Podcasts about courageousmom

Parenting can be challenging under normal circumstances, but how do we do it well amid a crisis?  Angie Tolpin from Courageous Parenting joins me today as we tackle questions like: How does parenting look different during seasons of crisis?  What is it about being in a crisis that makes parenting harder? How can we as parents lead biblically when we are feeling overwhelmed, fearful, or hurt? How do we shift into a healthy mindset that can help sustain us in our parenting during these seasons? How can we as wives encourage our husbands during a crisis? Resources mentioned in this episode: Link to podcast episode search bar Raising Boys to Men Book Raising Boys to Men Audiobook The Unhurried Homeschooler The Unhurried Homeschooler Audiobook CTC Math Heritage Defense (my.heritagedefense.org/access-the-vault) Our CPS Story The Excel Camp  College Alternative: Excel College Podcast Episode The Unhurried Homeschooler Unhurried Grace for a Mom's Heart The Four-Hour School Day Subscribe to my monthly email and receive access to Unhurried Grace for a Mom's Heart: 31 Days in God's Word Places I am speaking in 2024 Be Courageous Ministry Website Courageous Parenting Podcast Instagram: ​Courageous Mom and Courageous Parenting

Moms do so much with very little accolades.  Nitzevet, David's mom, changed the earth by being a courageous mom.  Check it out.  

We live in a world where employees have a free agent mentality with changing motivations. The right culture is the deeper retention solution that lasts. Isaac Tolpin has a unique understanding of how to craft and drive forward the right organizational culture that engages, retains, and boosts employee performance. There are three levers to influencing the right culture and he have broken down the practical steps executives can take to influence them long-term. It's no longer personality driven or an idea that's hard to grasp. Isaac created a proven ""High-Performance Culture System"" every leader can implement that drives all the right behaviors. He selectively give keynote messages in areas of organizational culture, innovation, and motivation. He also brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating their children with his wife, Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com and CourageousParenting.com. Isaac refuse to waste his life achieving the world's definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead he deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects his involved with, those he serve, and the family he leads. Find out more about Isaac at: Websites: https://www.isaactolpin.com/ https://www.resoluteman.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/isaactolpin Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheResoluteMan Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/resolute.man Twitter: https://twitter.com/isaactolpin Check out our YouTube Channel:Jeremyryanslatebiz See the Show Notes:https://www.jeremyryanslate.com/1115 You may watch the FULL Video Episode also via my Rumble channel: https://rumble.com/c/JeremyRyanSlate

We live in a world where employees have a free agent mentality with changing motivations. The right culture is the deeper retention solution that lasts. Isaac Tolpin has a unique understanding of how to craft and drive forward the right organizational culture that engages, retains, and boosts employee performance. There are three levers to influencing the right culture and he have broken down the practical steps executives can take to influence them long-term. It's no longer personality driven or an idea that's hard to grasp. Isaac created a proven ""High-Performance Culture System"" every leader can implement that drives all the right behaviors. He selectively give keynote messages in areas of organizational culture, innovation, and motivation. He also brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating their children with his wife, Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com and CourageousParenting.com. Isaac refuse to waste his life achieving the world's definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead he deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects his involved with, those he serve, and the family he leads. Find out more about Isaac at: Websites: https://www.isaactolpin.com/ https://www.resoluteman.com/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/isaactolpin Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheResoluteMan Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/resolute.man Twitter: https://twitter.com/isaactolpin Check out our YouTube Channel:Jeremyryanslatebiz See the Show Notes:https://www.jeremyryanslate.com/1115 You may watch the FULL Video Episode also via my Rumble channel: https://rumble.com/c/JeremyRyanSlate

Having both parents play an active role in their children's lives is the heart of co-parenting but it definitely comes with challenges. Carlee Dunlap, a mother of two, shares her story about how she makes it work and what she has learned along the way. The quality of the relationship between co-parents can have a strong influence on the mental and emotional well-being of the children and it takes a village.  For the sake of your kids' well-being, though, it is possible for you to overcome co-parenting challenges and develop a cordial working relationship with your ex. 

Our son’s adoption process involved a three-year trek through the foster care system. Our daughter’s journey included a six-year wait on the China Center for Adoption Affairs. But, in God’s providence, both adoptions were finalized the exact same day. Daryl was three years old, and Amelia just seven months when they became Worralls. A few months later, we stood before our church community to dedicate our children to the Lord. As bumpy as my own road to motherhood seemed, Elizabeth’s was even more arduous. Her relatives and neighbors knew of her pain and patience. So, when she finally gave birth to a son, they shared in her joy. The community gathered eight days later to witness the circumcision of this miracle child. According to custom, the baby would be named at the ceremony. Those leading the service believed he would be called Zechariah and were acting on this assumption when Elizabeth interrupted. “No! He is to be called John” (v. 60). The awkward moment was made worse when the people questioned her judgment. But she held firm. Zechariah had somehow shared with her the angel’s instructions, and she was determined to obey. The crowd, however, was not convinced. They turned to Zechariah, still mute, and asked for verification. He wrote on a tablet: “His name is John” (v. 63). Their astonishment doubled when Zechariah instantaneously regained his speech. This little family suddenly had the attention of everyone who wondered, “What then is this child going to be?” (v. 66). Clearly God was with this family. John’s childhood is summarized in verse 80, which attests to his growing strength of spirit. But we know that his faithful mother and father prepared him well for the call God had placed on his life. >> Raising children in today’s world can seem like a daunting task. If you are a parent, how are you preparing your children to live out God’s call? If not, how can you support parents you know in this important work?

Interior designer Nathan Turner gives a New Jersey couple's home a modern makeover. Also, Dr. Becky Kennedy answers parents' most pressing questions with advice from her book, “Good Inside.” Plus, tips to create extra space for your guests this holiday season from HGTV's “Home Town” stars. And, Carina Ranieri's inspirational story: how her battle with cancer led her to rekindle her love for dance and performance.

Mama, God wants you to have COURAGE, even when you are anxious and afraid! He will help you become a STRONG and COURAGEOUS Mom, filled with FAITH to raise your kids up in today's world!"David said to the Philistine, “You come against me with sword and spear and javelin, but I come against you in the name of the LORD Almighty, the God of the armies of Israel, whom you have defied." 1 Samuel 17:45

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Show notes: Hi everyone. It's Tanya I'm back after a long hiatus of recording any episodes and my apologies. Life was, or has been completely overwhelming and hectic. And I know if anyone understands that it is the moms that are listening to this podcast. So I thank you for your understanding. I'm happy to get back to this and share what's been going on because life the last six months has definitely given many, many topics to talk about here.   So what am I going to be talking about in this episode? The first episode back? Well, I've got to be talking about careers, motherhood, and autism, and all the good stuff that goes with it.   Like, do you stay at work? Do you go back? All those things that I have personal experience to talk about. And so let's get to it.   Hey, Courageous Mom. I want you to know that you are so brave raising those children and giving everything you have for everything that they need. I've been there and understand what it's like to feel like you're lost. To feel tired and so completely overwhelmed. Hi, I'm Tanya and an autism mom. This journey is not an easy one.   It's been demanding and confusing, but it's also been massively life-changing in a great way and has brought me more joy and more laughs than I could ever imagine. You shouldn't walk alone. And that's why I felt called to create this community. Here, you'll laugh. Find joy. Hear inspiring stories along with support and some tough love to begin your journey back to you again.   You have permission to take care of yourself, to go after your dreams and to be happy and fulfilled every day, even on those tough ones. So let's do this journey together, gracefully, boldly, and courageously.   Transcription: All right. So let's get started. I have lots to tell you. So what I have been up to in the last almost six months is that I officially went back to work. And, you know, I have always been working to some capacity, but I'm talking about going back to finance, which is what I did prior to going on maternity leave with my son, who was my first child.    After returning from maternity leave to that old position and company trying to juggle motherhood and just he from day one just required so much that it felt impossible to do a great job at work and to be the employee that my previous employer was used to. Just that woman that would stay till work was done, I would put in extra hours and often would go above and beyond. But obviously that changed when I became a mom. I am still doing the work that needed to get done, but those days of going above and beyond, I will admit they were gone because I had someone else that took priority. I, I was a mom now where  before my career, that was really all I had to focus on. I mean, obviously I was a wife as well, but my husband, you know, he can take care of himself.   Well, I can, most days I'm kidding. No kind of I'm joking kind of, but anyways, so becoming a mom, it was just a really big shift and it came to a point with my son where, when we tried to do the daycare, I would say he was about 16 months, that's when I really started to realize that something, you know, was just not right.    It was like a month after dropping him off and I thought it would get easier, but it never did. So daycare was just not an option. He would just scream from beginning to the end of the day.  The daycare providers at the center,  they were great, but my heart would break every single time. And they would say, oh, just give it more time. But I knew that there was something else going on. So my husband and I basically were like, you know, passed the baton, just he would work the late night shift and I would work in early morning and leave around 2:30 , 3:00 come home. Literally, he would just pass my son to me and he'd go off.   And that is how we operated for the first two years of my son's life. Well, almost two years, because I know that I made the tough decision to leave my job and my career at about, I want to say he was almost 18 months. So  we were burnt out. We couldn't do it anymore, but I think we hung in as long as we did because financial reasons.   And I think that's why a lot of people are stressed because it's not easy and feasible for every single person and couple to have one person stay at home and then there's the single moms out there that are doing it completely alone. And God bless you because I see you. And I know that you are doing both roles and you are working when you are just so exhausted and then you're coming home and trying to be everything to your child or children.    And then on top of it, You have to worry about therapies and IP's and managing appointments and that's a full-time job in itself. And so for moms of children with special needs, that is a really hard job to do on top of working and having a career and trying to manage a household and your other child.   Being a stay at home mom is just not for the faint of heart. I will always say that.  I think that there is this misconception that stay at home moms, just, you know, lunch and have play dates. And yes, there is some of that, but when I decided that it was time for me to stay home, that wasn't what my life looked like at all. Especially as my son became a toddler and then a preschooler, and then I became pregnant with my daughter, and then we moved closer to getting a diagnosis for my son. There was just never a dull moment. There wasn't any downtime. It was just filled with complete chaos. And much of, it seems like a blur.   And I often say that when I'm looking at pictures from when my son was a toddler and my daughter was first born. I feel like, of course I remember it, but I feel like I didn't enjoy it as much. And I wasn't as present because my mind always had 1,000,001 tabs open. And I know you get this. I know you get what I'm saying right now.   And when I speak with other moms, I think, you know, we're all in the same boat and we've all experienced the same thing. We are sleep deprived when our children are young. And it's kind of impossible to completely enjoy the moment when you're sleep deprived and your cranky, you're hangry, because you're just living off of, you know, leftover chicken nuggets from your child or like pizza crust and you're not taking care of yourself.   So you're giving your complete all to another individual and everybody else in your household. And basically, I mean, you aren't just barely surviving. Right? So I was fortunate to make the decision that I could put the job career on hold. And luckily I've had my real estate license for almost 20 years now.   And I have always, done real estate to some capacity over the last two decades. So I have been very fortunate to have that, but real estate is obviously not a regular salary, right? So those regular paychecks were no longer coming in, and that was something that we really missed because we needed it.   Especially when you have a child that needs extensive therapies.  My husband has great insurance, but the copays, I mean, there were points where we were paying probably about $200 a week just in copays. And that was just in therapy for my son.  Never mind the appointments for his neurologist, all his assessments and God forbid I get sick. My husband gets sick or my daughter gets sick. I mean, those are just all additional copays.  I mean, we were just starting to see the bills rack up and if real estate was going well, then yeah, it was good. You know, I just keep charging everything on a credit card and then when a commission came in, I would pay it off, but what happened when business was slow? you know, I'd be showing house after house and writing offer after offer, but nothing was getting accepted, but you're putting in the time and you're working amongst everything else, but you're not getting paid. So those credit card bills are still racking up and you have nothing coming in to pay it off because luckily, my husband's salary was enough to obviously pay the essentials, like the roof over our head or utilities, food, those types of things. But you know,  this is real life. So other things would pop up or go wrong or needed to be fixed within the house  and we'd have to pay those. So then eventually you're falling behind on other things, you know, and it's always credit card credit cards.   So we got to a point where the credit card debt was insane. And then, you know, I'd have a great year in real estate and then we'd get back on top and then it would not go so great. And the cycle was just never ending and it was just this up, down. And it completely consumed me because I was so exhausted from living like this.   But going back to work back to the career that I had prior to be coming a mom and making the salary that I used to make it wasn't an option because there wasn't an employer out there that was going to allow me to have the flexibility that I needed to be the mother that I needed to be. And I mean, it is so unfortunate  that was the case and probably just  one of the very rare things that were great about the pandemic is the fact that it really has changed the way that, you know, a career looks and where you work and the remote options have obviously changed that and made it so much more possible for a mother like myself to get back to it.   So that's what I've done. And the pandemic definitely with being home with the kids and just needing sort of a break from always being there and sitting by them when they were in their classes. Well, mostly my son, my daughter is very independent and did very well  with doing the whole remote school thing, even though she much preferred to be at school in person, but I was just, I was tired and I wanted something else for myself. And yes, there are many other things that I love to do.     Uh, none which have made me money yet, but doesn't mean that I won't pursue those things, but real life is that, you know, I wanted to get out of debt. I wanted to be able to, you know, go back to traveling and going out and enjoying life.   Once this whole pandemic is completely over. And I think I just reached that point where I was like, okay, I can't take this. Enough is enough. Like I'm able to work. So it's time to go back to it. And I think my mind craved it as well and wanted to use it for something else.  So I took advantage of the remote option and got a position just working 100% remotely.   You know, Just having that steady income coming in on top of doing some real estate transactions just really helped tremendously with getting back on top and paying down debt.  The pandemic and not being able really to go anywhere, was really great because we've cut our budget in many ways.  So I took the opportunity of being stuck in the house for the last  18 months to, you know, tackle that debt.   But then once the world started to open a bit, I actually ended up getting this other job offer someone found me on LinkedIn and it was like, almost like too good to be true. One of those situations where you're like, no, this, this can't be real. Like seriously, they're offering it to me. And I pursued it.   I really wasn't looking because I was completely content with just being at home remote. And I felt like I was actually getting somewhere and still being able to  be a present mom and I felt really good about myself because I was contributing back to our finances and, you know, being able to breathe and sleep at night because that debt wasn't constantly weighing on my mind. But I guess the reason why I'm sharing this all with you is because this is a really big thing that so many families with kids with special needs go through. You know, the decision, whether, you know, to have that one parent stay home  or, you know, a single mom trying to juggle it all and trying to figure out what the other options are because maybe your working right now, and there's no possible way that you could do your job remotely.  I get that. I mean, my husband is in that position and, you know, he luckily has a great job, very stable, and he has great benefits. So him staying home, I mean,  that wasn't even an option.   Obviously the person that would have to stay home would have been me. It just would of made more sense.  It doesn't mean that it wasn't easy because if you're a mom and you are trying to decide whether you should stay home or continue working, it's a big decision because you may be feeling, you know, resentment or bitterness on why it has to be you, that gives up your career. And I mean, I get that. I do because I think that's a whole another discussion is that in itself, is that, you know, as a mom, we feel the pressure to do it all. It always falls on us and we're always looked to, to be the ones that will make those types of decisions more often than the men do. So you've got that and then you also have maybe the financial stress of it all.  What do you do if you have to continue working and your job is just not something that you can do remotely, then looking into other options is definitely a possibility. I mean, some options may mean that you're not making as much, but if it's possible, they're definitely are positions out there. And I can tell you that because I definitely have done that. And at one point I was working in a school and it was actually the same school that my children went to and I worked in their office. So I was still using a lot of the finance part of my brain and, you know, managing all their tuition because it was a tuition-based preschool.    So I was creating all the invoices and tracking all the payments and doing all that accounting, which again, you know, kept my skills fresh and keeping up with the Excel and all that stuff. So those were ways that, you know, although it wasn't really close to what I was doing prior to having a child. It still was something. And it was definitely good for me personally, to feel like I was contributing, but I will tell you that the pay was like next to nothing. You know, it really wasn't much, but it had great hours. I had the summers off and I had every vacation with my children off. So schools are in great place for positions for mom that really needs to be with her family.    And her kids when they're not in school, but also needs to work, whether it be for her own sanity or money.  If you have a side gig that you've been doing is it possible that you could do that on your own. I mean, I am an entrepreneur  that is who I am to my core. Like that is, that's just who I am. And in this time, in the past 13 years, that was also something that I did. And I've mentioned that I had my own business and gym and I did that once both of my kids were in school and I was training early morning or training at night. I was also crazy to think  that's all I would be doing as a business owner. Now those years, I do not know how I did it all.   I was completely overwhelmed, but I definitely loved it because it was, it was my business. It was, it was my baby. It was something that was, was me. And when I was there, I wasn't a mom. I was just a business woman. I think sometimes when. You're a mom, especially when you're a mom and you've been staying home all the time.   And that's,  your sole role in life at the moment. You almost want to be seen as something else. And there's a part of you that craves the former life that you had before you became a mom. And listen. I think, you know that, I mean, it's not that I don't adore my children because believe me, I love those children more than anything in this world, but there's so many other things that I also want to do and accomplish and dreams that I have that have definitely been put on pause. And I say pause, and I've said this again before, too, is there just on pause for the moment because you're going to have other time to do this. Okay. But right now we've got big things in front of us with making sure that we help our children to become the most independent and successful human beings that they possibly can and they need our support.   So with me going back to work, I love it. It's great. It's going well. I accepted that other position and I'm enjoying it. Is it my dream? Is it my dream job? No. My dream job is still to have my own business and do the things, but I really love, but for now I am very happy knowing that I'm back at work. I'm using my brain.   I'm seen as something else other than just mom. I am contributing to my household. I have dug myself and my family, like out of debt, obviously in conjunction with my husband, but it is an amazing feeling to have that weight of all that debt off my shoulders and to now not feel so guilty if we want to get away for the weekend or we want to do a project on the house. Those are all things that have been great in addition to not having to stress about being able to pay the copays and get my son into some of the classes or therapies that aren't currently accepting insurance. Those are the things that we weren't able to do before  and now we can suddenly look at them again.   And listen, it is not all sunshine and roses. And I share this not to be like, oh, yay me. Like we're doing great. Now, listen, I am simply sharing all of this because I'm trying to give you hope because I'm telling you I've been at rock bottom and we have been in crazy debt and I've had many sleepless nights.   I've wondered and have cried my eyes out, trying to figure out how we possibly do it all. How do we give my son what he needs, my daughter, what she needs, and still be able to pay all the bills and keep the roof over our head. I mean, there were points where we only had enough to make the payment on the house and the cars and get some groceries.   And you know what utilities, oh, well, you'll have to wait.  I was constantly pulling from this to pay that, like, , it was insane. And I share all this because I know I'm not alone in any of it. And you may be in the middle of making a decision to whether or not you should stay home. Whether or not, it's time to switch careers.   Maybe you need to work nights. Maybe you need to reduce your hours and go part-time. Maybe you need to look at a school position, something with mother's hours. I wish I could tell you that this one podcast episode would have all the answers and blueprints for the rest of your life to help you make the decisions, in order to make your life easier, but obviously not the case. I'm just hoping that my experience in pretty much having seen, you know, at the beginning of having to make the decision, trying to work different jobs, to make it all work. And the time that I had to do that to my children, being a little older now to where I can actually get back to the workforce and take advantage of the remote hybrid work era that we're in right now, which I highly suggest. So if you're in a position where, you know, it could be done from home guaranteed, there is a company that is hiring and they're looking for remote people. So I really recommend that you start searching for that. I'm not saying drop your job right now before you even have another one, but it take a leap of faith and start looking.   It's there and you just have to seek it out. You need to make some decisions, again, not easy ones, but as mothers, our children are always going to come first. And we knew that when we became mom. Now, if you have a child with special needs well, obviously you have another thing on your plate and you can sit there and be sad about it and stressed and overwhelmed.   Again. I'm not saying that you don't have the reason to be because you do, you have every reason because it is a lot. It's overwhelming. I've live it on a regular basis. And I know you do too, but we love our children and we got to do what we got to do and we have to take action. So. Get your cry on when you need it.   And then wipe those tears off that pretty face and take some action and listen. Any change is going to be scary, whether you decide to finally start freelancing on your own so that you have the flexibility or you decide to stop working altogether, or you decide to finally go back to work. Oh that is scary.   Been there, done that, but I'm telling you, you can do it. Okay. I've got you. I'm cheering you on. So if you want to continue this conversation, why don't you come join us on the Courageously Mom Facebook Group? And if you want to talk about any of what's on your mind or any of the decisions that you need to make, share it there and let us support you and encourage you. So it's time for me to jet. And I just want to thank you again for taking the time to listen. It's good to be back. And I am reminding you that you are so brave and you've got this. Hey there, me again. One more thing before you go. Thank you so much for listening to the Courageously Mom Podcast. I hope you come back to hear some more and if you enjoyed this, don't forget to subscribe, share, and leave a review.   https://www.courageouslymom.com/

Have you ever thought about drinking less alcohol or heck maybe even giving it up? Courageous Mom, Demetria Brown, is sharing her life beyond liquor journey with us! We are discussing personal reasons for having a drink, the social side of it all and even the spiritual connection!! Demetria's honesty is refreshing and powerful!!! You can reach Demetria at: Demetria Online Fitness Coach (demetriabrown.com) and Facebook Demetria Michael Brown | Facebook and Instagram DEMETRIA⚡️BROWN ⚡️SOBER MOM (@demetria_brown) • Instagram photos and videos I would love to hear from you! Leave me a message here in Anchor at: https://anchor.fm/momcourage/message or send me an email at info@kariprmozic.com. Check out my website to learn more about courageous conversations: www.kariprimozic.com *This episode is about one person's journey. The Mom Courage guest on this episode and Kari are not experts on giving up alcohol. If you are concerned about how alcohol is impacting your life, please talk to your doctor. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/thecourage/message

Isaac Tolpin is one of the Founders of ConveYour.com, the #1 Micro-Learning platform for influencers and companies.  He’s a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart. On a mission, enabling brands to authentically connect and inform at scale with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies he’s helped build.  His success comes from understanding the relationships between human behavior, business and technology. This expertise helped celebrity influencers and companies to transform their knowledge into humanized digital training. His recent background includes, cultivating a vineyard, keynote speaker, digital marketer, and EdTech disrupter through the pioneering Mirco-Training technology, ConveYour.com, the platform that’s improving the way influencers and organizations connect and train people.  He brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating their 7 children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. He refuses to waste his life achieving the world’s definition of success that leave so many empty.  Instead he does what matters through projects, those he serves, and the family he leads. Isaac Tolpin Vroom Veer Stories Had the entrepreneur bug very early; started making and selling crafts in High School Went to college (cause that what Gen Xer's do!); starting doing direct sales in college How to overcome massive entrepreneurial failure and come back stronger than ever Big lesson from this failure was to listen to friends he really trusts Learned how to be a better husband and father and to check his ego Why digital training needs be fun, effective, and never boring Human behavior doesn't allow digital training to take hours at a time; more like 5-7 minutes An optional workplace test game had a 95% completion rate; making it mandatory caused a drop Isaac Tolpin Connections Conveyour.com LinkedIn Facebook

My guest Nicole Cooke will be sharing with listeners all about her traumatic birth storyIn today's episode, you are going to learn how one woman took her traumatic birth story and used it to fuel her life's purpose. You are also going to learn a little bit more about some of the struggles Nicole when through when getting back to exercise after baby.BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU'LL LEARN/DISCOVER/FIND OUT: Learn and hear how sometimes your birth expectations do not as plannedDiscover why it is important to check your ego at the door and listen to your bodyWhy women can have the wrong expectations when it comes to giving birthHow you can be that badass woman in the gym after baby the right way!When you finish listening, I'd love to hear your biggest takeaway from today's episode. Take a screenshot of you listening on your device, share it to your Instagram stories and tag me, @STRONG.MOMS.FITNESS ! While you're there, make sure you follow me on Instagram so you can see behind the scenes of how I help women stay fit and strong during motherhoodLinks:CONNECT WITH NICOLE COOKEINSTAGRAM | EMAIL | WEBSITELEARN MORE FROM DAISY @ STRONG MOMS FITNESS:WEBSITE | INSTAGRAM | FACEBOOK | PINTEREST | YOUTUBEOTHER LINKS MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE: Daisy's Links:www.strongmomsfitness.com/challengePodcast & 5- Minute Workout Facebook Group

When my son was diagnosed with Autism, I will tell you that I was in denial.  I couldn’t say the word, Autism.  I couldn’t write the word, read the word, hear the word.  None of it.  I remember at our first BIG IEP meeting after I had just been told that my son was Autistic, that I had to sign the IEP. One particular document had his printed diagnosis on it. I remember not being able to put that pen on that paper to sign and my hand shaking uncontrollably. But what did hit that paper were my tears because they were streaming down my face. It’s crazy how I remember that day and the emotions like it was yesterday.  I hope that this episode helps you to accept and move forward to helping you to be the Courageous Mom that I know you are to advocate for your child and get them what they need to live their best life. Let’s do this!

I have always loved Entrepreneurship and Women Empowerment.  I LOVE cheering others on and encouraging them to not be afraid to be who they truly are or to go after those BIG dreams they can’t stop thinking about. We’ve been given this one life so it’s up to us to live it fully and to the best of our ability! And while we’re busy trying to do that all and “unbecome” all that we thought everyone else wanted us to be, we are so incredibly hard on ourselves because we’re often comparing another person’s highlight reel to our messy-behind-the-scene moments. I’m totally guilty of this and because of it, I have often felt like a hot mess while trying to juggle a career, motherhood, Autism and still trying to make time to take care of me all at once. I have suffered from MAJOR Imposter Syndrome when self-doubt creeps in on any of those big goals I’ve set for myself.  So, if you can relate to any of what I just said, then we should totally be friends!Is there something that you planned to do after the kids got older? Or when things get easier? Or just "Someday"? And the excuses just keep going on and on... You can still be passionate and excited about something and still be a great and present mom. It's important for us as Mothers to have something that lights us up because knowing you’re able to spend time later in the day doing something you love helps to make your days feel more joy-filled.  You cannot be everything your children need if you don’t make yourself a priority. If there’s something you’ve been wanting to try or get back to since becoming a mom but have talked yourself out of it a gazillion times then I am encouraging you to get Bold and take action now! Regret scares the heck out of me!! I believe if you have something on your heart that keeps popping up and nudging you to do, then you NEED to do that thing. Listen, you are not going to accomplish everything in a day.  Take a little step each day. Let's do this together. Gracefully, Boldly, Courageously. 

We cannot give to our daughters what we have not received ourselves, and a courageous woman knows she cannot do this journey alone. Get Courageous: Being Daughters Rooted in Grace on Amazon. Create Your Best Simply Summer Need more help? Quarantine Routine 50 Device-Free Boredom Busters 7 Days Around the World Check out the Easy Enneagram resource- A FREE Video Typing Guide- discover and confirm your dominant Enneagram Type. If you are new to the Enneagram and want the EASIEST way to learn more then- check out the Easy Enneagram 101 Workshop. Walk away with clarity about what the Enneagram is, what it's not and what it can do for you in less than 30-minutes If you want to discover your dominant Enneagram Type and have greater clarity about your personality- check out the Easy Enneagram 201 Workshop. Head on over to follow Simply Wholehearted on IG to join the Enneagram conversation! Here are some of the promised Enneagram links: The Simply Wholehearted Enneagram QuickStart Guide List The Enneagram One Sheet Interested in the Wholehearted Enneagram Coaching? Sign up here to put your name on the wait-list. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/simply-wholehearted-podcast/message

This is a cool topic that actually came from some wives in the MAG community online who asked us to specifically talk about this. It is so encouraging to know that there are wives out there who are actively trying to understand how to help their husbands lead their home.What we believe about spiritual leadership is found in scripture.Ephesians 5:23-25 “For the husband is the head of the wife even as Christ is the head of the church, his body, and is himself its Savior.”1 Corinthians 11:3 “But I want you to understand that the head of every man is Christ, the head of a wife is her husband, and the head of Christ is God.” PrayerDear Lord,Thank You for the gift of marriage. Thank you for the opportunity to consider these things and how we can mature as a couple. We pray we would walk in righteousness, gentleness and self-control. We pray we would be people who see others through the lens of compassion. Help us to be thoughtful in our responses to each other. Help us to be respectful in our conduct. We pray our interactions as a married couple would be a testimony of your power and authority in our lives. May your light shine brightly in us as we direct each other back toward you.In Jesus’ name, amen!Read The Transcript- Hey, we're Aaron and Jennifer Smith with Marriage After God. - Helping you cultivate an extraordinary marriage. - And today we're gonna share how a wife can encourage her husband to lead spiritually. Welcome to the Marriage After God podcast where we believe that marriage was meant for more than just happily ever after. - I'm Jennifer, also known as Unveiled Wife. - And I'm Aaron, also known as Husband Revolution. - We have been married for over a decade. - And so far, we have four young children. - We have been doing marriage ministry online for over seven years through blogging and social media. - With the desire to inspire couples to keep God at the center of their marriage. Encouraging them to walk in faith every day. - We believe that Christian marriage should be an extraordinary one. Full of life. - Love. - And power. - That can only be found by chasing after God. - Together. - Thank you for joining us on this journey as we chase boldly after God's will for our life together. - This is Marriage After God. - Hey guys, thanks for joining us on a new episode of the Marriage After God podcast. We're in season three and - It's so exciting. - I know. And I hope you've been enjoying this new season. We've been doing some fun posts. We've been doing some devotional style marriage encouragements and just, we're trying to make it a little bit more dynamic. - Dynamic, ah that's what I was gonna say. - A little bit more mixed content. I hope you're enjoying it. If you are, let us know on Instagram. Send us a message. Let us know what you think of the show. Also, we always want to encourage you, if you love an episode, if this is a particular episode that has blessed you, would you just take a screen shot of wherever you're listening to it at and post it in Instagram and tag, "Marriage After God." We love seeing those. We love sharing those on our own pages and it gets the word out. Let's other people know about it. - Okay, so I have to share with them. Knowing that we were going to be recording podcasts, I stopped by the local coffee shop. Shout out to Dutch Brothers. - Yeah. - They're really good. They're just one of those drive through coffee shops, but sometimes the people come outside to take your order and you know, I'm like, well into my third trimester. Very noticeably pregnant and I rolled my window down and he goes, "so what are we having?" And I said, "A girl!" He was-- - When you told me this, I thought you were kidding. - No. - I was like, oh, you got him good. - He was so embarrassed and he was like, "even if I ever assumed I would never say anything." And I go, "oh no, it's not your fault. "I just, I just gotten done on an appointment "and it's on my mind all the time "and people are always asking me "if we know what we're having." And we were just laughing about it. - That's really funny. And what's funny is you weren't kidding with him. You thought he asked you. - I thought it was a legitimate question, but he was wondering what kind of coffee we would take today. So that's funny. But I did wanna just give a little update on the pregnancy. You know where I'm at, it's been really good and hard at the same time. - It's been really hard. - Well, no complications. - This has been hard when-- - We shared about this already. No complications, but just, you know when you're chasing around four other little kids and your body is physically limited, it gets hard and uncomfortable at times. And so I've been feeling just a lack of energy lately. - Mmh hmm. - I've been feeling slower and being confronted with my, just physical limitations and that's hard for my mind to wrestle with 'cause my mind wants to go, go, go and do more and I can't. - A tip for husbands out there. If your wife is pregnant in her third trimester, just massage her feet and legs every night. - Yeah. - That helps a lot. - It's wonderful. - It's kind been where we've been at. - But all is good and I'm really exciting for the nesting phase to hit because I know that that's kind of like an extra burst of God's grace for soon to be moms. It just, it comes on. - A burst of endorphins. - Yup and you just go and you clean the things that you never even look at and it feels so great. And so, I'm kind of looking around my house going, nope, that's gonna wait for-- - The question will be is how long will it stay that way with our four other kids. - I know. Like the cleanliness, yeah. - Okay, we just wanna encourage you guys, everyone that's listening, we have some free downloads. - Mmh hmm. - We have two specifically, there's actually a bunch more, but the two I wanna talk about today is, "The Marriage Prayer Challenge." It's a 31 day prayer challenge where you sign up. It's completely free and we'll email you a marriage prompt, a prayer prompt and a reminder to pray every day for 31 days for your spouse. And you can go to MarriagePrayerChallenge.com and sign up for that for free and then our other free download, it's a new one. It's our "52 Date Night Ideas" ebook. We have, we came up with 52 unique date night ideas and so if you're looking to have a whole year of date ideas, just go to DateNightIdeas.com and sign up and download it for free. And those two free, well, those things, we created for you guys just to encourage you, to inspire you. So yeah, MarriagePrayerChallenge.com and DateNightIdea.com. - Cool, okay so, the topic for today is how can a wife encourage her husband to lead spiritually and when, how Aaron and I kind of set up and prepare for these podcasts episodes is we have a document that we both share and we kind of just, once we have the topic down, we'll go in every so often and add notes and look over it and share our thoughts about it. And I remember when I first went into this document, it just said the words, "honorably and gently." - I put all the notes I could come up with in there. - It was really sweet, but I just had to get that out of the gate because it was really cool to see your perspective of how, like what it takes for a wife to encourage her husband and those are two powerful words. - Yeah, to my defense, I actually did put more in there later. - I know. - I wrote down, and we'll get to some of those, but I wrote down a lot of the ways that you have encouraged me. - Yeah - Whether we've talked about it or not. - This was just the first note that I saw and I just wanted to add that because it was really cool. But this is actually a topic that came from the wives in our Marriage After God community and it was a question that kind of kept coming up in different ways and so we thought it would be fun to talk about it, discuss it. - Mmh hmm. - And encourage you listening. Both husbands and wives because marriage takes two. - Yeah and for the husbands and wives that are listening, husbands take note of the things that we talk about because even if your wife isn't encouraging you to be a spiritual leader, even if she doesn't know how to or hasn't started yet, it's important that we as men start stepping up in that role. Trusting the Lord. Chasing after Him and guiding our family closer to Him, to the word of God. - Yup. - And we do that by example. - Mmh hmm. - We do that by being faithful, trustworthy. - Yeah. - And so I just want to encourage the husbands. - I think that's really good and I think that as the husbands are listening, of course not using everything that we share as ammunition to go, "see, you should be doing this," - Oh absolutely. - but rather, use what we share today as an encouragement to you in how you should be leading. - Yeah. - And hopefully, it inspires you both today. - Yeah and just, I always bring this up. Our pastor, Matt, our old pastor would always say, "read your own mail." So, in those scriptures when it's talking to the wife on how she should be, we don't read that and say, "see, this is how you should be." - Because you've got the whole section yourself to be reading. - Yeah, I have my own mail I need to be opening up and reading and to honest, there's enough there for each of us to be doing our thing to not have to worry about how our spouse walking those things. - Mmh hmm. - That doesn't mean we can't encourage our spouse to be like, hey, I just want to encourage you, the way you were being, that was a little disrespectful. Or, like, we can always encourage each other. We're allowed to do that. Again, honorably and gently. - Yeah. - But there's so much in our own, in the scriptures that talk directly to us, that we should be just walking in. - Yeah. - In the spirit. And you know what, when we do that, our spouse, it's so hard for our spouse to not. - Mmh hmm. - Like when we're walking the way the Bible calls us to, it's gonna be really hard for our spouse, our wife, or your husband to not desire to walk in that way as well. - Okay so, first Aaron, before we get into the encouraging aspect of encouraging our husbands to lead, there's something else that you wanted to talk about. - Well, I think it's a good point that we should bring up of just where this idea of spiritual headship, spiritual leadership comes from, 'cause there's a lot of people who will be like, no, that's not right. it should be, this way or that way, but-- - It's not for Aaron and Jen. - It's not my idea. It's not like I came up with like, hey, the men should be in charge and the men should be leading. It's a biblical concept. It's the way, it's an order that God put in place and for His purpose, not for ours. - Right, so what we believe and how we operate in our family comes straight from scripture. - Right. - And that's what kind of where we wanted to start off on the foundational aspect of this. - Yeah and I want to encourage everyone that's listening that your desire should not be to live Aaron and Jennifer's way. - Mmh mmh. - Your desire should be to live the Bible's way. So you getting into the word and saying, wow, it says this. How does that play out in our marriage? - We're just big neon arrows pointing to the word of God. - Let's hope. - That's what we're here for you. - So Ephesians five, 23 through 25, the famous marriage scriptures. It says this. It says, "For the husband is the head of the wife, "even as Christ is the head of the church, "his body and himself at savior." So just real quick, it's not saying that the husband is the savior. It's saying that Christ is the savior of the church. But it's saying in that same manner, in the same manner that Christ is the head of His church, His bride, the husband is the head of the wife. And we talk about his in the Marriage After God book, that the picture of husband and wife, the symbol of marriage is to represent the gospel of Christ the Savior and His church, the bride. And so, that order of headship is specifically to highlight that, that point. So if I'm trying as the husband, if I'm trying to lead in a way that diminishes the gospel, I'm not leading well and I'm not walking in the spiritual leadership that God's called me to. So, if I'm being abusive, if I'm being vulgar, if I'm using my power that God's given me in abusive ways to manipulate, to control, that's not how Christ came. That's not how Christ loved His church. He came humbly. - Humbly, yeah. - And He came putting it, laying Himself down. That's exactly what the scripture's talking about. Giving himself up for her. And so, we don't just get to say, oh, see the Bible says I'm in charge, so now this is how I'm gonna do it. No, the Bible says I'm in charge, so I must do it His way. - His way, yeah. - The Bible's way. So, I just wanted to point out. - No, that's good. - But that's one of the first spots that we would run to in showing this headship, is the husband represents Christ. Your bride represents the church and that relationship represents how the gospel works. The redeeming nature, the love, the unity, the oneness of us being joined to Christ through His death and resurrection and so, headship comes straight from here and it also says, and when I read first Corinthians 11:3, - It says this, "But I want you to understand "that the head of every man is Christ. "The head of a wife is her husband "and the head of Christ is God." - What I love about this is it's showing this order again and saying the head of every man is Christ. It starts that way. It doesn't say that the head of every woman is man. It's not written that way. It says, "the head of every man is Christ," and what that means is my authority does not come from me being a man. It comes from Christ and Him saying this is the order I want. That, so we have to first realize that we are responsible to our own head, Christ. That the way I love and lead and disciple and walk, I'm directly accountable to Christ and He's gonna look at me and say, how did you walk in this authority I've given you? That's this is idea of derived authority. It trickles down. It's not just inside me because I'm a man. - Right. So, the second part of that is, "the head of thy wife is her husband," and this is very specific 'cause it's not that the head of every woman is a man-- - Yeah, which some people believe. - Well, can you clarify that? - Yeah, it's, this is specifically talking about the relationship again between a husband and a wife that me as a man in the church, I don't get to have every woman be in submission to me, - Right. - as Ephesians five, 23 would call a wife to be in submission to her husband. Women do not need to submit to me. My wife should, but that's it. I don't get to have any sort of extra authority in any other woman's life other than my own wife. So, we don't get to use this scripture as an excuse of women are in this position and men are in this position in the church and that's not what we do. - I think this order, God showing us this order is really important because when you're bringing two people into a single unity so that they're one, which you know, the scripture tells us, there's gotta be-- - Order. - There's gotta be order because otherwise you'll have two people trying to lead and what happens when that's going on? - Chaos. - Chaos because they're fighting for their own ways. They're doing their own thing and they expect the other person to follow and so this provides the outline. - Right, well and what's even more amazing is it ends with, "the head of Christ is God." There's a scripture that says, "Christ learned obedience "through the things that He suffered." Which is amazing because you're like wait, what? Not that He wasn't obedient. It's this idea of full obedience meaning even unto death, Christ was obedient to God. Christ, there's another scripture where Christ says, "I only came "to do what my Father has called me to do. "To go where my Father has called me to go "and to say that which my Father wants me to say." There's this perfect picture of Him being completely and perfectly in unity with God in His obedience to God and His will. - Which, I love this because it just further solidifies that Christ is our example. - Yup. - Right, Christ, it could have just been that Christ is God and that's the authority and that's it, but no, He says that, "the head of Christ is God." That means that Christ is in subjection to God's authority and if Christ is our example, then we need to follow. - Right and this is a big concept 'cause Jesus is God. - Yeah. - And God is God. And the Holy Spirit is God because we have this triune nature of God. Three individual persons, but one God head, right. But there's an order to it. - Yeah. - They've been in perfect unity since before the foundations of the world. So for all eternity, God, Christ and the Spirit have been in perfect harmony-- - They get it. - and unity, but it's in order. - Yeah. - God the Father. God the Son, God the Spirit. There's this order and it's showing us right here. It's saying, in the same way that Christ, God, has a head, God, God, right, It's kind weird. The husband is the head of the wife and Christ is the head of the church, and the head of man. So all this is showing is a derived authority trickled down. Christ got His authority from God. I get my authority from Christ. My wife gets her authority from me. This trickle down of roles and positions and we shouldn't go beyond that. We shouldn't try and extrapolate that and say, see, men need to have authority over every woman in the church. No, there's not a single woman in the church that needs to be submissive to me the way my wife should be submissive to me. She's the only one. Now, if we go back early on in Ephesians, right before this it says, it says, "Be in submission to one another "out of reverence for Christ." - For Christ. - Which is a command to the church as a whole, - Right. - Which means-- - Be unified. - Be unified. That each one of us in the body are not trying to be above another. We're trying to raise the other ones up, but that's not to be mistaken with people, 'cause people do this. They mistake that, saying, see, husbands should submit to their wives also. That's actually not what that's saying. That's a command to the church as a whole generally. People in the church should be in submission to one another out of reverence for Christ, okay. And then it goes on, it says, "wives submit "to your own husbands." It says, "your own husbands." Not to other men. It doesn't mean my wife needs to submit to any other men but me. And other women don't need to submit to me the same way my wife does. But generally, in the church we should be in a mutual submission to each other in the body, not in marriage necessarily. - Right, so this idea of leadership and headship, it's not something that you just get because you're a man. - Right. - Or men get because they're men and it's also not something that men are naturally good at just because they're men. It's something that they look to Christ and say, you're my example. You're my head. The authority comes from You and from God and I'm gonna walk in Your ways. - Right and then that leadership plays out when I'm doing it God's way. Now, if I'm not doing it God's way, does that mean I don't, that the wife doesn't have a responsibility? Again, going back to the reading your own mail. Whether or not the husband is walking in this way, which is why this episode's here, is the wife has a calling and an opportunity to walk in her own obedience to Christ. - Right. - And to walk a certain way that will bless her husband. - Yeah. - Bless her marriage and potentially change his heart and raise him up to be the leader that he's been called to be. So, I just wanna reiterate that men, we're accountable to someone. Wives, you're accountable to someone and it's Christ. And we each have an accountability and we need to make sure that we recognize that so that when we're leading our families, husbands, we recognize that we don't just get to lead it however we want. We lead it the way Christ wants. - Okay so, that was kind of laying the foundation down. I know people like to hear from us, so let's share a little bit about just our personal testimony of how we've been walking in this. You reading your mail about headship and leadership and me reading mine about submission. - Why don't we start with yours? - Okay, so, so I admit that I had this understanding that a wife was to submit to her husband, but of course, learning something requires the experience of walking through it and learning from mistakes. - Doing it. - And growing and allowing the Holy Spirit to convict our hearts when we're wrong and to submit to Him and be transformed by it. I would say that actually, the opportunity of marriage has helped me understand what submission is and what it looks like and I've gotten better at it over the years, but I wouldn't say I'm perfect. - Right. - But I, I know that it, in the beginning, it was easier for me to submit physically and what I meant by that is, I had this idea that wherever Aaron, wherever you would go, I would follow you. Whatever you chose to do, that would be an easy thing for me. I'm just gonna follow you. I'm gonna do it and I saw it as submission. But then there was all these other little areas that I didn't realize I wasn't submitting to you in. - Like me having a choice in something. Or desiring to go somewhere or something. - Yeah or trying to make a decision for our family that would change the way we functioned as a family or even, this was before kids and so, just between you and I, whether it was about health decisions or-- - Getting out of debt. - Getting out of debt. That was a really hard one for me. - Yeah. - And if people read the Unveiled Wife, they know about this. I think I might have shared it in Marriage After God, too. - You were not interested. - Well, I struggled because I saw it as your debt and I was very young and immature in my thinking and I didn't see us as unified in that and so submitting to your request of, hey, let's put this thousand dollars we just got, that we just earned from hard work and put it towards my school loan debt. I was like, uh uh. But what I found through the experience of walking through that with you is that when I did submit my heart and I said, "Okay, Lord, whatever you ask." I'm gonna do this and this was just one area but, being able to submit to you in that decision that you made for our family, it actually blessed me and it benefited me and I saw-- - Still does. - Yeah. Yeah, look at our, the years that have passed and becoming debt free, that's just one area that I feel like has really changed my heart in this area of submission to you and it does happen in all the little choices. I remember, just recently something happened where you, I wanted to go out to lunch 'cause I had a desire for a certain thing. I think it was a certain sandwich shop down the street and you said, "well, let's just eat at home," and I responded with the worst attitude and I said something like, "that's not what I wanted." And I did it in front of the kids. - At least you're honest. - Well, I'm really embarrassed but I was, I ended up leaving. I think I took Elliot with me and we were gonna run some errands and I was gonna go get my sandwich and the whole way there I just felt the Lord saying, "You need to call your husband. "You need to tell him you're sorry right now." Like, this is bad. And I remember telling you I was, "I'm really sorry "for the way that I responded to you in that moment," because I wasn't in submission to your decision to eat at home. I wanted what I wanted and I threw manipulation out. I threw my emotions out to try and get what I wanted and it wasn't right of me and so learning, even in the smallest of things, how to submit to you in my heart, in my actions, in my attitude, all of it. I don't know. I'm still learning this, but it really does benefit and bless our family when we walk in the order that God has provided for us. Told us how to do it. - Right and not just in the practical things, because to be honest, you've been blessed by submitting to me even in bad things that, like choices I've made, and submitting to me in things that you disagreed with. And the blessing isn't in that my bad choice turned out good or that my decision wasn't a poor decision, 'cause those things happen. I don't lead well all the time. The blessing in the encouragement and the power comes from your obedience to Christ. Your closeness to God. - Yeah. - Your, when it says that, "Christ learned obedience "through the things that he suffered," - Yeah. - sometimes that's the joy and that's the blessing, is like, regardless of your husband ever does the thing that you want him to or ever leads the way you want him to, the true power in blessing is in your obedience to God. - And I would say this to add to that, you're absolutely right. It's also, it builds trust. I'm trusting God because if I can see something, like you said, a bad decision or something like that that you're gonna make and I still submit to you, basically I'm saying I don't understand why you're choosing that but I'm gonna trust God with you and with what's going on. - And with my life and the situation. - And that has blessed us. Some of the opportunities with that that have come out has been a learning opportunity for you or a growth opportunity for me and it-- - Yeah, so when I think about this, I think of that first Romans eight, 28. It says, "and we know that for those who love God, "all things work together for good "for those who are called according to His purpose." So, Christian, raise your hand. Are you called according to His purpose? - Yup. - Yeah. Do you love God? - Yup. - Yup. So, even when you're husband's not leading well, does God, can God work that out for your good? 'Cause He promises to. And we may not know what that good looks like right now and it may not feel good and we talked about this feelings thing a couple episodes ago, but He's gonna work it out. - Yeah. - I like what you said. Trusting God. - Yeah, I didn't know you were gonna bring this verse up but as you were reading it and you were getting to the end of it, it says, "those who are called according to His purpose," and when I just think about marriage in and of itself, it's for His purpose. It's not for our purpose, although there's benefits to us. Because earlier you'd talked about what it represents and so when we submit to His order and we say, okay Lord, we're gonna walk this out. I'm gonna encourage my husband to lead. I'm gonna let him lead. He's gonna lead me, and the husband's over there saying, Okay Christ, I'm following You. I'm walking Your way, it's for His purposes. - Yeah, so I think that's a good, for the wife listening, heart posture is saying, Okay Lord. My life and my marriage is Yours and I want to practice trusting You. I want to practice loving You. I want to practice knowing You, and so this is one of the ways I'm gonna do that is walking in submission to my husband. - Yeah. - Even when I'm afraid of how he's making, the decision he's making. If I think he's wrong. - Yeah, well-- - It doesn't mean you can't encourage him, right? - Well, here's the truth. We cannot encourage our husbands to lead and feel confident in leading if we challenge every time they try. - You're right. Think about our kids. We have to give them opportunities to make choices, make decisions, do things on their own and if we never do that, they're never gonna get good at the things they wanna get good at, right. - Yeah. - So, even with your husband, just like anything, the moment they, and this has happened to us, I try and make a decision and there's an immediate fight, argument. - Confrontation. - Yeah, confrontational, or opposition. - Conflict, disagreement. - Like, no, I think that's a bad choice, rather than letting me figure it out. - And then going to the prayer closet with it. - I have enough room for it. And we've seen this time and time again in our own marriage. We've seen it in other marriages. This is the things is, we'll get messages from people saying, "how do I get my husband to lead, "'cause every time he tries, "I don't like the decisions he makes." And I'm just thinking he's never gonna figure out how to make better decisions if you're not gonna encourage him and say, okay, let's try that. I might not see how that's gonna work out, but I'm gonna follow you and let's see how that plays out. - If we do submit, if we do act out in submission towards our husband, then it's gonna require us to pray more for them - Oh yeah. - and the choices that they're making. I think all the wives need to hear that right now because how often are we praying for our husband's leadership? How often are we praying for the choices that they're making and how they're leading our family? That we want it to improve or that we want it to go a certain direction and that we're submitting those desires and things to the Lord. - And I would say, 'cause I'm just thinking about marriages where you have a super immature husband. Someone who just, the decisions they make are totally selfish decisions and those, that happens. You know, their hobbies or how they wanna spend the money. Where they wanna go or they just wanna leave and they just wanna, that's a hard place for a wife to be. I just wanna say my heart is broken for where you're at in your marriage, but for you, your prayer closet, getting on your knees before God and knowing that God loves you and your husband. - And that He has a purpose for it. - He has a purpose for what's going on. Just start praying that God captures that man's heart. - Yeah. - And pray fervently without ceasing. Pray daily, hourly, minute by minute for them and watch God move. And then also pray for opportunities. - Yeah. - Like very calm, gentle honoring opportunities to be like, hey, that's great if you wanna do that. I just wanna give you an encouragement. Would you consider how this is gonna bless us when you make this decision? - Yeah, respectfully communicate. - And how ever they answer, be like, okay, I just wanna encourage you to consider that. - That's great. - Love you. - 'Cause we have huge influence in our husband's lives in the way that they do make decisions. So, even if we don't feel like that's true, they're thinking about the things that we say and how we're saying them. - Yeah. - Right. - And I would also give an encouragement to wives to not be manipulative in the way they encourage their husbands to lead because I think sometimes there could be, oh yeah, I want him to lead as long as he leads my way. And so, doing, just using your emotional, emotions and the way you word things to get them to feel like their decision's bad and they should go with yours anyway, or, that's not how, no one responds well to those things. So just being careful how you're using your words and being prayerful in this journey of encouraging your husband. Again, prayer and running to the Father 'cause God's the only one who can change hearts. And that's what needs to happen in a lot of these men's lives. Husbands, if you're listening. If you're having a hard time leading, it's a heart problem in you that you need to go to the Father and say, change this in me. Why am I so afraid, or why is this so hard, or why am I feeling like I can't. Because even if your wife's not letting you, you should still be leading. - Yeah. - Because you can be an example in your home. - Okay, so real quick. For the relationship that the husband hasn't been spiritually leading and maybe the wife has, there could become a root of bitterness in her heart towards him and so when he does step up to try and lead, it can feel almost frustrating in the sense that he's doing it wrong or he's not doing it how she thinks he should. I know you mentioned all of that. - Well, she's been doing it for so long and now she has to like, wait, you're just gonna come in-- - How do you transition. How do you transition and sometimes that root of bitterness can get in the way and so I just wanted to call that out because you had touched on it briefly and I just, do you have any thoughts about that or an encouragement to a wife who may, there may be a situation that happens in the midst of them working together in the kitchen, how does she respond in that moment? - Yeah, well, it's even before that. If there is a root of bitterness like this, I've been leading and I've been doing this and my husband hasn't stepped up and there's this irked feeling. - Now all the sudden he's going to try. - Now you're gonna try or if you're gonna do it and you're not gonna do it my way. All those kinds of things. - How do they respond? - The first humbleness and repentance. - Yeah. - Within their heart. Saying, okay Lord. This is gonna be difficult, but I have been angry and bitter. And I just wanna repent that because I do want my husband to rise up. I do, I don't, say like, we need to tell the Lord, I don't want to get in the way of what You're doing in my husband's life. I actually wanna be a catalyst for what You're doing. I wanna be a part of it. - That's good. - So, I would just say start with humbleness and repentance. - Okay, so we're gonna move on and share just what are some ways that I have encouraged you to lead our family that's impacted you, 'cause I think hearing personal stories like this helps get the idea across. - So, I just have a list here. This is one of the things that I just wrote down notes of. Things that I've experienced that you've done for me that I felt encouraged me in my leadership. - Which, by the way, I had mentioned how we kind of prep our episodes. I didn't know you were gonna do this and so when I went in there to look over the episode. I saw this and I was so touched by it because I thought, oh, I didn't even know I was doing these things that have impacted you. So, I was really excited to hear this. - Well, thank you. So, the first one is you often ask me questions about the Bible. So, this does a bunch of things and we talked about this before. Scripture talks about this. It calls wives to go to their husbands and ask them questions. - Yeah. - And I know many wives would be like, well, I know more about the Bible than he does. Exactly. - Or I know where to go that would give me the right answer. - Exactly, like I have, oh, I have so and so or I have this Pastor or I have this podcast. Those things aren't bad. - Or whoever, yeah. - But just, ladies, listen. Listen to the power that this has in a husband's life. If every question you had about the Bible, even if you knew he didn't have the answer, if every question you had about the Bible, like you're reading scripture and you're like, this is weird or that's interesting or I wonder what he meant by that, and you went to your husband. You're husband's at home, he's watching TV or he's doing whatever, right, and you're like, hey, Hon, I was just reading in first John and it says, this, what do you think about that? And not in a facetious way. Not in way that sounds antagonistic, but genuinely wanna know what he thinks. - Yeah. - I would imagine in the beginning you'll have, what, what are you talking about? I don't know. Just go ask your pastor. I don't know. - Who knows. - Who knows how he's gonna respond, right. But imagine the 50th time. What do you think that husband's thinking to himself? He's thinking, she must think I have answers. She must think I know something, right? - I better know something. - She must believe or must be interested in my way of thinking about this. So, over and over and over again, running to your husband and saying, hey, what do you think about this? Hey, I read this. Have you ever read this before? What do you think it means? How do I know how to and over and over and over again you go to your husband and you ask these questions, eventually he's gonna start going to look for the answers. - Yeah, I would say space the questions out just so that he doesn't feel berated. Right, give him some breathing room because it could be, for some husbands, new. - Right, this is tactical. This is tactical. - No, it's not. It's a beautiful way that a marriage gets to look at the word of God together and so, my first thing is just give some space in between each question and then if you have a husband that's having a hard time answering those questions or maybe he forgets or maybe there's a lot of time that goes by and he never gets to that question, gets to answer that question, pray for him. Don't let that become bitterness in your heart that he's not answering your questions. - Yeah. - Let it become an opportunity for you to pray for him. - See it as a tool. Well first of all, the Bible tells wives to go ask their husbands questions. Second of all, over time that's gonna build up so much respect in him. When someone asks you questions, ladies, just think about this. If someone comes to you and says, hey I have this question. I wanna know your opinion, thought, idea, doesn't that make you feel so respected and honored? - Totally and I either wanna share right there what I think or I wanna go figure it out and then come back. - Yeah, 'cause that person really wants to know from you. Cool, so lets, I'm gonna run through a bunch of these and then we'll go a little deeper-- - Sometimes Aaron gets really excited, - I do. - and he starts teaching on a topic, but we're gonna share a little bit more about how you can encourage your husband specifically in just a little bit. But first, let's get through this list of what you came up with. - So again, these are things that I've seen you do for me. - Something I was gonna share real quick on this is one of the opportunities I always take is after a Sunday church service, if something stood out to me that I didn't understand, I'll come to you and say, "hey, what did "the pastor mean by this?" Or, "I'm kinda confused," or whatever the question is. - Right. - And so that's one opportunity and then, one of the things that we like to ask each other is, "what has God been teaching us lately?" So, I like that. - Yeah. So, the next one is, you encourage me in the things I'm already leading in. So, it's like this affirmation. You see me doing finances and you encourage me in that. Hey, thank you so much for doing, taking care of our family so well in that area. If you see me with my, doing something leadership wise with my kids, like discipling them, talking to them about something spiritual. Teaching them something, anything. - Positive reinforcement with words. - Oh yeah, so what you're doing is you're, and it, you're going out of your way to recognize leadership things in me and affirm those things. - Yeah. - You work hard to implement things that I have put in place. Which again, - I have a good example of it. - That's a submission thing and a leadership thing. - So, I had a good friend, Angie Tolpin from Courageous Mom, encourage me in home schooling to say, go to the husband, 'cause I'm there all day with the kids, but to go to your husband and say, what's your vision for home school? What do you want me to be teaching them? And then to take that vision and implement it and let your husband see the fruitfulness that comes from it. - Which gave me an opportunity to lead because I'm like, whoa, I didn't even think about that. - Now you gotta look into home school. - It took me some time to think about things that I cared about. - Yeah. - You did all the detailed stuff, all the standard things. - But you got to cast the vision and lead our family in that way. So, that's just one example, one area of what that looked like. - Which I kind of already mentioned this, but you reinforce my leadership with the children. So when you see me doing, leading my kids. Teaching them things. Encouraging them, you affirm me in that. - We also have to be unified in that. - I notice you were working on submitting to my leadership and yielding to my way of leading by laying down your plan-- - Can you see it in my eyes when I'm not? - Yeah, or inviting me to make the plan. These things encourage me and show me like, oh, she wants me to lead. - I used to come to Aaron at the beginning of, not every day, but important days and I'd say, okay, here's kind of like my expectations and what I want today to be like. - You could tell me yours afterwards, but this is what I want. - I've gotten into it but I still do that at times, but I do, I've gotten into a better habit of going to him on those days and going, hey, what were you thinking about today? Let's talk about this. I'm trying. - Well, you have gotten better and I've also raised up in that area. - Yeah. - So. - Being thoughtful. - Yeah, so we sit down and we'll discuss the plans for the week. It doesn't mean that you don't have a voice in it. - Right. - You're expecting me to lead in that. You've reminded me of what the Bible calls me to do in a loving way. So, there's been times that you said, "hey, I just want "to remind you that this week's coming up. "There's gonna be these things. "I'd love for you to put your heart on "and your mind of what you see for us. "How do you want this to play out? "Remember, that's your role. "I'm looking for you to do this in my life." And so you just in loving, gentle ways, saying "hey, God's called you to this. "I'm looking forward to it. "I'm excited for it and I'm reminding you to do it." - Yeah, no, that's really good. And I think there's been other times where just the way that I hear you talking with the kids, if it's a little harsh, I'll say, I'll remind you, gentleness. Sometimes it's just a one word phrase and other times it's just, there's actual scripture that comes to my mind that I feel like I need to share with you. - Yeah, there's been times in my life when I'm in sin, - Yeah. - And we're talked about this in our pornography episode - Oh yeah. - Awhile ago where you came to me and you actually spoke truth to me. - Jesus' words about adultery. - Instead of giving me your heart in your words, which you definitely had those, - Yeah. - you give me the word. - His words, yeah. - You showed me what you're doing is adultery. What you're doing, you're going to end up teaching our children. You need to walk in the freedom you have. You spoke all these truths to me in a very powerful way, but you reminded me what the Bible says. - Yeah, I want to admit to one more, but this is more like a failure slash warning for wives not to use scripture to get your own way and there's one scripture in particular that always comes to my mind when I'm frustrated at you or what you're doing and it's the one about, "husbands walk "with your wives in an understanding way." - You're not understanding me. - No, it's such a beautiful verse and I love it and I really do believe that you should be walking with me in an understanding way. - Yeah, of course. - But I shouldn't use, there's been a couple times where I've brought it up and I know I'm frustrated because I want you to understand me, but really, I just want you to yield to me. So, don't do that. - Right. - Don't do that. - You've gotten better on that. - Yeah. - These last two are really powerful ones. Ladies, wives, speak well of your husband in public to others. This is the most dismantling, one of the most dismantling, destructive things you can do is speaking down of your spouse in public. - Yeah. - You should never do that. That doesn't mean, like you're not, you're going to a confidential, a confident, a brother or sister in Christ to get advice and you're sharing situations. But that's not what this is and everyone knows when you're talking down about their spouse. - Here's the deal. If you're walking with the Lord, the Holy Spirit will convict you on those times that you're not walking faithfully and you are talking about your husband. - Okay, I get so frustrated about this and actually, if any of you that are listening have done this, I pray that you would think through it. Repent of it and change. I've seen people, public comments about their spouse. Oh, husbands and wives. Oh, my wife would never do this because of this, this and this, and I'm like, well, why are you telling everyone? Go talk to your wife about that. Or, I wish my husband would read this because he's this, this and this, and I'm like, whoa. - When you say public comments, are you talking about comments on social media? - Social media. - Okay. - And this is just, that's just one forum. - Yeah. - It's super public. Everyone sees it and I would just imagine, if I was that husband, I would be destroyed. And I think that's the point that they're doing it is that they feel destroyed so they're retaliating. - Yeah. - And so, I just want to encourage that we don't speak down about our spouses in public. My wife, Jennifer, you do this. Not speak down about me. You speak well of me. - Yeah. - Which makes me desire to live up to the words you speak about me because I hear it and I'm like, whoa, that's what she thinks of me. I didn't feel like that today. I didn't feel like I was being that way. So, speaking well of me in public is something that's been done that's been hugely impactful in my life. - I will say this just to encourage the wives who maybe have done this or it happens occasionally is in order to change, you have to repent and I remember years ago, it must have been within the third or fourth year of marriage, I went out to lunch with a friend and the conversation turned into this kind of complaining about you. - Complaining about me. - And I was on, I remember still where I was on the freeway feeling conviction from the Lord on how I spoke about you and I called that friend up and I was like, I have to apologize. What I said, what I did, it wasn't a good example. It wasn't what I should have done and I told you about it and I had to confess it. Otherwise I could have easily just stepped right back into it another time. And when we're confronted with our sin like that and we deal with it and we repent, it changes us. God changes us. And so I just want to encourage you, if you find yourself in the midst of doing something like that and the Lord convicts you, repent. - Yeah and again, I wanna separate this idea of sitting with a close girlfriend who's going to draw you back to the word of God, - Right. - and encourage you in saying, here's some things I'm dealing with. - I think we all know the difference. - Everyone knows the difference. - Versus I'm gonna tell you how much I'm bothered by my husband. - It's a heart posture. - It's totally a heart posture, So, speak well of people and of your spouse in public and then the last one is, Baby, you do this. You look to me for guidance pretty much for everything. It doesn't mean I have the answers all the time. I rarely have the perfect answer, but you come to me and say there's this, what about this. Hey, this things going in my, hey, I have this relationship thing, what do you think. So, that's become a pattern in our life. Coming to me for advise. - As it happens, I trust you more. I wanna hear from you more. I wanna get your perspective more and so, it's a building block, so like in marriage, you may not be at a point in your marriage right now where you feel that way. Where you desire your husband's perspective on something, but as you guys work through that and as you grow and you give him more opportunities for giving you advise on things or help walk you through certain things, you'll learn to trust him more. - So, that was really good. Let's talk about some of the benefits of walking in submission to his leadership. So, why don't you share some of the benefits you've seen from learning to walk in submission to and allow me to lead. - Okay, well, feeling loved and looked after. I feel like you truly are concerned with my welfare, our family's welfare and just when you make decisions or how you lead our family, it shows. There's evidence of that. - Just real quick. Husbands that are listening. Listen to these benefits because when you walk in leadership and walk in spiritual leadership, your wife's gonna experience the same benefits. - Yeah, totally. I feel like God's honored and glorified because we're working out that order that you mentioned earlier. - Yup. - And it's a stark contrast to the way that the world operates. It just looks different. So, they see that picture of marriage. I feel like there's less worry in my own heart because the burden is shared. So, if we are walking through something hard, I know, especially over time of submitting to your leadership, that I can trust you. I can trust God with you. What else? Our communication is better. I feel like we communicate more respectfully towards each other. Intentional discipleship of our children. - That's been a huge-- - Them seeing a good example of what it looks like for a daddy to lead and mommy to submit has been really cool and they get it, even at a young age. - It's amazing what they get. - Yeah. I feel like it provides an open and safe place for us to talk about things, especially biblical things. And if there is ever disagreement or misunderstanding on certain things, decisions that we have to make or concepts that are even in the Bible that we get to talk those things out and wrestle with them together. - Those are good benefits. - Yeah. - And it just, it's, yeah, it's obedience to God's order and it's a blessing. - Yeah. - When husband and wife are walking that way it's good. - It's awesome. - It's awesome. - Marriage is awesome. - Now, it doesn't mean you can't walk that way without your spouse walking their way. We're still called to read our own mail and walk in obedience to Christ. - Yeah. - But man, when you're both doing it, the ministry that you can do, the example you are to the world of the gospel is so beautiful. - Yeah, I will say this is another benefit, too, is that when we understand His purpose for marriage and His order and we're trying as hard as we can to walk, maybe it's not perfect, but we're walking in those roles and in those ways, we're motivated by an internal, eternal perspective that far outweighs any current circumstances that we face. So Aaron, wouldn't you agree that over time, the things that we face, the things that we have to walk through together are now, like after 13 years of marriage, they're much smaller to us in comparison to our view of what's motivating us, which is God, which is His-- - Well because we repent way quicker. - Eternity with Him. - We humble ourselves way quicker. We realize like, man the thing that we're really fighting about now, - Yeah. - is not worthy of this much attention. So, we back off quicker. We come to each other and say we feel dis-unified. - Right. - Let's work on that. Let's fix it. Our kids, we also recognize it in our children. When we have disunity, when we're not walking well with each other, - Yeah. - our kids experience that and respond to that. So, we wanna give some scripture. We're coming to the end. But here's just in the Bible. So, wives listening, if you have a husband that's not walking obedient, in obedience to the word, listen to what the Bible says. This is some of the most powerful scriptures, I think, to a wife on the power that she has in her husband's life. First Peter, chapter three says this. "Likewise, wives be subject to your own husbands." Remember, that submission reference to your husband. "So that even if some do not obey the word--" - Now this could be a non-Christian or it could be someone who claims to be a Christian but is not obeying the word. He's not walking the way God wants. - Right, that's what I love about this is it doesn't distinguish. It's saying someone who does not obey the word. - Yeah. - It could be both. It says this, "they may be one without a word "by the conduct of their wives. "When they see your respectful and pure conduct. "Do not let you adorning be external. "The braiding of hair, the putting on "of gold jewelry or the clothing you wear. "Let your adorning be the hidden person "of the heart with an imperishable beauty "of a gentle and quiet spirit which in God's sight "is very precious." And so, the point of this is, it's saying, in stark contrast to letting your outside appearance be the thing that is attracting and is getting the attention, it's not saying don't wear these things. It's saying don't let that be what you're using as your adorning. The thing that you're putting on to show who you are. Who you are should be that respectful and pure conduct from within and what it says right here, it says, "they may be one without a word." So, you want to win your husbands' hearts, not just for you but for them to be a leader. For them to raise up and sort of obeying the word of God. It's your conduct. Your gentle and quiet spirit, which is amazing. What that means is, wives, you can actually walk in such a way before your husband in your home that could transform them by the way they walk. Like, why are you so respectful? I'm this way and you just keep serving and you keep loving and you keep forgiving and you keep showing me by example what it looks like. That's powerful. - Yeah. - And so I just want to encourage with that scripture is like, the Bible says it, so you can trust God that it's saying wives, if you walk in this way, this is power in your husband's life. - I love how specific it is that it says, "without a word," because I think that often times we get creative with our words. Women, we know how to talk and we talk a lot sometimes. And sometimes we think that our words are gonna change our husbands. We think that if we say something enough. - I just need to get him to... - Right and so I love that there's a distinguishing note there, that, "without a word." And that shows the power of, like you said, our conduct and our behavior and the things that we choose to do. I think if we slow down and really meditated on this verse and understood what God was trying to teach us through it and walk it out, man, your husbands will be influenced by this. - Let's take it a step further. So, the wife represents the church. The symbol of the church, right. And what power does the church have in this world? Our conduct. - Mmh hmm. - It says that, "the world may know that you "are my disciples by the love you have "for one another." In other places it says, "that the world may know "that God sent Me by the love you have for each other." - Yeah. - So, wife, your conduct is that symbol and representation to your husband. - Yeah. - And church, our conduct is a body of Christ, is that symbol and light to the world. That's what that's representing. - In Proverbs 3, 5-6, it says, "Trust in the Lord "with all your heart and do not lean "on your own understanding. "In all your ways acknowledge Him "and He will make straight your path." And what I love about this in support of the verse we just read is coming back to our words. Sometimes we think our way is the right way and we're just gonna speak those words and we're gonna say that thing over and over and over again, but here God's saying trust me, lead on my understanding and I'm saying don't use your words, use your conduct. And so we need to pay attention. We need to acknowledge Him. We need to acknowledge His word and what He's sharing with us. - Amen. So, let's just end on five simple ways that they can start encouraging their husbands. Of course, we talked about all the ways I've seen you do it. - Yeah. - But there's just five ways. I'll do one, you do one. So, number one. Pray for him that he embraces his role as a future leader. - Number two, ask him to wash you in the water by the word at night or in the morning and if you don't know what I mean by that, Ephesians 5 25 says this. "Husbands love your wives as Christ loved the church "and gave Himself up for her "that He might sanctify her, "having cleansed her by the washing of water "with the word so that He might present the church "to Himself in splendor without spot "or wrinkle or any such thing, "that she might be holy and without blemish." And so, getting in the word together. Talking about it. Making those safe places for you guys to ask questions, for you to ask him questions and get answers and learn together. - And don't become bitter if it takes time. - Yeah. - Just keep asking. Say, hey, when you're ready, I'd love for you to read to me. I'd love for you to talk to me about the Bible. - Yeah. - Which leads to number three. Ask him spiritual questions and questions about the word of God before searching it out on your own, which is super respectful and powerful. Just going to him and say, hey, I'd love to know your opinion on this. I'd love to know what you think about this. And just do that. Make that your pattern of, go to him first. - Yeah. - Don't go to your, you know, whoever you listen to on your podcast or who, blogs you follow or your pastor. Go to him first and then go to those places. And that let's him know that you totally respect him. First Corinthians, 14:35 says that is there's anything that they desire to learn, talking about wives, "let them ask their husbands at home." - And I will say this. I think you'll be really surprised by your husband's answers when he does share them with you. I've had girlfriends in the past tell me, you know, I'm not good at asking my husband questions, but I asked him recently, duh duh duh tah duh, and this is what he came back with, and she shared his response and it was incredible and then she got to affirm him in that and it built his confidence. - Yeah, which is number four. - You guys are so cool. Number four is affirm him with kind words. Let him know that you believe he can do this. - Yeah. Number five is be supportive in action. Meaning in front of the kids, being on the same page. If he has a decision, be like, let's do this. We're gonna do this as a family. Dad has made a decision. This is what Dad's decided. Showing him that you're rooting for his leadership. - And that means that things don't change when Dad steps outside of the home to go to work or Dad goes to run an errand. - You instill things that he's desired. - You are the, the mediator between you and your kids and you're going to be an advocate for his vision, for his decisions, for his leadership for them. - Yeah and just as encouragement, this, sometimes this takes times. This always takes time. But Jennifer and I, we're still learning how to do this. I've failed often. Jennifer fails often. This is something that we have to constantly be like, hey. We gotta get realigned. I know I have to remember my role. You have to remember yours. Let's do this. So we just want to encourage you to take those steps in prayer. To desire what God desires. To be in the word of God and yeah, just follow. His ways are good and we just need to chase after those. So as usual, we end in prayer. We pray that this episode encouraged you and so, let me pray. Dear Lord, thank you for the gift of marriage. Thank you for the opportunity to consider these things and how we can mature as a couple. We pray we would walk in righteousness, gentleness and self control. We pray we would be people who see others through the lens of compassion. Help us to be thoughtful in our response to each other. Help us to be respectful in our conduct. We pray our interactions as a married couple would be a testimony of Your power and authority in our lives. May Your light shine brightly in us as we direct each other back to You. In Jesus' name, amen. We love you guys. I hope this blessed you and encouraged you. Just get into those scriptures yourself. And we just want to remind you, if you have been following us for awhile and haven't left a review yet, would you please do that today? Just scroll to the bottom on your app, hit the star rating and if you write out a review also, we love reading those. Again, thank you for joining us and we look forward to having you next week. Did you enjoy today's show? If you did, it would mean the world to us if you could leave us a review on iTunes. Also, if you're interested, you can find many more encouraging stories and resources at MarriageAfterGod.com and let us help you cultivate an extraordinary marriage.

This question comes from a young couple from FINLAND, just expecting their first baby: What are a few parenting keys, as we're just starting our family? Ann shares from a recent video call from this precious mission-minded couple from Europe. Resources mentioned: Redeeming Childbirth with Angie Tolpin, known as The Courageous Mom (book and blog for pregnancy and delivery, and a new Christian postpartum course). http://RedeemingChildbirth.com I Peter 2:2 

Isaac Tolpin is today known as Resolute Man, one half of Courageous Parenting, husband of Courageous Mom, Angie Tolpin, and a home-church shepherd. Yet, his early life started out in an unbelieving household of a single, working mom. God didn’t leave himself without a strong witness, though. At one point, Isaac and his sister had a run-in with the wrong side of the spiritual realm when they and their friends began messing around with a Ouija Board. Strange happenings began manifesting around the young Tolpins’ home culminating in a demonic attack from one of their friends. The friend, a girl they were on good terms with, uncharacteristically showed up unannounced one day. She sat down quietly and stared at Isaac with what he could only describe as “demonic eyes.” Without saying a word, the girl headed for their kitchen. Moments later she emerged with a large chef’s knife which she flung with all her might at Isaac. The knife narrowly missed his body and ricocheted off the arm of the chair he was sitting in. Panicked, Isaac hurriedly pushed her out the door. Thankfully, provided his sister with the wisdom to get rid of the Ouija. She found a Bible and burned the board while she read passages of scripture over it. Even though Isaac knew the existence of the spiritual realm was indisputable after this episode, it didn’t lead to immediate conversion to following Christ. That would come much later when, during his college years, he had the good fortune to captain a branch for Vector Marketing, the marketing company that sells Cutco knives. He led his branch to be #1 in sales in the country, made a lot of money for his age and felt like he had a good grip on direction for his life. This confidence was put into question, however, when the girl of his dreams walked through his office door. “I didn’t even believe in marriage until I met her!” Angie had just returned from a mission trip and was an all-or-nothing woman of God. Isaac had never met anyone like her and though he had a strict policy not to date any of his sales reps, he was smitten with her. Angie felt called to witness to Isaac and faithfully followed through but thwarted any possible romantic pursuits by actively severing ties to him afterward. Though Isaac wanted to be with Angie and couldn’t have her, he could possibly have her faith and he realized he needed to figure out what he thought of Jesus and the Bible. God was drawing him powerfully and he found himself going to services, sometimes two a day, every weekend. He searched scripture and sought God. Finally one day he had a spiritual encounter and called Angie in the middle of the night. She told him he needed to accept Christ which he promptly did upon hanging up. The next day he was shocked by the immediate change in himself. He had previously been wary of what he’d have to give up to follow Christ and now he found himself just not desiring any of those things. Soon after, Isaac and Angie got together and were married a year later. Isaac found that his conversion to Christ had made him an even better businessman. Higher quality candidates were attracted to work in his business and, after climbing the ranks to division manager, he saw God do something truly remarkable. His division was selling about $5,000,000 a year and was consistently finishing number two in sales out of 40 divisions. During a prayer time he asked God to help him grow the division’s sales. God responded with specific instructions about giving God glory for every success and being obedient to everything the Spirit told him to do. From that point forward, the Holy Spirit began to give specific instructions on how to run the division and, though the directions were unconventional compared to how things were usually ran in the company, Isaac obediently implemented the changes. The result was that during the Great Recession his division doubled in sales and crushed previous company sales numbers. Even better, though, his decision to follow Christ had given something much more important to live for than just sales numbers. During his time as a division manager, he was able to publicly declare his faith with his many speaking engagements at conferences as well as one on one with people he was leading and working with. Now he was endeavoring toward eternal things rather than mere temporal goals. Later, he realized it was his time to leave the company and he started a new company of his own. Unfortunately, pride got in the way and the company failed. The family lost all their money and they were also stuck with a half million in debt from the business. But God was faithful to fully pay off the entire debt within two years and to lead Isaac back to humility–teaching him many lessons along the way. It was within a few years of this that God led Isaac and Angie to start Courageous Parenting, which is a ministry designed to help Christian parents lead with intention and conviction in an uncertain world. Isaac and Angie know a thing or two about this topic as they have eight children of their own. Their youngest is 1-year-old and their oldest is enrolled at Liberty University. Angie has also been blogging under the name Courageous Mom for quite some time. You can find her book on Christian postpartum care here. Their podcast has blown up with over 12,000 downloads per week and 200 people or more have already been through their six-week parenting mentor program. Justin listens to the podcast regularly and heartedly recommends it! Listen to this week’s episode for all the amazing details of Isaac’s story as well an amazing parenting tip for discipling your kids in the faith! HIGHLIGHTS Justin and Isaac have known each other for 20 years because Justin used to sell Cutco knives. He was also a sales manager for a few different offices in Isaac's division, which, at the time, covered Washington and Oregon. Isaac and Angie's goal with their ministry is to impact one million family legacies by helping parents have a huge impact on their families. Angie's book, Redeeming Childbirth, is the only book of its kind for Christians on postpartum care.

If you ask your kids "What is Easter about?", what will they say? Normal Easter traditions can be good as long as they also get the real point about Easter. This episode gives you lots of practical examples and resources to help you make Easter a faith growing experience. For a full resource list, notes, scriptures and information about the Parenting Mentor Program go to https://courageousparenting.com/

Regardless of your education choices, this will be a challenging but important episode for all Christian parents as we must be thinking Biblically so we win the spiritual battle for the hearts of our kids. It takes an adjusted parenting strategy based on the choices you make as education is an important part of discipleship. In this episode, you will learn 5 things to take into account as you make your decisions. For show notes, scripture list, and FREE COURAGEOUS PARENTING WORKSHOP got to CourageousParenting.com.

How to teach the Bible to your kids. We can't expect our kids to obey what they don't know and it's your job to make sure they know who God is and what He expects from them. Consistently teaching your kids the Bible will transform your parenting effectiveness. This episode will teach you exactly what to do; Ideas on when to do it, how to do it, and engage your kids in the process. It's never too late to start infusing the word of God into the hearts of your kids. For the notes, scripture list, and a video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/episodes/

If you don't reveal the ungodly truths behind the feminist movement, your kids may fall for its lies. Raising strong Biblically minded daughters takes proactive effort in the midst of the deceitfulness of things like "Self-love", "The Future is Female", and an ongoing effort to disrespect and disregard manhood. In this episode, you will get the Biblical truth on feminism with parenting tips to raising strong daughters in today's world. For notes, scriptures, and information about the "Parenting Mentor Program" go to https://courageousparenting.com/.

A teachable heart makes parenting easier, but it's not easy to cultivate a teachable heart. It's one of those few worthy constant efforts every parent needs to make. If you want obedient kids, if you want a peaceful home, if you want kids who want to learn about God, then they better want to learn from you. Get ready for another episode where Isaac and Angie hold nothing back to help you equip confident Christian kids in an uncertain world. For show notes, scriptures, and video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/ You will also find more information about the Parenting Mentor Program

Surprising reasons men are passive in leading their families spiritually. There is an attack against masculinity and it is impacting the confidence of men and negatively impacting God's purposes for the family. An important discussion for every marriage, as it is crucial we model for our children what we want for them when they are married. Find out the two key questions to ask your spouse and encourage God's design in your marriage. For show notes, scriptures, and video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/ You will also find more information about the Parenting Mentor Program

In this episode, we discuss how to prevent ageism by raising your kids who love, respect and enjoy doing life with their closest friends; their siblings. You will learn how to parent towards cultivating strong relationships and teamwork within your family No matter how old your kids are, this is a must listen for every parent. It's best to start young, but it's never too late to influence this with your kids. For show notes, scriptures, and video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/ You will also find more information about the Parenting Mentor Program

We have 18 years to help our kids experience God, yet so many still fall away when they leave home. This episode gives you practical ways you can help your kids experience God. The desires of the world have a stronger pull than ever on young people, but it's still nothing compared to the power of God, but He put you in charge of Discipling your kids towards knowing and loving God. This episode gives you five areas you can help your kids experience that God is real with tons of practical examples. For show notes, scriptures, and video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/ You will also find more information about the Parenting Mentor Program. We would love it if you gave us a 5-star review and shared this podcast too!

God says children are a blessing, while the world views them as a burden. Where do you stand and why? While God has a different plan for every family, Isaac and Angie cover 9 reasons why so many Christians don't want to have any more kids. Whether you are done having kids or not, this is an important episode as you think about your legacy and what you communicate in front of, or to your own children. Someday your kids will ask you about the "why" behind the decisions you've made and this discussion will be helpful. God is the ultimate designer of every family and there is no judgment or condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. There is truly beauty in His unique designs of each family. For show notes, scriptures, and video of this episode go to https://courageousparenting.com/ You will also find more information about the Parenting Mentor Program. We would love it if you gave us a 5-star review and shared this podcast too! Disclaimers: This message does not speak to those who are struggling with infertility and loss. Our hearts go out to those who have struggled for years to have children and have suffered greatly. We have lost a baby of our own and know the deep pain and heartache that brings. If you have suffered loss, Angie has written a lot on miscarriage and even shares her miscarriage testimony here on CourageousMom.com.

This episode gets super personal as Isaac and Angie share the intimate struggles of parenting through miscarriage, almost losing their house, and a business failure with over $500,000 of debt following them. They warn parents to reject the philosophy, "Let Kids Be Kids," as they share counter-cultural, Biblical wisdom in how to parent through trials. This is essential wisdom, with nine Scripture references for all parents. You can tune-in wherever you listen to podcasts; as well and find this video and the show notes with Scripture references at https://courageousparenting.com/episodes/ Please share this to further the Courageous Parenting movement in equipping 1 million families to raise confident Christian kids in an uncertain world.

Do your kids respect you? Do they roll their eyes or refuse to obey you? How you are parenting when they are young is either cultivating respectful or disrespectful kids. It doesn't just happen. In fact, it won't happen if your parenting looks like the majority. The great news is, this isn't difficult, but it does take doing the right few things consistently over a long period of time. In this episode, Isaac and Angie cover three practical and Biblical keys to raising kids who will respect you. There's some counter-intuitive wisdom even the most experienced parents are likely to glean from. You should expect your kids to obey and respect you because God expects it of them, but have you taught them what the bible says on this? You will be encouraged and get several powerful Scriptures you can teach your children as well.

We begin to answer one of the most asked questions in parenting; how to raise obedient kids. Isaac & Angie discuss two vital and foundational aspects of training up obedient kids. Without these two keys, everything else you do will likely fail over-time. They speak from experience having 8 kids, from 3 months to 18 years old, and are seeing the fruit from their experience following the biblical parenting model. You will get the raw biblical truth and practical wisdom you need in this episode on parenting that's relevant no matter how old your kids are.

Culture is the invisible force that drives behavior. There are a few important things you can do to establish and influence the right family culture that will have a big impact on your kids behavior this year and beyond. Find out the 3 steps you can take right now as parents to establish a breakthrough year in the areas of growth you see vital for your kids and family. As the new year is upon us, learn from Isaac & Angie who have 8 kids 3 months to 18 years and have seen fruitfulness following the biblical parenting model. For more biblical truth that's relevant to today's uncertain world, go to CourageousParenting.com.

Isaac Tolpin is a tech entrepreneur and futurist, on a mission to humanize the digital learning experience in order to equip and fuel change in the world. In the pursuit of making a difference through business, he's lost and won several battles in his entrepreneurial journey. He co-founded the tech company Throwing Boulders in 2001, that launched its most important product ConveYour.com in 2016 that's disrupting the digital training world. He brings a visionary mindset to everything he does including creating a legacy for his seven children with the help of his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. He refuses to waste his life achieving the world's definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects he's involved with, those he serves, and the family he leads. Learn More- ConveYour

Isaac Tolpin is a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on the mission of humanizing the digital learning experience to equip and fuel change in the world. In the pursuit of making a difference through business, he’s lost, won, and learned a ton with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies he’s been involved in building. Isaac co-founded the tech company Throwing Boulders in 2001, that launched its most important product ConveYour.com in 2016 that’s disrupting the digital training world. He brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating his seven children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. Isaac refuses to waste his life achieving the world’s definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects he’s involved with, those he serves, and the family he leads. Join The Brotherhood Join the Front Row Dads private Facebook community so you can ask questions, share ideas, and be part of a supportive group of incredible brothers who help one another navigate the role of marriage and fatherhood. Visit FrontRowDads.com/facebook For more information, visit FrontRowDads.com

Isaac Tolpin is a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on the mission of humanizing the digital learning experience to equip and fuel change in the world. In the pursuit of making a difference through business, he’s lost, won, and learned a ton with over $105 million in combined revenues from the companies he’s been involved in building. His unique expertise in digital training that comes from: Extensive experience working with young adults leading a large direct sales organization enabling me to see first hand the changes and challenges in human behavior around technology and learning Executive experience building and leading 32 area managers and an overall leadership team of 120 across two states. Co-founded a 43 employee digital publishing company that produced digital training programs for top-tier influencers used for Corporate employee training and online marketing. An influencer in the digital training world, writing articles, many meetings with mainstream publishing companies, universities, large MOOCs, influencers and companies on overcoming the poor engagement challenges of digital training. Co-founded the tech company Throwing Boulders in 2001 with Stephen Rhyne, that launched its most important product ConveYour.com in 2016 that’s disrupting the digital training world. Isaac brings a visionary mindset to my family by creating a legacy raising and educating their seven children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. He refuses to waste his life achieving the world’s definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects he’s involved with, those he serves, and the family he leads.

Many people are prepared for failure, but few are prepared for success. Without character, mentors, and real life experience, success can ruin your career. Isaac Tolpin unpacks this topic in today's episode. Isaac Tolpin is one of the Founders of ConveYour.com, the #1 Micro-Learning platform for influencers and companies. He’s a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, enabling brands to authentically connect and inform at scale with over $105 million in combined revenues from the companies he’s helped build. His success comes from understanding the relationships between human behavior, business and technology. This expertise has helped celebrity influencers and companies to transform their knowledge into humanized digital training. His recent background includes cultivating a vineyard, keynote speaker, digital marketer, and EdTech disrupter through the pioneering Mirco-Training technology, ConveYour.com, the platform that’s improving the way influencers and organizations connect and train their people. He brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating their 7 children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com.

I’m a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on the mission of humanizing the digital learning experience to equip and fuel change in the world.In the pursuit of making a difference through business, I’ve lost, won, and learned a ton with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies I’ve been involved in building.Co-founded the tech company Throwing Boulders in 2001, that launchedits most important product ConveYour.com in 2016 that’s disrupting the digital training world.I bring a visionary mindset to my family by creating a legacy raising and educating our seven children with my wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com.I refuse to waste my life achieving the world’s definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects I’m involved with, those I serve, and the family I lead.Learn More-www.conveyour.comInfluential Influencers with Mike Saundershttp://businessinnovatorsradio.com/influential-entrepreneurs-with-mike-saunders/

I’m a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on the mission of humanizing the digital learning experience to equip and fuel change in the world.In the pursuit of making a difference through business, I’ve lost, won, and learned a ton with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies I’ve been involved in building.Co-founded the tech company Throwing Boulders in 2001, that launchedits most important product ConveYour.com in 2016 that’s disrupting the digital training world.I bring a visionary mindset to my family by creating a legacy raising and educating our seven children with my wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com.I refuse to waste my life achieving the world’s definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead deeply cares about making a difference in the world through the projects I’m involved with, those I serve, and the family I lead.Learn More-www.conveyour.comInfluential Influencers with Mike Saundershttp://businessinnovatorsradio.com/influential-entrepreneurs-with-mike-saunders/

Isaac Tolpin is one of the Founders of ConveYour.com, the #1 Micro-Learning platform for influencers and companies.  He’s a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart. On a mission, enabling brands to authentically connect and inform at scale with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies he’s helped build.  His success comes from understanding the relationships between human behavior, business and technology. This expertise helped celebrity influencers and companies to transform their knowledge into humanized digital training. His recent background includes, cultivating a vineyard, keynote speaker, digital marketer, and EdTech disrupter through the pioneering Mirco-Training technology, ConveYour.com, the platform that’s improving the way influencers and organizations connect and train people.  He brings a visionary mindset to his family by creating a legacy raising and educating their 7 children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. He refuses to waste his life achieving the world’s definition of success that leave so many empty.  Instead he does what matters through projects, those he serves, and the family he leads. Isaac Tolpin Vroom Veer Stories Had the entrepreneur bug very early; started making and selling crafts in High School Went to college (cause that what Gen Xer's do!); starting doing direct sales in college How to overcome massive entrepreneurial failure and come back stronger than ever Big lesson from this failure was to listen to friends he really trusts Learned how to be a better husband and father and to check his ego Why digital training needs be fun, effective, and never boring Human behavior doesn't allow digital training to take hours at a time; more like 5-7 minutes An optional workplace test game had a 95% completion rate; making it mandatory caused a drop Isaac Tolpin Connections Conveyour.com LinkedIn Facebook

Isaac Tolpin is a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on a mission, enabling brands to authentically connect and inform at scale, turning followers into raving fans. In the pursuit of making a difference through business, he won, lost and learned a ton with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies he's built. He's mentored hundreds of entrepreneurs to pursue and successfully build what matters versus what's easy. Isaac's  recent background includes, cultivating a vineyard, keynote speaker, and EdTech disrupter as CEO and Co-Founder of ConveYour.com, the platform that's changing the way influencers connect and teach their followers. He brings a visionary mindset to my family by creating a legacy raising and educating our 7 children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. Isaac refuses to waste his life achieving the world's definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead build more than a business through the projects he's involved with, those he serves, and the family he leads.

Isaac Tolpin is a tech entrepreneur and futurist at heart, on a mission, enabling brands to authentically connect and inform at scale, turning followers into raving fans. In the pursuit of making a difference through business, he won, lost and learned a ton with over 105 million in combined revenues from the companies he's built. He's mentored hundreds of entrepreneurs to pursue and successfully build what matters versus what's easy. Isaac's  recent background includes, cultivating a vineyard, keynote speaker, and EdTech disrupter as CEO and Co-Founder of ConveYour.com, the platform that's changing the way influencers connect and teach their followers. He brings a visionary mindset to my family by creating a legacy raising and educating our 7 children with his wife Angie Tolpin of Courageousmom.com. Isaac refuses to waste his life achieving the world's definition of success that leaves so many feeling empty, but instead build more than a business through the projects he's involved with, those he serves, and the family he leads.