TLP 163: Rearing a Servant | Jessica Mair Interview

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We need the Holy Spirit to be able to serve in a biblical manner.

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It needs to be taught, demonstrated, and then given an opportunity to practice it over and over again.

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

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Here's your host, AM Brewster. Thank you for joining us today. Our last five episodes were concerned with learning how to help our children discover

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God's will for their lives. A couple times during that study, we discussed the importance of servanthood in the sovereign will of God.

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We also talked about servanthood being one of the foundation stones of how and why we do family chores, and we talked about that in episode 154.

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So today we're going to talk all about how to rear a servant. And to do so, I've invited

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Jessica Mair to be with us. Jessica's first show was with us back in episode 93.

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On that episode, she shared biblical ways to tackle tattling, and it's been one of our most popular episodes ever since.

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So now, 50 episodes later, Jessica's back to walk us through her parenting journey and share with us how

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God has shown her the importance of this issue. Jessica is a follower of Christ, wife to John, and mother of five, all under the age of 10.

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She and her family serve at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center in Brevard, North Carolina. She's also a

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Truth. Love. Parent counselor, and she has the supreme privilege of being my sister.

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Welcome back, Jess. Wow. What an introduction. Supreme privilege of being my sister.

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That's incredible. Yep. Well, I had no choice in that one, but I'm very thankful for it. I'm so excited to be back.

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I am very pumped. Awesome. All right. TLP, if those of you are just joining us, maybe you don't know this, we are now the number one iTunes podcast for Christian parents, and we've been growing quite a bit.

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So it's possible that many of you have not been introduced to Jessica. So Jess, why don't you take a moment just to kind of introduce us to your family?

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Well, it is always exciting in my home. I tell everybody, I get lots of looks, and I feel like, you know,

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I'm not the Duggars. So it's just five kids, but people, I don't know, like they're always like, whoa, that's a lot of children.

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And when I go grocery shopping, I get lots of remarks. And my favorite one is, are they all yours? And I've always been tempted to be super sarcastic in my response, and I've always just smiled very politely and said, yes, they are all mine.

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And one day I was standing in line and the cashier said, are those all yours?

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And I looked at her and I said, actually, no, I love to just walk around the grocery store and collect other people's children because it's way more fun.

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And I get a lot more done when I have five children grocery shopping with me. And she just looked at me,

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I was like, I'm joking. Yes, they're all mine. And she was like, oh, yeah, because she she was about to call the cops, you know, nothing much.

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Exactly. It was it was not good. But I'm like, really? Yes. Yes, they're all mine. Obviously, it's not so fun all the time to shop with five children, but we make it work.

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Anya is nine and she is actually going to be able to go to camp at the

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Wilds where we work for the first time. And so that's like really huge for our family. She is just absolutely pumped.

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She is the second mom. I mean, she loves her brothers and sisters. And somehow she has been able to master being a leader in a way that the kids actually want to follow her and they just love her.

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So every time she talks very excitingly about going to camp, I'm not joking you one by one, all four of the other ones start crying.

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So we try not to talk about camp very often with her because everyone starts crying and we're like, OK, so that's

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Anya. And she's just a huge blessing. We're very thankful for her. Ethan is going to be eight this summer in August, which is incredible.

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And he is our little gentleman. And we are so thankful for him. And he just finished second grade.

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He'll be going to third grade and he enjoys school and learning and he loves, loves, loves to serve.

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He just actually got an award for A .B. Honor Roll in school and then also for having a servant's heart.

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That's what his second award was. And my husband pulled him aside after the awards ceremony and said, son, we are very thankful and glad that you worked really hard to be able to get your

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A .B. Honor Roll. But most importantly, to be able to see Christ work through your life and be able to receive an award for showing a servant's heart, for looking for ways to serve other people is just incredible.

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And that's what we want you to know. That's number one. That's what's most important. And then grades come after.

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So we were just very excited about that, too. That was very neat. That's awesome. And then Isaac is our very tender and compassionate six -year -old.

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And he is a goofball and he always has the look or something to say that will just make everyone crack up.

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And he cherishes his brothers and sisters. He loves to take care of the little ones. So Olivia and Logan.

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And he just does such a good job with that. We are very interested to see how

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God is going to use him because right now he's very good at he's the middle child. So he can duck under everyone else and somehow not get his chores done while everybody else is doing their chores.

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And it's it's incredible. Like he just kind of under the radar. Not not cool. But that's that's him.

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It's going to be interesting to see God's plan for his life. Then we have Olivia and she's a little feisty pants.

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She has platinum blonde hair, bright blue eyes. And I have to jump in here. I have to jump in here real quick.

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Olivia probably should have been my child because she is like a spitting image of my wife.

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She is a mini Aunt Jo. It's it's pretty impressive, which makes her totally cool. Attitude and all.

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Yes. Oh, yes, definitely. Yeah. And she is hilarious. She loves to be the boss and she's our four year old and the fourth one in our family.

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And the only one that she tries and attempts to actually succeed in bossing around is Logan, our fifth one.

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She will not call him Logan. She only calls him baby. And so she will tell him to take permanent marker to my wall and my couch.

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And then as soon as I come downstairs, she'll look at me with her eyes, her eyebrows raised and go, baby, do that.

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It was baby, baby, do that. So that's her little sass pants. And she has not received

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Jesus as her savior yet. And we are excited to see the Lord continue to work in her heart. She has been asking a lot about the gospel.

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And that's just really neat to see when the Holy Spirit starts working in their heart and starts making them aware of their sin and aware that there's a savior.

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And that's really exciting. So we've been sharing the gospel with her a lot and praying for the sake of all of us that she will get saved sooner than later.

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And then Logan, he's number five. And he was when we found out we were pregnant with him, it was like, oh, here we go again.

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All right. And all my kids are 18 to 20 months apart. And he was just a blessing.

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Like when we found out we were pregnant with him, there was that, oh, you know, sigh. I'm like,

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OK, Lord, wow, your will is perfect. But our kids just cherish him.

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And that's the neatest thing. I don't know how many times the little ones have said he's such a gift, mom. I'm just so thankful for Logan.

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He's such a gift. And that's what he is. But he definitely has his own personality.

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He probably talks earlier and more than any of the other kids did.

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So he has a mouthful to say. And I actually cannot wait for you and Joe to come this summer because he literally keeps people laughing.

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So he's a little feisty pants, too. So anyway, that's our family. Jonathan is one of the cooks at the

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Wilds. And I work laundry lost and found and also at the coffee shop. And between all of that, you would think that would keep us busy enough.

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But we decided to go into the journey of homeschooling our children, our three out of our five, because they're the only ones old enough.

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And so we will be jumping into that this fall. And by God's grace and great mercy, we are really looking forward to the school year.

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Well, that is awesome. I love your family to death. And what's hilarious is having you describe them like that.

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It just makes me want to see them that much more this summer. All right, now, before we jump into this,

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I want to tell all of you that the inspiration for doing this show came really just from me watching my sister and her husband disciple their kids.

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Now, neither she nor her family members are perfect. You've heard a little bit about that. But I have personally marveled over the years as I've watched them be intentional and premeditated and all the steps that they've taken to teach their kids to serve others.

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This is actually, I think, a hallmark of the Wilds ministry down there. Many of the wonderful families

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I've met there are striving to do the same. So personally, I can think of no one better to share with us some practical examples of how to do this at home than my sister.

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Now, Jess, I'd like to start with some biblical principles as to why this idea of servanthood is so important.

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Now, we don't have to take a lot of time with it because we've touched on a number of biblical truths recently about it. But what's your favorite passage about the necessity of teaching our kids to be servants?

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Well, actually, all of us really started in our family a couple of years ago when my husband was doing a study of Christ's ministry on this earth.

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And he was just overwhelmed by how he desired to serve everyone he came into contact with.

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And as he was going through his character and who he was, it was incredible to be able to see that.

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And so as we started talking through it, it was just this overwhelming theme in Christ's life.

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So therefore, it should be an overwhelming theme in our life. So Matthew 20, 28 and Mark 10, 45 are the exact same verses.

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It says, just as a son of man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life a ransom for many.

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And that was the ongoing, like I said, theme of his life. And so that's really where we drew most of our desire and the push and urge to do this in our own family.

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I really love how the whole foundation of that really just was God's truth, not just a verse about servanthood, but the whole example of Jesus himself.

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So let that be a lesson to all of us, really. I mean, we need to tie all of these concepts and principles. It's so easy to take a little bit of a proof text or one idea in scripture and pull it out and talk about how we all need to be servants.

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But when we tie it back to who Jesus was and we allow our relationship with him to motivate our servanthood to be like him, that's just so much better.

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So with that groundwork, the first step, I believe, in rearing a servant is to teach our kids the importance of servanthood, which is great because that's exactly what you and John did.

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And I fear that too many of us, we have good expectations for our children, but we don't communicate them well.

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We want them to be servants, but we expect them to become it on their own or just to be able to put two and two together without our teaching them how to do it.

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Ladies and gentlemen, that's just, I have to be honest with ourselves, that's just poor parenting. Our children are foolish and they need us to teach them and to interpret life for them.

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And like even Jessica said, you know, our children are born into this world unsaved. They need us to help explain this concept to them.

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So true. I know that we all know of somebody in our own lives who just, they're natural servants, then they might not even be saved.

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They're just those natural, they hear something, someone needs it. And that is wonderful and great.

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But really, we need the Holy Spirit to be able to serve in a biblical manner. I wish it came naturally to all of us.

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I really do. But we and our children are naturally driven to please ourselves. So our kids won't just catch on to the idea, like you said, of servanthood.

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It needs to be taught, demonstrated, and then give an opportunity to practice it over and over again.

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And those three things are really important to teach it, to demonstrate it, and then to give opportunity for them to actually use it.

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Yeah. And that's the whole purpose of today's episode. We want to give you an understanding of how you can communicate this to your children.

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But before we go too much further with that and examples of what your children can do, we need to realize that along with teaching our kids, we have to model it for them.

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I think, Jessica, you said demonstrate it for them. We absolutely must never be those do as I say, not as I do parents.

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And I mentioned this when we discussed family chores. If I'm constantly on my kids about their chores, but I don't do any myself,

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I just come home from work and plopped on the couch. I'm literally undermining my whole ministry to my kids.

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Absolutely. I tell Anya, she has opportunities to watch her brothers and sisters. And we often every time we leave the house, we always say to her,

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Anya, being a leader and being a servant is never asking someone to do something that you yourself would never be willing to do.

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And so if you're sitting around just eating your snack and telling your brothers and sisters to do this and this and this, then you're not being a servant leader.

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You're not. And so that's one thing we are constantly reminding her. And I'm also reminding myself of that.

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Yeah, because it's really easy to have a long list of things for the kids to do. And even for us to be super busy, but the children don't see it.

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You know, we're getting a lot done while they're napping and we're serving people at church and whatnot. But we're not they're not seeing us actively serving other people or them even in our families.

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And so we give them the wrong impression. So number one, you know, we need to know God's expectations.

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Number two, though, we need to teach our kids that truth. And number three, we need to model for our kids what servant leadership looks like.

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So number four, what are some practical ways we can help our kids practice being a servant?

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Because that's what they need. They need practice and need experience so that they can get better at it. Absolutely. And this is one of those things

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I actually just a laser tree on just some parenting tips and stuff.

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And when I got to this one point, I really honestly felt that like I might possibly get things thrown at me, you know, tomatoes, chairs, who knows.

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And so please, when you people are listening to this, keep your mind open.

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This is one of those things I'm going to mention that doesn't just encourage us to be good parents.

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It gets to our hearts as well. And we have to deal with it and work through it in our hearts before we can even work through in our children's hearts.

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So what I'm about to speak about, like I am very excited about, but just keep an open mind because this is all from God's word and I'm very excited to share with it.

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But the number one thing before I ever wanted to introduce servanthood to my children was that all possessions and everything on this earth is

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God's. Nothing is ours. So my life that I live is not my own. It is God's.

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And you say, well, yes, I know that that's a very simple concept. So before I really jump into,

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I just want to share this with you. These are some verses on possessions and everything being

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God's. The earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof, the world and they that dwell therein. Behold, the heaven and the heavens of heavens is the

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Lord thy God. The earth also with all that there is in the heavens are thine. The earth is also thine as far as the world and the fullness thereof thou has founded them.

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For the earth is the Lord's and the fullness thereof. The day is thine. The night also is thine. Thou has prepared the light and the sun.

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What? No, you not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, which is in you, which you have of God and you're not your own.

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For you are bought with a price. Therefore, glorify God in your body and your spirit, which are God's. So with all of this concept, basically nothing is ours.

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I mean, I think God's word made it pretty clear that nothing is ours. Everything is God's in the heavens and on the earth.

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So all possessions and even our own life and our time, our abilities, our talents, everything is

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God's. And so from the very beginning, I'm teaching and training my children that everything that they see, feel, touch is

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God's. So my two year old right now is in the mind stage and he is saying, mine, mine, mine all the time.

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And so Logan will say, no, that's mine. And I will look at him and go, Logan, whose is that?

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And he will say, God's. And I'll say to him, Logan, if that's

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God's, then what does he want you to do with it? He wants me to share or be a good steward, because this is

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God's toy. He desires that you be kind one to another. He desires that you share.

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He desires that you prefer others above yourself. So if somebody else wants to play with God's toy, then you're here on this earth to be a good steward of that toy.

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So I hope everyone's tracking with me. Servanthood is based off of the foundation of stewardship.

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We have possessions and talents and those possessions and talents we are steward of and we want to be a godly steward of those possessions, which means that we are wanting to use all of our possessions, our time and our talent to serve others like Christ said when he was on this earth.

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Does that make sense? Oh, it makes all the sense in the world. I love it. You know, we need to we and our children need to relate to our possessions the right way.

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When we see them as gifts from God to be used the way he intended, then it's a lot easier for us to do exactly what he wants to do with them.

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When I see them as mine to be protected or to be selfishly consumed for myself, then

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I'm obviously not going to be interested in serving other people with that. I want it to be mine. And I think we all have experienced this in other people's lives.

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And I think if we're honest with ourselves, we see how true this is in our lives. That's mine.

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And that's why when, you know, my child drops my phone down the flight of stairs, I can become so upset because that's mine.

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And you just ruin that when the reality is so very different than that. And I can see, too, how that idea with kids tends toward a servanthood.

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And even your youngest understands this. Whose is that? It's God's. OK, so what does he want you to do with it? Well, he wants me to share.

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And sharing is inherently, if it's being done the right way, serving somebody else. Here, you can take this.

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You can have fun with it. I don't need it right now. So it's it is really the fundamental, fundamental truth underlying servanthood.

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And so when my children realize that nothing is theirs and everything is God's, then they just have to choose what kind of steward am

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I going to be? Am I going to be a poor steward who doesn't use that for anything, does not give God glory?

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Or am I going to choose to be a steward who's faithful and gives God glory in everything that he has chosen to have me be able to steward in my life, to bring glory to his name?

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A lot of the verses that we use for our children and reminding them of these things, my children take instruments and often

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I remind them that these gifts again are to minister to other people. First Peter 4 .10

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says, As every man hath received the gift, even so minister the same to another as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

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Matthew 20, 27 through 28 says, And whosoever will be chief among you, let him be your servant, even as a son of man came not to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life a ransom for many.

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And then Romans 12, 9 through 13 says, Let love be without hypocrisy. Abhorred that which is evil, cleave to that which is good.

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In love of the brethren, be tenderly affectionate one to another, in honor, preferring one another, in diligence, not slothful, fervent in spirit, serving the

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Lord, rejoicing in hope, patient in tribulation, continuing steadfastly in prayer, communicating to the necessities of the saints.

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And I love the last one, given to hospitality. Isn't that so neat that that's even in the verse given to hospitality?

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And that's one of the ways that we can demonstrate to our children servanthood and that is being given to hospitality.

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So as my children are little right now, I am opening up my home and using the things that God has given me, my food, the furniture, my time and ability, all of that to steward that for God, to glorify him so that my children see that mom not only wants us to serve, but she is serving by being a faithful steward of the things that God has given her to steward for right now.

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That's awesome. We use a similar thing here at Victory Academy. The guys oftentimes will say, you know, we have 14 people in the house and so everyone's coming to dinner and they'll say, hey, that's my seat.

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I'll say, hey, dude, you don't have a seat. This isn't your seat, it's God's seat. And you need to love others with whatever seat you sit in.

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So this is a huge thing and it can be applied in so many ways. And it works with really little kids. It doesn't have to be deep, the complicated concepts behind hospitality and love and whatnot.

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You start really simply with the kids. And I found that not only do our kids need to relate to their possessions the right way, and I think it's similar, but they also need to relate to their time the right way.

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I know we could say that time is a gift from God, just like our skills and whatnot are. But I think that's also a huge deal when it comes to our kids, because they guard their time,

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I think, even more selfishly than they do their stuff. Absolutely. And I, while I was speaking on this,

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I opened up for questions, which slightly intimidating sometimes.

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And one of the ladies said, you know, this is incredible, like you're telling me that everything is

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God's. And so if like I asked you to, if I could borrow your car, you would just let me borrow your car.

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And I said, well, remember, we are commanded to be good stewards of the things that God has given us.

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So if you need that car for whatever reason, and it's absolutely necessary, and it would be a good steward of me to give you that car to lend to you.

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The Bible says to lend it to you, not expecting it return to that extent. And kind of all the ladies eyes just like opened up really wide.

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I said, I know, like I have the same response. And I can't even say right now that I could sit here and say, oh, yeah, you know, without a problem,

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I'm going to let you have my car with no expectation of you returning it. Because that's if I am going to learn something, that's how

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I should be lending it to you. Knowing that I'm being a good steward of my possessions, that's super hard. And the lady said, well, my you know, my son, then like that's really hard to expect him to do that, because I know there are things that are in my life that are mine.

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And I don't want anyone to mess with them. And I'm not going to let somebody play with or mess with something that I really, really cherish.

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So how can I ask my son to do the same thing? And I said, exactly my point.

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It is so in our lives that we don't want to share and serve others with the possessions that God has given us that why would our children?

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They're not seeing us do it. And so being able to really just pray and ask God to work in your life first.

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And so often I will go and sit down with my children and say, you know what? Mom has been extremely selfish in this area of my time.

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And I've especially I think for moms, you know, you are going, going, going, serving, serving, serving, sometimes not even with the right attitude, which is very sad.

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But I can say that's that's common in my life, just that stupid martyr attitude.

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So I sit down with my kids and say, you know what? I am finding myself wanting to use this time that God's given me to serve myself.

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And so when it comes to two to three o 'clock in the afternoon, can you help me think of ways that mom can use this time to serve others and really have them become active in that?

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So we'll jump to serving to serve the family. These are those opportunities given to serve because we are relating to others correctly by Philippians 2, 3, which is let nothing be done in selfishness or empty conceit, but with lowliness of mind, let each esteem others better than myself.

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And when we have that attitude of preferring others above ourselves, then we're going to be relating to others correctly.

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And then they need to be given to opportunities to serve. And so I not only want to bring my kids into into doing this, but I also want them to help me have ideas in serving other people.

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And I think this runs so counterintuitive to our society. I mean, you can see all of these episodes or articles and episodes and whatnot talking about, you know, you need your me time.

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You know, mommy needs to be able to get away and she needs to be able to, you know, you know, have her, you know, her special food or her time alone and whatnot.

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And I'm not saying that any of that is inherently wrong. I'm not saying that it's necessarily sinful because you're right.

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We are stewards. If somebody wants to borrow my car, but I have a previous engagement that I need to drive my child somewhere,

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I need to take my child to the dentist or the doctor. We need to go shopping. And really, I need to make a decision. What's the best stewardship of my car?

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Lending you my car so you can go to a baseball game or doing the job that God has called me to do.

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I might have to say no to you, but I'm saying no to you, not because I'm being selfish and I don't want you driving my car.

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I'm saying no to you because I need to steward my time better and I steward my possessions better.

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And sometimes this happens, too. You know, we get sick and so we need to steward our time well.

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And that might mean investing some time in us getting better sometimes when we're spiritually low.

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Now, we shouldn't be isolating ourselves and running away. We should be getting help and comfort and community in our lives.

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But sometimes when we're spiritually low, we need to pull away from the temptations and that are that are sometimes, you know, we're responding incorrectly to and we need to get that help and we need to center ourselves on God.

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We need to have that that quiet time alone with the Lord. So it's really a balance. And I just want listeners to understand this is this is a very controversial idea because it seems to just say, you know, hey, listen, if you're if you need that me time, you're selfish and you need to grow up.

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And in a way, I think that's very true. I think we are selfish and I think we hang on to our stuff way too much.

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And I think all the examples you're giving, Jessica, are perfect. At the same time, we don't want to be a pendulum where we're swinging too far to one side.

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We want to be able to be honest enough to say that, you know, when we're wisely stewarding our things for God and stewarding our time for God, we're not just going to frivolously throw them here and there.

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Correct. And I you're absolutely right. And that's one of the reasons why it is very easy to throw tomatoes at this concept, even though that this is very clear in God's word.

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The main idea is to be a wise and good steward of our time.

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And so one of the women are like, so if my kid says, can I play with your cell phone? I just let them have it.

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I'm like, well, no, that's not being a wise steward of your phone or your son, let alone anything else, because, you know, there are dangers on the cell phone.

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And, you know, and we don't want our children to be sitting with electronics all day. Like there are so many things that go in behind it.

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And I do think it's also important for us to be wise in our health and our mindset, because I think it's very important for a mom to go get a bath and I have my children have room time so that I can be in God's word.

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And those are very necessary things because I need to be helping my health and make sure that I am in the right spiritual mindset to be able to parent my children.

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And if I'm not taking care of my own health and spiritual health, then

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I'm not being a good steward of the body and life that God's given me. You know, there are ditches on both sides.

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Absolutely. You need to be careful not to fall into either one. Absolutely. It comes back to what's the best thing that I could be doing with my time, my possessions right here, right now.

28:31

And that's a personal, sorry, that's a personal decision between you and God. And that's that is a lot of prayer and wisdom to be able to get to that point of saying,

28:42

OK, Lord, I want to use my time wisely today. Please help me be completely focused on you and pleasing you.

28:48

How can I go about doing that? And it's searching, it's searching the wisdom of God for that, not just saying, yeah,

28:55

I'm going to do this or I'm going to do that. And whatever feels good. That's so true. OK, so as I see this, you know, we need to teach our children to relate to their possessions the right way, need to teach our children to relate to their time the right way.

29:08

But I'm also hearing as you're talking about all of this and the basic idea that they need to relate to others the right way.

29:14

And I think that's, you know, you've kind of hit on this point as we've talked about the other other things. You know, if I'm relating to my possessions correctly and I realize that God wants me to share, then

29:23

I'm more predisposed to doing the loving thing toward this other person. And the same thing with my time. But is there any are there any other passages or concepts behind this idea specifically of relating to others the right way that we need to teach our children?

29:37

Well, Philippians 2, 3, and I have shared that before, and it is a life family verse, and it really helps my children really in any area.

29:49

But it's let nothing be done in selfishness or empty conceit, but with humility of mind, preferring one another above myself.

29:57

And there are is a really neat study. If you do a study on one anothering people, there are tons of verses about loving one another, preferring one another, serving one another in God's word.

30:12

And that's a really, really neat study to be able to do with you and your kids or your whole family to be able to fully understand how

30:19

God wants us to relate to other people the right way. Yeah.

30:25

I'm looking around on my desk. I actually have a piece of paper that has the list of like 30 some one another's from the

30:31

New Testament. And I'm glad you mentioned that. I actually want to do a short TLP snippet on each of them. Just like 30.

30:37

Yeah. I think because it's so powerful and you don't realize how many of them are there and it's also ties into the study that we did back in February, the study on family love and I really,

30:48

I designed that study specifically so that you and your kids could sit down and listen to it together because if we're not, if we're not loving each other, we're not going to be serving each other.

30:56

And if we're serving each other in the right way, then it's motivated out of love. And so that idea is integral,

31:02

I think, to this whole concept. So, okay. So my kids are relating to their possessions the right way.

31:08

They're relating to their time the right way. They're relating to other people the right way. What are some opportunities that I can give them to practice this?

31:18

That's a great question. I, you've already alluded to this, but family chores, I think would be number one, part of being the team is, sorry.

31:26

We remind our children every day to be part of the team means that you also get benefits.

31:34

So we had one of our children who did not want to be part of our team for a while, where I would ask him to do something and he would just look at me or he would choose not to obey.

31:44

And it went on for a while and we disciplined him and took things away from him. And we did lots of different things and nothing, nothing really got to him and really showed him his selfishness, but he just really wasn't willing to be part of the team to do his chores, anything.

32:01

And so I sat him down and told him, you know what, you are a child of God and you're not acting like a child of God and you are in God's family.

32:08

But you are also in the mayor family and being in the mayor family, there are benefits to being part of our team.

32:15

You get me to feed you every morning. You get a house and a bed.

32:22

You get to be driven down because a lot of our meals we eat down at camp. You are driven down to camp to eat meals there.

32:30

You have lots of benefits that you don't even, you don't even recognize because your mom's serving you all day long.

32:36

And so if you're not willing to be part of the team, then you cannot have the benefits of being part of the team.

32:43

He was around four years old at the time. And so the first thing was, it was, it was lunchtime.

32:49

And I said, everyone get in the car. And Ethan went to go climb in the car. And I was like, ah, no, you're going to walk down to camp because this is part of being a benefit of the team.

32:57

You get to have a ride down to camp. And so he cried all the way down to camp walking while I drove probably like two feet behind him in my van, very slowly all the way down to camp.

33:09

He just sobbed, absolutely sobbed. And he, we get down there. For those of you, for those of you who aren't familiar with the wild, this is all an enclosed thing.

33:18

Jessica's house is on this like private subdivision on the camp property or whatnot. So this is, you know, it's not walking on main roads or anything.

33:24

Very safe. It is like basically a very big backyard. And so, and no cars could even get around me.

33:31

So, um, it was, yeah, it was quite the scene to see. And when we got down there, he saw me, he's like,

33:37

I'll be part of the team. I'm so sorry. And I was like, but it doesn't work like that. You know, we don't get to pick our consequences.

33:45

We, we pick our sin, but we don't get to pick our consequences. So he had to serve himself food and had to clean up his spot and he came home.

33:53

And I can't remember. There were so many things that we, I didn't do for him. Oh, even like he went to go sit on the couch and I'm like, you know what?

34:00

That's a benefit of being part of this family. You can sit on the floor though. And he's like, okay. Okay. And so we finally, at the end of the day, we talked and I'm like,

34:09

Ethan doing your chores and obeying mom and dad is one required by God, because God says children obey your parents, but two, it's a benefit.

34:20

It is part of being a team. And there are so many benefits to being in the mayor family, to being here.

34:27

You get so many things provided for you, but you need to choose to jump in the team, be on the team and, and to serve other people, because that's what pleases

34:38

God. Not because you get things from it, but just showing him, you know, there, there really is.

34:45

There is a benefit to being a part of God's family and to be in part of our family, you know, and just like that.

34:52

And it's a very easy way to be able to paint that picture for your kids in a safe environment, being able to do it in a way that is age appropriate and safe for them.

35:02

And that really got a hold of him. And he looked at us and he's like, I want to be part of the team.

35:09

I want to serve others and think of other people. And, you know, he really grew from that. And it was so neat to just see

35:14

God's grace and his mercy working in his life and changing him to be more like Christ. Um, working with mom and dad is really neat.

35:21

We have many opportunities here to be able to do that. Before you move on, before you move on real quick, I just want to say that reminds me an awful lot of a series we did.

35:29

I can't remember which episode it was, but it was called the rock, the bread and the donut. And it talks about the, you know, the things that we should give to our children, the things that we shouldn't give to our children and the things that we could potentially give to our children, but we need to be wise as to whether or not we do that.

35:44

And that's a perfect example of donut issues where you said, Hey, the donuts are a benefit of being part of the mayor family.

35:52

And if you're not gonna be part of the mayor family, then you don't get the donuts and you're not sitting against your child. You're still giving them the bread.

35:58

You're still giving them exactly what they need, but not that extra stuff. So I love that. So obviously the family chores are extremely important.

36:06

We have a whole episode dedicated to that. I think the, this idea of serving the family is so huge because even the smallest child is there with their family.

36:13

They may not be going to school. They may not be seeing other people at church or many people in the neighborhood, but they've got mom there.

36:18

They have potentially their siblings there. So what are some other ways that a child can serve the family?

36:23

Working with mom and dad, I think is a, is a big one. I am whether it is actually going to work with them.

36:30

And a lot of people don't have the opportunity we do on the campsite and that's so neat. Um, Jonathan will have the kids cleaning up in the dining hall or in the kitchen with him.

36:41

And it was very interesting because sometimes they realize, Oh, people actually have to work for this food to get up to get on the table.

36:48

And that's just how kids think, you know, things just appear and get done, which is why working with mom and dad is very important because if we have the mentality of,

36:57

I'm just going to serve and serve and serve and serve and serve, and they're going to see mom serving all the time that they're going to be servants.

37:03

It's not going to happen. I promise you it's not going to happen. You need to bring them along with you.

37:10

You have to be that example, but you also have to bring them along with you because if they're used to just being served all the time, well, then they're not going to serve others because you're just serving them.

37:20

And so working with mom and dad, you are helping them be able to serve with you and see,

37:27

Oh, look at this work is getting done or this dinner is on the table because I had to work.

37:33

I had to serve in this area, spend my time and energy to be able to get the food on the table. And it's something that's very simple for us, but as little kids, they,

37:43

I have had my children make comments often like, Whoa, that was a lot of work.

37:48

Like they were just really surprised because they just didn't know. Yeah. And if you can't take your, your kids with you to work, which we understand that, um, just have them doing like the family chores.

37:57

So if, if dad, you're going out and you're mowing the lawn, uh, they could do something, whether it's raking or you're going out to do something on the car, there's something age appropriate that they could do.

38:07

That's not only going to give them an opportunity to serve alongside you, work alongside you, uh, but also to learn something in the process, which is really cool.

38:15

And also remembering all of these great ideas are never convenient because parenting's not convenient.

38:22

We are having a purposeful premeditated parenting. And that's something that we have to keep in mind with all those.

38:27

Cause you're like, Oh, but I could cook dinner so much faster if I didn't have five children in the kitchen. It's okay.

38:33

I think that on a regular basis. So cleaning each other's rooms. I love that one.

38:38

We often will hear, well, I didn't make that mess. I'm like, great. I didn't have lunch and I didn't make the mess in the living room.

38:47

And yet I'm still cleaning it because we are a team and we are here to serve other people for other people.

38:54

Yeah. The, uh, the mess in your brother's diaper. You know, I didn't put it there, but you know what,

39:00

I think I, someone's going to have to clean it up and I don't want it to be me. It could be you.

39:05

No. Ah, yes. So that is, that's a big one, just cleaning each other's room.

39:11

And you know, I love to make it fun. Say, Hey, you know what? Let's be secret servants. And Anya and Ethan are like in a spy mode right now in their life.

39:19

And so we will do this, like go clean the room and try not to let them know you're doing it. And so then it's a surprise and they're like,

39:26

Oh, okay. And they're all laughing and joking. And they're so excited and they do, they go sneak into each other's rooms and clean their rooms.

39:33

And it's just the coolest thing. Just being able to see serving others is a lot of fun.

39:39

And when you put it in that concept or like as a game or whatever, you're really teaching your kids that this is a blast.

39:47

We also do that for our summer staff. We'll go down and sneak into the room, grab their laundry, go up to our house, clean their laundry for them because they have to pay for their laundry.

39:56

So just be able to do a couple of loads of free laundry, you know, that's a neat thing for my kids to say, you know, wow, this is a neat opportunity to be able to be a blessing to somebody.

40:07

And usually Anya likes to make their bed while she's in there and stuff like that. So just those sneaky ways to be able to be a servant and not even to tell people it was you who did it because the only person we're serving is

40:19

God. And that's all that, that's the only person who has to see it is God. And that's such a neat thing.

40:25

This is really neat because God gives us possessions to be stewards of. And so when

40:30

I have a birthday for one of our kids, Jonathan and I, after, let's say, Anya gets a new bike, we say,

40:37

Anya, that's such a cool new bike. How are you going to use that to serve and glorify

40:42

God? And so we'll sit there as a family and Ethan will be like, oh, oh, you can let so -and -so ride it because they don't have a new bike.

40:50

And Anya's like, yeah, oh, oh, mom, you just baked banana bread. I could ride banana bread over to so -and -so's house and drop it off.

40:56

Yeah, that's a great way to use your bike to glorify God. So by just teaching and illustrating to the kids how we can use our possessions to glorify

41:05

God is so fun and it's such a great opportunity for them. And as a family to sit there and just, just kind of mull over ideas.

41:14

When I cut hair, I will save some of the money and I will say to the kids, hey, how should mom use this money to serve somebody else?

41:23

And we will sit and think about lots of ideas and lots of people who might be in need and then we'll give it to that person.

41:30

And that's really, really fun to do as well. And this goes back to where we were at the beginning of the show, you know, talking about, uh, we have to teach them.

41:37

We have to talk about, you know, and she's not necessarily going to get a new bike and think to herself, uh, how can

41:42

I use this to serve somebody? So we need to bring it up. We need to teach our children to think that way. And Lord willing, you do this enough.

41:49

Eventually by God's grace and the power of the Holy spirit, you know, Anya or one of your other children are going to receive something and their first thought of their own accord is going to be,

41:58

I wonder how I can use this to glorify God and to serve others. And that's the whole point of this, but we need to help them because they're not going to do it naturally.

42:04

Absolutely. Absolutely. So for Anya, her time, um, and we are using that for babysitting because there's a lot of young kids on this campsite.

42:12

And so once a month or twice a month, we have Anya spend some time at somebody else's house.

42:19

So the mom can be getting chores done or whatever, whatever it is around the house.

42:24

And she just plays with that little kid because she's nine. So obviously she's not going to fully babysit them, but she'll take him in the basement or she'll take them outside and she'll just play with them and just use her talent and her time to be able to serve another family on the campsite.

42:40

And that's just a neat opportunity again, to just reiterate in Anya's mind. Remember, we're not here to glorify ourselves or to serve ourselves, but we're here to glorify

42:51

God and to serve others. I had that similar conversation with my kids. My, my wife's grandmother just recently,

42:57

I went to be with her Lord and, uh, she was going to go down there to serve her mother. And we made the decision as a family that it would be best for our kids to go with my wife down to Indiana.

43:08

So before they left, I sat down and I said, listen, this is why mommy's going. Mommy wants to go and to serve her mom and to be there for her and to serve her grandmother.

43:16

And I want you guys to have that same goal in mind, but also to be going down there to serve mommy.

43:21

How can you best serve her on this trip? And we talked about, uh, you know, being good in the car cause it's a pretty long trip down there and talked about what they can do when they're there.

43:30

And by God's grace, I think they'd really rose to the occasion. Uh, it was a somber week or so.

43:37

They were there, um, before she ended up, um, passing away and, but they did such a great job.

43:43

They were there, they were there in the room. They would go to work with, uh, Grammy and grandpa and they would help out. And I'm just so thankful for that opportunity because it really stretched them in this area.

43:52

That's really neat. And God puts those areas and times in our life for our kids to learn. But if we don't see it and we don't grab ahold of that opportunity, we just, we miss it.

44:02

And there, I can think back even now of so many times that we've missed going, oh, that would have been a perfect teaching opportunity.

44:10

But by God's grace, he gives us other opportunities and that's, and that's so kind of him to do that. So I love this, where this is going, and we could talk more and more about how different examples of ways that your kids can serve their family members.

44:24

But I think it's more than that too. I think, you know, we can broaden our minds really easily. We can go from serving the family to serving the, the, the body of Christ, the church family, you know, now, even if the child is, is, is unsaved, you know,

44:36

I'm obviously this, this can still apply to them because they're still serving the people who have called themselves

44:42

Christians, part of the body of Christ being a blessing to them. I mean, that's all over scripture. We see that all throughout

44:48

Acts and the epistles, how people gave not just for their family, but for all the other believers and sometimes believers, they didn't even know.

44:57

So what are some ways that your family ministers to people at church? That is, it is so neat to be able to have a body of believers and to be able to have another opportunity for our kids to be able to serve, meeting a need at church with your kids, you know, there are kids at church always, and just being able to help out with other people's children.

45:21

So whether it's nursery, a lot of nurseries have like restrictions on kids helping in there.

45:27

But that is an option that you can do. Cooking a meal is one that we have done a lot because again, for me and my five little ones, being able to serve at home.

45:39

So I'm cooking a meal and having the kids help me prepare. And there's the excitement of that and then bring it to a sick church member or somebody who just lost a loved one, whatever it might be, just having that opportunity, but to really have your kids involved in doing that ministry of cooking that meal is a wonderful thing.

45:59

I brought Anya with me to help someone move and to clean their house. And she loves to clean and organize and pack.

46:05

And so I brought her with me. If you're not careful, someone's going to get the idea to try to kidnap your daughter, just so they can have her live with them because she sounds so wonderful.

46:17

It is actually very funny. I went to a Norwex party and it's all like these cleaning supplies and stuff. And it said, write down one of your secret weapons in cleaning.

46:28

And I wrote down Anya and everyone in the party knew Anya and they were all like, come on, will you rent her out?

46:38

She just loves to clean. It's actually very funny. Yeah, she is quite the gift. I'm very thankful for her.

46:45

But yeah, she helped move and that was really great. And she's a horse, man. That girl, she can hold twice her body weight.

46:50

I mean, she only weighs two pounds, but man, she can hold a lot of weight. So that's really helpful.

46:56

And again, babysitting, we go back to that, is always a need. And then for church families,

47:01

I would say saving money for someone. And we like to do that for missionaries. The kids save up money and we have little photo albums, like those cheap little

47:10

CVS photo albums that are really flat and small. And each one of our kids have their names on them.

47:16

And then as they struggle with things in their life and we have verses that go along with that sin to help them either share or be quick to hear, slow to anger, quick to hear, slow to anger, slow to speak.

47:32

There we go. We put their verses, I print them out, put their verses in there, and then they all have their own missionary and they have a picture of their missionary in that photo album.

47:43

And so that's their own book. And so we have five of those books and they all have different verses in them for their different struggles in their life.

47:49

And then they have their own missionary that they pray for and then they save money for. And so some of their birthday money or their

47:56

Christmas money, they can save it up and give it to their missionary. And they can either do a care package for them or they just send them the money.

48:04

We write a check and they pay us and give the money to their missionary. And they really, really love doing that as well.

48:11

And a lot of them get to see their missionaries on a regular basis. And so they get to tell them, we're praying for you.

48:16

And then ask specific prayer requests. And even in that, we're sharing and we're serving and we're making our children servants in that area because they're, they're looking for those needs and then trying to meet them.

48:28

And whether it's prayer or financial or whatever it might be. Now, these are some great examples, but obviously they're just a couple ideas specifically, you know, coming from your family, from my family.

48:40

Every family is different. Every child's unique. You may have a child who, you know, could, who's old enough to go out and mow someone's lawn or to rake someone's leaves.

48:49

Things like that are really easy to come up with, you know, but things that are unique to you. For example, this one young lady, I know she's recently turned 18, but as a 17 year old, it was her idea to go out and to collect a bunch of things that she was going to put into all these boxes to send over to military personnel.

49:05

And I mean, it was a huge undertaking that she and her brothers and her family all participated in and got to kind of watch what she was doing.

49:12

And she was putting it up on Facebook and it was so cool. So ask your kids, really know your family well, and to know the unique ways that your family can go and serve.

49:21

My wife can go to a nursing home and our children can play their instruments and they could sing or can minister or tell funny stories to the people there.

49:29

I mean, there's just things that your family is going to be able to do maybe better than another family can do. And I think that kind of leads us to the third group of people that we can minister to, you know, ministering, teach them to serve the family, teach them to serve the church family, but really they need to be serving everyone.

49:43

There's nobody that we shouldn't be serving. And so there are those people outside of the family too, those people outside of the church family.

49:50

And obviously I think this one's easy because, you know, we would do for them any of the things that we would do inside the church or for the family.

49:58

You can babysit them. You can mow their lawns. You can, you can do all these things. But I think the biggest idea to teach our children, especially if they're born again, is that the best way that we can serve people outside of the family is to share the gospel, to share with them the most important truth they will ever need to know.

50:15

That is being the best servant on the entire planet. And that's one of the things that we actually have a conversation in the van every single time we get out to go grocery shopping,

50:24

I ask them, how can you serve mommy and those around you today?

50:30

And then they will answer by obeying mommy, by being quiet, by listening, by being respectful.

50:36

And then I say, how is that serving? And then Anya or one of the older kids usually say, because if we are disobedient and we are bad, why would anyone want to listen to the gospel from you?

50:50

And that's the whole point. And so I teach them, we want to wrap that gospel up in a beautiful package to be able to give to people.

50:58

And so if you guys are listening and obeying and being a blessing to other people, then people will want to hear what mommy has to say even more.

51:07

But if you guys are being nasty and crabby, just like their kids and screaming, then what, you know, what do

51:14

I have to give? Nothing. There's not really anything that, that they're going to want to listen to because I am no different than them.

51:21

But if we can show Christ and everything we say and do while we're out, people will notice and they will want to hear the gospel and we'll have opportunities to share the gospel.

51:31

And so my kids right now, especially the young ones, I tell them, you might not be able to share the gospel, but you can make it, make a situation so that mommy has the ability to share the gospel.

51:41

And I have been able to in town and that has been so neat because either my kids have chosen to listen and obey and they've sat there quietly and I've been able to share the gospel with someone really quickly or just by our testimony.

51:55

I have had people come up and say, Hey, are you Christians? Because you guys live differently and talk to each other differently than everybody else.

52:01

And that's been so neat. And it's cool that the kids can be able to see that as well. Oh yeah, totally. And I, and I love that the motivation is not, you know,

52:09

Hey, be good while we're out in public so that, you know, because, you know, you're my kid or because, you know, you reflect on me, it's you be good in public so that we can glorify

52:17

God. And so that I can have the opportunity to share his truth and we can be a good example. I mean, the, the motivation is so pure.

52:23

It's so beautiful because it has everything to do with God. Wow. That is a powerful, huge list of things.

52:29

And we really appreciate your time. Uh, you, the listener, I know we, our episodes are not normally this long, but man, it's just so much good stuff.

52:36

And again, let me just say that I personally have watched John and Jessica actually do these things in their home.

52:43

It's not a theory. Okay. I mean, they're mentioning so many things and I'm like, wow, I didn't even know they were doing that. And I can't tell you the amazing ways that I've observed

52:51

God using their parenting to Anya and Ethan, Isaac, Olivia, and Logan, uh, to be servants of God.

52:58

Now, normally we don't have episode notes when we have a guest on, but today I do have a skeleton outline for you at taking back the family that includes some of the outline that we talked about today, as well as some of the verses, please do us a favor, share this episode with your friends, uh, be a servant to your friends by providing them this awesome episode full of tons of resources that will help them rear servants in their home.

53:20

And then plan to join us next time. Cause we're going to do a three part series on your children's friends.

53:25

We're going to discover how many of them are actually friends and what the Bible has to say about friends and what to do if your kids have bad friends and how to teach your children to choose good friends.

53:35

And this all will have a certain amount of impact too, on how they serve because your kids should be serving their friends, not using their friends to get ahead in life, not using their friends to make them feel good, but they should be having the desire to be a blessing to their friends.

53:50

I'm really looking forward to that. And I hope you'll join us. And I also want to take this moment to thank Ray and Carolyn for their generous support.

53:58

Uh, Jessica and I know Ray and Carolyn as dad and mom, and this little, this little family of four,

54:05

Ray, Carolyn, Aaron, and Jessica, we're just dedicated really to equipping you to be intentional premeditated disciple -making ambassadors, servant, parent of God.

54:16

And, uh, we are, we love this. We love you. We love this ministry that God has given to us. We appreciate you and your time.

54:21

And Jessica, I appreciate you for taking this time out. I know your kids are probably being good somewhere serving some little old ladies or something to give you all of this time to have this conversation.

54:33

Um, no doubt. Thank you so much for coming. Yep. I was a joy.

54:40

I'm so thankful for being able to do this. Now, if you'd like to learn more about how you could become a patron or a sponsor of this episode,

54:47

I know that Ray and Carolyn and my sister would strongly encourage you to click on the five ways to support TLP link in the description of this episode.

54:54

And remember, God will never command you to do something that you can't do through his power.

55:00

That means that God expects you to become a servant. He expects me to become a servant and he expects our children to do the same and you can do it through his power.

55:09

So I'll see you next time. Truth. Love. Parents is part of the

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Evermind Ministries 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.