Focus on the Family Parenting Podcast

Dr. Danny Huerta: Hi, I'm Dr. Danny Huerta from Practice Makes Parent. For nearly 40 years, Adventures in Odyssey has helped kids follow Jesus, and each year over 9,000 have made decisions for Christ. Today, you can help reach even more. We're preparing to release the new animated film, Journey into the Impossible, and your gift right now can help bring this film to millions of families.

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John Fuller: You've likely heard the word deconstruction or deconstructing. What does it mean for our faith, and as parents, what does it mean? I'm John Fuller, along with Dr. Danny Huerta, who heads up our Focus parenting team. Danny, this is something that seems like it's just all the rage. Kids are saying, "I don't want the Christian faith," and they're walking away. They've deconstructed. What's going on?

Dr. Danny Huerta: I've gotten to talk to several adult children in this process. The way they're describing their deconstructing is they're pulling away from certain aspects where they felt controlled. We're in a feeling culture, and if it felt uncomfortable, if it felt controlling, then it must be bad. They're going into this place of not trusting what their parents or those adults—those people—the way they did Christianity.

I can do Christianity totally differently, and I've been enlightened into this new form of Christianity that accepts everything and all. They're going towards a "create your own adventure" type of Christianity. They've lost trust in one that has a specific set of principles and is tied to God's Word. They've gone towards a following, and that's where social media can become so deconstructing in a child's life—not only their brain, their spiritual walk, but many different places.

Know that this is happening too much, but I've seen a reset happen. I want to put hope in there. I know we're going to be talking in this episode about this whole deconstructing thing. Listen in, and don't press the panic button.

John Fuller: Good advice. Here's Dr. John Marriott talking with Focus President Jim Daly.

Jim Daly: This whole idea of deconstruction of your faith—it's a fancy word. I'm rephrasing it to just losing what you were taught and not embracing it for whatever reason. What does it mean to deconstruct your faith?

Dr. John Marriott: I think what it means is that you've inherited a faith. You've gotten to a point in your life where you've become maybe intellectually mature and self-reflective, and you say, "I've accepted all of this, I've believed all of this my entire life, but I'm not really sure if it's really true." For some people who are deconstructing, they're taking it apart, evaluating, and then putting their faith back together in a new way.

For some, they're asking the question of whether or not Jesus is the way. They're saying, "Is Christianity even true? I've believed the whole thing, but I've never really thought much about it. Now I need to step back, make this faith my own, or reject it. I'm going to look at the evidence, and I'm going either to continue to follow or turn away." Then there are others who would say, "I think that Jesus actually is the way. I'm not wondering whether or not Jesus is the way; I'm now asking what the way of Jesus is supposed to look like."

I've inherited a faith, and now I'm looking at it and thinking, is this really reflective of what the Bible has to say about what Christianity is supposed to look like? I'm becoming skeptical that the faith that I have inherited really reflects that. You have these two folks: one's asking what's the way of Jesus, the other's asking if Jesus is the way. They are taking it apart, analyzing it, and hopefully putting it back together in a way that's reflective of what the Bible teaches.

Oftentimes, some people will come to the conclusion that he's not the way, and so now they've de-converted. Deconstruction has led to a de-conversion. Other times, people say, "Well, I'm still a Christian, but my deconstruction has led to a different understanding of Christianity." Sometimes that understanding of Christianity isn't very reflective of the historic understanding of Christianity.

Jim Daly: There seems to be a difference in that journey for people that come to Christ as first-generation believers. You weren't raised in a Christian home, and something got a hold of you. For me, it was Fellowship of Christian Athletes. God bless that organization. They target high school athletes particularly and encourage them in faith. That worked for me, and that gave me substance; it gave me a direction.

My mom and dad were not practicing Christians. My mom is terrific. I think both of them were raised in Catholic homes, but they were not practicing Catholics. They alluded to certain things about treating people the way you would want to be treated. They took elements out of it and put it out there almost as a saying. It did give us a little underlying background, but it wasn't a lot.

I want to compare that to someone who is raised in a full-on Christian home. You're going to church on Sunday right on through the time you go off to college, probably. That can be a little different. You do ask different questions. When you come to faith in Christ as a high school student or junior high student, it's different, especially if your mom and dad aren't people of faith, versus someone raised in a Christian home. Discuss for a minute the differences between those two environments.

Dr. John Marriott: The big difference is that in one, you're captivated by a story, and in the other, you're born into the story. You've inherited the story. Being captivated by the story when you're living according to no story, and then someone comes along and tells you that there's a hope and that there's a meaning in life, and that you can have a relationship with God, and that He has a plan for you and He loves you—to hear that and say, "I can be part of this grand narrative that gives life meaning," is kind of exciting. When people who aren't Christians and haven't heard the story hear that, it's very intoxicating and you just jump in. It lights up; it's exciting.

If you're born into that, it loses all of that excitement of being exposed to it for the first time. It's a story that you haven't chosen for yourself; it's a story that you've been given. The world's already been carved up for you, and you've already been told what's good and what's bad, and how you should live, and how you should dress, and what you should be doing on certain days of the week, and who you should be hanging out with.

If you've been raised in that environment for your entire life, at some point you will become intellectually mature and self-reflective. You will challenge assumptions. Something will come along, and you'll cast a critical eye back on that and say, "Wait a minute, do I really believe this?" This is a story I inherited, but I'm not sure it's the story that I've chosen.

Almost everyone who grows up in a Christian home and makes a profession of faith at some point has to consciously choose that story for themselves. I often say that Christian young people get saved three times: once when they're a little kid and their parents tell them this is what the truth is, once when they rededicate themselves to the Lord when they go to a Bible camp or something when they're in their mid-teens and they say, "I need to make this mine," and then maybe at some point in their 20s when they say, "I've made this mine and I've believed this all my life, but I'm not even sure it's true." I've never asked that question, and so that process starts.

Jim Daly: Personally, you went through a time of deconstruction yourself, which makes it more powerful when you write about it and talk about it. Speak to what the questions were in your own heart and what kind of journey you went through to get back to faith.

Dr. John Marriott: No one called it deconstruction when I went through it. It was just questioning and rethinking. What happened for me was both an intellectual and an emotional experience. I came across and had to deal with the idea that if God is completely sovereign, and He's completely good, and He knows the future, then what does that entail for salvation? How much free will do people really have?

For the first time, I was exposed to a Reformed or a five-point Calvinist view of theology, and that really caused me a lot of internal mental struggles. I thought, "Is God electing people, but not everyone seems like they're going to go to heaven, so did He not elect those people?" Is God even really good? What is this character that I've been telling people about and living for? I had no idea that there was maybe this side to Him.

I had to really wrestle through and think through that. The other piece was experiencing the problem of evil for the first time, despite the fact that you see things on the news and you know that evil goes on in the world. When I encountered someone who seemed like they were really seeking God and searching for God, and that got derailed through an act of violence, and this person was seriously suffering and never came to know the Lord, I thought, "I don't understand how God can be good and loving and allow this to happen to this person who's in my life."

The experience of evil and the problems of some theological issues really caused me to go into a bit of a tailspin and start to rethink and analyze, pull things apart, look at them, and try and put my faith back together in a way that was a bit more informed, that wasn't so naive, and that reflected what I thought that the Bible said.

John Fuller: Danny, as we've talked about deconstruction, there's the big thing—walking away from Jesus—or there are the smaller things. I don't want to make doctrine seem like it's not important, but let's say a child says, "I don't believe everything you believe. I'm still a Christian, Mom; I'm still a Christian, Dad. I just don't believe that." How do I navigate that?

Dr. Danny Huerta: We live in an age where there is a customizing of everything. Asking questions about that—are you wanting to customize more of what it is that you're believing? Is it something that feels off? Tell me more about why it feels off to you. Let's figure out what pieces of doctrine are different within the different faiths.

You have the Baptists that have some nuances and differences in doctrine than Assemblies of God, compared to Methodist, compared to Lutheran. As you look at each one, it's important to ask your child what it is that has caused you to question this now. It's so important instead of just reacting to go toward a responsive place and go on a journey of discovery with your child.

The more you have that, the more you're respecting the fact that they're stepping into an adult world that requires conversation and a back-and-forth of understanding, not only yourself but understanding the other person. You're stepping into that place with them. They're no longer the younger child—the five-year-old or the ten-year-old—and we have a tendency to see them that way. In this moment where they're saying, "I think I'm rejecting pieces of this," you need to shift your mind toward this being like somebody that is outside of our home—adult-to-adult—and go into that moment and say, "Okay, tell me more about that. What is it that you believe?"

As your child goes into that, you'll get so much more information. Maybe take the time to write some of the information down, pray about that, pray for God's wisdom, and see it as a long game. You don't have to convince them at that dinner, or that day, or even that week. Go on a long game. God is a very strategic God. If you look for that guidance as you're writing things down, you'll see. You'll think, "Oh, that's interesting. I wonder if it was this thing that happened in their life that now has caused that, or maybe it's this pain at this church, or maybe it's this friend that went through this pain at this church."

Make those connections and maybe ask about that. "Whatever happened with that? How did you process that?" because that seemed to be a pretty big emotional thing in your life. What did that do inside of you? As you go into that curiosity, you're causing those questions to come up for them to ask that to themselves.

John Fuller: Good advice. We've mentioned our counseling team here before, but if you're trying to reach your child through the ways that Danny's talking about but you're not quite certain how to get going on that, give us a call and ask to speak with one of our counselors. They can guide you through these conversations and get you going on the right direction so you can normalize these and have these conversations for the rest of your child's life.

You don't want to box this off or make it something we can't talk about. You want to make this a really natural part of life because faith is important to you and they're important to you as well. Our number is 800-A-FAMILY, and when you call, just ask to speak to a counselor. We'll schedule a time for them to give you a call back. It's a free 20- to 25-minute phone consultation. It could change everything for you.

Look for the book in the show notes by John Marriott. It's called Before You Go: Uncovering Hidden Factors in Faith Loss. It's an excellent treatment of this whole deconstruction movement and how you as a parent can be knowledgeable and get ahead of the game, especially if your kids are still younger and in the home. Make a donation today and we'll send the book to you. We've got details on how to donate and get the book in the show notes. On behalf of Dr. Danny Huerta and the entire team, I'm John Fuller, and thanks for joining us for the Focus on the Family Equipping Parents podcast.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Hey, parents! For almost 40 years, Adventures in Odyssey has been helping kids like yours form relationships with Christ. Now, the animated Adventures in Odyssey film, Journey into the Impossible, will reach a new generation of families. But we need your help to finish the film and launch it in theaters. Your gift will be matched dollar-for-dollar before May 1st. See the trailer and donate today at focusonthefamily.com/impossible. That's focusonthefamily.com/impossible.