September 18, 2020 Show with Aaron Brewster on “The Challenges of Christian Parenting Today”

Live from the historic parsonage of the 19th century gospel minister George Norcross in downtown

Carlisle, Pennsylvania, it's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs chapter 27 verse 17 tells us iron sharpens iron so one man sharpens another.

Matthew Henry said that in this passage we are cautioned to take heed with whom we converse and directed to have in view in conversation to make one another wiser and better.

It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours and we hope to hear from you the listener with your own questions and now here's your host

Chris Arnzen. Good afternoon

Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, Lake City, Florida, and the rest of humanity living on the planet earth who are listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnzen your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio wishing you all a happy Friday on this 18th day of September 2020 and I'm so delighted that I have for the very first time ever on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Aaron M.

Brewster who for over 10 years has served God and his people in various capacities including husband, father, homeschooling parent, preacher, biblical counselor, president of a non -profit that serves

Christian families, conference speaker, camp director, Christian school administrator, director of a boarding home for at -risk teens, podcaster, author, and host of Truth Love Parent and today we are going to be addressing the challenges of Christian parenting today and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio Aaron Brewster.

Thank you very much Chris, that's a really long list. Are you sure that's right?

That's fantastic. Thank you so much for having me on the show. Well it's a lot longer list than my own credentials I'll tell you that much and so tell us about Truth Love Parent before we go into any more details about our theme today and also about your personal salvation testimony.

Sure yeah my pleasure. So Truth Love Parent started back in 2016 as an extension of the work

I was doing at Victory Academy for Boys which is a boarding school in the north of Wisconsin.

I was doing a parent program and long story short I decided to package it up as a podcast put it out there not just for the families we were serving but also to put it out there for anyone else who might be looking for biblical answers to their parenting needs and the

Lord blessed and it's connected me with a worldwide audience and this past year so starting in January my family and I we stepped out on faith and we moved from Victory Academy to pursue

Truth Love Parent full -time and the big motivation behind that really had to do with the fact that at Victory Academy we were working with at -risk families and my big desire for Truth Love Parent was to help equip parents to have the types of families that don't need

Lord willing to have to send their children to a place like Victory Academy to help them preventatively at the very beginning of their their family life to be able to working and toward more

Christ -honoring trajectory and so we've been doing that since January and we are we are very close just a few steps away from being a 501c3 and super excited about what the

Lord has in store for us in the future. Praise God well if anybody wants to know more about Truth Love Parent you can go to TruthLoveParent .com

TruthLoveParent .com and I'm sure we'll be announcing that throughout the broadcast.

Well as I hinted at just a moment ago we have a tradition here on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio whenever we have a first -time guest at least when that first -time guest is a

Christian there are rare occasions I interview somebody who is not a Christian for one reason or another perhaps they still have something of value to say to the body of Christ and I'll allow them to have a an interview on this program but as you are among the 99 .999

% of my guests who are Christian I would like for you now to give a summary of your salvation testimony including the religious atmosphere if any you were raised in and what providential circumstances our

Sovereign Lord raised up in your life that drew you to himself and saved you. Well that's one of my favorite things to talk about so I appreciate the opportunity and it's a great tradition you guys have.

So I grew up in a home that was really for all intents and purposes a first potentially second -generation

Christian family. Both of my parents as they grew up their their family other their parents and their brothers and sisters were unsaved.

My mom's family all came to the Lord basically all at the same time when she was I believe in high school and so growing up there my parents loved the

Lord but they didn't grow up themselves in a Christian home and so they didn't grow up really in solid churches that had prepared them to be parents so they were doing their dead level best and I'm so thankful for that and one of the great things

I think my my mom in particular did for me was I had made a profession of faith when I was five and as I look back most likely it was just to to escape the realities of hell you know just some type of self -preservation but at the age of nine so four years later my mom confronted me and she said you know

Aaron it seems that everything in your life is done for you whether it's the good things you do or the bad things you do it's just all about how you are going to benefit from it and she went on to describe and explain to me that Christians aren't perfect but their driving motivation is to live for the

Lord to submit to Him and I had just shown over and over in my life that was not not not something

I was trying to do I remember the nine -year -old being offended by my mom questioning my salvation but the reality was that I had always questioned my salvation

I always struggled with that and it had a large part to do with the fact that there was a lot of sin in my life and I knew that I really wasn't truly a follower of Christ and the

Lord used my mom to open my eyes to that and that need and later that year I was born again so at the age of nine and I'm a double

Baptist you know so that makes me more Baptist than most I was a Baptist once when I was five but for real the first time when

I was nine and then at the age of 12

I dedicated my life to full -time Christian service it was during that we lived around a lot where I am now this is my 22nd move and so it was

I kind of remember my life not as ages primarily but more like houses and places where we lived but I do remember this particular age we were living in Missouri at the time and there was an evangelist at our church and I really really believed that the

Lord would be most glorified in my life by me being full -time Christian service so unfortunately our one of our next moves took us to Michigan and not nothing wrong with Michigan but for the unfortunate part was that I was very much a double -minded man unstable in all of my ways because I loved the things of the

Lord genuinely I was a follower of his but I also was too in love with myself and so I entered a time from the ages of 13 basically on through college very much of that back and back and forward unstable

I was studying to be in full -time Christian service and but I was also struggling just like too often was worshiping self so the

Lord used a series of events during that time what I like to call sanctified two -by -fours to get my attention to open my eyes to the reality of the fact that though I had submitted to him for the most part most of the time

I still was unstable in all my ways because I was double -minded and so I needed to follow the advice there in James and I needed to purify my heart and cleanse my hands and the

Lord used a number of circumstances to start drawing me to him and drawing well not through salvation but drawing me back to him back to my first love and I praise

God that that has been an ongoing progression this whole time since then just every day drawing me closer and closer back to him and I have been a full -time

Christian service since 2007 when shortly after my wife and I got married we moved to Illinois where I was working for a church in a in a

Christian school so it's kind of a long and short of how the Lord I was introduced to the

Lord and then the work that he's been doing in my life continually to purify me and purge me of my sin and sanctify me well praise

God you at the age of 12 recognized that you were a sinner in need of a

Savior and placed your trust in Christ and his finished work on Calvary I at the age of 12 was perfecting spitting watermelon seeds out of my mouth like a machine gun in my friends faces so you are a lot more advanced as a child than I was so our theme today is the challenges of Christian parenting today and I am

NOT a parent but I know for well knowing plenty of parents and having parents that being a parent has always been challenging and even when we read the

Scriptures it's obviously been a challenge from the get -go right out of the

Garden of Eden but there is I a unique emphasis of our theme today on the word today because this is a truly bizarre world we're living in but first of all let me start off by asking you a question lest any of our

Christian parents be discouraged right now I mean there may be many that are warmed and encouraged hearing your testimony when they have little tiny children and they may have greater confidence and hope and enthusiasm that their children will come to embrace

Christ as their Savior as you did as a very young child there are others who have teenagers or children adult children in their 20s and 30s and 40s and 50s who are rebels against God who are living wicked lives perhaps bordering on suicidal in their behavior who are discouraged because they their hearts are broken that they don't have children such as you were who are serving

Christ and where they can rest their heads on their pillow with peace and tranquility and confidence that should anything happen to their children unexpectedly if their children or any one of them should depart this earth before they as parents do they could at the very least know that those children will be in eternity with Christ and there are many parents who have no such peace so please perhaps give start off with a word of encouragement to those parents those latter that latter group who may be discouraged right now yeah there definitely are a lot of people in that category that described many of the families with which

I worked at Victory Academy for boys I guess my mind goes in a couple different directions one of them is the fact that God God is good is good and he is sovereign and that means that number one we're not going to always understand him in fact rarely are we going to understand what he's doing and why he's doing it unless the

Bible reveals it but we can trust him we can trust that his plan is going to work out exactly as it should now that doesn't always leave us with with confidence and encouragement because to be completely honest human beings are by nature control freaks we want to know how why where when we want to be in the middle of it we want to make it happen and that reminds me of the second thing that God has not called any of us to change anybody we can't do that but the beautiful reality is that we serve a

God of change not that he himself changes but that he is all about changing us as we just talked about he made a dead thing

Aaron Brewster alive at the age of nine he is about giving new life to dead people and he's about even after he gives life changing us sanctifying us purifying us taking us from one degree of glory to another so we serve a

God of change who is completely in control and totally sovereign and that right there with our eyes fixed on Christ should be the encouragement that we need

I think about Peter if he had kept his eyes fixed on Christ as he was walking on the

Sea of Galilee he would not have slipped below the waves but he took his eyes off of Christ and then he was scared by the waves around him and yes the thought of a child of ours going to hell of rejecting the

Lord is a terrible burden but we must keep our eyes on Christ Isaiah tells us that God keeps us in perfect peace when our mind is stayed focused anchored on him so that's where I would start but then there's also another encouragement that comes to my mind specifically from 1st

Corinthians chapter 7 and in this passage it's talking to a wife or a husband or a parent who is married to someone who is unsaved or has children who are unsaved and this is a this is a big passage it would be with deep concepts and would take a long time to really unpack it but I want to read it and just just encourage us real quick and starting in verse 14 and then verse 16 it says for the unbelieving husband is sanctified through his wife and the unbelieving wife is sanctified through her believing husband for otherwise your children are unclean but now they are holy and then verse 16 says for how do you know a wife whether you will save your husband or how do you know a husband whether you will save your wife or we could add to that and how will you how do you know

Oh parent if whether you will save your child and obviously this is not talking about us being the means of salvation providing the power of salvation but this this tells us that doesn't matter how desperate it may seem we need to continue to celebrate

God and worship him in our current situation because God plans to use us as a holy influence in the life of those around us that includes our children and to say what

Paul said here who knows if your family will come to Christ because of God's work through you so we can be encouraged now

I'm gonna tell parents all the time we can be encouraged because God is who he is if I'm discouraged because my son is who he is then

I'm putting more more emphasis on my son and his ability to mess things up then I am on God and his ability to change things and then secondly

I can look at scripture and I can see the fact that God doesn't give me the responsibility to change anybody but he does want to use me in the process of changing somebody and as I submit to God and I'm used in that process who knows what the

Lord is going to accomplish when we parents choose the parents the way he wants us to and I guess lastly

I do have to acknowledge the fact that God forbid but it is going to happen that you know every single one of us is a child somebody's child and there are people today who are dying and going to hell today and so yes it is possible that our children again

God forbid I would be one of those people but in those times in those moments we have to go back to the first point and we have to remind ourselves that God is good and God is sovereign and that he is trustworthy praise

God well I'm going to give our email address out right now in the event that we have listeners who would like to join us on the air with their own questions our email address is

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Welcome back this is Chris Arnson and hopefully we have Aaron Brewster our guest on the line and before the break

Al Yerkes who is on staff at Wretched Radio and Wretched Television the media ministry of Todd Friel who's been a guest on this program a number of times

Al says at what age should you start spanking if at all and he has a couple of other follow -up questions and I think that that's all that's also a very appropriate question for the emphasis on the word today the challenges of Christian parenting today because doing that and the wrong place at the wrong time could get you possibly thrown in jail yeah and I think

I was commenting on the fact that that is the question that everyone wants to ask and the one question that no one wants to answer but I will what

I have to do because there are lots of different ways to come at this what we have to do in every single situation is we have to start with what does

God's Word say and so in this question about whether or not what age that we should start spanking as I believe he it was written really we have to establish first that what is oftentimes referred to as spanking or using the rod or corporal punishment

I don't like really using that last one very much but it is something that we see in Scripture we see that is consistent with God's character we see that's consistent with how he disciplined us we see that from from Genesis and the fall of man all the way and and the lake of fire we see that there are consequences for our sin and really in this discussion of consequences we have to understand what they're for I'm going to answer the question but if we don't understand what discipline what consequences are for we're going to miss the big picture we can get stuck in the weeds so easily so first and foremost this is what consequences exist the consequences that we humans deliver to each other or what

I call secondary consequences they're not the primary ones the primary consequences are things that happen every single time anybody sends and I like to put it this way there are three primary consequences every single time

I send these three things happen number one I displease the Lord in order to be consistent sometimes

I like to use the word hurt not because we're actually hurting God causing him pain but we're we're hurting him in our relationship with him so number one we hurt

God number two our sin hurts others number three our sin hurts ourselves and those are the three things that happen every single time that we send and but those are also the three things that we don't think about we don't care about if we were thinking about those three things we wouldn't be sending in the first place and so the secondary consequences are designed to do one thing and it's designed to remind us that sin hurts that's something

I say to my children frequently regardless why are we doing this and they have learned that the answer is

I need to remember that sin hurts and the secondary consequences are not the end goal the end goal is to remind them that sin hurts and then to remind them more importantly about why it is we strive to not send it's not behavior management it's us desiring to glorify

God in our relationship with him so that's why we do it and that is consistent throughout scripture

I do believe that spanking is is something that glorifies the before the break you mentioned the reality that sometimes you know we have very huge concerns about our legal ramifications and things like that and to be honest you know everyone the country you live in the state you live in there are so many different parameters about that I would just encourage you to be wise to know what the local ordinances are saying and to again to be wise in this situation but there are other options

I'll get to that in a minute but back to this question so spanking is something that I believe is very clear in scripture if we're doing it the right way to glorify

God is an appropriate consequence so the second question ends up being well how early do we start what is the age and you know

God didn't say he didn't put an age in scripture but he does use some interesting terminology and I believe one of the best things that a study of God can do is to look into the original language we don't have to be linguistic masters of Hebrew and Aramaic and Greek to be able to appreciate what

God is saying and then you see is that all throughout Proverbs in particular when it talks about using the rod it uses a word that can refer to children of various ages

I remember from infants all the way up to people in their 20s or potentially even 30s and so an example for you know just as an example one of the passages in Proverbs talks about using the rod and that exact same word shows up in Exodus chapter 2 verse 6 referring to Moses as a newborn baby floating down the

Nile and the princess found him and said the boy was crying and that same word boy is the same word used to refer to a child in the spanking passages so um but there's another interesting thing in scripture too people like to look at Deuteronomy 1 39 is talking about the the children of Israel and they've sinned and the only people who are going to enter the promised land are going to be the people on the

Bible says this who this day have no knowledge of good or evil they shall enter there and I will give it to them and they shall possess it and we see something similar in Isaiah 7 verses 14 through 16 actually this one is referring to the the coming

Messiah so in verse 14 it says therefore the Lord himself will give you a sign behold a virgin shall be with child okay so we're familiar with this but verse 16 it says for before the boy will know enough to refuse evil and choose good the land is two kings you dread will be forsaken so you see these two instances where apparently there's this there's this age of children where they don't know the difference between evil and good and I've heard a lot of people say well okay whatever that age is we don't want to give them consequences before they reach that age some people equate this to the age of accountability and different things but again the

Bible doesn't give any any ages specifically this is the one thing I like to tell when

I tell parents in Genesis chapter 3 we have two people who according to the

Scriptures were innocent they did not have a knowledge of good and evil they didn't know what what those two ideas were they were innocent and yet they made a choice and though that choice brought consequences into their lives if we're going to argue that somebody doesn't have a knowledge of good and evil and so therefore we cannot give them consequences we're actually doing the exact opposite that God did in Genesis chapter 3 where Adam and Eve ate of the fruit even though they and then it was that sin that actually gave them the knowledge of good and evil and the

Lord gave them consequences for what they did even in their innocence so here's what I like to tell parents and this is unfortunately not you know

I can't give an age but I can say this every parent everyone who's ever had a child who spends the right amount of time with them and loves their child and knows their child and they have an experience where they realize that their child has made a decision a conscious decision no matter how immature it may be no matter how childish or infantile it may be they've made a conscious decision to do something they know they shouldn't and when it happens the parents see it the parents are paying attention they can recognize it and I have a beautiful story for this it's hilarious you're gonna love it my sister hates it though I'm three years older than my sister and shortly after my sister was born she and I were sharing a room and she would stand up in her crib and she would dab dab dab all night long and my dad wanted to give her the the harsh consequence of a pat on the butt and my mom did not want to do that she she believed that that was completely unnecessary and not a good idea she's just a baby and so my mom would do lots of things trying to coddle my sister and trying to convince her to go back to sleep well one night about six months she was about six months old but she was doing the same thing she was standing up in her crib and she had a lot of experiences with mom and dad up to that point because of this exact same behavior and my mom hoping to get to her before my dad did she rushed into the room and she she jumped into her cuddling trying to get my sister to settle down well my sister just kept dabbing and talking and smiling and laughing until she heard down the hallway she heard my dad's feet hit the floor the moment my sister my six -month -old sister her my dad's feet hit the floor she immediately prostrated herself in her bed close your eyes and didn't make a sound and my mom looked at her she said you think her a six -month -old child she had put two and two together so here's the thing we don't know all right we don't know at what point your child is going to be able to make a conscious decision to do something that I that they shouldn't do but when they make that decision you as a parent need to be there to help them realize the desperately important lesson that sin hurts it has consequences that God's consequences to be focused on God's truth and done out of God's love but it needs to be done and Ecclesiastes tells us that when we are not we are not consistent and we are not immediate in our consequences that actually encourages the child to continue into a sinful path that actually builds the habit of sinning so how old is what age should we start spanking

I encourage parents to start spanking when when they when they believe as well as they can tell that the child is doing something deliberately and oftentimes you can tell most parents

I've talked to the like yeah I know we had an experience like that and so I think that's pretty much a good place to start on that particular question well

I'll may be interested to know that when I was in attendance at a parenting conference being led by my friend

Ted trip author of shepherding a child's heart during a

Q &A session I asked Ted if something that I did was appropriate of family gathering during a holiday

I said my nephew was acting like a terror in the living room during the holiday gathering and nobody was doing anything to discipline him or stop him neither my sister who is his mother obviously or my own mother his grandmother were doing anything and finally when he took a

Bic lighter and started to set fire to the curtains I yelled at him at the top of my lungs and smacked him on the side of the head and I said is this appropriate behavior on my part and Ted said well how old was he when you did this and I said 37 we have and we have another listener and I was just oh let me ask a couple of other questions that Ted I'm sorry that Al asked before I move on to another listener he said who are he asked what methods of spanking are acceptable hand switch etc another good question

I think I think in this particular one again we need to go back to the scripture what does the

Bible say we know that the Bible frequently uses the term rod and that's a really important concept there but again the

Bible doesn't specifically say why and we are left to use our logic our theological logic to try to understand why it is the

Lord has prescribed that we do a certain thing a certain way so again doesn't say why we could conjecture about the reasons all day long but I believe it's safe to say that if we're going to follow the paradigm of scripture then it's generally the best course of action to go ahead and to use something you can refer to it as a switch or a glue stick or a wooden spoon or whatever else you're gonna you know you're gonna say

I think that has value and has benefit I think the key though to remember is that regardless of what we're using we're not we're not trying we definitely are not trying to harm our child we are not trying to to break them we're not trying to cause them to be bruised and broken that would be completely 100 % inappropriate remember sin hurts sin is going to destroy us physically and spiritually it is going to mess up our lives this is just a signpost this is a neon light pointing to that reality and all it has to do is get our attention and get us thinking enough discomfort to do that so the

Bible doesn't say that we should use a rod because that you know it's easier for us to hit them harder than if we're using our hand because that hurts us too no that is not at all the case we are not trying to do that whatsoever we're just simply a tool to use to get attention and to help the child realize that there are far worse consequences that sin is going to bring into our lives than this than this spanking at this moment and really keeping them a

Godward focus in it not not doing it out of anger not doing out of any personal feelings of having been offended that would be a completely inappropriate way to do this this needs to be done regardless of what you choose to use it needs to be done in a way that would please and honor the

Lord okay his last question is what do you think of time out

I mentioned earlier that I don't think that spankings are the only necessary way to to discipline

I think the Lord gives us that as an example I think it works and I think it works well on multiple ages but I but obviously that's not the only consequence the

Bible discusses other consequences of you know people had come upon them in all throughout their author of the scriptures different things happen to different people and rarely do we actually hear of somebody being in scripture so no

I don't think that's the only legitimate consequence for disobedience I think the key for this one though is to know your child okay the

Bible says that a wise man is able to draw out of somebody the purposes of their heart like it's deep water imagine putting a bucket down into a well and to draw it out you need to know our kids and we need to be able to determine which course of action has the best chances of communicating the one truth that sin hurts so in this particular instance

I use my children as an example one of the things that is that hurts more than a spanking does is a monetary consequence having to you know pay and like this has never actually happened but having to pay for a lamp that was broken teaches that truth that sin hurts for my kids anyway far more than perhaps even a spanking would so I think yes different things are appropriate but here's the key regardless of whether it's a timeout or a spanking or whatever it is you choose to use this is the big thing

I think a lot of times parents miss your children need an interpreter in their life here's what

I mean by that a child is jumping on the couch a mother trying to do her best you can go fluster and whatnot she says stop it get off the couch what are you doing

I've told you a hundred times not to use that go to your room generally speaking 99 .9

% of the time the child is not walking to their room thinking to themselves Oh praise God for my mother who loves me so dearly that in my foolishness she is going to give me a consequence to drive me to God and remind me of the fact that sin hurts no no a child is going to go off to his room thinking something like this my mommy hates me she never wants me to have any fun so one of the problems that I found that a lot of parents get into when it comes to consequences of any kind is the fact that they expect their child to respond maturely and understand the purpose behind all of that and that's just patently ridiculous adults don't do that let alone children so what

I explain is to parents is we need to in that moment take the opportunity to share with them to help them to see the truth of why it is you need to go to your room and have a timeout why it is you're going to have to have this spanking and when you sit down with your child and you explain who

God is and how much he loves us and how he desperately wants to have a relationship with us and our sin is an attack against him and our sin has consequences and it hurts and I'm doing this

I'm bringing this consequence into your life because and we explain this to them that right there is probably the single most important part of the consequence regardless of what the consequence may be but that is so often what we miss give me your car keys give me your phone you're grounded go to your room that's all often times where we stop and then we expect a child to draw the correct conclusions when they've been proving to us by their previous behavior that they are obviously not thinking in a

Christ honoring way well thank you Al and please send my greetings to your boss

Todd Friel tell him that I've been very annoyed with him lately for being too busy to return as my guest so nudge him and nag him and harass him until he finally agrees to come back on the program we are actually we do have time for one more question before we go to our midway break let's see we have

Cara in Salem Ohio I'm an avid listener of truth love parent podcast and I've already learned so many valuable and practical ways to parent for the glory of God by listening to Aaron's podcast

I've tried to implement many of the principles for Christian parenting in my family though it is still a struggle as my husband and three children are unsaved my question is to ask if there is a specific verse that Aaron can direct me to that would provide me that will would provide strength and encouragement in my situation thank you so much

Wow thank you Cara for being so transparent and for being willing to ask that question you know

I praise God I think it's awesome that some of the opening comments that that we

Chris and I were sharing back and forth about just kind of encouraging people in a situation like yours whose children are unsaved praise

God that those speak directly to your situation as well and like I said before yes first Corinthians 7 is such a huge encouragement for us that God wants to actively use us in the life of our children but the other thing

I mentioned was that really when we when we consume our gaze with the majesty of God that so often is that is really all we need for the peace that passes all understanding and my mind really right now it's going in with what you said my mind is really going to revelation 712 blessings and glory and wisdom and thanksgiving and honor and power and might be to our

God forever and ever amen that is the God we serve that is what he deserves and we need strength yes we do because we are impotent but the person is going to give us that strength and God and the avenue he's going to give us that strength is through his word through his

Holy Spirit we need encouragement I'll tell you what there is nothing more encouraging that knowing that that great

God has a relationship with us and wants to use this in the lives of our family so keep going keep praying keep resting in on God and be encouraged by his awesomeness well

I thank you so much Cara and guess what since you are a first time questioner and you have won a free pocket size

New American Standard Bible that you could put in your purse your pocketbook your pocket and hopefully that will provide you with years of blessing as you will always have the

Bible ready at your fingertips when the situation arises where you need it most so please make sure you give us your full mailing address so that we can have

CV bbs .com Cumberland Valley Bible Book Service ship that out to you we're going to our midway break right now and folks for those of you who are not familiar with this program this is the longer the normal break that we have in the middle of the show because Grace Life Radio 90 .1

FM in Lake City Florida requires of us a longer break in the middle of the show because the FCC requires of them to localize iron sharpens iron radio to Lake City Florida so therefore while we air our own globally heard commercials they air their own locally heard public service announcements and other local things so please be patient as we take this longer than normal break use this time wisely write down as much of the information provided by as many of our advertisers as possible so that you can more frequently and more successfully patronize them and therefore keep them happy enough to remain our advertisers because we absolutely require the funding from our advertisers to exist so keeping them happy is going to help us remain on the air also use this time to send in questions to Aaron Brewster to Chris Arnzen at gmail .com

Chris Arnzen at gmail .com and as always give us your first name at least your city and state of residence and your country of residence if you live outside the

USA only remain anonymous if your question involves a personal and private matter we'll be right back with Aaron Brewster after these messages from our sponsors.

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forward slash podcast james white of alphanomega ministries and the dividing line webcast here although god has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach preach and debate at numerous venues some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with pastor rich jensen and the brethren at hope reform baptist church now located at their new beautiful facilities in corham long island new york i've had the privilege of opening god's word from their pulpit on many occasions have led youth retreats for them and have always been thrilled to see their members filling many seats at my new york debates i do not hesitate to highly recommend hope reform baptist church of corham long island to anyone who wants to be accurately taught discipled and edified by the holy scriptures and to be surrounded by truly loving and caring brothers and sisters in christ i also want to congratulate hope reform baptist church of corham for the recent appointment of pastor rich jensen's co -elder pastor christopher mcdowell for more information on hope reform baptist church go to hope reformed li .net

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that's gracechurchatfranklin .org this is pastor bill sasa wishing you all the richest blessings of our sovereign lord god savior and king jesus christ today and always was your business shut down during the covet 19 pandemic depriving you of earning any money causing you to default on your rent as you try to survive without income maybe you've had to close your doors for good the good news you thought was that you purchased business interruption insurance as a part of your business liability policy with a major insurance company who told you they are a good neighbor or that you would be in good hands you filed a claim only to be told that it was denied due to the pandemic exclusion clause the pandemic exclusion since 2006 most insurance companies added this clause to enable them to deny your income loss claims in the event of a worldwide pandemic do not give up no matter what state you live in call buttafuoco and associates now at 1 -800 -669 -4878 buttafuoco and associates is a part of a large multi -district litigation and they are working with lead council to bring what they believe will be a successful lawsuit for these claims it is the best way for you to proceed there's absolutely no risk to you you do not have to pay them out of pocket and there is no fee unless you recover on your claim you need to call 1 -800 -669 -4878 right now trust the law firm where the attorneys at one of the largest business firms on long island new york are sending their own clients for representation during this lawsuit buttafuoco and associates here to help business owners rebuild their lives in the wake of the pandemic call 1 -800 -669 -4878 charles haddon spurgeon once said give yourself unto reading the man who never reads will never be read he who never quotes will never be quoted he will not use the thoughts of other men's brains proves he has no brains of his own you need to read solid ground christian books is a publisher and book distributor who takes these words of the prince of preachers to heart the mission of solid ground christian books is to bring back treasures of the past to minister to christians in the present and future and to publish new titles that address burning issues in the church and the world since its beginning in 2001 solid ground has been committed to publish god -centered christ exalting books for all ages we invite you to go treasure hunting at solid -ground -books .com

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and purchase books from them as frequently as you can and as generously as you can before we return to our interview with aaron brewster we just have a couple of important announcements to make first of all on monday i'm excited to announce that we have for the first time ever on iron sharpens iron radio joining us mike lindell the my pillow guy he's going to be addressing his testimony which is actually the theme of his biography what are the odds from crack addict to ceo and even more important than that title mentions is the fact that he has received the gift of eternal life through the shed blood of jesus christ and so we're going to have mike lindell on for the first half hour this monday the 21st of september to discuss that biography we're also going to be having mike gadosh on excuse me from 4 30 to 5 30 p .m

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click support then click click to donate now also folks if you are not a member of a local bible believing church you need you need help finding one i have lists of biblically faithful churches all over the planet earth and i may be able to help you so send me an email to chrisarnson at gmail .com

and put i need a church in the subject line i will help you find a church if at all possible from these lists that i have of churches all over the planet earth that's chrisarnson at gmail .com

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we have a question from Sarah in Phoenix Arizona and let me find that question here it is uh

Sarah is also a first -time questioner and she says how do you balance living with wisdom regarding legitimate awareness of safety without being fearful i love that my kids are polite to strangers and incredibly excited to visit with employees at our regular stores etc and i do feel there's some gospel aspect to this as opposed to a purely cultural regional thing we've brought with us to a big city how should a believer have a recognition of god's sovereignty over the well -being of their children without being overly trusting and naive i found it easy to vacillate between the two extremes well that's a fantastic question i praise god for your insight and and asking it this definitely is the same thing that we encounter i think in every question that we're faced with in scripture how do we avoid the extremes you have children who honestly i want to tell you are are blessed i think obviously you know shy children children who uh don't communicate uh well or often are also gifts of god they're special in their own unique ways but i think specifically children who who don't know any strangers right and i can definitely my kids fall into this category as well i think they are are kind of just have a little bit of a step ahead in this particular area because like you mentioned there's a really fantastic gospel element to this a child who is going to in the future become a city set on a hill and salt that can be tasted um by the people around them are going to be people who are going to have to interact with individuals who are going to have to be able to love as christ loved uh when when christ was presented with a stranger and the stranger had a grotesque physical ailment or who was a sinner jesus loved them and he connected with them where they are so i think that's a fantastic thing to encourage in our children so what i what i think is the the best way of coming out this is to be balanced and what i mean is this you need to teach your children to use their gifts in such a way that it pleases the lord they can be that light that when people see your children because the bible says even children are known by their fruit you they see your children they can glorify god who is in heaven because of your children's righteousness all right that's the first thing that's they should be encouraged in that however to truly be wise we can't not teach our children the other side and oftentimes i encounter parents who don't like to say what might be considered scary things to their kids they don't want to talk to their children about the potential of being kidnapped they don't want to talk to their children about the about sexuality and things like that because a they don't want to scare their children or b sometimes i think to themselves i don't want to be the person to introduce this concept to my children but let me just say uh that we parents need to be the people doing that all right we need to be the people um talking to our children honestly about god and and how he would have us live in this world and the temptations that we're going to encounter they don't need their friends at school okay so yes uh kidnapping and things like that and god forbid sex trafficking i mean all of that is a huge danger and we do want our children to be wise and so we need to talk to them about that now the age of the child you need to be appropriate with that and i'll leave that to your wisdom and discretion but you need to talk to them about how there are dangerous people in this world people who want to hurt them um you can tell them to prepare them uh for uh to be wise in this world all right so that's extremely important thing on that side and then really from the parental side of things i i this is something i say a lot of times in my counseling you know as a biblical counselor i work a lot with with families and it's so easy for human beings to be like a pendulum you swing to one extreme or the other uh when really we need to be in the center uh balanced right where god's word is and which which means that just like you teach your children both sides of the beauty of their personality but also the potential dangers of it and you teach them uh to be aware of that you as a parent have to embrace both as well uh when we go out shopping i can't just turn my brain off because i'm focused on something i have children with me and i need to be parenting them and i need to be guiding them in truth uh when we're out shopping i need to do that when we're at theme park you need to do that when we're um when you're dropping your kids off at school you know you need to be there aggressively actively parenting that entire time and so as the parents i say you know you need to be wise your children depending on their age should be within a certain distance from you when you're out in public as wisdom dictates as my son has gotten older he's 13 he's 13 going on 27 and he uh he looks a lot older than he is and i give him some uh some freedom to do things that i i won't i won't give my daughter uh permission to do just yet she's 10 and uh she's a lot smaller and she's a little girl and they're just things that i wisely won't let her do even though she potentially is capable enough to do what her big brother is doing um i know that uh the dangers of this world in which we live uh she's going to be a bigger draw to the those wicked people so yes by uh teach your children both sides of the coin uh encourage them uh to understand their responsibility before god but not just to spread the truth but also to be wise um and to uh to avoid evil and then for yourself to be be that parent who's able to guide them through those choices help them to see this is the time that we can we can talk to this person and be a good testimony of christ but you know what this is the time that we are going to go do this we're going to walk away we're going to go over here and guide them in that and i would say that that's a good uh a good philosophy really for any parenting uh situation show your kids both sides of it from what god has to say about that about it and then actively help your child apply that truth that you're teaching them well thank you sarah and if you could also give me your full email you're not in your email address for your full mailing address in phoenix arizona so that cvbbs .com

cumberland valley bible book service can mail you as a first -time questioner a free pocket -sized new american standard bible perfect for your purse pocketbook pocket etc to carry the word of god with you wherever you go so please make sure you give us your full mailing address as soon as possible let's see we have an anonymous listener who says children are individuals just as all people are no matter what their age is how do we treat our own children as individuals without giving them the impression that we have partiality of one or two over others well that's definitely something else that we see a lot in our culture we see in the scriptures uh you know where or esau and jacob each had their parent who preferred them over the other one and i say that that favoritism is a sin and we need to be very careful with that we never want to love a child over another child at the same time to your point um sometimes we'll just connect better with one child than we will with another and there are so many different reasons that we do that and their personalities are different and they're beautiful and so i think uh there are a couple uh different things we need to keep in mind from scripture first of all when we think about love in 1 corinthians 13 we learn a lot about love and love hopes all things and loves believes all things and love is not does not put our own desires over other people when it comes to our children we need to intentionally love them just like we are called to love everyone else including our enemies it takes intentionality to love and oftentimes i work with at -risk families whose children are what i call terrorists they're using fear and manipulation to control their families and you know what it's really hard from a human standpoint to love kids who are actively trying to tear the house down from the inside and i tell those parents the exact same thing you need uh between you and god you need to love your child and when i do that when i make that plan and i'm purposely looking for a way to communicate to this child that i i love them whether it's an extreme disobedience scenario rebellion or it's just that this child and i just don't connect as well as this other child maybe because of shared interests or whatever else when i'm doing that it's amazing how that can eclipse whatever differences we have if i can love my enemy if i can love a complete stranger in god and that's going to affect my children in the exact same way i can love them regardless of uh of their differences in personality and then the other thing is this um sure you might not have the same personality uh as a child uh one of your children that's that's perfectly fine so what you want to do is you want to encourage the christ honoring aspects of that personality invest in them one of the best ways to show that we love somebody is to show that is to focus on them and and invest in them to help them become who god wants them to be um start taking start appreciating those differences in their personality start seeing how that personality trait can be used to glorify god and start teaching your child to do that in their lives and what that will do is i will endear you to them it'll show them that that part of their personality that is not like yours is still very special to you and it's special to god i think that's a wonderful way to connect with them despite the fact there might be some differences between the two of you and the last thing i'd say about that particular question is the fact that uh really there are a lot of extreme personalities in scripture from peter to paul i mean this they're all over the place but what we see is that as we are conformed into the image of christ as we think his thoughts after him as we talk like he talks and act as he acts and we're being sanctified if your child is born again what we start to see is that the extreme personality traits kind of start to get their their edges worn off and then we will always be unique and i believe in eternity we will still have unique personalities that will be free of sin and we'll see that uh we we have a lot more in common than perhaps maybe we do on this side of eternity so as you are helping your child become more like christ what you'll find is that uh you will be helping them to think hopefully the way you're thinking which is supposed to be the way christ is thinking and you'll find that you have more and more in common as you are discipling your child to be like jesus and as you as a disciple of jesus are also going to become like him well thank you anonymous and uh by the way if you are a first -time questioner uh please uh send me your full email i'm sorry i keep saying email your full mailing address obviously your full name it's not going to be disclosed over the air obviously uh so send me that information if indeed you are a first -time questioner so that cvbbs .com

can mail you also a free pocket -sized new american standard bible that you can um uh bring and carry with you wherever you go it's always great to have the word of god handy in a size where it's convenient so uh please get us that information and cvbbs .com

will get you that bible shipped out to you as soon as possible um let's see here we have we have john in bangor maine who says in response to your last answer that is a sin to show favoritism how do you explain jacob the father of joseph in the old testament and how do you explain jesus christ himself who the scriptures refer to as loving john the disciple which must mean there was a unique way that he loved john that was more extreme than the other disciples that's a good question thank you so much for uh for sending that in before i answer though just really quick uh chris i think your audience would love to know this i've created a special page just for them at truthlovesparent .com

um that they can access it's truthlovesparent .com forward slash iron and if they go to that page i'm going to try to uh i've curated a number of resources for them that talk about some of the things that we talked about today as well as a bunch of others i put on there a bunch of the things that i view as being challenges to christian parenting today and i put that on there so i hope that would be a blessing to anybody who's looking maybe for some more information on any of these topics i'm going to go in i'm going to add some more info uh based on the questions that have been presented today and spankings and favoritism and that type of thing so i hope that's going to be a blessing to everybody who wants to do a little bit more study and get to know truth loves parent a little bit more uh so truthlovesparent .com

forward slash iron uh but to the question about favoritism so one of the most important things to do in any conversation really is to define our terms that is super important the word favoritism doesn't show up in scripture if the word love does we have to know what it means to love uh so for example when we look at all the accumulation of the word love in scripture we basically can boil it down to this which again is not these words are not specifically in scripture but to love someone is to want and to work toward god's best interest in the life of that individual if i am doing what is in god's best interest in your life it is in your best interest and if i'm working toward that in your life i am loving you all right but relationships are different okay i told the boys at victory academy that i loved them as much as i loved my own children in fact i would tell them that i loved them as much as i loved my own wife now i would say that specifically to get a reaction from them and i always did but then i would explain it to them if i want god's best interest from my wife then the bible is very clear how i'm supposed to be relating to her however if i want god's best interest for the children in my the boys at victory academy or my own children or chris arnzen or you or anybody else the bible is going to be very clear how i'm supposed to love you as well and oftentimes there's not overlap i'm supposed to be loving my wife in a way that is unique to any other person on the planet does that mean that i love my wife more than i love my children or the boys at victory academy well if loving somebody is wanting and working toward god's best interest for somebody the answer would be no as a christian i'm commanded to do that for everybody to the same degree because it's god's love being poured out through me so if it's a question of favoritism uh liking somebody more uh sure again we can have that we can easily you know feel attracted to one person over another person but if we're talking about love and jesus christ obviously the the manifestation of love god's love incarnate here on earth um god jesus loves the whole world and i would say that he loves the world equally i think that that passage is really beautiful that talks about jesus loving john however there's something in that passage i'm aware of that would give us any impression that he loved john um more than he loved somebody else um so i think that really it's just a question that his relationship with john was different we know that um that joseph's uh relationship with his dad was different um i would say though that that's probably not maybe the best example only because we know that um and that caused a lot of trouble uh in the family there are a lot of there's a very broken family and i don't know that his father's doting on him really was the best choice praise god that joseph loved the lord and worshiped him and uh and glorified god despite his family situation and everything that happened to him um but i would argue that really what we need to do is we need to be finding out what is in god's best interest for every member of our family and then we need to be actively working in that direction and if a child is too immature to see that um god's best interest for mommy is different than god's best interest or that potentially god's best interest for my son at this moment is for me to invest in him in a unique way but i'm not investing in another child um then i need to help them see that as well it's not that daddy loves this child more and likes this child more it's that right now this is the best way that daddy can glorify god in the life of this child and we want to be consistent obviously doing that in everyone's life so thank you so much for that question thank you for keeping me honest and uh and helping to help me to clarify that um we definitely want to need to love everyone the way that christ loves us and we have another follow -up question from arnie in perry county pennsylvania and he asks the classic example that i think may refute your assertion that it is a sin to show favoritism is jacob being loved by god while esau is hated and the whole concept of unconditional election itself great again great observation i'm really appreciating you guys uh pushing on this because it's really this is what we need to do we need to be interacting with the scriptures i did a study uh you can find it on the podcast about 10 things that a christian parent is supposed to hate hatred is a fantastic um and very uh biblical concept we don't have the time to unpack it all here today but suffice it to say and this is and brevity unfortunately uh keeps us from really digging as deep as we'd like um but i would encourage everyone to study this more in scripture the concept of hatred that hatred is not um 100 the opposite of love that hatred is not an emotion love is not an emotion hatred is a position just as love is a position as i position myself toward you um and wanting god's best interest for your life that i'm loving you at the same time uh biblically speaking um to hate something is to draw a line in the sand to say that i am separated from this thing that thing is something over there that thing is like sanctification refers to our uh us being set apart for god this is setting apart something on the other side uh saying that it's an abomination that it's something to be hated however um and without getting into all of the nitty -gritty details of the god sovereignty and salvation and election and predestination and all of that kind of stuff we see in scripture that god is a god of wrath in the same way that he is a god of joy and love and peace we see that he is a god of judgment the same way that we see that he is a god of mercy and grace all right and god is perfectly able to balance those in ways that we humans don't understand but the key is this specifically when working with our children that's the context of really these questions i say that favoritism is a sin again maybe i should have defined my term better if i am if i quote my own selfish reasons and i believe this is the situation with joseph if i am for my own selfish reasons doting on a child and not doting on another just like it's like happy with jacob and esau right one one parent was selfishly uh engaging and investing in one child the other one was selfishly engaging investing in the other one that is sinful favoritism that does not glorify god to love my child to like my child to enjoy spending time with my child is fantastic there is nothing wrong with that but if my behavior communicates to the other child that they are less loved that i don't value them as much as i value their brother and sister i am sending the incredibly wrong message uh that is going to be detrimental to my relationship moving on i am not god i am not sending anyone to help i am trying to disciple my children for his honor and and so therefore to that degree i say that favoritism sinful a self -focused favoritism as as just spending time with a child because i like it versus spending time with that child that i don't necessarily i like to spend much time with that's going to be a problem every single time in a relationship um but despite the fact that i love that i like one child more than i like another child i need to love them uh just love them the same and that's what god has called me to do and of course uh perhaps you can correct me if you think i'm wrong but god is a unique being uh he is uh almighty all righteous uh all holy and although there are allegories and commonalities uh that we can see in scripture where his love for us can be compared to a husband's love for his wife and a parent's love for his children and other things there is nothing that is perfectly and exactly parallel and exactly reflective of god god's unique situation that he is in a category unto all to unto himself where he can do anything he wishes amen so i'm not speaking off base here no i think i think that's completely true we do the bible says that we uh can be angry and not sin god is angry oftentimes and he does not send and we can do that too but i'll tell you what most of the time uh we don't get that right most of the time when we're angry we are definitely sinning because a god is able to do that with ease a perfect ease that we are not and there are some things he's able to be his incommunicable attribute that we will never be not even in eternity free from sin we will never be so you're 100 right and we do need to to be careful not to put ourselves into god's position i'm not saying that the the person who wrote and did that not saying that at all but we do need to be careful putting ourselves uh into certain of god's positions that we uh we just can't do we can't uh we can't have necessarily we struggle anyway to have what might be considered a god version of papertism it ends up backfiring on us well we're going to our final break right now it's going to be a lot more brief than the last two breaks so if you have a question i would strongly suggest that you send it in immediately to chris arnzen at gmail .com

chris arnzen at gmail .com to make sure we have enough time for our guest aaron brewster to adequately respond to it chris arnzen at gmail .com

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that's l e e s drugs rx .com don't forget to ask about their discount generic drug program welcome back this is chris arnzen and our guest for nearly two hours now has been aaron brewster we are talking about the challenges of christian parenting today and if you'd like to join us on the air we're rapidly running of time out of time so send us an email immediately to chris arnzen at gmail .com

chris arnzen at gmail .com and we do have an anonymous listener who says what do you do in the precarious situation where your ex -spouse and ex -in -laws may be steering your children to an opposite direction from what the bible has to say about their lives and about obedience to god if they are unbelievers without vilifying them and starting a war in the family that's a fantastic question and that right there is the reality that many people live in so i i feel your plight um with that we have to understand though that the situation your children are in is not so dissimilar from the situation my children yes my kids are hearing the same truth from both parents and from their grandparents but the world influenced by satan run by satan is desperately trying to lie to them in every single arena entertainment in their schools and their friends it's happening everywhere everybody is being influenced and sometimes we like to think that certain influences are more powerful than others and that is true but if we are going to acknowledge that certain influences are more powerful than others then we have to acknowledge the fact that the holy spirit is the greatest influencer ever when i worked at panera bread company as a cashier one of the things that i had the privilege of experiencing was finding a counterfeit bill now i didn't find a counterfeit bill because i studied counterfeit bills you guys know where this illustration is going i found a counterfeit bill because thousands of dollars of real bills passed through my hands every single day so when i when i found the counterfeit it stuck out to me as being different and something wrong with it by the way i just want to let you know i want to let you know that i passed it on without my knowledge of its origins i'm just i'm sorry that was a joke that was a joke eric i'm sorry that counterfeit bill i appreciate that oh my goodness this guy all right so so despite the counterfeit bill that chris gave me um the reality that we're facing with our kids is the fact that we really need to focus on them being grounded in truth they need to know that they need to we need to introduce them to christ they need to be filled with the holy spirit and they we need to fill our parenting with truth and if we are going to believe that an ex -husband or ex -in -laws or a friend at school or some radio program or some tv show or some uh rioters are going to somehow undo what god has done we are very mistaken and your point is difficult i acknowledge that and it's hard you're right you do not want to vilify anyone you want to love them you want to teach your children to love them but first and foremost you need to teach your children to love god's truth so that they can recognize the error so that they can see it and it's difficult when they're young but we have to start when they're young jesus encouraged the little children to come to him because they could understand they could have the faith necessary to trust in god so your children are in very good hands in the fact that god is the father to the fatherless and the husband to the widows he's the protector of the widows and you have a very interesting position because of that and i would thank god for that position you're in and you're right don't vilify anybody we need to be honest we need to speak truth in love we need to let our children know that this person believes this but god says this and that's really uh the most important thing that we can do for our kids especially in the situation that you're in we have another anonymous listener who asks is it ever legitimate to insist that one of your children leave the home if they are sinning in such a way where we believe that they are putting the lives of not only uh us and our spouses but our other children in jeopardy i did a podcast series a three -part series called the rock the bread and the donut uh and and that that speaks to this question of why we give our children what we give them good bad and ugly and a qualified answer to your question is going to be yes it is appropriate uh in certain situations uh to do that however i do want the qualification is this obviously we have the legal responsibility in our country whatever your country happens to be to uh to protect our children to care for our children to be legally responsible for them i would say if your child has for example here in america if your child has not yet reached the age of 18 that that is not an option for you all right that's not something that you should be uh pursuing however if your child has reached that age legally um where removing them from the home difficult and terrible as that would be in many ways um is legal all right and they're not getting any ramifications for that i would definitely say that there are situations where that is a legitimate uh course of action that sometimes has to be taken there are a lot of things to uh to think about in that and i would just encourage anybody um especially you anonymous people who have who've sent in your questions feel free to send us an email we do free email counsel at truth of parents just send an email to counselor at truth of parent .com

if we can be a speak through the unique intricacies of your family situation to be able to give you better answers um i would be honored to serve you in that way but the answer generally speaking is yes that that is appropriate and we see uh that in scriptures and many different occasions um for how the scorner is to be treated yeah and that even could warrant a program all on its own because there are many scenarios that go even beyond putting at jeopardy the safety of parents and siblings i mean you might have a child that's an unrepentant homosexual who is actively involved in that activity while still under your roof or even heterosexual sin uh but but we could go on and on and with that uh well i want to make sure that our listeners have all of the contact information they need to be in contact with you uh truthloveparent .com

is the website truthloveparent .com and uh do you have any other contact information that you care to share most of it will be found there uh we'd love to redeem your social media news feeds so finding us on social media so that you can get christ honoring parenting uh encouragement there is something you can definitely do uh truthloveparent .com

forward slash iron you can find out specific information for you considering the show what we talked about and the other podcast that i host is called the celebration of god um i think that'd be a very huge encouragement to anyone listening today especially if you don't have children that would be a lot more applicable to you whereas truthful parent would be more for families and uh reaching out to us a counselor at truthloveparent .com