We become more patient with our kids through God’s Spirit

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:

Welcome to the show.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, amen.

 

Kent Evans:

I was just showing Lawson on the Zoom here, I have grapes that I can eat in your face.

 

Lawson Brown:

We don’t need to be hearing your chomping.

 

Kent Evans:

In your face, lack of nutrition.

 

Lawson Brown:

What’s up, man, out there?

 

Kent Evans:

Dads, we hope you’re having an awesome start to your new year. Although we’re kind of getting further into the new year, we should probably stop saying that, even though we’re recording this in January.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I was talking to somebody else. What is the shelf life on happy new year? I think it’s January let’s say the 10th.

 

Kent Evans:

Ish. Ish. We’re past the happy new year. Dad listen, forget you and you’re happy new year. If you’re having a happy new year, neither Lawson nor I really care. We don’t care. It’s past the point where we care. The only question is, are you ready for the Kentucky Derby because it’s right around the corner? Lawson, I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a position where you’ve read that list in the Book of Galatians 5. It’s commonly known in Christendom as the fruit of the Spirit or the fruits of this Spirit. And you’ll see this list, right, that gets paraded out in all kinds of sermons and blog posts and podcasts. It’s about the fruit of the Spirit, in verse 22, is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self-control. It says against such things there is no law. We’re in the book of Galatians 5 and we get this list. I don’t know if you’ve ever thought about it this way, but I find that as God wants to have those aspects, those characteristics of the Spirit be more evident in my life, he tends to like put things in my way in order to make that happen. For example, if I want to be more loving, he brings more people into my life who might be kind of hard to love.

 

Lawson Brown:

In other words, if you’re talking to him and you’re saying what I feel like I need to work on, or maybe he’s talking to you and telling you this in some way, he then, therefore, gives you a scenario to work on that with?

 

Kent Evans:

It’s kind of like if I want to be more kind, he brings more jerks in my life. If I want to be more patient… I have found out, by the way, his formula for wreaking more patient in my life. For having me be more patient, he makes everything in my life slow down. My income doesn’t go up as fast as I want, or my kids don’t grow as fast as I want. I don’t personally grow as fast as I want. Something that I want to happen in our ministry doesn’t happen as quickly as I want. The whole time God’s going, “Hey, man, you pray to become more patient, so I did you the favor of slowing everything in your life down. I’m trying to help you.” I don’t know. Does that happen to you?

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. This is a silly example, but I think it was my wife or maybe one of my daughters, we were in traffic the other day. This is several weeks ago, and it like, gosh, just one person after the other was coming out of a red light or changing lanes and getting over in front of us and slowing down. We were kind of in a hurry, but it wasn’t an emergency. The third time happened and we just looked over at each other and I said, “I feel like God’s trying to teach us to slow down or be patient or something.”

 

Kent Evans:

We have this cool feature on our website. If you go to manhoodjourney.org/podcast, go to the manhoodjourney.org/podcast page, and on that page, we have this feature that we really would love for dads to take advantage of. And that is a recording feature, where you can hit a button and on your cell phone or with some AirPods or with some headphones, you can record to us a comment. We’d love to hear about a challenge you have as a dad, a victory you’ve had as a dad, a question you have as a dad, and can’t wait to hear from you. Now, last week, I don’t know if these will run an exact succession, but recently we heard from a guy named Caleb in I think Bermuda. And then this week we’re going to talk about a voice recording we got from our friend Andrew in I think Central Minnesota if I’m not mistaken. Let’s do this, Lawson, let’s play this excerpt. We pulled out a piece of what Andrew said to us, because we want to focus on something. Let’s play what Andrew said to us, and then we’ll dive in and talk about it right now.

 

Andrew:

Hey, Kent and Lawson. This is Andrew here in Central Minnesota. My struggle kind of stems from the interruption part in the testing of patience that goes along with that. Recently having some struggles for a few days and I just stopped one morning after doing a little scripture reading and paused and just told God that I’ve been trying this myself. I’m struggling. I need that little extra help from you. I can’t do it on my own. Please help me. Within a couple of days after that, he led me to a podcast of yours. And then to me, sitting down and talking to out about that stuff is another huge one. Just realizing that we might not be able to do all of it on our own and we will struggle from time to time, but sitting down and asking for help and acknowledging that we don’t have all the skills necessary to do what we need to do has been huge for me also.

 

Kent Evans:

Lawson, one thing I loved about what Andrew said is he’s talking about the idea behind what are some things in his life that have forced him to become more patient. Maybe it’s your kids ask you a bunch of questions, like Andrew mentioned, where you just think, “So many questions.” Actually just yesterday, I think it was just yesterday at the time of this recording, we’re recording this on a Monday, and just yesterday, we were watching an NFL game and my 10-year-old son was trying to better understand the game of football and he kept asking questions, but I mean like every second. Was he out of bound? Is he high bounds? How come they didn’t get the ball? What’s the first down? Who’s winning? That’s a point where I was like, “Bro, so many questions.”

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah. I mean, I know. I totally get where he’s coming from. It brought back memories of kids do. They ask a lot of the questions. I was reminded of like how many why questions. Like, what? You explain one thing, why? Explain that, why? And you could hear in his message to us, I kind of got from what he was saying is, he had had maybe one of those days, strung into a series of one of those days. What I loved about it was he said that he stopped, that he paused and was reading some scripture and asking for help from God, like what he said, I’m paraphrasing, something to God like, “I’ve been trying this myself on my own.” I laughed. He goes, “And I need a little extra help please,” which I thought to myself he sounds like a pretty patient guy already. But anybody with kids of really any… Not quite any age, but it goes on for a while. I totally get it. But the other thing that I wrote down when listening to him was he was kind of talking out loud to himself and he remembered something someone had told him that it wasn’t that that the children are necessarily attention-seeking, but are connection seeking. Dude, when he said that… I’m listening. I’m kind of scribbling some notes when he said that. I thought to myself like, that’s me too to God. I bet there have been times where God’s listening or looking or whatever and he sees in me the child that is connection seeking through some of my questions or my impatience or my frustrations. I thought that was really neat that he kind of brought it around and summed it up with that that’s where he wants to reframe his perspective is what he said. I want to reframe my perspective. I think that helps as a balance against the impatience, which yeah, can sometimes lead to anger or raising your voice or not handling that situation as Galatians 5 would have us with love and joy and kindness and patience.

 

Kent Evans:

You put in our show notes for today a really powerful Bible verse that I want to dive into that connects back to this idea that Andrew mentioned that as he came to realize. He’d probably been trying to do it on his own, and he realized he’d kind of gotten disconnected… Not disconnected. It’s the wrong word, but that he needed to rely on God’s strength, not his own strength. But share with us John 15:5 lawson. You dropped that in our show notes for today and I’d love to talk about it.

 

Lawson Brown:

Two things. First, I was remembering back to the episode on patience, where you got to the point where you wanted to Galatians 5 about the fruit of the Spirit. You were in such a hurry to get to the word patience that you were like, “But the fruit of the Spirit is blah, blah, blah, patience.” I was like, “Uh, Kent, I think you just gave your own example.”

 

Kent Evans:

These words can and will be used against you.

 

Lawson Brown:

I’m super proud that just five minutes ago, you actually slowed down and went through them each. I was really proud of that. I think John 15:5 tied into me in a couple of ways because fruit can sometimes be on a tree or whatever. It starts with John 15:5 says, and this is Jesus, “I am the vine. You are the branches,” which I think ties in kind of in a cool way that I had not thought of before. Because it goes on to say, “Whoever abides in me and I in him, he bears much fruit. For apart for me, you can do nothing.” So it really kind of, for me, tied in together fruit of the Spirit, vine and the branches, that’s where it’s coming from, and then also where Andrew said, “Can I get a little extra help here, please?” For apart from me, you can do nothing.

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, yeah. It’s an amazing moment when a dad realizes that he’s either going to parent out of his own strength, or he’s going to ask God for help up. Just today, I was finishing up a study. Full disclosure, it’s an Advent study. And you may think, “Man, Kent was finishing up his advent study in the middle of January?” Yeah, okay. It’s been a busy season. Back off. But yeah, it took me a few extra weeks to finish my Advent study. One of the things it asked you to do at the end was create a prayer for 2022. I was really praying both on paper and just in my heart that God would make 2022 a year when I would parent and husband and live and lead our ministry out of his strength and not my own strength. I just know my own strength, man, is a complete sham compared to God’s strength. We see throughout like even I think of Old Testament verses, like in Psalms, when it talks about, God is my strength. He is my shield. He is my support. He’s my shelter. I just think, man, I’m just not going to make it as a dad without God’s strength. I was really glad when Andrew’s comments on his voice memo he left us turned kind of that way, where he was saying, “Man, I know I need God’s strength in this area.” Andrew, way to go, man. Exactly. Thank you for sharing that with the rest of us and reminding some of us that we’re not going to make it without God’s strength. Lawson, what’s that make you think of?

 

Lawson Brown:

Well, originally we kind of landed on from Andrew’s note on patience. And in the context of talking with your children, representing fruit of the Spirit in those conversations, for sure patience. I think in Andrew’s case with small children, he said he’s got three boys, so right there that’s a lot. Three boys under the six, four, and a year and a half. That’s a lot. But the fruit of the Spirit is the combination of those things. I think in the context of talking to your children of any age, particularly maybe these younger children, I would throw…

 

Lawson Brown:

And when questions are coming at you nonstop, machine gun questions, I would add in joy. As a father, I’d love for them to experience and you may have to carve out special time for that where you are dedicating… The phone’s away. The TV’s off. If they’re craving your attention and connection with you, then show them through your patience not only that you are focused on them because you were being a patient person, but also joy and faithfulness, gentleness. I think through that exercise, you get better at it, that’s where self-control comes in. Part of something Andrew said was in those moments, it was a bit of a struggle to not show impatience or anger. That’s where self-control comes in. Self-control isn’t something that you just blink your eyes and have. I think it comes through God giving us the strength. Something that you’ve said before about being reminded that you don’t read the scripture and it says the fruit of my effort or the fruit of my tenacity. Talk a little bit about how did that come to you in the context of this not being something that you buck up and do because you find strength of your own.

 

Kent Evans:

Man, it’s interesting to me how often we take some kind of prevailing thought in our culture. We’ve got guys I know who listen to this podcast all around the world. The cultural settings might be a little different, whether you’re in like South Africa or Australia, you’re maybe in a different cultural context. Certainly in an American context, there’s all this like national pride around freedom and individuality, and I’ll do whatever I want, and liberty and I define me. Sometimes we take our cultural context and we smash it against and over top of scripture, and we make the Bible say things it never says. It never says, right. I think when I look down this list, I really am to be more patient. I’m commanded to be patient in other parts of scripture. I’m told I need to be patient. I need to be loving. No question. But then we also see this duality where we see in this stretch in Galatians, the fruit of the Spirit, the fruit of the Spirit. I think in an American context, it’s like the fruit of my hard work. It’s the fruit of my 24/7. It’s the fruit of my sticktoitiveness, and all this stuff. We elevate those values that aren’t evil. It’s not awful to have tenacity. It’s not awful to have initiative. You could kind of defend that biblically. But I think what we do is we mix it in a stew and we think, well, dog on it, man. 2022 is going to be the year of patience. I’m going to make it happen. And in some ways you kind of go, “Naw. Man, you’re going to have to let it happen. You’re going to have to let the Spirit work.” I love the word in that stretch in John where it says, “I’m the vine. You’re the branches,” that you read a minute ago, Lawson. And it says, “Whoever abides in me.” And that word abides, if you look at it throughout the New Testament, it basically means to remain, right? Before we started today’s podcast, Hunter was doing a sound check with our microphones, and Hunter said, “Hey man, get this far away from the mic. Sound test. Okay, that sounds good. Stay right there. Stay right there.” That’s the same exact idea behind the word abide. It basically means, where you are, don’t move. Don’t move. In some ways, it could be argued that my job as a believer is to remain in Christ and abide in him, to be in him. And it says, “Then I will bear much fruit. Because apart from Christ, I can’t do anything.” For me, man, it really gets down to, am I letting God’s Spirit flow through and out of me into the lives of the people around me, or am I just trying to like white knuckle this thing, man, and I’m going to make it happen, come hell or high water, that kind of mentality? We’ve got to let God’s Spirit do its thing.

 

Lawson Brown:

Yeah, which is, generally speaking, for a lot of men, the temptation to do it ourselves, to rely on ourselves, to pull your boots up alone and get it done. It’s just not about the effort. It’s about God doing the work in you that then flows through you into your interactions with our family.

 

Kent Evans:

Hey, dad, do you wrestle with anger? Man, I sure have and so have thousands of other dads in our email list. What we did for those dads and for you, we built a digital course called the Anger Free Dad. This digital course is chock-full 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 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.

 

Kent Evans:

I’ve had so many instances in my adult life where I realized God’s Spirit was not the predominant way that I’m responding to a situation so many times.I have yelled at my children the phrase, “We don’t scream at people when they’re angry.” I literally yelled that phrase at my kids one time, and I was just like, “Do you hear yourself? Do you in fact hear yourself?” There are days, weeks, seasons, decades where I’m not as defined by the fruit of the Spirit as I would love to be. I really am in a season where I’m asking God, can you help my response in the area of patience, in the area of leveraging God’s strength, not our own. These things Andrew talked about. Can you help me to respond to people and to live the way that you would respond to people and to life? I’m not always very happy with the speed at which he seems to be conforming me into the image of himself.

 

Lawson Brown:

Don’t pray for him to work on you even more in a faster way.

 

Kent Evans:

Right. Yeah. The prayer of I want patience five minutes ago is a bit of an oxymoron. It’s a bit ironic.

 

Lawson Brown:

That’s really good.

 

Kent Evans:

But I think some of the factors for me, some of the factors for me is I look at this issue for dads, I think, you know what? Okay, there’s the fruit of the Spirit. God wants us to be more patient. And then there’s also some like kind of day-to-day practical things that we can do to put ourselves in a position where we can respond in a more patient manner. I’ll give you an example. One time I was talking with a guy who was starting up a ministry, and I asked to him if things were going as quickly as he would like. Or I said something like, “Do you feel like the pace that you guys are growing at is the right pace?” And he wasn’t hateful. He wasn’t trying to get me. He wasn’t mean to me, but he kind of pushed back a little bit and he goes, “If I set a pace and it’s X, then I measure everything against X. And I’m either happy or sad depending on whether I’m hitting that mark or behind it or ahead of it.” He goes, “But if I let God set X, then the pace is the pace. I’m not going to worry about it.” \

And that was his nice way of saying, “Kent, man, you’re way too controlling. You’re way too ate up on stuff like that.” For example, if you would like to respond to your family with a bit more patience, one thing we can do as dads is don’t cram your schedule so stinking full that you have no margin for anything to go wrong, right? You’re driving down the road the other day with your family and you keep getting cut off, or you have folks get in front of you, or you miss that light. You know when I’m most impatient when I’m driving? When I left too late, right? When I didn’t allow myself enough time to get to the next spot and I left no margin for error or whatsoever. There are some practical bits here, right, that we want the Spirit to work in this, we want to have the fruit of the Spirit, but also we do want to make some wise choices as we walk through this. What are some things, Lawson, that come to mind for you as we talk about in this area?

 

Lawson Brown:

Like some practical…

 

Kent Evans:

Yeah, like Andrew talked about relying more on God. Andrew talked about being more patient, about listening to his kids as if they’re trying to connect, not gain attention in a negative way. What are some things that you’ve been able to do as a dad that are maybe some practical ideas in this arena?

 

Lawson Brown:

Well, what Andrew said, and I’m really thankful that he went online and sent that to us because it’s rich and it’s helped, but something I think is really important was that he reframed his perspective into more of a, they’re wanting a connection, they’re seeking a connection. I think that’s key to reframe your perspective. And then I had an instance, this was a work thing, not with the kids, but a very, very young… A very eager, I should say, younger salesperson on a team once and just wanted to talk. He was new. He was excited. He was fun. He was rocking and rolling, but he wanted to talk like three times a day and I just couldn’t do it. He’d call me after a sales call or something would go right and he couldn’t wait to get on the phone, or we’d be talking about something and he’d bring two or three other things. I set up on Mondays and Fridays that we would have a good 30 minutes or an hour of time together. Mondays, talk about the coming week. Friday, we talk about what happened and what’s coming out. What I found myself being able to do then was in those moments throughout Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday where I couldn’t take the phone call or we’d get a voicemail or I’d be talking to him and then something else would come up, I’d just say, “Hey, that’s a really good idea. That’s a great question. Whatever. Let’s talk about that Friday in our one-on-one, or let’s talk about that on Monday when we get together.” And push it toward something like that is I think maybe less of a way to shut someone down, which is not what you want to do. You certainly don’t want to do that with your children. Like in Andrew’s case, I’m imagining that his six-year-old son, while Andrew’s in the middle of something, busting in and want to talk about some specific thing or whatever.

 

Kent Evans:

Right. Right.

 

Lawson Brown:

And if he says, “Hey, buddy, let’s talk about that at dinner tonight,” that’s a great thing for the dinner table, or “Hey, when me and you go to the store tomorrow, let’s talk about that on the drive. That’s a really good thing for us to talk about.”

 

Kent Evans:

That’s cool.

 

Lawson Brown:

You don’t want to deflect everything. I’m not saying that, but use those predetermined times of built-in margin, like you’re saying, into your life for that purpose.

 

Kent Evans:

I think what you’re saying, Lawson, in is each of your kids, you should have like a one-on-one every week and like, “Okay, listen, let’s talk about that at our 2:30 and don’t be late. Because if you’re late, I’m not going to talk to you.” It’s definitely not in my nature to want to be interrupted. But I tell you what I have figured out is that if you look at the interruptions in Jesus’ ministry, man, there’s a bunch of them and he was always willing…

 

Lawson Brown:

He was all about the interruptions. Yeah.

 

Kent Evans:

The question is, even when my son was asking about the rules to the NFL game, right? That’s really not the plot of the story, right? The plot of the story is I’m in a position to help him learn something. Forget what it is. Whether it’s NFL rules or Bible verses or how to shoot a basketball or whatever it is, I’m in a position to help him learn something. In the moments when I get the opportunity to go into that kind of mode where he’s asking, those set the stage for me to teach him more complex things later. So like right now, if he’ll let me talk to him about what’s an offsides penalty in NFL if I can build that kind of muscle memory between him and me, that he can come to dad with a question, and dad’s going to be ready to answer if dad knows the answer if dad doesn’t know the answer, we’ll Google it together, or we’ll go figure it out, then later… I mean, the ends of the parenting spectrum, right? I’ve got one son who’s married, and I got a six-year-old who still kind of wets the bed. At the end of the day, you got all these parenting things still happening in real-time. Well, I can tell you today, my 22-year-old, if he’s got a decision to make that’s of any significance, he will call me and invite me into that conversation.

 

Lawson Brown:

That’s awesome.

 

Kent Evans:

That’s probably because as often as I could, I tried to let the little things… I let him connect. I let him connect. That kind of bid for connection. The concept that Andrew was talking about where… I think psychologists would call it a bid for connection. It’s like when you walk into a coffee shop and you see a stranger and you kind of go, “Hi.” You kind of give him the hi or whatever. That’s a bid for connection. That’s a bid for connection. I’m sticking out my hand and saying, “Hey, you want to connect?” And that person either says yes or no, depending on lots of factors, their personality, how their day is going, whatever. For us as dads, we should be kind of in this perpetual state… I mean, perfect world. If the world’s not falling apart at our feet, we should be in this perpetual state of being willing to be connected with. I’m super grateful that Andrew brought this topic to our attention. I love the practical idea you gave the guys at work, Lawson because you’ve managed some teams. You’ve managed a lot of people. You’ve had a lot of people in your kind of organizations over the years, and you’ve had to learn how to do that. Are there any other things that maybe connect, either work, even physical fitness? You’ve had a group together for years where you guys have kind of pushed each other in the area physical. Is there any other suggestions you might have for a dad who has people around him that want to connect and how he can be more connect a bull? Any other ideas?

 

Lawson Brown:

Man, I don’t feel like I’m in any way an expert resource for espousing the way to do it. But for my own good, sometimes it does take getting away and being quiet. I generally get recharged when I’m alone or just have carved out some quiet time or something like that. So listening to Andrew, it’s not always easy, especially when your family is young and growing and all that. But dude, even 30 minutes a day, if that means getting up just a little bit earlier, or going for a walk, whatever, to go in whatever your way is. Mine happens to be kind of pulling away a little bit and going and recharging and quiet if that helps. I think that’s a decent consideration as a suggestion for go catch your breath. Like literally Andrew said, he stopped. He paused. He read some scripture. He asked for help. I think getting away and just taking a moment for yourself, reminding yourself what your role is, reminding yourself to reframe your perspective that your children, they’re not trying to get attention for a reason other than they want to come to connect with you. And that is super valuable.

 

Kent Evans:

Big time. And the other thing I would say to Andrew is, hey, man. I think he said his kids are six, four, and one and a half or something like that. From an exhaustion level standpoint, I feel like I remember those years as being really tiring. I kind of wish somebody would’ve told me a couple of things when my wife started having babies in our mid-twenties. One, eventually you will get your wife back. Eventually, you’ll get your wife back. And secondly, eventually, you will get a whole night’s sleep. It’s going to happen.

 

Kent Evans:

Just hang in there. For some guys out there who have super young kids, they’re trying to do everything. They’re trying to be a perfect husband. They’re trying to be a perfect employee. They’re trying to be a perfect dad. They’re trying to be a perfect golfer, a perfect fitness guy, whatever. It’s just not all going to work. You just can’t cram 10 pounds of life into a five-pound bag. Andrew, hang in there. Hang in there. By the way, at the time we’re recording this, it’s winter and Central Minnesota… Andrew called in from Central Minnesota.

 

Kent Evans:

I say called in. We all know. And then secondly, Caleb called in from Bermuda. I think I committed to this last week because I’m a giver. I am a giver. Lawson, I suggest you go hang out and visit Andrew, Central Minnesota.

 

Lawson Brown:

He’s probably listening to my suggestion going, “Yeah, come up here and have a walk.”

 

Kent Evans:

And I’m going to go to Bermuda just because we have to kind of divide and conquer. We only have two of us, so yeah, you do that, I’ll do that, and then we’ll see you guys… If Lawson’s fingers are unfrozen enough to be able to click a mouse next week, we will see you back here next week on the Father on Purpose Podcast. Hang in there, stay warm, and get some sleep.

 

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 the 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.