Practice Makes Parent

Dave Stone: Your church comes to you each week to fill their cup. But when the crowd leaves, who's filling yours?

That's exactly what I'm here to do with my new podcast from Focus on the Family. It's called Pastor to Pastor with Dave Stone. I'm so excited to help you navigate the unique challenges that pastors face in their ministry journey, both personally and professionally. So, I invite you to listen and subscribe to Pastor to Pastor wherever you get your podcasts.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Hi and welcome to Practice Makes Parent, where we understand it's not about perfection but about transformation. I'm Dr. Danny Huerta.

Rebecca St. James: And I'm Rebecca St. James. I want to share with you a little story at the top of this. We were sitting around our table recently as a family. We have children 11, seven, and five, and we asked the kids what questions would you ask Jesus if he was at our table right now?

It's the first time we've done that. It was very interesting. Our seven-year-old said, "Are unicorns real?" That's what she would like to ask Jesus. Then our five-year-old said, "Do you have a motorbike with 25 wheels?" I'm presuming in heaven that this is what he was interested in. Hard to picture, but he wanted to know.

Then Gemma, our oldest, 11, said, "Am I a real Christian?" She wanted to ask Jesus if she was a real Christian, which gets me a bit emotional. She's given her heart to Jesus a couple of years ago, but I think when she followed up with further questions, it was, "What do I need to do to even be more of a real Christian, Jesus? What are some things, ways that I can pursue going deeper with you?" It really touched my heart. I just love that that's what came to mind with no preparation. It was just kind of spur of the moment where it came to her heart. So, we are going to be talking about theology today.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Parents, ask your kids that question around the table. You'll enjoy the answers you get. Depending on their age and personality, you are going to get some winners as to what they would ask.

I remember a few of those in our home. I asked my son when he was little, he was about six years old, and we were driving. I said, "If Jesus was right here with you today, what would you ask him?" He said, "Why do people fart?" It wasn't deep, and I was thinking, "Son, I think we could ask a different one."

But anyway, so that was our moment. You never know what you're going to get. We have had some moments where my daughter and my son have said some deeper ones where they wanted to know why do people live life without a mom and dad? Why do people not have food? Why is there poverty? Some deeper ones, and I think as adults, we ask the same question. Why is that happening?

Theology is so important because we need to know what it is that we believe and why we believe it. We want to teach our kids that. Sometimes I think it can be intimidating to talk about theology with our kids. It sounds so scholarly, but really it boils down to, do you really believe who God is and that he cares about you, that he listens to your prayers? So, that's what we're going to get to talk about today with our guests.

Rebecca St. James: Our guests today are Sam Luce and Hunter Williams. Both men have served or are currently serving in various ministry roles, especially with children as children's pastors. Together they've written the book, "How to Teach Kids Theology: Deep Truths for Growing Faith." Gentlemen, welcome to Practice Makes Parent. We're really glad you're here. Was that opening story fun? Have you asked kids that same question before?

Hunter Williams: Yes, and it was so relatable. You have no idea when you open up questions what kids are going to say. We may laugh at them, but they really could be pondering those types of questions. My son just yesterday said, "Dad, if God is everywhere, is he in the water that I'm drinking right now? Am I drinking God?" They ask those kinds of things. They're great thinkers.

Sam Luce: I think the scariest thing in the world is being a kids' pastor. They know everything about you because when your kids go to church, they tell everything. You ask for prayer requests, and you get to know the down-low on everybody.

Rebecca St. James: Guys, I would love to hear right off the top what created your passion for this book? Why did you see such a need for it in your own story?

Hunter Williams: The catalyst for this book started a few years ago. I used to serve on staff at Awana. Awana produced this research project called "Children's Ministry in a New Reality." It covered a lot of data points on the church and on families. One question that it asked was, "What are you comfortable doing?" It was asking children's pastors, "How comfortable are you leading discussions on doctrines of the church?"

To my surprise, almost 40 percent said they weren't comfortable having conversations about basic doctrines of the church. I thought this cannot be. Of all the things we should be comfortable doing in the church, it should be discussing doctrines of the church. One of the reasons it gave for why children's pastors weren't comfortable is they said they lacked resources or training in this area.

I thought surely not of the bajillion resources we have online or at conferences, there has to be something on teaching kids theology. Sure enough, there really wasn't that much. There's a lot of books on teaching kids and there's a lot of books on theology, but there's not really many books that strike that balance of deep theology and high practicality.

One day I was driving back from an event in Nashville and I'm just sitting there thinking, "God, someone has to write a book or make a video series or do something to fix this problem." It's like I got this little nudge that was like, "Well, why don't you do it? You've got the passion. You're a bit of a theology nerd. You could do this." I thought I wouldn't want to do it alone. I'd want someone else to do it along with me who also has experience in this and has the same passion.

Immediately Sam came to mind. At the time Sam and I weren't super close. We were acquaintances that we had met at different events. So, I called Sam out of the blue. I called him through Facebook messaging and said, "Sam, I've got this burden for this book and I know you share it. Would you want to co-author this with me?" Long story short, here we are. We're praying that it can be a resource that helps equip the local church and parents to teach kids with theological richness, but it's also very practical and meets kids where they're at. That was the big catalyst for the book.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Sam, could you explain theology to us? As we start talking about this, I think we need to define that. What is it and why do we need to teach it to our kids?

Sam Luce: I think first of all, if we're honest for all of us, it's a little bit intimidating because the general definition is the study of God. That's a little bit overwhelming for any of us. To study God, to know God, and I think a lot where we're at, most parents and most pastors, is it's in the trenches and trying to get our kids through to the next day. The thought of studying God in that way can sometimes feel overwhelming and feel like too much.

The definition that we prefer and we use in this book is from John Frame. It's the application of God's truth to all of life. The reason why we like that is because it talks about that theology is truth and it needs to be applied to all of our lives in such a way that he's glorified and our lives are better because of it.

This is why it's important for us as parents and as pastors to study theology, to understand who God is, because our understanding of who God is affects how we live our daily lives. It affects the way that we pray. It affects the way in which we raise our kids. It affects our prayer life, the way that we worship, the way that we read scripture.

It's all affected by this reality of who God is and what we believe him to be and how he's revealed himself to us in scripture. The more clearly we can understand that, I think the more passionately we will love and treasure him above all things and then be able to pass that to our kids in such a way that they see him as infinitely more beautiful.

I think this is one of the things in the study of God that we've missed out on. We're really good at the good and the true, but we're not so good on the beautiful. When you study theology, what happens is you see that God is not only good and God is not only true, but God is way more beautiful than anything this world can offer them because it all came from him. It all points to him and what the purpose of this world is, to reveal the beauty of the God that made it all with a word.

Rebecca St. James: One of the things that I'm thinking about as we're talking about theology is that a lot of parents are so busy and overwhelmed. I think one of our passions with this podcast is that it's practical, that parents can have tools and techniques and ideas for making this Christian life as a family an application.

You have techniques in your book for teaching theology and some of them have really interesting titles. I'm very intrigued. Godrails, the flower technique, building coat racks, mental leaps. Can you just both of you maybe take two and just explain two of those techniques? I think that would be wonderful. Maybe pick your favorite couple.

Hunter Williams: I'll use the coat rack one because this one is very helpful no matter what stage of life you're in. The idea of coat racks is, I live in the South and so coat racks are almost pointless. It doesn't snow much here. It doesn't get super cold to where you're going to need thick coats. But they can come in handy. Like last year we had a big snowstorm and so those coat racks were handy to have.

This idea of coat racks is sometimes when it comes to teaching theology to kids, it's okay if we teach them something purely for the sake of exposure. A great example is the Trinity. Adults struggle to understand the Trinity. But just because something is hard to understand doesn't mean we shouldn't introduce it to our kids.

So, what I say is it's like giving them a coat rack. It's like giving them a mental hook that one day they can hang their understanding on. For example, with my little kids, I taught them from very early on that our God is a Trinity. He's one God in three persons. Could they fully tell me what that means? No, but I've given them that mental hook. As they get older, as their understanding catches up, they have that mental hook that they've memorized to hang their understanding on.

That's why I'm a huge fan of catechism. A great practical tool that goes along with the coat rack concept is catechisms. Catechisms have been used for centuries in the church and basically all they are are questions and answers of basic truths of the Christian faith. They cover things like the Trinity or the Ten Commandments. What catechisms do is it gives kids concise mental hooks that are going to serve them for the rest of their lives because one day their understanding will catch up with the mental hooks you've placed there that they can hang it on.

I just want to encourage parents with that. It's okay if you expose something about God to your kids they don't fully grasp because one thing we don't want to miss out on is we don't want to make teaching God so accessible that we diminish his glory. We have to recognize that God is mysterious. I said this to my son the other day. I said, "Saying we can fully understand God is like saying we can fully fit the ocean in a juice box." He's so vast and infinite, there's no way we could fit him in our tiny brains. Letting your kids know it's okay that we don't understand everything about God. You don't have to understand everything about someone to trust them.

That's the coat rack idea, that we're memorizing key truths because one day our understanding will catch up to what we've memorized.

Dr. Danny Huerta: It's almost like you're hanging pieces of knowledge for later, and as understanding catch up, it's those mental hooks. We talk about age and stage here a lot on our show and at Focus on the Family, and this idea that kids are maturing in their ability to understand big concepts. Then life understanding and life experiences catch up to that knowledge, and all of a sudden you have that coat of understanding for that particular thing that you can now say, "Oh, okay, I get it now." Sometimes it is experience that a child or a young adult has that catches up to that understanding of who God is. I love that visual. What about mental leaps or flower technique?

Sam Luce: One of the things I'd say is that we want to give our kids a faith that they can grow into rather than a faith that they grow out of. One of the ways that we address that in the book is through the whole idea of simplification versus distillation. Are we simplifying truth or are we distilling truth?

What we mean when we talk about that is the temptation for us in talking about theology like the Trinity is to try to make it so simple that kids can understand it in the age and stage that they're in, rather than distill it. In distillation, you remove what is unnecessary and keep what is most weighty and most important. It's more strong and it's more viable. When we simplify, sometimes what happens is we tend to remove the important things and what it does is it weakens the faith that we're trying to build in our own kids.

One example that we use is there was a curriculum I used once and it was talking about Easter. Instead of talking about the fact that Jesus died on the cross for our sins, it said that Jesus went away and then he came back. It was like some sort of cosmic peek-a-boo and this is not what happened. That's simplification. In our right desire to try to not hurt kids or overwhelm them, what we do is we sometimes make God smaller in their eyes.

One day when they face something that is so great and so big, because life will happen to each of our kids and they're going to need to be prepared in their faith, their faith needs to be strong so that when those waves come, it won't knock them off. They won't revert back to this faith that says God isn't big enough for the type of thing I'm facing. Kids are struggling with anxiety. Kids are struggling with worry. What we need to do is fortify the truth of who God is in their mind in such a way that as they grow older, what happens is they see God as bigger than their issues, bigger than their problems, because he's greater than anything that we could ever ask or achieve.

When we talk about simplification, what we want to try to avoid as parents and as pastors is to say that God is... One example we use is talking about the whole idea of sin. Sin is bad, which is true. Sin is bad, but sin is much more than that. When you look at the catechisms, when you look at the different teachings of the church throughout the centuries, what you see is that sin is a willful act of rebellion against God. What we're doing is we're going our own way, going opposite of God and what we're doing is we're trying to say, "I know what's best for me."

Sin is more than a mistake. It is us willingly and willfully rebelling against the God who created all things for our good and his glory. For us to distill that for kids is to say, "Listen, God desires for us to know him and to be known by him, and when we sin on purpose or on accident, we run to him for forgiveness, not away from him in shame."

Dr. Danny Huerta: How would you take that concept of sin and talk to kids from an early age and then school age and then pre-teen and teen? How does that conversation develop on understanding sin, the seriousness of it, what it is, the way that their friends are going to be talking about it, the way culture talks about it? What does that look like for a parent in a practical way with kids at a very young age, toddlers all the way up?

Hunter Williams: I talk about sin quite a bit in our ministry because we try to share the gospel every week in our children's ministry and also at home. One way I simply try to talk about sin with our kids... One thing I will say at the outset, when you're defining sin, you always have to define it in light of God. To Sam's point, if you say sin is anything that's bad, well culture defines what bad is differently than how the Bible defines what bad is.

You always have to define sin in light of God. What I do with our little kids, I say sin is wanting to live our way instead of God's way. God created us to live for him, but in sin we live our way instead of his way. You can grow that as kids get older. That's a simple way that I have found very helpful for our kids.

With some of our older kids, I will use something like the Cross Form Kids Catechism where it says sin is doing what God forbids or not doing what God commands. I like kind of that double side of that. Notice there I'm still using my coat rack technique. It's concise hooks. I'm wanting it to be memorable because what I've learned with kids, if they can't remember it, they can't live it out.

You want to try the best you can in distillation and all these things we're talking about, give them concise, memorable hooks for truth. When life hits them, they need to have these succinct truths that they can cling to to apply to their lives. One thing we really try to emphasize in the book is that theology is inherently practical. There is no such thing as impractical theology. It's common to think that theology is just brainy, it's super abstract, but the truth is every issue we face in life at its root is theological. The decisions we make in life, our politics, the people we relate with, all of it is affected by our theology.

The way we teach it, we can show our kids that too. One way I've talked about sin with kids, it's loving anything else more than God. That's why we sin. It's because we've wanted something our way so much. We've loved ourselves so much, we forsaken what God desires, or we wanted someone else's approval so much that we denied what God thinks of us. Those are a few ways we could think of distilling truth or talking about those things at different levels with kids that can be both memorable but also practical in their lives.

Rebecca St. James: What you're talking about right now, even with the idea of sin and helping kids understand that, does that link into your Godrails technique too? I'm kind of imagining that when you set up a framework for theology, you're really giving kids parameters and Godrails. Is that what that is or is it different?

Hunter Williams: The guardrails technique, that one's a pretty specific one for the church, but it can apply to parents too. The idea of train track versus guardrails is sometimes when we buy curriculum or a book for our kids, we'll be so tied to that book, it's like trains to a track. We're not wavering or moving off what it says.

What we say in the book is we need to see resources more like guardrails because nothing is perfect except scripture. If you're using a curriculum or a book, having the discernment to see, "Okay, this thing that it says, maybe there's a different way we could word that or maybe there's another way we could apply this section."

It's more so giving pastors and parents the freedom that they can adjust things for their kids what they know would be most applicable or make more sense to them. It can be easy, as parents you buy a book off the shelf and it's like, "I've got to do exactly what this person said because they're the expert." It's like, no, the only true expert is God.

We give some tips on how to study the Bible for yourself so that if you're looking in a book and you say, "Wait a minute, I don't know if this is true," we give you a few tips on how you could study that passage for yourself to see if you could follow right along with what this book or resource is saying or if you can kind of veer off it a little bit, even though it's giving you some good guardrails to guide you.

Dr. Danny Huerta: For the parent that is going, "What is catechism?" It could be a big word that someone's wondering, "What in the world is that? Is it a weird thing?" Can you guys just briefly explain catechism as you guys are talking about it? Why that's so important? It's hundreds and hundreds of years old, right?

Sam Luce: It's one thing that we both are really passionate about because we think it's something that has always been necessary, but I think in the day and age we live in now, it's even more necessary and for a lot of reasons because it encompasses all of scripture in this question and answer format, which is a really great way for kids to internalize truth from God's word.

Catechisms aren't scripture, but what it does is it takes scripture and distills it. One of the questions in the catechism is "What is prayer?" The answer is "Prayer is pouring out your heart to God." Another question in the catechism is "If no person can keep the law, what is the purpose of the law?" The answer is "That we might know the holy nature of God, the sinful nature of man, and thus our need for a savior."

What it does is it doesn't cheapen the answer and make it less true. It actually makes it more potent because all the extra words that are sometimes confusing for kids are removed. We live in a very heavily Catholic area, so for us to do the catechism was very difficult because a lot of people believe that it's only a Catholic thing, and it really isn't. It's something that the church has done for years and years and years.

There's several of them that are great. Our church uses a version of the Heidelberg Catechism, which is called the New City Catechism, but then there's also the Baptist have one, their Confession of Faith, there's also the Westminster Catechism. There's multiple different ones, but what they all do at heart is they're based around three things: the Ten Commandments, the Lord's Prayer, the Apostles' Creed, and then the church. The reason why it's so important we believe is this: it gives parents this ability to theologically train your child without having theological training yourself.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Repetition with meaning has huge benefits for kids and for adults as well. The word you used there that is key is internalizing the truth, internalizing scripture, internalizing what God is telling us in a meaningful way. One of the things that I know many parents would be asking is, how do we teach theological discernment?

How can we teach that to our kids in a world where discernment is so important with so much coming at them? How can a parent develop that in their children at different stages of their development? Because there's different understanding. Let's start with the youngest kids. How do we teach that to a young child, maybe a school-age child?

Sam Luce: Every systematic theology book that you look at starts with scripture. It starts with scripture because I think that is the basis of our authority in everything. This is what I talk to our kids all the time. When we read the scriptures, what we do is we're not putting ourselves over it to say, "Let me pick what I like," but we're submitting ourselves to it. We submit ourselves to scripture in such a way that we say, "God, I pray that you would help me to understand the things that you're saying in this word and help me to live it as a result."

Discernment comes from understanding what the voice of God sounds like, and what the voice of God sounds like is it sounds like scripture. This is what I tell my kids all the time. If you want to know what God's voice sounds like, open the Bible and read the words for yourself. When you have a question, you come to me and we'll talk through it together, but it's training them to be good readers, to be good understanders, to be good submitters to the word of God. That's where discernment comes from because there are a lot of voices in our culture.

The Bible says that my sheep know my voice. The way that you know the voice of God is how he chose to reveal himself, and that was through a story. Our job as parents is to tell that story to our kids faithfully, to tell our story to our kids faithfully in such a way that they see the beauty of Christ in the words that we preach, in the words that are written, and the lives that we live as a result.

Dr. Danny Huerta: What you just said was really the heart behind Family Reading of Scripture that we created here at Focus on the Family. We're trying to provide families with a resource that they can consume in all the busyness, but as a family and it's centered not on devotionals, not on other things, but on God's word. They get to listen to scripture out loud as a family, follow along, and then have discussion questions that are stage-specific. What would that look like for a pre-teen to talk about theological discernment, to just tell them, "Hey, you're equipped with this"? How do we let them know that they're equipped with something very powerful and important as a pre-teen getting prepared for the adolescent years?

Hunter Williams: Chapter three is all about building theological fluency, which is just basically saying you're fluent in thinking like God and speaking like God. One tip we give for developing discernment, and discernment's just knowing how to make the best choice. Biblical wisdom is knowing how to apply God's truth to the situations of my life. For most young kids, that's seen just by what they observe their parents do.

One way you build biblical discernment in your kids is you doing it in front of your kids. It's learning to apply the Bible to any situation. Like one for me, because I have so many young kids, is sharing. They struggle to share. The only time they're good at sharing is when they're sick, then everyone's good at sharing because everyone gets sick.

When it comes to sharing, I could say, "Oh, you need to share with your brother because I said so," or I could show biblical discernment where I apply God's truth to this situation and say, "Whose toy is this?" They'll say, "It was mine." Actually, it's neither of yours because God is the creator and he owns all things. So, really, nothing belongs to us, we just borrow it. If the God of the universe lets us borrow and enjoy his creation, then surely we as his children, we can share what he's given us with others as well.

That's an example of applying a biblical truth to a situation. That helps build discernment in kids because they're seeing how you process life and they just kind of glean from it. With pre-teens, as they get into abstract thinking, one tip we give in the book is "Some say." You're talking about a Bible truth and then you throw in, "But some say that isn't true or some say it might be this other way. Why is it not? Or what would you say if someone said it wasn't this?"

Just getting kids to... it's almost like you're playing devil's advocate with them a little bit, but that's helpful for them because kids need to learn that as they get older, people will not agree with them. People are going to push back and it's okay. It's okay to have questions. It's okay to think through it and process it.

That's one tip I give, is play devil's advocate a little bit. Another one is just to simply be specific and ask them, say you're doing a Bible reading and you learn about God's love. Pausing and saying, "Hey, how could we show God's love tomorrow when we're at school?" I say paint pictures, get specific as possible. "How could we show God's love at basketball practice tomorrow to our teammates or to our coach?" and just giving them that ability to exercise biblical discernment. How will I apply the truth so it's not just something that's stuck in a book but it actually influences my life all around me.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Hunter, Sam, Proverbs 1:7, this is all about that, right? Train up a child in the way he should go and even when he is old he will not depart from it. I came across this quote from A.W. Tozer. It says, "All I have seen teaches me to trust the creator for all I have not seen." For our kids with this theology, what we're talking about is being on the lookout for who God is. What's the truth? Who is he? In that, it'll help me understand what I cannot see. We're going to go through a Q&A, Rebecca, do you want to lead us into that?

Rebecca St. James: Yeah, and I just want to let our listeners know too that Sam and Hunter's book will definitely lift your gaze and your goals for discipling your children and give your family a biblical vision and definitely so encouraging on incorporating theology into your daily life. It doesn't have to be this kind of heavy, glazed-over eyes thing with your kids. It can actually just be a very practical everyday part of your life and conversations around the table and in the car.

I know this book will definitely encourage our audience. Every children's ministry leader or volunteer will also benefit from "How to Teach Your Kids Theology." You can get your copy of this resource in our show notes.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Also in our show notes, there's an article from our parenting team, "Seven Ways Your Kids Can Connect with God." FocusonTheFamily.com/parenting has help for you. It's practical, research-based, biblically-based, and again age and stage specific on many topics. So, make sure you're looking for that and be sure to sign up for our free age and stage resources at MyKidsAge.com. The link will be in the show notes as well. You'll want to check that out. Again, it's free and it's customized to the ages that you're raising right now and the stage you're in in parenting. There are many challenges at each stage. This one will come to you weekly and then around their birthday as well with many practical tips for you as a parent.

Rebecca St. James: Sam and Hunter, thank you for your insights and we'd like to invite you actually into our Q&A segment right now. We are excited to hear what you're going to say to our listener and their question. Today's question comes from Savannah, who writes:

"My son is a strong-willed five-year-old with an unteachable heart. How can I nurture his heart into learning or how can I approach him in a way that softens his heart? I try to have grace but often end up frustrated at him and it turns into an argument where he talks over me. He's a sweet kid, full of life, but there are moments each day that leave me drained. He is also the middle kid of five and he's the only boy."

Savannah, I want you to know that I relate in part. I have a five-year-old myself and sometimes it feels like he's going through the teen years. The emotion right now is so full-on. I relate to that, but I think this mom is really trying to get to how can her heart be softened and compassionate towards her son? How can she stay calm? What would you guys say to this sweet mom?

Sam Luce: I think I would tell her that parenting is not for the faint of heart. It is a responsibility and it is one of the ways that I often tell people that are getting married, like if you want to be more like Christ, get married to a spouse, and if that doesn't make you more like Christ, have kids. That will finish what your spouse started.

I think part of it is this: I think we underestimate the power of prayer. Our prayers soften hearts, our heart and it softens the hearts of those we're praying for. The depth of the relationship determines the depth of the pain. The people that are closest to you are the people that can hurt you most deeply.

What we have to realize is that this child that you are raising, by God's grace, he gave that kid to you. He knew that you're the mom that that kid needs and what he's doing is he's asking you to form that kid in the image of Christ and at the same time that kid is forming you into the image of Christ. What that requires from us is it requires sacrifice. It requires us to say, "God, I need your help."

Our kids will drive us to the face of God like nothing else. Being a boy, just practically, being the only boy, boys are very different than girls in so many different ways. Boys have, in my experience, I have two boys, my two oldest are boys, my two youngest are girls. We almost stopped having kids after two boys and then after two girls we almost kept having kids. Girls at the elementary age and five-year-old girls are like the best thing in the world, but then junior high comes and it gets more complex.

I would say your continual love, your continual sacrifice, your continually pointing that kid to Jesus and do the hard work of disciplining him consistently and patiently and pointing him to Jesus over and over. What happens is you will train his heart to trust you and to trust Christ.

Hunter Williams: What's hard for parenting is we can't control our kids. I think about this all the time. I can't control them and that can just be so frustrating. Like, "We know what's best for you, just do what I said." It can lead to disappointment, frustration.

The encouragement I would give is we can't control our kids but we can control how we respond to our kids, and even that's hard sometimes. There's been times my kids are bickering and you just get overwhelmed with emotion and you're trying to match them. Just know that even when you feel out of control, you have a God who is in control.

Parenting is made up of many moments. I think sometimes we can put so much weight on specific moments that we forget what shapes our kids is millions of moments over time. In this season you're in, it's very hard and some of the moments feel so heavy and so big. Just remember that God's going to use many moments and some are going to feel like you failed, but God can even work through your failures.

One of the best gifts you can give your children is to apologize in front of them, to admit "Mommy messed up here" or in my case, "Daddy got frustrated too quickly, I shouldn't have done that. Can you forgive me?" What you're doing is you're modeling for them over and over what it looks like to be a Christian, to be a child of God who can recognize sin and bring it to the Father.

One day, it might not be right away, they're going to remember those many moments where even though when Mom failed or Dad failed, they were willing to admit it and bring it to God and they loved me no matter what. At the end of the day, that's what faithfulness is. Faithfulness isn't about, will my kid have the perfect grades or will they always be super well-behaved when we go to the restaurant or grocery store or whatever. Faithfulness is that each day you committed your time to God and it may not always look perfect, but that's what faithful parenting is. It's not so much about outcomes, it's about inputs. If you're faithful to input scripture, consistency, blessing, apologizing, you're walking faithfully. So, I just want to encourage you that it can be so hard in the midst of it to say that kind of stuff because I know. My son is six. I totally get it. There's a lot of frustrating moments in parenting, but faithfulness is measured by inputs, not always by the immediate output.

Dr. Danny Huerta: Savannah, thank you for your question. I think this is one that is so common as far as a strong-willed five-year-old. They take you to the ropes in the ring as you're going in as a parent. Sam, you talked about that it's not for the faint of heart. In this case, I would say that Savannah, your son is going to act different than your daughters and you want to look at your expectations. Are you comparing the behaviors to your daughters and how he should be behaving?

Also he has a leader personality and that means he wants to articulate what he feels should be done. That could actually be world-changing, his leadership, his ability to articulate what it is that he wants and how he wants to do it. The hard part is that right now he hasn't refined it to be able to listen to anyone else. There's a refining that's going to take place here.

What you want to do is understand also he's probably trying to get your attention as a middle child and one way to get that is to get into this conflict with you. He also gets to have some control and a leader personality loves and craves the opportunity to have some type of control and the fact that you're giving it to him in that moment empowers him to want to continue to do this.

What I would encourage you to do is define what a teachable heart is to your son. What does it look like? What does it look like in a practical way? Then create some goals there. Maybe it's a marble system where you have an empty jar and then a jar that is filled with marbles or cotton balls or rocks. This is one where you can use it in a really fun way. Five-year-old boys love marbles.

What you can do is say, "Teachable heart, when we see that in you and when we see it in us, when we see it in someone else in the house or somewhere out there, tell us what it looks like." When that happens, we're going to fill up the empty jar of marbles. As we see you finding evidence of what a teachable heart looks like or we see it in you, that will continue to fill and then as a family that's when we'll celebrate. We'll have a movie time together. That's when we get to go out to favorite restaurant and we'll go as a family and we'll celebrate that a teachable heart is growing in you.

That way you're helping define the growth in him because leaders love to know when they're growing and they react strongly when they're just told that they're doing something wrong. I would imagine for you, you're tired, you're exhausted and frustrated with him and it's correcting, correcting, correcting and that begins to divide you guys out and he just goes after control. I hope that gives you a place to start. Continue to ask the questions. Savannah, send it in and I'd love to continue the conversation because this is so helpful for many parents that are dealing with that leader personality, that strong-willed child. If you can refine the direction in that, you're going to see a world changer in there.

Rebecca St. James: Savannah, we are going to send you Danny's book, "Seven Traits of Effective Parenting," to say thanks for trusting us with the advice that you've been given today and for being so honest and vulnerable. Nothing makes us happier than helping a parent on the show. We love it.

Dr. Danny Huerta: We'll answer your question when you click on the contact tab on the homepage or send us a voicemail by clicking on the black tab on the side of your phone. If you're watching on YouTube, there's a link in the comment section. Thanks for being on the show with us on Practice Makes Parent. Lots of great tools and encouragement there.

Rebecca St. James: Well, everybody hears the "Cribology" update. We love this segment. Not to make anyone feel bad, but only about 30 to 40 percent of families attend church together weekly. That's what we're finding now. A father's regular church attendance is strongly linked to his children continuing to attend church as adults. The mother's attendance apparently has less of an impact on the children's adult attendance. When both Mom and Dad go to church together, 72 percent of the children studied attended church as adults.

Want to have a statistically happier marriage and reduce your risk of divorce? Want to have more friends? Go to church. There are 168 hours in a week and let's say I gave you $168 as a gift but then I asked for one back. Would you refuse that?

God gives us all of our lives and he asks for one hour a week roughly to be in church. Obviously he's wanting all of our lives to be about him, but when it comes to church, one hour. That's because he loves us. We're giving back to God in the form of worship, spending time with him, socializing with other believers and even serving. How can this be bad for us? It's not. How different do you really want your family to be? These are really very good questions.

Dr. Danny Huerta: There are a lot of demands on families and we have to be the managers of our home. Dads, this shows that you're so important in the leadership spiritually of your home. It's really to give you the opportunity to understand and then step towards this opportunity to transform your family. Take your family to church, lead your family spiritually with prayer and reading scripture together. A united family where Mom and Dad go to church and take the family together, it can transform everything.

Rebecca St. James: I also think our kids pick up on our attitude about church. Is it a joy to be there? Is it a privilege to gather in freedom and love Jesus through worship and learn about him and grow? Or is it something that we're kind of ticking off a box? I think our attitude also impacts our kids. Are we worshipping or are we being entertained?

Next week we'll be talking to Kate Strickler about "Lies That You Think Will Make You Happy." You're going to learn a lot about yourself and help your children grow up with a clearer sense of God after this one. We're delighted you've listened to this episode and we can't wait to see you again next week. I'm Dr. Danny Huerta.

Rebecca St. James: And I'm Rebecca St. James. Join us next time for more tips for transforming your parenting on Practice Makes Parent.

Dave Stone: Your church comes to you each week to fill their cup. But when the crowd leaves, who's filling yours? That's exactly what I'm here to do with my new podcast from Focus on the Family. It's called Pastor to Pastor with Dave Stone.

I'm so excited to help you navigate the unique challenges that pastors face in their ministry journey, both personally and professionally. So, I invite you to listen and subscribe to Pastor to Pastor wherever you get your podcasts.