What I Learned on My Summer Vacation 2004 Part 2

In the second session of his summer vacation reflections, Tom Shrader challenges parents to understand their true standing before God - deserving hell but receiving grace. He critiques modern permissive parenting and provides eleven ways parents can ruin their children, including living vicariously through them, giving stuff instead of love, and refusing to discipline. Shrader calls parents to be parents rather than friends, emphasizing the importance of saying no and teaching children what truly matters.

“I deserve to burn in hell, anything less than that is a pretty good day.”

— Tom Shrader

Series: What I Learned on My Summer Vacation

Recorded: September 02, 2004

Duration: 43 min

Themes: parenting, discipline, grace, authority, boundaries, love, teaching, character, struggling parent, new parent, raising children, parent, mother, father, family leader, overwhelmed parent

Scripture: Romans 3:10-12, Romans 3:23

Theological Themes: sanctification, biblical parenting, parental authority, child discipline, grace doctrine, christian parenting, biblical authority, spiritual formation

Full Transcript

This is the second session in what we titled, What I Learned on My Summer Vacation. I know for some, because twice a year I repeat in church what I do here. This is one of those times. So if you're out of that church group, and there's probably just a couple of you, I apologize for the redundancy, but you're here, so hang on. It's also a time where we kind of get away from a study flowing out of the scriptures necessarily and where I get to look at stuff that I see, hear, experience. It's just a great time for me and hopefully helpful to you as well.

We looked at last week, don't need to recap it. One of the things we did on summer vacation, we were up at Cannon Beach, and I am a huge Cannon Beach guy. I love Cannon Beach. In fact, how good is life, I just got a call from them yesterday to book coming up for a week at the 4th of July next summer. Perfect. And I could not say yes fast enough.

Testing Environments and Learning

When you're in that environment, it's a testing environment. We have at church, we are trying, attempting to teach young men in particular how to preach. And I try to tell them it's like anything else. You can go to a sales class, but the way you learn to sell is to sell. The way you learn to preach is to preach and the best way to learn is to be in environments that you really are uncomfortable in and really are beyond you.

A conference is a lot like that because when you walk into a conference setting, you have no idea who's there or what's there. You have churches of all different backgrounds. In fact, we were at the ASU game a couple weeks ago sitting in that weather delay and there's like five or six of us at a table and we start talking and then all of a sudden somebody mentions East Valley Bible Church and this guy was there and he said, are you guys part of East Valley Bible Church?

We said, well, we go there and he said, no, no. He said, my sister was just at a conference in Cannon Beach and there was a guy from your church who was up there and taught and she said, I ought to go hear this guy. And I said, he's incredible. He's unbelievable. He is the best. And I said, every time he speaks, he just captures my attention. So funny.

Diffusing Hostile Environments

Well, when we go into those semi-hostile environments, potentially, we always try to diffuse them a bit. So a little bit of humor. We may have talked about some of this in here before, but one of the things we talk about is we know there's Episcopalians and Presbyterians and all these others, but are there any of you from a redneck church? How do you know if you're from a redneck church? Let me give you four or five things.

Number one, the finance committee refuses to provide funds for the purchase of a chandelier because none of the members know how to play one. So that's one way. And this is good. When the pastor says, I'd like Bubba to help take up an offering, five guys and two women stand up. That's a redneck church. And the last one is referred to as branding. That's a redneck church.

I like this. You've got to listen closely. When finding and returning lost sheep isn't just a parable, you're in a redneck church. I like that. People think rapture is what happens to you when you lift something too heavy. You're in a redneck church.

So what happened to us Sunday is, I have the graphics, which I don't here, so I had a couple of pictures and one of them, I wish I could do this show, one of them is a redneck walking his dog. It's a guy sitting in a chair with a Coke, looking at a TV with his dog on a leash and the dog's on a treadmill. And it's perfect. And the other one was a redneck palm pilot and it's a palm with a string and it just has on it written, get beer. So that was pretty good.

A Book About Living and Dying

Well, I said last week, I read a lot, I did read a lot and I read, this book is totally a chick book. This is just a chick book. The cover's a chick cover. I mean, it's just the colors and you look in the back and there's two ladies and you look on the forwards, Katie Couric and the title is Tales from the Bed, hang with me now, on living, dying and having it all, a memoir.

Whenever I see, and I tend to hang and peruse in like a Barnes and Noble, that's why I'm going tonight for the debate, is to Barnes and Noble, I'm going to go to Barnes and Noble because I don't want to watch this. And so I'm going to go to Barnes and Noble and I like to hang out where they'll have, like Barnes and Noble usually has a section where they'll go unusual reading or they'll have different things.

And Barnes and Noble, and I'm a big Borders guy, but Borders is losing me gradually over several issues. They have the dirtiest restrooms in the world, which I don't understand. And they took out, we've talked about this before, they took out the biography section, which to me is stupid, especially when you come in and they have a section that goes new biography. If you have new biography, why wouldn't you have old biography? So I have my own little problems.

So I see this book and it's on living and dying and having it all and it's a memoir by a gal as told to her sister. I pick it up and the story is there's this young lady, there's these three sisters, and they are close, they're tight, they're friends. And they're ready to embark on perhaps a new business venture when this one, Jennifer, has some problems and some spasms in some of her arms and legs. Eventually it drives her to the doctor and she has Lou Gehrig's disease. And the book is about from that point on, what happens to her, she ultimately dies, her sister finishes writing the book.

For whatever reason, though I really do think it's a chick book, I wrote it, I got it all turned up and there were just a lot of things in there. Let me read you one, so we're trying to see what I learned on my summer vacation. Let me read you one paragraph. Why me? You've asked that question, I'm sure. I have, my sisters have, why us? Why did a fatal disease with no medicine break up our miraculous love and cut it short? I don't know.

Look at Christie Brinkley, which by the way is pretty good advice. I digress. Look at Christie Brinkley. You wouldn't think she has a "why me," but I bet she does. Look at your parents, your friends, your children, look in the mirror. Everyone faces a challenge. Everyone has a "why me." I got a pretty bad one.

Now a little bit earlier, she has this simple sentence, six words if I remember correctly: "Unfairness is a fact of life." When I read this, coupled with a whole bunch of other things in that book, I go back to what was going on in my life as I was leading up to vacation, and this is just me and your vision may be way different.

The "You Deserve It" Mentality

I was really working hard last year. I mean really working hard. Lots of hours, lots of issues, lots of stuff, lots of teaching, lots of just working hard. People were saying to me as I was getting ready for vacation, "You deserve it. You deserve vacation."

Then we went away, had a great time, came back for a meeting, and they said, "How's vacation going? How was the cruise?" We said, "It was great." They said, "You deserve it." Then we went away, went up to Flag and we had this great place and it was terrific and it was ideal and it was magnificent. We're going to be there the first two weeks of August next year, I can't wait. We came back, they said, "How was Flag?" I said, "It was terrific." They said, "You deserve it."

Then we went away to Cannon Beach and we came back and now we're back. They said, "How was..." Now this is when I come back and I always get a little sensitive about this. They'll say, "How was your summer?" I'll say, "Well technically June and July stunk because I was here with you. What you meant was, how was August?" I get a little sensitive there. I said, "It was terrific" and they said, "You deserve it."

What We Actually Deserve

In the back of our worship center, there's the music offices and one of the music guys has a little plaque back there that deals with this topic. The plaque simply says this: "I deserve to burn in hell; anything less than that is a pretty good day." That's what I want to focus on because I know what they mean. I say the same thing, "You deserve it. You've worked hard, you deserve it."

Sometimes I fear we forget what we actually have earned. The wages of sin is death. I deserve hell. I deserve to burn in hell. Anything less than that is a pretty good day.

What I want you to get here is a biblical view of how God sees you and me as lost people. Paul writes and gives it to us in Romans chapter 3. Here's what he says: "There's none righteous, not one. There's none who understands. There's none who seek for God. Together they have all become useless. There's none who does good, not even one." And "All have sinned."

It's a universal statement. Each and every human being that's ever lived is a sinner. And the wage of sin is death. And what I deserve is not just separation from God, but I deserve eternal destruction.

Our Tendency to Minimize Sin

It's so important for you and me to start to see our lives and to see especially sin as God sees it, because our instinct is to always minimize it. I've got a couple of illustrations that I use all the time. One of them is Adam. It's a great illustration because when you read the story, you kind of look at it and go, "What did Adam do? He ate some fruit. What's the big deal?"

And certainly I can understand God, if you want to duke it out with Adam, have at it. If you want to punish Adam and you want to put him in time out for a while, I understand that. But clearly, you're not going to let that sin pass on to all humanity. You're not going to let that usher in sickness and death and suffering and pain.

You understand that. You and I understand that, don't we? We understand that before Adam's sin, nothing was dying and nothing was scheduled to die. But with Adam's sin comes condemnation to the world. And don't you and I look at that and go, "Man, how big is the sin? It's this big. How big is the punishment? It's this big." And don't you sound like one of your kids when you want to go to God and say, "God, what's the big deal? You seem all bent out of shape here."

David's Census: Another Example

We see it all through scripture. I love the illustration of David. In the story, David takes a census. Seems like a harmless thing to do. We do it every 10 years. He takes a census. He counts the horses. He counts the people. Counts the wealth. Counts what's going on.

And God says, "OK, that's it." And you're going, "What's the big deal?" Well, God had said, "Don't take a census." Why? Well, because the minute you do, it's kind of like you are every quarter when you get your statement and you look at that money and you go, "Look at this I'm doing. I'm secure. Look at this. I'm secure. Look at this house. Nothing can touch me." And God had said, "Don't do it."

So now it's time to punish him. And God says, "You've got three options here, David. What do you want?" And David comes and said, "God, you pick what's appropriate." And God kills 70,000 people. Isn't that amazing?

Now, how big is that sin? I mean, I find myself on this one going, "Gee, really? How big a deal is this?" How big is the punishment? This. Our view of sin and our view of our own sin is to always minimize it. And we look at God's punishment and we sound like my kids used to say, "What's the big deal, Dad? What's the big deal, Dad?" Just take out "Dad" and put in "God." "What's the big deal, God?"

Another guy and he says, "Isn't that illegal? Isn't that wrong?" The guy's response was, "Not if you don't get caught." It's wrong.

I read a Dear Abby letter where a kid's writing in and said, "Listen, I'm feeling guilty here because I took something that belonged to somebody else." He talked to his friend who said, "No, stealing is just borrowing without asking for permission." Harkens you back to the Clinton days, doesn't it? And it was something they ate or whatever and they couldn't give it back. So she wrote back and said, "No, borrowing by definition is asking for permission. Stealing is stealing." But that's kind of our reaction.

As I'm on vacation, I'm reading different things, and I read a lot of periodicals. To be really honest, not because I'm trying to expand my knowledge—I'm looking for quotes to use for you. This is one: Jamie Lee Curtis out of Moore Magazine from September. "I'm freer today than I've ever been." Listen to this. Why? Why is she freer today than she's ever been? "Because I'm in control." Control of what?

Here's this—marry that with the story of the girl in this book who cannot even control her right arm. We're not in control of anything. We may have an illusion of control. Now there are some things you can control. You can control your attitude, you can control your response, you can control your behavior so it's not sinful. I understand that, but "I'm in control of my life, I'm in control of my domain, I'm in control of..." Silly. That's the start.

The Challenge of Modern Parenting

What I want to spend the day on is this. There's no way you can see it. This is Newsweek Magazine from September 13th, so not outdated at all. This is pretty current stuff. The cover story is a picture of a gal, looks to be a mother, head to head with a young man, young boy. He looks to be about twelve. He's got earphones in. He's looking at her, staring at her. They're in a face-off. The headline in the story is "How to Say No to Your Kids."

Now what this article says is kind of interesting. The article basically says saying no—let me put it the other way—not saying no, in other words being permissive with your kids, can have some bad results and they may not be responsive. I'm stunned that that's front page material, but apparently it is.

So what I want to talk about is parenting. Now some of you are going, "Why are we...get your coat, Bessie, we're out of here. We're not parents anymore. You're grandparents. You're talking to parents." I don't care. Every person, if you've got a mom, a dad, if you were born into this world and you got contact with somebody, you need to be through this because you need to think it through.

I don't have the notes. The notes are on the website if you want to download them. So if you go to evbc.org, you can download them.

A Necessary Warning

I spent just a second here as a caveat because there are two things that we can talk about in here that instantaneously produce reaction: divorce and marriage and kids. We're not going to talk about divorce and marriage, but we're going to talk about kids. The minute we talk about it, some of you are careening out of control. There's all sorts of emotion. There's all sorts of guilt. There's all sorts of problems. That's okay. This is not meant to be discouraging, but encouraging. And as I said, if you're married and don't have kids, if your kids are out of the house, you need this because you're going to have an opportunity to talk to people about it.

Now I add—hit the pause button on that. When I'm in church, I would say what also is really divisive is music. And every time I say it, at every church you're at, you laugh because it's an issue. So I made this point when I was teaching this in church: music is divisive. Here's a note that I got. It's written, my suspicion by the handwriting, by a man, an older man, and he misspelled my name. So we're not starting off well.

Here's what he said: "Your music does not need to be divisive, abandon the rock and roll theme, and return to a more serene and respectable music format." It's like exhibit A of what I was saying. "Your music doesn't have to be divisive, just do what I would like you to do." And let me read you the rest of it. It's been signed "Obviously, Always." "Your current format is based on repeat, repeat, repeat—does this sound like your church?—and has little, if any, musical value. Let's develop this lifestyle. We work when we work, we play when we play, we attend concerts when we look for musical nourishment, be prayerful and quiet in the Lord's place of worship, be joyful that we can be absorbed in His word and not revved up by the band." It's like exhibit A of what I was trying to say to Him, and it doesn't need to be divisive. That's a side note. We're back to the lesson.

A Teacher's Perspective

Kids—before I was getting ready to teach this, I got this letter, this email. "I understand you said you were going to talk about the importance of parents saying no to their kids. I think it's coming this Sunday." So this was the email I got the Sunday before I taught this. "If so, I think that's great. I'm a junior high math teacher, and I can't tell you how much parents need to hear this. I've been teaching for more than 20 years, and parenting skills are at an all-time low. Parents are becoming more and more permissive with their kids. As a result, those kids are getting harder and harder to teach."

"At parent-teacher conferences, it's sometimes hard to determine which one is the child and which is the parent. When I know I'm going to have to call a parent about"—and then she uses this imaginary name—"Biff, about Biff's behavior, my head starts to ache. I know I'll likely hear a boatload of excuses about why Biff can't be expected to behave, or that my expectations are just too high for poor Biff. Many parents are just caving in to their kids, and these kids are running the show."

Now in a paragraph, she said

Basically what's in that Newsweek article. One of the experts says this: it's almost like parents have lost their parenting skill. They want to be their kids' best friends, make sure they're having fun, and what kids really need is for parents to be parents.

Let me just encourage that, because I hear this all the time, especially as kids get a little bit older. "I just want to be your friend." You're not their friend. You're their mom, you're their dad, and there is inevitably going to be conflict. Your management, their labor. There's going to be this conflict. You are the one that has to toe the line.

If you don't take a line, they'll just eat Twinkie, Twinkie, Twinkie, Twinkie, Twinkie. If you don't play—you're the parent, you're the responsible one, you're the mature one, you're the one that's been through this, you're the one that's learned. You're not there to be their friend. Their friends they find at school, or at the exercise place, or at sports or somewhere. Now there's a point, I think, when they get a little bit older, that it becomes more of a friend relationship. But even then, you're mom, you're dad, they're kid.

So there's a fatal flaw right there. If you're one of these nuts that says you just want to be a friend to your kid, and you want them to have fun, you've already screwed up.

Eleven Ways to Ruin Your Kid

With that loving introduction, let me give you eleven things you can do. Eleven things you can do to ruin your kid. You do these eleven things, and I guarantee you, you'll screw your kid up.

Number one: attempt to live your life through them. There's an article in the paper when we get back—you all probably saw it—where they have been forced to cancel the Pop Warner playoffs. Now they're canceling the Pop Warner playoffs because of the rampant cheating on the part of the parents. You're moving kids around, they're lying about ages. I knew there was something up a couple years ago in the World Series when the pitcher had a better beard than me. I thought, "My, he looks like he's in his early thirties for a twelve year old."

And what is that all about? And it's just watching. I listen to parents, you watch them in these events, you watch the dads duke it out at a hockey match, you listen, you go to a grade school basketball game and the parents are screaming at the officials, yelling at coaches. There's a whole booming industry teaching these twelve year olds how to hit and how to run.

And almost always, it's mom or dad just living out their life through them. Tiger Woods has now brought to the driving range four year olds with dads who have them there hitting balls. And dads who now have little girls out thinking they're Michelle Wie. And that's fine. I don't think there's anything wrong with having a dream for your kid and fueling that dream. But you better watch closely because my experience is, most of that is about your pride, not their well-being.

My favorite illustration is from my own life—it's Iowa Basic Skills Test. And I can't even speak about Iowa Basic Skills anymore without my son-in-law, Tyler. His mom tells this great story. When Tyler was first, second grade, time to go to school, he starts crying: "I don't want to go to school, I don't want to go to school, I don't want to go to school." Very uncharacteristic of Tyler, because Tyler wanted to get to school. And finally, she calmed him down enough to say, "What's the problem, why don't you want to go to school?" And he said, "We're taking the Iowa Basic Skills Test today, and I don't know anything about Iowa."

And what's interesting—every time I say that, you hear that whole group of women go, "Aww," and the guys go, "What a putz." It's funny.

So Sarah gets her Iowa Basic Skills results at the end of her first grade year, and I look at them, and I discover that she is average. And I mean, I'm traumatized by this, and so I have to sit her down. I sit her down, and I explain, "Now, you can't understand all this, but this says you're average. Now, we got—and that's the bad news, the good news is, it comes from your mother's side of the family, and we can work, we can navigate our way through this."

Let's get down and dirty. Why do I care about her Iowa Basic Skills Test in first grade? It's for one reason, and one reason only. I want to have this extraordinary kid, so you'll look at the kid and say, "She must have a great dad." Most of the time—even, this is really honest, and this is maybe more of a reflection about how sick I am than you—but I think most people, even when they want these good things for their kids, somewhere mixed in there with a pretty high percentage is, "I want them to do well, because it reflects well on me, and it minimizes the problems I have." So you're living your life through your kid, you'll ruin the kid.

Here's the second thing—just do this: refuse to fulfill your God-given role, and by that I mean in marriage. These kids need to see a mom and dad who love and care for each other. They need to see love. I think they need to see physical contact.

The kids were over the other day to watch the Iowa game. We watch all the Iowa games, and it's been pretty painful here lately. We watch all the Iowa games, and in our family room where we watch, we have this giant L-shaped, whatever it is, kind of a couch thing, sectional, and it just envelops you. It's the most comfortable, it's perfect. Well I looked the other day, and Haley and Tyler are down there, and they're all wrapped around each other watching the game, and Timmy and Sarah are there, and they're kind of wrapped around each other watching the game, and I'm thinking, "I hope they keep that up the rest of their lives."

The tendency is to not. But especially with the kids. I used to all the time be wrestling with Susan, and I'd be all over, and I'd give her a kiss, and the girls would be going, "Oh, gross, yuck," or it might have been Susan going "gross yuck," but somebody, I know somebody...

They needed to know we were there. They needed to see dad's lead, gentlemen. They need you to take the lead, especially in the area of religion and faith. Ladies, they need to see from you what a godly wife is all about.

Don't show them that. Stay real stoic. Stay away from each other. Don't ever tell each other that you love them. Don't ever show any affection from one to the other. Don't let the kids see that, and man, that'll screw them up really big. That'll give them a great picture of marriage, and most of the times when they see that, they're going to end up acting that out in their own marriage.

Just Give Them Stuff Instead of Love

Here's a third thing you can do to ruin them. Just give them a bunch of stuff instead of love. Here's a new statistic. Money that families are spending on three to twelve-year-olds on entertainment, personal care items, and reading material is now $53.8 billion. It's up from $17 billion just seven years ago. Twelve to nineteen-year-olds are spending money - allowances, money parents give them, money they earn - $175 billion every year.

So you just give them stuff. Now here's what Newsweek says: "Despite their good intentions, too many parents find themselves raising wanting machines, who respond like Pavlov's dog to the marketing that's aimed at them. Even getting what they want doesn't satisfy these kids. They only want more."

Now listen to this sentence: "Saying no is harder when you can afford to say yes." And that's what's problematic for most of you. It's like this election and two Americas and the economy's in the toilet and all this stuff. I don't buy that for a second.

Here's how I prove it: go over to the Good Egg and try to get in there to give them $10 for 25 cents worth of eggs, and you stand in line 45 minutes to do it. There's my economic indicator right now. With families of four, I watch - it's expensive to eat, and I'm not picking on the Good Egg, it's anywhere you go. You go into a Good Egg, there's families of four and five. I'm telling you, that's a 60 buck breakfast. Don't tell me how bad it is. It's bad, and you may not have everything, because you're dumping all your money on all this stuff.

It's really hard to say no when you can say yes. When you don't have anything, I don't remember us as kids walking through a store going, "I want this, I want this, I want..." It just didn't happen as I remember. Because we knew we were going to do the best we can for it. If you wanted a ball glove, or you wanted a bike, you would identify that in March, or April, or May, and you'd get it at Christmas. You didn't just indiscriminately walk through a store and say, "I want that." My dad wouldn't go, "Oh, perfect, Tommy. What else? Can I get you anything else?" That didn't happen.

It wasn't that my parents were harsh. My parents are great parents. It wasn't they didn't provide - they did provide. But we didn't have the ability to just go get whatever we wanted. It's hard to say no when you can say yes. And yet, you need to be saying no.

The Consequences of No Limits

I'm watching Airline the other night. You ever watch that show? Great show. It's where they track the Southwest guys, and it's a Monday night show where they track the customer reps and stewardesses in Southwest. They got a plane that's coming in. It's got an eleven-year-old kid on it. The kid is an unescorted passenger. He's running up and down the aisle. He's tripping people. He's kicking people.

They get him off the plane, and the kid goes - they said, "We're trying to get your dad." He said, "My dad isn't going to care about this. My dad doesn't care. He isn't going to say anything." He said, "Well, you'll probably be punished." "I'm not going to be punished."

They finally find the dad. They tell the dad what happens, and the dad says, "That's not that bad." You might as well get this kid a timeshare down at Florence right now, because that's where he's headed. This is a little delinquent. This is a guy that's going to rob, steal, kill, and murder.

It gets into the third thing. You want to screw Him up with discipline. That kid needs to be spanked hard, placed in a room, and told not to breathe. I'll tell you, the only way to fix that kid is to put some really tight lines around Him. Interestingly enough, that's what a psychologist at Temple says: "Children need limits on their behavior, because they feel better and more secure when they live in certain structure."

This kid's trying to figure out what the limits are, and what He's learned at this point is, there are no limits, and there's no consequences, and just do whatever you want to do. And somewhere, He's going to have to go to work for somebody. And let's hope it isn't you. And He's going to have to learn, "Hey pal, you flip the burger like this, and you say yes and no to the customer, because we're here to serve that customer. And when we say 9 o'clock, we don't mean 9:15, we mean 8:55."

You want to ruin Him, you let society train Him, you don't.

Let Peer Pressure Drive Your Parenting

Here's the fifth thing. Let peer pressure drive your parenting. Try to just keep up with the Joneses. Worry about what other people think. And we do that all the time. You've done it. You're going over to some people's house, you're right around the corner, you stop the SUV, you turn around and you say, "Now listen, I'm telling you, if I've got a problem with you tonight..."

when we're at these people, if I've got a, there'll be a price to pay. Why do you do that? Well, because you know these people are going to evaluate you by the way you raise your kids. Hit the pause button. Here's an application. Your heavenly Father is evaluated by how His kids behave. Larry used to say it this way, and we can argue all the theology of this, I don't care. It's a point that's made. You may be the only Bible that some people ever see.

Never Refuse to Apologize to Your Children

Here's the sixth thing. Never tell your kids that you're sorry. Don't ever tell them that you're sorry. I learned this. Most of my negative parenting illustrations involve Sarah. Sarah and I are a lot alike. She was the first one. Most of the time you have no idea what you're doing with the first one, I guess. So I think you tend to be especially unfair and harsh to the first one. As a firstborn, that's my belief.

So Sarah and I are a lot alike. We would go at it a lot. When I say a lot, I mean she would, if there were - Haley had never needed to. I mean, Sarah, you did. I remember coming home one day, I had a bad day, she was the first person I saw. I got honor, honor, honor, honor, honor, honor, honor. Finally, she responded. The problem was mine, not hers. I had provoked my child to anger.

I said, "You get in your room, stay in your room. I'll let you out of that room when there's an independent elected president. You're in there." She goes to her room. Susan and I have an agreement that there's no way that you disagree on the kids in front of the kids. You have that agreement, I imagine. She is now secure in her room. Susan said, "What are you doing? What is the problem? She didn't do anything. Tom, she's standing there. And you just launch into her, and ultimately she's going to respond."

I said, "What do I do?" And she said, "You better go tell her you're sorry." I remember this was the first of many times where I would go to her room and say, "I blew it. I'm sorry." And she's four or five years old.

As many times as Sarah and I went at it, not one time did it carry over to the next day. Not once. And it never happened to me. Because sometimes there'd be some real disagreements. She'd go to bed, and she'd wake up the next morning, and I mean, it was like it never happened. I'll tell you why we were able to do that. Two reasons. Number one, she knew I loved her. Number two, she knew if I screwed up, I was willing to say I was sorry.

We had a thing. She was older. Seems to me like it involved a boy. I'm not sure. She was older. I said, "No, no, no, no, no." Fine. She said, "Fine." She said, "Look it." I said, "I'm serious about this." She said, "Dad, I do not agree at all with that. Your assessment of him and the situation is absolutely wrong. I don't agree with it at all. But if you say do it, I'm going to do it, because you must think it's right." That was the relationship we had. I think it all goes back to an understanding of being willing to say, "You know what? I screwed up."

Don't Let Kids Choose Their Own Spiritual Path

A couple more things. We got, oh my, seven, eight minutes. Number seven, teach your kid to be open-minded, especially regarding spiritual matters. That'll screw them up. Let your kids just figure out. I still meet people that say, "We're just going to expose our kids to all sorts of religions and let them pick the one they like." I go back to food. You don't let them do it with food.

I think, now I'm going to get, this is kind of a soapbox for me. I watch parents do stupid things with these teenagers, the biggest of which is not make them be in church. I hear them say, "Well, they don't want to be there." That's fine. I don't care. They don't want to be in math class. You don't say to them, "Well, don't go to math class." They don't want to go to school. You don't say, "Don't go to school." You say, "Look it, get in there." Their natural response is to not be there. I don't want to go on Sunday sometimes. You go, and you start to make this trade-off, and I'm telling you, you pay a price.

The Power of Words to Wound or Heal

You've got to go fast. The eighth thing, don't restrain your mouth. Sarah came home one day, or I came home, Susan said, "Sarah's so excited. She's in her room. She's so excited. She's been waiting for two hours for you. She's down there. She's doing some homework or something now. When you get here, you get down there. You see her. She's ready for you."

So I go down. She's so excited. She said, "Dad, look at this." She gave it to me. It was a report card. Five As and a B. I looked at it, and I said, "Sarah, how did you get a B? What are you doing with a B?" Now as I say it to you, I cringe, and I cringed right afterwards. Here was this girl so excited, so jacked, so juiced, so enthusiastic in her homework to get tomorrow together to do five more As. I just took the steam right out of her. I just killed her spirit right like that. It wasn't two minutes later, those books were closed, and she was asleep.

Some of you have experienced the pain of that. Some of you have heard from parents or bosses or people that you love, "You're stupid, you're dumb, you'll never amount to anything, you can't do it right, don't do it at all." You've heard all those painful things. Then you turn around and you say them. You can take this little thing called a tongue, and you may never stab somebody in the back with a knife, but you'll rip them with this tongue. They'll carry those wounds forever.

The Two-Income Myth

Two more things, and I'll give them to you quickly. Number nine, accept the two income myth. There's this lie that's going around that says it takes two incomes to live. It does at a certain level. I want to be sensitive. There's some people, I got it. You're a single mom, single parent, there's tough times, there's economic, something, I got it. I got it. I understand it. But the vast majority of the time, you're pursuing this two income thing simply to fulfill your wants, not your needs.

I hear this all the time. You get the same mail I get, where they took prayer out of the school and so on. I'll tell you, when we had a cultural down shift, when moms went to work, that's when the culture changed, right there. Because now, there's nobody holding it anymore. There's nobody holding it together anymore.

Let me tell you what a three, four, five, six year old, what a third, fourth, fifth grader needs, what a junior high, high school student needs. One thing: a mom to be there. When a dad plays a role, I got it figured out, I understand it. This is why people might say, and they do, he's chauvinistic, he's archaic. I'm just telling you the facts. It's just the way it is. And they need to know that.

Number ten: when problems come into a marriage, just split up because it's best for the kids. It's not best for the kids. Here's what's best for the kids. You love each other, put God in the center of it, and let the kids see that. That's what's best for the kids. The best is not to split up. Some of you are 30, 40 years old, and I'm telling you, I meet with you, and you're still messed up from when your parents were divorced.

Here's the last thing. It's the flip of all this. You want to screw them up, hold them too tightly. Don't let them go. Don't let them be independent.

What to Do Right

That's a downer. Let me give you some up real quick. It'll take about five minutes here.

Number one: remember you're the boss. You're the boss. They aren't. If you can't control a four-year-old, something's wrong with you. Figure it out. And you may need to spank them.

Here's the second thing. There's no one-size-fits-all approach. People want this fixed. They want this one single thing. I see it in education. I take a lot of people who come in and say, what is the church's position on education? Our position is, you ought to be educated. We don't say public school, private school, home school.

I've seen private school kids who are all screwed up, and private school kids who are on their way to seminary. I've seen public school kids who are all screwed up. I've seen public school kids who are using the school to bring their kids to Christ. I've seen home schoolers who are on their way to med school. I've seen home schoolers who at age 18 leave the house, go gothic, and get pregnant. I've seen it all.

That right there tells me there's not one way. There's not a single way. There are these principles, but how you implement them is up to you. And there's this big desire in parenting to make your thing be my thing. I don't need your thing. I want to learn, I want to grow, but I'm going to adapt this differently. When you've got something called growing kids God's way, you're implying that there is God's way and then out there's everything else. There's a little danger in that.

Teach Them What's Significant

Here's the third thing. Teach them what's significant. This is great, and I know we're right up against the time.

Last year, American Idol, they're at the very end. They're getting ready to say, here's the new American Idol. So they talk to Simon Cowell, which is probably the only reason to watch this show. And Aaron and I say, what's going to happen? What will happen to this person? Here's what he says, and I quote, "They'll get what they've always wanted: fame, stardom, and a ton of money. That's what it's all about."

A couple of months later, Marlon Brando dies. And they start replaying interviews with Brando. Now, I acknowledge I don't get acting. I don't think acting's that big a deal. I really don't. This is such a head game that they play and say, that was an incredible performance. Come on.

Here's what Brando said. Now here's the guy, he's way beyond the American Idol. He's got it. Greatest actor that ever lived, that's what they told me. Here's what Brando said: "The idea of being successful and having a lot of money and having all your dreams come true is completely crazy. I've had so much misery in my life being rich and famous. I thought that's what it was all about."

See, if you want to teach Him what's significant, it's not about teaching Him to be in the Hall of Fame. It's not about teaching Him to make every free throw, hit every ball. It's not about even sending Him to school with the wrong reason. If you go down to ASU and you interview 100 kids and say, why are you here? They say, I want to get an education. Why do you want to get an education?