The godly dad rebukes those who wander

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 know 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.

 

Kent Evans:

Lawson, what is up, my friend?

 

Lawson Brown:

Hello, Kent. Have you been having a good week?

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah. Yeah, I’ve had a good week, man. It’s been fast-moving, a lot going on. I had a friend in from out of town. Let me share what we’re going to talk about on today’s episode, and then I’ll tell you about my week. Today, dad, if you’re tuning in, we’re at the tail end of a series on the Book of Nehemiah. My friend, Eric Ballard, and I wrote a book called Bring Your Hammer, and its subtitle is 28 Tools Dads Can Grab From the Book of Nehemiah, so 28 really short chapters, easy to read, quick reads, tips from how we can be more godly, effective fathers straight out of the Old Testament Book of Nehemiah. We’re going to cover the last of that series today. If you’ve missed the first nine, go backward. You’ll see them all there in the queue. Listen to the first eight or nine. If you want to learn more about how Nehemiah can help you to be a godly dad, go back and check out those other episodes, and then, if you’d be so kind, go snag a copy for you and your 47 best friends on Amazon, and then, once you do that, you and all your 47 friends can write us a glowing review on Amazon. If you notice-

 

Lawson Brown:

You said it’s doing pretty good, right? You said it’s a…

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, as books go, if you sell. I had Dennis Rainey, the famous guy at Family Life back in the day. Dennis told me one time 95% of Christian books never sell 5,000 copies, 95%, and so, if you hit over that several thousand copy mark, you’re on your way. The month of March was almost 2,000 copies for us, so that’s good. It’s a good start. The reason I bring that up about the review is because Lawson here is my faithful and trusty co-host on the podcast, and the only thing that he could find positive to say about our book on Amazon was that it came in great packaging. If you go to Amazon and you see the reviews-

 

Lawson Brown:

You saw that? Okay.

 

Kent Evans:

I did. Yeah, look for one from a chump named Lawson who said, “Oh, yeah, packaging was awesome.” Actually, we were laughing about that, and I said, “I dare you.” I said, “I dare you to put that up on Amazon,” and he actually did it, Lawson. I’m impressed. He took the dare. He took the dare.

 

Lawson Brown:

I mean, the audience for this podcast and for just, generally, Manhood Journey stuff, it’s a bunch of guys. They should have a good sense of humor. I hope people saw that and were like, “Oh, that’s good. That’s funny.”

 

Kent Evans:

Right. Right. Yeah. My wife would look at that and be like, “Uh.” She would actually roll her eyes and she would say, “Uh, Lawson, he is so dumb.” She’d probably say something like that, but I really appreciated that review. If you’re dialing in now, today we’re going to talk about godly dad finds his way to rebuking those who wander. Now, Lawson, you have a background as a business executive. You’ve run big teams, distributed teams, teams who’ve had goals and objectives and targets to hit, a number of customer visits to make and you name it. You’ve been in the metrics and business world long time and, before that, you were in the military. You were a Marine. I’m so grateful for your service, by the way. I’d like to say that publicly any chance I get. Thank you for serving. Over the course of your, I don’t know, 20-plus, 30-year career, both militarily and business-wise, my hunch is you’ve had to be in a number of spots where you had to tell somebody they’re not doing it right or they’re not doing enough or they missed the mark somehow. Have you ever had to share that with someone in either a military or a business context?

 

Lawson Brown:

Oh, yeah. I really like, first of all, how this chapter lays out. I was thinking of things as I got going into it and writing notes to myself and then see later on in the chapter that, in fact, Eric is I think… Let me just get it. Eric is the one that wrote this chapter that he would-

 

Kent Evans:

You seem to always have to bring that up. Any chapter you like in this book, you seem to always have to point out, oh, that was a chapter written by Eric, not Kent.

 

Lawson Brown:

I think there’s a reason for that, if you go back and look at the ones that we chose.

 

Kent Evans:

Okay, moving on.

 

Lawson Brown:

An early thought was that we just don’t use the word rebuke in our modern-day terms. It feels like to me an old Bible term, so rebuke, and I was like, “I think, I’m pretty sure I know what that means,” so I went back and looked.

 

Kent Evans:

Google it. You may have to Google that one.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, I certainly did look it up, and here’s the definition. Express sharp disapproval or criticism of someone because of their behavior or actions, that’s the verb, and then the noun is an expression of sharp disapproval or criticism. It’s not just like, “Hey, watch out for the way you just did that.” It’s sharp and it is disapproval. It is criticism, and I don’t want to take lightly that that is the word, that rebuke is the word used in the Bible. I don’t want to dilute that, dumb it down. Yeah, there were times in the Marine Corps where a rebuke needs to happen on the spot with force, with a louder voice because someone is about to get hurt or someone is about to do something that’s going to really, really go wrong, and then, in business, that’s a whole lot more rare that you need to sharply address something that someone is doing, their behavior, their action as a sharp disapproval or criticism. What I was saying is one of the initial things I thought of getting into this chapter was the whole reprimand in private and reward in public. I think about that often because, from a fatherhood standpoint, because it’s just… If you can ever help, it’s just unnecessary to embarrass someone in front of other people. You’ve got a gaggle of kids. There’s always a group, and I’m sure that’s just not always hard to be in the moment, take a time out, move them out of the crowd and have a one-on-one discussion. That’s always best, I think, versus just addressing it on the spot in front of everybody. In the Marine Corps, we had to do that sometimes. We’ll get into it a little bit later, but, from a drill instructor standpoint, I think that that is something that they use as a tool is correcting individual. Whether it be bad behavior or somebody messed something up, they’re totally fine with doing that in front of everybody. In fact, I’m sure that’s part of the prescription is to embarrass and then, not only that, but if somebody has done something wrong, guess what, everybody gets to get punished because of that one person. Just a little bit of rambling thoughts as we get going, but, I’m curious, how do you react to that about reprimand in private, in this case, rebuke in private and reward openly?

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah. I learned that basically the hard way as a dad. There were times when I would lean on my kids. When they’re five or six years old, it doesn’t quite matter because they don’t quite have the social care about their friend circle, but when they get 10 or 11 or 12 and you start rebuking them in front of their friends, wow, man, you create a big issue because, now, what do you have? Now, you have two separate issues. You got whatever he was doing that was not wise and then, now, you have the emotional damage and the lack of trust and the fear connected with how my dad talks to me in front of my friends. I learned that the hard way eventually where I did it a few times and I thought, wow, that probably didn’t work. I mean, my kids actually laugh these days about… I have this unnatural and… I really am working on it slowly. I’m 52. You think I’d be over it by now, but I have a major problem with people who chew with their mouth open at a dinner table. Something inside me, I don’t know what it is, it’s not even like… It’s not natural. It’s not healthy, but if you chew with your mouth open at my table, I can feel my blood pressure go up.

 

Lawson Brown:

All you can do to not say something?

 

Kent Evans:

It’s all I can do not to say something. My older son Alex, or Jeremy, if any of their friends are listening to this show ever, they’re going to go, “Oh, yeah, I remember that.” I would tell their friends, “Hey. Hey. Could you chew with your mouth closed?” my kids’ friends, and they were like… It became this almost running joke about what Mr. Evans might do to you if you chew with your mouth open. I’ve gotten better about it where, now, I don’t rebuke at all anyone who’s not in my own family because it’s just not kind. It’s not friendly. I need to get over it. What I found over the years is… For example, we may be at a party or at my house, and one of my kids does something that I think needs to be addressed fairly quickly. What I will do is I’ll do the old, “Hey, Jonathan, I need your help with something,” and I’ll walk down the hall, and they’ll follow me away from the party, and then I’ll be like, “Hey, knock it off. Y’all need to cut it out. Don’t do that anymore,” and then we’ll leave the room, and he can make up whatever cover story he wants when he goes back to his friends. I’m not going to rebuke him in front of his friends, but I might pull him aside and say, “Hey, man, this conversation y’all are having needs to be nipped in the bud.”

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I’m thinking about a baseball field where there are multiple dads and it just kills everybody when that one dad is just railing on his son or at the soccer field just yelling at his daughter. It’s awful. It’s just so cringey, and there’s a reason for that because it’s our human nature that to be pulled aside and corrected is… That’s learning. You respond to that so differently than if somebody in front of your friends and other parents you’re getting called out unreasonably. Well, actually, whether with good reason or not, but the point is, dads, just do not do that to your kids. Their head will go right back into the turtle shell and they won’t listen to the rest of what you’ve got to say, and it may be very valuable, so be wise and be careful with that.

 

Kent Evans:

It can persist, man. I mean, if you’ve ever been embarrassed about anything, whether it’s about rebuking or not, if you’ve ever been embarrassed, you can remember it. If some dad is listening to this show and he’s in Topeka, Kansas, or Dallas, Texas, or wherever, think of a time when you were embarrassed, you’re really embarrassed in front of people, your friends, your company, your wife, your kids, your church, whoever. Think of a time when you were embarrassed, and I’ll bet you every dad listening can think of a time or two, and some of those times or two are 10, 20, 30, 40 years ago, and you still haven’t forgotten it because embarrassment, especially embarrassment in a public setting or a surprise embarrassment, is really hard to forget.

 

Lawson Brown:

Dude, I was in a meeting with probably 12 or 15 other people. I’m at the table. My boss is leading the meeting. This is long, long time ago. This was back in the Blackberry days. This is before iPhones. I’m on my Blackberry in the meeting and, my boss, she stops the meeting and says, “Lawson, I need you to… This is exactly what I was talking to you about in your review where you’re multitasking. It’s distracting especially to me when I’m trying to lead a meeting,” and, dude, the room just got deathly quiet. I’m not kidding, man. I bet it was over 20 years ago, and I remember it to this day because there’s something about being called out in front of other people. It did not make me want to respond to listen to her encouragement and guidance from that point on, and so, as dads, you got to just be so careful to correct in the right way.

 

Kent Evans:

It’s funny because now you remind me. I walked into a meeting one time. I was an assistant hall director at the University of Kentucky. We had a meeting of the assistant hall directors. I walk in, and I’m two or three minutes late, and the leader, Jim Ploskonka, goes, “Hey, Kent, thanks for joining us. How late are you?” I look at my watch and I go, “Three minutes,” and he goes, “Just a moment,” and then he starts counting the people in the room. He goes, “One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. You’re 24 minute late. Have a seat.” Man, okay, so, at one level, I’m like, “What a jerk. I mean, did he have to do that?” At the other level, I was like, “That’s a pretty good lesson. I just burned 24 minutes of productivity,” and I never forgot that lesson. Hunter can attest. If Hunter is five minutes late, man, I’m on him, and I’m on him. It’s probably still I’m lashing out from when I was 21 and being an assistant hall director at Kentucky.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, that’s funny.

 

Kent Evans:

When we’re in that moment where we’re the recipient, it just does a lot of damage if it’s public and hateful, yet we see Nehemiah rebuked those who got off track. Jesus rebuked a lot of people, a lot of people, not just the Pharisees. He rebuked some of his own disciples. He rebuked Peter.

 

Lawson Brown:

We, as sons of God, as followers, we should… I almost said crave, and maybe that is the right word. We should crave correction. We should crave discipline. What’s in the Book of Proverbs 3:11-12? It says, “My son, do not despise the Lord’s discipline, and do not resent his rebuke because the Lord disciplines those he loves, as a father the son he delights in.” There’s an underlying reason for rebuke for this disapproval or criticism of someone’s behavior, but if it doesn’t stem from, if it’s not coming from a source of “I love you and I want you to learn from this so that you are better, you are going to avoid pain”, whatever, love should be the driving force behind each of our rebukes.

 

Kent Evans:

I’d like to tell a story of a guy who did this so perfectly. When I was in my 30s, I was a marketing consultant, and I was not a very accountable one. I would make promises and break them all the time, and I’d gotten into this habit of over-committing and under-delivering big time. I had a client who I went to church with. Now, I go to a big church, fortunately, so I can usually hide in the bushes, so to speak, and I didn’t think I’d bump into this guy, but one day, man, after church, I see this guy. I mean, I literally wanted to hide behind a pillar or a chair. He owned a roofing company. He’s a contractor, and you think of contractor as being these rough, gruff guys, beat you up and throw you out, but he was a really quiet, soft-spoken, but commanding kind of leader, I think of almost like the NFL equivalent of Tony Dungy. He has this reputation of never really raising his voice, never flipping out on the sidelines, but you listened to him very carefully. This guy, Rick, Rick Steinrock, he sees me and he goes, “Hey, Kent, do you have a moment?” and I just thought, “Ah, it’s not going to go well,” and we go back into church and we sit down in this big auditorium. There’s two of us in this big auditorium. We sit down, and he goes, “I get the sense you’re avoiding me. I’ve tried to contact you a few times, and you haven’t called me back. You haven’t responded to my emails.” That’s it. That’s how he started.

 

Lawson Brown:

Good for him, and then he just stopped talking?

 

Kent Evans:

He just waited. He waited, and I said-

 

Lawson Brown:

Let the silence do its work.

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, and I said, “Well, that’s true. Yes, I’ve been avoiding you,” and he goes, “Ah, okay, my suspicion is it’s because the project you owe me you’re not done with even though we’re past the deadline. Is that true?” and, again quiet, calm, and I said, “Yeah. Yeah. I’m not done,” and he goes, “Well, as a business guy, you owe me that work. We’re paying you. I expect it done really soon.” He goes, “But let me add, as a brother in Christ, I really expect better from another brother in Christ,” and then he paused for a second and he goes, “But you know what? I’m sure you’ll figure it out. Have a great day.” Brother Lawson, I’m not kidding. We weren’t in those chairs two minutes, not two minutes by the clock.

 

Lawson Brown:

That a great example right there.

 

Kent Evans:

At least 20 years ago, maybe more, early 30s, and I’ve never forgotten it because, man, you talk about somebody should put that in the rebuke hall of fame, if there were a hall of fame for rebukes. Number one, it was really short. It was quick, to the point. Number two, he didn’t lead with his anger. He led with the facts, and he led with the establishment of the facts both ways. “Hey, I get the sense you’re avoiding me. Is that true? All right, but I think it’s because you haven’t finished the project. Is that accurate? Let me just make sure.” For all he knows, I got hit by a car and was in a four-week coma, and if I had been, then he’d have been like, “Gosh, brother, I’m so sorry. I’ll pray for you.” He had options, so then he confirms and just goes, “Ah, okay, well, in light of that, as a business guy, you owe me better. As a brother, you owe me better, but I’m sure you’ll figure it out.” Oh, my word, brother, it was so, so good.

 

Lawson Brown:

How effective was that?

 

Kent Evans:

Oh, man, literally, it should go in the rebuke hall of fame.

 

Kent Evans:

Hey, dad, do you wrestle with anger? Man, I sure have, and so have thousands of other dads in our email list, and so what we did for those dads and for you, we built a special digital course called The Anger-Free Dad. This digital course is chockfull of almost 50 assets, a bunch of teaching videos, a ton of PDF booklets and worksheets so you can walk through and understand your anger triggers, the expectations underneath, and how to pull those out of your heart and mind so you can be a dad who is less angry and more at peace. If you’d take this course and you do not become less angry, you will get all of your money back. Plus, we’ll send you some boxing gloves so you can beat up the wall at your house with all of your mad anger. Dad, come take The Anger-Free Dad course today at manhoodjourney.org/anger-free-dad. That’s manhoodjourney.org/anger-free-dad.

 

Lawson Brown:

In chapter 27, a couple of things came to mind about midway through, and I’ll just paraphrase, that I think the correction has to be done with the right measure, and I think timing is important.

 

Lawson Brown:

When I say measure, what is written is… and I did this before. I’ve slapped one of the little… one of my daughter’s little hands when she’s about to touch something that’s going to hurt, and it scared them. She scared them a little bit and made them start crying, but that was a whole lot better than had they touched what I did not want them to touch like an iron.

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, or them pulling back their hand and only having two fingers left.

 

Lawson Brown:

Right. Right, but what Eric writes is you don’t slap their hand as hard as you can. You measure the correction, and that’s silly analogy to use when I’m talking about measuring, I guess, your degree of rebuke. That’s one thing, measure, and the second is timing. It doesn’t have to happen in all cases in those moments. In fact, sometimes it’s better I remember, especially my youngest, Olivia, because she was just so expressive as a little girl, the spankings were never worse than the wait.

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah. We’ll talk about this tonight.

 

Lawson Brown:

Going upstairs and hanging in her room was twofold. That wait was psychological, and she’s up there just dreading and dreading and dreading, thinking about what happened, and then, by the time I would make my way upstairs and go into her room, as soon as I opened the door, that was… The spanking was nothing compared to that. By the way, I think, in those cases, especially you guys that have little kids, the wait is mandatory. If spanking is part of the agenda, just, period, do not do it in the moment. The wait is good for them and it’s good for you, so I just want to talk about the measure, the degree to which the rebuke as well as the timing.

 

Kent Evans:

Well, and let’s look at Nehemiah. In Nehemiah, the other thing I would add to that, Lawson, is what it is that we’re rebuking them about? For example, sometimes we rebuke them for things that are preferences or that are just the way we want it. Chewing with your mouth open, I don’t think that’s listed among the seven deadly sins, and so there’s a reason, because it’s not a big deal. It’s not a big deal, but what Nehemiah was rebuking the people of the city about was the work of God. For example, Nehemiah 13:10, it says, “He found out that the portions of the Levites hadn’t been given,” so funds are not being allocated correctly. Resources are not being allocated correctly, and this is according to the commands God put in place. It’s not just like some law was passed that they voted on. God said, hey, we’re going to set aside the priests, and the priests get a certain allotment, and so then Nehemiah goes to the officials in verse 11 and says, “I confronted the officials and said, ‘Why is the house of God forsaken?'” Just notice what he is choosing to rebuke them about is something that is spiritual and God-ordained and holy and important to the administration of God’s will on earth. It’s not that, “How come y’all got the red carpet instead of the blue carpet?” like the stuff that we flip out over. “How come y’all do so many hymns in this church? How come y’all do so many courses in this church?” It’s not over matters of preference. It’s not over matters of preference. It’s over matters that are deep and rich and important. Even later, he goes on, and one of my favorite verses in Nehemiah is chapter 13, verse 25. It says, “And I confronted them and cursed them and beat some of them and pulled out their hair,” in verse 25, “and I made them take an oath in the name of God saying, ‘You shall not give your daughters to their sons or take your daughters for your sons for yourself.'” It was this idea of intermarrying the communities which God had strictly forbidden. He said, “Look, don’t intermarry with these people. They will pull you away from the Lord your God.” I just want our dads to hear. Sometimes, we get really bent out of shape. Kent Evans gets really bent out of shape over matters of preference, matters of preference, not like actual sin and not things that matter for any more than five minutes. When we’re going to tread into this area of rebuking or leaning on somebody, man, it’s got to be significant. It’s got to really matter.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. You’re a great communicator. What you do in some of the stories you’ve told about the way you interact with your children is you pull out of them through questions to get them to a solution.

 

Kent Evans:

When I’m on my game, I don’t always do that, but when I’m on my game, boy, you’re right.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I mean, you’ve got to. The other thing that Nehemiah 13:11 goes on to say was, basically, he rebuked them and then got them back in position where they should have been and where they were meant to be, where they were going to be able to do God’s work. He didn’t just rebuke them and then steam off. Take that opportunity to measure your response correctly, to make sure your timing is right. Maybe there’s good and a bad time, and maybe there’s two or three things that gather together that you want to address at once because there’s a trend or there’s a tie to them all, and there’s some habit that’s beginning. Be thoughtful about it. Be wise in your approach and help your kids understand what they were doing or what they said or whatever the thing is can affect them long term or maybe could affect someone else longer term if it were to have continued where this someone could have gotten hurt, and then redirect. I guess I would just add rebuke and then redirect in a way that gets them back on track like Nehemiah did. He stopped.

 

Kent Evans:

Like you said, in verse 11, he confronts them and then he says, “And then I gathered them together and set them in their stations,” so like, “Then I said, ‘All right. Look, guys, this is how it’s supposed to happen,'” and in verse 12, he says, “Then all Judah brought the tithe to the grain, wine and oil into the storehouses.” So, okay, we’re back on track. That’s what should have been happening. I’ve set them in their stations. They’re bringing it in, and then he goes on in verse 13, it says, “And I appointed as treasurers over the storehouses,” and then he goes on to talk about that reliable people, so, to your point, he said, hey, this is going wrong. Let me show you how to do it right. Let’s get back on track. Okay, anybody ready for lunch? To your point, just leave them hanging and make them just figure it out on their own. It’s so important for us as dads to keep in mind another verse of the Scripture. I want to fast forward mentally to Galatians 6:1, Lawson, where we’re looking at how Nehemiah rebuked, and that’s really important, and we’ve got to not lose sight of that. I also want to dive in to this verse in Galatians 6:1 because I find it very helpful in the area.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, I’m really glad you brought this in.

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, chapter six, verse one, in the Book of Galatians says, “Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression,” and let me pause for a second, but I’ll come back. I’ll come back. Let me come back to the word transgression, “But if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself lest you, too, be tempted,” and, to that end, it goes on to say, “Bear one another’s burdens and fulfill the law of Christ.” It’s the idea that it’s redemptive and restorative. This word transgression in chapter six, verse one doesn’t mean… Let me reread it. Brothers, if anyone is caught doing something you just don’t like very much or anyone is caught being a fan of a team you don’t enjoy, if anyone’s caught in a transgression, like an egregious sin, a sin, not just a matter of preference and doubling down on that topic, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness. I’ve probably had a thousand moments as a dad over the course of 22 years of fatherhood. What’s that work out to math-wise? 10? 20? 40-something a year. That’s one a week. Yeah, I’ve probably had a thousand moments, ballpark. I did some quick math in my head. I probably had a thousand moments where I’ve had to rebuke my children. I mean, something as simple as don’t go on the street or put that down or you’re going to poke your eye out, things that happen, just life. I’ll bet you, out of those thousands, I’ve restored them in a spirit of gentleness. Well, let’s go down. 500 of them, maybe only 300 of them were actual sins. Of the few hundred that were actual sins, I’ll bet you, I restored them in a spirit of gentleness 25% of the time. The other 75% of the time, I restored them in a spirit of harshness. I didn’t even really restore them. I yelled at them. To your point, sometimes those are safety issues. However, notice what it says. Restore them in a spirit of gentleness. Keep watch on yourself lest you, too, be tempted. We’re going to end up with two sins if we’re not careful, the sin of the child and then the sin of the jerk, angry father. By the way, dad, those are not connected. Those are not connected. I don’t yell at my kid because of what he does. I yell at my kid because I choose to, because I’m sinful, and this verse is reminding us, Lawson, we got to keep an eye on ourselves, man. If we’re going to restore someone, that’s holy ground. We got to be careful there as we restore them that we do it in a spirit of gentleness. I get the sense that, even though you have this military and business background, you’ve always come across to me as someone who’s wired a bit more patient. You seem to have a more calm demeanor about yourself. Is this the idea of restoring someone in a spirit of gentleness? Is it an area of temptation for you, or do you find it comes a bit more naturally?

 

Lawson Brown:

I guess I got to watch my mood. I think the timing is a big deal. I got to do my best to bite my tongue often. I have learned through experience where I’ve done it wrong and addressed something in the moment, and not even necessarily about embarrassing somebody in front of others or anything like that that we’ve already talked about, but if you do it too quickly, you don’t have time to really think through your motive and how you’re going to design for the outcome. I’ve learned over time that it just does take time. I continue to mess that up still to this day. I think the military in general has somewhat of a rap of just a bunch of people running around screaming at each other.

 

Kent Evans:

You mean that’s not what happens?

 

Lawson Brown:

You know what? In fact can we talk about who we have as a coming-up guest on one of the episodes coming up?

 

Kent Evans:

Absolutely, sneak preview.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, so in our conversation with the great Dr. Ken Blanchard-

 

Kent Evans:

Hey, I don’t know if you heard that. If you’re 45 or over and you’ve never heard the name Ken Blanchard, I mean, seriously, where have you been living? Where have you been living?

 

Lawson Brown:

I think it’s younger than that. I think it’s 30 or over. My whole company is… Part of the foundation of our leadership is a Ken Blanchard Situational Leadership II…

 

Kent Evans:

What a guy, man.

 

Lawson Brown:

… series. Yeah, he’s so great.

 

Kent Evans:

We just interviewed him two days ago, and it was a blast.

 

Lawson Brown:

It was super great. Yeah. I couldn’t believe it.

 

Kent Evans:

What were you going to say about Ken?

 

Lawson Brown:

Well, but in that, he talked about his father who was a Navy officer, and in part of the conversation, we talked about how the military to somebody, who may have only seen the military through movies, thinks that everybody is running around yelling. It’s not that. There’s a lot of time spent on effective leading of other people, and it rarely includes raising your voice and demeaning people in front of others, and so that was just beat into us early on for me as a young non-commissioned officer and then, later, as an officer. I think more so my temptation is getting all bent out of shape on something that just doesn’t matter. Like you said, you’re calling it a preference. It’s just like some pet peeve or some little thing that irks me can get under my skin, and I just don’t say anything and, before I know it, I’ve said the wrong thing, and it’s something that’s so inconsequential.

 

Kent Evans:

I shared one of mine. You got to share one of yours. Mine is chewing with your mouth open. I got four or five others if we need to keep going.

 

Lawson Brown:

Mine’s cleaning up behind yourself.

 

Kent Evans:

Really? Okay.

 

Lawson Brown:

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

 

Kent Evans:

What happens? As you walk into a bathroom, there’s a piece of toilet paper sitting on the floor that someone obviously didn’t pick up, but it’s just right there, what do you do?

 

Lawson Brown:

Oh, yeah, I’ll just wreck the whole rest of the room. I’ll just tear it apart. I’ll throw-

 

Kent Evans:

Oh, like turn into the Hulk?

 

Lawson Brown:

No. No, I don’t.

 

Kent Evans:

That is so crazy, man. I walk into some restaurant and just hear this commotion in the bathroom and I’m like, “What’s going on?” “Lawson probably found some tissue is out of place or something.”

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I don’t know. Why is dad doing that now?

 

Kent Evans:

That’s so true though, man. We have these things that, really, in the grand scheme could be pretty minor, but, boy, we get bent out of shape over them big time. A couple things, Lawson, I want to make sure we don’t forget, we’re getting toward the end of this episode, a couple of quick wrap-ups, but then I want to kick it back to you for some comments. Number one, you did mention something about Ken Blanchard. He’ll be on in a few weeks after you hear this episode, a few weeks from the time this episode airs later. Dr. Ken Blanchard was with us, and he talked about fatherhood and grandfatherhood and leadership and writing and business, and, oh, my word, what a fantastic interview that was. Also, coming up right after this episode airs, next week, after this episode airs, we should be running the interview we did with Bob Russell. Now, Bob was the pastor of Southeast Christian Church for 40 years. That’s 40. If you’re 39, he pastored the church a year longer than you’ve been alive, just as a data point. Bob was fascinating, amazing. He actually did the wedding for April and me years ago, so, man, what an honor to have Bob. We’ve got Bob Russell coming on the show next week. We got Ken Blanchard coming on a bit later. I want to make sure we thank Eric “The Man” Ballard for being on at the kickoff of this series where we did the Bring Your Hammer series as well as for helping me co-author the book. His chapters are fantastic. He wrote maybe two-thirds of the book, and they were just stellar. Way to go, Eric, thank you so much for your contribution to the kingdom by putting your gifts of writing and humor and theology and life into the book. What I want to pivot toward, Lawson, before we close is I want to read something from one of the guys who listens to the podcast. As I do, I want to remind you, on our podcast webpage, that’s at manhoodjourney.org/podcast, that’s manhoodjourney.org/podcast, there’s this button, and if you press the button, it’s like magic happens, and you get to leave us a voicemail. Can I say a voicemail? Whatever. You get to report-

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I was calling it a voicemail, too, but we’ve got some good ones, and I can’t wait to-

 

Kent Evans:

Ah, fascinating.

 

Lawson Brown:

I’m looking forward to getting into those.

 

Kent Evans:

We’ve had a few come in just in the last month or so. We’ve had a few come in, and we needed to wait until we were done with the Bring Your Hammer series. We’re going to slot those in, and we’re going to play some of those. I almost think of it like an asynchronous call-in show where you call in, you leave a comment, a question, a struggle, a complaint. Like, if you don’t like the way Lawson does the podcast, we get a lot of those, just continue to call in, but if you have a question about fatherhood, you have a challenge about fatherhood, you have a good story about something you did that worked out really well, leave it for us in that voicemail. We get an email. We review them. We listen to them, and we might even play yours on a show, and then we will ridicule you mercilessly, but also, at the same time, try to find some ways to encourage you or give you feedback about the question. We’ve got one of those, several of those, coming up, so right after the Bob Russell episode, we’re going to run several of guys, so go to manhoodjourney.org/podcast right now and tell us your greatest fatherhood challenge these days or a fatherhood question you always wished you had the answer to. The hard ones, we just delete those and don’t listen to them anymore because we don’t know how to answer them. The easy softball ones, we tee up on a future episode. Meanwhile, I heard from a gentleman in my email inbox. His name is Tim Rockwell. Tim, if you’re out there in lovely Dothan, Alabama, thanks for emailing us. Here’s what Tim said. He said, “Kent, I just wanted to say that I’m really enjoying Bring Your Hammer and the Father on Purpose Podcast. I also got your Manhood Journey book that I’m going to start reading next. I’ve been looking for solid tools to help me grow as a dad. I’m also leading a men’s group of a collection of dads my age. This has been such a great resource. Thank you, and keep up the great work.” Tim, way to go, man. Number one, you’re actually moving the needle on our resource sales. We noticed your sales come in because the percentage was so significant. Thank you. Thank you, Lawson. Secondly, thanks for being a faithful listener. Thirdly, thank you for telling us that something might have blessed you and gone well and, I don’t want to overlook, I’ve been looking for… He says, “I’m also leading a men’s group of a collection of dads my age.” Tim, dude, super stud, hero, way to go. So, dad, if you’re out there, send us an email telling us how great we are. Secondly, go to the podcast page and leave us a voicemail, even though it’s probably not the right word for it. Leave a voicemail and tell us what’s going on in your fatherhood world. We’ll address it on a future show. Lawson, what kind of cherry should we put on the top of the Bring Your Hammer Sunday as we wrap up this eight or 10 podcast series on the Book of Nehemiah?

 

Lawson Brown:

Bring Your Hammer Sunday. I applaud you, Tim, for leading a group of a collection of dads your age. Thanks a lot, man. I mean, I’m serious. To anybody that leaves feedback, that this is helpful to them in any way, that’s all we’re doing this for is we hope that God is using this means of talking about him to help other dads. I want to wrap this up with something that is near the end of chapter 27. It says correction is a necessary part of being a parent. Nothing can teach you more about your father than becoming a father yourself, so about your own way of being a father, about your own father and, I would add, the relationship between you and our Heavenly Father, and so, dads, I encourage you to give some thought to rebuking and how you approach situations where someone in your family, maybe even sometimes your own self, you need some correction of your own, and how do you want to receive that? How do you want to receive from your Heavenly Father where we should look forward to and appreciate and crave discipline that is coming from his love in our lives so that we can become a better father? I encourage you guys to give that some thought and continue to be a father on purpose.

 

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 manhoodjourney.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 fatheronpurpose.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.