Pray for the future spouse your child will marry

Show Transcripts:

Intro:
Welcome to the Father On Purpose Podcast, featuring author and ministry leader, Kent Evans, and business executive and military veteran, Lawson Brown. This is a show for you, dad. You want to be a godly and intentional father. Unfortunately, you’ve turned to these two knuckleheads for help. Let us how that works out for you, before we begin, remember this, you are not a father on accident, so go be a father on purpose. Please welcome your hosts, Kent and Lawson.

Lawson Brown:
Hello, my good friend, Kent Evans. How are you today?

Kent Evans:
I’m doing good. Just had a great lunch with my 19-year-old son who’s headed back to college today. So we had a good going away lunch.

Lawson Brown:
Me too. I had a great time last night watching the Georgia Bulldogs win. That was fun. Great game too. So it’s always good when your team wins, but it’s also good when it’s a really good game, fun to watch. I’m pumped about today. This is one that’s always on my heart. And for us to dissect it, I’m super interested to hear your take. Also, it’s just something that because my daughters are approaching, in no hurry I hope, the age of potential weddings down the road. And really since their, I guess, teenage years, but maybe a little bit after teenage years, it started before then, but really heavier duty thought and prayer about who they will one day marry has always been on my mind. Early on when they were babies growing up, it didn’t feel applicable to me, although the prayers began pretty early in their life. But now man, as they’re in their younger 20s, with no prospects on the radar right now for either of them.

Kent Evans:
That you know of.

Lawson Brown:
Right, yeah. But it’s something that praying for our children’s future spouse has been on my heart for a long time and as it gets closer and closer, it feels more imminent. And I’m both excited about it because I think it’s going to be super great and fun, you’ve been down this road already, and also a little not worried about it, but I can’t not say that I am not somewhat anxious. Am I going to like the guy? Is he going to be a godly person? What’s in store for them, for our family? And so praying for whoever that is out there in the world has been something that my wife and I have done and continue to do. So really taking that thought process apart today is I hope going to be interesting. I think it will be.

Kent Evans:
Well, and a lot of dads tell us they want to be better prayer warriors and they know they should. They feel almost this prayer guilt where they’re like, “Oh, I should pray for my kids more.” So they sometimes roll around in this feeling of inadequacy in the area of prayer. One of the things that I think helps us as dads is some targeted things to pray for. Whether that’s their future spouse or a specific medical issue or educational issue or money issue. Sometimes it helps to be able to aim our prayers. And man, what a fruitful place to be praying. And be aiming prayers is in the direction of who your children might marry, whether you have sons or daughters. Now, we have boys and our oldest is married. I keep telling my boys, we are one for one. Alex did a great job of finding a godly, awesome young lady. And we feel like the day we met her and since then, the last few years, she’s just a part of our family. It doesn’t feel like Alex’s spouse, it feels just like we got a daughter. And I love Gracie, she’s a fantastic young lady and I have really enjoyed getting to know her. I would say, by way of confession as you and I start this podcast today, I occasionally prayed for who Alex might marry. But not, almost just said religiously, that would’ve been funny. I didn’t pray every day or every week, every quarter, or every year, but occasionally I did. And I’m getting more and more intent in that regard. So I’m looking forward to talking with you about it today.

Lawson Brown:
Be thinking about what would your prayer be, what sorts of things are you… Obviously just the most obvious, “God, please put someone in their life who is a follower.” And then what from that point on? Have you had a more specific, detailed thing in mind that you’re talking about to God? Or not thing, but characteristics, that sort of thing.

Kent Evans:
Well, the top of the list for me is, do they like Chick-fil-A? Because if they don’t, it is an absolute deal-breaker.

Lawson Brown:
Because when they come to visit.

Kent Evans:
Exactly.

Lawson Brown:
If they’re bringing.

Kent Evans:
Don’t bring your non-Chick-fil-A loving girlfriend to our house. Just kidding, a little, sort of. It’s funny today, literally today, I was at this restaurant in Louisville eating. And across the way, I saw a table of four guys and I recognized three of them because they are three of the local Chick-fil-A owner-operators. These guys are all the local Chick-fil-A legends. So what was really funny is one of them comes over to our table and says, “Hey, how are you guys doing?” And we chatted up and my wife was there with me. And April, my wife says to one of the guys, “We figured you guys were over there fighting over Kent’s Chick-fil-A business, like where’s he going to eat?” Because they all own different restaurants. And Matt, the local Chick-fil-A guy Matt goes, “Oh no, there’s plenty of Kent to go around.”

Lawson Brown:
I didn’t realize you had quite that big of a problem.

Kent Evans:
I’m a bit of a local Chick-fil-A buying legend, I like to say. For sure, man, as my boys were starting down the path of being interested in girls, the prayers for their spouse did really inform a lot of our conversations around their dating life. Not that they had a big dating life of any significance really. I have a 17-year-old son who really only allows him to date. My 19-year-old son’s away at college and my 22 is married. So we haven’t had years and years of dating. But what it did inform is, hey man, what are you looking for? So my prayers for their spouse were for things like that they would love the Lord, that they would be honest, that they would be diligent. The Proverbs 31 woman thing kept coming to mind for me as a dad of sons because I’m looking for these future daughters-in-law. And that they would be-

Lawson Brown:
Explain that, you said the Proverbs 31 thing.

Kent Evans:
Well, there’s this righteous woman described in Proverbs 31. A lot of what’s in that proverb speaks to the characteristics that I would love for my boys to have. So for example, if you’re a dad out there listening to this particular episode and you have sons and you’re wondering what to pray for your son’s future wives, just go look up Proverbs 31. There it is, you’re done. Just pray that over and over again. Because what you’re going to find in the Proverbs 31 woman is that she is industrious, she has a good reputation, she is kind, she provides for those in her household, she’s hard-working. You find these characteristics down Proverbs 31, a godly woman. It says even like a godly woman or a noblewoman is precious and is hard to find actually. So for me, a lot of the character-based stuff that I prayed for in my daughters-in-law are things I took straight out of Proverbs 31. Because quite frankly, I don’t care where they’re from geographically, I don’t care if they’re even… My son’s going to a college where there’s tons of international students. He’s probably just as likely to find a young lady who doesn’t live in this country as one who does, I don’t care. I don’t care what church they go to, I don’t really care. I care that they love Jesus. I do want to encourage my boys to find a woman who is hardworking. Just there’s something about industriousness and not being lazy and those things. And man, that’s one of the things I love about my only daughter-in-law right now. I kid her a lot and I go, “You know you’re my favorite daughter-in-law.” Right now I have one. Man, she is a hardworking young lady. She grew up working on cars and doing things that she just had to fix her own car. That girl can go and change breaks on a car, I don’t even know how to change breaks on a car. She’s way more handy around the garage than her father-in-law for sure. Those were a few of the things that I prayed for my future daughters-in-law. How about you man, as you’re looking for these godly sons-in-law?

Lawson Brown:
As you were talking, I looked up Proverbs 31 starting at verse 10, and it’s got this whole list. You could replace she and wife with he or husband, and that’s as good a prayer for me as it is for you, just reverse them.

Kent Evans:
Yeah, it’s really the character of a godly person.

Lawson Brown:
I like that. So I copied and pasted into a Word doc, I’m going to go in there and fiddle around with it and see about creating something for the converse of wife of noble character. Because it’s just as applicable. But in thinking about this, I’ve also… So we’ve had conversations with the girls and just sitting around that thing. And Colossians 3:2, I came across, it’s very widely applicable in the thought process of what are you thinking about and what is important to you for the future? What would your husband look like and act like and value? What kinds of values and characteristics are you praying for, talking to the girls, are you hoping for? Colossians 3:2 says set your mind on things that are above not on things that are on earth. And you can search scripture, you showed me that cool open Bible tool. You can search scripture all day long, you won’t find one that says, find you a spouse who plans to make a lot of money and have a big house and a bunch of nice cars and really funny, whatever. I don’t know how for whatever reason how my brain works sometimes. I was thinking about, so they’re looking today, they’re in the middle of dating that sort of thing. There are apps out there where you present yourself and then others are presenting themselves too. And you can filter, you can choose some settings, I don’t know that there is or there isn’t, but it would be neat. The way my brain works is like, think about putting some settings in for your dating app to filter that they are grounded in faith, that they are active at a church or in a small group, that family values, they’re very open about it, they’re very committed to certain family values. Maybe you don’t always find this, but it could also be nice if they have a great relationship with living parents. The parents are still alive, they have a great mom, great dad. That’s not necessarily indicative alone of anything necessarily. But I guess I’m saying all that to say in these conversations, that could be some thought starters to say, what is important to you? What would you choose as your search settings?

Kent Evans:
Well, I guess you’d probably have one in there that says Georgia Bulldog fan, so that’s a requirement.

Lawson Brown:
That’s not the requirement, but it is a requirement to not be an Alabama fan.

Kent Evans:
It’s not so much a setting as it’s an anti-setting. We just got to make sure you can lock anybody you want long as it ain’t them. I don’t know why I just went into my Southern accent. I probably just offended all of our Bible Belt listeners, sorry for that guys. I think what we’re leaning toward is this idea like it says in Colossians 3:2, you brought that up, “Set your minds on things that are above not on things that are on earth.” Man, what a great guiding principle for us to help our boys, at least in my context, I’ll keep talking about the boy raising context. You even see in scripture where it says beauty is fleeting, beauty is fleeting. There’s this thing where you see over time beauty may not look the same all the time, but character remains and character gets more and more beautiful over time. I think as I look at the young ladies that I would love for my boys to fall in love with, these would be ladies who have solid, strong, almost I would even use a word like rugged, is probably the wrong word, but a solid character. A character where they’re not affected by every TikTok video that comes out and every political that comes out. These girls aren’t flapping in the breeze in terms of the winds of culture and they’re always up and always down based on some petty development in the world.

Lawson Brown:
So one of my girls was, I don’t want to say dating because they weren’t, it wasn’t near far enough down any road, they were getting to know each other. And the vaccine came up as a topic they were talking about. We’re not going to get into that here, but what happened was she said something about that she had been talking to one of her girlfriends and she said about how they share values. And he was like, “Oh cool. Really, what values?” And she ran through a few. Somehow in their conversation, I guess COVID came up or vaccine or something. And he asked her a specific question about children, about her potential future children. It was like-

Kent Evans:
Was it like it related to the vaccine?

Lawson Brown:
Yeah. She didn’t have kids. Her answer was basically like, “I don’t think we know enough. And probably so down the road maybe.” And his answer was, “Okay, that’s good because your answer would have determined whether I stay here today or not.” She was taken back. They were out walking on a nature trail. So what happened, what came from that was like that was a very specific thing. Had nothing to do with faith or godliness or anything at all like that. But that guy was like going to die on that hill. So that’s immaterial, the vaccine and that specific instance even is immaterial to what we’re talking about. But the fact that that alone was that important to him versus she had run through some other core values and family and that kind of thing, and that’s the one he latched onto. So that was her radar pop pretty high and hard. And that frankly was part of the reason that things dwindled. That’s the thing that’s most important to you?

Kent Evans:
Man, it’s interesting just as our kids go down that dating road, what are the top two or top five things that our kids are looking for? Are you only going to date Republicans? Are you only going to date vaccinated people? You’re only going to date liberals, you’re only going to date people who advocate a certain political view. Or even in the church, you’re only going to date reformed people, you’re only going to date Methodist, you’re only going to date Catholics. Is there something… I’m not trying to lobby on this podcast for one viewpoint or the other as much as, hey Dad are we praying for those things, and are we praying for that wisdom in the searching process and in the matching process, if you will, of our kids? And I sure have been praying for that more and more as my boys have gotten older. We’ve made those conversations pretty, I don’t want to say regular, but definitely pretty frequent about character. So for example, one of the things that I’ve… I remember I had a boss, his name was Frank, and Frank was one of my favorite bosses of all time, partly because he was really good at his job but secondly, he really cared about people and thirdly, he was a great teacher. So he was really good at teaching you the things that he knew.

Lawson Brown:
You just described my current boss. It’s very important.

Kent Evans:
Some people are functionally great like they can hit really well but they can’t teach anybody to hit. In Frank’s case, he could do both. He could hit the ball and teach you how to hit. One of the things that he used to say to me verbatim, that I think my older boys, the three of them, I bet you all of them could repeat this phrase back to me because I have said it to them over and over. Frank used to say hey can’t remember, “Those who talk to you about people will talk about you to people.” So as people are sharing with you, that sort of, “Hey Lawson, can I just tell you something in confidence? This doesn’t go outside this room. It’s about Sarah, it’s about Billy.” You know that the minute I do that about Sarah and Billy, when I’m with Sarah and Billy, I’m going to do it about Lawson. It just makes you feel like you need to take a bath after being with those people and wash it off. So one of the things that I’ve prayed for and I’ve asked my boys to look for in the young they might be interested in, is how do those young ladies talk about their friends? How do those young ladies talk about their siblings? Not that you disqualify people if they say one thing wrong. But you do get this sense that, huh, what am I dealing with here? So I encourage guys all the time and be praying for, be praying for the character of your child’s future spouse, the character. Not necessarily the political viewpoint or the economic background or even whether they came from a stable two parent Christian home or whatever. Man, in my case, goodness gracious, I am absolutely not what my mother-in-law was praying for, I am now. As time has gone on, God has turned me into the husband that I think she is glad her daughter has. However, first few years, not so much, I did not fit the mold. And quite frankly looking back, I don’t blame her. I was a total roll of the dice at age 20, wow.

Lawson Brown:
Yeah, same. Something I’ve always admired about Audrey and her relationship with the girls is our house has always been and the place where our daughter’s girlfriends have felt super comfortable coming over. And they have all these great chats with our daughters and with Audrey. It’s interesting to me whenever I’ve been near enough by or even included in some of that sometimes, the discussions that Audrey has had with the girls about the perspective that their girlfriends have about certain dates or certain guys and weaving in to those kinds of conversations. It’s interesting to hear what is important to the girlfriends of my daughters about guys and the way they share. So pulling some of that out versus just always only having a conversation one on one with your own kid in the context of a little bit bigger audience. A small group setting like that is also really valuable to help guide discussion, to maybe add some thoughts about the filtering process of what they’re looking for, what’s important, what’s not important. So I’ve always really admired how and very thankful that Audrey has such a great, good, deep relationship with not only our own daughters, but with someone else’s daughters, our girls’ girlfriends,

Kent Evans:
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Kent Evans:
I would encourage dads to use this as a point of conversation with their kids. Go to your 10, 12, 15-year-old son or daughter and say, “Hey, I’m going to be praying for your future spouse.” And they may go, “Ah, really, that seems weird.” What are one or two things you’d like for me to be praying for? Wouldn’t that be a fun conversation with your teenage son? Now, he may say, oh, she has blonde hair or she has blue or whatever he comes up with that might be a physical trait, which would, in turn, give you a great opportunity to talk about character as an example. Not that he wants to go marry somebody who he finds to be physically ugly. But at the same time if you walk him through Proverbs 31, “An excellent wife who can find.” Verse 10, it says, “The heart of her husband trusts in her.” Verse 11. Can we pray for somebody that we can trust? “She seeks wool and flax and works with her hands, brings food from a far, rises while it’s yet night.” Like verse 13, 14, and 1, she’s a hard worker, she considers a field in buys it, she’s a shrew operator, she is intelligent about things that matter. She doesn’t have to get As in calculus, but she’s intelligent about-

Lawson Brown:
Speaks with wisdom.

Kent Evans:
Speaks with wisdom, opens her hand to the poor. Look at verse 20, “She opens her hand to the poor and reaches out her hands to the needy.” I have had young ladies around our house, I don’t want to give too much away here, who I look at how these young ladies treat my son’s brothers. So for example, the day after my son, Alex, proposed to Gracie, one of the coolest things happened. They were both in town and they would stay in separate places in our house. We let her stay here and him, of course, but separate parts of the house. And they’re both here that night and I wake up in the morning and what do I find on my kitchen counter? I have five boys and I find six notes handwritten on the kitchen counter. One note to each of the four brothers and a note to me and a note to my wife, that my newly engaged daughter-in-law wrote the night she got engaged to my son. They were the sweetest notes. Like it was… My son Titus at the time I guess was four or five years old. And the note to Titus was, “Titus, I’m so excited I get to be your sister. I really look forward to hanging out with you.” And I just thought, “Who does this? Who writes notes to her future brothers?” Oh, it was amazing. But as I go down, I look at it like she opens her hand to the poor, she [inaudible 00:23:58]. Not that my kids are poor and needy, but there’s just a heart. There was a heart there to be either sister. That was so cool, so cool. That’s a high bar. If you’re a young lady and you’re listening to this podcast because you’re dating one of my other sons and you’re thinking, “Man, I wonder what Kent Evans values in a daughter-in-law.” That’s a tough one to beat. Had she written those notes and they were sitting next to some Chick-fil-A, that’s the only way I can imagine that could have gotten better. So tip for you ladies, if you’re just daughter-in-law number two.

Lawson Brown:
That’s so good, man. If she included a couple of Chick-fil-A gift cards, that would’ve been ka-baam. We’re starting to have other, I keep using the word filter, filter is not the right, it’s the thought process. What do you have in mind? What are you setting your mind to? Like Colossians 3:2 says. But what sort of spouse are you praying for? Because you want to raise faith-filled kids also and you’re going to need a partner in that. What do you want your partner to bring to your marriage? And so that helps create this lens through which you’re looking through all dating experiences. As you get more and more serious with someone, think about the two of you and your marriage. But your children and raising faith-filled follower children of your own.

Kent Evans:
Man, to that point, I’ve got a godly wife who’s been an exemplary character-filled Proverbs 31 wife. The only thing she does probably better than being a wife is being a mom. She is a terrific mom, a praying mom, a disciplined mom, a hard-working mom, a character-filled mom, a doesn’t take any crap mom. When you’re raising a house full of boys, you got to have some moments where you can buck up and remind those boys who’s in charge. I’m fairly confident my boys are more afraid of her than they are of me, and that’s for good reason. But for real, to your point, can we get our kids to think beyond the immediate romantic and fleshly stuff and think, “Man, how’s this going to play out 10 years from now or 20 years from now?” And even that. So even as we pray for our children’s spouse, I like the word filter, let’s also pray for our kids to have a godly filter. So I want my boys to marry women of character and that when we get together for Christmas, I enjoy hanging out with them. For real, when Alex and Gracie show up, I’m like, I’m so glad they’re here. I’m just fired up. In case you’re running an errand I’ll be like, “Hey, I’m going to get coffee. Gracie, you want to come?” And I just take her and we get to hang out. She’s a blast. So for me, will my boys be attracted, and I use that word and it’s multifaceted, will they be attracted to women of character? I want their heart to be shaped. Not just that we luck up on a godly woman who comes walking into my son’s lives, but that my son is smart enough and sensitive enough spiritually to know one when he sees one. I’m praying for his lens and his heart and his filter.

Lawson Brown:
I think you’re right, it is a filter. Because what does a filter do? It keeps certain things out but it also allows certain things in.

Kent Evans:
Like Alabama fans, for example.

Lawson Brown:
Keep them out, that’s right. I’m kidding.

Kent Evans:
We’re kidding.

Lawson Brown:
I’m sure there’s an Alabama person out there somewhere.

Kent Evans:
Hey, I went to the University of Kentucky, so we don’t even pick fights in the football season. Well, except this year we went 10 and 3 or 11 and 3 man. We had a good season. That’s acceptable in the SCC. I hope that part of what we’ve said today has helped a dad do a couple of things and then, Lawson, catch whatever I miss. One, pray for your kid’s future spouse, period, full stop. Secondly, let’s make sure those prayers are about godly character and not secondary or tertiary things. And we might debate what some of those are. If you want your Methodist son to marry a Methodist girl, fine, awesome. I’m not going to shove that into the secondary or tertiary category. But I am going to say pray about what belongs in that central category. Third, the other thing I would say, Lawson, on this topic is, as I’m praying for my children, future spouse, I’m also praying for my heart and my wife’s heart to accept those people into our family. There’s always going to be that tendency to think, well, my child is perfect and no kid outside this family is ever going to measure up. You’re going to think your daughters are so great that there’s no boy on earth who deserves their hand in marriage. Well, at some point, you’re going to want your heart to be open to accepting these young men as the sons that God brought you into your family. If your daughters do get married, you’re going to want to accept those boys. That’s part of this process. Let’s pray for godly character, let’s pray for our kids’ future spouses, let’s pray for our own hearts to be ready when your precious little daughters bring home Mr. Wright. There’s all kinds of memes and jokes about, I just take him and show him the gun safe and make sure he understands how this is going to end if he makes her sad. But in reality, the most godly guys I know who have daughters, they see boys as young men they can mentor. And they just step into their lives and begin that process. What else would you add, Lawson, as we wrap up?

Lawson Brown:
I love what you just said, I think you covered it well. I guess the overarching or what I’d wrap all this in as we close is talk to your children about this, include them in this conversation. We say that often on this podcast, but I look forward to encouraging them to listen to this discussion that we’re having right now and use this as a means by which I can continue to have this ongoing dialogue about my prayers for them and my prayers for who they will one day be with as they generate and grow into their own family life. So it’s an active prayer and it’s an active dialogue that I want to continue having with my children.

Kent Evans:
Amen, brother. And remember, there’s only three words you’ve got to remember when it comes to this topic. Chick-fil-A. You just remember those three words.

Lawson Brown:
If you can’t get them to sponsor this podcast, you are…

Kent Evans:
If you’re a Chick-fil-A executive and you’d like more information on how to sponsor Father on Purpose Podcast…

Lawson Brown:
It sounds like they don’t need to, you’re going to talk about it enough.

Kent Evans:
Yeah, exactly. Why would they sponsor us now? You know what, next episode I’m going with KFC. Listen, you hear me, Chick-fil-A. If y’all don’t call me and if we don’t get you to sponsor us, I’m going to start promoting KFC. God bless you guys. And I hope this podcast has been encouraging, hope you had a great time. And pray for your kids pray for their future spouses. We’ll see you next week.

Lawson Brown:
Take care.

Kent Evans:
Hey, dad, thank you for listening to today’s show. If you found this episode helpful, remember you can get all the content and show notes at manhoodjourney.org/podcast. And if you really liked it, please consider doing three things number one, share this podcast with someone. You can hit the share button in your app, wherever you listen to podcasts, or just call a person up and tell them to listen in. Number two, subscribe to this podcast so you get episodes automatically. That helps us as well to help dads find the show. You can do that through your favorite listening app, whatever that is. And finally, review this podcast, leave us a review good or bad wherever you listen. Those reviews also help other dads find the show. You can always learn more about what we’re up to at manhoodjourneyd.org or fatheronpurpose.org. We will see you next week.

Outro:
You’ve been dozing off to the Father on Purpose Podcast, featuring Kent Evans and Lawson Brown. Now, wake up, head over to father on purpose.org for more tools that can help you be a godly, intentional, and not completely horrible dad. Remember you are not a father on accident, so go be a father on purpose.