PODCAST TRANSCRIPT | EPISODE 222: The Four L’s of Raising Children, Part 6
LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell
EPISODE 222: The Four L’s of Raising Children, Part 6
We have come to the last L on raising children, which is giving our children a LOVE FOR LIBERTY! We are living in a nation where our young people are being programmed for an entitlement mentality where they expect everything to be given to them. The only way for this to happen is to rely on other people and especially the government! This ends in servitude. Are you programing your children for liberty? “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance,” which must be passed on to each succeeding generation!
Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.
Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Always wonderful to be with you. I have Michele with me here again today. We’re going to talk about the last “L” of the four L’s of raising children. What is it? We kept it a secret until the last. We’re going to talk about LOVING LIBERTY. I think this is going to be a very great subject to talk about.
Before we do, I’ll just catch you up on news, what has been happening. Oh, back a couple of episodes ago, 220, that was when we told you we were having a little bit of problem with our little dog, who liked and used to like to sit beside me when we were doing the podcast.
Well, the very next night, he wasn’t the same. The next night, it was prayer meeting night, and he was sitting beside me in the prayer meeting. He began to take a little turn, so I took him out into the kitchen and turned off the light and sat with him. But then later in the evening, he took quite a few more turns, seizures which weren’t very nice. He just passed away that night.
That was the end of my little doggie, whom I have had for about 11 years. I think he would have been about 14 years old, because he was a few years old when we found him on the side of the road. This little poodle was so frightened and so scared he could hardly look up. I think he had been very abused. For quite a long time, you couldn’t even get his little head to come up. But eventually he began to receive our love and lived a very, very happy life.
Now, for the first time in many, many years, I am without a dog. I’ve always, I usually have a dog. I usually like big dogs. Most of our dogs have come . . . they’ve just turned up! Many we’ve found on the side of the road. They’ve all been absolutely amazing dogs. Now I’m wondering, what kind of dog is going to turn up? Or what God is going to bring us next? But we’ll wait and see.
We’ve just got back this last weekend from another Above Rubies retreat, this time in Mississippi. We’re now having an annual Labor Day weekend retreat in Pulaski, Mississippi. That was a wonderful time, organized by the Lanford family. A beautiful family of eight children that they have raised. Oh, most beautiful young people! In fact, one of their sons, as all their children, were there. One of their sons has actually learned the whole of the New Testament by heart!
Michele: Wow!
Nancy: He got up one night and recited a chapter or so of Hebrews. He didn’t even stammer or try to remember. It just rolled off his tongue. He’s actually learned the whole New Testament. I thought, “Wow, that’s a great testimony, isn’t it?”
This family, oh, at the end of the retreat, they did something which was very powerful. They got all their children up there, their eight children. In fact, they didn’t have their first until Connie was 34 years of age. That’s amazing, isn’t it?
Michele: That is amazing!
Nancy: They’ve got eight children! Wow! The husband, Les, was sharing how that at that time, when they were married, he wasn’t really interested in having children at all. He was a teacher, a schoolteacher. He had got with the population explosion, you know, you can’t bring too many children into this planet.
But Connie had a heart for children. She so wanted children. He gave in and they had their first two children. But then, parents on both sides were getting at them, saying, “You should not have any more children!” Somehow, she prevailed, and they had another two children. But by the time they got to four, they were sharing how that, wow, the parents were so adamant. There was one set of parents who were wanting them to even sign this document to say they would not have any more children!
Michele: Wow!
Nancy: And bring any more into the world! It was pretty tough, but at that time, Les was opening up to the blessing of children and beginning to see that all these humanistic ideas he had didn’t belong in the Bible and they didn’t belong in God’s heart. They continued to trust God and came into the total understanding of the blessing of children. They began to trust God, and they had four more, and were blessed with eight! Even though they started late. It was a beautiful testimony.
But as they told the story, they would eliminate the children, like the last four. If they hadn’t come to the revelation of God’s truth, those beautiful, amazing children would not be here. They said, “Bye, children! Walk off.” So then, there were four left. Then he talked about, OK, the two that they had, even though there was pressure and persecution, but they had them. If they had listened to their parents, they would not be here, so “Bye, you go off!”
Then it was the last two, which they hadn’t planned to have either, except that Connie was so desperate. But if they had listened to Les, where he was at that time, they wouldn’t even have had those children. So, “Bye! Off you go!”
They were there, just Connie and Les, all on their own. It was an amazing picture to see. Wow! There they were, they could have had no children, but by God’s grace, and blessing, and not listening to their parents and the world around them, they were eventually receiving the wonderful revelation of God’s truth and they were blessed with these eight amazing children. It was such a beautiful picture to see it like that.
Yes, and at this retreat, we had the Crevier family again, who have come to a number of our Panama retreats. They are the CHAMPIONS FOREVER, the basketball one-wheel cyclist family who do this great show. They are a beautiful family of God, twelve children, all loving and serving the Lord. We also had the SHAW family, a lovely family, a singing family. So, we were really blessed!
Then, since I’ve been home, since the weekend, I’ve been busy preserving, putting down beans in the freezer and preserving tomatoes. Praise the Lord, because all mine got wasted when our freezers, the plug came out somehow, and they all went to rot. Anyway, Erin still had some left on his vines. That was so amazing! So, I went and got them with the girls here and we’ve been fixing them up which has been great!
Anyway, let’s get on to our exciting subject of teaching our children to LOVE LIBERTY. Now, how did you get on to this, Michele?
Michele: Well, it started in our own home with our own children’s hearts. I noticed if they were not able to control themselves, if they weren’t able, then I had to step in, or Dad had to step in. They didn’t like to be controlled. They wanted the freedom.
Then I got to thinking, it’s comparable to the government. We don’t want to be controlled, we don’t want the government telling us what we can or can’t do, we want to be able to live in the freedom . . . it paralleled exactly with parenting. It’s to love liberty. It’s so important that we love our country, and we love the freedoms in our country and fight for them.
Otherwise, we’re going to be just like our children. We have to get on to them and sometimes tell them something over and over, and how they don’t like, they want to resist. They don’t like that. It’s the same thing that happens within our country.
Nancy: Yes, yes. It’s learning to be a people who know how to govern ourselves. A people who can govern themselves don’t need to be governed. Well, yes, it’s good to have a small government. We do need that. But we do not need an overpowering government who is controlling everything we do. But we first have to be this people who know how to govern ourselves, don’t we? I think that’s so important.
Michele: Absolutely! And the definition of “liberty,” right out of the dictionary, is “the state of being free within a society from oppressive restrictions imposed by authority on one’s way of life, behavior, or political views.”
WE THE PEOPLE
Nancy: Yes, it comes back, doesn’t it, to “we the people.” I love how that is the very beginning of our whole Constitution. It’s “we the people.” Sadly, I think because of our public education today, our young people are not growing up with this so strongly embedded in their whole psyche.
They are more and more just handing their lives over to government. The more that people do that, well, the more the government begins to take control and becomes tyrannical. I think it’s so important in our teaching of our children to teach them the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, so that they know!
Michele: Absolutely! And then our trust, if we’re dependent on the government, our trust becomes in the government, rather than in God. That’s the way we look at it, too. In Isaiah, it commands us to proclaim liberty.
Isaiah 61:1: “The Spirit of the Lord God is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to bring good news to the afflicted. He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and freedom to the prisoners.”
Nancy: I love that! Amen! I think it’s so important for us, we, as parents, and our children, to know the First Amendment. Do all your children know the First Amendment? It’s such a powerful statement of freedom and liberty, isn’t it? I should read it again.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof, or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.”
That is so powerful! That gives us complete freedom to live. And yet, back in 2020, even in 2021, we had this tyrannical mandate coming against the church, and against the right of the people to “peaceably assemble.” They were saying, “No, you cannot meet for church unless you only have this amount of people, unless you are six feet apart.” This is totally ridiculous. It was against our Constitution, and against the Bible, which says that we “must not forsake the assembling of ourselves together” (Hebrews 10:25).
Of course, maybe churches just caved in, and said, “Oh, don’t worry, folks! We’ll have our Zoom meetings.” Well, you can get a good message from a Zoom meeting but it’s not church. It’s not what God said. He said we were to assemble! ASSEMBLE TOGETHER! The Constitution tells us that the government cannot come against the right of people to assemble. Yet what happened? The people caved in! Obviously, most of the nation, even the Christians, did not even know the First Amendment!
Michele: That’s exactly what Barton said. They don’t even know our freedoms. They only know their rights. It’s so important we teach our children just the basics of our country, what we were founded on. What the amendments say? What does the Constitution say? What does it mean?
Nancy: Exactly! Now, if everyone had known that, there would not have . . . We could not have caved in, because we would have known our rights. In fact, this is how I felt when all this happened. OK, “You must not assemble at church!” And all this nonsense. I felt that the greatest thing that could have happened was that every church-going person would fill the churches to overflowing! Goodness, they couldn’t have done one thing!
By the way, was anyone ever aware of this amendment that was surpassed by the Supreme Court after the Civil War which still stands today?
“Neither the legislature nor any executive or judicial officer may disregard the provisions of the constitution in case of emergency . . .
Section 98 therefore, ANYONE who declares the suspension of constitutionally guaranteed rights (to freely travel, peacefully assemble, earn a living, freely worship, etc.) and or attempts to enforce such suspension within 50 independent sovereign, continental United States of America is making war against our constitution(s) and therefore, we the people. They violate their constitutional oath and, thus, immediately forfeit their office and authority and their proclamations may be disregarded with impunity and that means ANYONE, even the governor and President.”
Michele: Wow! That is exactly what they did!
Nancy: They did all that and nobody said anything! Because we people did not know their rights. We, as parents, have a responsibility to know and to teach our children! Amen?
What about the Second Amendment? Well, we all know that means we can bear arms, but how is it actually stated?
“A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of the free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
That is the Second Amendment.
Of course, we know they’re trying to annihilate it. But it is our Constitution, so therefore we must keep to it. We must stand strong. We must teach our children that this is part of our Constitution.
In fact, did you know that it was affirmed strongly again in 2008, with the Supreme Court case with the District of Columbia v. Heller? That was back in, when was it? I think it might have been 2008. Yes, it was 2008 when they affirmed the Second Amendment and the Supreme Court examined it very, very carefully in exacting detail.
They, once again, affirmed that this was definitely the Constitution of our nation. It actually enshrined the ancient, they said, “It enshrined the ancient Roman principle of every citizen a soldier, and every soldier a citizen.”
These are just two of our most basic amendments of the Bill of Rights that we must know, as parents, and we must impart them to our children. Just like we impart the Word of God into our children, we’ve got to impart these important things, because this determines how we will live!
Michele: Absolutely! How do we impart these to our children? Well, we start when they’re young, with self-government, and that continues as they grow. We even have to do it as adults, you know, circle back to the Lord. How do we self-govern ourselves?
But then we need to teach them the laws of our land, that there are liberties, our freedoms, the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, everything. Some practical things we’ve done as a family was taking our children to the capitol. Every capitol in the United States is now open. They closed them during the plandemic, but they’re open. You can go and visit the state capitols. That’s just a small foundation you start with.
Our family has also gotten involved with a program called Teen-Pact. They run a class in every state now, I think, except for two states. All United States. They meet at the capitol building, and they have a class, a week-long class. When we were in Missouri, we were able to go as a family and participate. Most of the states are still set up that way, I believe. I’m not sure. Each one’s run a little bit differently.
Learn about the government. The children actually dress in suits, and girls in their business wear. We’d go into the capitol, and they would learn things like how they would write their own bills, how to run whole court sessions, how to get bills passed. They got to talk to the governor. They got to talk to different state representatives. It was the best experience. We’ve done it, I think, a total of five times throughout the past seven or eight years. It’s been such a good experience.
But there are all sorts of opportunities if you just look out there. Teen-Pact is for Christian organizations. They always brought back a biblical worldview, and that aspect as well. It made a lot of fun for the families, to be able to attend, to be able to do this.
There are so many opportunities, and so many things you can get plugged in. Another so-important thing to get involved in is grass roots efforts. We’ve done a lot of this, moving to Tennessee and learning the area we’re in.
We just had some local elections. Being able to get involved and meet people who were running. Take your children and meet these people. They’re running for office. They’re usually happy to come meet with you. They’ll even come in your home.
Just being able to sit down with them and find out where their views are. What’s important to you? You can learn. Your children can learn so much by meeting different candidates and figuring out which ones you want to support as a family or church. And then going out and helping them campaign.
It can be as simple as putting the signs up, or passing out flyers, or talking to other people in your church, or other families in your neighborhood. And why you support this candidate. What values they have. Do they line up with the Word of God? Those types of things. Getting your children involved is key to teaching them to love liberty.
Nancy: I love that. Actually, I have to make a very big confession, because I have to confess that I have always been so insistent in making sure that I vote in federal elections. I vote for the president and so on, but I have never really bothered much with local elections. I always thought, “Oh goodness, I don’t think they’re very important. What’s so important about them?”
Until just recently, I have realized that they are the most important elections of all! Oh, ladies, and I just want to encourage you, maybe you’re not like me. You’re really into it. Or maybe you have been like me, and you haven’t really bothered about it much.
Well, I had to change my ways! Because I am now realizing that right down to our school boards, and our county commissioners, and our mayor, and our sheriff, wow! These are the most important people, actually, in the whole nation, because they are where we live, and they will determine how we live our lives in our area.
Of course, we had to get involved, just recently, with our county commissioners, because we’re all involved in Save Lick Creek. Now, Lick Creek is the most beautiful river that we have running through Hickman County here. Serene and Sam’s land goes down onto this beautiful river. It’s so much a part of our lives here. Many of the families go kayaking. I think Evangeline and Erin kayak nearly every day in that beautiful river. It is the most glorious river. It is totally spring-fed. It’s the purest river. . .
Michele: I’ve heard it’s the second purest water form in the whole state of Tennessee. My boys are out there on that creek almost every single day. They’re out working on our land or working for somebody here. They get all hot and sweaty and they go jump in the creek. They’re out there fishing. They’re out there catching crawdads. They’re kayaking. They’re on there almost every single day.
Nancy: And they can catch beautiful trout in that river. But you know what they’re trying to do? Oh, neighboring counties are planning to pour into this beautiful, clear creek, how many billions is it again?
Michele: Twelve million gallons per day!
Nancy: Twelve million gallons per day of poop! Oh, this is beyond it. They said, “Oh, well, we will clean the water with something.” But it is never, never, never this pure water. So, we are trying to save this Lick Creek, as it is called. We’ve all been to these meetings and meeting our county commissioners. As Michele says, taking the children along too!
Michele: Absolutely! Taking them along. My older ones, even having them ask the questions, because the more they’re involved, the more they feel like they’re invested, and their interest grows. Even though my boys love this creek, I don’t think they would see quite the connection if we hadn’t gone to these meetings. They wouldn’t have asked the commissioners that were running for office how they felt. These questions about, “What are you going to do to help us save our creek?” That sparked a new level of interest and involvement. They feel like they’re part of it.
Nancy: It certainly made our eyes open to who we’ve got for commissioners! Wow! You really find out whether your commissioners are looking after you in your community, in your county, or not looking after you. I’ve had to realize I hadn’t even thought about them. I didn’t even know who they were! But now we’ve had to find out who they were, write to them, go to meetings to meet them, to find out, well, who’s worth voting for, and who’s not!
Oh, I was reading, too. I did tell you, didn’t I, about how the Lord laid upon our hearts at some of our prayer meetings, to really pray against the Georgia Guidestones, these great 19-feet granite rocks on which were written the Ten Commandments of the New World Order. We were so concerned about them. They’d been standing there for about 40 years. The first one saying, “We want to reduce the population of the world to 500 million.” That would be wiping out about 93% of the world’s population. That’s how much they hate people.
We felt a burden to pray, “Oh, God, just come, wipe them out! Bring an explosion, bring an earthquake. Do something!” Well, we couldn’t believe it! About two weeks later, we woke up to see the news of this explosion that exploded these great, huge granite rocks! Then they had to bulldoze them over for safety. That got rid of them.
Then we were thinking, “OK, what’s going to happen? Are they going to try to build them again? We’re praying against that. But then I read recently how the commissioners of Elbert County, where they are, that they decided, the Elbert County Board of Commissioners, they voted a few weeks ago to donate the debris from the mysterious “Georgia monument,” as they called it, to the Elberton Granite Association and its museum.
Well, that wasn’t as bad as rebuilding them again. But I thought to myself, “Why do they want to even save these things that were so against mankind?” And here they are, but it was the vote of the commissioners!
Michele: It shows you the power that the commissioners have. I would imagine that there are a lot of people out there who don’t even know who their commissioners are. They may not even know what district they’re in to be able to vote, because you vote per your district for your commissioners. Those are things just to . . .
Nancy: Those commissioners obviously are not really truly versed in understanding the implications of those Georgia Guidestones. They thought, “Oh, well, they were a tourist attraction, and we’d just like to donate them to the museum.”
Michele: Either that, or there were some liberal commissioners voted in. So there again, you need to know your commissioners that you’re voting for; their values and where they stand on things.
Nancy: Yes! You realize, your commissioners, lovely ladies, in your county, in the county where you live, will be determining what life is like in your county for you and for your children. So, are your commissioners liberal? Or are they conservative? Are they God-fearing? Or are they not? We have a responsibility to find out who they are and then vote in ones that are godly.
I’m realizing this. Wow! Have you got anything more to say about that because this session’s coming to an end. I think we’ll do another session! Have you got anything else to say?
Michele: I don’t know if we have time to touch on the sheriff. That can be next time?
Nancy: I think we’ll do that next time.
Michele: Because, yes, these little compartments per county, they make a difference. But I have something here I was going to share about liberty in general. Just think about life without liberty. It’s unthinkable! It’s unthinkable to be able to give up our freedoms! Who wants to live as the one at the end of the leash, being told what to do or not to do, or how they have to live their lives?
Sometimes I think it happens, even the people you’re voting for, you think they have good intentions. It’s not about having good intentions. It’s about being able to govern ourselves, and make wise decisions for ourselves and our families, to support the freedoms that our Constitution says that we have.
Nancy: A couple of quotes as we close.
Thomas Jefferson said, “The price of freedom is eternal vigilance.” Our country fought for freedom, but we have to keep fighting for it. It must be passed on to each succeeding generation. Freedom will pass on through the parents. We’re either passing on this vision of freedom, or we are allowing our children to grow up in a country of tyranny.
Sadly today, our schools and our colleges are being taught the opposite of our Constitution, and our freedom rights, and “we the people”. They’re being encouraged to look to government. In fact, if you talk to most college students today, they expect that their college fees should be paid for.
In fact, they expect everything should be paid for! They don’t even seem to think that, OK, somebody’s got to pay for it. But it won’t be them! They don’t care. As long as somebody else pays for it, they want it free. Right. We are not raising children like that, with that mentality. We want to raise children who understand freedom.
“Father, we thank You for bringing this subject to our hearts, and to hear how Randy and Michele are raising their children to love liberty. Lord, I pray that we will all have that vision, Lord, in a very intense way, because things don’t happen unless we make them happen. Help us, Lord to really do something to make this happen, to pass on the truths of liberty to our children. In the Name of Jesus, amen”.
Blessings from Nancy Campbell
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Transcribed by Darlene Norris * This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
You can check out the CHAMPIONS FOREVER online and see pictures of them.
https://www.championsforever.com
You can also check out the Shaw Band online too.