Q&A

And I set up everything in advance and then didn't do it all right, Well, good morning to you all. A few words before we began the question and answer segment, I'm going to talk about two books that you may write be very familiar with. If not, let me expose you to them. The first, obviously, he'sn't written by our brother what he must be if he wants to marry my daughter. This book was actually given to me. I was at a conference and I was walking by, and the guy saying, Hey, you can choose any book you want. And I didn't. I didn't even have a daughter yet, but I just saw the name and the impact that this brother's preaching. I was opening up the word I said, I just got to give this little did I know that my wife was actually pregnant with our daughter when I grabbed it. I devoured this and had a dual purpose because only did it not only did it help me to see what kind of man I should be preparing my daughter to receive as husband, but it also showed me what I needed to be. And so I had a dual purpose of both looking out for my daughter and looking out for my wife. And so was this was wonderful especially many many questions. You know, some of the questions that we're going to look at today are answered in this book. And husband's father's this has been a tremendous tool in my life to leave my family according to the word of God. And his brother has really poured his heart out in this work. And so again, if you're not familiar with these I would highly encourage that you get them, whether your husband, father, or a mother or wife. These are tremendous pools that center around the Word of God. Oh our hoptively that's right. Yes, you don't have to wait until you're already in the game. You can start going to practice. Well, so we have some questions for our brother and right, all right, what is your accouncil to those considering foster care or adoption? First, I'll just say a word about adoption in general. There are a lot of things that we talk about today. You know, this is a gospel issue. That's a gospel issue. This is, you know, an implication of the gospel. That's an implication of hospital or whatever. A lot of times we say that, and it's a stretch, but this is one of those instances where it's never really a stretch. When we talk about the order salutis or the org salization, usually we talk about justification, sectification, and glorification, right, But theologically, historically, the order salutist is justification, adoption, sanctification, glorification. I can't justify anybody, I can't sanctify anybody, I can't glorify anybody. But guess what, I can adopt it. And it is an incredible picture and expression of God's loving redemption of his of his people. And so first I want to say that from a biblical theological perspective, this is something that ought to be a part of our thinking. Whether it's something that we end up participating indirectly or indirectly, is something that ought to be a part of our thinking. That being said, it's something that we ought to be very sobered and deliberate about. Unfortunately, a lot of people when they think about either the foss character or system or adoption, they had this picture of the day of the Knight in shining arm or was going to come rescue some grateful child who will then spend the rest of their lives going thank you so much appreciation. Right, And the fact of the matter is we live in a falling, broken world, and we are following and broken people, and adoption and foster garrett involves getting your hands dirty and people who by definition are in thements of following and growken circumstances. And if you're doing this because you want to be a man of shining armor or because you want people to match you on the back, then go do something else, or maybe help somebody else you know, to do it, because that will just lead you to a long road of disappointment and heartache. And you talent, We won't help the way you think you're helping, because in all obviously you're more concerned about yourself than you are about somebody who needs needs a home of the family. And the last thing I would say is you need to do wise as a servants, because we're dealing with you know, the government, we're dealing with the law, We're dealing with you know, family situations and circumstances. We're dealing with our own family dynamics, and you know all these issues. So those are just kind of three general words of counsel that I would give to anybody who's who's who's thinking about that? Well, who's not thinking about that? You're not thinking about it. You need to be thinking about that because that that is that is our art, right, so the part of our thinking. H If you are thinking about that, you need to consider your motives. And then if you are interested in moving forward with that, you need to become as informed as you possibly can recognize that. Uh, there are there are a lot of moving parts, you know. And and in the end, if this is what the Lord's calling you to, can do it? You know, no way for trumpets and hearts. And you have done this yeah times seven times, so yeah, you know all right. So you have a you have a Christian man. He's a husband, he has children, he's he's read some of your writings, he's heard some of the teaching. And I need to be focused on discycling my fent. I need to be making that an extreme priority. And he reads the Word of God as well as your other writings and sees the responsibility to call out those who are in a sin, to run to Christ and honor him. Can't believe in him, and he feels his tension. I have a bit of time. I work a full time job. My children need me, my wife needs me, and I see the loss and my heart earns for them. What counsel would you give to that? My first counselor to that advent is stop dividing up the world like that. My counsel would be to understand your motivation in the second way, because it includes the first. And here's what I mean by that. I don't I don't want to be in a position where I think about evangelizing my children simply because they're my children, right, Like, while these are mine, evangelism is now real and important. Then you don't understand evangelism. You don't understand the gospel. Right. The focus needs to be Christ die for his bride. He died, and he called me to himself. And my desire is that Christ might have the fullness of the reward for which he died. That is my life life, right, that is my life. How, I don't know how by any means. Right, that is my life. If that's your focus, and then God gives you children, then the natural extension of that is well, wow, I've got lost people who now live in my house. Right, do you see the difficult It seems like a small thing, but this is a huge paradox shift. And now all of a sudden I'm not going, well, Okay, I've got my children and I got there eat and I've got my and then I got the lost people I got. No, your focus should never change. Your focus should always be. My desire is that Christ would have the fullness of the ard tru which he died. Right, So how do I know who to evangelize? Well? Who are the lost people that God puts in my pack? Right? What are the ways? What are the means? What are the Okay, and then children come into my life. That's a that's an easy answer, right, Yes, these are a defm it. I do the responsibility, but the focus of my life hasn't changed. It's just that God has put these individuals in a situation, in a circumstance where they get to have like more of that focus for me, and more of that tradition for me, and more of that concentrated effort for me. And then I want to work and there are people who got who puts in my life at work, and then I have you know, other avenues of my life working out these people in my life. It's interesting and my legous book, I mean this is you know, I'm not the book plugging guy or whatever. But I'm like, okay, we got two books that are regularly about the visuals of that. Yes, this is commercial for all of them, you know, but it's poss very politetics. One of the things I talk about there is I got involved in Brazilian ju jitsues back in two twelve. And I got involved in brazil ju jitsu because you know, my oldest son, Trey travel would be for three and a half years, from you know, thirteen to about sixteen seventeen. He was he troubled be full Peen States and fourteen countries together, and then all of a sudden he was done and you know, off doing his thing, and I just missed it like crazy. So we started trying to find some things that we could do together. He was interested in martial arts, and we list these different you know, Marshal Wats things and none of nowhere, you know. Then we found this Brazilian jiu jitsu stuff, and I was like duck in water. I mean I was home all, you know, And he practiced for a few months and then he was like, you know, off, like other team got off to something else. I was like, I'm I'm home, I'm not leaving, you know. We would find something else that we would do. Yeah, but I'm doing this. And it's interesting. Most pastors, within a few years of being in a pastor don't have lost friends anymore. You're at the church, you're at home, you're counseling people, you're preparing sermons, you're doing all this stuff right, and it's just as busy as it can be. And you may run into most people at the grocery store. You may run into a lot of people here and there to the other, but you generally now have put yourself in an environment where everything you do is basically with the people from your home and from your church. And most pastors, after a few years in a pastor do not have real relationships with people who are not associated with the church. Through being involved in Brazilian jiu jitsu and being part of this group that I was part of, it, we competed together, you know, all of a sudden, for the first time Coribian decades, I had real relationships with people who did not know Jesus at all, and my understanding of evangelism just blossomed all over again because of those relationships and those avenues, right, and so this was kind of another reminder to me that wait, this is not just about okay, church, we're evangelizing because people come to church and anild the Lord. Okay with my family, of evangelizing because my family, all of a sudden, I was reminded again when there's a whole loss of world out there, right, and that focus has to be broader, That focus has to be all encompassing. And then what happens is we look at the different avenues of our life and figure out how it is that we can live out that focus in the various avenues of our lives. For some of us, especially those you know, neepastities, that needs have to be intentional about injured abues where we will actually be encountering people you know who who lords. So that was a huge way of call for me. So that's a long way around the auld question. But damn so on the heels of that, this is a nice segue into this next one. So you are pouring into your children, giving them the gospel, loving them, and this young child says, I want to be a Christian. I believe in the Gospel. I believe in Christ. And here's this, because we know that so many have abused the sinner's prayer and false professions, and the scriptures are replete with warnings against these bad fruit berry trees. And then you have this child of yours. You don't want to be skeptical, right, you want to believe, and yet you don't want to give a false confidence. So what counsel would you get to that parent? We see said things in that child that seem to indicate I don't know, but out of their mouth they're saying, I do one of the pufform crimes. Yeah, the great thing. And let me just say that part of what creates this tension is the way we have come to view after you know, because as parents, here's the deal. If we're not okay, many parents in our circles and in our Credo Baptist circles, you know, said pedal bapchers. Right, we've got doze infants, Credo Baptists, baptized believers. And and so what ends up happening is because we as parents, we we don't so much more and here, please hear me, we don't so much want our children to be saved as much as we want to see them get baptized. Can say a man say, ouch, right, we want to see our kids get baptized, and so we end up pushing for that. Okay, we end up pushing for I want to see my kids get baptized. And I don't remember who said it, but it just resonated with me. Oftentimes people are baptized so young that we're not baptizing that person. We're baptizing parental anxiety. That's what we're putting in the water, parental anxiety. So that apparent can now say, Okay, spiritual job is done. We got him baptized. Okay, We've got to get away from that. We've got to stop thinking about our child's spiritual journey as the movement toward an event and water, and start thinking about our child spiritual journey as a movement toward Christ. And So, if I have a child who's who's young, and this is one of the things that led us. I mean, as a church, we we we set a limit on the age of which we would baptize someone, which really can do a very helpful for a lot of ways for people. But you know, you have a child who's very young, and they say that they believe if I view their spiritual journey as a movement toward baptism. Now all of a sudden, I'm anxious because I'm like, okay, is this it? Now? Do we not? Do we? But you know, pass around, don't know. But if I see their spiritual journey as a movement toward Christ. And my young child is saying I believe, I say that's awesome. Keep believing. I trust, that's incredible. Keep trusting because again, we're not We're not in a rush. Okay, this brings up another issue because a lot of us, if we're honest, you know, on the one hand, we said we're pre back credo bacts, not payo batters. Right, we don't baptize infants. We baptize believers. So all right, there's the one issue that we have to settle, right, But the second is this without technology it we've come to believe in baptismal regeneration, that baptism saves. And so here's what we're afraid of. We're framed this child says that they believe, Well, what if we don't get them baptized in time and they're gonna have to meet the Lord without having bed in the water. Right, that's a that's a theological problem. You're having a man that's a theological problem you're having. I mean, if you believe that the child is going to to, you know, tragically, have a life that ends early and then steady before God and being judged because the parents under who's authority placed them didn't baptize it soon enough. You've got an issue of good for you of God. Are are we getting this? Okay? So just slow down a little bit, all right? Slow down. Their spiritual journey is not a journey towards the waters of baptism. Their spiritual journey is a journey towards Christ. You switch that and it really changes things in terms of your anxiety over the water. Okay, and then we've got a child who's talking about believing, and we go, okay, great people leaving because here's the other issue that we have when you make baptisms. You know, the sort of sinkron with this this you know experience when baptists is everything and we're gonna kill We're gonna get you in the water. And then all of a sudden we get them in the water. And then a year later or five years later or ten years later, they're living like they're not really a believer. We're kind of going, don't We're gonna mean they were, they were baptized, but there now they're they're like, God, this one. Stop me if you've heard this one right, stop me if you've heard this one, because again, now, when are we're communicating? We're communicating, you know. And I've had people come to me. You know, there's a twenty year old who's a hell in the twenty year old who's on full hill of the twenty year old. This absolutely no fruit. And I'm looking into the eyes of my our dad and I'm saying their child's lost, and they're going, they're back. I was there. You can't even admit that your child is lost, wife, because theologically you made a decision, and the decision was you believe the waters are what's safe? You How all of this is? Is it a flanes Okay? So that's my journey towards Christ. So now what I'm doing. Little one says they believe, Keep believing. Little one says they trust, keep trusting. What's your hoping? Your hopes in Christ? Okay, your hope is in Christ. Because I can't tell you how many times as a pastor I've had the counsel adults who sit there and they down have anxiety over when they were really saved, because everybody and everything pointed to the waters being the magic moment. But they go in there going their harder parts. I'm just now coming to those the water. I was in the water. I was five, but I'm just now coming to Jesus. Now they have this anxiety. I was a false convert. I wasn't really saved. And now I basically have to say to my parents, who think they did a great job by getting into the waters at five, O, by the way, you were wrong. Nobody wants to say that's a mom and dad. So now I got that anxcity. Yeah right, anybody, and we're talking to anybody, Okay, So we got to really switch our parents out. The journey is a journey toward Christ, not towards the water. Right the water. Don't say don't rush through the water, okay, if you will help you and it will help your child if you meant this. Switch okay. Man. So you have this finger that's constantly pointing the child to Christ, and by nature we are bent towards legalism. Yes, right, So the child, you know, one of the most Stephen person, one of the most impactful messages that this brother has preached is child training. If you're not familiar with it, it's forty nine minutes, go check it out. You will not regret it. And one of the things that you discussed in there is the biblical command all through our proverbs to apply the road, and you apply to rod when the law is broken and when so, so here you have this world where the child disobeys and they're punished, they obey, they're rewarded. That just seems right into our natural event towards legalism, and we have to do that or we're being disilleeding into Christ. And yet we want our children to have a mindset that's looking to the Gospel. So how do we keep our children from this natural bent of legalism. We have to deal with the law and all that. Yeah, and this is that this is that beautiful law gospel picture. Right. We have to understand that the law and the Gospel are not entities of friends. Right, the law is tudor, the law is trained, the law is teaching. So one of the things that we have to do in this process is remind our children that you know, because here's what our tendency is. You disobey. Here's the punishment, and the punishment exists so that you get afraid of the punishment and don't do that anything we have that's kind of the way we right, our bid. Right. No, you disobeyed, you violated the law. Justice comes, and this justice is to remind you that God is just and you can either seek to be just, which you've just learned you can't, or learn that you need another to be just. On your math, right, our kids need to get tired to hear that, right, They didn't get entire to hear that. But this is again another paradox shift for us. Right, we have to learn how to take that extra step, and we have to learn how to think about the First of all, you have need to learn how to think about discipline as formulative discipline and corrective discipline, right, And most of our disciplines should be formative and not corrective. Formative discipline teaches us what to believe, what to do right. Corrective discipline comes when we failed to do that. But when that coreactive discipline comes, you have to remember that the correct discipline comes to remind them of the law that they violated and the fact the fact that violating the law has a consequence, and that their ultimate hope isn't the one who can take that consequence on They never have. So if we have to take that extra step of that shoulder and not just think about it as you know, you've done this, here's your consequence, do better. Right, you've done this, here's your consequence. To laws there to teach you, the loss there to teach you. They have to teach you one thing you can't do this apartment crest. So again it's it's it's a paradise ship law, like a lot of these things are, you know, and just think about it this way. For most of us, the reason we have these broken paradigms is because us we come from broken paradigm, and our parents come from broken paradigm, and my kids' parents come from broken paradise, and all of our parents come wide well because we have our ultimate parents, Adam and Eve, who grew up in paradigm. Right, So history from Adam and Eve has been about repairing broken paradigm that we've inherited, that we've inherited from them. So oftentimes when people you know you mentioned earlier, is being helpful to you, is you know, growing up without a father, and I grew up without my father. And one of the things that we have a tendency to do when we grow up in circumstances like that is to think, well, we come from a broken situation. But that makes us different than other people. The only people in the world who were not born into a broken family where the two people who ended up being there is in a broken family. Everybody else comes from a broken family. So stop thinking. Stop thinking that you somehow have a unique hurdle to overcome because of the brokenness and your fans everybody, everybody, everybody comes from a broken family. And people who don't think they come from a broken family only think that because somehow they haven't been told about the brokenness. Right, how many times you heard the story? You know, you grow up and be knowing this ideal a home and then you know, you realize later on when you get married and you come to your parents who never had problems about the problems in your marriage, and they tell you, oh, yeah, we had that problem. People what because everybody comes from a broken there, because everybody's fallen and broken, so you know, remembering that. So that's what that means, is all of us have to go back, rethink the paradigm, back to the scriptures, remind ourselves of that truth, recognize that we have some views about the discipline and our children that automatically tends toward legalism. Right, we've got to acknowledge that, overcome that, and we've got to do it on an amiting basis, And we had to constantly be pointing back to the cross, and we got to constantly put our children back to the Cross. One of the things that you've preached very passionately about, written about are the issues of our day, abortion, on the sexuality, and staying on social justice. A lot of these issues and a lot of them the subject matter is very mature, and we have children growing up in this world. And so for some parents they can say, should I expose my children to this subject matter at this time? And what what? What are some helpful guide close to determine when should we take our children to be exposed to such subject matters. Yeah, there's a couple of things. One is, there's there's a wisdom, right, and that's just parenting. We don't expose our children to anything just all that once right, our children grow through the process of growth and maturity, and the essence of parenting is shepherding our children through that process of growth and maturity, right and dealing with things as they come. And think about it like this. Think about it in terms of reading, right, what a parent would just wait until their child is you know, ten, twelve, whatever, and then okay, we need to have to talk about reading. No, you don't do that. You get the little blocks with letters on long before they know what letters are, right, You teach them the ABC song, long before they know what the alphabet is. You teach them. So what you do is you teach them rudimentary fundamental things that they can later begin to put together. Right, So, in terms of you know, human sexuality and these issues that are going on in the culture of human sexual reality, physical parents, stable case, we'll just not having any discussions about betting that until one day when they're mature enough, and then we'll just dive into the whole thing. Absolutely not. We teach rudimentary fundamental truths about being male and female and in the image of God, right, all of this stuff. We teach some of those rudimentary fundamental truths you know about marriage and about you and opportunities arise all the time to do this right that family members get married, you know, and all these sort of things happen. There are these teachable moments that are always going on. So what we have to do is have a firm commitment to a biblical worldview on these issues, being aware of the challenges taking our children through this rudimentary fundamental understanding right as they grow and as they mature, and then as i'm two of these arise and as what's are creditive about party about things? Because here's one of the things that out of learn especially you know in the age words with them. You don't get to choose when you talk to your children about stuff. Amen, somebody right, No, we're not going to have that conversation that to wait what you saw? What? Right? You just you know, I can look at that one. You know, where is that great Texas delog enough the field abody says, how's that working for you? Right? So you don't need to do that. What that means and that doesn't mean that we just go all out right, here's the full deal for you, because I know it's going to be. What that means is that commitment to fundamental you know again, catechises categorize our children. We we we we you know, given the foundation of truth, and then when things come we don't act like a deal when it exist, we don't avoid them, but we can kind of go, Okay, here's this issue, here's where you are. Let me add this to your fundamental understanding to the degree that I can, right reinforcing those fundamental physical truths. Okay, telling you about fallenness and brokenness. Yeah, so these are these are these are the principles. And we have to think about this in terms of principles because there's so many issues. You will not be able to be on top of all of the issues and all of the things that will come right. But have a fundamental commitment to training and teaching your children. Again, catechises is so important here. And then when things come up to the best of your deal, h with their understanding in mine, address those things, putting them back to the fundles, reminding them of the perfectness that's around it, and that I mean, in the end, that's all we can do. Eventually they'll be old enough and be sure enough where you can, you know, talk about the whole deal. But they don't start out there. But give them, give them those rudimentary, fundamental truths so that they're prepared for that when when it comes and we were thinking about just reading through the scripture and cover to color, they're gonna say, yeah, wait, he go back to that. Yeah, yeah, they gonna come up in there. Man, right, yes, I mean, are right. And let me say another thing in that regard. I think here's one of the big problems. One of the big problems is, you know, he raised our children is with this view toward keeping their eyes closed and their minds closed to all of these things, right, And all of a sudden, Yeah, and I know there's there's children in here, and if they're shocks by this, shame on you. But sex is a beautiful and glorious thing. And here's what's said. A lot of our children don't hear that from us, and the world brings perversion to them and paints the version as this beautiful and glorious thing. And they kind of go, oh, how y'all never told me, you know, And and here's what they end up thinking. The world has discovered this beautiful and glorious thing and my parents in the church know nothing of it. What's wrong with them? May it never be May it never be. May our children hear from us that the lovely a man and a woman is a beautiful and glorious thing. Right, that this one flashion is a beautiful and glorious thing. Their aspects of it that you cannot understand, but know this, it's beautiful and it's glorious, a gift from God rather than you knows anything. All of a sudden, they go out here, right, and music tells them it's beautiful, it's glorious. Movies tell me it's beautiful and glorious. Art tells them it's beautiful, its glorious. And you told them nothing, right, So either you don't get that it's beautiful and glorious, or you do get it and you get that from them. Really, what's that about? Okay? So yeah, we've gotta this. We we gotta get passed that, and they've got to understand that it is beautiful and glorious, that there are physical aspects of our relationship with one another. Yeah, if your kids aren't being embarrassed by your relationship on the regular, you need to work also stuff, right, and every once in a while your kids needed to go oh guys, yeah, yeah, right, So we're gonna transition to another subject that you are very passionate about and grateful that you are. Home education, and I phrase it that way, I'm perfect because I learned home education. So first, probably this very often when it comes to the curriculum, Had you created your own? Are you thinking about creating your own and you don't have your own as a family, how do you put together the curriculum or your own education? No, no, we haven't created our own. We used so many things because there's so many great things out there. I think about those pioneers in the eighties. You know how education is is legal in all fifty states. But that was the truth would the mid eighties. It was true in the Earlian American history. Within there was a time in the eighteen hundreds with the product education system was establis was really invented, that it that it became that a difficult and in illegal in the late eighteen hundreds, early nineteen hunders, you know, because of this progression of ours and so no, we we use a rat. But what happened in these early years is that people were having to just use whatever texts were available, right, and you don't bring them home and do their best to try to teach them avable way nowadays and you go to also Pompice and you're over well, I mean it's it's jaw dropping, right, the things that are available out there. So we take advantage of as many of those things as we can and try to bearticling our approach. Basically, we classicist, so it's in a classic as a divisional model that we have, yeah, but classical educational model. It really is the trivia we take our children to do. These phases of education. There's a grammar phase, the lot of the phase of the regular phase. In the grammar phase of education, there's a lot of learnings through who memorizationhesis, right, And there's the logic phase of education there is learning how to really manipulate and apply these truths and facts. And in the rhetoric phase of education there is a learning to basically all in communicate these facts. And so that's kind of a row strokes of must a person education And that's you know, social the universe that we apply. Just think about the highest invest in in in the history of education and those states those things being held on to acknowledged, learned apply. That's kind of a person that we take the education, and for us this thing is just about discipleship. Lou six forty four people is not about his teacher. For everyone of them is fully trained movie like this teacher. In twelfth grade. Children spend fourteen thousand instructural hours in school, fourteen thousand discipleship hours, and so for us, we just it's just about, Okay, how do we best steward those fourteen thousand instructural hours? And then believing you know, that that Christ is who he is, that always the knowledge comes to us to them through the person of Christ, how do we contain everything that children are learning through talk and and de stem as though that is true? Right? So for us, it's not about you know, well, there's this opposite, that option and that option, and we want this option that we won't have. No, it is about again, I hope you're hearing a theme here, fundamental principial view of what education and desireship is, and then from that, you know, trying to figure out how we best steward the resources that we have in terms of of giving that you know, to our children, and then the application of that on the ongoing basis. Okay, well, we're around you are currently, but you're living in down the end. Now it's your family and you travel the world and you are aware of the poverty and the illiteracy that is very common in mostly the world. So think of the family who's living in this third world literate, yet they have this desire for educating from home and yet this literacy. How would she help those in that situation. Yeah, Well, one of the one of the issues all of the duties of a full education, especially because of the resources that are available, is that in must of the world we assume we assume that the rest of the world is like us, which is poor. Right, So for example, we assume that the rest of the world has an educational system like ours, that they're just poor. Know, a lot of people, for example, in Zambia, their kids don't go to school at all because they can't afford to send them to school. And even in the old school system, you have to pay something to say your kids at school. So there's a lot of kids who just don't go to school, or people who get educated to a certain point and then they stop because they just don't have the money to continue to do that. And there's a lot of countries that don't have education in certain you know, parts of their country. They just kind of to do that. And so a home education various resources that can be provided for people. Really in the instances, is an opportunity for people to provide an education for their children that otherwise they would not be able to provide because it's much more affordable, right, Yeah, it's much it's much more affordable to do. Even in America, the average on school spending spends less than five hundred dollars per year for job. By the way, the government spends on average seven to ten thousand dollars per year per job, and complaints that they don't have enough life, just saying okay, And by the way, homeschool children can perform public and private school students on every measurable metrics, everyone on every measurable metrics spending less than five hundred dollars per year per child. So reprehend around that I'm trying to make this point. The point is, Okay, in a poverty stricted situation right where governments are not able to do that, if Americans can do it, you know, at you know, five hundred dollars, less than five hundred dollars per child per year, and that's on a level way above, you know, what's sort of necessary. Now, all of a sudden, you can see how with just at a moderate amount of money, people in the developing world can provide actuals and education far superior to anything that they're utterly could for very very little. So yeah, we try to help people understand that and try to help people to do that, especially in the environments where the education extremely poor and the countries are extremely Okay, last question, and I kind of asked you this earlier. So there's the doctor Bodie Bacam of twenty nineteen, and sitting next to you is the young body who just said I do to his wife and the children are they're just their only way? You know. I know again, you've written about these things extensively. What would you say to the to the younger you, Yeah, remember one that's didn't happen just you know, uh no, I uh, it's interesting. We talked about this earlier. To me, that's the essence of my writing industry. The trilogy of books I did Kind Faith, Family, Shepherds, and Wit must be those those three books that came, you know, one after the other, are really answer to that question. Yeah, I'm sitting here and I'm recognizing like the kind of the holes that I had, and I'm thinking about people who were in my circumstance and uh so really and anyways, these are the books that I wrote to you know, uh, the younger the younger me. Uh, I think, yeah, I think those would be some some really signifi things that that I would say, really good stuff that's compiled in those street pieces. And I thank God for the opportunity to do that because I've had so many conversations with different iterations of the younger me, right, who have come to me and basically said, listen, thank you for writing when you wrote, because I didn't add that. Nobody taught me that and I was just starting out, and you know, do this was so healthful, right, And so it's really it's just kind of it's the kindness of God that has allowed me to be able to in some ways have a real picture of what that could look like if I talked to me for me, because in a lot of ways that's what I'm doing. So, yeah, those are those are the things that I was saying that I had said. But at the same time, I am I've come to appreciate the prominence of God. And you know, I'm not one of these people who say, you know, I don't have any rebets. I have many regrets. But at the same time, I would not change things because I understand the province of God, and because I understand that the only reason that I am who I am and where I am is because of the products of God, which includes the frowning providences and those difficulties that if I could change things, I wouldn't have gone through and it would not have made me right. So it embraced the providence of God. Right, you are who you are, You've been through what you've been through, and God was not absent. He was not surprised in any of that. Right, and those are the things that you used to make you who with what you are, So embrace those, lean into those, uh learn from those growth you go for a red shaking with this that God and I think it's important to live that way lot the same time, but at the same time going back and using those you knows, be both with your children you know the word gives you and with other brothers and sisters. H thank you do it so well. Brothers. If you heard that again, that's not just some foolish plug for a book. These writings are the are the heart song of this man saying, this is what I've learned, this is what I wish I would have known. And I am one of those examples. My family has been great, great in the trajectory of our entire family has been changed, but the little what has shown through the words. So we encourage you to get those books if you are able. Let's pray and transition to their father. Thank you, Thank you for your encouragement, thank you for the truth. Thank you for the reminder that it is about your son. Christ is pre eminent, supreme. It's all about him, the Lord. Thank you for the reminder that we should not be distracted by other things and lose sight of the main purpose of all your glory. Would you be with us now? Is your transition? And or please help our brother give your strength to continue to show us our Christ, said Jesus nay and