The Myth of ADHD

Welcome to No Compromise Radio, a ministry coming to you from Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. No Compromise Radio is a program dedicated to the ongoing proclamation of Jesus Christ, based on the theme in Galatians 2, verse 5, where the Apostle Paul said, but we did not yield in subjection to them for even an hour, so that the truth of the gospel would remain with you.

In short, if you like smooth, watered-down words to make you simply feel good, this show isn't for you. By purpose, we are first biblical, but we can also be controversial. Stay tuned for the next 25 minutes as we're called by the divine trumpet to summon the troops for the honor and glory of her King.

Here's our host, Pastor Mike Abendroth. Welcome to No Compromise Radio ministry. Steve, Pastor Steve, Pastor Steve Cooley is here. It is me. It is well with my soul when Steve is here. Allegedly. Now, Steve, you don't know this, but just a while ago, by the way, No Compromise listeners, Steve does not know this is coming.

He always likes to do this to me.

Yeah, these are my least favorite segments of the show. These are my favorite. Just a while ago, though, Steve,.

Someone emailed and said, we love Tuesday shows. He needs to be on every other day as well. And then I also got an email from someone that says, we don't listen to Tuesday shows.

Is that my fault? The person who said, I need to be on every other show. Here's what I like to do on the Monday shows where you run the sermon. They could just kind of edit me in the background going, amen, amen.

Well, you know what? And I don't know if the people know this, but we've had technical difficulties with our, not just email, although I'm finally getting email now. Thanks for your patience. But also the audio quality on Sunday morning sermons for the past, I think eight shows.

Steve, it sounds like I'm in Jonathan Edwards' barn in Northampton.

Didn't we record those sermons outside? I think we must. Parking lot sermons. It's a new series. I'm calling them parking lot sermons.

Oh, it's horrible. So thank you for staying with us. You're welcome. Oh, not me, okay. All right, well, so Steve, here's what I did. John Owen wrote a book called The Display of Arminianism, but it's a longer title.

So what I did several weeks ago when you weren't on the show, it's one of those non-Tuesday shows. I read the title. I didn't rehearse it. I read the title as fast as I possibly could. The full title.

So I have something now I'm holding in my hand. I'm gonna pass it over to Steve. And Steve, I'd like you to read John Owen's first work, 1642, just before he started in helping the Westminster assemblies.

The full title of Display of Arminianism. Okay, ready? Go.

Oh, sorry. You're supposed to speak it out loud. You're not supposed to read it. You're supposed to speak it. A Display of Arminianism being a discovery of the old Pelagian idol free will with the new goddess contingency advancing themselves into the throne of grace of heaven to the prejudice of his grace, providence, and supreme dominion over the children of men, wherein the main errors by which they are fallen off from the received doctrine of all the reformed churches with their opposition and diverse particulars to the doctrine established in the Church of England are discovered and laid out open their own writings and confessions and confuted by the word of God.

Yeah.

Hey, what do you think? If you had to judge, if you had to put a score sheet up, you know, a three from the Soviet judges and a four from the Czech judges, what would you put up?

On a scale of one to six? I mean, isn't that ice skating? The East German judge says 5 .4. Das gut.

I also want to say, Steve, before we get into our topic today, that I'm actually going to do a little promotion here. Okay, promote away. Do you like Grace Life at Grace Community Church? I love Grace Life at Grace Community Church.

Did you know there's a couple of guys that were from England originally, but then went to Master Seminary and attended Grace Life, which is the Sunday school fellowship at Grace Community Church.

Yeah, the biggest Sunday school class you'll ever go to in your entire life. That's true.

And for those of you that don't know Grace Community, my daughter called it properly. It was Grace Tammunity Church when she was little. They, the men there who went to seminary are back in London now and they've planted a church.

And guess what the name of the church is? Grace Community Church. Grace Life London. Grace Life London, good. So they said, would you promote us? We like no compromise radio. And I said, sure, prepare a blurb.

So here's the blurb. Hey, I want to tell you about Grace Life London so you can pray for them. They're a new church started up right in the heart of central London, connected with John MacArthur's ministry.

Let me give you their name again, Grace Life London. You can find out about them on gracelifelondon .org. That's pretty original, isn't it? Awesome. This started when two Brits came over to London, I'm sorry, came over from London to California and studied at the Master's Seminary before heading home last year to bring that same uncompromising approach to the Bible to London.

Pray for these guys, will you? Yes.

All right. That's awesome. See? They probably have even found a good restaurant there in London.

We don't respond to our emails for six months, but we do follow up.

And when we do, when we do respond to those, we apologize for being so late. That's right.

ADHD, Hyperactivity, and the Problem of Modern Labels

So today I want to talk about why we don't follow up on our emails. And that is because Steve and I have HD.

HD, HD, ADHD.

I am so tired. I don't even, I have high-deaf ADHD. It's not the typical ADD. Yes, yes, it's high-deaf. What would that be? HD, ADHD. HD, DD, that is so bad. No, we want to talk about ADHD. Why is that so confusing to me, Steve?

I don't know, but because you can't seem to focus on it, I guess.

I was at the pediatrician's office the other day, not for me, but for my daughter. And I saw something, a little brochure, and it said ADHD, a pair of glasses. And it said, a parent's guide. Healthy advice.

And you know what, I thought I would pick that up. And so I picked it up and I glanced through it and it talked about discussing things with your children. And then, Steve, it had something called symptoms.

So these are telltale signs. Okay. And I want to know if you have any of these. Okay. Because I think that if I had a script here, I would have to prescribe something for you and to you. Inattention can cause your child to be disorganized and have trouble listening, following directions, or paying attention.

Huh? That is so funny. Steve, I actually have a smoker's cough now. It's a smoker's laugh. I feel like I'm, you know, Jane Crawford or something. Betty Crawford. Who are those people? Who's Jane Crawford?

Who is Jane Crawford? I think that's Betty's sister. Okay. The unfamous sister. Who has the faraway eyes? Betty Davis. Betty Davis. Oh, I thought that was Bette Midler. She's got Betty Davis eyes. Forget our loose things and get easily distracted.

What were you talking about? I'm confused. Who doesn't do that? You walk into a room and you don't remember why you went into the room? See, I mean, no, this is crazy. And we're going to talk in more detail about this, maybe not from a medical perspective, but from a biblical perspective.

But seriously, Steve, these are so generic. You know what this reminds me of? Horoscopes, zodiacs. That if you're so general, then you go, yeah, I guess I could prescribe it. Maybe that'll work. Just throwing anything at the kid.

But no compromise, listeners. This is Pastor Steve to a T. Because sometimes with ADHD, you cannot pay attention, but other times you can be impulsive. And so Steve on the radio, at least, I think sometimes he does this.

This is step one. Do you have ADHD? Symptoms of impulsivity. One, blurts out answers. No. Yeah, that's right. He blurts things out. Number two, when it comes to impulsivity, has trouble waiting their turn.

And I can't believe they use this word here. And I guess this is WVNE, so we have a big umbrella policy, but it says to butt into or interrupt conversations. Yeah, that's rude. Hyperactivity could also make your child fidget or have trouble sitting still.

You should see Steve. And of course, on no compromise radio, the coup de grace of all symptoms of hyperactivity with Pastor Steve talks a lot. Well, when I was just a young lad,.

To show you though, I think the song, the hymnist, hymnal person, whoever wrote it, said, you know, prone to wander. And I think he was talking about our hearts, but I think in our minds, we're prone to wander.

And I remember being in seminary when I got to the class on apologetics and evangelism. There was so much reading in that class. I told my wife, I said, there's no way I'm gonna get through this reading because I was working full time and everything else.

And I said, I need to rent a cubicle in the library because if I have any distractions at all, I just get distracted and I needed just nothing to look at. So I could just focus on the reading. And if it were not for that cubicle, which was right next to Phil Johnson's cubicle, by the way,.

I couldn't have made it. Maybe it was the cigar smoke permeating from the Johnson cubicle. You know, I never saw Phil in the cubicle,.

Probably because he didn't really use it all that much.

Steve, there's an interesting picture here on this ADHD, how it works. Decrease amount of chemicals called neurotransmitters into the brain. With the right amount of neurotransmitters, areas of the brain that control activity and attention don't work like they should.

Now, here's what I will say. Steve's not a doctor. And I don't play one on the radio. You know what?

Steve actually changed his name. You know, Chad Ochocinco, he changed his name. Steve changed his name to, his original name was Marcus Welby.

Well, and you know, it caused a lot of confusion for people. So I wanted to straighten that out.

Diagnosing ADHD, according to the Healthy Advice Network, which is a subsidiary of Obamacare. It says, ADHD diagnosis, Steve's laughing, lasts at least six months, happens in more than one setting, like at home and at school, causes problems in relationships.

Now, here's my biggest problem with this whole ADHD thing. Here it says, with an exclamation point, Steve, ADHD, that is, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, ADHD is not your child's fault. And it has nothing to do with being a bad parent.

Well, you know, the first part may be true, but it would be reliant upon the second part because Yeah, yeah, they're linked. Yeah. Yeah, if your child has AD or ADHD, there's a high probability that you're not properly.

I mean, let's just put it this way. When I was a kid, I probably had ADHD. And the reason was because I was a kid. Kids, this is what kids do.

And especially if you're a young boy, yeah. Boys are the worst. Having a hard time. Now, for treatment, how would you treat this? I'd put them on heroin.

Well, I mean, that's what they're gonna do.

Stimulants come in several forms, pills or patches. Or non-stimulants, pills once or twice a day, et cetera. Now, Steve, I know that you're typically categorized by on-the-go behavior. I know you sometimes come across on the radio like you're driven by a motor.

Those are two more descriptions of ADHD.

Yeah, can you give me some medication for that?

I need some medication. Steve is driven by a motor. And so, in all seriousness, and you know, Steve, the other day someone emailed me and they said, we get the point. Even though you guys laugh and joke and yuck it up on Tuesday, there's usually a point.

There's a salient, biblical, theological, purposeful point to your banter. And so, in all honesty, honesty. In all honest knee. Steve, could you hand me those blue pills over there, please? Here you go.

In all honesty, we want to help you. If your child struggles, or if you struggle with this issue of paying attention, a hyperactivity, et cetera, we want to help you. And so, what do we do when we want to help?

We go to the Bible. So, I'm gonna just pose some questions to Steve and then you can hear him wax eloquently. And he'll also probably throw in an Elvis Costello lyric once in a while. Clown time is over, baby.

Hard Work, Self-Control, and Biblical Parenting

So, for ADHD, what does a parent do? What should you do? Should you take your kids to the doctor, et cetera? Is there something that you could do theologically as you think about the issue? So, number one, Steve, sometimes there are tasks that are difficult in life, but does the proverb, do proverbs teach us that it's good for us to try to be faithful to accomplish key tasks?

Hard tasks, working heartily?

Absolutely, work heartily as unto the Lord. I mean, everything that we do, we should put all our effort into, why? Because we want to glorify God in all that we do, whether we eat, we drink, or whatever we do, we want to glorify the Lord.

And this whole thing just has me thinking, the main problem, I hear this from adults, by the way, I'm getting off track a little bit, because I do have ADHD, but I hear this from adults. They say that they are handicapped and I go, oh, really, what's wrong?

Well, you know, or they have a disability. They're ADHD, you know, and I'm going, well, here's the problem. The problem is you probably need more physical labor, because we didn't hear much about this when kids were outside playing and exhausting themselves or when adults had to do manual labor.

But now that we've become an Xbox computer-driven, you know, generation where our bodies are basically bowls of mush, we don't do anything with them, you know, that's where this whole mental vacuity, also known as ADHD, has come in.

Steve, I think that's a good point. And before we get back to Proverbs 6 and Colossians 3 .23 that you quoted about working heartily, that is a great way to look at the big picture that in our society today that's so full of technology and ease and comfort, a non-agrarian society, where, you know, we're not out working all day, there's something to be said for working hard and then that calms people down.

You've got ants in your pants when there's nothing, you know, you're not out doing anything. And so this is gonna be bad because people are gonna not like me for saying this. But if you have a Jack Russell Terrier, for instance, like I do, and you let the Jack Russell Terrier do nothing all day, guess what that Jack Russell Terrier ends up doing?

Chewing on furniture, biting, you know, just doing things, going to the bathroom in the middle of the room because they are built to work. Yeah, they're bored. And so you go to the pound, there's a lot of Jack Russells because people are gone all day and they can't take care of their dog.

But if you work your dog all day long, and I pretty much do that. I have a variety of things. I put something up in a tree and she's got to jump for an hour to get it, literally. She's exhausted and she doesn't have D-A-H-D-H.

She didn't have dog attention deficit. And what does Caesar do when he trains dogs? He gets them to work. And so before we even get into this, sometimes you have to use your mind to work hard. Hard work is a good thing.

And what about kids that just play H-Box all day? HD, AD-Box. Everything starts with an H. By the way, if your kid has ADHD and you say he can't pay attention, I guarantee you that if I give him an X-Box, he will sit there for eight hours without eating or drinking or going to the bathroom,.

Paying attention the whole time. And then we'll complain when you ask him to get off.

It's selective, not a disability or disorder, but selective attention. So listen to Proverbs 6. No, let's not do that. How about this, Steve? Number two. Does God reward hard work and a focus to get the hard work done?

Is there a measure of reward for a task that started and done well and finished?

Matter of fact, I think there is. Well, I mean, think about it this way. We'll get to the scripture here in a second, but think about it this way. I mean, don't you just look at it and just feel like you've accomplished something?

I mean, just for your own sake, you look at something and you just go, I can't believe I did that. And you look at it and you're, to use a sinful word, you're proud of it. Why? Because it's a good thing.

It says there in Proverbs 12 .11, whoever works his land will have plenty of bread, but he who follows worthless pursuits lacks sense. You will have plenty of bread. I mean, what we don't see when somebody starts a business and they work hard and they succeed, nobody ever says, well, gee, he sure was lucky.

He didn't have to put in much sweat or efforts because we know that's not true. If we look at a company like Apple, those guys spent hours and hours and hours, hundreds of hours putting together the first Apple computer and doing all these kinds of things.

It's work.

And you know, this goes back to parenting. We are people who are lazy by default if we're not energized by the spirit of God and doing the right thing. And so parenting is a very difficult thing because it's day in and day out.

There's no relief until the kid goes off to college or whatever. And so I'm after the parents today. I'm not after necessarily the children, I'm after the parents. And so you need to tell your children about work, show them about work, demonstrate what it means to work.

And I'm thinking of Proverbs 7, Steve, and now, oh, sons, listen to me and be attentive to the words of my mouth. We need to teach our children to listen attentively. And so if you say to me, I don't mean you, Steve, but if you say to me, listener, my kid has a problem.

It's not his fault. He can't pay attention. What does it mean when Solomon says to his kids, pay attention? This does have to do with sin, obedience, rebellion, submission.

Well, and to just jump right off that, I'm not trying to, I'm not gonna give anybody a hard time here, but here's the typical parenting methodology today, and I'm not singling anybody out, but both parents are working and they're just too busy, basically, to be bothered with their kids.

They come home, the kid's been in school all day, or maybe the kid's been in childcare or preschool, they come home and they want their kid to just kind of parent themselves. And that does not work. It didn't work when I was a kid, and it doesn't work today.

You just can't do that. And if you just expect the kid to do his homework because that's what you would do, you're going to be very disappointed. I told a parent here recently, I said, you don't get what you expect, you get what you inspect.

And that's true, whether it's homework, whether it's keeping the room clean, whether it's, you know, you think your son might have some pornography or some drugs or whatever in his room, any of that stuff.

They have no right to privacy. I'm just kind of rambling here, but the main point is parents have to parent. It's an interactive thing. You have to be on and with them all the time.

I used to call ADD not attention deficit disorder, but I call it attention dad disorder, where the dad had, there's a deficit of the dad being around and parenting. Listen, if you've got a kid on Ritalin or some kind of medicine for ADHD, we're not telling you to stop that.

We are telling you nothing of the sort because we're not medical doctors. But our issue is, do you just default to something? The Bible says, pay attention, work hard, finish the task, rewards for hard work, self-control.

We haven't even talked about that, have we, Steve? No. And I know kids necessarily who aren't saved can't have self-control, but self-control is a good thing. And so if you say, my problem has a hard, my kid has a hard time paying attention,.

Let's give him drugs. We think you're making a mistake. Well, how many millions of kids are on Ritalin? And you already know this. What kind of drug is it? It's a very serious drug. What is it, a schedule two drug on the pediatric or the doctor's thing or whatever?

It's a serious drug. Even if your child's on it, you could not just take them off cold turkey without them having some kind of physical withdrawal or whatever. I mean, it is serious. You have to get medical help to even get them off of that.

And when you think about that, would you put your son or daughter on heroin, cocaine? And the answer is absolutely, obviously not. And yet you're gonna put them on a drug that yeah, it's gonna kind of control their behavior, but that they'll have to go see a doctor to get off of because it's so serious that it could cause a physical reaction.

Ritalin, Medical Caution, and a Christian Doctor’s Perspective

Speaking of doctors,.

You might wanna write this down and pull up an article online by a doctor, Dr. Jan Strydom, S-T-R-Y-D-O-M, S-T-R-Y-D-O-M. Or you can email me for the link, info at nocompromiseradio .com. I'll answer in six months.

Guaranteed or your money back. The myth of ADHD and other learning disabilities, parenting without Ritalin. Jan Strydom, myth of ADHD and other learning disabilities, parenting without Ritalin. And you should pull that up to get a doctor's perspective on this.

And by the way, lots of Christian doctors are saying, let's not use drugs for ADHD. And many secular people are doing the same thing. They're realizing how long can I put a kid on Ritalin before there's some trouble?

So on No Compromise Radio today, we want to say that if you say my kid's impulsive and it's a disorder, I want to say to you, Proverbs 21 .5, there is a consequence to being hasty. The plans of the diligent lead surely to abundance, but everyone who is hasty comes only into poverty.

How can that not be responsibility? You do hasty things like speak when you're not supposed to and do things when you're not supposed to and you're hyperactive. There's going to be trouble for that. Parents need to teach their children cause, effect.

Well, I mean, that's what parenting is, right? As they get older, there are different effects and different causes, but parenting is not a passive activity. And I get sometimes a little bit discouraged when I see parents that their kids reach a certain age and they think, okay, now the kid can go on autopilot.

If he or she is still at home, I don't care if they're 13, if they're 15, if they're 19, they still need parental influence. They still need parental guidance. It might be more guidance than demand or whatever, as they get older, because there is, I think there's a kind of a continuum where you give them more responsibility as they kind of mature into it.

But parenting is really pretty much a lifetime job.

Well, let's just not default to calling our kids' sinful behavior, our foolish behavior, a disorder, because then that just takes the blame away from them and away from you. Jan Stridham does say, another child who cannot ride a bicycle must surely suffer from bicycle riding deficit disorder.

And I have to admit that I cannot speak Russian, so I suffer from a Russian speaking deficit disorder. Any person who reads this and who cannot play chess then must poor soul be suffering from chess playing deficit disorder.

It is quite beyond my comprehension that such an obviously ridiculous notion could have been taken so seriously.

By so many people all over the world. Foolishness is bound up in the heart of the child. And if you don't believe that, watch them. I mean, it says it in the Bible and it is patently obvious. Just watch them.

Steve, are you talking out of turn? Yes, I am. Are you cue jumping? Yes, I am.

Are you ignoring the dress code? Yeah. Mike Abendroth with Steve Cooley here, ADHD. Read the Proverbs, that's gonna be your best bet. And talk to your doctor, especially if there are pharmacy issues involved because we are not doctors.

No Compromise Radio with Pastor Mike Abendroth is a production of Bethlehem Bible Church in West Boylston. Bethlehem Bible Church is a Bible teaching church firmly committed to unleashing the life transforming power of God's word through verse by verse exposition of the sacred text.

Please come and join us. Our service times are Sunday morning at 1015 and in the evening at six. We're right on route 110 in West Boylston. You can check us out online at bbchurch .org or by phone at 508 -835 -3400.

The thoughts and opinions expressed on No Compromise Radio do not necessarily reflect those of WVNE, its staff or management.