TLP S00-E01: Who We Are and What that Means for You

Truth.Love.Parent.

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This is the greatest issue facing the church today. This is the reason families are broken. We all need a new mind, and that mind is the mind of Christ.

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Welcome to Truth, Love, Parent, where we use God's Word to become intentional, premeditated parents.

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Here's your host, AM Brewster. This is Truth, Love, Parent, Episode 1, and today's show is an introduction to who and what we are and what we can be for you.

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It may be hard to believe, but I've met men and women who don't mind being failures at parenting.

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To them, their children were an accident, and if they didn't get an abortion in the first place, they're impatiently waiting for their child to turn 18 and leave the house.

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But I don't think that describes you. If you're listening to a biblical podcast on parenting,

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I think you understand that God's given you an eternally significant job, and you need as much advice, encouragement, and assistance as you can get.

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I know I do. And that's what we at Evermind Ministries and Truth, Love, Parent want to offer you.

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God's Word has everything we need for life and godliness, and that includes your daily parenting.

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So, let's start with introducing who we are and then discuss how we hope to help you become more intentional premeditated parents.

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My name is Aaron Michael Brewster. My wife and I have been married for 11 years, and we have two children.

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Micah is almost 10, and Ivy just turned 7. Now, some of you may be reaching for the back button or the off button because you're wondering what a guy with elementary -aged children can offer you and your teenager.

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Well, hold on. I've been in full -time Christian service for the past 10 years, and before that, I finished my graduate work in biblical counseling.

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In 2007, I began teaching at Schomburg Christian School in Schomburg, Illinois. Among other things,

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I was on the high school faculty and eventually given the supreme privilege of being dean of students. Handling the discipline in a large

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Christian school may not sound enjoyable, but I honestly loved it. That role afforded me the opportunity to engage in preventative discipleship opportunities as well as work with families and students who found themselves in sin's death grip.

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There's nothing more spiritually intimate than allowing God to use your own brokenness to minister to hurting families.

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I'm eternally grateful for my time there. But in 2014, God moved me and my family to a new ministry.

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For the past two years, I've been filling a dual role of family counselor and residence counselor at Victory Family Ministries in Amberg, Wisconsin.

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During the school year, I work primarily with our Academy for Boys, where my family invites up to eight at -risk teens to live with us.

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Our model is that of a professional family. We eat and prepare meals together, study God's Word, work together, and have an awesome time doing it,

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I think. Living in the Northwoods of Wisconsin affords us beautiful locations where we can canoe, rock climb, hike, camp, and enjoy all the outdoor fun you can cram into a 10 -month program.

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But beside my relationship with my wife and kids, being the residence counselor for the guys and working with their parents are the most challenging and rewarding experiences of my life.

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But I'll talk about that a little bit more later. When I'm not being a parent for eight teenage guys,

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I have the opportunity to travel, speak, and counsel in Victory's Family Life Ministry. All this is to say that I've dedicated my life to working with families of every age and size because the single most vital human relationships you will ever have are the ones in your own home.

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And I believe that the Bible has everything your family needs to glorify God, and I'd be honored to share that with you.

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And that's what another ministry I'm involved in is all about. You see, Evermind Ministries is the parent organization which publishes a blog on Christian living, provides challenging and uplifting content on social media, participates in speaking opportunities across the

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U .S., and for the first time today, has a podcast dedicated to using God's Word to help

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Christians become intentional, premeditated parents. You can find out more about Evermind at evermindministries .org.

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That's evermind, E -V -E -R -M -I -N -D, ministries .org. But for now, let's discuss this podcast,

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Truth, Love, Parent, and how we hope to serve you as you steward your family. First, if you hadn't noticed, we're all about the

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Bible here. God's truth has the absolute preeminence in all our discussions and advice.

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My opinions and experiences are only beneficial when they line up with Scripture. My philosophies, ideologies, and psychologies only matter when they submit to the

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Word. I don't claim to speak for God unless I'm quoting His Word, but my hope is that I'll be doing that a lot.

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But I think we all know that teaching without application is challenging at best, disastrous at worst.

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I love how the New Testament writers filled their letters with doctrine and then seamlessly wove it into practical application.

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And that's what we want to do for you. When the Bible gives us commands, we want to obey. When the

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Bible gives us principles, we want to use our wisdom and discretion to apply that truth in a way that makes it usable.

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For example, I was once told that God wanted me to open the car door for my wife. I didn't remember that injunction in Scripture, so I questioned the speaker, and he told me that God commands me to love my wife, and that one of the best ways

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I can show my love for her is to open her car door. Well, the moment he explained himself,

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I knew one thing for sure. This man had never met my wife. My wife thinks that the time wasted in the car, waiting for the husband to get out, walk around the car, and open her door is one of the most ridiculous things on the planet.

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But wait, you say, I love how my husband does that, and here's the point. God does command us to love our wives, and to be transparent, that's easier said than done.

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Seriously, what does love really look like? Is it buying her flowers, helping with chores, rubbing her feet?

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Does that communicate genuine love to everyone the same way? Is that what God meant? My wife and I are like many of you.

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We don't fit the old -school sex stereotypes too well, so how does a counselor apply the command to love to a wide range of listeners without suggesting unhelpful or unbiblical ideas?

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What we hope to do here is to address the roots of who you are. I want to get detailed and intentional with what

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God wants us to believe, and how He wants us to think. When we've accomplished that, when we've really tuned our minds that way, the way

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God intended us to be before the fall, the actions and practices that grow from those roots are guaranteed to glorify

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God. I won't need to metaphorically tape fruit on the tree, aka legislate specific actions with no biblical basis.

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Once we know and trust God, the life and godliness follows. This is the greatest issue facing the church today.

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This is the reason families are broken. We all need a new mind, and that mind is the mind of Christ.

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So, let's look at our little slogan, using God's word to help Christians become intentional premeditated parents.

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Well, like I said, God's word has the preeminence there, and we want to help Christians. Now, that doesn't mean that this podcast isn't for you if you aren't born again.

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In fact, we would love nothing more than to share with you God's wonderful good news, so that you too can become a child of Christ, to be born again, to become a follower of God.

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But really, until that point, you're like a vacuum cleaner that's not plugged in. You can try to parent well, and you know, as you move a vacuum cleaner back and forth across the carpeting, you're bound to pick up some things and to move some things around, and honestly, there are a lot of people who, though they are not followers of the

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Lord, on the outside really do seem to be good parents. But until we plug that vacuum cleaner in and utilize the power of electricity, we would never really know how well a vacuum cleaner could do its job.

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In the same way, until you've truly accepted Christ as your Savior and have the Holy Spirit indwelling you, you'll never truly understand exactly what it's like to be able to parent in a new way, in a way that's not about you anymore and your kids anymore, but it's about someone entirely different.

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So, we want to use God's Word to help Christians become intentional premeditated parents. That word intentional,

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I think, is intentionally used in a lot of intentional ways nowadays. People love that word, and I really love it too, because it is so, you thought

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I was going to say intentional, it's purposeful. It has real meaning in that we want everything we do to have a purpose.

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It's not an accident. It's not just a whim. It's not just how I felt in the moment. I did it for a reason.

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And one of the biggest times that I get in trouble as a parent is when I am not intentional, when

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I respond in the moment, when I react instead of act, but we also want to be premeditated parents.

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And I guess that's not so much also as it is really a requirement of being intentional. I need to think about,

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I need to plan in advance what my purpose is and how I'm going to accomplish that. If I am premeditated and I put that plan into action in the moment, that makes what

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I'm doing intentional. So, that's what we want to do here at Truth, Love, Parent, and we hope that you subscribe and we hope that you come back time and time again to hear what

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God's word has to say about yours and my parenting. Please check out evermindministries .com.

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Also check out victoryacademyforboys .org to learn more about the ministries that we featured on today's show.

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You can also feel free to email us at staff at evermindministries .com to ask questions or to give us ideas for future podcasts.

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And of course, you can follow me on Twitter at AMBrewster. It's been a pleasure talking with you today and I look forward to many more in the future.

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Truth. Love. Parent. Is part of the Evermind ministry family and is dedicated to helping you become an intentional premeditated parent.

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Join us next time as we search God's word for the truth your family needs today.