Transcript

Dr. Jessica Peck prescribes Hope for healthy Families on American Family Radio

Hello, and welcome to the Dr. Nurse. Mama show, prescribing Hope for healthy Families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: And mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck. Well, hey there, friends, and welcome to my favorite part of the afternoon, getting to spend time with you, prescribing Hope for healthy Families.

Parents have an opportunity to help shape their children's worldview on Worldview Wednesday

Are you needing hope where you are? Well, we've got hope for you. If you've been listening in since January, I promised you a recurring segment called Worldview Wednesday. And today is that day. It's Wednesday. And we're having a Worldview Wednesday. And I'm really excited about this because as we've been talking about, we've been looking at some of the research from Dr. George Barna that's come out on Worldview. And really, the conviction is that children's worldview is pretty much set by the time they're 13. Now, don't go thinking there's no hope for those afterwards. There is always hope. But we really want to encourage parents to be very intentional. And our prescription for hope today is to be a worldview influencer in a world where influencer culture reigns supreme. Don't forget that you as parents, as invested grandparents, you have such a great opportunity and the biggest opportunity to be the most influential person in helping your children and grandchildren develop their worldview. Now, here's the catch. Got to do that intentionally. And I think as we're talking, I know if you're listening to this program, you're already invested. You think, I want this, but it's just not enough to be invested. We've got to be intentional about our investment. We can't just let this passively happen. We can't just take our kids to church on Sunday and hope for the best. We have really got to be intentional in shaping our children's worldview.

WorldView Wednesday focuses on who shapes a child's worldview

So I'm really delighted to have back on WorldView Wednesday, Dr. Josh Mulvihill He leads Renewanation as the executive director. And he is so qualified. He is a pastor, he is a dad, he's a husband. He has a PhD in family ministry. He has written a lot of books. And the book that we're going to talk about today is the book that we've been talking about. So if you've missed the past couple Worldview Wednesdays that we've done, then go back and take a listen to that.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: His book is Biblical Worldview.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: What It Is, why It Matters, and How to Shape the Next. How to Shape the Worldview of the Next Generation. Don't go away Today, because in a little while, we're going to be giving away a copy of this book to one of our listeners. So you're going to want to be in on that. So, Josh, thank you so much for joining us again. It is always a privilege and a joy to have you on talking about this really important topic.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah, it's great to be back. And, man, this is such an important topic. So I'm honored to be here.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: It is, because I think that's part of. We've discussed this before, Josh. This is part of what is driving youth mental health crisis today. This crisis of worldview, this sense that the world is on fire, it's chaotic, it's changing, and the ability to give kids the message that, hey, there is a truth that is timeless, that is trustworthy, that never changes. It's so important. And so in our first two conversations together, we've talked about what, why worldview matters. We went over six reasons. Every child needs a biblical worldview. Last time, we talked about what is a biblical worldview, because we all kind of say, yeah, we believe that, but what is it really? So we talked about the specific set of beliefs about life that determines how we live. You gave some great questions for parents to ask themselves to think. Do I have a biblical worldview and am I imparting that to our kids? But today we're really going to drill down on who shapes a child's worldview. And you believe, Josh, that there are five significant influencers in the life of a child. So tell us about that.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah, that's. Ah, man, it's a fun topic we're going to be talking about today. And before we jump into the five, I would just say this is real helpful. whether you're parent, grandparent, pastor, educator, whoever, you know, whatever influence you have over kids be thinking through, you know, who are the primary influences and how do we become intentional about what is going into the hearts and minds of, children? That's kind of the whole point. yeah. So there was a study done by George barna of, 602 teenagers. And he asked them, you know, up to this point, point in your life, essentially kind of who's shaped you the most? How have you become the person you've become? And so then Barna said these were kind of the five that came to the surface of the answers for that survey. And I'm going to guess the first one's not a surprise to most people. The greatest influence that this survey found was parents as the strongest influence. and that doesn't surprise me. I don't know if that. Does that surprise you at all, Dr. Peck?

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, it really doesn't. And I'm so glad that you said that, Josh, because, this is a common misconception I get. Parents really believe this lie that they aren't. That their kids really don't care what they say, that they care more about what their friends say. And usually, even when I'm teaching pediatric nurse practitioners, they think that coming in like, oh, that the friends are the more significant influence. But secular research also mirrors what Barna found, and saying that no parents are by far the most influential. And Josh, they're more influential when they have a better, stronger relationship. So when they are. Have a healthy relationship, there is just nothing else compares, you know, for that. But when there's not a healthy relationship there, that's when you've got other influences that start to creep in. So, no, it doesn't surprise me at all. What did you think about it?

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: That's a great qualification that you have, that the strength of the relationship, if that's present and occurring. I think the peer influence comes in, as you mentioned, when things aren't going great in the home with kids, and then that essentially fills the gap that parents are not having with their kids. So that should be a great encouragement to all the listeners that are really striving to have an intimate, strong relationship with their children. And as we build that and it spans into the teen years, provides the foundation for an intentional worldview development. So, yeah, parents were number one. Number two on the list, though, is a surprise to a lot of people. You want to. I feel like we should, like, drum roll, raise hands for guests. Yeah, right. yeah. The number two one that Barna found was other family members, he said, typically grandparents. And, you know, at first I was kind of like, wow, that, you know, that was kind of unexpected. But as I thought about it, it made a little more sense to me simply from, the standpoint of who else has a relationship with our children from the time they're born all the way up to the time they enter into the adult years. A lot of the other relationships in their life, while they're still significant, they will change over the years. teachers will come and go, pastors will come and go. Even, and even coaches, they'll have them for a few years, potentially. But grandparents, they're there. should God give grandparents a long life? They're there for that whole season. and that's pretty rare for children. To have that from birth through the adult years. So I like to think about this almost as the potential influence of grandparents because I think there's a lot of grandparents that really don't have as great of an influence as they could. And I'm curious for you, Jessica.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: just in this grandparents grandparent influence, just for you personally, what, what influence did your grandparents have on you and, and your faith?

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well Josh, I'm so glad that you asked that. Now on one side of the family, you know, there was a lot of brokenness, honestly, and a lot of divorce. And so I did not. And my biological grandfather actually died before I was born and so I never knew him. And so there was, you know, I didn't have that. But on the other side I had grandparents who were very engaged and involved. And in fact probably my regular listeners are like, oh, here she goes, she's going to talk about granny again. Yes I am. Because my grandmother was such a precious soul, Josh. She was a beacon of faith. She was in church every Sunday. She was the I've got my guidepost devotional open on the bathroom counter to the right day with my tithing check as my as my bookmark. She was constantly serving, she was throwing baby showers. I don't even know how many baby quilts she made. But she prayed over every stitch that she made. She prayed over every ingredient she put into a cookie. She was the welcome wagon in the neighborhood and she actually, I got her picture on the shelf behind me here in my office because she just is such an influence. And even the book that I wrote, the, the key on the front is significant of a key that she gave me in my life. So she definitely, definitely influenced me and I'm so grateful for her.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: What a blessing. That is incredible.

Josh: I think our culture tells grandparents that their influence is waning

You know, I think for those, I guess there's two people I want to talk to listening right now. One is the adult children like me. I'm not a grandparent yet. you know, God's given our parents, the grandparents of our children, a role with our kids. And you know, there's a whole lot of dynamics present with families that you know, there takes wisdom and discernment there. But if we just go to like the 30,000 foot view. God's given grandparents a role scripturally. And I think it's pleasing to God for us to invite grandparents in should the relationship be one that allows that the other one to mention is just to grandparents specifically. I think our culture tells grandparents that they Largely their best days are behind, and their influence is waning. And what we see from God's word is something very different, that grandparents matter significantly. And, I was actually, preaching at a church a few weeks ago, and I, was preaching through. Psalm 78 talks about having a vision for four generations to disciple them. And I kind of preached through that. And the grandparents came up afterwards with tears in their eyes and they said to me, we have 24 grandkids, Josh. And we were feeling a little bit lost, like, what's our purpose? What's our place in life at this point? And the grandmother said, I have just from God's word today, I have a sense of purpose in life that I can disciple my grandkids. And I think that's been lost in large part in our culture. Our culture tells grandparents, your job is to spoil your grandkids and send them home where the real work of spiritual formation is done. And of course, God's given parents the primary stewardship of kids, but he's also given grandparents a role. so here's the big picture, I guess. Parents, you have a goldmine in grandparents to build into your kids, to help them know love, serve Jesus as a father of five. I'll take all the help I can get, you know, with my five kids.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Absolutely.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: And yeah, and grandparents, you know, this is a great season to capture a vision for God's design for you. So, you know, Josh, wouldn't it be amazing?

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: It would be amazing. I was going to say that I heard from one of my friends who was retiring, but she said, I'm not retiring, I'm refiring. And I thought that's so great. I'm going to say steal that when I get to that age, because that's what I see a lot of grandparents do. They're re firing, they're just redirecting their influence because, you know Josh. And actually we should say, Josh, that your entry into ministry has a really, big twist with writing to grandparents before you became a grandparent yourself. So go back and listen to that first show that we had with Josh, and he talked all about discipling, discipling grandkids and the, and the opportunity there. But you know, Josh, I just want to push back on the narrative that, you know, that young people don't respect old people, that they don't want to be around old people, that there's some ageism, there. Grandparents really are cool again because this generation, especially Gen Z, they are really enamored with things that they call vintage. I'm talking about things like this is going to hurt a little bit. VCRs, Walkmans, you know, actual photographs in a an album. Kids are listening to records. I know my teens and young adults all listen to actual records on a record player. We look at the fashion trends. Josh and coastal grandma is really cool. Like to dress like a coastal grandma or grandma couture is actually a design style, a home design style. And it's so funny because I'm looking at these, you know, 20 somethings designing their home that looks just like my granny's house. Like it's just got a lot of pattern, a lot of texture, a lot of personality. And so to grandparents out there, don't think that your influence is over and kids want to talk with you. You have social skills, old school social skills that they need desperately because so much of their communication is digital. You can communicate with them in person and you've got the time to do that. So pursue them, be bold enough to ask them meaningful questions. Gen Z is hungry for meaningful conversation.

Preborn helps rescue babies from abortion and lead their families to Christ

Well, we told you about the top two of the top five influencers. That means we've got three influencers left. And we're going to give away a copy of this book at 1-888-589-8840. That's 888-589-8840. Don't go away. We'll have more with Dr. Josh Mulvihill on the other side of this break.

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You make everything beautiful by FOR KING + COUNTRY and Rebecca St. James

Grant. Me serenity, Lord, and patience for things will take time. Grant me freedom to walk a new path and let me feel your love in my weakness. You can shine in your strength I can fly, You make everything, everything beautiful. You make everything, everything new you make everything, everything beautiful in it's time, in your time. It's beautiful.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That song is you make everything beautiful by FOR KING + COUNTRY and Rebecca St. James. If you haven't seen the movie that that song is from, it is from the movie Unsung Hero, which is the origin story of the group FOR KING + COUNTRY Beautiful movie celebrating family. And so if you're looking for something to watch with your family, that would be a great one to check out. But we're talking about how God makes everything beautiful in his time and he is making your family beautiful. It seems like in this world, everything is just so chaotic and so often hopeless. We see a lot of things on the news that are discouraging, that are downright scary. We are empowering you with hope. And our hope today that we're giving you is how to be a worldview influencer, how to influence the worldview of your children. We're talking with Dr. Josh Mulvihill from Renewanation And if you're looking for more information from him, you can go to renewanation.org That's renewanation.org and we're talking about his book Biblical worldview, what it is, why it matters, and how to shape the worldview of the next generation.

Josh: Top five influencers of a child's worldview come from teachers

So, Josh, we have talked about, we're talking about the top five influencers of a child's worldview. We've talked about parents, we've talked about grandparents, and where's the other three? Let's pick up where we left off.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah. Drumroll for number three. according to this survey, it came in as teachers. Ah and coaches. And, again, the logic with this, as I'm trying to think through, how did they end up at number three? I think it's largely just a math equation with the amount of time children have in kindergarten through 12th grade, around 16,000 hours in the classroom. That's a lot of time.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: That is so much time.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah. I mean, that shapes who we become and what we value and how we look at the world. So I'd be curious, Jessica, did you have any teachers, or coaches that really influenced, your life in any way?

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, I really did, and I can think of ones that influenced my faith. But, you know, honestly, Josh, I was a really timid student, and when I went to. I barely got my associate degree. I'm just going to put it out there. I've been very transparent about that. Working three jobs to put yourself through school will do that. And when I went back to a community college, I had one professor who announced that I got the highest grade in the class. I had never, I don't think, done that before. And he came up to me afterwards and he said, you know, you're smart, right? And I said, no, actually, I don't. But I think about that, you know, even now, gosh, that was probably 30 years ago. And think about that influence. but I did also have many teachers who were very influential in faith.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Wow. Those words, that teachers speak are impactful. And, I can see how that looks like that maybe shaped a path in your life moving forward with education.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Yeah, absolutely. And. And so I just want to say, if you're hearing any noise, we're having a little interference with some construction. So I'm trying to do my best to mitigate that, but. Yeah, but, you know, I think, Josh, that this isn't surprising when we hear about how much time. When you start to think about how much time kids spend with teachers and coaches, and then you compare that to the time if they're, you know, going outside the home for school. That's a lot of time. That is really a lot of time. And it challenges me to be more intentional with the time that I do have. If your kids are going to school now, there are a lot of families out there who would say, hey, that's why we homeschool. And I'm sure that you could speak to that, too.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah. So let's think about the different educational, places our kids are. So, you know, public school, private school, homeschool. I know that the topic of education tends to be a sensitive one. Yeah, but we do need to think about that because it does impact who our kids become very significantly. And so, I'll just speak that a little bit here. if our kids are going to be in a public school setting, I think it's safe to say that they're not going to have a biblical worldview developed, from that approach. So that means in the public school world, as parents, we know that, we know some of the things our kids are going to be exposed to. Evolutionary thinking, some LGBTQ stuff that's in curriculum, but oftentimes it's not what's in the curriculum. I mean, that is part of it, but it's also what's not in the curriculum. that's a big deal. So every time that a curriculum is presented, it will be presented void of God and thinking through. Then a subject like science, history, math will be presenting that from a non Christian perspective. And if we know that, we go in thinking that just means, okay, I'm going to have to, you know, everything my kids read, everything they watch, we're going to need to be watching and reading ourselves and then have conversations at home. as a pastor, one of the things I used to do with our public school parents, I'd give them the curriculum. I bought the fifth grade curriculum from our closest school right down the road, science, history, and said, okay, I just got a little assignment for you. It will be on Sunday. morning class. Find the truth claims on the first 10 pages here of the science math curriculum for fifth graders. Because a lot of parents are under the assumption their child is able to catch that. Come home, have conversations and they'll talk through it. as soon as we did that, parents, they caught many things, but a lot of times there was many things that slipped through. The, last time I did this, one example, there was a dichotomy made between, science and pseudoscience. And of course pseudoscience was presenting, ah, religion as this kind of fake. you know, there's no objectivity to it. It's all feelings and it's not true. Essentially, it was just say Christianity, but essentially was pointing to Christianity. And you know, as we talked through that, you know, it was pretty eye opening for a lot of the parents that, wow, we actually missed quite a bit of stuff here. We're expecting our, you know, our 10 year old, 11 year old to catch this and come home and have conversations with us. And so, you know, for a lot of us it means we have to do some work at home on a pretty regular basis to be on top of this stuff, to teach our kids, in the public school setting, in the Christian school setting, we work with a lot of Christian schools at Renew Nation, and I would say about 50%, don't use Christian curriculum. And they are kind of Christian in name and environment. They might have a Bible class, they might have a chapel, and Christian teachers, of course. But just because the name Christian's on it, doesn't mean that we let down our guard. We still need to be, watching, reading, staying on top of, and part of that whole educational process. We, homeschool our kids in part because we want to have influence on this side of things. We want to teach the topics science, math, history, from a Christian perspective to our kids. and that's just been our aim.

Josh: The Bible does speak a lot about education

And last thing I'll say with education, a lot of people think that the Bible doesn't really have much to say on the topic of education. and I'll push back a little bit on that. God created three institutions. He created the church, the family, and government. There's no fourth institution of education. We kind of treat it as such. And so that means education has to live in one of those three institutions. And the question is, who did God give the responsibility of education to his children? Was it parents, church or government? we know from scripture that's not the government. Romans 13 gives us very clear, definition of what God's role is for the government. it doesn't mean that we can't share that role. God firmly places that, by the way, in the parent arena. It doesn't mean every family has to homeschool. but it does mean that parents are ultimately responsible at the end of the day if they choose to send their children to a different educational, choice. So I said the Bible does speak a lot about education. It just does. So from the perspective of language, like learning, teach. the Bible is really prescriptive actually on what we're to teach children. teach children God's laws, God's character, God's word, very prescriptive, mind, knowledge. All these words are actually, education, language. So when the Bible says in Ephesians 6, 4, raise your children in the instruction of the Lord. So that's education, language. And that gives dads a pretty important role in the home. So all that to say, I'm not trying to throw a grenade out on education here, but we do need to be Thoughtful that it really is, extremely transformative in the life of a child. And I think sometimes, we might downplay that, pretty significantly. So you're, you know, whatever, whatever course you've chosen for a child, you know, we have to, it doesn't change the fact that we have to be very hands on.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, I agree with you, Josh. I think education is a very sensitive issue and, and a lot of parents can feel judgment about their choice and that's, that's certainly not the intent. We know. And from what I hear you saying that every parent has the responsibility to prayerfully consider what God has for their family and what they're able to do depending, and that's going to depend honestly on sometimes on the resource, on the ability, on the family situation. Sometimes there can be health struggles, I mean, all kinds of reasons that, that go into those education choices. But what I'm hearing you say, and I think is one of the most important takeaways is that sometimes we just focus on, say they are in an external education setting. We focus on okay, what are the bad things, let's find them and, and let's stop them, but really walking alongside them and not just depending on wherever they're educated to be the sole influencer of their worldview. It doesn't replace that. Just like you said, even if they go to a Christian school or even if they're going to a homeschool, you still have to think about how are you intentionally shaping their worldview. And there's, there are risks and benefits and in any sphere, you know, that you're looking at, and obviously some, some of those options are going to have a greater advantage, a built in advantage than others. But I think that, you know, just that concept of being alert, being aware and walking them through those things, that's so important.

Josh: It's really important for parents to be engaged in kids' media

And I want to do a little chase, a chase, a little rabbit here, honestly Josh, because this is what I see on the media too. And we'll talk about that a little bit. But whether, whatever media they're consuming, whether they're streaming something or it's media that they're watching for school, or books, media that they're reading for school, any of those messages that are coming in, it's really important for parents to be engaged. So I get asked a lot like what, what media should kids, you know, watch? What's safe to watch? And, and I just say, you know, whatever they're watching, the safest way to view it is together. And I believe that's true across the Education sphere, Josh, whether that's reading the, the books that they're assigned to read at school so that you can walk them through interpreting those messages. Because if you don't, if you're not there, then that just leaves a void for their own immature reasoning. They don't have mature cognitive reasoning. And when we look at pulling in those morals and spiritual values from a developmental lens, they can't do that really maturely until the late teens and early twenties. So modeling that with them and helping them to interpret all of these messages that they're getting from education, I think is really important. How do you feel about that?

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: I think it's a great point. Basically, wherever your kids are, you should be there as well. you know, in media and education and if you combine those two together, it's about 30,000 hours for a child between kindergarten and 12th grade. I mean, it's a massive impact. I, think the average child in the grade school years, what I've read is about 7 hours per day on media. And for teenagers that goes up a little bit to about nine hours per day. And you think, well, how's that even possible? That's like, a lot of time.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Full time job.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah, but you know, I see it with my kids. You know, they get up and it's like they want to text their friends on, you know, and they, you know, are wanting to look at the iPad. And you know, you go to the store and you put your child in the cart and while you're shopping it's like, hm, the phone, you know, boom. And like suddenly you're like, wow, that doesn't seem so far fetched. but you know, sin knows no age and so lies know no age. So it's coming through with the screens that our kids are watching. So, you know, it just means we need to be really mindful and have some boundaries with what's seen with our kids. And it's okay to say no. you know, for our family, we've chosen not to have mini video game systems in our house. We got the old, we actually have the old Atari and Nintendo sometimes that we pull out. but not, we don't just have. Yeah, right. The old, like old school ones, I can actually compete, compete with my kids, you know. But, you know, we've just chosen to be very limited in our media on purpose. Our family has an iPad, that they, you know, it's, it's password protected. They can, they can text their friends. when our kids get their license, they can get a phone on their own. But we've limited it, to that point simply because, you know, as a pastor, I've had so many kids in my office.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Oh, I'm gonna hold you. I'm gonna hold you on that thought because I want to, I want to hear that we're up against a break here. But I think your point is, is so well taken that we need to not be afraid to be that parent to put in the limits and limits rules with relationships that leads to thriving kids. They need those boundaries in a healthy way. Well, when we come back, we'll tell you about the fourth and fifth most influential forces on your child's worldview so that you can continue to think about your own family will give you more hope on the other side of this break. Don't go away. The month of June has been hijacked by the anti Christian culture to show their pride in something God calls an abomination. When you support afr, you help us continue to stand for godly values and provide the resources for you to stay in the know about the enemy's tactics. To say thank you for your gift, this month, we'll give you the booklet inside the LGBTQ push of the 1990s To help strengthen your convictions, just go to afr.net/offers afr.net/offers.

>> Holy Forever by Chris Tomlin: Your name is the highest, your name is the greatest. Your name stands above them all. And the angels cry holy. All creation cries holy. You are lifted high. Holy. Holy forever.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Welcome back, friends. That song is Holy Forever by Chris Tomlin. And hey, we want to congratulate. Congratulate Linnae in Kentucky for being the winner of a book today. We are proud to give you. We're so grateful to give you a copy of Dr. Josh Mulvihill's book on biblical worldview. So we'll be sending that out to you today. And we're talking about being a Worldview influencer, being intentional. We're having Worldview Wednesday and talking and guiding parents and grandparents on how to do this. And we've talked about the five most influential forces in your child's life. Number one, being parents. Number two, grandparents or other family members. Three, we were talking about education and going down a rabbit hole a little bit, Josh, with talking about screens. But right before the break, you were just saying that you had kids in your office. And I'm going to let you take it from there.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah. With the screen topic, often parents that bring kids into my office because they have stumbled into the pornography world, usually unintentionally they'd be given unlimited, access to a screen in the house. And, you know, oftentimes parents didn't realize that there were a lot of dangers there for their children until they had gotten to the point where kids had stumbled upon some pornographic stuff. And it was, you know, as a matter of when, not if, you know, the earliest. The statistics show that, usually about in the second to fourth grade age windows about the first exposure the average children have. So not to create any fear for us, but just as an awareness piece, if we're giving our children a screen or Internet access without any, filters or limits on it, there's so many dangers like that waiting for them. So, put some protections in place for your kids. Obviously, not just pornography. There's a lot of other stuff, violence and profanity and all this stuff. It's crazy. Today, it's like you can't even watch commercials on television hardly. and so we just want to be intentional with, these areas. Sometimes I think on a screen, would I allow this in my living room if it was a real person? The way they were talking, the way they're dressed, the kinds of things they're doing. And, you know, if that was a real person in our living room, it'd be like, wow, this is making me really uncomfortable. Or it's presenting a morality that I don't want my kids to have. And so we need to, you know, we need to overlay the principles of scripture onto the screens. And the same kind of expectations that God gives us, you know, in real life, apply in the screen world as well.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: They really do. And I think that's the point. We were talking about the sphere of education. But even through education, there's so much. There's so many screens that are involved. And a lot of times parents, you know, will think, oh, well, this is educational programming. But there are ads that come with that. And, you know, it's interesting. I was just sharing with you during the break, Josh, that on Monday, I interviewed the film director, M.D. Perkins, for the movie Culture Warrior, which is the story of Don Wildmon starting the American Family Association. You can watch that movie for free, actually, if you go to culturewarrior.movie And it's so interesting, Josh, because in some ways, times have not changed. His story started with, in the 1970s, trying to watch TV with his kids. At that time, there were only three stations on and seeing something negative, something harmful on every station and just challenging his church to turn off the tv. And I think, you know, yeah, we've got to minimize those negative influences, but we've got to be more intentional about providing compelling alternatives. And one of the things that MD said on Monday that really captured my attention was that he said when Don realized what his family was passively consuming through screens, he was appalled by his own apathy. And that has stuck with me since Monday because I think there's a lot of times that we just kind of don't really think about it. And that's what I see. It's interesting because you've got kids sitting in your office having had exposure, having had harm from exposure to pornographic or other things that are, that are violent or harmful in some way. I've got kids sitting in my office with the same way because a lot of times kids don't have the language to describe what they saw. And so I say this all the time, Josh, but I feel like it's worth saying again because I want to emphasize that that exposure is happening younger and younger. Most of the time the first exposure is unintentional. So you've got to have talks with your kids. This is what I did with mine. I said, said just something as simple as this. Hey, everywhere you go there are screens and people watch things that we don't watch. And you may see something, you will see something at some point that just makes you feel kind of weird, makes you feel kind of icky inside and maybe you don't even understand why. When that happens, I want you to come and talk to me and we'll work through it because again, sometimes they don't even have the language to describe this. And that's why it's so important if you want to be a worldview influencer, you need to see and be well aware of all of the influences that are coming into your kids world. And I mean really, we could talk about media for a really long time, but maybe we'll come back to that later. I want to move forward, Josh, and talk about the fourth influence, which is peers. Now most people are going to think peers is at the top, but we're actually talking about this fourth. And so talk about how peers influence and what, what role we have as a parents in cultivating that peer influence around our kids.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: I've really seen the peer influence become more pervasive as my kids have gotten older. My oldest now is a, ah, sophomore in college. And I think that's a natural, healthy thing. although if the foundation is strong as parents with our kids as they move into that phase, then it just becomes a healthy, additional influence. So we've really tried to steer our children to having solid Christian friends as their core friends. You know, there's a lot of people that our kids will be in relationships with as far as peers go. and you know, we have. One of the things we've done is we have looked specifically for families that we are like minded with and for kids that we, you know, with parents and their kids. We've intentionally tried to provide opportunities for our kids to be together, to develop friendships and relationships. So, inviting over, you know, creating opportunities with, you know, sports and there's so many different ways to do that. And it's been fun to see how those relationships have formed with our kids and blossomed. And even our oldest, now his best friend, we started this kind of intentionality when they were really little, 7 years old. They're still best friends, hang out a ton even into their, into their college years. And you know, our other kids, in their teen years having those core solid Christian friendships, I'll just say from a practical standpoint, makes all the world of difference. When they go into church, they love coming to church in part because they can't wait to see their friends and connect on a regular basis. That's probably the biggest lament I get as a pastor from parents with children in the teen years is my kids don't have a good Christian friend. so whatever you can do as parents to facilitate this, to encourage it, not wait passively for that to develop through church or some other place. But what could you do to get, kids in the same place as your children that have Christian views and values along the same lines as your family? And see if you can help facilitate that process in some way.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Josh, I want to emphasize again what you're saying. You're talking about an intentional, proactive approach. And a lot of times sometimes what I see, you know, even as a clinician, I'll have parents who come in and, and their kids are involved in, in peer relationships that are harmful, that are negative. And there are. But it's so hard when you do that, Josh. If you've got a kid who's lonely, who's looking for a friend, they're going to be more vulnerable to any offer of friendship, whether that's healthy or unhealthy. And then by the time you're trying to, you know, be the friend police and saying don't hang out with that person, then you've got conflict. It's so much Better if you can be intentional from the beginning about curating those friendships, being active and helping them develop those skills. And especially today, Josh, we've got kids who really have a lot of social anxiety because so many of their interactions are online or digital. And so we can really show off those old school social skills. If you really want to make a Gen Z very anxious, all you have to do is show up at their door without calling or texting and just knock. I mean, it's like barbaric. You know, they think, where are your manners? Like, text me like a normal person. But we can just show up and have those in person interactions because that's what we used to do when there was no call waiting and the line's busy forever. Right. You just drive over and you see what's going on. But I think having those intentional, moments where you make it easy for them to make friends with people who will be a positive influence and then talking with them, I think that's important too, Josh, to talk with them and just, and give them positive affirmation. Hey, I really like who you are when you're around this person. They bring out the best in you. That, that's really great. They seem to really care about you and as much as you care about them and, and trying to teach them, what do those healthy friendship characteristics look like? I think that's really important. And so there were, for me, just a personal anecdote, Josh. For there were certain, when, certain my kids would have friendships and they would reach a certain state. I'd say, you know what, this friend has reached the level that you don't have to ask permission for them to come over anymore. They're welcome anytime you can ask them to come over. So it make that easy, you know, so they don't have to say, well, let me ask my mom, or let me ask your mom. And then they were at my house and I loved that. but I think those things are great. And they can do those through the church, which now we've arrived, Josh, sadly.

The average child now attends church about two out of four times a month

And number five, I know this, this hurts your heart as a pastor, you told me, but the church is number five on the list. You still made the list, so I feel like that's good. But the church is number five.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Yeah. And again, I think this just comes down to time. and the church is at a little bit of a disadvantage because, you know, we get, as a pastor, I'll get maybe midweek, Wednesday night or Sunday morning, with, children and youth. And so we, you Know, we might get two to three hours a week, and that's if a child is present every single time every week. the average child, the statistics show, now attends church about two out of four times a month. so you, you just start adding those hours up on a yearly basis, and that's why it's number five. It's, just against a math equation. But a couple of things I think that we can do from the family side. church is God's design for us as Christians. We're not to live in isolation. And so, I think we want to make the commitment on a weekly basis to be at a good church and a local church. my encouragement for all of us is to find a church that preaches the word of God. And as our kids sit under that kind of good preaching and are just saturated with the Bible, that's what shapes the worldview in the church world. I encourage our families to have their kids attend corporate worship. that seems probably old school. but youth group and children's ministry, as valuable as they are, they're not meant to be replacements for that. And so, you know, I tell our families, I want you at church for two hours on a Sunday. I want you to worship corporately as a family. And then I'd love for your kids to be in our Sunday school classroom. I think both serve a purpose, but they're very different. And, and so when our kids sit under the preaching on a Sunday morning and they get the depth there that shapes them. and when they're in with a Sunday school class and they get that added value from God's Word, that's a good supplement to what we're doing in the home and finding a really good Bible preaching church should be high on all of our list. And, you know, the pressure we have on the church side for us as families is all of us are encouraged to put our kids in all kinds of activities. And there's nothing wrong with that. But my encouragement is don't let that trump being at church on a weekly basis. So put, you know, put that on your calendar first. We're going to worship corporately and then fit the activities around that so that both can happen. that sometimes that, you know, you can't do travel ball or whatever, maybe you need to do city league, but that's okay. You know, for most of our kids, you know, sports are going to be. They're really a hobby. I've had only two kids in my whole pastoral career that have ended up in the pros, one with the Texas Rangers, and one with the, Giants, the NFL football team. Most of our kids aren't going pro. I'm sorry to break that off. you know, some. It might go into coaching or, you know, training or other things, but,

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, I don't know. Josh.

>> Dr. Josh Mulvihill: Something.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, I was gonna say, I feel like you should have led with that. The Texas Rangers, you and George Barna with the Yankees. listen, I am an Astros fan. We need to. But we can still get along, and we can still share a world view. Well, I hate to cut you off there, Josh, but I know you'll be back, and it's so important. I hope that you go away encouraged. And one of the statistics you cite in your book, Josh, is that for each drop in frequency of family church service attendance, There's a corresponding 1.25% drop on spiritual health, which tells me that the positive intention. Having your kids in church helps their spiritual health, and it helps influence their worldview. So parents, think about that. Think about the parents, the grandparents, education, think about peers and church. How are you intentionally cultivating those around your family to influence their worldview? And as you're doing that, I pray the Lord will bless you and keep you and make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you, and I'll see you right back here tomorrow.

>> Jeff Chamblee: The views and opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.