The Aim of Our Legacy

Parenting is to be done on purpose. You should have a mission or a goal in mind. Dave Wilson says you need to know what it is you're aiming for with your kids. You're going to launch your children. They are meant to be sent out toward what? And so that was the question we actually had to sit down and decide, okay, what is our bullseye?

What target are we shooting for? This is Family Life Today. Our hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson.

I'm Bob Lapine. You can find us online at familylifetoday.com. There's a word for parenting without a goal in mind, without a purpose. The word is floundering. We're going to talk about how to not flounder as you raise your kids today. Stay with us. And welcome to Family Life Today.

Thanks for joining us. I think a lot of people back, I don't know, 10, 15 years ago read, there was a business book that came out that was a big popular business book on the seven habits of highly effective people. You remember that book, right? Stephen Covey, yep. One of the principles in that book was that you got to begin with the end in mind.

Yeah. How did I know you're going to go there? We're talking today about parenting, and really when we think about parenting, that's a principle that ought to mark how we do what we do. I'm thinking back to when we became parents. I think I had the next week in mind, maybe the next day in mind. I had the next hour in mind. Yeah, I wasn't really thinking, okay, 20 years from now, what do I want the outcome to be? Although I did think I won't sleep in for 20 more years.

A lot has just changed, absolutely. You guys have just written a book called No Perfect Parent, and you talk about in this book the realization that you do need to begin the journey with some objectives, some goals in mind. And Dave, some of this came to you because you started off your parenting journey with a deficit to draw from, from your own experience.

You knew, I want to make sure my kids have more in the tank when they get to adulthood than I had in my tank. I don't know how often I thought about being a dad as a young young man growing up, but obviously after Ann and I were married and then realized we wanted to have kids, and I knew that I had a chance to do something I never saw. It's interesting, I write about this story in the book of talking to a woman who was, boy, she had to be 60, maybe closer to 70 years old. Just this conversation, her name was Janice, and I asked her, you know, tell me about your family. And she had this great husband, airline pilot, you know, she said we had four jacks and a queen, which meant four sons and a daughter. And, you know, they made money, they lived in a gated community outside of New York because her husband flew out of Newark Airport.

And anyway, it was your all-American family in the 50s, really, and so I'm loving this story. And then it turned, she says, and then around year 25 I started to suspect that my husband, who's now a captain with the airlines, was having an affair. I'm like, what do you mean? She says, there were just signs that he was seeing someone, and I knew it was on his trip. So, you know, back in those days there weren't cell phones and you couldn't call up a private, so she just thought, I'm gonna call the hotel where I know he's staying, where he lays over, and see if I can find out anything. And literally she calls the front desk, the receptionist answers, and all she said was, has Captain Ralph checked in yet?

Because they all knew him as Captain Ralph. And this woman didn't realize she's talking to Captain Ralph's wife, Janice, and the lady at the desk just said, oh yeah, he just went to his room with his girlfriend. And so Janice tells me, she goes, I realized, I've caught him, he's having an affair.

And I'm like, so what happened? She said, when he came home from that trip I confronted him to find out this was one of several. And he admitted it, and the long version of the story is they ended up divorced. And, you know, Janice ends up moving to where her parents live, in another state, with her two little boys. She had a seven-year-old and a five-year-old. And then she tells me when she got to the new state and started her new life as a single mom, the five-year-old dies of leukemia, like two months later. And by this point, obviously, she's tearing up, and I'm tearing up.

And it's not just a sad story. The reason I'm tearing up is Janice is my mom. And I was the seven-year-old, and Craigie was the five-year-old, my little brother, and Captain Ralph was my dad. He's really Dave Wilson, but it's Ralph David Wilson.

So at the airlines, he went by Captain Ralph. And that's my legacy. So, you know, as I become a dad, I have the opportunity to continue that, which, honestly, many do. You know, whatever you're sort of handed, unless you intentionally decide, if it's a great legacy, you still have to decide, I'm going to continue this. But if it's a legacy like mine of alcohol, both my parents were alcoholics, my dad was having multiple affairs. If I don't decide, I'm probably going to continue the sins of the Father.

But I knew that I get to change the Wilson legacy. I, you know, it was like on my knees, God, could you use Ann and I to create a different path that our three sons would be raised by a dad who broke the cycle. Talk to me about that sense of intentionality as a parent and aiming for a different legacy, because I think that's the exception and not the rule. I think most moms and dads, I'm thinking of Mary Ann and me, I think when we got married, I knew there were certain things I didn't want to replicate as a parent. I didn't want to replicate certain things in my marriage. So I knew a few things not to do. I don't think I knew what to do. And I don't think I was pulling back and thinking, now here's what I want the outcome to be. I think I was thinking real short-term. I think most people are thinking short-term and just thinking, you know, we'll bump along and I hope it all works out. Where did you get a vision for intentionality in terms of parenting and a legacy?

Do you remember where that came from? I think Ann and I would have the same answer, but initially, all I knew is what you just said. It was like, okay, I don't want to do what my dad did, so here's some simple things. No alcohol in the home. So we didn't have alcohol anywhere in our house.

You couldn't find a bottle of whiskey or gin or beer. It was just not there because it was like, I have two alcoholic parents. I got to be very careful and I don't want to pass that on.

Put extreme barriers around women, you know, in any relationships and just boundaries. And so that was the, in some sense, the easy short-term. But it wasn't until CJ is four or five years old, I think, you know, now we have probably number two, that we sort of stepped back and said, okay, what is the long-term vision? What are we hoping to raise when they're 25, 30 years old?

What kind of men are we envisioning they become? And to be honest, I have great parents who were married 70 years, but what I didn't have, even though I had this great family, there is no spiritual component. And so neither one of us had any idea of what did it look like to raise a family centered on Christ, where the foundation of the gospel is what we're aiming for.

And we had never even seen it until Dennis and Barbara Rainey. Yeah, family life was critical in our lives from the very beginning with a vision for what godly marriage looked like with the We Can Remember and all the resources in our early years of marriage. I think it's the first time we heard the word legacy. Yeah, I mean literally the last talk, as we all know, we've been speaking at the We Can Remember for 30 years, is a talk on legacy. And sitting there as an engaged couple, hearing that talk from Dennis in Chicago two weeks before our wedding, it was one of the first times we thought we can change the legacy.

Again, can't do it perfectly, we can't control it, but we can set a goal to say we want to change. I knew for me, legacy was like a visceral word. It had emotion.

It's like I get the opportunity to possibly, when you hear the Wilson name, it's not connected to adultery, it's not connected to alcohol, it's connected to Jesus and a new way forward. And again, never was the thought perfect, you know, like we're going to do it perfectly or our kids are going to be perfect. But even in the subtitle of our book, it was, you know, no perfect parents ditch expectations. So it's like, you know, the expectations you have, how it's going to go, just put those aside because it's not going to go that way. The second phrase was embrace reality because it's going to be really hard and you got to embrace it. But then the third one was and discover the secret that'll change your parenting. And of course, when you hear the word secret, you're like, okay, what's the secret? This is Dave's marketing strategy.

Yeah, of course. And we have the same subtitle for vertical marriage. And the, you know, the secret vertical marriage is you go vertical. Well, it's the same thing of parenting, but it's the secret is, and I don't know if you found this as well, Bob, but when you ask most parents and I think it's most if maybe 75% of parents, what are you trying to raise? Most parents have never answered that question. What do you think they would say?

I think you're right. I've talked to enough parents that they will say, the goal I'm looking for is I want my kids to be first thing happy. I want them to get a good job. I want them to find a good spouse and get married and have a happy marriage and family. If they can be successful, happy and in marriage and in their jobs, then touchdown. I've won, right?

That's the score. And what do you think of that when you hear it? So I think those are all good things. And I certainly want those things for my kids as well. But I remember Tim Kimmel being on family life today, he'd written a book called grace based parenting. And he said, most parents on a practical level, that's what they're emphasizing as they raise their kids. So they're worried about their academics because they want them to get a good job. They're worried about their socialization, how they're fitting in with other kids so that they can be happy.

And so they can have good relationships and find a good husband. He said, but they're not spending equal amounts of time thinking about how their kids are developing spiritually or what the spiritual goals are. What, you know, Jesus says, seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness.

Then all these other things will be added unto you. And that's what you're saying in this book when you think about legacy is let's make sure we're propping the ladder against the right wall before we start to climb the ladder, right? Yeah, we call it a bullseye in the book or a target.

Like what are you aiming for? We stole that from the art of parenting. We stole it from Dennis Rainey and really the same passage that is mentioned in the art of parenting is the passage Psalm 127. It says, unless the Lord builds the house, the builders labor in vain. Children are a heritage, a gift from the Lord, offspring are a reward from him. And then he writes, like arrows in the hands of a warrior. So there's the visual of your shooting at something. Arrows in the hands of a warrior are children in one's youth, born in one's youth.

Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them. And so obviously he's alluding at, you're going to launch your children. By the way, parents, you're going to launch them.

Don't hold them there forever. They are meant to be sent out toward what? And so that was the question we actually had to sit down and decide, okay, what is our bullseye?

What target are we shooting for? Well, Dave, even, even verse one, unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain. I remember reading that the first time thinking, who is building my house?

Am I? I say that it's Jesus, but how is that happening? See, I think that's a difference between the way you guys tackled this and the way Mary Ann and I tackled this. And I think the way a lot of Christian parents tackled this, I thought, well, yeah, the Lord's building our house. We're Christians. So we love Jesus. We came from a church going, but not a Christ centered home. So we're going to have Jesus at the center of our home.

So Jesus is building our house. So the legacy will take care of itself. I had a hope for a godly legacy, but I don't know that I had the level of intentionality.

Here's what I didn't have that you guys had. I didn't have a mission statement for our family. I didn't have the intentional goals of saying to get the legacy that we want, these are the inputs that need to be happening during those years. I just thought that'll take care of itself if we go to church and love Jesus and do all of that.

And I would say to parents today, no, it needs to go a little deeper. You need to be a little more purposeful and intentional. And honestly, that's something I came to realize as I'm hosting family life today and talking to all of the guests and taking notes and going, I need to go home and do that differently. And I need to, yeah, that's a good adjustment.

I need to be. That was your mentoring process right there. Exactly what it was. And I love that. I remember someone saying, if you aim at nothing, you'll hit it.

Right. And I think that's what we do as parents. We get caught up in the day-to-day demands of life, and we're not really aiming at anything.

And so why are we surprised that the outcome isn't the biblical outcome that we were hoping? I mentioned the mission statement. You guys actually have a family mission statement, right? Again, we called it sort of our target or bullseye. Our kids never knew it. Yeah, we don't want to sit here and act like, oh, we recited it every night and everybody put on their halo and had the Wilson Little mission statement moment. And Ann and I didn't talk about it daily. I look back, I wish we would have, but it was something we sort of crafted.

We knew what it was. Our kids didn't. And I don't think, for parents, your kids need to know. Because even if they do, they might feel pressure.

Oh, this is what they're trying to do. But as a parent, you really do need to know, what are we shooting at? Because if it is, I want my kid to be the most popular or happy or successful, there's nothing wrong with those goals. But in my opinion, they're not high enough.

That's a low bar. You know, it's like, really? How do you even define success and happiness, popularity? And even as our kids got into high school, we thought, you know, being the most popular is not a good goal.

It's actually not a goal you want. So when they were really little, and we put it in the book and not in a way to say, this should be your mission statement. We just said, here was ours.

It's an example. But the Lapine's need to sit down and the Joneses need to sit down and say, what would it look like for us as parents to say, this is what we're shooting at. So before you tell us your mission statement, what was the process by which you came up with that statement? Did Dave come home one day and say, I've been working on it. What do you think? Or did the two of you work on it together?

What did you do? We talked about it, but Dave's processing and writing where I don't do that. And it probably came down to, we probably had to give a talk somewhere.

No, I can tell you exactly in my mind what happened. I'm a young dad. I don't know what I'm doing.

And so what do I do? I go find dads in my church and I buy them lunch. And I tell you, there's not too many dads will say no to a free lunch. And I remember back then I had a little piece of paper and a pencil or a pen. And I picked dads that I saw their teenage kids or older that I was like, wow, I forgot you did that. I mean, this is long time ago, but I remember, man, if our kids were living like that in high school and college, and again, they weren't perfect kids, but they had, what do you mean living? They had a real faith for God. They had integrity. They were making really good choices. They cared about others. I mean, again, they weren't perfect, but there was, there's something right happening. They were on the right track.

Yeah. They were living on purpose. And I, I met with the dads and I just took notes. Hey, what'd you do?

How'd you do? And I kept hearing from these dads that they had a goal. This wasn't, this didn't just happen.

It was intentional. Another thing I heard a lot of is we have prayed every day. I heard that over and over. Like we never stopped praying for these young men and women. And anyway, so that was like doing research and building some things. And so that's when I would come to Adam and say, man, these families that are raising kids that we hope someday our kids will be. And at the time I thought our kids will never be anything like that, you know?

Because we're messed up, not because of kids, but because we kept failing. Yeah. So anyway, and then over time, as we talked, it was like, let's write something down. And, you know, it's like any mission statement for a business or a church or a corporation, every word matters, you know, and you take your time to say, no, not that word, this word. It simply became, and it doesn't sound profound, but it was train and launch L3 warriors who make a dent where they're sent. L3 warriors.

Again, it's a personal thing. So you're like, what does that even mean? And so in the book we actually go through, okay, what does training look like and what does launch, of course, launch comes from Psalm 127. You're going to launch these arrows. Warriors was a key word because it isn't like we're just raising kids. They're actually kingdom of God warriors. They're in a war. There's a battle going on.

That's something you never want to forget as a parent. It's not about their personality of like, oh, they're strong. It's more of they're in a battle. And so in a battle, we want to have warriors. Yeah. And again, it isn't like we raise these incredible, you know, men who are wearing the breastplate of righteousness around. But there was a sense that this is epic.

This is better than Gladiator. This is real. And then the L3 was actually something that we had crafted at our church as a staff on our leadership team years before to say, okay, what are we trying to raise as disciples of Christ at Kensington? And again, a lot of meetings and discussions about, well, at the end of the day, if you look at what Jesus said a disciple was, it sort of had these three values and we called it L3, love, lock, live. So love was love God and others. The great commandment, Matthew 22, where Jesus said, you know, rabbi, what's the most important that you love God with all your heart, soul and mind and love your neighbors yourself. So that was our first L. If our sons and when they're 25, 30, 35 years old, love God with all their heart, soul and mind, and they actually have a heart for their neighbor and others, that's a good thing.

You know, that would be like, oh, that's a worthy goal. Lock was lock arms. And that's the whole idea that God made us not to do life alone, but in community. Hebrews 10, don't forsake the meeting together in community fellowship. And so we thought, man, if they understand as men, they need other men in their life to sharpen them and keep them accountable to their walk with God as husbands, as dads, if they're doing life with other followers of Christ, men, that's a good thing, you know? And then the last one was just simply live open handedly. So love, lock, live, live open handedly was if our young men, when they become men, realize their time, talent, and treasure, or a gift from God, not just for themselves, but to give away, you know, you can live with your fists closed, holding on to everything, or you can live open handedly, which is mean, man, I'm supposed to serve others with my time, serve God with my time, I'm supposed to give my money away. And I'm supposed to give my my talents to the kingdom of God. Again, there's so many other things you could think about, but we just thought those three sort of L, love, lock, live, capture, man, oh man, if we looked at our kids in their 20s and 30s, and they were living that and hopefully passing that on to their kids, our grandkids, that would be a dream. And then the dent where they're sent.

Yeah, and then the dent where they're sent. Family Life listeners have heard me say this many times, but it's simply the idea of you're on mission and God wants to use you where he's put you. And it's really from Jesus' words, you are the light of the world.

A city set on a hill cannot be hidden. And so it's wherever you are is where you're sent. So if our sons knew when they're 20, again, 30, 35 years old, that God has placed them in this business, in this neighborhood, in this church, to make a difference for the kingdom of God, because you are in a war and you're a warrior.

And again, I'm saying all this thinking, did that actually happen? Did they wake up every day thinking that I doubt it, but there is a sense that God has honored that, you know, it gives you something to shoot at, and then you can work toward that goal. And that's the point. I mean, the title of the book, No Perfect Parents, tells us that even when you've got a goal like this, you're not going to execute flawlessly. There's no guarantee that if you'll do this, your kids will grab onto it.

There's no recipe. Or they won't rebel. There's no guarantee. But to have a North Star as parents to say, here's what we want to be intentional about, that shapes the daily decisions you make as a parent to say, does this align with the mission that we're on?

And will this produce the legacy that we're aiming for? And again, that's in God's hands. We talked already about expectations and surrender. Big theme in your book.

You can't force it to happen. But you can be intentional about aiming in that direction and asking God for favor, right? I do like the cover of our book is the publisher, they were sending us ideas. So you have a target with arrows. A bullseye. Yeah, a bullseye. And there's two arrows that are in the bullseye.

And then there's about 10 that are laying on the ground. I like that because I thought, yes, sometimes you do hit the mark and sometimes you don't. That's where we're not perfect, but God is perfect. And so if you're aiming at God, if you're going vertical, even as a couple, or even if you're a single parent, or even if you're in a blended family, just talking about it is a great step forward. Once you know what the bullseye is that you're aiming at, then you can develop a strategy. Which is the rest of the book is like, okay, once you know what you're aiming at, you got to step back.

So how would we get there? Every church does that. Every corporation does that.

Most families never do that. That's why it's so critical to say there's a secret that you got to understand. And it's this.

And we talked about legacy earlier. I'll never forget when I turned 50. I told Ann before that birthday, because she had thrown a surprise 40th birthday, and I'm like, please, I'm struggling with turning 50. I'm an old man now. Do not. It sounds pretty young now, doesn't it?

I know. It sounds young now. But I was like, please don't throw a party.

I just want to slip into the 50s and nobody will know. And she's like, okay, I won't. And so she was so good.

She didn't throw a party. And I turned 50 and nobody even knew. And about a month later, I'm sitting at home on a Tuesday night.

And one of the Detroit Lion players that I had mentored and was still in our ministry calls and goes, hey, I've been trying to get you and Ann over here. Rebecca and I are really struggling. And you never have time.

But I'm telling you tonight, we're about to get a divorce. Is there any way it's an emergency? Can you get over here right now? And I'm like, well, there's nothing on my calendar. And I'm like, Ann, Luther just called.

He and Rebecca are struggling. Can we go over there? She goes, well, right now?

I'm like, yeah, okay. We jump in the car. We rush over there. We get to the front door.

Nobody's there. I'm like, you know, it's open. I'm like, Luther, where are you? And he goes, we're in the basement. Get down here. So I go walking down to the basement. I don't know where Ann is. She's behind me somewhere. I step into the basement. Surprise! I am so mad. The whole basement is full of all these people. Ann had gotten there, you know, six weeks, a month after my thing.

I'd forgotten all about it. And it was only men, which was different from other birthdays that I had. Ann says, you know, honey, I had these guys come. And I instructed them to bring a gag gift and a tribute. A little bit of a roast. And I'm out. See you later.

She goes upstairs. And it's just us guys. And there are several Detroit Lion players. And it was hilarious.

You know, the first guy, John Kitna, I'll never forget. He goes, I brought a money chain. I'm like, what? He goes, you are so tight with your money. It takes the jaws of life to open your wallet. So this way, you'll never lose your wallet.

It'll be connected to you. He's fake fun. And then they would share something. And it was powerful, you know? And it was like, unbelievable.

It really was. This went on for over an hour. And then at the very end, Ann walks back down the stairs. And she says, hey, I need to read you three letters from your three sons who couldn't be here.

Two of them were in college at the time. And I'm like, okay. And she goes, they wanted to be here, but they couldn't. But they wrote you this. So she reads a letter from CJ and Austin and Cody, who are now men. And it was so interesting, Bob.

As I'm reading it, I happen to look over at Dave, who's not a big crier. He doesn't cry very often, except in movies. So this is real life. And I look over, and he's crying so hard, not just some tears, but like really, really crying. I was sobbing. It was so emotional. I mean, it was great, the men, that God has given me a chance to impact, but my three sons. When she read those letters, I think it hit me so hard.

It was like, legacy. You know, I'm hearing from three warriors. And again, they're not perfect sons at this point. None of us are, but it was so powerful to hear their words. I'm like, God did it.

You know, God's changed the Wilson name. And I got a chance, just a glimpse of all those prayers and the goal you set, the bullseye, and then working toward that. I just got the fragrance of, God has done that.

And he's going to continue to do that. But it was, I would say, maybe the best night of my life. You know, because it was like, what you live for is, God, I want to leave a legacy that honors you. And again, we are not saying our kids are perfect and no kids will be. But they, I got a chance to see that God is good and he can do things you can't even imagine with your legacy.

I'm thinking every listener knows somebody who is pregnant for the first time right now. What a gift you could give them if you could help them at the front of their journey to think intentionally, to have a legacy focus, to give up expectations, to surrender like we've talked about, but to have that goal in mind and to say, this is what we're aiming for. And start that from day one. If they could get a copy of your book and pass it on to parents that they know need this kind of focus, need this kind of help, go to familylifetoday.com and pre-order Dave and Anne Wilson's book, No Perfect Parents. It comes out next week.

Go ahead and sign up to get your copy now. Again, you can pre-order at familylifetoday.com or you can call to order 1-800-FL today is our number 1-800-358-6329. That's 1-800-F as in family, L as in life, then the word today. The title of the book again, No Perfect Parents by Dave and Anne Wilson. The subtitle is Ditch Expectations, Embrace Reality, and Discover the One Secret That Will Change Your Parenting. Now tomorrow, we want to talk about something that Anne, you experienced a lot of when you were raising your kids. And that's the whole subject of mom guilt. What do you do with that?

How do you process that? We're talking about parenting this week with Dave and Anne Wilson. We'll continue the conversation tomorrow. I hope you can join us again. I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, got some extra help today from Bruce Goff. And of course, our entire broadcast production team. On behalf of our hosts, Dave and Anne Wilson, I'm Bob Lapine. We'll see you back next time for another edition of Family Life Today. Family Life Today is a production of Family Life of Little Rock, Arkansas. A crew ministry. Help for today. Hope for tomorrow.