[SPEAKER_00]: Hello, everyone.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the Christian Parenting Podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: I am so excited for this episode because I get to introduce you to my new friend, Scarlet Hill to Vital, who is the new host of part in the mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: So part in the mess is Christian Parenting's other in-house podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: We have an entire network of podcasts that you should definitely go check out if you haven't already.
[SPEAKER_00]: But this podcast, the Christian Parenting Podcast, and part in the mess are created by the organization.
[SPEAKER_00]: So, part of the mess started with Cynthia Yenneff and then Courtney Defeo took over and now we are joining forces with Scarlet and we are so excited to have her.
[SPEAKER_00]: Scarlet is a wife, she's a mom of four, she's an author, a speaker, and now the voice helping us untangle real life parenting messes through a biblical lens.
[SPEAKER_00]: In this conversation, we talk about what life looks like with kids in very different stages.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why parenting can feel so overwhelming and how the gospel frees us from trying to be perfect parents raising perfect kids.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love this conversation because Scarlet is so honest and funny and wise and right in a thick apparenting, just like the rest of us, so I hope that you enjoy getting to know her.
[SPEAKER_00]: Hi Scarlett, new host of part-in the mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: Welcome to the Christian Parenting podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you my new friend, Steph.
[SPEAKER_00]: I'm happy to be here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm so excited to meet you and to chat with you and to talk all things Scarlett and part-in the mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: It's just gonna be really great.
[SPEAKER_00]: But for listeners who are meeting you for the first time tell us kind of about you, give us the real life version, like what does life look like?
[SPEAKER_00]: What do you do?
[SPEAKER_00]: How old are your kids?
[SPEAKER_00]: All the good stuff.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, real life version.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I have four kids, three girls, 15, 13 and 11 and the 11 year old prayed her baby brother here.
[SPEAKER_01]: So now I have a little boy and he's one and a half and it's that's my life right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's crazy wild rescuing him from killing himself in a million ways every day.
[SPEAKER_01]: I did not have this with my little girl.
[SPEAKER_01]: I didn't even have to baby poop with my little girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: very little different.
[SPEAKER_00]: So different.
[SPEAKER_00]: So that keeps me super busy.
[SPEAKER_01]: I live in Texas with my husband, who's a pastor and I write books and I travel around and talk about him, talk about Jesus, and very recently, pardon the mess podcast.
[SPEAKER_01]: So that's that's basically it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, pardon the mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: Pardon the mess has been around for so long.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are third house host.
[SPEAKER_00]: We are so, so, so excited to have you jumping in.
[SPEAKER_00]: Tell us just so we can get super real here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Tell us like a parenting mess that you're currently navigating in your home with your all ages of kids because you are in every single season of parenting.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe it's an actual physical mess.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, it's always that.
[SPEAKER_01]: No, this is very timely question and I'm grateful.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, this is what I'm doing on the podcast.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's all very fresh in my mind as I'm thinking through all these things.
[SPEAKER_01]: I would say the biggest like real-time thing that I'm wrestling with and seeking
[SPEAKER_01]: is loving each of my children well with all their differences.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I've got the huge age gap.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've got the boy girl dynamic and then I've also got one of our daughters we adopted from China and she's got special needs and she's
[SPEAKER_01]: the one who's turning 13.
[SPEAKER_01]: So a lot of adoptive parents and foster parents in my life have told me, well, that is the most difficult age, because not only are they becoming a teenager, but it's like, you know, noticing not only struggling with extra things that the every day person doesn't have to struggle with, but
[SPEAKER_01]: just the awareness of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So walking with her through that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I take my biggest parenting struggle right now is I so deeply want to love all my children well and love them where they're at.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I feel stretched to very thin and the baby takes up so much my time.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's like, yeah, that's what I'm that's the mess I'm constantly juggling.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, you know,
[SPEAKER_01]: Lord, please help me to love each of these wonderful people that I get to raise well when there's I only have two hands, and I have so much time in the day and a lot of parenting stuff is like, you know, like we have the guide book of of scripture, but there's a lot of things every day where I'm like, I have no idea what to do with this particular thing I'm looking at.
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, yeah, that's that's mine.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I just feel like that's so relatable because we all no matter what our age gaps are or your gender or adopted or not.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like every kid is so different and you think you have it figured out and then the next kid comes along and you don't.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the Lord gives you eyes to see all of your kids but you have to ask for that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And sometimes I remember like I need to be praying like Lord, let me see each of my kids for who they are.
[SPEAKER_00]: and who you see them to be so that I can love them well, but it's hard.
[SPEAKER_00]: And somebody is harder than others.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, for sure.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then like those moments where you have the hindsight where you're like, okay, I was really investing a lot of time, which is one child who was struggling.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I totally overlooked the one that seems easy because she doesn't voice her, you know, she's more internal.
[SPEAKER_01]: So then just going back to, you know, acknowledge that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, it's just a wild ride and I'm just right in the thick of it.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'll do your cue.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, you mine are 14, 11, and 10.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, it's very similar to mine if you didn't have a surprise, if I didn't have a surprise baby on the internet.
[SPEAKER_00]: The surprise babies are always the best babies.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, bad boy, boy girl.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had the insane like wild and I grew up with all sisters.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I had these two boys and all my friends had girls.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it was just like insanity all the time trying to make sure they didn't die jumping off of something.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then all my friend said boys and they're like, we're so sorry, we didn't know we kind of judged you.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I'm like, I know this is fine.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's crazy.
[SPEAKER_01]: The only boy in my family was my sister-in-law has my nephew.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I just remember seeing him just punch her and beat her when he was a toddler and thinking, how is she not flinching?
[SPEAKER_01]: And now I understand.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, I just get beat up all day by this adorable little Sophie's monster who's so, yeah, he's so physical and wonderful.
[SPEAKER_01]: But anyway, yeah, that's life right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes, well you are the perfect person to be taking over part of the mess because you are just in the thick of it and we're kind of doing like a little rebrand over there.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm super excited about it.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's really promising.
[SPEAKER_00]: I think the entire idea of the show is kind of built around this idea of like untangling a mess, like a parenting mess and looking at that through a biblical lens.
[SPEAKER_00]: So tell us more like what does that look like?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I'm really fortunate.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I'm really excited for the new format.
[SPEAKER_01]: So just like you said, it's just more topical than than, that's not a word, more topical than interview style.
[SPEAKER_01]: So all sometimes have just the regular interviews, which is most of my podcasting experience has been being a guest, being interviewed on a podcast for the books that I've written.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I love those, but the majority of the episodes will be me talking through a parenting mess.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I just brought up the one that I'm wrestling with right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just recorded one about that a couple days ago, so that'll be soon.
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, it'll be an untangling, and then I'll have this segment called The Messima Moment where I'll bring on somebody who speaks into that topic for a few minutes with me.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it won't be totally just me the whole time every episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, just looking at what scripture has to say it's been super rewarding to kind of take these things that are like like you said I'm in the thick of it.
[SPEAKER_01]: So whatever it is that I'm looking at in my parenting, which is so many things because of all the ages and all the things going on and just being like what is God's word have to say about this and if God is the perfect parent, which he is like what is scripture say that he does in this instant so for instance, the one I just mentioned it was so fun.
[SPEAKER_01]: I looked up a list of how the Lord loved different people in the Bible in different ways.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that was so fun just for me to be like, oh my goodness, I've never sat down and noticed that with Peter, he was like more confrontational and then with Thomas, who doubted, he was very gentle and he's like, look at my wounds and, you know, Mary and Martha, two women in the same family, very different at the ways that he loved them and interacted with them.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that was super inspiring.
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, as I think about part of the mess and the format, I'm really excited to just, yeah, because it's like, when you're, when you're parenting, you're like, in it, and you're not really analyzing it that often, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's good for my soul to just step back and just analyze and, and most importantly, see what God, God's word has to say about it.
[SPEAKER_01]: I hope that encourages listeners because we're all in this together, you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, and I feel like so many parents, mom specifically, and I'm, I'm a mom.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I can only speak to mom, so I can speak to dad, but I feel like I can walk around with this invisible report card, that like grades us and our kids.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if our kids aren't getting a good grade, I don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: like literally school or just like behaving well or, you know, they didn't make the team they wanted or if we feel like we lose our temper too much and we don't have everything, you know, we're not like the team mom because we're not working nice enough.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like give ourselves a bad grade and we feel like we're the only ones.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like everyone else has an A when we are the ones who are like struggling to maybe get a passing grade and
[SPEAKER_00]: I feel like this concept of just talking about, this is a mess, but here's the one thing that matters in here.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, that's so freeing because we do it.
[SPEAKER_00]: We just put so much pressure on ourselves to be perfect.
[SPEAKER_00]: And none of us are perfect at everything for anything.
[SPEAKER_01]: Right.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's, I mean, you know, as so many believers, that's my whole testimony is when the Lord helped me.
[SPEAKER_01]: When I became a mom, when the Lord helped me realize that it wasn't about my performance, it was about pointing to him.
[SPEAKER_01]: that really, really changed everything and yet I still am a human and I still forget that and I still get caught in the weeds and still live like there's a report card.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, yeah, I'm really excited to just take each week bringing it back to the good news of the gospel which affects not only eternity like I used to think, I used to walk around thinking, okay, hopefully I'm getting it right and I can be an eternity and stop whitenuckling life, you know, that's how I kind of used to live as a believer.
[SPEAKER_01]: But when you hold to the good news of the gospel up to every mess, whether it's parenting or not, you remember that you can have joy and peace today.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so that was just revolutionary.
[SPEAKER_01]: When that clicked for me way later, if my Christian walk, then you know, post marrying a pastor, post Bible college degree.
[SPEAKER_01]: It was like, way late.
[SPEAKER_01]: When the light bulb went off and I'm like, my goals are all wrong.
[SPEAKER_01]: So yeah, just reminding moms of that every week as we look at
[SPEAKER_00]: What was it that made that light bulb go off?
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, I was at pastors' wives' retreat and I was very young and I had my first baby who's now 15 and I brought her to the retreat and it was in a circle of moms who was the large church with a lot of pastors' wives and they were all giving parenting advice to younger moms and it was great, godly, wonderful advice, I remember some of it to this day.
[SPEAKER_01]: I should have just been grateful, like this is Titus 2, the older women are pouring into the younger women, but I was at a very anxious point in my life, first baby off the heels of a miscarriage and just kind of obsessed with getting everything right and so.
[SPEAKER_01]: I just remember listening to the advice and being overwhelmed by it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then this woman that I don't know that I talk about all the time, and Elizabeth, who's probably so tired, I'm talking about her probably.
[SPEAKER_01]: She gave her parenting advice.
[SPEAKER_01]: She had three kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had one baby.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she just basically said what I just told you is my testimony.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was already a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: I've been walking with Jesus since I was 14, but she was like basically told us what her parenting goals were and she was like, my goal is not to be perfect and it's not to raise perfect kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's impossible.
[SPEAKER_01]: My goal is to practically live the gospel out.
[SPEAKER_01]: So then she just kind of explained like when I have, when I snap at a child or argue with my husband, I don't dismiss it like it didn't happen.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't pretend I'm perfect.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't keep going and or I don't despair.
[SPEAKER_01]: I, you know, I'll teach my kids what repentance is and be like, hey, this is what said this is why we need Jesus and I'll even pray in front of them and help them see like I just sinned.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm so sorry.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're going to sin and here's what we do when we sinned.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I get chills literally every time I talk about it's stuff because I, it was like, I had heard that in so many ways from so many people.
[SPEAKER_01]: There were so many seeds planted.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I do believe if I had died before I met Elizabeth in that, at that retreat that I would have been in glory.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I was pretty miserable all that every day because I was so striving and living like I could earn God's favor.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then when I heard that I was like, oh my goodness, I can just rest.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, it's like, okay, I don't have to live this way anymore.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, I think, you're, and a bunch of times, and it really slowly started changing every area of my life, just kind of having that perspective shift, and I'm so grateful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, there are so many different voices competing for parents' attention today.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're always having, but...
[SPEAKER_00]: I was like, I can't remember who I was doing an interview with.
[SPEAKER_00]: It might have been with Sissy Gough, but she was talking about how, like, there used to be one parenting book.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, just like, one, it was like the parenting book that everybody read.
[SPEAKER_00]: And now it's like, there's a million every month that are published and anyone can publish a book.
[SPEAKER_00]: and anyone can be on social media and we just have access to so much information and there's so much pulling out us from every direction that it gets so overwhelming because you're like I'm doing everything wrong and nothing right but maybe I'm doing this one thing right you know it's just so hard it's not the same no one has ever had to parent like we have to parent.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's true.
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: You're right.
[SPEAKER_01]: I haven't thought about it that way.
[SPEAKER_01]: As I have my parenting book in a proposal on the tower.
[SPEAKER_00]: I can't I mean, but you know what it's here's the thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the cool thing about me finding this ministry and becoming the host to part of the mess is that I have never written a parenting book and I thought the same thing like nobody needs a parent.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm
[SPEAKER_01]: I never claimed to be an expert at anything, and I know you interview a lot of real experts like Sissy Gough, who people should listen to, but I've always, my ministry has always been, it was rooted out of that conversation with Elizabeth that I just told you about, and I've always just written stories about my life, I've always loved writing, and just had a gospel lens on it.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I thought that the new thing I'm working on in all areas right now is just sharing testimonies.
[SPEAKER_01]: as a non-expert, like I'm not in parenting.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm just doing it, and I have Jesus, you know.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, yeah, I love, it's really cool that there are so many different ways to get content out there, and it's really fun to be able to have all these voices to listen to, and it can be super healthy if you don't look at those voices as God, or Jesus, you know?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, but it can be your right.
[SPEAKER_01]: It can be so overwhelming because there's so much out there.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like, who do I listen to?
[SPEAKER_01]: And that's what how I felt at that retreat like, okay, this mom is saying sleep train.
[SPEAKER_01]: This mom is saying attachment parenting.
[SPEAKER_01]: This mom is saying spank.
[SPEAKER_01]: This one.
[SPEAKER_01]: It looks like who do you listen to and I think it all boils down to.
[SPEAKER_01]: just look at look to Jesus and you know we have his Holy Spirit in us and once you get a few kids under your belt you just figure out like I'm doing what works you know I want to honor God with my home but there are so many different ways to parent I mean it's crazy yeah
[SPEAKER_00]: One thing I feel like I have learned over doing this podcast for the past three or so years is that nobody is a parent and expert in parenting.
[SPEAKER_01]: But there are a lot of people who are experts in parts of parenting.
[SPEAKER_00]: And if you can discern who you want to listen to, and even like, don't listen to everything I have to say on this podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: And don't listen to everybody that I interview on like take their every single word for full.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, like you have to be discerning of
[SPEAKER_00]: And I think that can be really challenging because so much of it sounds so good.
[SPEAKER_00]: And it all is good.
[SPEAKER_00]: It just might not be good for you who got me to you to be raising your kids that he placed in your life.
[SPEAKER_00]: And that's where it gets overwhelming because you're like, there's so much good out there that Christian writers and speakers are putting out there.
[SPEAKER_00]: Because at least everyone we have on the show, I have fed it and I make sure that you know.
[SPEAKER_00]: They're publicly sound, but you still have to be discerning.
[SPEAKER_00]: Like, how have you found, what have you found to be the most helpful way to discern?
[SPEAKER_00]: Who you listen to and who you're like, you're great, but that doesn't apply to me.
[SPEAKER_01]: Hmm.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's a great question.
[SPEAKER_00]: Maybe not an answer, because I don't know if I have an answer to that.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't, yeah, I don't know if I have an answer.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think that just getting, I'm 40, I turned 40 this year and it's so funny, because I have a baby.
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you also turn 40 this year?
[UNKNOWN]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, man, I really do what she lived closer.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't know.
[SPEAKER_00]: Why don't you talk about it?
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, it's like being an older mom.
[SPEAKER_01]: You just kind of, the things, it's such a cliche, but it's like, I've got my first born who's away at camp right now.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she might as well move out, like she's 15, but she's ready.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's so together, like, she's the type A first born, because I was so wound up tight doing all the, you know, even though I'd had that moment with Elizabeth, I still was like, first time mom, you know, so I don't know.
[SPEAKER_01]: Of course, just walking with Jesus longer, I think.
[SPEAKER_01]: the Holy Spirit.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's easier to hear his voice and also just be at peace with like what works in your home, practically day-to-day.
[SPEAKER_01]: I have a little sister, one sister.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's eight years younger than me.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she just had her first baby in February.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so she was just asking me, she's like, Scarlet, I'm trying to do this thing with bottles and blah, blah, blah, blah.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was like,
[SPEAKER_01]: you know what in like less than a year like your baby's going to be eating it doesn't matter like whatever don't stress yourself out about bottles like just don't stress yourself out about it and so I feel like in every way now that I'm 40 and have a baby I'm just so much more chill
[SPEAKER_01]: over the little things you know as far as like discerning who to listen to.
[SPEAKER_01]: I think I love getting new ideas and good advice because I forgot how to have a baby.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's been so long since I've had a baby at the house.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I'm way more confident in my own way of doing things.
[SPEAKER_01]: And just like you said, it's like, I love it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Give me advice.
[SPEAKER_01]: And if it doesn't work in my home, then I'm going to do what I know works.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I'm going to lay my head down at night.
[SPEAKER_01]: As long as I know that I'm committed to
[SPEAKER_01]: whether or not I bought a crib or a toddler bed that was a full size so I could nurse my son to sleep so I could sleep.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what I did this time.
[SPEAKER_01]: I had a crib in a box and I was like I can't sleep if I have to get up and down and up and down and I'm nursing this baby and so I just got a big floor bed and that's what I did and I slept great all the whole year of nursing and so you know what?
[SPEAKER_01]: Like that's what I'm telling moms and like don't do it like I do it, but like just give yourself a break and do what works so that you can rest in your baby a safe and you know yeah and you're not out to like Dive sleep deprivation exactly sometimes we do no matter what man my second act like you just sometimes you get a kid who doesn't sleep.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's true.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's really rough.
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, it's like the the main thing is walk with Jesus all the other stuff like he will guide you just walk in confidence and
[SPEAKER_00]: We all do it a little differently, I think, so yeah, yeah, it's just that comparison piece gets hard, but we're all trying to get away from that, you know, I feel like yeah, I feel like we're getting better as we get older.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I mean, I think so.
[UNKNOWN]: I don't.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think what has discipleship like looked like at your house because your house is a pastor.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: While it's looked different in different seasons, like there was a season when he was doing Christian publishing and he was pastoring on the side.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so when he was working from home, those years, he was so easy to have like family devotion time, which was so good.
[SPEAKER_01]: He is the one who instituted that.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we would just take kind of a book at a time.
[SPEAKER_01]: When they were little, we would do the Jesus story book Bible, and then we kind of moved on and advanced to other things.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we just will read a little family devotional.
[SPEAKER_01]: There's usually questions in the books that we do pray together as a family.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, that stuff has been really good.
[SPEAKER_01]: Now, our lives are so different.
[SPEAKER_01]: We have a teenager, and she's got her own schedule.
[SPEAKER_01]: So it's like, we are still doing that, but it's way less.
[SPEAKER_01]: I mean, it can't be daily.
[SPEAKER_01]: That would be like a possible.
[SPEAKER_00]: excuse me.
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, we really just, the main thing is we try to just make our lives about living the gospel out and looking at Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so, you know, if my husband's a pastor, I write Christian books like our lives do in a lot of ways revolve around Jesus, but you know, it's like when you work and your work is tied up in Jesus, it's very easy to just kind of like neglect the personal relationship and then find yourself being like, why am I
[SPEAKER_01]: joyless.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, what am I doing?
[SPEAKER_01]: Oh, was I just, you know, studying the Bible to prepare for a thing rather than delighting in this gift that I have with the, you know, so I would say it's just a constant.
[SPEAKER_01]: It looks different every season and now that we have a teenager who is learning to drive, it's definitely we're in a transition moment where you're praying.
[SPEAKER_00]: What is a time of day and time of week?
[SPEAKER_01]: Where do you say I'm sorry?
[SPEAKER_00]: And is that you're praying more?
[SPEAKER_01]: more for sure.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_01]: And also just trying to be like, what are the rhythms that we can have now that work?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because when they were all little little, it's like, I'd put seeds family worship on.
[SPEAKER_01]: And scripture would get in our brains with that kid that you're taking sound in kid music, but it's scripture.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like, it's, yeah, I still sing those songs, you know, because it got in there.
[SPEAKER_01]: But now they're older.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so I'm figuring it out.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I'm listening to people and discipleship.
[SPEAKER_01]: What does that look like?
[SPEAKER_01]: Asking the older
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's where I met.
[SPEAKER_01]: What about you?
[SPEAKER_00]: I think it's been really fun to see how discipleship has changed in our house as our kids have gotten older and as they've gotten busier like I've kind of had a fear like oh we're not going to have that the same like sit down family time and they're not going to be as interested because their teenagers or tweens and have little attitudes sometimes.
[SPEAKER_00]: all the things, but I was thinking as you're talking about having my oldest can't drive yet, but we're driving everywhere all the time.
[SPEAKER_00]: And he and my husband started a little Bible study for boys and their dads on before school on Friday mornings this year, and they would just come over for like 45 minutes, and they were going through this devotional book, and then they would go through the book during the week together, and then they would just talk about it as a group.
[SPEAKER_00]: And I was in charge of making cinnamon rolls, so that was my only God's.
[SPEAKER_00]: But
[SPEAKER_00]: They all the dads found that it was easier if the boys, they would do the most of them did their devotionals while they were driving.
[SPEAKER_00]: So the boys would sit in the front seat because they were big enough to do that and they would like read the questions out loud and then they would talk about it like driving tune from their sports practice and I think when if someone had told me they had done that when my kids were little and I had different expectations of what discipleship was supposed to
[SPEAKER_01]: But you're not like sitting down together.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, like you're not looking at each other.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like that is so sweet that they're using the time they have together to be talking about in Jesus.
[SPEAKER_00]: Instead of, I don't know, whatever else, 14 year old boys want to talk about sports.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love that.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, I think it just, it's been really fun to see how it's changed but how it stayed incorporated in our lives because yeah, being in a ministry house that just kind of is what it like there's no really get no way from it.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_01]: When you make it a priority, it's, yeah, you all, you crave it.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like oxygen, you know, being with Jesus.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like we all have seasons that are busier and crazier and right now.
[SPEAKER_00]: That's where I'm at with a baby and we just move, we move to Texas less than a year ago.
[SPEAKER_00]: So it's like we're still finding our feet.
[SPEAKER_00]: But I love that story because it's, it's true.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like when you prioritize it as a family, you're going to find
[SPEAKER_01]: You're going to find the time for what's important and it's so important and so that's such a great idea.
[SPEAKER_01]: I love the in the car drive the sports practice as awesome.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's like that due to around me whenever you get up and walk on the path and, you know, that's, yeah, just have got to work.
[SPEAKER_01]: That's what we're supposed to be doing.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, because we don't want also our kids to think that like we only do family devotionals sitting around the table or on Sunday morning with exactly what I do.
[SPEAKER_00]: You know, like it can just be part of a ritual every day.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, and casual.
[SPEAKER_00]: I love that.
[SPEAKER_00]: And the kids are, I think it's like that too.
[SPEAKER_00]: Less formal.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_00]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_00]: What type of give us a little preview about what type of message you're going to talk about on part of the mess?
[SPEAKER_00]: I know you're just getting going.
[SPEAKER_00]: So you may not totally know, but whatever you do know.
[SPEAKER_00]: And then what are you really hoping that parents are listening like walk way feeling after an episode of a part of the mess?
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let me answer the second question first because I have to think with my brain for the first one part.
[SPEAKER_01]: Okay, I hope they walk away, feeling encouraged.
[SPEAKER_01]: My goal is not just to like, ramble about a mess.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I don't want that.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thankfully, the people at Christian parenting, who have been helping me put this all together, have been so great at helping me outwine.
[SPEAKER_01]: And like, the first few episodes, and like, okay, how can I make this?
[SPEAKER_01]: Not just stories, because I do want to tell stories.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I,
[SPEAKER_01]: I love listening to people's stories.
[SPEAKER_01]: I learned from people's testimonies.
[SPEAKER_01]: So I want them to be entertained for sure by stories.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I want them to learn something about God or remember something about God and how he fits into.
[SPEAKER_01]: our day-to-day, you know, my grandma, of course, was always teaching me scripture.
[SPEAKER_01]: She's in heaven now, but, you know, in Proverbs, and all your ways acknowledge him and he'll direct your paths.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I want, I want that so badly in my life.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, I want just the Holy Spirit to be all over everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I know that's what all Christian moms want.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, yeah, I just hope that moms walk away feeling encouraged.
[SPEAKER_01]: And my goal is to have one small, faithful step at the end of every episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: So, just a really practical, like, okay.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's what we talked about.
[SPEAKER_01]: Here's the mess.
[SPEAKER_01]: Let's sit with it, you know, what's underneath it.
[SPEAKER_01]: We're not gonna fix everything.
[SPEAKER_01]: We live in a broken world, but what can we do this week?
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, what can we do differently this week?
[SPEAKER_01]: So, yes, I hope that this practical entertaining encouraging all those things.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then just to speak preview, it's so funny.
[SPEAKER_01]: I don't know when this is gonna air.
[SPEAKER_01]: So maybe by the time this comes out, all these will already be done.
[SPEAKER_01]: But I did a interview style with Courtney as she was leaving right before my first episode.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she asked me, she was like, you know, what do you have in store for the next year?
[SPEAKER_01]: And I was like, well, Courtney, I know when I was store for the next four weeks.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm still figuring out the hard casting and so yeah, I don't I don't have like a year plan yet, but the the one I'm recording this week is about walking with your kids went through When if like a terminal illness in the family, so my mom has terminal cancer.
[SPEAKER_01]: And what do those conversations look like?
[SPEAKER_01]: We have different kids, different temperaments, different ages.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I think it's like a knee jerk thing.
[SPEAKER_01]: As moms, we want to protect our kids from pain.
[SPEAKER_01]: And we want them to just be laughing and having the best summer ever, you know?
[SPEAKER_01]: But like, this world has stuff like that in it.
[SPEAKER_01]: All of our families are touched by sickness.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so this episode that I'm recording this week, I had a mom on, we talked yesterday, because she's also her mom has cancer.
[SPEAKER_01]: I said, how do you talk to your kids about it?
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, what does that look like?
[SPEAKER_01]: Because for me, it's been a super sweet.
[SPEAKER_01]: My mom's a believer.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so what I thought was going to be this huge tragedy when her cancer came back two years ago, and they said it's terminal, you know, just will extend your life as long as we can.
[SPEAKER_01]: I thought it was just going to be this huge tragedy, and it's been really sweet to see my mom's faith in action.
[SPEAKER_01]: Like, she's been walking with Jesus for whole life, and allowing the kids to see the sadness, and allowing them to see my mom.
[SPEAKER_01]: Suffering like someone who has hope like that is what we're supposed to do as Christians like we we're not perfect We don't never suffer.
[SPEAKER_01]: We don't never suffer.
[SPEAKER_01]: Great sentence.
[SPEAKER_01]: We we do suffer But we don't suffer like people who don't have the hope of eternity like my mom believes that death is not the end for her So she is excited about eternity and of course she is sad to leave
[SPEAKER_01]: But yeah, what I thought would be this horrible thing ended up being just there's really sweet season in our family.
[SPEAKER_01]: And she's still living with terminal cancer.
[SPEAKER_01]: And every time we talk, it's like, my kids are getting to see like this death sentence isn't really a death sentence when you're a Christian.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know, so like that's so that's one.
[SPEAKER_01]: And then what's another one?
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm going to talk about later this month about moving with kid.
[SPEAKER_01]: I moved a lot as a kid and moved a lot with my kids.
[SPEAKER_01]: And so
[SPEAKER_01]: of that thing of that episode will be when you're walking through something as a family that your kids didn't choose but you did and so like how can we help them be excited?
[SPEAKER_01]: How can we help them as they grieve what they're losing stuff like that?
[SPEAKER_01]: I clearly haven't fleshed that one out very much yet but yeah that's just the next couple.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well, I'm just really excited, because I feel like these are all things that parents again, just normal people go through all of the time have to move or choose to move or, you know, get a bad diagnosis and it's so easy to feel alone and it's so easy to feel like you're the only one or like you're not doing it right or like you don't even know what to do.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I'm just really grateful that you are pouring your heart into this and that you said yes to helping shepherd parents along.
[SPEAKER_00]: Some of these messes that we all have.
[SPEAKER_00]: So thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_01]: I'm grateful for all the examples of you and everyone in Christian parenting because I think you guys do such a great job of doing that every weekend.
[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, super grateful.
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, thank you.
[SPEAKER_00]: Well, I'm going to link everything for you and part of the mess and show notes.
[SPEAKER_00]: You're going to do the prayer episodes on Mondays still and then your untangling the mess episodes on Thursday.
[SPEAKER_00]: So I think everyone should go tune in.
[SPEAKER_00]: We're really excited that you are joining a Christian parenting podcast or not Christian parenting podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: Christian parenting family and you are on the Christian parenting podcast.
[SPEAKER_00]: So thank you so much for being here.
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much, Steph.
[SPEAKER_00]: I hope that you loved getting to know Scarlet as much as I did.
[SPEAKER_00]: She is such a gift to the Christian parenting family and I cannot wait for you to hear what she brings to part in the mess.
[SPEAKER_00]: So go subscribe to part in the mess so you don't miss the Monday prayer episodes and Scarlet's new Thursday episodes.
[SPEAKER_00]: And as always remember that you are not called to be a perfect parent.
[SPEAKER_00]: You are called to keep pointing your kids to a perfect savior.
[SPEAKER_00]: Thank you for joining me today.
[SPEAKER_00]: I will be here next week.
[SPEAKER_00]: May God bless you this week.
[SPEAKER_00]: When the message of parenting feel overwhelming, may you remember that Jesus is present in every single one of them.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is guiding you.
[SPEAKER_00]: He is growing you and loving your family even more than you do.