LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell

EPISODE 249: Raising Godly Children in an Ungodly Culture, Part 1

Daniel and Allison Hartman from Pensacola join me today as we talk about passing on the baton of God's truth to our children. Are our children growing up with a biblical worldview? We as parents must first have a biblical worldview. What about the church we are attending? Does it have a biblical worldview?

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! It’s always so great to be with you. And I have to share some beautiful, wonderful news! That is that last week, Colin and I celebrated our 60^th wedding anniversary. Wow! It doesn’t seem 60 years. It just seems like a blink of our eyes. We’ve been so blessed.

We had one night together at a restaurant with our children and their spouses. That was such a beautiful night. Most amazing conversation, and then the greatest speeches. It ended up that every speech was all about marriage. It was so great!

Then last night, we had a surprise party. We had no idea. Usually, when there’s a surprise going on, I have an inkling. I’m sort of aware of little things that are happening. But I had no idea of this. Actually, I have sitting with me today, and they’re joining me for the podcast, Daniel and Allison Hartman, from Pensacola. Now, Allison has joined with me many times. Each time they come up to stay, we do a podcast together.

This time, Allison called and said, “You know, we’ve got a free weekend. We thought we’d come and spend it with you before we get back to our busy season.” I said, “Oh, that sounds so lovely!” Had no idea they were actually coming up for our surprise 60th!

On the Sunday night, they said, “We’re going to go out! We’re taking you out for a meal.” There was another couple, also. They said, “They’re over at the Wedding Barn. We’ll just have to go and get them.” We drove over to the Wedding Barn which is on Sam and Serene’s property.

I get out of the car and go running in. I thought, “Better get these people! We’re going to be late!” I opened the door, and I could not believe it! There were all these people, all our family, and children and grandchildren, and friends from many, many places. I just could not believe it. It was such a glorious night, just wonderful speeches, and a beautiful meal, and everything. I hope you enjoyed it!

Allison: Oh, it was so wonderful!

Daniel: Amazing!

Allison: Yes, yes. Just the look on your face was amazing! You were so shocked!

Daniel: I saw you from the back as you were running in, saying, “Let’s in the car and go!” I saw you stop, almost like, what is going on?

Allison: It seemed like it took a minute for you to really soak it in what was happening.

Nancy: Yes.

Allison: There were so many people, though, that were so happy to rejoice with you guys. Yeah, it was such a beautiful scene. All the speeches! I loved all the speeches by your grandchildren. They had so many, looking back on . . . your impact on their lives was precious to hear.

Nancy: We were talking in our last two sessions about how we, as a family, love speeches. It was so beautiful.

So, here are Daniel and Allison. They are with us. We’ll do a podcast together. Allison, I think you’ll need to remind everybody about the big family retreat coming up in Florida.

Allison: Yes, yes. We’re super excited! We’re just a month and a half away. Every year we do our annual Above Rubies Family Camp on the Gulf Coast at Panama City Beach, Florida. The location is Laguna Beach Christian Retreat Center. The dates are April 19-26.

It has turned out to be, over the last ten, fifteen years, the largest family camp. Right now, we’re hitting about 95 families that have already registered. We probably have room for maybe five to ten more families before we’re maxed out. It’s going to be a week-long retreat, conference. Tons of fun.

Our theme that we’re going for, is “Raising a Godly Family in an Ungodly Culture.” We all see where culture’s heading. As Christians, we really have to take a different direction on raising our children. It’s not that we can’t do it, it’s that we have to be very intentional in how we’re raising them. Not just be willing to go with the flow, go with culture. If culture says let your children all have iPhones, then we just do it. No, we raise them in a different way.

This whole week is going to be encouraging families to do that. Also, just meeting other families is so encouraging. Like-minded families. You’re going to be blown away. I was just talking to a family last night. They said, “When I came to the retreat, I realized I’m not alone. There are so many of my people out there. I just didn’t even know it.”

Nancy: Yes, actually it’s a family retreat, but we love all the young people. Bring all your young people! Oh, we have more young people than anyone else, don’t we?

Allison: Oh, absolutely! The adults are completely outnumbered. It’s more like a big, giant youth retreat, but we don't separate the youth. It’s so much fun. It’s on the Gulf, so you’re on the beach. We have five or six pools. There’s volleyball, there’s basketball, there’s bunker ball. You name it. There’s every activity you can imagine. Walking distance, too, are a coffee shop and donuts. So much fun. Fishing.

Daniel: If the surf’s up, I’m out surfing. I’ll add that there’s a little lake right there that we go out in the boat as well, and let people ski.

Allison: Lots of good free time in the afternoons. A good chunk of the afternoon is free time. It’s such a fun thing to do with your family. But yeah, young people, singles, single moms, grandparents, the whole thing is, everyone’s invited.

Nancy: Yes, we believe in bringing the whole family together. In fact, generations. We can have four generations there. We had another baby shower on the weekend. We had a bridal shower the weekend before. Our lives seem to be going from one bridal shower to one baby shower to another.

I was taking a four-generation picture of myself as the great-grandmother, Serene as the grandmother, Chalice as the mother (who’s due in one week) and then her little baby, Marvel. It’s so wonderful to live generationally. It’s a beautiful thing to do.

When you go away for a week, I remember when we lived in New Zealand. Back in those days, we would have our annual holiday. We would take, of course, our whole family, but we never thought of ever going without our grandparents! My parents who were the children’s grandparents. They lived in a different city, but they would always come and meet and be with us. That was such an important part for my children.

So, bring your parents along too! The grandparents, or whether they’re grandparents, or great-grandparents! You just bring everybody! It’s so great.

Allison: My last thing to say: we led your ladies’ retreats for years, or I did. But when you get the whole family involved, it’s a long-lasting effect, because when you have your husband on board, and you have your children on board . . . We have eleven children, and they range from 24 down to two. My entire family is there, and they all want to be there, because we’ve made them feel like this is a family thing. This isn’t Mom going off to a ladies’ retreat.

Now, that’s fine, and that’s fun and wonderful. But when you have the whole family there, it brings a whole different facet to this message. Because you’re all on board, if that makes sense.

Nancy: Yes. And then, talking about this familyness, this togetherness, now you have just recently begun having a church family in your home, because you haven’t been able to find that real family togetherness anywhere else, although you tried for years.

Allison: We really have. We bounced from a couple of churches. Sadly, one thing we really found was that most churches are very program-driven. Program-driven means “age-chunking.” I liked how Suzanne said that “age-chunking.” The older folks, you go to your class, and then the younger folks, you go to your class. And the Generation X-er’s, you go to your class, and then the Generation Y, there’s so many. Then the young children, you go to your class. The babies, you go to your class.

Well, guess what? When you walk into church, you’re immediately divided. Juh, juh, juh, juh, juh, juh. There is no unity. Therefore, the opposite of unity would be division. Then, when you get home, you all hear ten different messages. You’re not on the same page.

Then you start the work week. Well, guess what? Dad goes to work, Mom’s at home, the children are in programs and sports. It’s continual. We said, “We’ve got to get unified. We have to do church as a family.” So, we sought out. . .

Daniel: The best way that I like to say it is, everyone wants my children. They’re a valuable asset. I want my children. I want to have that influence in my children’s life, truly based on that verse, “Turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the children’s to the father’s.”

It is my duty to have the Bible study at home, and then to worship together, and to do everything together. Truly that is the Biblical concept. There are never these programs. It’s always when the church is pictured, it’s fathers, mothers, children, together in the Lord, and learning and growing together.

Nancy: Oh yes, yes! Anyway, you were telling me you’re going, at the moment, to a Biblical world view class which sounds great. But, tell me all about what’s happened there.

Allison: Well, we’ve actually done this course before, a year ago. It’s called “Biblical Citizenship.” Rick Green is a state rep in Texas. It’s a great program. Rick Green and . . .

Daniel: David Barton. WallBuilders.

Allison: David Barton, WallBuilders, and Kirk Cameron. They do this video series. So anyway, we took the class. Just recently, we found out that the class is offered in our town at another church. We don’t go there, but it seems like a great church.

Well, when we went, it was all older folks in the class. There were five or six older people. The first night we went, we brought our children, because that’s what we do. Then the next night, we invited two or three other families. By that week, we had 26 extra people there. Most of them were children.

Nancy: And by the way, right down to your youngest, how old?

Allison: All the way to my two-year-old. We were all listening. They all were gleaning different things. Even though maybe the four-year-old wasn’t getting the whole message, they got some stuff out of it.

Sadly, we were told by the leader of the class that there were some complaints about noise, because there were children in an adult class. They really wanted all the children that were in fifth grade and under to be in a children’s program. They asked us if we would please do that.

I’ve never been known to be someone who just says, “OK, sure, whatever.” I pretty much argue and fight anything if I feel like it’s a principle. I’m not going to go along with it. I said, “I appreciate you telling me this, but honestly, this is unacceptable. This is not OK. I’m not going to have my children in a program when I’m here to hear about patriotism and the Constitution. I want them to learn what our Founding Fathers did. Our Founding Fathers would be mortified if they found out that children were in a children’s program when they could have been learning!” I said, “No, I’m not OK with that.”

She goes, “Well, what should I do?” She’s actually a city councilwoman in our city. I said, “Go fight for us.” And she did. She went and talked to the church, and they made the decision that they would allow us to come. We would have to take children out that were noisy. I said, “Absolutely. That’s acceptable. That wouldn’t be anything I wouldn’t do anyway.”

We ended up taking the class as a family. But it was so interesting to me that they didn’t see this as an amazing opportunity to have children, fathers, all learning the same thing. It was foreign to them. I don’t think they meant harm. I think it’s all they know. This is what churches are doing. They’re looking just like public school, private school, right? You go, and you separate by age. That’s all they know.

Well, like we said earlier, we feel, me and my husband, we feel like the reason that children are leaving church once they hit that teenage age, is because they really haven’t been a part of their family their whole upbringing. They’ve been in different classes. They’re not a part of their family.

People in our town that know us, they’re amazed at our adult children spending so much time with us, and desiring to be with us. That is why we decided we had to start a family-integrated church in our home, because it was so rare. We want our children to be worshipping together as a family. I think it is so critical.

Nancy: Oh, yes! Yes! I think we have to begin to see and live biblically. It’s so easy to just succumb to what everybody does. Colin and I were just sharing with the folks last night some of our early start of our life and how Colin went out full time for the Lord when we were engaged. We’ve been in mission and church work since that time.

We started off pastoring, doing it the normal way. We had our Sunday schools, and we had our youth groups. We thought this was great, and we had all our programs. Until one day, we discovered that no matter how much we looked, we couldn’t find that in the Word of God. It wasn’t there.

Every time God brought His people together, he brought them all together as families, including the children, including the suckling babes, including even the little toddlers. A number of the Scriptures that talk about when God brought His people to listen to His Word, it uses the word taph in the Hebrew. That particular word means “the tripping gait of little children.” It’s the toddler stage. “Well, those are the ones we just don’t want in our midst! Goodness me! Let’s just have them baby-sat, because how can they sit and listen?”

But God wanted them all there. Even in Joel chapter 2:16 where it talks about coming to fast and pray, even for such a solemn time as that, God includes the suckling babes. Everyone!  God sees us as families. Now, it’s the devil’s ploy to separate us as families.

We had to come to that place of realizing, OK, what we were doing was just what everybody does. Then we began to have church together, families included. That is not actually so popular. You won’t get everybody to your church. Why?

Because when families haven’t trained their children at home, they bring their children, and goodness, how could they even sit and hear a message unless they put their children in the nursery and the Sunday school, because they wouldn’t even know how to control them. But you see, we start in the home. We have to learn how to train our children to sit and how to listen. It’s all training. That’s why many are quite happy to go to their churches where everything is all separate. It’s so much easier.

Allison: Oh, yeah.

Nancy: And even when we’re together, there’s always a little baby crying, or this happening. Some may not like it, but it’s life! We’ve got to learn to live as families.

Allison: The whole concept of this multi-generational church is such a beautiful thing. For a little one, they’re watching everything we do. How are they going to learn to worship if they don’t see their moms worship, and their grandmas worship?

I was telling you before the podcast I actually had someone I talked to in a church one time, and I said, “I don’t see you here every Sunday.” And she said, “Well, it’s because I go to a different church every other Sunday just so I can worship all by myself, with no distractions from my children.” And she was bragging about that, as if it was a really good idea to just go to one. Probably like a girls’ night out with Mom-time, Me-time, Me-time. And she would go to a different church, just to have worship time.

That set so badly with me. I thought there was something that was wrong with that, but for years, I couldn’t put my finger on it until just recently. We watched this documentary called Divided. This young, homeschooled boy . . . it was years ago. A documentary, and we just happened to watch it recently. A light bulb came on as my husband and I were watching this.

The young boy set out to answer the question, why are young people leaving the churches in droves? 85% are leaving the churches. Why? By the end of the documentary, he came up with the answer.

The whole idea of discipling children is the role of the father. But in churches we have replaced that and put youth pastor in its place. A lot of people will say, “Well, the youth pastor is great for the street kids. The unchurched. They don’t have a father, so we need a youth program.”

No, you need fathers in that church to rise up and take in those street kids. That will take care of that problem. But instead of losing your youth, losing your young people, they’re so driven. They’re so connected as a family because the father has been the youth pastor. The father has been the shepherd. It was a game-changer for us.

We talked earlier before the podcast that we actually were asked to leave a church because of this very thing, because they were offended that we wouldn’t send our children to youth groups. They couldn’t understand it. They thought we thought we were better than them. It isn’t about that!

It’s that Daniel’s job, my husband’s job, is to raise our children, not the youth pastor! And there’s nothing that’s innately wrong with having fun youth activities, but when it’s done to replace the father, it’s absolutely detrimental to the family. It has to be. . . You’re right. It’s not in the Bible. These Sunday schools, youth programs, are not in the Bible. It is man’s creation, and it is destroying the family. I just recently realized how important this is.

Nancy: Well, the latest statistics are that only six percent of the church has a biblical worldview. I think this is a part of it, too. Even our worldview of church, in fact, of so many things. I keep finding new things in the Word of God all the time that, wow! I don’t line up with this! We’ve been doing it this way all our lives but it’s not in the Word.

We’ve got to become Word-people. We’ve got to get a true Biblical worldview so that we’re thinking what God thinks, and what He says, and His plan on every issue of our lives. So, of course, a big part of that is our church life. When we bring our children into the church life, we are saying, “Children, this is how it’s meant to be.” Well, are what we bringing them into exactly what it reveals in the church in the Bible?

In fact, it’s interesting, we go back to the early church, and they really are our example, aren’t they? In 1 Corinthians 14:26, this is a picture of the early church. It’s actually quite different to most churches. “How is it then, brethren? when ye come together,” notice that “come together.” Oh, there’s so many Scriptures about that in the Word.

Some Christians today don’t even believe that. They don’t believe you have to come together. “I love God. I believe God but I don’t have to go to church.” They’ve got all their different excuses. But God loves the coming together of His people. He loves it.

“How is it then, brethren? When ye come together.” He knows that we can’t really walk victoriously in our faith isolated. We need one another. Our faith is a mutual faith. It’s a together faith. It’s a me-and-you faith. Romans 1:12 tells us that. Paul is writing to the new Christians, and he says: “Our mutual faith of you and me.”

OK, so you come together, every one of you. It’s not talking about pew-sitters. “No, every one of you hath a psalm, hath a doctrine, hath a tongue, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation. Let all things be done until edifying.” We see there such a coming together and participation of the whole body.

In our fellowship, we usually have someone, my husband, or sometimes someone else, will give a good word so that we are really getting fed, but we have opportunity for sharing from others from the body, because that’s the example of the early church. Today, young children, yes, we do have young children getting up. We have young people who get up and pray and give a word.

In a modern church, they’re all just pew-sitters. How can they ever grow into young men and women of God if they haven’t got an opportunity to share of the Word, or to get up and pray? They’ve got to learn how to participate.

Daniel: That verse, specifically that verse, we started reading each chapter in Corinthians. Because of that verse, I wanted to see, as a family, what the whole book looked like. By the time we got to chapter 12, we actually started our own church. It was because of that specific verse, 1 Corinthians 14:26: “When ye come together, every one of you hath a psalm, hath a doctrine, hath a tongue, hath a revelation, hath an interpretation. . . Let all things be done decently and in order,” in order to edify.

I had never really seen that done anywhere other than here at this church. I felt like I was starving for that. If you want to shift gears into the Jesus Revolution movie, that is pictured in that movie to some degree, but not showcased. That is what I would consider to really make a difference in people’s lives.

Myself, I was in a home group in a Calvary Chapel church back in ’91, ’90 -’91. I would say it was a hugely pivotal point in my life, because I grew so incredibly much, because it was in this group setting. It was comfortable. I could speak; I could share my thoughts. I could grow. I was in the Word, just studying all the time.

I did not have a father, so I chose men in this group, and other men to take that role. I was able to choose all these amazing attributes that were good and leave out the ones that I didn’t think were so good. It really helped me. Really, that’s where they met in the New Testament, was in people’s homes.

Going back to “turning the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the children to the fathers,” that specific verse, when it says it at the very end, it gives a curse to the earth, “I’ll come and strike the land and utterly destroy it.” I’m going to read the whole Scripture. “Remember the law of Moses, my servant, that I gave him at Horeb, for all Israel, both the decrees and the laws. Pay attention. I am sending Elijah the prophet to you before the great and dreadful day of the Lord comes. And He will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers. Otherwise, I’ll come and strike the land and utterly destroy it.”

Nancy: That’s so powerful, isn’t it?

Daniel: What it says to me is that it’s my job to take that mantle and become that verse. The consequences are great if I don’t. I’ve got to figure out, through the Word, how I’m going to apply and how I’m going to take into account that verse and build God’s church, not mine. Include my children, include families, as God did, as Jesus did, sitting on the hillside, with the men, women, and children, and truly grow together in Christ and walk in the Spirit.

Nancy: Yes. And another thing too, is that we’ve got to get beyond the normal way we see church. That we come to church and that’s doing the right thing, yes. And I believe it. At least, if you’re doing that, you’re doing something, because we know Hebrews 10:24: “Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together.”

YOU CAN’T MISS THE FELLOWSHIP

There’s that “together” again. “As a manner of some is, so much the more as ye see the day approaching.” But church and coming together, you see, it’s a coming together, it’s not just coming just to come in—we worship, we hear a message, and we go home. No, it is fellowship. We go back to the example of the early church in Acts 2:42. What does it say? “And they continued steadfastly.” It tells us four things here.

Number One. IN THE APOSTLES’ DOCTRINE

That was in teaching. Doctrine is so important. In fact, all of Jesus’ teaching, all the apostles’ teaching, all of Paul’s teaching, the whole Word is doctrine. We’ve got to know doctrine. Doctrine has to be part of this. It has to live in us.

I love that Scripture in 2 John 1:9: “Whosoever transgresseth, and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he  hath both the Father and the Son.” Isn’t that an amazing Scripture? But we are to continually apply the apostles’ doctrine.

Number two. FELLOWSHIP

We’ve got to have time for fellowship. At our church fellowship here, we always have a fellowship meal after the service. Everyone brings a dish, and we get out the tables and chairs. We sit around and fellowship.

This is really, perhaps, even it’s as great, or even greater, than the first part of our coming together, because we’re having more intimate fellowship. Everyone is talking about their week, but they’re talking about the Lord. They’re talking about Scripture. They’re talking about their ideas. We’re getting to feel one another’s hearts. In fact, I never have time to talk to everyone! You just get to one or two or three each time because you get into conversation.

But it’s so wonderful! I think, wow, if we didn’t have that! I would only know people in a surface way. It’s only when we sit, and we put our feet under a table, and we begin to talk together, that it is true fellowship.

Number three. BREAKING OF BREAD

“And in breaking of bread.” That was not only communion, folks. This is what they called coming together to have a meal. Back in those days, “breaking of bread” (you’ve heard the phrase “break bread together”). That’s where you actually break bread.

In the Middle East, when you eat, you break the bread. You break the flat bread and you dip it in the dish, in the hummus, in the baba ghanoush. You’re eating together. You see, fellowship is always more powerful when you’re eating together. Either after church together, a fellowship meal, or when you’re inviting people to your home and showing hospitality. We do this now.

But we have also been in churches where we didn’t have fellowship meals. When that was the case, we always invited people home. We would have up to thirty or forty people coming into our home. We’d have them just sitting around our big table, and then our children would find another place, because they’d invite their friends. It was fellowship going on throughout the whole home. Because this is the pattern of the early church.

Number four. PRAYERS

“And in prayers.” They were committed to prayer. That is so powerful, too. So, if you just go to church on Sunday, but you’re not involved in a prayer meeting in that church fellowship, or with other believers, it’s not really, it’s not the early church.

CONTINUING DAILY

Then it goes on, down in the latter part of the chapter, verse 46: “And they continuing,” again, it’s “continuing.” “Continuing daily, with one accord in the temple, and breaking bread from house to house.” They ate together at one another’s homes. “And ate their meat,” their food, “with gladness and singleness of heart, having great fellowship together, praising God, and having favor with all the people, and the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.” When they lived that lifestyle, daily, the Lord added daily to the church.

Allison: So good. I was asking you yesterday what should we do? We’re a brand-new church, starting a church in our home. I was trying to decide, do we do a fellowship meal? Maybe once a month? So, I sat my family down and we talked about it. My older girls are the ones that are going to be fixing food. I didn’t want to make the decision for everybody.

I thought, “Hey, what do we think? Do we want to do just once a month?” And all of them said, “Why would we not do it every week? That’s the best part, Mom. You know, having everybody go outside, play volleyball together, the fellowship part. Unanimously my children decided. I thought they would say, “You know, we really need to have family time, at least every couple of weeks.” But no, they didn’t look at it as a negative. They looked at it as a positive. Of course, they’d want fellowship the whole time.

Nancy: Yes, and that’s what our children growing up, they just loved the fellowship, the hospitality. It was such a blessing. In fact, I can remember one time in our lives. It was a time when we were raising our children. We were always having hospitality.

I said to Colin, “Oh, Darling, let’s just have a break this one Sunday. We’re always having people. Just let us ask nobody this Sunday.” So, we didn’t. We all came home, and do you know what? It was the most boring Sunday of our whole lives! [laughter] We didn’t know what to do. We were bored out of our brains. We never ever did it again!

Allison: Really!

Nancy: The children were bored and we were bored. I think, “People go home after church, what do they do?” Well, of course, I know, many just put the TV on, or they go out to sports, or they go out. But that’s not what we’re meant to do. This is the day for His people. It’s not an hour. It’s a day. It’s a DAY we give to the Lord. But anyway, why does time go?

Allison: I know! It’s amazing.

Nancy: One more advertisement for the retreat!

Allison: This totally takes us back into where we said in the beginning, the whole reason why we started doing these family camps was to give vision to families, that they’re so important. Your ministry has, yes, people think of your ministry as a women’s ministry. But it really isn’t. It’s a family, it’s the whole concept, it’s the whole picture of families being together.

The beauty of these family camps is, number one, you can come and have a wonderful, fun family vacation. But you can meet other like-minded families and you will be amazed. You will leave, come as strangers, leave as friends. So many people at your party last night were from the retreats.

One of them came up to me, and they said, “You know, we told Nana and Granddad how thankful we are of watching them. But we really want to tell you, thank you for putting these retreats on! Some of my best friends now we met at the retreat.”

We’re going to encourage moms and dads to raise their children in a godly way and not just go with culture. Part of that is not just being involved in a church and dividing up your family. Don’t feel like that’s something you have to do! You can start a different way of doing things. It’s going to be a good thing for your family.

Daniel: Like-minded children. Your children seeing other like-minded children could save them from the world. If that doesn’t happen, it’s best if there’s no outside influences that could steal their heart. Whereas, when other children are in the same, exact, like-minded situation, it changes your children for the better. I see it every time.

Nancy: Amen! That’s so powerful, Daniel. And just before I’m going to ask you to close in prayer today, I want to remind you ladies, don’t forget to tune in next week, because I’m going to be interviewing Michael Tate, the lead singer of the Newsboys.

You’re most probably aware that every podcast starts with and ends with a song written by Michael, that beautiful song, “In That Home” which he wrote about his mother. His mother had the biggest, biggest heart that reached out to so many hurting souls. You’ll hear more about that next week. I’m sure you’re going to love it. Your young people will all want to tune in as well. So, can you pray, Daniel?

Daniel: Dear God, thank You for this time to think on You, to think on Your Word, to think on Your kingdom, God. I speak a blessing over each individual that’s listening right now, God. Just touch them in a special way, God. Let these words sink into their hearts and minds, God. Give us all Your mantle of wisdom to walk with You with all our hearts, souls, minds, and strength, and love each other as ourselves. In Jesus’ Name, amen.

Nancy: Amen!

Blessings from Nancy Campbell

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

www.aboverubies.org

Transcribed by Darlene Norris * This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

ABOVE RUBIES FAMILY RETREAT IN FLORIDA

April 19 - 26th at Laguna Beach Christian Resort

This is our biggest retreat serving over 100 families during our week of fellowship, sessions with Nancy and Colin Campbell, breakout sessions with gifted speakers and teachers, family activities, and incredible worship! Come as a friend and leave as family!

If you aren’t already registered, sign up now! We still have room!

Registration fee $300 (non-refundable).

Housing is assigned through Above Rubies    but payment for your housing will go directly to Laguna. Click here for the website to register:

https://aboverubiesgulfcoast.com/

https://www.facebook.com/reel/5850807198369612?mibextid=0NULKw&fs=e&s=TIeQ9V 

LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell

EPISODE 248: Preparing Your Children to Speak in the Gates, Part 2

Kevin and Bonnie Kookogey are with me again today, and we continue talking about the importance of raising our children to speak, and, most importantly of all, to speak forth God’s Word. This includes memorizing lengthy passages of God’s Word and other powerful truths. Check out how Kevin and Bonnie have made this happen in their family.

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: We are again with you, and today I have Kevin and Bonnie Kookogey with us again! I have some more questions to ask them and I know you’re going to want to hear more from them. Now, Bonnie, you didn’t get to say too much last week. Tell us, tell us how you started homeschooling.

Bonnie: We started in 2001. It was the day before 9-11, and we started simply teaching Chloe, the oldest, phonics and a little bit of math. Nothing really intense. Just maybe 30 minutes a day. But I was all excited. We had three children at the time, and we’d just got rolling. Then all of a sudden, this big event in the world happens! I’m like, “Oh, thank You, God. These children are home with me. I was so. . .”

Nancy: It was 9-11.

Bonnie: It was 9-11 in 2001. I was so thankful that we’d made the decision. Prior to that, my father had put a blessing on us that I should stay home. I was a nurse anesthetist. He told me I should quit and stay home with our children. I said, “But we just have one child! One six-month-old.” He said, “No, God’s told me you’re going to have many. They need you.”

That is what I did over the course of the next few years. I stayed home with them. We ended up having six in 10 years, I basically organized the math and the science and the history, that sort of thing. But Kevin was the over-arching, “This is our plan. This is what we’re going to do.” The memorization was his brainchild. I made pancakes every week, or bacon. We originally called it “Waffle Wednesday.”

Kevin: Wednesday Waffle Day.

Bonnie: Sorry, Wednesday Waffle Day. [laughter] We made waffles originally, and then changed into other breakfasts.

Kevin: We got bored with it after a while, so we went to other things.

Bonnie: Other fun breakfast menus.

Nancy: That’s so lovely! Kevin, we talked about your teaching your children memorization of the Scriptures and important writings. Tell us a little more of how you actually did that, because it’s very easy to memorize something, and then forget it.

IT TAKES DISCIPLINE

Kevin: As we discussed last week, the impetus to my doing this was that I had memorized in law school the entire book of Colossians. But then, because I didn’t keep it fresh, I lost it. I never wanted that to happen again. So, the goal was not only to memorize important passages and elements of Scripture and literature, but to retain those, so that you can use them for life. The way to retain those is discipline, discipline, discipline.

We would start on Wednesday. Short or long, no matter what we were memorizing on a particular week, we would always start off by reciting what I would refer to as “our inventory.” In the early years, our inventory would not take very long, because we only had a couple of passages. But as the years went on, some weeks we would say, “We can’t even do a new one now, because we’ve got so much inventory, it’s taking up an hour, an hour and a half, just to go through the inventory.”

At different times, we would require the different children to go around the table. Some weeks we would recite everything together at once. But frequently, and more commonly, I would go around the table, and I would call out from the list. Sometimes in order, sometimes out of order, and say, “Willis, your turn. Declaration of Independence. Naomi, your turn. Gettysburg address. Chloe, I want you to recite the Henry the Fifth Christmas Day Speech.”

They always had to be prepared. They didn’t know what they were going to be called on to do. They would have to recite it. But then, if I saw the other children doodling when one of their siblings was saying it, I’d stop and say, “No, just because your sister is saying this, it’s also your job to retain it, to make sure that in your head you’re going through the same part in the process.” Very, very important.

I still, to this day. I do that. Whether I’m traveling, whether I’m at home, I make sure that at least once a week I’m going through. Our list is so extensive that I can go through half of the list once a week. I do that with Sophia, our youngest. But that was the only way.

It’s still the only way to maintain that, because, as you know, when you speak publicly, you can think you know it, and you’ve memorized it, and you say it very comfortably in your bedroom, or maybe to your family. But when you’re called upon to speak it in public, suddenly that memorization goes! You’re like, “What? Why am I not able to retain this?”

I always say, “If you think you know it well, you’ve got to practice it three times as much.” If you’ve done it for a month straight, then you probably need a couple more months to make sure that when you step before a live audience that you don’t know, you have to assume the jitters are going to come. You have to assume the sound’s going to go out, the lights are going, something odd is going to happen.

The only way that you’re going to be able to deliver effectively is to have it so embedded in your spirit and in your brain, that it’s muscle memory. Even if the other side of your brain says, “I’m going to attempt to confuse you, I’m going to attempt to interrupt you, you’re going to stumble,” that the muscle memory will spit it out.

WE MUST GET IT INTO OUR MOUTHS

Nancy: That is so great. The Bible has it right in every situation. I love the way the Bible encourages, not only to get the Word of God into our minds, and then into our hearts, where we want it, but the Bible talks about getting it into our MOUTHS. You see, when you can speak it forth from your mouth, that’s when you know you’ve got it.

Kevin: Yes.

Nancy: You can say that Scripture in your mind, but can you actually speak it forth from your mouth? I love this Scripture. It’s one of my favorites. I think it’s a mandate that God has given to every family, to every parent.

Isaiah 59:21: “As for Me, this is My covenant with them, saith the Lord. My Spirit that is upon thee, and My Words, which I have put in thy mouth . . .”

You notice, it’s not only in our hearts. God wants His Word in our mouths. That means that we, as parents, we’ve got to have it in our mouths first. So, He says: “My words, which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy children, nor out of the mouth of thy children’s children saith the Lord, from henceforth and forever.” Isn’t that powerful?

Kevin: It is powerful. And it speaks to how we are created by God. We, as human beings, are unique in all the things that God has created, because we can communicate with words. Well, that wasn’t an accident. God gave us those words for a purpose. We can use our tongue for sinful purposes, or we can use our tongue to praise the Lord.

But those words, Nancy, are absolutely essential. It’s the difference even in a mission sense. It is the difference between a Christian mission and just a worldly charitable mission, because we have the Word to speak. That is our responsibility. Everything we do in a temporal sense is but an illustration, a shadow, of what the Word of God is and will be. We have a responsibility, a duty, as you point out in the Scripture, to speak.

CONTINUAL REPITITION

Nancy: Yes, and this is God’s mandate to us. We DO. It’s not a suggestion. We are commanded to get it into our children’s mouths, and into our grandchildren’s mouths. It really is a huge challenge. I notice too it also says: “It shall not depart out of thy mouth.” That’s where the repetition comes in, because you had learned the whole book of Colossians, but you forgot it.

I’ve learned many passages of the Word and forgot it. I’ve got to go back and memorize them again and get them into my heart and into my mouth. But even then, wow! It can go again. So, I’ve got to do it again! It’s continual repetition of getting the Word.

I think saying it out loud is a wonderful thing, with your family, that you have some time every week, just as Kevin and Bonnie do, where you’re speaking. Your children are speaking forth these Scriptures out loud. It is saying them out loud that gets them into you more than just in your mind.

Kevin: I would add to that, Bonnie and I have also had the privilege of teaching in homeschool tutorials in the middle Tennessee area for a number of years. In one of the tutorials, where I taught for six or seven years, no matter what course I was teaching, whether it was a course on Christian apologetics, which I love, whether it was a course on history and western civilization, I would always require my students, of course, to publicly speak, both first semester and second semester, as their final project.

I had a method for it, and I told them, “Look, it’s one thing for you to read it.” Some students think, “Oh, I read it, I understand it.” No that’s step one. Number two, then you must engage with what you’ve read by writing your thoughts, thinking it through, writing your papers, all of that part. But even then, you’re still not finished. That’s only stage two.

Stage three is, then you must get up and speak it, because not until you speak it, not only does it become part of you, but you also learn the defects of your thinking. You may say, “Wait a second. That doesn’t sound right. I don’t really understand what I’m saying, or what I read.”

Now it takes you back to step two, where you go and engage again. But that speaking process, there’s something supernatural in how God has created us, that the speaking is a necessary finishing part of the process. Think about Scripture. Before Scripture was written, it was passed down.

Nancy: Oh, yes!

Kevin: Through recitation, recitation. That’s how the Bible was passed on for generations.

Nancy: That Scripture, “into the mouth,” why was it into the mouth? To get it into the mouths of your children, and then into the mouths of your grandchildren. It was all by mouth. It is so important. Did you ever read that book, Ten Peas in a Pod, by the Pent family?

Kevin: No. I’m familiar with the title.

Nancy: Oh, my! I think it’s one of the most challenging books that I have ever read. We do have it on our webpage. You can order it. It’s about this family. The Pent family had eight children, so it’s called Ten Peas in a Pod. The father was an evangelist and loved to go out and preach the Gospel. They traveled through the USA. They traveled through Canada, preaching and teaching the Word.

He took his family with him. He was a family man. He didn’t leave his children behind. He took them with him. But he had such a vision to get the Word of God into their lives and their hearts, their minds, and their mouths.

Every single day he would read the Word of God to his family after breakfast at the breakfast table. You know they had breakfast. Then he’d read the Word for one hour.

At lunchtime, they’re all sitting there. He would read the Word again for another hour.

At suppertime, he would read the Word for another hour. And also, he would encourage his children, as they got to a certain age to have their time reading the Word of God on their own, before they got up. As they got to a certain age, they had to spend an hour! Wow!

Those children ended up being able to speak forth the whole New Testament verbatim. They could get up and speak the whole of the New Testament, and many passages of the Old, just because that Word was constantly going into their hearts.

But I remember reading in this book. Since then, I have met the guy who wrote this book, sitting right here in this chair I’m sitting in now. I did ask him, “Has this continued down the generations?” He’s now our age. He said, “Yes,” and shared the blessings.

He shared in that book that, as they traveled and stayed in different homes, people hosted them as the father was preaching, and so on. The father never, ever, deviated ever from his plan. He would say to the host, “I love to read the Bible to our children at the end of the meal. Would you be happy about that?” “Oh, yes! Go ahead!” Of course, they’re all Christian homes that he’s staying in. And then he would say, “Would you like to join us?” [silence] Not one ever joined him.

Kevin: Really!

Bonnie: Wow!

Nancy: “You just go ahead, but we’ve got this to do, and that.” Not one ever joined them. That was just too much out of their day. “We’ve got too many other things to do.” But this father had a vision. His children came forth speaking the Word verbatim. Great story. Oh, it’s very challenging.

Kevin: Yeah, talk about challenging!

Nancy: I admit, we don’t do that every day in our home. We have a precedent that twice a day, morning and evening, we have the Word. But my, we didn’t get to that. That’s such an amazing challenge.

TWICE A DAY

Kevin: Do you know, Nancy, also that our heritage as Americans, was rooted in that? Harvard’s Rules and Precepts, when Harvard was founded, it was founded in 1626, and this was written in 1636. It’s a passage which emphasizes, first of all, Harvard was founded for the training of Christian ministers which people would never imagine today. They tossed Christianity to the curb and teach everything except the Word of God.

But that passage was instrumental in the foundation of the intellectual heritage of America, because they required that Scripture be read TWICE A DAY, and that they check what they’re reading with their tutors. It was emphatic. The writers of that emphasized the importance of everything else you’re learning is rooted in the Word of God. This discipline specifically says TWICE A DAY you must read the Word of God. Harvard University! Can you imagine saying that today? You’d get kicked off campus.

Nancy: Yes. Very interesting, because that twice a day comes from the Word. It comes from the type in the tabernacle where it talks about how every morning and every evening they participated in the things in the tabernacle, which all speak of Christ, and speak of our walk in Christ. But it was always a morning and an evening. They took on that twice a day. It is a very Biblical principle.

Kevin: Amen.

Nancy: And I love this Scripture. We all know Psalm 127, of course, but we often overlook it. Psalm 127:3: “Lo, children are a heritage of the Lord, and the fruit of the womb is His reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man, a warrior, so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them. They shall not be ashamed, but they shall SPEAK with the enemies in the gate.”

What are we training our children to do? The Scripture tells us. We are preparing them to speak. And where? To speak in the gates, even with the enemies. I believe that this is a vision we need to have as Christian parents. We’re not just raising our children to be lovely people. No, we’re raising them to be filled with the truth of God, so that it’s in their mouths, and they will come out speaking it. They can speak it in such a way that they can even speak in the gates of the city, the gates of the land!

Kevin: Amen.

Nancy: That’s the vision! Here it is! It tells us right here.

Kevin: Yes. We love that Scripture. We actually have all of Psalm 127 on a giant sign. You know who Richard Oding is, who makes all of these signs? He made us four signs for our house, and one is that Scripture.

Bonnie: His company is called Revelation Culture.

Kevin: It’s a seven-foot-tall sign. That entire Scripture passage, starting at the beginning, which is, of course, “Unless the Lord builds the house, they labor in vain who build it.” I love how all that Scripture sticks together. It’s inter-related. In the middle, he switches and starts talking about the blessing of children.

At the beginning he’s talking about building. But they are inter-related, because this is how we build our family and how we build a society and culture. It does not happen unless the Lord is at the root of it.

You should come to our house and walk up our stairs and turn around, because you can see this giant sign! It took us like three hours to put it up on New Year’s Eve last year with my son-in-law, and my son, and a couple of daughters and my wife.

Bonnie: Yes, I was holding the ladder for the men. Willis was the lightest of them. He climbed to the top to drill the holes.

Nancy: Oh, that is so great!

Kevin: But that Scripture, I’m so glad you cited that, because that’s one of our favorites.

Nancy: So, we are training our children to speak, and speak clearly. So many children today can speak but they mumble. They don’t speak clearly. If we are preparing them to speak in the gates of the city, in that place where the decisions are made and they have an impact, even to speak with the enemies . . . Now, we have enemies in the gates of our cities, every city. We have enemies right up there in the White House. This is where our enemies are. We’ve got to prepare children to speak with their enemies, who can come forth and tell the truth, and can combat the lies of the enemy.

Kevin: Yes, and I think the reason that most people do not have the belief that they can speak is purely because they don’t believe. They haven’t spent their time in the Word of God. Therefore, they have not allowed the Spirit of God, through the Word, to fill them with truth. Because of that, I’m talking even about believers, they do not realize the power of God through the Word; that if they would speak truth in the gates, it would transform our society.

The enemy is afraid of truth. Remember, Jesus said the gates of hell will not prevail against Him, will not prevail against the Word of God. Yet, we have Christians who are constantly in retreat. “Oh, I’m afraid to speak in the gates because they’re talking about transgender. They’re going to cancel me!” No, you have the Word of God. Your word is more powerful than anything that they could say.

FROM THE TREASURY OF OUR HEARTS

Nancy: Absolutely! I think it is so important. I was just reading in my Bible reading yesterday that Scripture of how our hearts are a storehouse, and how we’ve got to store up in the treasury of our heart all good things. That is firstly the Scriptures more than anything else. They are our light. They are our treasure. They are everything we need to know to live.

Then, as you have also done, these great writings of people who had truth. We store them up. Our hearts are a storehouse. Then it says out of that storehouse, where there are good things stored in the storehouse, that will come out of their mouths.

Then there are those who store up evil things. So many of our young people today, their hearts are a storehouse. But their hearts are filled with all the lies and deceptions and the entertainment of this hour. That’s all that fills their hearts. Much of it’s just so evil.

So, out of their hearts it will come forth from their mouths. Out of the abundance of their mouths, they speak it out. But it’s all from the storehouse of their hearts. We’ve got to fill our children’s storehouse with all these good things so it will come out of the abundance. It just flows out of their mouths.

Kevin: That’s right. Jesus said that it’s not what we put in us that corrupts us. It’s what comes out from us; what we have in our hearts. The only way to keep those evil things out is to fill your heart with the Word, to fill your heart with all that goodness and truth, so that there’s no room for the enemy to happen to get a foothold.

BIRTHDAY SPEECHES

Nancy: Oh yes, yes. And we can even do this in little ways. As I shared last week, we’ve always been speechmakers in our house. Every little function, even every little family function, every birthday, we always have speeches.

OK, we did this. We started it with our children. Every time they had a birthday, everyone who was there would always have to give a speech to the birthday person. They would have to think of all the good things that they could say about them. Well, it was a beautiful thing for the birthday person, because if they wore a hat, they wouldn’t be able to fit it on by the time they finished! [laughter] Everybody sharing all the good things about them. It’s really wonderful!

But it was also practice for speaking. We did that as a family, but as other people would come in, we would say, “You can say something, too.” But sometimes they’d stammer around because they weren’t used to it. You have to get used to that. That was our life.

Then when our children began having their children, they carried it on. Right from little and I can remember, because our children, our grandchildren have grown now. Most of them are married now. But when they were little, it was quite hilarious. They’d give their little speech. Then they’d end with, “And you are my best cousin!”

Then that became the phrase. Every little grandchild with a birthday speech for their cousin, they’d say a couple of little things as they were learning to speak. And then, “You are my best cousin!” So now, it’s quite a joke. Sometimes (they have wonderful speeches today) and for a joke they’ll end with, “And you’re my best cousin!” [laughter]

Bonnie: I love that!

Nancy: But they’re a wonderful thing, for the person, and also for speechmaking. Whatever the occasion, let’s have some speeches! We do that on Thanksgiving and Christmas. We have a sit-down meal. Then, like Thanksgiving, we’ll have toasts. We encourage, well, not everyone, because we have about 80 or more people sitting down. Now it’s even grown to more!

But those who do get up will talk about someone who’s meant something to them, maybe in the last year, or even in their past life. Well, some person they want to talk about. The speeches we have are really amazing. Speeches! Once again, my favorite time of the whole Thanksgiving Day is speech time! We do it on all different occasions.

Kevin: And I think that it’s also important because it forces the people who are invited to speak, whether they be old or young, to really think about what it is that they feel or believe about everything. When you speak publicly, you are now exposing yourself, and what you really think and believe to be true.

In fact, the best speeches are always the ones, they don’t have to be prepared, they don’t have to be crafted, when they’re spoken from a heart of belief. When you believe that what you’re speaking is true, that’s what has an impact, because it’s authentic. It really touches the hearts of all of those who were there on that day.

But in thinking through and preparing to speak, or someone asks you to give a word, the reason it’s so important is because we spend so much of our time engaging in superficial conversations. We fill up a lot of space and time with that, especially with phones and whatnot. It’s ubiquitous today.

But when you’re asked to stop and to say something, if you’re going to say something, you want it to be heart-felt. It doesn’t need to be long. It doesn’t need to be something that’s earth moving as far as the people that are there are concerned.

But you do pause to reflect and think, “Well, I’m going to say something here that people are going to remember, for better or for worse, whether I embarrass myself. So, what do I really believe to be true about this occasion, about the person who’s having the birthday, or a person who’s graduated?” That’s why it’s important, because it gets us to think about the heart of the matter.

Nancy: Oh, yes, yes. I love to ask people, I hate just boring, superficial conversation. So often, I will say, “What has God been saying to you through the Word?” Wow! You ask that question today, and you don’t get any answers! People are not reading, or they’re not reading even to receive. Sometimes people have their daily Bible reading because that’s the thing you’re meant to do. But they don’t really even get anything.

I think we have to come to the Word looking, looking to receive. I’ve always been a great believer in writing down what God shows me. More understanding. I want to write it. I remember a little saying that I picked up when I was a teenager. I still believe it.

“Thoughts tend to disentangle themselves when they pass through lips or cross pencil tips.”

Back in those days, you would use a pencil.

But it’s true. When you write, you get more understanding. Or when you begin to speak it out, you get more understanding. That’s why it’s so good to speak about the Scriptures, or even something God is teaching you, or showing you. To speak about it, it disentangles, and you get to know what really is truth.

So, everything is speech. It’s speaking it out. God brought the whole world into being just through His Words. Words have such power, don’t they? We live our life by words.

Kevin: I know we’re short on time here, but that’s exactly what, I believe it’s in Peter, where he talks about having been at the Transfiguration, and the experience of seeing Jesus and Moses and Elijah. But he goes on to say, “But even your Word is truer than that experience.” The Word of God is more certain. That’s why Scripture tells us that everything else will pass away, and the Word of God will remain.

Nancy: Amen! Let’s just end this session with those words Jesus said: “Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.” Amen!

Kevin: Amen!

Bonnie: Amen!

“Lord, we thank You so much for your Word! Lord, this is Your Word. It’s a Word. We thank You that You are the Word. We thank You that we have Your written Word. We thank You that You want us to speak it out. You want it to be in our mouths. Help us, Lord God, to have it in our mouths.

“I pray for every one of these precious mothers, daughters, parents, who are listening, that, Lord God, we will take up this mandate, to have Your Word coming out of our mouths, coming out of the mouths of our children, coming out of the mouths of our grandchildren. We ask it in Jesus’ Name. Amen.”

Kevin: Amen.

Bonnie: Amen.

Blessings from Nancy Campbell

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

www.aboverubies.org

Transcribed by Darlene Norris * This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

To purchase TEN P’S IN A POD, Go to:

TEN P’S IN A POD By Arnold Pent III (mybigcommerce.com)

LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell

EPISODE 247: Preparing Your Children to Speak in the Gates

Welcoming Kevin and Bonnie Kookogey to the podcast today. Kevin and Bonnie have been homeschooling for over 20 years. Kevin shares how he has taken his responsibility as a homeschooling father, and how he also prepared his children to be prepared to be speakers.

We talk about the importance of speeches, which is a dying art. Although it was mandatory for a bridegroom to give a speech at his wedding, this rarely happens today. Kevin and Bonnie share how they prepared their children to be ready to give a speech on any occasion. 

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Great to be with you again! Today I have two special guests with me, Kevin and Bonnie Kookogey. We were just talking together before we started this podcast and realized that we have actually known each other for 31 years! I simply can’t believe that!

Kevin has been very involved with my son, Wes Campbell, who owns the NEWSBOYS, so we often meet together on functions with the Newsboys, or things like that. We met again recently, and this is why I have asked them to come.

But before we even get onto that, I must introduce you to them, so you can hear them and know who is on the podcast today. Kevin and Bonnie, it’s so great to have you. Maybe you can tell the folks how many children you have and their names. You’ve been homeschooling them all your life, haven’t you? OK, let’s hear from you!

Kevin: All right, I’ll start, and then I’ll pass it off to my wife. Kevin Kookogey. First of all, Nancy, thank you for having us. We do appreciate it. Always a privilege to be in the company of your family for the 31 years. Those events, over the years, initially were extensions of the professional environment. But now we always look forward to them because we are like family. We’ve become friends over this and we feel that it’s a mutual benefit.

We’ve always believed that God has had His hand on the Campbell/Kookogey connection. I didn’t know it when we moved to Nashville in 1992, but when I met Wes, it was the beginning of a beautiful friendship and a beautiful relationship.

Bonnie and I have been blessed with six children. Their ages are 26, almost 26 and almost 16, so it's a ten-year gap. We have five daughters and one son. Our oldest two are married. We’ve had our first grandchild in the past year, who’s now eight months old, Olivia.

The children’s names: Chloe’s the oldest. She lives in Atlanta with her husband. Carmel is our second oldest. She’s the one who is the mother of our grandchild, Olivia. She and her husband live in Hillsdale, Michigan. Rachel also lives in Michigan. She is our third. She’s unmarried. Naomi is our fourth. She is living in middle Tennessee with us which is a great privilege, because we were quickly going to be empty nesters.

Our son Willis, who’s number five, is in school in Texas at LeTourneau, which is a Christian engineering school in Long View, Texas. He’s a freshman. And then Sophia, our baby. She’s finishing her driving school and will have her license. So, I’ve finished my job of teaching six children to drive in the next couple of weeks.

Nancy: Oh, that’s so great. Did you want to say anything, Bonnie? You’ve been the homeschooler, but I know Kevin’s been very much involved in that too.

Bonnie: Oh, yes, completely involved!

Nancy: Yes, so wonderful! It’s a wonderful thing, because often homeschooling is left to the mother, but you guys have been involved in it together. That’s such a beautiful thing.

Bonnie: Yes, it’s been a great thing to have his support. I’m more of a math/science kind of girl, so I would focus on that. He would focus on the memorization when we did the memorization that we’ll get into. I was making the pancakes and the bacon so we’d have a nice breakfast around the table, that sort of thing. We just tag teamed.

Kevin: Yeah, it’s an important point to make, though, because when we first got into homeschooling, I still knew a number of parents who, one or the other, usually it was left to the mother.

I one time met a homeschool father from Chicago, strong family, married, and no issues, but the father was primarily responsible. He worked a day job, blue collar worker, so he did his homeschool in the evening which I found incredibly challenging. In the morning, you’re fresh. We do everything best in the morning.

I asked him, and he had six or seven children. I asked him how he was able to do that. It was more of a mindset. He said early on he knew he wasn’t going to be able to change his employment, but they were so committed to homeschooling that over time they disciplined themselves that that was the place where God allowed them to have the energy. So, he got home from work and began his homeschooling journey.

That’s an unusual case, but it’s so important that the parents be involved together, just like in raising your children. This is an extension of raising your children, the academic process. Again, by God’s blessing, I was always able and privileged to be able to set my schedule a little bit differently.

The nature of my work as an entertainment lawyer is global in nature because of the music industry. Music is global. It also crosses time zones. So, I pretty much have to determine when I turn it off. It will always be on. Because of that, I figured out, OK, I can spend the first couple of hours of each day making sure my children are off on the right track, and getting things situated. Then I would leave it off to Bonnie.

The next day I would come in at the same time, so I was the impetus to get it going, and then Bonnie made sure that everything was followed through. She was grading papers, and helping with questions along the way. But because of that, I would spend the first couple of hours, wouldn’t go to work and begin work until 10 AM. But then my work would extend later into the night. But again, that’s the privilege of having been self-employed for all of these years, to be able to do that.

Nancy: I think that is wonderful to see the father beginning each day. What a marvelous thing that is for the children! It’s so great. That brings me to the last time we met, only a few weeks ago.

It was our grandson’s 21^st birthday. My son Wes decided that, yes, they were going to have a 21^st birthday. I know that here in the States, when a young person turns 18, they’re coming of age. But back where we come from, New Zealand, it’s not until 21. Back in my day, and in my son’s day, the 21^st birthday was a very big thing. In fact, you always had a big party, and the parents would give the one who just turned 21 the key of the door. They actually got a key. Did you know that?

Kevin: No.

Nancy: Yes, it would be a key. It could be made of glass, made of special cardboard, or made ornamental. It was always a beautiful key. It was something that they could put up on the wall afterwards. Usually, it was done in a way where there was room for people who were at the party to sign the key.

It was to show that now, at 21, they had come of age. They had the key to the door of the home. Well, they most probably had it before. But that was official. [laughter] It was a great big party. I think Wes was reminiscing back and decided he would do it for Michael. I have to say, and I think you would agree, it was a wonderful night.

Kevin: Oh, it was beautiful.

Bonnie: Yes.

Nancy: I just love the vision they both had. Tracy called and said, “OK, we’re doing this 21^st birthday for Michael. We don’t want you to even bring presents.” But she said, “I want you to write something that would really impact Michael’s life. Something that he can take into his life with him for the future. Something really powerful.” That was her burden. She put that on everyone.

So, when we arrived, we had to come with what we had written for Michael. That was so great. Colin and I spent a lot of time praying about what we should write, so we could really give something into his life. But that wasn’t the end! Then we had a beautiful sit-down meal.

Then it was time for speeches. Not only was Michael getting all this written stuff that he could keep for life, but the speeches began. Everyone was so powerful. Every speech was not just some bit of fluff. It was something that really spoke into his life, that encouraged him in the Lord. Oh, I don’t think any young man could get anything better, could they?

Bonnie: No.

Nancy: It was so great!

Bonnie: We walked away feeling so blessed by what was said, even though it was said and directed to him. We felt so encouraged. It was awesome!

Nancy: Yes, I thought, “My, if every young man and every young daughter could have that as they’re going into life, it would be so amazing.” Speeches have always been part of the Campbell lifestyle. We’ve always believed in speeches. In fact, also wedding speeches!

I can’t believe that here in America, speeches are kind of fallen away. You go to a wedding today, and you have the service, and then you have the reception and the cake. Everybody starts drifting away. There’s not a speech or anything! Help! Back in New Zealand, this was traditional. You had actually traditional speeches that had to be made.

You always had the speech from the bride’s family. Someone was chosen to represent the bride’s family, and to tell all the stories about the family so the other family is getting to know them. Then the bridegroom’s family would choose someone who would speak about their family. Then, of course, the father of the bride, and then the father of the groom.

Then the best man, and then, of course, the speech of the day from the groom. He had to be ready to give a speech. Part of his speech would be to thank everyone who had participated in preparing for the wedding, and to thank his parents for what they had done for him throughout his life. Then, of course, to say whatever he wanted to say on his heart. I remember when we got married, I think Colin’s speech was about half an hour. [laughter] In fact, just about every speech was! We were the family of speechmakers.

Then I remember Wes’s wedding himself. We had all the official speeches, but then we opened it up to anyone who would like to speak into their lives. Wow! It was speech after speech after speech, and story after story. Oh, it was always the best part of all our weddings. Well, forgive me, I want to get back to what we were going to talk about, but I must tell you this.

Then, we came to the States. OK, some of our children were married in Australia. Then we came to America and Evangeline was getting married. We had just arrived in the States. She was in Minneapolis, so we drove all the way up to Minneapolis. We hired an apartment, rented an apartment, then began to put on and prepare for a wedding in a city where we’d never lived.

We prepared. We put on all the food and we prepared it ourselves. We were cooking for days before. We put on this wedding. And I blissfully and ignorantly thought it would be just like it was back in New Zealand and Australia where we had just come from. Because although we’re New Zealanders, we then lived ten years in Australia before we got here to the States.

We had the service. We had the reception and everybody’s eating all this great food we’ve prepared. And we’re just getting ready for the speeches! And I’m noticing people disappearing! Yes, this one’s going, and this one’s going. It dwindled down. We were ready for speeches, the greatest part of the day! But there were only a few left! I simply could not believe it! Goodness me! They just went!

Really, to me, a wedding is a very important occasion. I don’t believe we go to a wedding as a token thing. We go, and then we go away. We should really give ourselves. That was very, very disappointing to me.

So then, a little time went on, and then Serene was to be married. By this time, we were in Tennessee. I thought, “What am I going to do?” I wrote it on the invitation. “OK, at our reception, at this wedding reception, we will be having speeches. We would like you to stay to the end.” I put something like that. It was many years ago now. I actually felt like putting, “And we will be locking the doors until the end.” [laughter] I didn’t put that. [laughter]

Kevin: That invitation was more of a warning, right? [laughter]

Nancy: It was so amazing. Actually, it was so great. In some ways, it was sort of, “Oh dear, we didn’t have a beautiful sunny day.” In fact, even as we were driving to the service, it was downpouring! It was cold and raining, but where we had the reception was a beautiful place, with a big fire going. It was so cozy and lovely. I think nobody wanted to go out into the cold and the rain anyway.

But everybody stayed, and oh! The speeches were wonderful. Not only the official ones, but then we opened it up to whoever would like to speak. The stories, and the sharing, and the speaking into their lives. It was so wonderful.

I do think that needs to come back to weddings. I believe that people need to be. . . The trouble is, people are not prepared to give speeches. They don’t know what to say. So, that gets me onto why I have Kevin and Bonnie here today.

Because, at Michael’s 21^st, nearly everybody gave a speech. Then Kevin got up to give his. Wow! He began to quote these great quotes of great men of past ages. Then he moved on to the Scriptures, and he would quote them. Back to great quotes of people of the past, who said such great things. Wow! It was so impressive.

I was talking to him afterwards, and I said, “Kevin, that was so great! When did you learn all these great quotes?” We got talking, and he began to share that not only did he learn this, but this was part of their family homeschooling! Not only did he know these things, but they have taught their family, all their children. So, tell us more! We want to hear all about it.

Kevin: Ok. That is a great set-up because it is true. I wish I had begun earlier. I think what was most compelling to me is that we did not start this journey until 2010 of serious devotion to memorization. This means that Sophia, our youngest, would have been three. Chloe would have been 13.

I grew up in a small Presbyterian church in Pennsylvania. Memorization was always encouraged, but it was never enforced. I would memorize Scripture and memorize speeches and whatnot for school but it would be short-term memory. I would never keep up with it.

The real inflection point for me was when I was in law school, in fact, it was the year that Bonnie and I had gotten married. I heard someone say that they had memorized the entire book of Colossians. That fascinated me. I thought, “What?” I’m used to memorizing little passages of Scripture, right? Important phrases. And so, when I heard that, I took the challenge.

What I did, this is my second semester of my third year of law school. I decided that, by the end of the semester, when I graduate from law school, I’m going to have memorized the entire book of Colossians. I did! It was successful. I had a 45-minute drive where I went to Temple Law School in Philadelphia. We lived 45 minutes outside the city. So, every day I would memorize going to and from school. By the end of the semester, I had the entire book of Colossians, four chapters, memorized.

Well, my weakness was, after I moved to Nashville and was getting into the music business, I didn’t stay on top of that. I eventually lost that. All that work I retained probably for about a year, and I lost it, because. . .

Nancy: It’s so true, because one of the biggest secrets of memorization is recapitulation. You’ve got to keep on.

Kevin: Absolutely! I was determined to invigorate that practice with my children when they were young. We began a journey in 2010, that one day a week our homeschooling would be devoted to memorization. You can see, Nancy, I told you we got to 100 just last year with Sophia, so the older ones didn’t quite get to 100.

But so your listeners can get an idea of the types of things we memorize, I would say about half of this memory list is comprised of Scripture. But some of the other things, the longer things we would memorize. . . All of my children memorized the Declaration of Independence. It takes about ten minutes to recite at a good even pace that is understandable.

Nancy: That’s great! Most people don’t even know it, let alone memorize it!

Kevin: Yeah, let alone having it memorized. We would do it to music. In some situations, we would do different passages to music. The Declaration of Independence actually took us six months of Wednesdays to learn. We would map out a section, and I would draw it on a whiteboard, a combination of funny cartoons, and mnemonics, and words on the board. Our children would write it.

We wanted to do it in commonplace books, but I didn’t get this until too late, so most of it was all on yellow notepads. They would draw these little pictographs and word phrases. Then we would rehearse it. As we added each week, we would always start off with what I called our “inventory.” We would go through and rehearse everything that we had learned to that point, and then start adding anew. Over a period of 13 years, Sophia and I still do it every Thursday on the way to tutorial.

I wanted to give an idea and a sense of some of the things that we’ve memorized. Some are very short. Some are very long. The Declaration of Independence is probably the longest thing that we have memorized. Quotations from Henry V’s Christmas Day Speech are my favorite passages.

A number of Shakespeare, T. S. Elliot, Thomas Browne’s Christian Morals, which I quoted, and I can quote for you in a bit, at Michael’s 21^st. Some Robert Frost poetry, Gettysburg Address, speeches from Ronald Reagan, Edmund Burke, Churchill, Charles McKay, George Orwell, Jane Austin, Tolkien, C. S. Lewis, Dorothy Sayers, Abraham Kuyper.

But what’s interesting is, if you look at the second half of the list, we used to scatter in Scripture here and there. But I’m looking at the list and this is pretty much sequential. It’s the second fifty that are almost all Scripture. That’s when we began going deep into the Scripture, choosing the Scriptures.

I told my children, especially as they got older, that I wanted them to develop their own lists when they have children, and to do this at a much earlier age. Because I remember, at times, Chloe and Carmel, the older ones, when we started this would say, “Can’t we memorize this?” And they would want to quote something that was not as personal to me. We would pick. Some of these were selected by the children for that reason.

But I have always advised them that that’s what you need to do with your children. You need to train up your children, not just with the Scriptures, but then with those passages that are important to you. Because, the principal reason I wanted my children to do this, and this ties to your acknowledgement of the importance of public speaking. You never know when you’re going to be called on to give a public speech, whether it is a public prayer, whether it is a presentation.

Sometimes you don’t have time to prepare. Sometimes you have a day to prepare. Sometimes you have a month to prepare. But what this memorization does is it gives you anchors. It gives you a starting point, a bridge. It gives you ideas of how you want to address any occasion in life.

You can imagine, with 100 different passages that we have memorized, there’s not a time when I have been invited to speak publicly that I can’t start from my list. In fact, I’ve got so many now. I’m like, “Oh, I could go this direction. Or I could go that direction.” It’s such an effective tool. It takes all the pressure off.

It’s not that your whole speech is memorized. It’s that, again, you’ve got these anchors and bridges to then relate it to whatever the specific scenario. So, with Michael’s 21^st, I started off with the passage from Sir Thomas Browne, because it’s important for a young man who’s 21 years old. The essence of this is, “How do you touch pitch and not be defiled?” Let me quote Thomas Browne.

Nancy: Yes, would you quote it for us? I love the quote.

Kevin: So, Thomas Browne, for history, wrote this in 1686. It was not published until 1716, after his death. If you read it, it’s funny, because the words are spelled in old English. But it’s called On Christian Morals. It goes like this: “Live by old Ethicks,” and it’s spelled “E-T-H-I-C-K-S.” We spell ethics “E-T-H-I-C-S.”

 “Live by old Ethicks and the classical Rules of Honesty. Put no new names or notions upon Authentick Virtues and Vices. Think not that Morality is Ambulatory; that Vices in one age are not Vices in another; or that Virtues, which are under the everlasting Seal of right Reason, may be Stamped by Opinion. And therefore though vicious times invert the opinion of things, and set up a new Ethicks against Virtue, yet hold thou unto old Morality; and rather than follow a multitude to do evil, stand like Pompey's pillar conspicuous by thyself, and single in Example of Virtue; since no Deluge of Vice is like to be so general but more than eight will escape; Eye well those Heroes who have held their Heads above Water, who have touched Pitch, and have not been defiled, and in the common Contagion have remained uncorrupted.”

Nancy: I love those words! Oh, I want to repeat them again! Can I?

Kevin: Yes, you may.

Nancy: Yes, yes. I will. “Those Heroes who have held their Heads above Water, who have touched Pitch, and not been defiled, and in the common Contagion have remained uncorrupted.” Oh, we need those words in this corrupted age, don’t we?

Kevin: Amen!

Nancy: Oh, we’re looking for young men and women, who, in the middle of all this corruption and evil and deception, will remain uncorrupted. I know all you lovely mothers out there, that you’re longing and your goal is that your children will grow up to be uncorrupted in this very corruptible world.

Kevin: One of the things I love about that particular passage was, at the end he says, “since no Deluge of Vice is like to be so general but more than eight will escape.” He’s talking about Noah and his family.

Nancy: Yes! That was powerful.

Kevin: Sorry. I tend to get emotional, as I did at Michael’s 21^st. It’s so powerful because it’s true. The truth is so powerful. But I love when I can find passages of literature that are rooted in Scripture. Obviously, God created everything, so everything tells us something about God. God even uses the unrighteous to speak. He tells us that if we don’t praise Him, the rocks will cry out.

But I love even more finding passages of literature and music and art, poetry, prose, speeches, that understand, whether the speaker understood it, whether the writer understood it or not, that make reference to the created order. I find it compelling. Then you can weave it in and out and go to your direct passage of Scripture that says this is where he got this. And then weave it back into the day.

Nancy: I love what you did. You started with that quote, and then you said, “Michael, how does one touch pitch and not be defiled? How, in the common contagion, do you remain uncorrupted? In other words, how do you engage with the world without being corrupted by the world?” And then you went on to quote, what was the Scripture?

Kevin: Let me tell you one thing that I didn’t do that I wanted to do that night. I went to Hebrews. I had brought my Bible that night, but it was in the kitchen. So, Wes, in typical “Wes fashion” says “We’re going to do it this way.” And then he changed the plan on the spot. I had my Bible in the kitchen. I didn’t want to get up and make a scene by walking out.

But I wanted to lift up the Word. I made reference to Michael. I said, “How do you do this? Well, you start, you begin, and you end, and everything in the middle must be rooted on the foundation of the Word of God. I was going to hold up this old, messed-up Bible, well-worn, well-flagged too (He held up this Bible as we were doing the interview)! But I think I quoted, but forgive me, because I don’t have it on the tip of my tongue. I think I went to Hebrews 4:12-13.

Nancy: Yes! Yes! Yes! “For the Word of God. . .”

Kevin: “. . . is live and active, sharper than any double-edged sword. It penetrates through dividing even soul and spirit, joints and marrow. It judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart. Nothing in all creation is hidden from God’s sight. Everything is uncovered and laid bare before the eyes of Him to Whom we must give account.”

Especially for our day, when we see what is happening in the world, we’re seeing more exposure of evil and wickedness than we ever have. I think that Scripture is being fulfilled right before our eyes every day, that God is exposing and fulfilling that very promise of Hebrews. He’s exposing everything that man has operated in secret.

My point to Michael was not only that we begin with the Scriptures, but to reveal to him through God’s Word, that what he is seeing, what he is experiencing, is the very operation of God’s Word in His world today.

Nancy: Yes. Amen! I love how you went on. You gave some more quotes and then you kept quoting Scripture. It was so great. I love this whole vision that you have for your family, to prepare them with the Scriptures and with great, important writings and quotes so they’ve got something to say. Not only have they got it for their own heart, and for their own life, to keep them from corruption, but they’ve got it ready to pass on to others.

Kevin: Can I offer something to encourage all of the parents who would listen to this? It’s always satisfying when you teach your children something, and perhaps when they’re younger, they don’t understand. Sometimes they rebel against it. Then when they get older, they come back and say, “I am so glad, Daddy, I’m so glad you taught me this.” Or “I’m so glad you made us do this.”

Well, Carmel, our second-oldest, actually used one of our memorization passages. It was part of the package that got her a significant scholarship for a fellowship that she did. If I may, it’s a very brief quote from Tolkien. I’ll say it, and then we’ll talk about it.

He says, “War must be, while we defend our lives against a destroyer who would devour all; but I do not love the bright sword for its sharpness, nor the arrow for its swiftness, nor the warrior for his glory. I love only that which they defend.”

You understand the idea, right? People talk about war and peace, and they present it as two alternatives. You either love war and all the dangers of war, or you love peace at all costs, even at the cost of liberty and your soul.

But what Tolkien was acknowledging was that when we live in a fallen world, war is necessary to preserve what is righteous. We don’t love war. War is awful. It’s destruction of God’s created order. But there’s something bigger, and there’s something more important that’s going on. We don’t love war but we defend what is necessary. We defend what is true. That’s what I loved about that Tolkien quote.

It gave me such great privilege and honor, and it warmed my heart, to know that Carmel had used that as part of her presentation to get this fellowship that she got for a couple of years at Hillsdale. The proof is in the pudding. That was some of the pudding that was very satisfying to parents.

Nancy: Well, we will close, but I think we’ll do another session, because I’ve got some more questions to ask you about this. I trust you’ve been really blessed today, ladies.

“Father, we thank You that we’ve been able to talk about these things, and Lord, have the vision for our children, to prepare them, Lord. It’s not enough for them to just know things in their hearts and in their minds, but they need to know how to speak them forth. We pray that You will help us, Lord, to be able to impart this to our children, and raise them to be speakers of truth as they come forth from our homes. We ask it in the Name of Jesus. Amen”.

Kevin: Amen.

Bonnie: Amen.

Blessings from Nancy Campbell

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

www.aboverubies.org

Transcribed by Darlene Norris * This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

LIFE TO THE FULL w/ Nancy Campbell

EPISODE 246: Mothers Are the Transmitters of God’s Truth to the Next Generation, Part 4

Are we passing on mothering to the next generation as God intends it? Are we passing on to our children family togetherness as God intends it? Do your children know how to set a table?

Announcer: Welcome to the podcast, Life to The Full, with Nancy Campbell, founder and publisher of Above Rubies.

Nancy Campbell: Hello, ladies! Good to be with you. Back a couple of weeks ago, podcast #243, I was encouraging you to buy up old dictionaries because I don’t think we really want our children to be learning from these new editions that are coming out with all the changing of the meaning of very important words. So, Darlene Norris, she’s the one who transcribes all the podcasts, which is so wonderful of her. If ever you need to check anything, or check any references to Scriptures, well, you can go to the transcripts. They’re right there on the home page of aboverubies.org.

Anyway, of course, Darlene was listening as she was transcribing. She said, “We went to town today. Had to go to the thrift stores! At the first one, we found a stack of old dictionaries, and a bunch of Bibles. They were only $1 for the hardcovers and 50 cents for the paperbacks. So, we’ve started our trove of Bibles and dictionaries that we can hand out to people in the future. We were talking to the cashier in the thrift store about how they’re changing the dictionaries, too. So, we’re trying to get the word out!” Well, I thought that was so great! I think that’s a good idea to do, ladies, don’t you?

Last week we were talking about the animals and how God has created them. So many of the mammals that God created have such a wonderful maternal instinct. They’re wonderful mothers. I’d like to mention just a few more. Of course, I won’t be mentioning all of them.

But dolphins are wonderful mammals, aren’t they? They nurse their babies for two or three years. The polar bears never ever leave their baby cubs until they are at least two-and-a-half years of age. They have such a beautiful maternal instinct also. Whales are pregnant between ten and 18 months, depending on which type of whale they are. They also nurse their babies for up to three years.

Then there is the orangutan. Oh, yes, they are such an interesting animal, aren’t they? Apparently, they have the closest DNA to humans than any other animals. They are 97% similar to human beings, although, goodness, we wouldn’t like to look like one of them! They are kind of strange-looking creatures, but pretty amazing.

They only give birth to a baby once every eight years, but they also are wonderful mothers. They nurse their babies for at least six years, sometimes even up to eight years. And yet, they live a much shorter lifespan than human beings. So, that’s a challenge, isn’t it, when you think of how much time they spend in bonding and being close to their babies, and nursing their babies, even though they don’t have such a long lifespan as we do.

It’s amazing, isn’t it, how animals can be so close and willing to nurse and nurture and nourish their little babies, when often human mothers can leave their babies! I find that so hard to take in. I wonder what it is, because we, being the most intelligent beings that God has created, we should have even greater understanding of the importance of that nurturing with our little ones.

I thought I’d tell you about some of these mammals, just to encourage you. What does the Bible say? “Doth not even nature itself teach you?” Yes, we can learn even from nature, by their example. Our example should be greater.  

Oh, some other interesting things about the orangutan. They have to do a lot of teaching to their young. That’s another reason they stay close together. They’re teaching them all the ways of the forest, and all the different seasons of the fruit trees, and when they’re at harvesting. They’ve got to know it all, because they’ve got to stay alive. They do eat mostly fruit, although when that is scarce, they have to feed on tree barks and insects and birds’ eggs.

But their favorite fruit is durian. Have you even heard of durian? Well, I first came across it many, many years ago when Colin and I were first married. We went to the Philippine Islands as missionaries. When Colin and I were engaged, my future husband went out full time in work for the Lord in New Zealand. We were with an organization called “Tell New Zealand Crusade.” He was involved in taking a copy of the gospel of John personally to every home in New Zealand, along with others.

Then from there, we took that same vision to the Philippine Islands. We were taking out the gospel of John into this nation. It was called “Tell the Nations Crusade.” We went to the Philippines and there we discovered durian.

But I’m so sorry. I have to confess that I never, ever ate it when I was there because there’s a little phrase about durian. This is what people say: “It tastes like heaven, but it smells like hell!” And it did! Oh, goodness me! It was the most terrible smell! I simply could not get past the smell. So, I never ate durian in the Philippines.

Eventually we went back to New Zealand. Later on in the years, we did ministry over in Singapore and Malaysia. It was there that I actually got to love durian. Now back in the Philippines where we were living in Davao City in Mindanao Island, down in the south, Davao was the durian capital of the world! And to think I didn’t even eat it when I was there.

But I can remember gathering up courage to get past the smell, and to eat it when I was in Malaysia. Oh, goodness me! The taste is truly gorgeous! It is so very rich. I could never ever eat it with any other food because it was just too rich. You could have it on its own, and oh! It was so beautiful! I got to really, really love it.

Maybe if I went back to the Philippines again now, I’d love to eat durian. But there was something else when we lived in the Philippines that I never ever ate. It was called balut. We were living down this dirt road in a compound with other Filipinos. Every time I walked out the door and crossed the road, there would be all these Filipinos making balut. And soon as they saw me, they’d call out, “Balut! Balut!” This is what they would do to every passerby because it was a street food. They sold it on the street.

And what was balut? Well, it’s either a chicken egg, or a duck egg, which they boil or steam. But ladies, there is a little bit more to it because it’s not just an egg. They wait for about 21 days before they cook it, so you’re not actually eating an egg. You are eating an embryo!

I could never ever get up courage to eat that half-chicken in the egg, so I actually didn’t taste balut while I was there. I think if I went back now, as I said before, I would try it now. But that was a long time ago. It was when we were first married. Actually, in ten days’ time, my husband and I will celebrate being married for 60 years! That’s right! Six-zero.

Talking about fruit, though, last night I was over at Serene’s. We were having supper with them. I was asking her about her new book that she is writing. She’s currently writing “Trim Healthy Grow.” It’s all for mothers who are in their childbearing years, their fertility years, and for when they’re pregnant and nursing. It’s going to be such an amazing book with all the information you’ll ever, ever need to know.

She was mentioning just a little thing, how that if a pregnant mother eats four or more apples a week, it will be so beneficial for her. It will prevent anemia, prevent gestational diabetes, prevent respiratory problems, and asthma. It also has lot of antioxidants and will strengthen the lungs and especially will strengthen the lungs of your baby that you’re carrying in the womb and lower the chances of them developing asthma later on. It also lowers the chances of birth defects.

I thought that was amazing because it wasn’t some great big thing you had to do. Just eat an apple! Isn’t that amazing? I thought, “Well, that’s a great little hint to pass on to pregnant moms. Eat four or more apples every week. It will be such a blessing to you and your baby. Of course, I think it would be best to eat organic apples, or if you can’t afford them, to at least peel the skins, because I know they do spray the apples a lot. That was most interesting.

Here we are, talking about elevating motherhood to the place where God has put it. We even see through these animals that God has created, the way they mother. Now, getting on to some other things, I think another thing that we should elevate in our homes is our table.

ELEVATE THE VALUE OF YOUR TABLE

The table just looks like an ordinary thing in our home, but I find that many times, families don’t realize the power of their table. I believe that our children will respond according to how much we elevate the table in our home. I’m not talking about making your table higher physically. No, I’m talking about the value that you put upon your table.

Often we’re so busy, and time for another meal. We just put some food together, throw it out on the table. “Come and get it, everybody!” We even put it out on the table, just as it is. We don’t do anything special. It’s just a naked table. So, everybody comes running. They’re hungry. They gobble up some food and they leave. There’s nothing special about the table.

But I believe that if we will just elevate the value that we put on the table, our children will rise to a higher level of behavior at the table. I have seen this happen. Children’s behavior will be according to how you value your table.

Just to put the tablecloth on the table. It’s a very simple thing, although maybe you could be saying, “Well, that is extra work for me.” When you have little ones, you don’t want to be having too much extra washing. So, you may not want to put on a new tablecloth. But you can buy plastic tablecloths that look like real tablecloths. You can get them at JoAnn, probably at Hobby Lobby. You can go and cut it off to how long you want it. Beautiful, beautiful patterns. Just put something pretty on your table.

Maybe all day it’s had books, and you’ve been homeschooling there, and it’s got junk and stuff on it. You’ve got to get all that off. But don’t just bring your family to a naked table. No, put that tablecloth on. And set the table.

Even the Bible talks about setting that table. In Proverbs 9:1-3 it says: “Wisdom hath builded her house. She hath hewn out her seven pillars. She hath killed her beasts. She hath mingled her wines. She hath furnished her table.” She has set her table. She’s made it look beautiful. Now she has all the food on it.

Who is the one who does that? The woman of wisdom. She is the one who prepares and furnishes and sets her table. I think it’s a beautiful thing to do. Even setting the table. It’s a little different here in America. Back in New Zealand, with our English tradition, we always set the table properly, with knives, forks and spoons if we’re having dessert, too.

Here in America, most people just throw down a fork on the table. That’s fine, even if you want to set the table with just a fork. But I think that most Americans don’t even know how to set a table. You can go onto the internet and it will give you a picture of exactly how you are to set your knife, fork, spoon and where to place them.

I do think that is a very important thing for children to learn, even if once a week you set a table properly, as a table is meant to be set. The other nights, you may just want to put the forks, perhaps, even though you’re still going to put a tablecloth. Even if it’s not a real one, just the plastic which you just wipe down. You have to wipe down your table anyway.

But it would be a good idea, I think, to set a table properly so your children grow up knowing how to do this. I find that most young people who come into our home have no idea of how a table is properly set. I was interested when we were on this cruise. Every night (coming to the dining table on an American ship) but the table was set exactly how it’s meant to be.

So, they actually do do it in America! It does something. You can always add something special to the table. Maybe a candle. Maybe some flowers. They can even be wildflowers. Maybe springtime is coming, and soon different little flowers will appear. You can bring them to the table. Or you can bring something of interest, just to make a centerpiece of something interesting to talk about.

You don’t have to be doing all this yourself. You’re teaching young children. You’re teaching them how to do it. Now, ladies, dear mothers, if we’re not teaching our children these very basic things, how will they pass on to the next generation? Already we have a generation of most children and young people who don’t actually know how to set a table properly. That’s the most basic thing in life. We need to be teaching these basic little things.

I think I’ve told you before. It’s worth telling you again. The little phrase that I love to use about the table, I got this from a movie I watched years ago, Babette’s Feast, where this gentleman in this movie said these words. He talked about a woman who was a great chef. He said, “There is a woman who knows how to make every meal into a love affair.”

I was really arrested by those words. I think that’s an amazing vision to have. So, you’re not just putting down some food on the table. No, you’re thinking of how you can make it special! It’s a good idea, ladies, if once a week you do something special. In our home, we do Shabbat every week. But you can do other things.

When our children were growing, I would always think of something different to do, maybe at least once a week. Sometimes I would write name places. We often write name places for guests when they’re coming, don’t we? But it’s something beautiful you can do for your children too. I would get a bit of cardboard folded over so it could stand up, and write their name, but not just their name. Sometimes I would put their name, and then some special phrase or word beside their name that started with the same letter. Like “Billy—Bold for God.”

Just a little thing like that. Sometimes I would spend some time, maybe a couple of weeks before I would do it. I would be writing a little couplet, or sometimes a little four-line rhyme for the children about their character. I would write that for them. Sometimes I would write a limerick for them.

So, they will get this, and it will be on their plate when they come to the table. It is so special for them. It’s amazing. When you do these little things, children spark up. They want to be good at the table because it’s something special. Even when little children see a candle lit, oh, it really does something special for them. You can think of all these different ideas.

Of course, another thing; not only remembering to prepare your food, but preparing what you will talk about. Think about it beforehand. Think of some questions you can bring to your children to ask them at the table, maybe a subject you’d like to discuss with them. Get each one to take a turn at sharing what they think about it.

FACE TO FACE TABLE FELLOWSHIP

Anything new that you are learning, because we should all be seeking to learn something new all the time. Well, share it with the children at the table! Ask them, “Have you learned anything new today?” Get them to share that so that when you’re there, you’re all interacting together. That’s what the table is. It’s interaction. It’s face-to-face, table fellowship. That’s why we’re sitting around because we can communicate with one another. That’s very important.

If the children come to the table, and you all just sit there and you don’t have anything prepared for what you’re going to talk about, no questions to ask, well, you will find that the conversation is pretty boring. Goes nowhere and nothing happens.

You see, you have to make things happen. The affirmation I use constantly is,

“Things don’t just happen. You have to make them happen.”

You can make your table as wonderful or amazing as you want it. You just have to make it happen! And then it becomes such a glorious, wonderful place! Yes!

But there are a few other things that I think are important to remember about a table. These are all things that we’re teaching our children, not only for the blessing in our own home, but when they go to other homes. And that is, firstly that when they come to the table, of course, when they come, they’re going to come on time.

Well, usually we have about the time we’re going to eat. So, we need to remind our children to come at that time so that they’re around you as you’re finishing off preparing the meal. They can be helping you, doing last-minute things, and then you’ll have the helpers around you anyway, chopping and cutting up, and helping with the preparation of the meal. Because the mother should never do it on her own.

Even from when children are little, she is teaching them how to help her prepare, cut, and chop. It’s amazing how even young children can do this so amazingly! I’ve seen young children who are better than some adults! Some of those adults never had much training. Then there are other children who hardly even know how to cut a piece of celery! They’ve never done it! Start with your children when they are young. They are part of preparing the meal.

SIT AT THE TABLE

Then you’re all going to sit down together, and guess what? You’re going to sit! Yes, we do sit at the table. Isn’t that a strange thing to say, that we have to sit at the table? But so many today don’t even sit for their meals! They don’t even sit around the table. Oh, goodness me! It is so important to sit, because the Bible talks so much about sitting at the table!

I’ve been reading through the gospels, and I read, “And Jesus sat at the table.” In another place, “He was at the table.” So much of where Jesus taught, and even where miracles happened, was at the table, where they were sitting.

I think of the example of the feeding of the 5,000. This particular miracle, ladies, is mentioned in every one of the four gospels. It’s very interesting. When Jesus fed the 5,000, plus women and children, do you remember reading how Jesus would not feed this multitude until every single person was sitting down?

Another interesting thing, let’s start off with Matthew, of course. Matthew 14, verses 13 and onwards. In Matthew 14:19, it says something very interesting: “And Jesus commanded the multitude to sit down on the ground.” Isn’t that interesting? It didn’t say, “And He said, ‘Oh, well, I think it would be great if you all sat down.’” No, He commanded.

In fact, if we go over to the Mark passage, that’s in Mark 6:39. Here it says: “And He commanded them,” that’s the disciples, “He commanded,” the same word again, “He commanded the disciples to make all sit down by companies upon the green grass. And they sat down by ranks, by hundreds, and by fifties.” And then it goes on to say how He blessed the bread and gave it to them. But once again, we see the word “commanded.” He commanded the disciples, and He said to His disciples, “Now you make them sit down.” Isn’t that interesting?

Go over to Luke’s gospel. Here we read the same story again in Luke 9. What does it say here? Luke 9:14: “And there were about 5,000 men. And He said to His disciples, ‘Make them sit down by fifties, in a company.’ And they did so, and made them all sit down.” Now, do you notice those words again? They “made them all sit down.” And then verse 16: “And then Jesus took the five loaves and the two fishes and gave it to them all.” Isn’t that interesting? Jesus did not give them the food until everyone was sitting down. And He had to make them.

Now, it’s interesting that we have those words “commanded,” and “make,” because oh, dear lovely mothers, I know that you face this all the time, because when you’re teaching your children, when you’re training them, you’re teaching them to sit down. You find, oops, they pop up! One will run to the toilet, and they want to do this, and they want to do that. But you’re teaching them to sit down.

YOU’RE NOT MEANT TO EAT “ON THE RUN”

I want you to be reminded that it is a biblical thing. It’s not just for the sake of sitting down. It is because, when you sit down to eat, you will receive far more nutrients from your food by just sitting, relaxing, and eating than just eating standing up, or eating on the run. We’re not meant to eat on the run.

Today, in our busy lives, people do this all the time. They’ll just grab something, eat on the run. No, you might as well not eat. Jesus gave the example. He wants us to sit down. There’s another passage, where there were so many crowds around, and Jesus was healing everyone. It was lunch time, and they were hungry. He said to His disciples, “Come, look, we’re going to find a quiet place where we can sit and where we have leisure” (Mark 6:31).

Interesting. He uses the word “leisure,” because it would have been so easy for them. Jesus could have said, “Oh, OK, just go and get some food, and we’ll eat this as we’re continuing to heal the people and everything.” No, Jesus stopped, and He took time to take a leisurely time to eat. All this is in the Bible.

And then, the last gospel, John, it says it again. John 6:10: “And Jesus said, ‘Make the men sit down.’ Now, there was much grass in the place. So, the men sat down, in the number about 5,000. And Jesus took the loaves, and when He had given thanks, He distributed to the disciples, and the disciples to them that were sat down.” Those are the ones who got the food. Isn’t that interesting? Yes, I love having a Scriptural basis for everything we do. Don’t you?

Now, when your children come to the table, where do they sit? Do they just run and sit anywhere? Oh, I guess they can if they want. It depends on what you like to do in your family. Everybody likes to do things differently.

I do think it’s so important for the husband to sit at the head of the table, because he is the head of the home. I think it’s a beautiful way for the wife to honor her husband as the head as she places his plate at the head of the table. It’s wonderful for the children without having to be lectured about it. They just see that Daddy is the head of the home. And he takes his place there. It establishes his headship and his authority without having to say anything.

We see a little placing of people way back in another story in the Old Testament. Actually, one mother came to me, and she said, “Oh, Nancy, I don’t know what to do. My children sit down, and they all squabble, because one wants to sit here, and one wants to sit there, and they’re all fighting over where they’re going to sit.” I said, “Well, look. Why don’t you make assigned seating? And tell them exactly where they will sit?”

I think this is a very good idea, because it takes away a lot of children from wanting to do their own thing. And, of course, you can change that from time to time. Maybe in a month or two, and they can then have different places. But they should know where they’re going to sit.

We see this, actually, in the story of where David was beginning to see that King Saul was against him. It was getting a bit scary, because he was starting to throw javelins at him and everything. He and Jonathan went out into the field to decide what they would do. They made up a plan.

1 Samuel 20:5: “And David said unto Jonathan, Behold, tomorrow is the new moon, and I should not fail to sit with the king at meat.” That means at the table for supper. “But let me go, that I may hide myself in the field unto the third day.” So, he’s saying here, “OK, I should never fail to be at the table.” If he wasn’t in his place, well, something would have happened. But anyway, they’re going to see if they can make this work and find out what will happen.

Down in verse 18, “Then Jonathan said to David, Tomorrow is the new moon: and thou shalt be missed, because thy seat will be empty.” Isn’t that interesting? There was a seat for each person at the table. They knew his seat would be empty and what would King Saul say?

The story goes on, and it comes to the evening meal. The king sat at his table, in his usual place. Yes, against the wall, with Jonathan sitting opposite him, and Abner beside him. You see how everyone had a different place? And isn’t that amazing, ladies? Why does the Bible take time to explain even little things like this? Just the place at the table. Because all these things are important.

Then it goes on to say, “But David’s place was empty.” And, of course, the story goes on then, of how eventually David did have to leave, knowing that King Saul was so angry with him. There we see how all these little things are so important.

NO IPHONES AT THE TABLE

Of course, at your table, you will never have any iPhones, will you? Oh, can you believe it? I’ve had people at my table, and I have seen them looking down, sort of down past the table. I know that they’re looking at their iPhone which is on their knees, hidden away. I’ve had to say, “Sorry. We don’t have iPhones at our table.” You see, that is the rudest thing you can ever do!

It’s amazing. People today are so addicted to their iPhones. They can’t even leave them to come to the table! They’ve got to have them. You go to a restaurant, and you see families and they’re all just looking at their iPhones. They’re not even communicating with one another. But the table is for communication. We put iPhones away. You might like a basket, where they can all put them, as they come to the table, or whatever you want to do. But we don’t do that.

DO NOT WHISPER PRIVATELY AT THE TABLE

No whispering with one another at the table. To whisper to someone else at the table is, once again, so rude. You don’t do that in front of people. At the table, if what you’re going to say can’t be said to everybody, well, don’t say it at all.

I have never allowed whispering at the table to someone, or even having private conversations. No, we don’t have private conversations. We are a “togetherness.” We are together as a family so we all communicate together. You have to learn how to encourage that, and teach your children that.

Time has gone, but I know you know all these things. But I want to just encourage you in them and remind you of them, because we’re transmitting these things to the next generation. If we’re not doing them in our homes, if we’re not training in our homes, it will be lost!

In fact, I had some friends. They were forever going out for meals all the time. They went out. I said to them, “Help! How are your children going to know how to even have a meal at home if you just go out all the time?” This is the thing. We’ve got to think about the following generation. What are WE passing on to them?

“Lord, we thank You for another time together. We thank You for family. We thank You that this is the plan, Your eternal plan, for the way You want us to live as families in our homes. Lord God, help us to establish strong, healthy, godly homes, and a beautiful family life.

“I pray that You will bless every mother, father, children, and families who are listening. In Jesus’ Name, amen”.

Blessings from Nancy Campbell

This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

www.aboverubies.org

Transcribed by Darlene Norris *This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

P.S. More information from Darlene:

“Haha, now there's going to be a run on thrift stores, with people looking to buy old Bibles and dictionaries! 😉 But you know, I was reading today how the censors have "updated" Roald Dahl's books. The article said that Amazon had already "updated" books that people had downloaded onto their Kindles! The author said this is why you should have hard copies of books. 

Andrew (her husband) has been saying the same thing. He says we should always have hard copies of the Bible, not just electronic ones. It's very handy to have them on your phone, or your Kindle, but he said that if the powers that be decided to change them, most people would never know the difference! And he's right. We'll keep adding to our collection as we go along!”