Pardon the Mess with Courtney DeFeo - Christian Motherhood, Biblical Parenting, Raising Christian Kids

Today’s podcast hits some tough topics we don’t often cover on Pardon the Mess. But these are very real issues facing so many, and I’m thankful Ashley Abercrombie is with us as we do it.   Ashley is a writer and speaker whose work has been featured in outlets like OprahMag.com, Relevant, and Grit and Virtue. She is the author of Rise of the Truth Teller and Love Is the Resistance.   Ashley chats with us today about her last eighteen years of working through recovery from drugs, alcohol abuse, eating disorders, sexual assault, and an abortion. She’s realized that, as Christians, we’re so often tempted to live in the bondage of silence instead of overcoming our shame and sharing our stories. She’s found that only in breaking the silence will we experience full healing and beautiful glimpses of God’s redemptive hand at work.   There’s also a great word for those of us who struggle with the need to perform (guilty ✔️) and parenting our kids through the hard places they will face in their own stories.   Can’t wait for you to hear from Ashley today, and please share this powerful testimony with those around you who need to be encouraged to share their own stories.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

As we wrap up the last several weeks of praying the greatest commandment over our kids, we’re focusing today on what it means to love God with all of our strength.   Contrary to how it sounds, loving God with all of our strength is not a reference to our physical strength, but instead it’s using our possessions, our time, our talents, our parenting, our volunteering—everything we’ve got—to love God and live for him.   As we pray for our kids to love God with all of their strength, we’re praying that they use all of their party-planning skills, math aptitude, athleticism, and social media acumen for God’s greatest glory. It’s taking the seemingly small places in their life and asking the Lord to use them in every possible way for his bigger purposes.   Let’s join together this week and ask God to use our kids for his greater purposes right where he has them today, teaching them what it looks like to love him with all of their strength.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

It’s cool enough to have one opportunity to chat with Bob Goff, but then to get a second shot that includes his daughter, Lindsey Viducich?   Well, that’s the makings of a podcast packed with laughter and endless nuggets of truth.   Lindsey and Bob co-wrote Everybody, Always for Kids, and they describe it as a book of stories demonstrating how to live out our faith as expressed in love.   Take that in for a hot minute and consider how different our lives, our parenting, and our relationships would be if our primary focus was to express our faith through the lens of love.   As you might expect, there are lots of great stories coming your way on growing up in the Goff household and their crazy antics.   But I was especially challenged by their family goal of picking the meaningful over the practical in life and intentionally drawing others into our circle through the grace of Jesus.   Sit back and enjoy a few minutes of encouragement from Bob Goff and Lindsey Viducich—and then grab a copy of their new book so you can remind your kids that around every corner lies the opportunity to live bigger than ourselves, when we love “everybody, always.”Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

As you know, we’re praying the greatest commandment over our kids this month—that they will love God with their heart, soul, mind, and strength.   As we pray for our kids to love God with all of their minds this week, we’re reminded that our mind is made up of our thoughts. In order to love God with all of our minds, we have to think about what fills our minds and how it impacts the way we love God.    Our thoughts are significant because they have the potential to grow our love for God or distract and pull us away from a relationship with him and his great plans for our life. The Enemy loves to get ahold of our thoughts and make us question God’s goodness and protection in our lives.   For our kids to love God with all of their minds, we’re praying that they “take captive” all the thoughts that are destructive, not instructive. We’re also praying about what’s going into their minds and how that’s fueling (or lessening) their love for God.   Let’s start this week together by praying over our kids’ minds and all that they will think about today and every day.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Having never met Angie Smith before, I had no idea what I was missing out on until I had the most heartfelt, Spirit-led conversation with her for today’s show.   Angie is a mom, wife, speaker, author, and a much-needed breath of fresh air for all of us trying to live our daily lives for Christ while struggling through the bumps and bruises we face along the way.   Angie recently wrote a book, Woven, that’s a beautiful depiction of how the seemingly different storylines throughout the Bible are actually woven together into one big story of God’s love. If you’ve ever found the Bible to be confusing or even disjointed, Angie provides a deep dive into the bigger picture of God’s word and why it matters.   As much as I loved talking about her book, I was struck by Angie’s vulnerability in sharing about her real-time fight with depression and loss.    Without going into too much detail, suffice it to say I walked away so thankful for a strong Christian woman willing to share the hard places of her journey so that we might be encouraged in our own journeys.   If you’ve ever had doubts about your faith, or struggled to understand the Bible, or even felt like life is too hard, I believe this conversation is exactly what you need today!Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

We’re continuing to pray through the greatest commandment to love God with all of our heart, soul, mind, and strength. This week we’re praying that our kids love God with all of our souls, but what exactly is our soul?    Our soul lies deep down inside of us and is our very core. It’s the invisible part of us that connects us with God. It is where we are most at home, and it’s the most fundamental driver of who we are from the inside out.    To love the Lord with all of our soul, we’ve got to be faithful in private. We’ve got to be devoted to the things that drench our soul in Jesus and be willing to drop the things that don’t.    As we pray for our kids to love God with all of their souls this week, let’s pray that they learn to love him with the very core of who they are—not by what they intellectually believe about him, or how they serve him, or what they communicate to others by their faith, but truly learning to love Jesus from the core of their being.    I’m so thankful you’re staying strong with me each week as we finish off this school year. Don’t miss today’s podcast and the opportunity to pray with me over your child’s very soul and the core of who they are. Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Today is Opening Day for baseball, and in my baseball-crazy family, that makes today a big day!     In honor of this momentous occasion, we’ve got the perfect show for you with baseball-great Darryl Strawberry.   Darryl has an amazing testimony of addiction, redemption, marriage struggles, and cancer. He shares some very practical principles that have changed his life, things like weathering trials with hope, nurturing godly friendships, and always believing in the power of prayer.    And, of course, we also get some interesting behind-the-scenes scoop on his time in the Major Leagues and some amazing baseball moments.    Incidentally, Darryl Strawberry is one of my husband Mike’s all-time favorite players, making it only right for me to ask Mike to join me on this show; however, in a strange turn of events, Mike actually relieved me of my duties and ran with the interview himself. 😂   Don’t miss today’s show with Darryl Strawberry and Mike Yanof talking all things Jesus, MLB, and allowing God to transform our missteps into ministry.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

“Love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30 NIV, emphasis added).   Remember the lawyer who tried to trick Jesus by asking him to name the greatest commandment? (Lawyers, am I right?) Jesus, knowing this guy’s antics, responded with, “Love the Lord your God with all of your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength” (Mark 12:30).    It’s this verse that will guide us the next few weeks as we pray for our kids to be marked by loving God with their heart, soul, mind, and strength.    We’ll kick off this week by praying for our kids’ hearts, which is not just critical to their health—it’s also the epicenter of their spiritual life.    It’s central to their thoughts and actions and even the words that come out of their mouths. When Jesus talks about loving God with all their hearts, he’s referencing their emotions and decisions.    In order to love God with all of our hearts, we have to prioritize spending time with him and in his word. Having time with our creator enables us to know what he wants for our lives, and we can’t help but pursue him and the things he values and wants for our families.    Let’s pray this week that our kids learn to love God with all of their hearts, beginning with prioritizing time with him and pursuing him in all that they do. Join me on today’s podcast and let’s pray together for our kids. Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week we’re wrapping up our Pardon the Mess series on brave conversations we need to have with our kids. Dr. Ken Wilgus is with us to talk about addiction and its impact on today’s kids.    Believe you me, I would rather ignore this topic too and hope it never becomes an issue rather than face it head on—however, it’s too significant of a problem in today’s culture to idly stand by.   Dr. Wilgus and I discuss these topics: Defining addiction and the idea of addictive personalities, drugs, alcohol, and vaping—how to discipline when/if your child experiments, video games and the time our kids spend playing them, how parents can deal with addiction and avoid enabling, important conversations to have with our kids beginning at an early age    I’m so thankful for the information Dr. Ken shares today, and I know we will all be better for having listened.    Please take a minute to share this with your friends—it’s too important of a topic to take lightly.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

As Easter approaches in the next few weeks, it’s the perfect time to begin praying that the power of the cross impacts every area of our kids’ lives.   It is an incredible assurance knowing that, by accepting Jesus, our kids have a new eternal destination. But we’re also praying for a daily life transformation.   When our kids become Christians, we should begin looking for (and hopefully seeing) fruit in their lives. Jesus said those who follow him will produce spiritual fruit, and it’s by this fruit you will know them (Matthew 7:20).    In Galatians, Paul describes some attributes of a life without Christ, including anger, idolatry, jealousy, selfishness, impurity, and strife. In contrast, with Christ we start to see the spiritual fruit of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and self-control.   Thankfully, this is not simply a checklist of things we’re constantly trying to achieve. Instead, it’s produced by allowing the Holy Spirit to work within us. Without even trying, our kids will produce fruit that’s visible to the world around them. This fruit can either be produced by the Holy Spirit or produced by their own spirit.   Our prayer is that our kids will submit to the Holy Spirit’s leadership, resulting in less of their own fruit and more of his. This week, let’s pray that the Holy Spirit produces fruit in our kids that leads others to trust Jesus and his great sacrifice at the cross.Privacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy