Preview:
Brooke McGlothlin: They are going to face temptations. Evil is going to give them an opportunity to find it. You know, wisdom calls aloud from the streets, but so does foolishness. Scripture gives us both pictures. They are going to face temptations. Instead of praying, “Lord, keep them from that”, pray, “that when they come to it, they’ll stand.” And the only way that they can stand is if their roots are deep enough and if they’re getting enough nourishment so that when the storm comes, they can stand up.
End of Preview
John Fuller: Brooke McGlothlin joins us today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly to help you better understand the power of prayer in your son’s life. I’m John Fuller, and thanks for joining us.
Jim Daly: John, I’m a terribly proud dad. I love my two boys so much.
John: You are, you talk about them a lot.
Jim: I think the greatest joy I’ve had in my life is being the dad of those two boys. And, you know, I can meet with presidents and senators and heads of state, where I want to be was coming home and the two boys running out, grabbing each leg and me monster walking them back into the house. I just loved it.
John: Yeah.
Jim: I just loved everything and still love everything about being a dad. And, uh, you know, they’re through the teen years and they’re into their twenties and they’re doing their thing. And again, I’m so proud of them and, and optimistic about their future spiritually and in every way. But praying for our sons is something we experienced you know, there were times in high school, where’s that homework? Whatever it might be, uh, Lord, help this kid do better (laughs). And so we want to help you today here at Focus on the Family to do the best job you can do, being that dad or that mom.
John: Hmm.
Jim: Uh, for those teen boys.
John: And Brooke is here to do just that. Uh, she’s the founder and CEO of Million Praying Moms and, uh, has written a number of books. Today we’re gonna zero in on a terrific resource Praying for Teen Boys, and I love the subtitle, Partner With God for the Heart of Your Son.
Jim: Mm.
John: Uh, this book is available on our website, and that’s focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.
Jim: Brooke, welcome back to Focus. Good to have you.
Brooke: Thank you so much. It’s such a pleasure to be here again.
Jim: Let, let’s start with the disclaimer. We have covered praying for your teen daughters, so-
Brooke: Yes.
Jim: For those moms, they go, “What about our daughters?” Uh, look in the archive, get the app, all the shows are there, and you can, uh, search that and find that. But today it’s about praying for your teen sons, which being a father of two boys, I’m grateful for. You too are a mother of two boys.
Brooke: Yes, I am. Yes, I am.
Jim: How’s that gone? Have they, have they done so many things that you pulled your hair out?
John: (laughs).
Brooke: (laughs) Oh, yes. Yes.
Jim: (laughs).
Brooke: I mean, I just had my roots done before I came.
Jim: (laughs).
Brooke: But I’m fairly certain that the amount of gray hair I have is their fault.
Jim: Oh, that’s funny.
Brooke: Um, no, it’s, it’s been fantastic. I love being a mom of boys, kind of like you just said in, in the opening, you know, there’s just nothing that brings me any more joy than being a mom of two boys. People often said to us, “Aren’t you gonna try again for a girl?” And, and I said, “No, I, I actually prayed and asked God to give us boys.”
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: I wanted boys and God in His infinite sense of humor, uh, gave me that wish, gave me that prayer.
Jim: You want boys, I’m giving you boys.
Brooke: Yeah. And then sometimes I, I have looked back and thought, what in the world was I thinking and doing that? But it was good.
Jim: You know, I, I don’t know about you, but one of the things that I, as a dad, I did miss not having a daughter.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: I, I wish that would’ve come our direction, but, um, but when you moms get together, you moms of boys.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Wha-what do you think about when you talk about raising boys? I, I think for us it’s more the activity.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: You know, when dads talk about, “Oh, it’s great, you know, Bob’s, Bobby’s in on the varsity team and he’s blah, blah, blah, blah.” That’s what we do as dads of boys.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: What do moms of boys talk about?
Brooke: Well, I don’t think you can take that part of it away. Both of my boys are athletes, and so the groups of, of moms that I hang out with do tend to talk about what little Tommy did at the game or, you know, whatever. There’s an element of that too, that I think moms do. But also, you know, if you’re raised… If you have the privilege of being able to raise your boys in a group of moms who all have the same goals as you do, like you all are trying to raise godly men as much as it depends on you, then the conversations tend to go in that direction.
Jim: Let me ask you uniquely, uh, what are boys facing when, again, you talk amongst your mom friends.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: What’s the perception of what boys are facing in the culture today that, that might be different from girls?
Brooke: I think the biggest thing, and, and maybe I, I would imagine that this is a conversation you guys have often because it is a big issue, is the way that their phones and social media are impacting their ability to have relationships and their ability to process.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And the examples that they’re being given of what is good and right and true. They’re not necessarily looking to the family as much to define what that looks like, or even to the church as much to define what that looks like. They’re looking at TikTok reels.
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: To tell them what’s funny. And as I look like, look at TikTok reels a-as opposed to, you know, with the exception of maybe the ones about cats and dogs, most of them are not that funny.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: The ones that they’re looking to to define things are actually teaching them ways of communicating with their peers that are destructive.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And hurtful and really tearing each other down. I think there’s a tear down culture among today’s teenagers that is devastating, but it is very difficult because it’s become so common. And I do talk about this in the book, “Lord, place a guard over his mouth.” That’s one of my biggest prayers for my teen boys, is that God would teach them the power of their words because words have the ability to give or to, to take life. And so to me, that’s one of the most important things that we’re dealing with in today’s world. And some parents, because my generation, you all’s generation, we didn’t grow up with those things in our hands. And so I think there’s this, uh, tendency to just say, well, I don’t really… It’s too big for me. I don’t really know what to do with it. And then take a hands off approach.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And I would encourage moms and dads not to take a hands off approach on that particular issue, but to press in and figure it out.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: For the sake of your teenagers.
Jim: I read the other day, this is really interesting. There was a report on, you know, the Gen Z-ers are a most gullible…
Brooke: Mm.
John: Mm.
Jim: … generation. That kind of caught me ’cause I don’t see that in Trent and Troy, my two boys.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: They’re pretty skeptical about what they see on TikTok and other things like that. But I could see where they’re… They believe things that are on social media.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Meaning generally, not just Trent and Troy, but you know, the 20 something, the Gen Z-ers, that they, they believe what they see probably to a fault. Have you seen that?
Brooke: Yeah. I, I think that’s probably true. If you, if you count how many hours, and maybe you guys know the number of hours that an average teenager spend-
Jim: 2,700 hours a year.
Brooke: Okay. There you go.
John: (laughs).
Brooke: I knew you would know.
John: Yeah.
Brooke: If you think about it in those terms, like how much time is a child sitting in one-on-one conversation with their dad?
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: How much time are they sitting in one… Like right here with their parent, their phone and what they’re seeing is the biggest influencer in their life right now.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: So I’m not surprised by that at all.
Jim: You know, you had a beautiful story in the book about a moment you had looking at, I think your 18-year-old or your-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … you know, your son and seeing something. What, what happened?
Brooke: So this actually was my oldest son, and it was a couple years ago, right before he turned 18. He had come into the kitchen and was on his way out into, uh, to go to baseball practice. And he… We were laughing together, and as I stated and mentioned, uh, or mentioned a second ago, he picked me up to hug me. And when he did that, he hugged me so tight that it caused me to squeak. Like, it just kinda made a noise come out of me, which we both thought was really hysterical. And when he laughed, I saw his nose crinkle up.
Jim: Uh-huh.
Brooke: And when his nose crinkled up, I immediately had this like, flashback to seeing that same facial expression on him as a child, as a young child. And it, like, it felt like this moment where my insides were constricted as much as he was constricting me on the outside with that hug. And I thought to myself in that moment, how powerful, I am one of the only human beings on the planet that has the privilege of seeing that look and knowing the boy that got to that point.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And it was just a very powerful moment for me-
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: … to realize how far God had brought him. And yet I could still see the little boy.
Jim: The little boy in him.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: Yeah. That’s such a sweet story. You know, you’ve written this book, Praying for Teen Boys. Yo-you know, at times I prayed harder, better, more on target than at other times.
Brooke: Mm.
Jim: I’m assuming there are parents of teen boys who don’t fully understand the power of prayer.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And that’s okay. It’s not a, a hit. What is a good definition of prayer and how do we apply it in a regular way so that we’re doing our part as a parent? And maybe talk about the components of that, what it does for you, what it does for the Lord in terms of opening up the windows of heaven-
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: … for those prayers, and then ultimately what it does for your son.
Brooke: Yeah. I like Tim Keller’s definition of prayer. He says that it’s a conversation that God started with us. And so, so many times I have moms that will come to me and say, “Brooke, I just, it feels weird. I don’t, I… God is not sitting physically right beside me. And so it feels odd to be… I know I should pray. I want to pray, but it feels weird. I just don’t know how to do it. I don’t know how to start.” And so for me, that truth, that it’s a conversation that God started actually helps because I don’t have to start it. He already started it.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: It’s a partnership that He’s inviting me into. It’s not a vending machine where I put in what I think of as a good prayer, and then God gives me the exact answer that I want. That’s not the way it works. God, reserve… He’s still, God, He loves us and He cares about us. But He can say yes. He can say no, or He can say, wait. And He has told me, wait a lot of times in my life. Um, and I think sometimes that rubs us the wrong way. We don’t like that when God says no.
Jim: Yeah, of course not.
Brooke: We don’t like that. We want to define what’s good, right? And we forget that God is the one that gets to define what’s good, and that He has all of eternity, the whole kingdom that He’s trying to bring in, um, you know, to work with, not just us. But it helps me to understand that the God of heaven, who in Psalm 116:2 says, “He bends down to listen to us.” He has bent toward us. His posture is one that is to toward us, invites us to join with Him in prayer for our kids. And it isn’t just about, Lord, would you help him to be safe today? Lord, would you help him to do well on that test today? I know he studied so hard. Lord, would you help him in, you know, keep him safe in the car today or whatever. It isn’t just that. It’s proactive prayers that are inviting God into his life. And that’s really what this book is about. It, it tackles the idea of prayer from the perspective of actually praying God’s Word over our children in a proactive way. Not just waiting until prayer is the last resort-
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: … but actually making it the first and best thing that we do as moms. Like we are going to God and we are praying purposefully and intentionally for these areas of his life that are some of the most important things that he has deal with. And then we’re waiting to see how God responds and shows up.
Jim: You know, Jean and I, we often pray for our boys to draw closer to the Lord.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: It, it’s an obvious one, the Lord’s omnipresent.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: I mean, He’s there for them always. Um, but for them and their hearts to recognize the Lord and to draw toward Him-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … is really critical.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: So that’s, uh, one of the prayer habits that we have, you know, just open their hearts up to see spiritual things.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: And spiritual truth. Uh, is something you learned is that you have to pray for yourself.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Now, a lot of moms, man, talk about the last person on earth that thinks about it, it’s a mom-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … about praying for herself. But you, you said that, um, that was really critical for you. And you prayed specifically, “Lord, show me.”
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: What did you mean by that?
Brooke: Yeah. When my oldest son was about 15 years old, we were on our way to a sports practice that was out of town. And he was spilling his heart to me, just telling me something that was going on in his life. And he, he paused and asked me a question. I’m so grateful as a 15-year-old that he wanted to know my opinion, but I…
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: Because I know that doesn’t always happen. But he asked me, he said, “Mom, what should I do?” And in that moment, I did not know what to do. I did not know the answer. And that was probably the first time in a long, what would happen to be a long, uh, you know, line of things that I would not have the answer to in his life. In fact, most of the time, I don’t know the answers that they’re looking for, but I paused and I said, “I’m gonna need to pray about that, and I’m gonna have to get back to you on that.” And my prayer as that story was unfolding, as I was listening to him share his heart with me, was, “Lord, would you show me… Show me what do I need to say to him in this moment? What are the right words? What… How do I validate what he say? Show me how to guide him. Show me what to do. Show me what to say.” And God says in His Word that when we ask for wisdom, He’ll give it. Not just a little bit, He’ll give it liberally. And so for me, in that moment, and in many, many moments like it that have come since I have just been inviting the Lord to come and show me what I need to know in that moment to personalize what needs to happen in that son’s life. And I’ve just never found Him to not meet me where I am.
Jim: Yeah. That’s so good.
Brooke: He always comes. It might not be right that second, it might be after a couple weeks of prayer or maybe seeking wise counsel, but He always comes and shows me what I need to know for my particular child in the right time.
John: Mm. Some assuring words from our guest today, Brooke McGlothlin, um, coming from her heart and captured in her book, Praying for Teen Boys: Partner With God for the Heart of Your Son. Uh, get a copy of the book from us here at the ministry. Uh, you’ll find it at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.
Jim: Brooke, another prayer that you had in the book was interesting to me ’cause it was very specific, “Lord, help me keep his heart.”
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Um, I guess there needs to be a little definition-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … about what did that mean for you and where did you come up with that prayer?
Brooke: Yeah. I had the privilege many years ago, even before I had children of listening to a precious mom. Her name was Ruth Ann, teach what was essentially a biblical parenting one-on-one class. And her kids were grown and she was full of wisdom. She’s still with us today. I actually had the privilege of interviewing her to get this chapter. But she mentioned that in the class, and I’m sure she shared all this other wonderful wisdom. But when she shared that one of her main goals in her parenting was to keep her children’s hearts.
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: It just like, I didn’t hear anything else that she said. There was something about that that deeply resonated with me. And so I asked her in the book to help me understand what does that mean. And, and I think the heart of what she was talking about is that if we can keep our children’s hearts turned toward us, if we can keep deep relationship with our children over the years, then it’ll be easier to go through the hard things when they come. It doesn’t mean that it’ll be easy to go through the hard things when they come, but if we have a foundation of relationship with them, if we have communicated to them I love you and there’s nothing that you could ever do to make me not love you, um, I will fight for you. I am on your side. We are in this together. Um, I believe in you. I love you the way you are, but I am full of hope for who God’s gonna make you into. If we can convey that in the early years to our kids and keep their hearts turned toward us, then it becomes easier for them to turn their hearts toward the Lord when the time comes. And that is what that means.
Jim: And it, you know, it seems like such a simple truth but we struggle as human beings and in our flesh as parents to really embrace that. I mean, the Lord says, “I love you unconditionally.”
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: “There’s nothing you can do that’ll take me away from you.” Um, you don’t test that. You don’t say, “Oh, okay. And therefore I’ll go sin,” right? It’s not… It’s kinda this reciprocal thing that the Lord loves you so much, your response needs to be loved back to Him. We know that in our relationship with the Lord, but we don’t think it applies in our relationship with our children.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Uh, you know. Wow.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: And it does.
Brooke: It does. It absolutely does. My younger son got in trouble at school one day and-
Jim: No.
Brooke: Um, he did. Yes. And he… And by the way, my kids approved every story that’s in the book.
John: So, so you could out him and just-
Brooke: I can out him.
John: He’s okay with that, wow.
Brooke: He already knows. He already knows that it’s talked about.
Jim: He outed himself.
Brooke: He did.
Jim: (laughs).
Brooke: He totally did. Um, I was really upset with him about this. It, you know, in the grand scheme of things, it was a fairly benign offense. But he did get in trouble in school. And when I picked him up, uh, from school that day, this was several years ago before he could drive, I looked at him and I, I wanted to give him time to, to share his story, to get… I wanna get his side, right? Like, I, I totally respect the authority that God’s put in his life at school, and I respect their right to have their opinion, but I always want to communicate to my kid. I, I wanna hear you too. But before we even did that, he got in the car and he was like, just all physically slumped over, you know, like he knew, he knew he was in trouble. And I looked at him and I just put my hand on his leg and I said, “There is nothing you could ever do that would make me not love you.”
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: And that has been a defining thing in our lives for our children. I say that to them over and over again. No matter what you do, even if you end up living a life that is totally opposite of what I hope God will do for you, you can’t make me not love you.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: There’s nothing you can do. I might not like you very much, I might not like the decisions that you make all the time. I might realistically be disappointed in you at times. I was disappointed in him that day.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: For doing what he did. But it doesn’t change the fact that I love him.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And if he can get that, then I become a safe place for him. It becomes… You’ve maybe seen it on social media, these memes that say, you know, I don’t want my kid to get in trouble and say, oh no, I, I can’t tell dad, or I can’t tell mom. I wanted to create an environment where my kids would say, oh, I, I need to go tell mom.
Jim: Yeah. How refreshing.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: Let me ask you this. It’s not, I don’t think you covered this in the book, but this is a, a bonus question, your husband.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: I mean, you’re describing something that I think I’ve written about. It’s kind of like the lock step that your mom’s gonna love you no matter what-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … when dad becomes the wild card. You know, he may not love you coming home from school with that disobedience.
Brooke: Right.
Jim: But in that context, how did your husband react to that incident, for example?
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: How did he respond? Did your son feel the same from him?
Brooke: I think he did. I mean, we’ve, we’ve had these conversations for years and my husband… In many ways, not in every way, but in many ways are aligned on, you know, these goals that we have for our parenthood. And I think it’s really important to say that just because you are mad at your child… You’re allowed to be mad at your child as a parent. They’re not gonna do everything right. But just because you’re mad at them doesn’t mean you don’t love them. So if you can couch it in love, like if you can say, I’m mad because I want better for you, then that will help them get it a bit better.
Jim: You know, sometimes, and I use this analogy, you talk to a marriage counselor.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And they’ll say, “Well, Jim, you know how you should address that with Jean? You should say, you know, when you said that, you made me feel like…”
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And you sit there and go, duh, that’s the best way to communicate. But we don’t.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Typically. ‘Cause we’re reacting out of emotion.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: The same is true in parenting. And I think of that when… I guess it’s, the question is the mechanism of slowing down.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And saying, how can I communicate my displeasure with the action-
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: … but not my displeasure with you, the person?
Brooke: Absolutely.
Jim: So critical.
Brooke: So critical. In fact, I would just say, state it out loud.
Jim: Say it.
Brooke: Just, just say it.
Jim: Yeah. That’s good.
Brooke: Just say, I want you… I do not think you’re a bad kid.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: I think you’re a good kid and I’m proud of you in so many ways. Lay that aside for a second. What I’m getting ready to say to you has nothing to do with that. That is true no matter what I say to you in this moment. Because I think sometimes when we come to our kids with a criticism or, or if we’re upset with them, they’re blanket feeling or emotion in that moment is, oh, mom’s upset. You know, I’m a terrible kid.
Jim: We blend it too.
Brooke: She thinks I’m a horrible kid.
John: Yeah.
Brooke: And that’s not the truth. They are totally separate.
Jim: Right.
Brooke: I can love you and think you’re amazing and still be really upset with you in this moment.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: And if we just go ahead and lay it out there for them and distinguish between the two, I have found it to be so helpful.
Jim: And it’s so good and healthy emotionally ’cause they can understand that at a very young age.
John: Yeah.
Jim: Okay, I that… I did steal the cookie.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Right? Mom’s got me.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: And they can get that. Just don’t personify that to say you are a bad person.
Brooke: Right.
Jim: Because you know what you’re gonna end up with is a really bad 15-year-old-
Brooke: Yes.
Jim: … when you convince them that they’re not good.
Brooke: Yes. And I think moms and dads can help each other. You mentioned taking a step back, maybe not reacting in the moment. My husband does that for me as uh-
Jim: Jean does that for me. Yeah, yeah.
Brooke: And I do it for him too. I think if we’re both aware of it, we can say, “Honey, like, just give it a minute. Let yourself- go mow the yard or go take a walk or do something that’s gonna help you get some perspective beyond the emotional reaction right now.”
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: Because that is never the best time to have hard conversations.
Jim: Yeah. When you were young, you experienced a hurricane.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: I haven’t actually interviewed a lot of hurricane survivors.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: So this is fun.
Brooke: (laughs).
Jim: I know all of you in Florida that support Focus, thank you very much. And the Gulf Coast and of course North Carolina and all those places. What did that do to you? What kind of impression did that make on you that you apply now to your parenting?
Brooke: Yeah. I think we, we don’t get a lot of weather like that in Southwestern Virginia. We have the mountains that protect us from a lot of really bad weather. And so this really stood out. It was Hurricane Hugo, and um, it was a big one. It was very big. And my parents live on about five acres, and there’s trees all around our house.
John: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: And so we’re literally inside the house watching the trees fall in all around us in the front yard, in the backyard. And there was some legitimate concern-
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: … that we would have a tree in my bedroom, you know?
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: That, that would, or in my brother’s bedroom, that that could happen. It didn’t happen thankfully, but it was a scary moment. And as a 11 or 12-year-old, whatever I was at the time, it made a deep impression on me as I watched these big trees that I had played in, these were a, a safety-
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: … and a security for me. They were my imaginary forest that I would, you know, go out and, and play in or, or build things in or whatever. They, they’re falling because of the strength of this storm. And I’d never seen a storm that, that strong before. And so today I look at that and I know that those trees fell as opposed to some of the others at my parents’ property that didn’t fall because they were older or because they didn’t have the depth or the strong root system to be able to withstand the storm. And so I apply that to my kids and I say, “I, I want you to be able to stand.”
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: “When the storms come, I want you to be able to stand.” There was this moment in my early parenthood, my boys shared a room for a lot of years, and I went in to pray for them one night after they were already asleep. And I just went in and I was laying hands on them and they… You know how kids are when they’re asleep?
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: They’re so cute.
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: They’re so precious.
Jim: And so, so quiet.
Brooke: And innocent. And quiet. Exactly.
Jim: (laughs).
Brooke: And so I’m looking at them and I had this moment where I was just overwhelmed with their innocence. And I started to think about all that was coming for them and about how our very real enemy was going to try to kill, steal, and destroy from them, and like the challenges that they would face, and the way the world would try and rip them away. Because that is our reality. If we don’t think that’s happening, we’re naive because the world is out to get our children. The enemy is out to get our children. So I’m in their rooms looking at them all precious, and I’m praying in a moment of motherly emotion, “Lord, would you please keep them from evil? Keep them from that. I don’t want them to go through that, Lord, keep them from that.” So the next morning I went to my Bible study and I was sharing that with some of the ladies. And this precious older saint said to me, whose kids were already grown, she said to me, “Brooke, you’re praying for the wrong thing.”
Jim: Mm.
Brooke: And I was like, “What do you mean I’m praying for the wrong… You’re just taking my really sweet moment and throwing it right out the door.” And she said, “No, no, I’m not saying that you shouldn’t pray for that ever. But what I’m saying is they are going to face temptations. Evil is going to give them an opportunity to find it. You know, wisdom calls aloud from the streets, but so does foolishness.”
Jim: Yeah.
Brooke: “Scripture gives us both pictures. They are going to face temptations. Instead of praying, ‘Lord, keep them from that.’ Pray, ‘that when they come to it, they’ll stand.’ And the only way that they can stand is if their roots are deep enough.”
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Brooke: “And if they’re getting enough nourishment so that when the storm comes, they can stand up.”
Jim: Boy, that’s so good.
Brooke: So that’s what God taught me.
Jim: I, I think it’s a beautiful way that you’ve portrayed that journey we all have as that innocent child. That’s why I think why Jesus said, “You wanna see the kingdom of God? Look at children.”
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: They’re just bold, honest, having fun. I mean, it is, the Lord loved kids.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And I think it’s because they’re not sullied yet.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: By the terrors of this world, right? And you saw that as a mom.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And I’ve certainly have seen that as a dad. And then things begin to happen.
Brooke: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Selfishness, sin, whatever it might be. And that rootedness is so critical.
Brooke: Yeah.
Jim: And that love that you talked about. So Brooke, this has been great. Thank you so much. And what a reminder, Praying for Teen Boys: Partner With God for the Heart of Your Son. I think God’s all in. The question is, are you all in? And, uh, that’s what you’re trying to do is rally the church to do the right thing. So thank you for being with us.
Brooke: Absolutely.
Jim: It’s been good. It’s gone by fast.
John: Mm-hmm.
Jim: If you want a copy, maybe your grandparent and your adult kids need to read this and, and, uh, you can partner with the Lord as a grandparent too, to be praying for your grandsons and granddaughters, so get a copy. If you can make a gift of any amount, like we often do, um, monthly, or a one-time gift, we’ll send you a copy of Brooke’s book in. It’s our way of saying thank you for being part of the ministry.
John: Mm-hmm. Contact us today, 800, the letter A and the word FAMILY, or uh, stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And on behalf of the entire team, thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly. I’m John Fuller, inviting you back next time as we once again help you and your family thrive in Christ.
