0:00:00 – Speaker 1
nextTalk, sponsored by nextTalk.org, contains content of a mature nature. Parental guidance is advised. Welcome to nextTalk Radio with Mandy and Kim every Saturday at 10 am on AM 630,. The word nextTalk Radio is brought to you by nextTalk, a non-profit organization keeping kids safe online through cyber parenting and open communication. Find resources, videos and subscribe to our weekly podcast at nextTalk.org. Are you ready for the nextTalk?
0:00:32 – Speaker 2
We just wrapped up our five-week pornography series and if you didn’t catch those shows, we had three special guests go. You can listen to each of those on our podcast at nextTalk.org. They were really great. The guests were amazing. You know, kim, one of the things that we talked a lot about was we don’t want to talk to our kids about pornography because there may be an underlying issue that we haven’t resolved. Yeah, and I kind of wanted to talk a little bit more about that, because I think that could be way more than about pornography.
0:01:02 – Speaker 1
Absolutely.
0:01:02 – Speaker 2
We may not want to talk about sex or what abortion means or drug addiction, because of something from our past that we’re not completely healed from, and so that’s what we kind of want to dive in today on today’s show.
0:01:16 – Speaker 1
If you feel nervous about talking with your kids about anything, it’s probably because you haven’t dealt with it yet.
0:01:22 – Speaker 2
It should be a red flag in your brain. That is kind of saying I got to address this with myself and God first before I could move forward on this journey of open communication with my kids. I say this in my book because this is the part of the journey when I started this four years ago that hurt the most. This is going to sting, and it stings because we have these wounds that we’ve swept under the rug for years and years and years and we think that once we become an adult, the past doesn’t follow us, that we can hide it, and there’s nothing more farther than the truth.
0:02:00 – Speaker 1
Bringing these things into the light is a painful process because it requires looking in the mirror. It requires really being honest with ourselves and being willing to do the hard work.
0:02:12 – Speaker 2
I mean, you’re looking in the mirror saying these are my faults, these were I messed up, this is where I went wrong, and what I want to encourage you today is it’s worth it to go through this personal pain, so to dig all this stuff up, because we’ve got to fight for our kids. They are being exposed to so much online and even if they don’t have a phone, they’re being exposed by other kids at school who are showing them, like my daughter, or telling them, and so the enemy comes to steal, kill and destroy. John 1010. 1 Peter 5 8. Satan prowls around like a lying waiting to pounce, I’m going to say, on your family. So you are doing this to break cycles, to break free, to change your children’s legacies. We’ve got to talk about the difficult stuff because the world is talking to them Absolutely, and you know we wanted to kind of work backwards here.
0:03:16 – Speaker 1
We’ve been talking all of this time about open communication with your kids and why that’s so important. But, as you said when we started the show, you have to rewind a little bit because there’s your kids, there’s your marriage. Neither are good place for open communication If you’re not having open communication with God about what he needs to heal in you through the power of the Holy Spirit. And that is what today is about.
0:03:40 – Speaker 2
So many times. And this was me. This was me four years ago. I was a Christian. I was a Christian wearing a mask and we looked like a great family. But here’s the thing I really wasn’t dealing with my past and it took my light bulb moment to realize I got to walk through these things because, I have God.
I’m ignoring these questions from my kids because I don’t want to answer them because of a wound, and I’ve got to get this healed and listen. Open communication only works perfectly if it’s lined up. Just like Kim said you and the Father, you’ve got that open line. He’s healing you, he’s using his Holy Spirit to guide you on a daily basis, and then that can transfer over into your marriage and then that becomes a beautiful place of open communication where you can really talk about difficult things and we’re going to dive into some of that on future shows but then that goes on to your kids, and so when I say you’re actually changing your children’s lives, this is what I mean. It starts at the foundation, with you and God.
0:04:47 – Speaker 1
Well, I know, in my husband and I, when we were dating and then engaged and first in our marriage, we kept saying we want to change the legacy in our family, we want it to be different, like we wanna break the cycles. It’s easy to say all that stuff, but really how do we do that? What does that look like? And it really starts with us individually and that’s what is so painful, because we wanna like move forward, but you really can’t until you stand still and see what really needs to be done.
0:05:19 – Speaker 2
And so many times you break a cycle but it stinks back up on you. Oh, my goodness. You know, because you’ve learned something for so long the process of doing something, and then you go back to that. You let your guard down, and then you go back to that.
0:05:33 – Speaker 1
Or you replace it, or you replace it, I see that a lot too, is you work through something and then you replace it with something else, and so again another stronghold or another issue can be new. It’s not always in the past, it can also be something new. You’re struggling with that. You’ve gotta let go to God so you can work through it and help your kids and your marriage.
0:05:52 – Speaker 2
If we aren’t seeking and listening to God, how are we gonna teach our kids to seek and listen to Him? Yeah, it starts with us, it starts right here and it is painful. So in my book, I have a chapter of this I actually have. Part two is about creating open communication, and I look at it with your relationship with God, your relationship with your marriage, your relationship with your kids, and then your relationship with your inner circle, because that’s important too friendships and people in your life that have influence over you. And so today I really wanna focus on this communication with yourself, the relationship with God, and I cover it in three main points, and I say one you have to face it.
0:06:32 – Speaker 1
Yeah.
0:06:33 – Speaker 2
Two, you have to know God, and three, you have to listen to God. So I kinda wanna dive into each of these individually, if that’s okay, kim, of course, yeah, so first we really need to deal with our baggage. What do I mean by that? I call it the dreaded. Did you questions? We ignore questions from our kids because we have baggage that we don’t want to remember. We don’t wanna speak it. These are questions Mom did you wait to have sex? Dad did you ever struggle with pornography? Mom did you have an abortion? Dad did you ever try drugs? You can ask whatever question. It is that you’re Fill in the blank.
Yeah, it’s a fill in the blank question. And when I started this journey and I realized, oh my gosh, I’m avoiding these things because of my past and this communication with my kids. I’m avoiding it because I’m afraid of some of these questions, because I have questions on this list that affect me. Yeah, this very list that I just shared with you, and God showed me something. He said, mandy, I’m not going to turn around your whole family dynamic without requiring you to change, and so I really need you to look in the mirror, and a lot of it was. I did this and I’m healed from it, like God wanted me to accept that forgiveness that I’ve not been willing to accept. I just haven’t forgiven myself Because there’s so much shame and guilt. I mean, here I am writing a book and leading a ministry, talking about open communication, and I had all these things swept under the rug.
0:08:13 – Speaker 1
And God really dealt with it Well, and I don’t want to blame this on parents or whatnot, but it’s also very generational, this concept of open communication and really being honest about who you are and your worth in Christ. Those weren’t generally the conversations that our parents were having with their parents, and so we didn’t even see that modeled and so we probably most of us saw the finished product or what our parents wanted us to see, and we don’t want to repeat that cycle. We want to walk through what God has planned for us by letting that go and letting him forgive us Because he wants to. As you said, it’s really us who hold it back, because we don’t feel worthy. We don’t feel worthy of it, and he wants so much to free us from those strongholds.
0:09:07 – Speaker 2
And he wants us to face it. I mean, we just have to face it. It happened, we did these things and we may have some contributing factors. For me, my parents divorced when I was three and I can tell you I fell into that typical stereotypical, aggressive girl syndrome. I wanted attention from boys but I got to a point where I could only blame my dad and my mom so much for that divorce and it had to become a personal responsibility thing. Now I can actually choose what I’m doing here. I can’t blame anyone anymore. This is my responsibility, this is my life, and to have to look at that and really realize that it’s hard, it’s difficult.
0:09:51 – Speaker 1
And we’re carrying around shame and secrets and the guilt that comes with that. We avoid these conversations with our kids and again, that’s manipulation from the enemy. He’s so good at that, he knows what your buttons are.
0:10:04 – Speaker 2
He’s scaring us into silence, yes, in the dark. And let me tell you why that’s so much more critical in this generation than the last. You know, we talked about our parents’ generation and they did the best they could do with the information they had and we’re trying to do. I mean, we’re gonna miss something. We’re not gonna be perfect in this generation.
We’re all gonna miss that, yeah, we’re all gonna miss that. There’s no perfect parent, but except for God himself. But what we’re trying to do is raise awareness, because the world is speaking so loudly to our kids through the online world now, through games, through apps, through games that are rated four plus. I mean they’re seeing things and hearing things, and so we have to bring the awareness. We have to face these things and not sweep them under the rug anymore. It’s so important to have a healthy dialogue with your child. It is so important. The world is speaking loudly and Satan is trying to manipulate us and scare us into silence because we’re afraid of these dreaded did you questions. We got to face it.
0:11:06 – Speaker 1
Well, and the world normalizes these things and that’s another trap that we can fall into. Because we get into our little bubble a lot of us, especially in the Christian community and we feel a certain way and we know a certain thing. I encourage you, if you feel like you haven’t stepped out of your bubble in a minute, go somewhere outside of your circle, and that will remind you how important it is to prepare your kids for the world outside that circle, because it will shock you. Even to this day. I will turn on a show or I’ll go into a place where I normally wouldn’t go and I realize how normalized some of these dreaded, did you questions and topics are in the world and I say it’s okay, it’s fine, everybody’s doing that, everybody’s into that, everybody experienced that and it’s no big deal. And that’s what the world will tell your child and we can tell ourselves that too. And then we’re wondering why we have shame and why we don’t feel like we can talk about these things. It’s because we have accepted the world’s truth instead of God’s.
0:12:11 – Speaker 2
Yeah, let me just challenge you to, on your social media, follow people who don’t believe the same way you are. It’s important.
0:12:17 – Speaker 1
It will shock you.
0:12:19 – Speaker 2
It will take you out of your bubble in 2.5 seconds. Yes, follow people who don’t follow your same beliefs on social media. This is important. You’re doing research actually to help your kids, because that’s what they’re hearing and seeing, that we need to hear it and see it too, so we can have these conversations with our kids. Okay, so face it.
And then once you face that, that baggage whatever you’re trying to avoid that thing that forces into our second step and that is no God. Because once you realize, oh my gosh, I did these things and God still loves me, it forces you into this realization that it’s not about religion or rules or restrictions, it’s about this relationship with God. And so when I say no God, I’m not talking about know the 10 commandments, I’m saying know the heart of God, love him. I’m saying his word, pray with him every day. You know, and then you’re going to experience this Holy Spirit where the 10 commandments become something you love Of covering, because it’s protecting you from pain, from baggage, from turmoil. And so that know God. We just have to know the difference between religion and Jesus.
0:13:36 – Speaker 1
And that transfers so beautifully into our relationship with our spouse and then our kids. You know, if our spouse and if our kids know our heart and why we’re doing what we’re doing and why it’s a covering and not a restriction and we’re really hearing and listening to one another, that relationship we have with Jesus transfers into a beautiful relationship with our spouse, which transfers into our kids. It’s this whole cycle that is incredible. When we get it right.
0:14:04 – Speaker 2
Yes, and my daughter won in Snapchat. She has it now she’s a teenager, but you know, when she was younger, she was wanting it because everybody else had it. And I would say no, and I would explain the why behind it. And you know what I did? I would pull up my Snapchat and I would show her the bad articles that were on there. Like I didn’t let her read them, but I let her read the titles and I said this is why your brain is not ready for this. I don’t even want to read this, like I want to move past it because I don’t even want to put this stuff in my brain, but you’re not ready yet to know if you can click on that or not. And so, explaining that why, you know I’m not trying to be mean. You can come play with the cool Snapchat filters on my phone, but we’re just not going to let you have it yet because we’re trying to protect your heart and mind and that’s what God wants us to do.
0:14:52 – Speaker 1
Well, and that why for us comes from the relationship with God. That’s where we get that why from Him. So it’s no longer just rules, it’s a covering, it’s I love you, no matter what in this is why. And so it’s so important, once we bring those things into the light and we face it, to really, really invest in our relationship with Jesus.
0:15:14 – Speaker 2
Yeah, you know, we talk a lot in our house about religion and Jesus and how they’re different and how you know hypocrites. You know that’s a, that’s a term that people just fly around all the time anymore. I’m kind of sick of it quite actually, because, you know, in a sense we’re all a little bit hypocritical because none of us are perfect. We’re all trying. But, you know, I want to be the kind of person that I want to be transparent with my struggles, with my kids, with my family, with everybody, because I, I don’t want to wear the mask, the hypocritical mass, to act like everything’s okay on the outside, but inside our lives are in shambles and I think that’s where we are. I’ve overused the word a little bit because I think that, you know, wearing that Christian mask is a true hypocritical statement.
Yeah, we think about the people in Jesus’s time. You know, the religious leaders who just couldn’t grasp why he was having dinner with certain people or why he, he, they just couldn’t grasp it, you know. And they and they were ridiculed. I mean, they ridiculed Jesus. Why are you doing this? I mean, they challenged him, they fought back and they, they fought against him. And so when I, I want to be the kind of person that’s just honest and sometimes you know my daughter will be like mom, you, you. This is not how we do on Snapchat, or this is not the kinds of things we post on your accountability partner.
She’s my accountability partner and I will say, look, I’m, I’m learning, I’m still learning too.
0:16:42 – Speaker 1
Yeah Well, I’m glad you said that, because a lot of times our human nature is we want to know what to do, we want to complete it and be done. Yeah, it’s a task check. I’m good, and one of the hardest parts about relationship is that it’s ongoing every day. It’s moment by moment, and especially in our relationship with God, listening to him moment by moment. It’s not a one and done you know, this is the third.
0:17:10 – Speaker 2
This is the third point that we’re moving into. You know, in my, in my, in my Personal responsibility, in my personal life. You know, knowing God is having that relationship with him, realizing the difference between religion and Jesus. But this listening to God, you know, and that means I’m saved. You know, I’ve got Jesus in my heart, I’ve given my life to him, I’ve invited him in. It’s a relationship, but but this moment by moment listening, it’s different, like I can have Jesus in my heart and choose not to do what he asked me to do. When he asked me to write this book, I told him 800 million times no, I was not listening. Yeah, I was not listening. And so that is a moment by moment choice.
0:17:54 – Speaker 1
And not only went our relationship with God, but on our marriage I think that’s what’s so beautiful is that God gives us these different experiences with him to prepare us to walk on this earth. Our temporary home and marriage is the earthly example of our relationship with God, and it’s the same thing. We couldn’t be in a marriage, be in a committed relationship, but it doesn’t mean we’re really listening to our spouse. And so if we’re practicing that in our relationship with God, it makes it easier to do that in our relationship with our spouse, because we know the fruit of that when we’re really doing it. We see, yes, it’s hard and it’s not always what we want to do, but when we do, something beautiful happens, yes, and so it’s just such a gift that he gives us these examples of how to live here before we come home and marriage, and then our relationship with our kids Our perfect example of that.
0:18:50 – Speaker 2
Yeah, and you know, listening to God is it requires us to be in tune with the Holy Spirit, and to be in tune with the Holy Spirit makes everything else line up at home, you know, with the family, with the husband and the kids, but that in tune with the Holy Spirit, it’s, it’s so important and it’s it’s like we said again, it’s a moment by moment choice. You know, I could be so in tune yesterday. Yes, I could have. You know, I completed the book several months ago but I could already be out of it like totally not listening to God, doing my own thing, thinking that this is all about me. This is a moment by moment choice of what I’m going to do. It’s a place of learning to submit to what God wants you to do, and it’s hard because you want it to be all about you. We’re selfish people, yes, like we’re selfish in nature, our flesh, and so this listening to God takes ourself out of it. And then it’s not about us.
And so these moments of these dreaded did you questions become less about us and more about what Jesus did on the cross, to like cover it and it becomes this most beautiful thing that then you want to talk about with your kids and then you’re not scared into silence anymore to avoid certain topics.
0:20:11 – Speaker 1
You know, I tell my kids all the time when something happens and it’s not what we wanted or what we hoped for or what they were expecting, I say you and I can see this moment, but God sees the whole picture and whatever is happening right now is because the picture is beautiful at the end and we can’t get there if we get our way right now and it’s hard to understand the unknown. It’s hard to understand when it’s not going the way we thought it would go. But that’s why God is God and that’s why it has to be a moment by moment decision to follow, knowing that he has the end in mind and he sees it differently Again. That transfers into your marriage, again, into your parenting. Like you said, it’s covering your child and giving them knowing the bigger picture, because you’ve walked through life, you know you’ve walked through experiences that they haven’t and they only see the right now. And explaining the why to them so they understand the goal that’s in mind.
0:21:10 – Speaker 2
Yeah, and Isaiah tells us that God’s ways are not our ways. We don’t understand sometimes why things happen, what we’re processing through. When I talk about baggage, I really talked about choices that we’ve made, but a lot of times things happen to us it’s baggage that we’ve acquired through a death, an immediate death or some kind of trauma that we’ve gone through sexual abuse, rape. We didn’t contribute to that. It was done to us, yeah, lots of times by the choices of others.
0:21:44 – Speaker 1
Yes.
0:21:44 – Speaker 2
Sometimes, and then other times, through death or whatever it’s unexplainable, and so that’s why it’s just so important to heal from whatever it is in your past, to face it.
0:21:58 – Speaker 1
After you face it, and then you heal through the power of the Holy Spirit, then moving forward and listening moment by moment. That’s what really the listening, the hearing, the being quiet before the Lord, be still and know that I’m God. Yes, that’s when you see the fruitfulness and the joy that comes in this life that he has for us, even when it’s hard, and you are joyful, you know you have made that step.
0:22:25 – Speaker 2
Jesus died so that we could have an abundant life. But if we do not listen to him, we are not gonna have an abundant life, and sometimes the listening requires us to get out of our comfort zone. Oh yes, I mean, kim and I were stuck in here. We’ve got kids at home. I’m just gonna be honest. We don’t have time for a radio show, ain’t?
0:22:44 – Speaker 1
nobody got time for this.
0:22:46 – Speaker 2
But God has called us to something. We’ve gotten out of the boat, we’re listening, We’ve got our ears to him and I can tell you the last four years even though it’s been some of the hardest four years in my life, getting out of the boat, doing all these uncomfortable things, sharing publicly things that I’m so ashamed about that’s scary. I mean, people know my junk now and it has been the most joyful and peaceful four years because I know I’m listening to God. It has transformed my life.
0:23:23 – Speaker 1
Yes, absolutely.
0:23:25 – Speaker 2
Listening to God daily.
0:23:29 – Speaker 1
It’s the key In all things For our wrap up segment. Today we wanna remember to create open communication with our families, but we have to look in the mirror. First One we have to face our baggage and heal. That’s key, god, start with yourself before you can start talking with your spouse and your kids. Number two we’ve gotta know God. It’s not religion, it’s relationship. We’ve all heard that, but we’ve all heard it because it’s true and if you’re on the relationship side of it, you know how true it is. And three we need to listen to God in a moment by moment choice that we’re making. It’s not a one and done. It’s not. I heard him. I’m living my life now for Jesus. It’s every day, every moment, listening and hearing and being obedient.
0:24:13 – Speaker 2
Listening to God helps everything line up. It helps it all work. You know, when you’re just off center and you’re off balance and you’re feeling overwhelmed I mean we all have that. I mean I’m like, once a week I’m like that right, at least by listening to God, being in tune to him, being still and knowing him, knowing his will. You know that transforms everything because it all lines up and it’s perfectly centered and it’s perfectly balanced and, like Kim said, something beautiful and amazing can happen. And when that happens and this open communication starts exuding between you and God, and then it flows into your marriage which is what we’re gonna touch on on our next show and then it ultimately goes to our kids and it changes the generational cycles.
0:25:04 – Speaker 1
We break it. That’s how you change the legacy.
0:25:07 – Speaker 2
We change the legacy, but it all starts with us facing it, getting real with God.
0:25:14 – Speaker 1
And one of my favorite things to remind myself it’s funny, as that sounds is that you don’t have to do it.
0:25:22 – Speaker 2
God will do it. He already did it, yeah he already did it.
0:25:26 – Speaker 1
It is the submission, it is the obedience, it is the willingness to listen, and then he does the work. He does the work.
0:25:33 – Speaker 2
Thanks for joining us on nextTalk Radio with Mandy and Kim every Saturday at 10 am on AM 630, the Word nextTalk Radio is brought to you by nextTalk, a nonprofit organization keeping kids safe online through cyber parenting and open communication. Find resources, videos and subscribe to our weekly podcast at nextTalk.org. Are you ready for the nextTalk?
Transcribed by https://podium.page
