Latest / Growing Disciples: Faith at Home with Chatham Families / Passing on a Legacy of Faith to the Next Generation
Transcript
- J&T New Intro_take 2: Grandparents can hold a special place in the lives of their grandchildren. After all, they have a lifetime of experiences to share and stories to tell. But what about the important role grandparents play in nurturing the faith of their grandchildren? Whether they live down the street or hundreds of miles away, grandparents can share the love of Jesus with the young people in their lives and impact generations to come. Welcome to Growing Disciples, Faith at Home with Chatham Families. My name is Elizabeth Lindbergh, the host of this podcast and Director of Family Ministries at Chatham Community Church. And today I'm joined by June and Terry Little, a wonderful couple here in our community who have a real heart for encouraging and equipping grandparents to be intentional about passing their faith on to their grandkids. June Terry lead our Grand Monday mornings gatherings, a monthly opportunity for anyone who wants to invest spiritually in the next generation, to come together, learn from one another, share ideas, and pray for their families. In our conversation, we talked about the joys of grandparenting, the unique spiritual influence grandparents can have, and some simple practical ways to build meaningful connections with grandchildren of all ages. And I think you'll be encouraged by their reminders. that it's never too late to strengthen those relationships. I started by asking June and Terry to tell us a little bit about their family and what being grandparents has meant to them. So let's jump in. GrandParenting Take 2: June and Terry, thanks for joining me today on the Growing Disciples Podcast. Thank you for having us. We're glad to be with you today. So I'm so glad for our audience to hear from you about your heart behind the grandparenting ministry here. but before we talk about the great work that God is doing tell us a little bit about your family. Well, we have three children. Our oldest son lives in Raleigh with his wife and three grandchildren of ours, and they are young adult grandchildren. And then our daughter lives close to us in Chapel Hill and she has two children and they are middle school age and then our youngest son does not have a family. And I happen to know two of those grandkids that live here in town and they're pretty awesome. We agree. We think so. so when you first became grandparents, did you think much about the spiritual influence you might have on your grandchildren? Or did that sort of awareness grow over time? Well, for me, of course my heart was always that my children and grandchildren would come to know Jesus, but I thought mainly of my role as reading Bible stories to the little ones. taking them or going with them to Sunday school and church when that time came. kind of the traditional usual things. But beyond that, I don't think I was really a aware of what influence I could have spiritually. It has definitely grown over time. Yeah, I would say my same. It has grown. Hadn't really given a lot of thought to it, but found an organization that put a lot of priority on that and instruction and it just would fit. a few years ago you shared with me about this organization, the Legacy Coalition, whose mission it is to help grandparents be intentional about passing on their faith to the next generation. And I really appreciate the work that they're doing in this ministry and they really exhort grandparents to sort of buck the culture's narrative that once you retire you can think, I've done my time, it's time for me to kick back and relax Or the myth that we can't relate to the younger generation as we get older. And Larry Fowler, the legacy coalition founder, he encourages us instead to remember that we're uniquely positioned to have a great influence on that younger generation. And that our grandchildren and the young people in our lives that they need us, right? They need godly wisdom, they need a Christ-like example and our faith stories and and our prayer. And so with this in mind, how has grandparenting changed the way you think about your own faith and also the legacy that you hope to leave? Well I think for me I had thought of legacy more in terms of my career. Okay, yeah. Thought about when we I retired to do consulting in in an area where I was very comfortable. And the Lord didn't want us to be comfortable. We found He's led us to pack up and leave and the northwest and move to the east where our kids were. And it's been a ride and a thrill ever since. Yeah, that's a pretty common thought. the legacy that we're gonna leave is the work that we do and in our careers and whatnot. it's a little bit of a shift, a mental shift that we that we can take, that we're invited into. what about you, June? I never thought about passing my faith on to my grandchildren that much. I n I wanted to do that with my children, definitely. And I wanted to live a life of faith and be a good example. But I I guess I kind of stopped here. now that I have grandchildren, I realize how important it is to leave that legacy of faith. I want them to know that I prayed for them. I want them to know how much I desired their spiritual well-being and I want them to just know that I'm behind them encouraging them to have a closer walk with the Lord than I've ever had. That's what my my legacy would be is that they walk e more closely than I ever have. Beautiful. I think t too the importance of passing on stories and and how God is a part of our lives and answers prayers and does things that are just unbelievable. And to share that with our grandkids is is a g goal I have. in fact you took that to a real tangible level when you created your Story Worth book. Yes, that's true. so Story Worth is a website where you're asked questions and then you're prompted by questions, I should say, and then you're invited to sort of tell your story around answering that question. And you can add photos, you can edit, and then you can package it as an actual book that you can give to your family members, which you've done, right, Terry? Yeah, that's correct. It comes out a really nice bound book with colored pictures and just a joy to share. For our kids and our siblings and our grandkids. And and you just went to a family reunion, I believe it's now a bestseller in the family. Very limited audience there. A very biased audience, I would say. Especially if their name is in it, they won't. so the together, the three of us, we've held workshops, we've had meetups using this excellent material provided by the legacy coalition. Including our monthly Grand Monday morning gatherings, which we're gonna talk about a little bit more in just a bit. But I'm curious to hear from you both. What have you found to be some simple ways you've sought to be intentional about passing on your faith to your grandkids that maybe you've gotten tips or learned strategies by engaging with some of the materials from the Legacy Coalition? One of the things that we've done and we were encouraged to do this by Legacy Coalition, is visit our adult, our young adult grandchildren on their college campus. And I think that we the kids got to be high school age and graduate from high school and and we kind of wondered if we would have much contact with them almost in it, you know, that or how that would change. we thought about it and some of the recommendations were is don't don't give up when they get to be a certain age. Keep going. So we decided that before our grandson graduated college, we were going to definitely get on campus and see him there. It took us till his junior year, but we got there and what a wonderful experience that was for us to be with him, see his environment, enjoy time with him. Have him be the host to us. And it was just seeing him in a different light. And I think that was a real bonding experience. And it's so it's things like that that we've learned about, or been encouraged to do is maybe take the extra step with our grandchildren, finding something that interests them or going to a place that they frequent or that type of thing, you know. I think that's one key thing that we've learned to do. Yeah, the campus is thirteen hundred miles a round trip, so it it does take an effort, but it's worth every mile of it. Sure. Sure. some grandparents face challenges when they're trying to influence their grandchildren spiritually. it could be the due to physical distance, it could be emotional distance due to fractured relationships, or perhaps a gr grandparent isn't permitted to have faith conversations with the child, or they might think, My grandchildren are older now and I'm Not sure I can have that much more influence and June, you were just referring to that idea. And also, when you had younger grandkids, you were living far away. You were living across the country. And so you had a transition of trying to develop a relationship with those grandkids from afar. And maybe you can talk a little bit about some strategies you had with that and challenges. And then and then of course ultimately you came you came east at the Lord's direction. but maybe s maybe sharing some wisdom for other grandparents in in some of these situations. When we lived in Idaho, we tried to make sure we got out to North Carolina twice a year, which was really important to see those children and spend time with them, those grandchildren. and of course the usual in between do FaceTime or send them something in the mail. talk to them on the telephone, those kinds of things we tried to do. it was hard. It was you just didn't feel that close closeness. at least we didn't. so it was really wonderful to get here and have that time with them one on one. I think that some of the things that we've put into practice is having like when we did come out a couple times a year, we would bring a favorite book that maybe they something that they didn't have in their home, but we'd brought it the year before and they would enjoy that. And that went on for a long time. And even to the point when they got older, Terry made up some questions for them to answer about the story. And they loved that, that challenge of finding what what the answer to the questions Grandpa had. the other things were a game. There might be a favorite game that we played when we were with them. And that next time we came we would start with that game. That was our point of connection again. Or a new game. We started with Candyland and we worked up to ruckus and other more wild games. But they have memories of those things. They they said, Remember the time we we would play ruckus together and we'd play game after game and yeah, those are good points of connection. Yeah, so really making the most of those opportunities that you work together and not making it about sort of maybe what you wanted to do, but being being intentional To to make a plan to make a connection. that was the goal, not just taking a vacation. But to make a connection. we have a new granddaughter, she's just six months old and she lives two and a half hours away. So it's not so hard to get to her, but you know, lives are busy. even at this age she changes so fast, so quickly. we were just with her and My daughter in law was saying, We should FaceTime more frequently so Lainey can see Hernona's face and her papa. And then just making an effort to to go up at least at least once a month, if not more. They grow up so fast. They do. so just a little bit ago I mentioned our monthly Grand Monday mornings gatherings. And so we meet on the second Monday of the month and we listen and discuss some of the great teaching offered by Legacy Coalition. Which I'd love to talk about a little bit in depth here, just a sec. and we also share resources like devotionals or books that we can use when we're with our grandkids. So recently we had a grandmom who was with us who their grandchild was experiencing loss in their family. There was a loss of a pet and a a family member. And so she just shared with us how do I talk to the kids about this? And so some of us found some books for her to to share with her grandchild. So things like that. and of course we take time to pray with and for one another. June and Terry, maybe tell our listeners about the impetus behind Grand Monday mornings. where we got the idea Right now, probably most popular. tool of the legacy coalition is Grand Monday nights. And it's a little over an hour a session and with an expert each week with a new twist and turn on grandparenting. It's just so educational and so encouraging So many have moved here to this area specifically to be near their grandkids. Here's an organization that everything is free. Our basic stuff is free. other stuff very low cost and just so rich in terms of tools to work with your grandchildren. during these episodes on Monday nights that we watch, there are all manner of topics covered. it might be how to pass down wealth or f dealing with finances regarding your grandchildren. It might be the fact that some grandchildren are being bullied. And, what can we as a grandparent, do to help support the parents in this matter and show the concern for our grandchild that we need to s to show. There's matters of education. there's one gal that's so talented about learning your child's learning style and we as grandparents can come alongside the parents in that way and help you know maybe point out I think that so and so learns well this way and what do you think? there's a lot of sessions that deal with prayer and how we can be very intentional with our prayers for our grandchildren. many other topics are addressed. That's great. Right. So an interesting one is the teaching on writing a legacy letter. And I d did that with our oldest one as he got out of college and it w it's especially good to do it to key points in life, but it lets them know you love you're you're rooting for and you're be proud of things that they have done and It was just a great experience and I'm looking forward to doing that same with the rest of the grandkids. What a gift for your grandson to receive that from you. to be able to reflect on that as he gets older and what an example it is for him too as he thinks about passing on his faith. It's wonderful. so I I would like to attest to the fact that the Grandmone Nights episodes are just they're just fantastic. they bring in experts from all different areas to speak to to grandparents on how they can love on their family and and pass on their faith. we joke a little bit that, Grand Monday nights it starts at eight o'clock at night. So we thought, let's make it Grand Monday mornings. it suits our schedule just a little bit better. that's what we've been doing, meeting on Monday mornings and in doing this, not only are we trying to encourage grandparents in our community, but we're also trying to reach out to anyone that has a heart for young people. they may want to serve as spiritual grandparents and influence the next generation and June you were telling me a story before we started recording about someone who in your older grandson's life when he went off to college she stepped in and acted as a spiritual grandparent to Jacob. Do you want to share a little bit about that? when we were on campus with Jacob at his graduation this past spring, we got to meet this couple and the lady shared that when Jacob first started college he came to church on Sunday mornings all alone. And she realized, you know, that was a big deal for him to come to church by himself. And she just felt compelled by the Lord to get to know him. So she and her husband did. And they invited him out to dinner and that sort of thing. And it was a wonderful relationship that developed over the years and he valued that so much, it was a very meaningful thing that to him that they reached out to him and now his two sisters are there on the campus and that family's doing the same thing. And it's just a beautiful, beautiful story of how someone who's not the biological grandparent can step in and have a great influence. Yeah. And be a real encouragement to a young person. And I I told her how much that meant to us as Jacob's grandparents that they would do that. Yeah. we've had great aunts join us adopted grandparents join us and everyone's just got such a rich story to tell and even reflecting back on the influence our grandparents had on us and you know some's positive some some not so positive, but it helps us to think through what kind of impact we want to have on the next generation. So June and Terry, as we wrap up our time together, I'm wondering if you could offer one piece of advice to a grandparent who would want to be more intentional about helping the next generation know and follow Jesus, what would it be? I think it would be to follow Jesus yourself in your your personal life and let him or her know about answered prayer, about how important it is to be in church and the way that God blesses us in our lives. I think to me that would probably be the most important thing. Very wise. Grow in your faith, deepen your walk with the Lord and be an example, not only your actions, but also reflecting on what the Lord's doing in your life. I agree. The next Grand Monday mornings is going to be Monday, November 9th, here at the North Chatham campus We've got a great program planned for that session, so we encourage you to join us. June and Terry just want to thank you for taking the time to sit down with me today It's such a joy to serve alongside the two of you. And also so grateful for your heart for the next generation and all I've learned from you both. Thank you, Elizabeth, for allowing us to share about the ministry and thank you for helping us to bring it to Chatham Community Church Yeah. Amen. Well, thanks for joining us for another episode of Growing Disciples, Faith at Home with Chatham families. And we hope to see you Monday at our next gathering at 930 to 1130 at the North Chatham campus. And until next time, may the Lord bless you as you nurture faith at home.