oh, I tried to anyway. I wanted to give them a firm foundation in God's word, and I tried very, very hard to teach them different things about our Lord and Savior. Your old school all the way through. No, no, no, no, no. You know, fall is when small groups start back up.
No, fall is when football starts.
Well, small groups start back up too. And if you're a group leader, You've been thinking about pulling some couples together for a marriage or family study. I hope you're thinking that. And this really is the best time of year to grab materials. Yeah, I mean, you can get them right now through the end of August at Family Life.
All the workbooks for our small groups are 25% off at familylife.com/slash shop. And there's no discount code needed. You just go there. You can pick from like the art of marriage or the art of parenting or vertical marriage. They're all video studies and the workbooks are included.
And I'm telling you what, you want to be a part of a group. It's phenomenal to watch God work in your family room. And it's so easy. It's plug and play. Yeah.
And I feel like we've done almost all of these studies. You guys, they're so good. And it's hard thinking like, what can we do this year? We have the answer for you and it's on sale. We've got you covered.
25% off at familylife.com/slash shop.
So we have that modeling, we have the teaching, and then this is the hard part. It's not the hard part, it's the fun part. Oh, I like that. The first thing is applying. I think what Jesus did with the 12, he modeled, he taught them the life and the kingdom, and then he sent them out two by two.
Now, you guys go and do what I've told you to do: go cast out demons, go heal the sick, go and do what I've done. And they were able to do that, come back, and there was a debriefing, and they could talk about it. Hey, won't went well. And you know, disciples are going, you know what, we did this, Jesus, it didn't go well. I'm sure there was a conversation about that.
But I think too many of our kids spend all their time in our homes, in our churches, learning a whole lot of Principles and truths, and they memorize scripture and Bible programs, but we don't give our kids a chance to apply and really have a chance to taste and see that the Lord is good. That putting legs to your faith where you can see, God showed up in my life. God showed up when I needed him to show up. You look for every opportunity. We encourage parents in the book.
Here's dozens of examples to make your home day by day a laboratory to practice what we say we preach or what we say we value, what we're learning about, the ways of God. Let's put it into practice truly to be able to see what God's up to in our lives day by day. Yeah, I love that.
Well, so many parents do that. They teach your kids, learn the Bible, learn the principles, but let's not ever practice living it out. Deuteronomy 6 is my like, someone at a women's retreat said, What is your verse for your life verse for where you are right now? And God gave me that. And he just said, as you roll along in the minivan, as you take meals, I joke that my kids would look at the brownies and they'd go, Can we eat those or is that for somebody else?
You know what I mean? we cooked so many meals for people who were sick or we cleaned a lady's house one day and my son's like can we come back tomorrow that was fun i mean you know i'm like are you serious i feel bad that i just made you clean this woman clean our house yeah yeah why don't you clean your room no yeah so we're doing that we're abiding back to this what does a parent do to disciple their kids like jesus you walk with god you start there and i don't want anybody to see this as a five-part checklist because if god said here's a five-point checklist raising great kids right i think we'd work the checklist and we'd never bother going to jesus that is what i have said that's my saying that's what i said i would have gotten the pamphlet and i am such a you know just in control person oh got that got that i would have never talked to god i would have never gone to my room and felt before the moment you're on your face before god saying god help me if you don't show up i don't want to do that is the best place to be in the world because god wants to come join so we abide with god we teach for life change we're modeling we're teaching along the way we're giving our kids a chance to apply And then the capstone of this model, what Jesus did with his 12. He did all of this, not as a distant rabbi, student, you know, teacher student. He did it in the context of relationship. Yes.
He said, I've called you my friends.
So there's a love relationship. I'm doing life with you in this Hebrew moment. And we, that's what's getting us through right now. Yep. That's what's getting us through.
What's that look like? What do you mean it's getting us through? Every day, just saying, God, I hate this. Every scan that Barrett has had for the last three years shows more cancer. Really?
He's got it so many places. I can't even name them all. You know, as you walk through this journey, how do you walk it with your kids? That's connecting. Yeah.
And then the connecting part is, I think. It's a capstone to this model. It's what Jesus did. It's what we want. We want nothing more, obviously, as husband and wife to be in a relationship together.
But we want to have a solid relationship with our kids, because that's, I think, where the influence is greatest. For parents out there who have kids still at home, children or teenagers. You know, it's easy when your kids are young. You know, they see you as they're utterly dependent upon you for all good things. They're talking through illness and teenagers.
It gets harder. You prioritize trying to. To connect and keep that relationship, but it, you know, distance and challenges are always going to be there. But I think it still should be our goal as parents to try to strive. To maintain that the best you can.
And we're trying to do that while we fight cancer. In spite of that, it's interesting because you want to communicate to your loved ones, friends, family, kids, grandkids, all that, this urgency that we feel of. Hey, time may be short. Let's we want to spend every moment we can with you because who knows how much time we got. And it's interesting, you're, you know, I don't think people around you.
Fully feel that urgency like you do. And that's not anyone to blame. It's just a reality.
So we feel that, and we live from that. My fear is that the day will come when I'll move from fantastic to not so great. And perhaps I have no idea what it's going to look like, no idea what the end of my life, as none of us know what it's going to look like. But will I move from, hey, fantastic and great to not so great very quickly? And the people around me that I love and want to be with and have wanted to be with during this season will go, oh, goodness, let's make the most of our time.
Yeah. And when we had all this time. And we'll run out of time.
So we don't know. That's our fear. And that's our fear.
So my message. Let's talk about the people that are listening right now. We can talk about Barrett and Jennifer's struggles and pain and emotions. We want to be encouragement to your audiences listening. My encouragement would be to any parent who's listening to this to say: you've got a short amount of time to connect with the hearts of your children and teenagers, even your young adult kids.
You got a short amount of time. And it feels like, what would they say? The days are short. Days are long. The days are long, the years are short.
Don't waste your time to connect with your kids. All the influence, all the teaching, all the modeling, all the things that Jesus did, he did it to the context of relationship. Whatever it takes, connect with the hearts of your kids. If a parent looks at this model or buys this book or says, All right, I want a disciples like Jesus, where do I start?
Well, I think obviously start with your relationship with God. Start abiding God. Where are we right now? How are we doing? How do I grow in you and connect with you and be close to you?
And you can leave me. But I think the second priority is if you do not have the heart. Of your child or your teenagers. There's not a love connection there. You got to go back and win it.
Go back and get the heart of your kid. Yeah. Go back and do whatever it takes. And, you know, love languages. You guys talked to Gary Chapman recently.
Go back and say, What's the love language of my kid? How do I connect with them there? How do I go to my kid, my teenager, and say, you know what? We haven't been close these days, and I hate that. And it's not what God said.
What will it take for us to be close again? Does it take me humbling myself and confessing all my shortcomings? Parents, confess your shortcomings to your kids. They know you have shortcomings. Hey, yeah.
And the parent who says, No, I'm perfect, got it all together. Your kid knows you don't have it together. And when you live your life communicating, I've got it all together. No, they know better than that. Humble yourself and go there.
So connect with that love relationship and start there for sure. Those are great actions with your kids. And I think that enables us, I think, to maximize our influence on our kids to model, to teach, to give our kids supply and help them grow up. We are watching our kids parent. And, you know, they know they're not perfect parents, but hopefully they're, I know they're crying out to God for help.
And I don't know. It's just so neat to see it on the other side, I will say, to young moms who want to give up and just walk out the door. I joked, we had an electric car one time, and I'm like, if I ever want to run away from my family, I can only go 68 miles until I find a plug to plug my car back in. I can't run away. But every mom wants to run away from the responsibilities of all this because it is heavy and it is hard.
And be in connection. If you're a young mommy, find a mops group, mothers of preschoolers, get encouragement. It's so hard. And there's a lot of encouragement out there in the churches for, hopefully, for young moms that people can find. Do a good podcast like this one.
Yeah, let's do a good idea. Apply it. Apply it. Yeah, as you. We were talking, I literally pulled up the lyrics because I was thinking.
We know this. We're all terminal. Yeah. That's what God says. None of us know if we get to tomorrow.
None of us are getting out of here alive.
So in some sense, you have a gift because you know your time's short. We think our time's long. It could be shorter than yours. We don't know. And I thought, you know, you want to live as if we're dying.
And I thought, remember the song you're talking about? I'm not going to sing it. But here's what I thought about Tim McGraw's song. I thought, what a great song was I hit. And I thought, I wonder if the lyrics have anything to do with parenting.
They don't. Really? It's all about. I just pulled it up and it says, Living your best life. Basically, you know, he went to the doctor and he says, Your time's short.
And he goes, I'm going to go ride a Bronco.
So, what did I do? I went skydiving, I went rocky mountain climbing, I went. I went 2.7 seconds on a bull named Fu Manchu, and I loved deeper and I spoke sweeter, and I gave forgiveness. I've been denying, and he said, Someday I hope you get the chance to live like you were dying, which is awesome. But I thought, man, of all the things to do when your time is short.
Love God, love the people in your life that mean the most to you. Love God, love others. That's it. That's Deuteronomy 6. That's Jesus when he was asked what's the most important commandment.
It's be the parent. That guy called you to be with your kids because that's your legacy. I mean, you're doing it. You're doing it. Way to go, guys.
Well done. We're trying. I'm glad Barrett's legacy is in print, you know, for when he is gone. And it's, I don't know, he is just such a precious man. And oh, we're going to pray.
We don't know what's next. We're going to pray for you. I'm going to pray that God heals you. And I'll tell our listeners you can get their book, Disciple Them Like Jesus, at familylifetoday.com. Just click on the link in the show notes.
And we'll have your other books there as well. Yeah. Thank you. The talks. Thank you.
Meet me in the middle and you name it. It'll be there. It's all FamilyLife Today. Yeah.com. Let's pray.
Thank you very much. Y'all are awesome. Father God, I pray for healing. Yes, Lord. Only you can do that.
And you can do that. Yes. I don't know what your plan is, but we're asking that you heal him physically. In the days we all have left, whether it's many or little, I pray we live every second. For you, and we'd disciple our children, and anyone you put around us, we'd make disciples.
And Lord, I pray for our kids and our legacy, that that legacy would honor you. And long after we're gone, grandkids and great-grandkids would continue to literally live out a legacy of their parents and grandparents. And hopefully, that's us that love you and love others. In Jesus' name, amen. Thank y'all for having us.
Thank you. So, love y'all, and thank you for your ministry. Family Life Today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry. celebrating fifty years of God's faithfulness as marriages grow stronger and families flourish in Him. Yeah.
