TLP 36: Parenting Q&A | Tim Challies interview, Part 2

So, what I say here is never exactly what people want, but I think it's what they need. And this happens a lot when people ask me questions.

The Church as the First Source of Counseling for Parenting Problems

Welcome to Truth. Love. Parents. Where we use God's Word to become intentional, premeditated parents. Here's your host, A .M. Brewster.

Thank you for joining us today. Last time, I spoke with Tim Challies about parental blind spots. It was a fantastically insightful discussion. If you haven't heard it yet, please check out episode 35.

And there's more good news. Tim is back with us to answer some of your parenting questions. I love involving you in these podcasts because we're doing all of this for just two people. Our great and awesome Heavenly Father and you.

So, don't ever hesitate to suggest topics, ask questions, and participate in our discussions. So, Tim, thank you for staying with us to answer a few questions.

Sure thing.

I'd like to start with a big question. Something a little heavy. Again, it's possibly just because of the ministry that I'm in. My day job is lead counselor and residence manager at Victory Academy for Boys.

And I find that every parent who sends their child to us has this one thing in common. They no longer are able to influence their child. They speak to their child. They teach a child. They try to help their child.

And it's like the kids are a brick wall and they refuse to accept it. And so, we step in as a ministry not to take the place of mom and dad, but to really, in two big things, number one, help the child come to a place where he's accepting God's truth.

And then number two, helping the parents get back to a place of influence by helping the child get back to a place where they will accept God's truth from mom and dad. And some of the questions that we have, especially this first one, I think speaks to that because oftentimes influence is lost because of something that I've done.

Many times it's lost because something that I've done as a parent. And oftentimes that can include mom and dad not being on the same page. This first question we have from Buddy embodies that. He's asked this question.

What advice would you give a Christian dad whose wife is not a Christian and antagonistic? And then he follows that up with, how would that advice change if it were with the mom?

So, what I say here is never exactly what people want, but I think it's what they need. And this happens a lot when people ask me questions. I want to direct them first back to their local church. So, it's not the job of a podcast or a counselor or anyone else, not primarily, to give that counsel.

It's the job of the local church, the leaders in a local church. At least it falls under their jurisdiction, their ministry, because they're the ones who know the situation. They're the ones who have the capacity to properly follow up the situation.

They're the ones who know a lot of the intricate details of the situation. They're the ones who have been charged by God to shepherd that person. And so, I think that's where I'd want to say your very first thing has to be to go to your local church and plead with your elders for help.

And I would then not want to... I'd be very hesitant to contradict their advice or to give advice that would counter what they would say because those men on the ground there are the ones who are best equipped to take that one on.

Yep, and that is fantastic. We definitely want to point our listeners back to the church because you can know a lot about the Bible, but if you don't know the people themselves, if you don't know who they are and their relationship with the Lord, it's so difficult to answer these questions.

I am curious, though, what if I tweak this question just a little bit? What if this question is not being asked by the individual who is in the situation where the husband or the wife is antagonistic?

What if this question is being asked by an individual who is a pastor, who is working with a family, and the Christian dad comes to him and says, you know, I'm trying to rear my kids for the Lord. I go off to work.

My wife doesn't believe in God or whatever else, and she's not on page with me, but she's doing so much of the parenting. What do I do? And the pastor says, what do I do? Where do I point him in this situation?

Would you have any specific advice for that pastor in dealing with that family?

Sure, yeah.

Confidence in God When Parenting with an Unbelieving Spouse

I would want that father, in this case, or if you're going to switch it around, the mother. I would want those people to have a lot of confidence that God is good and that God is for them. I think that the temptation is to think, well, they're getting this unbelieving influence.

I'm going to lose this one, or the devil's influence is greater than God's influence, or something along those lines. So I'd want to lead them to some scriptures, some passages that would give them hope, that would give them confidence.

I would want them to practice humility and yet to find humble ways of boldly saying what is true. And it's not that I haven't seen this situation. I've seen both fathers whose wives are antagonistic and mothers whose husbands or ex-husbands are antagonistic.

I think most pastors have dealt with this in one way or another. But to still lead your children to the Lord, to still read and pray with them to the best of your ability, and just to trust that if you're the humble one and you're the kind one and you're the godly one and you're constantly leading people back to the Lord, you're seeking your children's forgiveness when you sin against them, you're taking the high road.

I think that stands both as then you're introducing them to the Christian faith and you're modeling the Christian faith in its own way. I think preach is much louder.

And that would obviously go for parents who are putting their kids into the public school system, saying, how am I going to be able to battle against the secular ideas that they're being taught? I think the same advice would go well for them.

Yeah, very much so.

Also, I was thinking as you were talking, that passage that refers to a woman with an unsaved husband. By her good works and by her righteousness, he can oftentimes be won. And that's obviously going to have the same effect on children as it would on a spouse.

Right. Yeah, exactly so. There's a lot of confidence to be found. And what is it that will win him? It's her quiet demeanor, right? It's her humility. It's her modesty. What I've seen so often is this constant nagging, trying to nag him into the kingdom or him trying to nag her into the kingdom or just constantly chipping away, where the Bible calls to quiet, modest behavior, not constant proselytizing.

That's not to say you don't share the gospel with your antagonistic spouse, but that there may be opportunities, but more so you live the Christian life. And as you grow in holiness, your life will more and more accuse that person of their own unholiness.

And somehow in the Lord's good grace, that can be used to challenge people and to win them to the Lord.

Okay. Well, I think that based off of the answer to the first question, perhaps your answer may be similar for the second question, because Megan asks, what do you do if you're a woman who has inherited stepchildren halfway through their lives with all of their experiences and expectations already?

They've already experienced so much of that, both past and present. How would you counsel that woman? And I'm assuming obviously the answer would be, you know, this is a question for your pastor to get their feedback.

Stepparenting, Maternal Roles, and the Help of the Local Church

Yeah, there's a lot that I would want to work out in that context. There's so much that can come with it. Were they abused? Did the mother die or was there a divorce? There's so much that could have happened there.

The kids could be traumatized. They could be doing quite well. There's just so much that comes with it. So I think the answer would have to vary a lot. But generally, I think the big distinction I've seen is whether you are taking on the role of mom or whether you're taking on the role of stepmom, right?

If they have a mom that they love and honor, then your role is very, very different. If their mom has died or mom is completely gone, then you're taking on more of a maternal role. And I think those are the sorts of things that have to be thought through and prayed through and, again, worked through in the context of a local church.

Also in the local church, you have other people to appeal to. So chances are there's someone else in that local church who has had to become a stepmom who has inherited stepchildren halfway through their lives with all their baggage past and present.

And so you can go to that person and say, what did you do? What were some mistakes you made? What is some advice you'd want to give me? So within your local church, if your local church is formed around the gospel, preaching the Bible, and full of people who love the Lord, you've got a whole lot of resources right there, and you just need to take advantage of it.

So if I could just kind of pull a couple things out there. One was your role in that family is going to dictate to a large degree how you handle the relationships, obviously, with the stepkids. And then two, I was thinking of that verse, let the older women teach the younger women.

Find those resources in the local body of people who can tell you how the Lord worked through them and what worked and didn't work, what their blind spots were.

Yeah, exactly. Titus 2 is great for that. Just addressing the distinction between women who have been there and women who are just arriving there. Of course, the same is true of men. Always look at people who have already been down that road and look to them for help.

And that's true in all of parenting. If you haven't at one time scanned your church and seen a couple and said, I want my kids to be like their kids, you need to go to that family. You need to go to those parents and say, how can my kids be like your kids?

That is a very legitimate, useful question in the life of the local church. And then just sit back and listen or ask if you can hang out with them. Just figure out how, you know, find good models and form yourself around them.

That's why we're in community.

And like we talked about last time, that's all part of that multitude of counselors. Getting people speaking God's truth lovingly into your life and being willing and open to be transparent, to be humble to one another, each other, really.

Yeah, and the one another is great because the one another implies that you're going to them and they're coming to you. You're going to them in good moments and bad, they're coming to you in good moments and bad.

They're encouraging. And if necessary, rebuking or exhorting in the sense of addressing things you're not doing well and giving you a better alternative. That's all good and all legitimate within the context of the local church.

It's all very hard as well because we are so proud.

Shepherding the Heart Rather Than Only Behavior

Well, this next question is a little bit more personal for you. Kevin writes and wants to know, other than the Bible, what one parenting book has been the most influential for you? I'm really curious about this one too.

Yeah, I guess it would probably be Shepherding a Child's Heart by Ted Tripp. And I think it was just the right book at the right time. And, you know, I think it's John Piper who says, books don't change people's sentences do.

So if you read a whole book and you get one idea out of the book, then that is time well invested. So to some degree, Tripp lays out a methodology and we've never really followed that methodology much.

But we did get the idea of the child's heart. You're not just addressing their behavior, you're pursuing their heart. And he illustrates that and describes that in many different ways. But that's the heart of parenting.

The temptation is always, always just to address their behavior, especially when they're behaving badly. The much deeper thing you need to be doing, the much more effective thing is to be pursuing the heart.

That's the struggle, but that's the big challenge of the book. And I think it's really that. Gospel-powered parenting by William Farley was also very good and helpful in its own way, but I still think Shepherding a Child's Heart was right at the top of the list.

Out of curiosity, because it's just one that I've recently read and plan to discuss later, but have you read Paul Tripp's newest book that came out in September just called Parenting?

I have not.

Okay. Yeah, I'll just tell you, friend of friend here, I would definitely encourage you reading that, because I'm not even all the way through it yet, and it has been a huge encouragement for me, so I can add that one to the list there.

Great.

All right, let me see here.

Okay, here we go.

Joe asks this question. A truth-loved parent has been dealing a lot with teaching children biblical sexuality. How do you plan to address that with your kids?

Teaching Biblical Sexuality as an Ongoing Conversation

Well, my kids are 10, 14, and 17, so we have addressed it in many ways at many times.

Good.

Maybe. How did you address that with your kids?

Yeah, so John Yontz, he goes by J. Yontz, that's Y-O-U-N-T-S, has a couple of books about the talk, about that sort of phase that we all go through where we're instructing our children in sexuality, and I found his work very, very helpful in that way.

But really, I think that there's two ways to go wrong. There's various ways to go wrong. One of them is to think that it's a one-time deal, that you teach them about sex or sexuality, and then you move on.

But it's not that. It's many, many different conversations and different talks, and it's often circling around. We've had conversations with our children where we explained and answered their questions, and then two weeks later we saw they really had no understanding of what they had heard.

They still didn't really get it. So if we had just left it at that one talk, that wouldn't be very helpful to them. And so circling around, and really a lot of it is allowing them to dictate. If you can create a safe place, and you can allow your children to know that you will answer their questions, and you'll do it without being angry or without being embarrassed, you're just going to answer what they ask in appropriate ways, then I think you create an atmosphere where they can approach you, and they can come to you and ask those burning questions.

Our children are in public schools, and so there's opportunities. There's things they're going to hear as any child here, but then they're also potentially going to be taught things that would counter what we believe.

And we're not at all opposed to them being taught those things, but we want to speak to them louder and clearer, and think it's actually quite helpful for them at a younger age, you know, in their teens, to hear the alternate viewpoint.

And then while they're still under our care and still love and trust us, there's a lot we can teach them about why that is just not God's way, and why God's way is always better.

Amen. Wonderful. Well, knowing what our topic last time was going to be, this idea of parental blind spots, I think one of our listeners decided to turn the tables on you. Their question ends up being specifically for you, Tim, what's the biggest parenting blind spot that you've encountered to date in your parenting?

What's that one thing that just kind of, when it was all said and done, you're like, oh, you know, I should have, or maybe I could have seen that coming, praise God that I realize it now.

A Blind Spot in Warm, Personal Faith

That's the funny thing about blind spots, right, is I suspect my biggest blind spots are ones that I have not yet seen, or that others have not yet told me. And as much as I advocate seeking out help and other people suggesting help in appropriate ways, it's very, very rare.

So I have a bad feeling that that blind spot relates to speaking of my faith in a really warm and personal way. So we do family devotions, and I speak to my children about what I believe and all of that, but yet I fear that I don't let them, I don't allow them enough into my personal relationship with the Lord.

And so perhaps what their encountering of the Christian faith interpreted through me would be too formal and not warm and relational enough.

That's a wonderful observation. Praise God that you have at least an inkling that perhaps that's maybe something that could be addressed.

Wonderful.

Well, we have two questions left here. This next question, I think, is a significant one, and it kind of turns, it doesn't turn your article on its head. I think it just comes at it from a different angle than what you originally intended.

The question goes like this, in your article, Three Parenting Myths, you said that some parents would sacrifice their own walk with God, their emotional health, and even their marriage for their children, and you pointed out how that was wrong.

But my question is this, what should we as Christian parents be willing to sacrifice? And I'll just say, obviously, for clarification, the reader agreed with your points in your article, and obviously there are things that we should never sacrifice, and yet there are things where I think we're not willing to sacrifice them as much as we should.

What Christian Parents Should Be Willing to Sacrifice

Yeah.

Boy.

I guess we have to sacrifice just about everything we can for our children. We have to be willing to. I think one of the hardest parts about parenting is an unwillingness to sacrifice in those moments when it's inconvenient, when we're tired, when there's other things going on that we deem more important.

So we have to be, obviously we sacrifice our money, obviously we sacrifice our comfort, obviously we sacrifice a lot of our dreams, you know, the things we might like to do today we can't do until we're empty nesters.

We sacrifice a lot of our time. But I think we have to be willing to sacrifice just about, just about all we've got for their benefit. Yeah, I find this one hard. I think one of my struggles is giving my time to the kids, and I can have great, great ideas and great plans for early in the day, but when the evening comes and I'm tired and my kids are now finally available, that's when I'm actually least likely to want to do things with them.

So that sacrifice of time is something I found so, so difficult.

Yeah, and I just, it totally resonated with me just then because I was thinking in my head, yep, yeah, I can remember that. Yeah, yeah, all those times I've done the same thing. And I think what's interesting about the list that you put out about the things that you shouldn't sacrifice really come down to the core relationships that God has in our lives.

Our relationship with the Lord. I think very much the emotional health to a degree is related to our relationship with the Lord. And then our marriages being preeminent, obviously in our families, even above and beyond our relationship with our children.

So I think keeping a right view of those relationships and then pretty much everything else is really, it's open game when it comes to what we should sacrifice for our kids.

Yep.

Awesome. Well, here's the last question. And it goes like this. What's the hardest situation you've encountered in parenting and how did you handle it, good and or bad?

Suffering, Providence, and God’s Goodness in Parenting

So I feel like I'm cheating a little bit on this one, but we've had a very easy time of parenting and at least when I compare it to others. So there's two ways of looking at parenting, what you've actually gone through or comparing it to what other people have experienced.

And sometimes I think about people we love and what they've gone through. We know people who have lost a child, people who have had severely disabled children, children who have been sexually abused. Our parenting has been beautifully simple.

And it hasn't been, so it's been difficult in the sense of we have children who are children of Adam. They are simple children and God has charged us, God has charged us with helping them, with teaching them and training them.

That's a difficult thing. And yet we haven't had any of those really grueling situations that so many others have had. So I feel like there's others who would answer this in a much different way and with much deeper sorrows in mind.

And though I understand your feeling that that almost feel like you're cheating in a bit, at the same time I just want to say it offers us hope. Obviously you've admitted that you're not a perfect parent, your children aren't perfect, but our God is good.

And when God does bring difficult situations into our lives, he doesn't just, oops, I'm sorry about that, sorry I didn't mean for that to get thrown there, I hope you make it out okay. He brings it into our lives because he knows that equipped with his word and his power, that that's exactly what we need to become the people he wants us to be.

And for those people who are in a different situation and those things haven't come into their lives, it's not that they're better off or it's not that they're more spiritual, it's just that's not the type of thing that God has chosen for them.

Right. I was recently reading a book by J .R. Miller, who's a Victorian pastor, and he was writing about this, why some people suffer and some don't. And obviously he doesn't have clear answers for every person, but he does talk about trees.

He makes this nice little analogy with trees, talking about how some trees need to be windswept and they grow in bare places and other trees grow in sheltered valleys and God knows where each one needs to go.

And in the same way, God knows what is best for each one of us. He makes the comparison to gardeners as well. The wise gardener knows where to plant each flower. And so God, the divine gardener, knows where his people will best grow into what he would have them be.

Some require the fierce storm. Some will only thrive spiritually in the shadow of worldly adversity. And some come to ripeness more sweetly under the soft and gentle influences of prosperity, whose beauty rough experiences would mar.

He knows what is best for each one. So I found a lot of hope there, that no matter what you're in, God has somehow determined that it is right and it is best and it is what will more and more conform you to the image of his son.

So whatever your situation, whether your children are doing well or struggling, whether they've gone through really difficult things or not, God's at work and he's doing what's best for you and for your children, if you're in Christ.

Well, amen, and thank you so much. This has been, I know for me, very encouraging. I pray it'll be the same for my listeners. Thank you again for taking this time to answer these questions and to spend this time with us.

I hope that perhaps as our listeners go to your website and as they read your material that it'll do really the two things that we hope and pray for that we are doing on this podcast. Number one, that it present God's truth.

Number two, it'll do it with God's love. Because as we've already observed, we need people speaking truth into our lives in a loving way so that we can grow and become more like him.

Yeah, that's my hope and prayer, too. Thanks for having me. It's been fun.

Thanks a lot, Tim. I hope all of you listening today will like and follow Tim on Facebook and Twitter and swingbychallies .com. I'll give you all the links in the description. And of course, please like and follow TLP on Facebook and me on Twitter at ambruster.

And I hope you'll join us next time for a very important discussion about parenting terrorists. Have your children ever thrown a temper tantrum? Have they ever manipulated you by yelling, kicking the wall, or throwing something?

Have you ever chosen to ignore your children's behavior because you didn't want to deal with the repercussions? If so, then you, like all of us, have parented a terrorist. So on our next episode, we'll deal with some very practical steps you can take with a terrorist in your home.

In fact, we're starting a short series of interconnected episodes that will provide you a number of tools you can use when your children are losing control. And remember, you're not alone in this. Tim and I and a milieu of other Christian parents are right where you are trying to parent our kids for Christ.

I praise God that we can be a blessing to you, but I want to encourage you to do the same for another family. Share this podcast, or better yet, encourage them face-to-face, these struggling parents that you know with the truths that God's been teaching to you.

And we'll see you next time.

Truth. Love. Parents. is part of the Evermind Ministries family and is dedicated to helping you become an intentional, premeditated parent. Join us next time as we search God's Word for the truth your family needs today.