Focus on the Family

Rich Griffith: We're asking the wrong question. We should not be asking children six to 12 what do you want to do? We need to ask the question, who do you want to be?

Jim Daly: Yeah, I love that.

Rich Griffith: And it's character issues. Because you can do any career. You can develop any career, but developing your character is really important. So in this path goal, we try and find out what our kids excel at and do well that brings out character, not a product.

John Fuller: That's Rich Griffith, and he joins us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. And he's going to be talking about how to disciple your children using different leadership styles as they grow. It's going to be really fascinating, and we're glad you've joined us. I'm John Fuller.

Jim Daly: John, one thing that is so true about parenting is often times I've felt behind the curve. Jean tended to be a little ahead of the curve, which was great. But as your children grow, you as a parent have to grow as well. And how are you going to engage that eight-year-old and then that 10-year-old, 12-year-old, 15-year-old? It's very different, or it should be. And if you're still parenting that 15-year-old like an eight-year-old, you've got some problems around the corner.

And that's part of it, how to learn how to be ahead of it and make sure that your kids are getting the kind of parenting that the Lord has set up for you to provide. And I think it is not complicated. We try to make it like a protractor event, when it's a compass event. Move them north to the North Star. Don't worry about what degree they're on, but just gently continue to move them to the North Star.

One thing that we've developed here at Focus, which is so important, is something we call Age and Stage. This developed out of Trent as a young boy going to the pediatrician, and the pediatrician gave me a sheet saying, "Here's the behavior you can expect at this age." And I was like, "Why aren't we doing this at Focus?" So now, you can sign up at our Age and Stage location on the website. You put in your children's birthdates and we will send you e-newsletters every week about how to do that parenting journey a little better and things to be mindful of at two years old.

And we will age that record and we'll let you know what to think about when they're six and 10 and 15. And it's all free, so do take advantage of that. We want you to.

John Fuller: Yeah, that Age and Stage e-newsletter also has an annual bucket of information that you get just to reset and to reframe.

Jim Daly: That 13-year-old e-newsletter is really good. Look out, Mom and Dad.

John Fuller: It really is good stuff. So sign up at focusonthefamily.com/weekend. And our guest is Rich Griffith, as I said. He's a part-time pastor and associate professor of youth ministry. He's a single dad of three adopted sons, and we're going to be talking about a book he's written. It's small, but it's really got some great principles in it. It's called Discipleship is Leadership: Stages of Generational Development. Learn more about Rich and this excellent resource at our website.

Jim Daly: Rich, welcome to Focus. Welcome back to Focus on the Family. It's good to have you here.

Rich Griffith: Thanks. Privilege to be back. Thank you.

Jim Daly: You know, let me say this and then ask you a pretty tough question, if I could do that. One, I admire what you've done. There's so many kids in foster care who are waiting to be adopted. Their hearts yearn for that mother and father. So way to go. As a believer in Christ, you're stepping up and you're doing it. And that's something we promote here at Focus on the Family.

Let me ask you this little tougher question, though. We're working with Katy Faust. There's a documentary coming later this year. And in there, she's really talking about every child deserves their biological mother and father. Things happen to where it breaks down. But that idea as a single man adopting, you know, just by doing that, they're not going to have that Mom. I just want that perspective from you that you didn't do it with that purpose, but these kids need a home.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, absolutely. And I would say look as a single dad, it's not the ideal situation. I think we have the ideal, which is a Mom and a Dad. But then there's the real of life. And so I fought that call to adopt for four years. I mentioned this last year. I thought a single guy, particularly in youth ministry, that looks weird.

And then I could not fight that call anymore. And there's lots of things that circumstantially God spoke into, and I won't get into all that. But what I do for my sons, realizing that I can't provide femininity to my sons, so I have godly women from my church who mentor them.

And I think last time I shared a story about Ms. Harriet and Jamie. Ms. Harriet did some really tremendous things. And so they just... it's what the church should do. It is becoming a family to each other beyond biology.

Jim Daly: And again, you can be critical, our critical spirit goes there. You know, they should have a mother and father. But my goodness, they're languishing in the foster system. So you have to kind of build a pyramid of call, right? At the bottom line, they need a home. They need somebody to call Dad or Mom, or Mom and Dad. All is good. And all is certainly better than being in changing foster homes and never feeling like they belong. So again, well done, and I appreciate you answering that.

Rich Griffith: Well, I think the research that really after the four years of fighting it, of course I researched a lot. And you probably are aware of this, but maybe your listener's not. 50% of kids that age out of the foster care system—which by the way, if they're age eight, which is second grade, they have a 90% chance of aging out of the foster system.

Jim Daly: Never being adopted.

Rich Griffith: Never being adopted. And of those children, 50% of them will wind up homeless, incarcerated, sex trafficked, or dead. And when I came across that research, I get emotional. I was like, I cannot not do something. I got to do something. And it wasn't ideal.

Jim Daly: Think of the intervention and the benefit of that, spiritually speaking, where you know a predictable feature like that, where 50% are not going to do well. And the Lord's saying, can you help them? Body of Christ, this is us. Let's go Team Jesus. And it's not easy. I mean, we fostered for about 15 years and there's a lot of trauma. And it pushes all your parenting buttons. "Just do what I tell you to do" doesn't work.

Rich Griffith: No, it's every time you push on a fresh wound you never knew was there.

Jim Daly: But the parenting principles are so true. We did 40 hours of parenting training to become a foster parent. It was actually really good material. It didn't have the spiritual edge to it, but we can bring that. We don't have to be void of that. But it was just good basic parenting material. And 40 hours of training, I would say every parent should go through that kind of training and hopefully through church, a biblically centered parenting training. Now you've done that.

Rich Griffith: Yeah. And the spiritual part is what brings the healing holistically. We can do the parenting part and the secular perspectives, which there's social sciences. But the bringing people to Christ and modeling that, that's where they get their healing.

Jim Daly: Now you've adopted these three boys and I want you to tell us about how parenting changed your perspective on discipleship. Is it really, man, I don't know that many of us think of it that way, that parenting is discipleship. Rich, parenting is parenting. You got to bring the wood.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, that's a funny quote. Not very helpful in parenting actually, especially if you had kids with trauma. And so I've been writing on some things too right now of generationally culturally induced trauma. And so even kids that come from loving Christian homes, they are swimming upstream and they are getting damage and wounds from the culture that is a whole 'nother issue.

So you're right, I think Christian parents want to do what's right and they have to do what's right. But there is no manual. I mean, most of us when our kids go to school, we don't know what they're facing. We don't know the things that happen and it can trigger a little bit of trauma there with bullying or whatever.

Jim Daly: I would say a litmus test of that in terms of your parenting is how your children come to you at those problems, actually. Is it safe? Can they trust bringing something to you that maybe is outside the pew and they experience something, or they did something, and now they're feeling something about that action, bullying somebody? Or maybe they're on the other end receiving that bullying. But man, the relationship with you as a parent is so critical and it's a great measure of how much they believe they can come to you with anything, hopefully, and say it to you without the over-dramatic response that we as parents so often have.

Let's start with that. Why do we as parents respond to outside the boundary activity viscerally, and how we're not aware how that can damage our relationship with our children?

Rich Griffith: I think most of us as we parent, we tend to be a little more reactionary. And so there's a word that's been pressing on my heart for the last about 10 years, and it's intentionality. And being in tune with our children. And listen, we live in a busy, busy culture. I mean how many parents—you've probably seen it—you go out to a restaurant and people are supposed to be spending family time together at a meal, and what are they doing? They're on their phones, on their devices, and we are missing such good opportunities to be attuned with our children, our spouse, whoever we're with.

And so I think it takes that intentionality. And I think intentionality means it avoids a lot of reactiveness. In other words, it's intentional as planned. We know kids are going to get bullied. Our kids, we don't like to think our kids getting bullied, but we might sit down and say, "So how did school go today?" And especially if you're attuned with their emotions, something's off. You know your children better than anybody.

Seems like something's really bothering you. You don't have to talk about it now, but let's talk about it. And I do have a rule because sometimes kids don't want to disappoint their parents, or hurt their parents, or get their parents afraid. So we have a rule in our house. You don't have to talk to me, but you have to talk to somebody. And it's typically their mentor.

So Ms. Harriet, if there were issues, Jamie would go talk to Ms. Harriet. And her rule was, our rule was like a counselor. You don't have to tell me anything. He needs to have you as a safe place unless he's going to harm himself or harm someone else. So I think being attuned and having building a scaffolding system for our children, because we can't do it all as parents.

Jim Daly: I think Christians that get into that environment with foster, for example, you learn a lot about what you should do with your bio kids. Those kinds of little things and building that relationship. What impact does a child's age make on what kind of discipleship they need? So give us a little Age and Stage insight here.

Rich Griffith: So I'm going to give you an example. I'll talk about one of the easiest Age and Stage that really is foundational for everything we do. And while it's a stage and kids navigate it, we navigate it with them, you might have to go back to it sometimes but you don't have to rest there, if that makes sense. So this is based on Erik Erikson's psychosocial development model.

So in zero to about a year and a half, 18 months, there is this platform called Trust vs. Mistrust. And that's the attachment part where families really do attach with that infant and the infant trusts the parent if the needs are met. You guys know this basic psychology.

Jim Daly: No, but not everybody swims in this area.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, it's true. And so to your point about everybody should take classes, Amen. Because you just have to have this information that you usually get this college, not everybody goes to college. And not only not everybody remembers it. My undergraduate degree, special education, we went through this. I didn't remember it. I had to go back through it.

So this stage here, and what I love about this book is it gives a biblical model of who this is. Now, in danger of being a Sunday school answer, the first model of this, the parent role model, is you're modeling Christ. So if you think about it, the first model is servant leadership.

And the reason being is because you got to meet the needs of that child. Other than the cuddling and the warm fuzzies you get and stuff like that, the reality is that baby's not going to do a whole lot for your I don't know what to call it.

Jim Daly: They're not taking the garbage out soon. Maybe hopefully by eight, but we got eight years of ramp up on that.

Rich Griffith: Right. But they're, you know, the sleep deprivation, the changing diapers, you mentioned this too John about one of the basic tasks, right? But those are how even changing a diaper, how you interact with that child, how you serve that child, how you nurture that child. That is that Trust vs. Mistrust, the eye contact. There is more and more being learned about literally that saying about the eyes are the window of the soul.

And it's true, and the facial expressions, they did a whole experiment about moms who kept the blank face and the baby would just look at the baby. And when the baby would start out laughing and trying to get the mother's attention to laugh and stuff, and the mom just kept the blank face, the child moved from a happiness to distress. And it's heartbreaking for me to watch it.

If you watch the clip, it's heartbreaking. And then the child would start crying, literally go to a point of distress. The mother, you could tell was hurting her to do it. She had to look away and then she re-engaged with the baby and gave the facial expression back. So that Trust vs. Mistrust and leading as Christ would serve us to wash our feet, to change the diaper, to do whatever, it's so instrumental.

Now obviously, if your child is 12 years old and they're in the middle school and you have to go to school to feed them, there's an issue. So it's moving out of these stages too. But trust is always going to be the foundational stage.

Jim Daly: Well, and that servant leadership, just so the viewer and the listener connects to this, I'll just, if I can rattle through that list that's out of your book. It's listening well, empathy, healing, awareness, persuasion, conceptualization, thinking beyond daily realities, and dreaming is part of that. I love this. Foresight, stewardship, commitment to the intrinsic value of people, and building community. You'll find those threads certainly through scripture, but in human experience too. And if you're doing these things well as a parent, your kids are... we always say you don't fall far from the tree.

That's the tree you don't want to fall far from. And hopefully you can do that well. Now some parents, Rich, may go, "Whoa, yeah, okay, be Jesus to your kid. I can't be Jesus in my life because that's perfect." What about that guilt thing and shame thing? We're not saying you got to be perfect to do this, but generally be good, be healthy, be spiritually in tune. You don't have to be perfect.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, I love that. We don't think about this in Genesis. Even in Genesis, God says be fruitful and multiply. Well what does that mean? It doesn't mean, pardon me, it doesn't mean like being rabbits and just multiplying. Being fruitful means make wise decisions, bear fruit in your life, fruit of the Holy Spirit. And when you do that, then you can actually propagate. Because then your children are going to benefit from fruitful decisions. Be fruitful and then, or and, multiply.

And the perfection thing, I like to remind people, and I have to remind myself, Adam and Eve had God as the perfect Father and they still blew it. We're going to make mistakes. But here's the good question. Are we better off as a parent now than we were five years ago? Have we learned and have we grown? And have we been humble and admitted that to our children?

John Fuller: This Focus on the Family broadcast will continue in just a moment.

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John Fuller: Thanks for listening to Focus on the Family. Let's resume now with the balance of today's program.

Jim Daly: You know, I like that admonition about be fruitful and multiply, but in that context of a God-centered home, I mean right? And what that means to me is, right, trust the Lord for the outcomes and be the best parent you could be. Talking about discipleship for toddlers. Now again, I think you're stressing a very important point, and science is proving this, I think scripture backs this up obviously.

But children are learning things at a very early stage. I don't think we comprehend that as adults, that these are kind of just little cute puffballs that eat a lot and poop a lot. But in reality, those transmissions are occurring and their brain is developing at a rapid pace, like a million brain cells a day are formed and all of it. And in that context, how do we pay attention at a young age to be doing the right things that help that development?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, I think again as you mentioned too, there's two times in our life that the brain grows most rapidly and learns quickly. It's adolescence and then infancy. So I think again that mindfulness of just paying attention. And your infant is learning in the womb. I think it's a shame that when our children are at their most critical stages of formation, we're actually surrendering them to daycare.

And look, I know there's a need, I understand the financial need, but most parents will spend most of their money doing childcare. Now if you could put them with a loved one who shares the same attributes and Christian worldview and all that, that's even better. And I understand people have to work.

But I also want to say, is it worth sacrificing that first year to year and a half, to even six years when you realize that you're developing such a critical character and learning in that child? And again, I will take it back all the way to mindfulness. It is not about us even having this cute little child. It is about the child. It is about developing a Christ-centric nurture.

Jim Daly: Rich, you talk about the impact. And science again, we're digging deeper and deeper and the deeper it goes, in my opinion, it's proving scripture. So one of the amazing statements I heard recently, I heard a rough cut of a documentary that's coming out, "This Is a Child," that we're going to be producing and releasing. But we have a medical doctor in that footage who is saying the telomere, which is the length of your chromosome, if a Dad is present in the home—think of this—if a father is present, they've done the research, those telomeres are longer.

And it actually determines your well-being throughout your life, health-wise. If those telomeres are longer, you live longer typically. If they're shorter, your life is shorter and they see an impact with a father in the home. Whoa. Now we're starting to connect these dots. It's not just physical but spiritual in what a Dad brings to a child, and it's related to stress.

Rich Griffith: Right, absolutely. And stress, the cortisol, the things that it produces actually rewires the brain in a... So here's the other thing about science, what I love about this. Scripture already validates science before science got there. So for instance, you look at the verse in Romans, "Be transformed by the renewing of your mind."

Professionals used to think that your brain was set by a certain age. But now science says no, there's neuroplasticity, that your brain can change and it does. That's how you get over addictions. It's exactly right. And it's but it's all based on nurture. There's a great study, Trust-Based Relational Intervention, that comes out of the Karyn Purvis Institute, Texas Christian University, TBRI.

And it talks about how you can rewire the brain. This is my hope for adopted kids. Even if you adopt them older, there is always hope in Jesus Christ because He wrote the DNA.

Jim Daly: Definitely. I mean, that's a truism. And that's so good. Rich, modeling the traits you want to instill in your kids is important for your children at any age, obviously, not just toddlers. How did you see that come into play with your sons and board games?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, we get so busy in our culture as parents and we're so hooked to our digital device and stuff that sometimes God can give us great blessings by simply having the power go out. Like we get off of the TV, we get off of the computers, we get off of work. And in this particular case, the power had gone out in our house.

And my kids, because we had this habit of playing board games and things like that—and play is so critical for kids with trauma—so teaching them how to play, play for fun, not competition. So they came...

Jim Daly: I'm sorry, what? I know, it's hard, right? You play for fun, not to win?

Rich Griffith: Well Monopoly, boy, it's blood-draw right there, right? But yeah, my kids were the ones who came to me and said... we had these old-fashioned oil lamps and they came to me and said, "Dad, let's just play some board games." And more than playing board games, what that told me is they have an opportunity, they see it, they want to connect.

And so we sat around and we played board games. And it is amazing how you connect with people just by play. And like I said, kids especially come from hard places, they have to learn how to play. But let's face it, as adults, we get so busy. How often do we forget, the older we get, we need to play.

Jim Daly: We love board games at our house and we do it every Sunday, the boys are over, we're playing a board game. And there's one that you have to... it's you make up a fib and the other person's trying to catch you. And they keep telling me, "Dad, you're so bad at it," because they can see in my eyes that I'm struggling, which I think is a good thing, saying well maybe I'm not a good liar for a reason. But it's so funny because I'm never getting off the start square and they're already finished and they're like, "Dad, you're a terrible liar."

Rich Griffith: But what's fascinating about that too, and I've seen this in my kid's life, when they first came to me and we were playing board games, boy, they would fight or they'd be angry or whatever. And to see the progression of nurture, what nurturing care does, that they could play a game now with not being upset.

Jim Daly: That's a good thing to do. It really is. Moving beyond toddlers. I mean now we can talk and we can begin to understand. And at about 10 years old, they have a good part of their judgment portion of their brain is intact. And Chuck Colson, of the Colson Center, used to tell me—and he did a lot of reading of research—by 10 years old, your son or daughter's moral compass is pretty much formed by 10.

So that means you got a short period of time to really work with that child to set that compass and to help them set their compass. Speak to the older-than-toddler age and stage and what do we need to be mindful of as parents there.

Rich Griffith: Sure. So like six to 12, that's an age stage called with Erikson called Industry vs. Inferiority. And so the leadership model is called Path-Goal Leadership. In other words, you're helping your children already think about not what they want to do. I don't think we want to ask the question of "What do you want to do?"

How many kids said, "I want to be an astronaut," "I want to be a firefighter"? We're asking the wrong question. We should not be asking children six to 12 "What do you want to do?" We need to ask the question, "Who do you want to be?"

Jim Daly: Yeah, I love that.

Rich Griffith: And it's character issues. Because you can do any career. You can develop any career, but developing your character is really important. So in this path goal, we try and find out what our kids excel at and do well that brings out character, not a product.

So in this one, the leadership model is Moses with Jethro. And this whole thing about "I belong to God." So look at Moses. He had great leadership ability, stumbled a lot though, right? And we know this too as leaders and as parents. Think about this. As a parent, if you're exhausted, how intentional are you being with your children?

Jim Daly: Right.

Rich Griffith: And so Moses is exhausted by seeing the Israelites from morning to night. Jethro comes in and he literally says, "What you're doing is not good." And he has to learn how to delegate. Why did he do that? Because there's this concept of learning teaching our children how to develop their character, find the things that they enjoy. And here's what I tell my students older.

Tell me what your passion is and then you will find your purpose. So when ages six to 12, one of the things that we're trying to teach our kids is we're no longer being that cop. We're trying to develop character more, it's not about the rules and regulations, it's about who are you and who are you becoming. And so we do more coaching. Well why is that? Because we're preparing our children...

It takes a long time to prepare our children for healthy what I call interdependence. I don't like the term of saying, "Oh we're supposed to raise healthy independent children." No, that's narcissistic. We have to learn to be not codependent, not independent, but interdependent. And that takes a lot of coaching.

Jim Daly: It does. And Rich, I'd love to have you come back next time. I'll look forward to that. And to those of you listening, I hope this conversation has equipped you to lead your younger kids. That's the goal. And I want to recommend you get a copy of Rich's book, Discipleship Is Leadership, so that you can do the best job possible in your parenting journey. We have copies for you here at Focus on the Family. Make a monthly pledge of any amount and we'll send it as our way of saying thank you for being part of the ministry.

And when you donate on a monthly basis, you make it possible for us to create new resources to reach more families for Christ. Last year alone, we helped prepare 470,000 parents for the transition to their kid's next stage. That is awesome. And we need your continued financial support and prayers to keep walking alongside these parents.

But if a monthly pledge is a little much right now, we get it. If you can make a one-time gift, we'll send you the book as well.

John Fuller: Donate today and get your copy of Rich Griffith's book when you call 800-232-6459. That's 800-A-FAMILY. Or contribute to the ministry and get the book when you stop by focusonthefamily.com/weekend. And then while you're online, sign up for our free Age and Stage e-newsletter. You'll get free resources straight to your inbox tailored to the age and stage that your children are in, each one of them by the way, as they grow up. And you can sign up at the website.

And thanks for listening to Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we continue the conversation with Rich Griffith and once again help you and your family thrive in Christ.

You're listening to Focus on the Family's weekend broadcast. We'll take a quick break and then return with the second half of this program for your family. Stay tuned.

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John Fuller: Thanks for listening to Focus on the Family. Let's resume now with the balance of today's program.

Jim Daly: We've become more of a confidant, right? It's... I get emotional talking about this because what a rich relationship that is. Think about when they are little and you have to play the cop. Do you really want to live there all your life?

Well, that's Rich Griffith and he's back with us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly talking about how you can adapt your parenting style from cop to that next stage of leadership as your children grow up. Thanks for joining us. I'm John Fuller.

Jim Daly: You know, our children's needs change as they grow and we have to grow as parents right alongside them. Yesterday, we talked about parenting younger kids and ways to lead them well as they grow from toddlers into grade schoolers. It's not complicated, but it takes intentionality. And I want to encourage you to listen to that episode in the Focus on the Family app if you missed it.

Making parenting adjustments as your children get older can get more and more challenging. They say small children, small problems; big children, big problems. So we are going to talk about some of those changes that need to happen when your children grow into teenagers today.

Here at Focus on the Family, we want to come alongside you, help you throughout your parenting journey. One way that we do that is through our Age and Stage e-newsletters. You simply sign up, you enter the ages of your children—each one of them—and we will send you weekly emails to give you parenting ideas on how to continue to help that two-year-old, eight-year-old, 15-year-old. It goes from zero to 18 and it's all free.

John Fuller: Yeah, it's a terrific resource and it's available to you when you sign up on our website. Now Rich Griffith is a part-time pastor and an associate professor of youth ministry. He's also single dad of three adopted sons. And he's written a really wonderful resource, it's called Discipleship is Leadership: Stages of Generational Development. And we'll link over to it on our website.

Rich, welcome back to Focus on the Family. Let me start off by talking about the impact it has on the relationship when a parent is still using the cop leadership style with a teenager. How does that hurt both the parent and the child?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, it frustrates the child. And the overall what it communicates—so this is the platform again, this is where it goes foundational—overall it communicates to your child, "I don't really trust you." And so at some point you have to start learning to trust your child. And even when your child makes mistakes, instead of coming down hard with consequences...

By that time, how many of you know this, like if you've made a mistake, even when you were younger, and you knew it and you owned up to it. Did you really need somebody reminding you about your mistake?

Jim Daly: No, it's really healthy.

Rich Griffith: Yeah. I mean, if you can do that as a child, that's amazing and great. If you can do it as an adult, that's great. And this is where coaching comes in. So I used to coach soccer and martial arts. You put a kid out on the field and stuff like that. At some point as a coach, you've trained them, you've done the transactional leadership, now you have to step back and you let them play the game.

Now, you're still on the field as a coach. You don't abandon them. Because when they're out on the field and they did something good, who do they look to? The coach and the parent. They want that affirmation. If you're playing the cop, "Oh you should have done better, you should have done..." No, how can... Okay, you did great. Is there anything you can see improved then?

I just love thinking of T-ball. If you play T-ball with your kid the first time out, like the little kid hits the ball, everybody goes to the ball. I think Trent was playing left field, the ball was hit to right field and he and everybody else ran to right field to get the ball. It's pretty funny.

Jim Daly: It's so true. You know as I think through that illustration, at some point that child out on the field, your inclination as a parent might be to help them. "Hey you could have..." But they're absolutely not going to hear you at that point.

Rich Griffith: Absolutely. You encourage. Here's what I always say, sort of like this principle of—this doesn't exactly fit but—praise publicly and discipline privately. But even in that, "Hey you ran, you gave it your best." If not, we move into that helicopter, you probably heard too the terminology of a bulldozer parent.

Just push every obstacle out of the kid's way. You're still, believe it or not, you're still playing a cop. You're not really coaching and helping that child learn how to make their own decisions and learn from failure. And most of us, we learn more from our failure than we do success and building resiliency, which is so critical. If you're the bulldozer parent, you're knocking down those barriers that actually help your child to learn how to overcome things.

But let me dig in a little bit, because folks are watching and listening. "You don't know my child. I have to be the cop at 15 because of their behavior." So again, these can be delicate things, we're working with generalities. We don't know your specific situation, that might be true. But generally speaking, what coaching advice do you give a parent when they today are going, "Wow, I'm still acting like a cop"? What can they do differently? What's the next phase, I guess is the question.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, I think to step back and seek other counsel outside of yourself. And you know, I'm amazed—and I don't know if you guys have ever had this happen—I'm amazed, and I don't know why, but I'm amazed sometimes when my kids I'm picking up from school and a teacher comes up to me and says, "Let me just tell you, Jamie or Dylan, they're such a joy to have in my classroom."

And we in the classroom, "You talking about my kid?"

Jim Daly: I've never heard that.

Rich Griffith: Well, we don't we always because we can get stuck in this cop role. And I think it's a natural inclination. Why? Because we feel responsible for our children. And we are, but we got to remember in order to develop healthy people who have their own what's called individuation in the sense of knowing who they are, we've got to learn to let go a little bit.

I will say this too. These are not cut and dry stages and phases. You may have to go back and honestly as much as this pains me, I've had to go back and go rework and build the Trust vs. Mistrust stage. There are things that I've done and said to my children that I look back and I go, again, I'm a better parent five years now than I was before, five years later.

And I got to look back and go, man, I really blew that. And how can we work on this trust issue a little bit more? What do we need to do? It could be simply, let's go back doing our Friday night game nights. Let's build relationship. Let's build trust. So you can go back and revisit these stages. You don't have to get stuck in a stage.

And then experiment. And here's the other thing. Don't throw the baby out with bathwater. If you've been playing cop and then all of a sudden you try and do this coach, it's going to be tough. So I think what you might have to do is let's try one or two approaches that move me into being a coach, neuroplasticity, rather than being a cop.

Jim Daly: So Rich, what about—I appreciate so much what you're saying. I'm buying it and I go home tonight and I say, "We're going to do game nights on Friday nights." And my kid basically doesn't even want to give me the time of day. So how do I bridge that gap? How do I disciple them when they don't really even want it?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, I think there's principles that we I learned from TBRI, which is Empower, Connect, and then Correct. We're so quick to jump to the Correct, right? And I think the empowering is, "Okay, you don't want to do game night, what would you like to do?" And here's what I would do, I would make it a heart matter. "I really miss connecting with you. I really want to connect with you."

Now, kid may not say that's what they want to do, but they want it. And they know they want it. So you empower them, you give them the choice. "All right, fine, you don't feel like doing game, what about if we go out for ice cream?" So you give them options, let them come up with it.

And that's how you start. So again, this is actually, if you think about it, it's moving to coach. You're now empowering them to make decisions of things that they would find more attractive and appealing, and you start building that relationship. Keep trying. Exactly right. You're the parent. Keep trying. You're the one who's wiser, right? It's that Mark Twain quote, "When I was 17 I couldn't believe how dumb my old man was. And then I turned 21 and I couldn't believe how smart he had become."

So true. A little maturity. Rich, how did you use the coach leadership style—kind of that teen parenting era, I would think—to teach your boys about money?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, that's a really interesting one. I think when kids start getting the concept of money—which is brilliant when they actually start working on their own, have to pay some things on their own—they're like, "Oh, this actually costs me some things."

But before I even did that, what I would do is I would actually take them grocery shopping with me. And I know if you're a parent, you're like, "That's probably the worst thing you could do because they..." It's not like they're toddlers anymore and they're grabbing for all this stuff on the side shelf.

And I will actually give them money and I'll say, "This is just a freebie, this is grace, I'm just giving you money to go buy whatever you want. But you're going to have to be selective about it." And I constantly teach my kids about the value of money and what you earn.

But here's what I also do. I want them to learn the difference between wants and needs. So for instance, I will always call them, even to this day, and I will say, "Hey, I'm about to run to the store, what do you need?" And they have to tell me what they need first, deodorant, toothpaste, whatever stuff.

And then I will say, "What do you want?" And they'll say, "Oh can you pick up some of those cookie things?" And I'm like, "You know what? I have the finances, I will be glad to do that." They don't always get that. And then I also teach them the value of like when they start making some of their own money and it's really like an outlandish want, not really outlandish, but they want cookies or whatever. "You can buy that for yourself, because then they understand it costs them." Exactly. That's a good lesson. It's very good. So it's just teaching them the value of money and earn and the love of money is the root of all evil, not money itself.

Jim Daly: So Rich, as a coach at this point in time when you're looking at your child with regard to money, what about a child that doesn't regulate? So I bring the cookies home and they want to eat the whole thing. Do I let them?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, no, that's not good either. So what I've done with my kids who were in that stage and not regulating, I would actually break the cookies down and put them in a smaller Ziploc and just say, "These are the cookies you can have for now."

And so they just learn the value of it. And when they were younger, it's a little bit easier, I could kind of put up in a high place there. I had to hide. You all ever had this situation in your home where you buy something you like too and you never get any of it because your kids eat it all?

Jim Daly: Yes I have as a matter of fact, just the other day.

Rich Griffith: So you have to have a safe or something to put it in. Almost, almost. But I do teach them about regulation and again, natural consequence if they eat it all, then I'm like, "You know what? I usually buy something like this once a month. Well now you're going to have to wait until another month or now we might have to skip." So it is teaching them to learn how to regulate and moderation.

John Fuller: This Focus on the Family broadcast will continue in just a moment.

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John Fuller: Thanks for listening to Focus on the Family. Let's resume now with the balance of today's program. How can parents disciple teens using transformational leadership? And what does it mean?

Rich Griffith: Yeah. So transformational leadership, if you really think about it, it is you are the leader. When you're displaying this as a parent, you are the transformational leader. So what that is is you're actually delving more into the things that transform your child from the inside out. It's the nurture and the care.

And really I talk about this about so you start moving when your child has trust, has all these stages, and they navigate them well. You're actually becoming more of a counselor. The counselor role is more of, "Really tell me about your life." And you suspend or withhold judgment. I just want to hear about you. Tell me what's going on in your life.

Jim Daly: Now can I let me break in and you'll continue. The parent that doesn't do that naturally, how do they learn to do that better?

Rich Griffith: Yeah, that's I'll be honest with, I'm still in that role myself.

Jim Daly: What trigger words do you use to catch yourself when you say, "How is your life going?" and then they say, "Well, you know, kind of tough. I had a beer the other night."

"What? You did what?" I mean, and that's just an example. There's going to be a hundred examples like that. But how do you say, "Well that's interesting. Why did you do that?"

Rich Griffith: Yeah, and I think that goes back to the comment I made. Most of us as parents, we tend to be reactionary. Look, we know that God knew Adam and Eve were going to make mistakes. We know as parents our kids are going to make mistakes. And so instead of being reactionary, I think we have to sit down and exactly you pinpoint it, is having the conversation to say, "Okay, so what was the motivation? Were you hanging out with some friends? Did you just feel pressured to do that?"

And there's no withhold the judgment. Kids are going to explore. It's just how they explore as an infant is different than how they explore as a teenager.

Jim Daly: Rich, let's spend a little time here because a parent can translate that. If I don't correct, if I don't do the cop thing then, then I'm letting them get away and they think that action is affirmed. But if I am the trusted guide, they're going to come to me more often with those things and I can provide the wisdom in the coaching phase to say, "Man, that's maybe a little unwise, don't you think?"

But again, sometimes in parenting, it's counter-intuitive. Like we feel we have to correct the behavior or we get a bad adult.

Rich Griffith: Right. So don't get me wrong. I'm not saying withhold discipline. Discipleship shares the word discipline. It's how you disciple. So if I could share this story. I don't remember if I shared this last time, but my son, my middle son, when he was 15, he had called me and said... I was at work. He said, "Dad, can I go hang out downtown with my friends? Walking distance."

Given the questions were, you know, who are you hanging out with? What time are you going to be back? What are you going to be doing? Answered all the questions, said, "Fine, just be back by 5:30 because that's when we have dinner, stable time."

And so I don't think much about it. And he comes back about 4:30, 5:00, between there. And he's home really early, which as a teenager hanging out with friends you're like, okay, so what's up with this? And I didn't ask anything. I'm fixing dinner.

And so he says, "Well I'm not really feeling well," which was the excuse, right? "Okay, I'm starting to get a headache." Okay, fine. Well dinner time comes. "I'm not really hungry. I'm going to go lie down." So I go, "Okay." We had dinner, I go have dinner. I go to my church, have a church meeting that evening. And I get a call at the end of our church meeting. It's from the school principal.

And she goes, "Mr. Griffith, I just want to find out make sure that Dylan's all right."

I'm like, "Well what do you mean?"

She said, "Well he was in a really bad car accident."

I'm like, "What? Excuse me?"

He had apparently gotten into a vehicle with a young lady who just had her driver's license. She's 16 going on 17, something like that. Got in a van, a minivan, overloaded with people. Went down a gravel road and took a curve too quick, hit the brakes, flipped the van over multiple times, hit a tree, almost wound up in the river upside down. God's providence was there.

I didn't know this. And I'm now all of a sudden it made sense to me like why my son has such a bad headache. He's probably got a concussion. So now's not the time to jump on him and say, "I can't believe you, whatever, you know better, you know." I didn't do that. My first expression with him was, "Look, I got a call from your principal. I know what happened. I'm not worried about that right now. We need to get you to the hospital, make sure you don't have a really bad concussion."

Interestingly enough, this is a point where my 15-year-old son will mark it back, well now he's 23, he'll mark back and he'll go, "Dad, that's when I knew that you loved me. Because you were more concerned about my well-being than giving me consequences." So part of this transformational leadership is you have to let your kids learn within reason consequences.

Now, don't get me wrong. He had some unnatural consequence. I'll explain that in a minute. He had his phone taken away for a little bit and he had consequences. But I knew I didn't need J... he learned because I know there was a time I hit my brakes too hard in the truck one time because somebody slammed the brakes and he, you know, went forward like that in the vehicle like you normally do, and you can see the PTSD kick in from the accident. Why would I add more trauma to the trauma he already experienced?

And that's when it opened up conversation very quickly to see the progression of this. He's now 23. He finished some college. He wanted to go in the military, wanted to go Army. I'm a former Army vet. I'm like, I love the Army but, son, I know your skills and stuff. I think, I think—I'm guiding, I'm coaching, transformational leadership—I think you should look at maybe the Coast Guard.

Well because he trusts me, guess what he did? He decided to join the Coast Guard and he left for the Coast Guard for his basic training on December 9th. So it's all these stages and processes that when that trust is in place. Exactly. To give him that input and act upon it, which is amazing. Because he knows I'm not trying to chastise him or so direct his life that I'm a bulldozer or helicopter parent.

Jim Daly: Your son once had a relationship. I'm assuming he was probably in high school.

Rich Griffith: Actually, he was past high school. He was out on his own a little bit.

Jim Daly: Okay. It wasn't going well. And so how did he come to you for help?

Rich Griffith: Well it's funny two times this happened. He'd call me and he's like, "Dad, can I come home? Things are just not working out well." And at this point, as a parent, you get the read and you're like, this is just something they need to work through. And so I'm like, well let's talk about it and I gave him a little advice and you just need to work through this.

But the second time he called, I knew it was over. And he was broken. And I will tell you, and if you're an adoptive or foster parent, you know how significant this is. It is loss. But the significance also of him knowing he had a home to come back to. At this point, he's like 21 years old and for him to be able to call and say, "Dad, can I come home?" and I knew it was over and I knew it was toxic. And I'm like, "Son, of course, you can always come home."

And so it was actually another chapter from the come home and kind of get his life back on track again. I mean, I don't we never want our kids to go through that and it's painful. But what a beautiful story for a child who knows in the words like Jesus said, "I'll never leave you or forsake you even to the very ends of the earth." To be a Dad and model that to my son and say, "Of course, you can come home."

John Fuller: You know, Rich, in that regard—and it's not a parallel, I'm not bringing it up for this reason—but the prodigal son story in the scripture must really speak to your heart. It does to mine and probably most people, because it's such a touching story of a loving father.

Rich Griffith: Yeah, absolutely. And I look at, you know, people will question, "Well why did the father let the son go in the first place?" Well, he was not being a bulldozer or helicopter parent. But again, the beauty of it was what? When the young man came to his senses. And sometimes the world has to do its thing for our children to come back and go, "I know where my security is."

Jim Daly: You know, my linear brain always thinks, could we have another chapter on that, Lord? Like, how did he turn out? What was his relationship with his Dad like five years later? But, you know, it's left to the imagination. But when love is there, I think things generally go in a very good direction.

Rich Griffith: Absolutely. My kids, I am so thankful that my kids know that I love them.

John Fuller: So, Rich, there are times after our kids leave home, assuming they do at some point, where the relationship changes and the discipleship changes. So coach me a little bit on that. What should my expectations be for my 23-year-old? Am I discipling that child still or is it done?

Rich Griffith: No, I think it's lifelong discipleship. And I think that as your child grows and you continue to stay invested in their life in different ways, they just appreciate you in different ways. So for instance, when my child—so this is a great example—when he talked about... my middle son talked about going in the Army.

Well, I had experience with that and I'm like, I really did not want him to go and be sent to Afghanistan or wherever. But I also know his gifting. So this is where the discipleship comes in. It's more of a conversation. It again is this role of a confidant. "Tell me what you're thinking." And, "You know, let me process it. Let's pray together. And then let's just see what the Lord says."

And so at this point, knowing his gifting, I just I said, "I think Coast Guard would be better for you." And come to find out when he went through the different jobs that were being offered and stuff and he looked at it and he's like, "Yeah, this job in the Coast Guard really fits me." And he's really excited about it.

John Fuller: I appreciate what you said though. I mean you're the lead on taking this to the Lord. You're hopefully your child is thinking that, but if not, you're at least expressing that, that there's a spiritual dimension to life. Let's not ignore that in these big decisions.

Rich Griffith: You become more of the intercessor. I think of Job and how he was a righteous man and he made sacrifice for himself, but he made sacrifices for his children too. He didn't stop discipling his children. And so it's just such a beautiful story.

And I think that role and here's what's going to be really interesting. I'm not looking forward to this but I can see it already happening. I'm a little bit older and I can see because my sons have developed the right heart, they're starting to disciple and nurture me.

And that sounds strange, like if I, you know, I got some few injuries and if I stumble coming up the steps carrying groceries, my sons will reach out and grab the bag. I'm getting emotional, I can't believe this. My sons will reach out and and grab the bag. And like, man, you know that's connected then, right? Because they're aware of my needs now. And so now it becomes a mutual discipleship, which I love that. I can still learn from my children.

Jim Daly: You know and again, I didn't have an engaged Dad. I didn't have a Mom. I lived with my brother in junior high and high school who was, you know, he was not my Dad. So from that though and seeing my friends who had Dads, again, that experience, there were the two types of Dads and Moms who they are looking to correct right in that moment. "How could you do this?"

I mean in the strongest of terms, Rich. Coach them on that's a moment for you and you got to choose wisely as the adult, as the parent, because there's going to be two years from now and three years from now with that child. How is this setting up that relationship?

Rich Griffith: Jim, I know why we go there because we see our children as a direct reflection on ourselves. And the fact of the matter is not we're trying to help them become their own person. So I want to go back to these principles, the way you do it. Start a process. It's our brain has change. We're not going to get there overnight.

But try and remember. Empower, Connect, then Correct if you have to. Like by the time your kid gets to be 21, honestly, how much correcting are you going to do?

Jim Daly: Right, none.

Rich Griffith: Wouldn't you rather be the counselor? And as they get older, you become more of a confidant. I think that's the point I'm at now with my 23-year-old. We've become more of a confidant, right? It's I get emotional talking about this because what a rich relationship that is. Think about when they are little and you have to play the cop. Do you really want to live there all your life?

Jim Daly: Yeah. And in that regard, I think right here at the end this is the right place to land. Teaching your children how to integrate their faith into regular life. That's a big one. How do you do that in 30 seconds?

Rich Griffith: I think you model it. You have to model it. And I will say this, there's I'm a firm believer discipleship starts in the home, it expands outside the home. But you have to have humility. You have to say, "I blew it. I'm so sorry. Will you forgive me?"

It's all the really good parenting principle, but we have to model it. And my kids see me pray, we pray before I left on this trip, I got them up, we joined hands and I said, "I'm going to pray for you." And I prayed for them. I said, "Lord, just help them continue to become the men that you're creating them to be."

Jim Daly: Solid. That's so good. Rich, again, thank you for being with us here Focus on the Family. This is great stuff. And again, I want to say thank you for what you have done for those three boys you adopted. Awesome job.

Rich Griffith: Your ministry, Focus on the Family, has equipped me to become a better parent. So I want that for other parents too. Thank you guys for your ministry.

Jim Daly: So sweet. And to those of you listening, I hope this episode has equipped you to disciple your children, whatever age they are. And if you want to learn more about the different styles of leadership, I want to encourage you to get a copy of Rich's book, Discipleship Is Leadership.

We have copies for you here at Focus on the Family. When you make a monthly pledge of any amount, we'll send you a copy as our way of saying thank you for being part of the support team. Your donations allow us to offer resources to parents so they can raise their children in Christ.

We had a woman named Kate who is a mother of six tell us that Focus on the Family gave her many parenting tips and resources, including Brio Magazine and Adventures in Odyssey. And she said every little resource ordered through Focus on the Family has been instrumental in nuggets and seeds of faith that have been planted in my kids. You have made parenting so much easier in this culture that is against what the Bible stands for.

And I would just add, our commitment is to continue to meet the needs of parents and reach more children for Christ. But we need your help year-round to keep this ministry going. So be a partner with us and if a monthly gift doesn't work for you right now, we get it. We also will send you the book for a one-time gift of any amount.

John Fuller: Donate today to the ministry of Focus on the Family and request your copy of Rich Griffith's book when you call 800-232-6459. That's 800-A-FAMILY. Or stop by focusonthefamily.com/weekend. And while you're there, be sure to sign up for our free Age and Stage e-newsletters where you'll get specifically tailored information every week for your child or your children. And that link is at the website.

Thanks for listening to Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I'm John Fuller inviting you back as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ.