Latest / Homeschool Insights - Biblical Home Education Inspiration in Under 10 Minutes! / Are You Fighting the Wrong Battles in Your Home? Chuck Black
Transcript
- speaker-0: Wherever we see the enemy attacking, we can obviously see that those are the important things, right? That's where he's gonna go for first is right right for the throat. So we've got to be guarding our marriages. It really is that that there are forces all around us that are trying to destroy us, and they're coming for our kids. We so often want to focus on all of the wrong things, right? And we put the relationship with our kids in the back burner and we put the relationship in of the marriage, you know. Well, I have all these things to do as a mom and my marriage will come later. Or, you know, we get kind of into this legalistic mindset of okay, it's academics and then it's chores, and then we choose all these battles in our home. ⁓ I have teenagers right now. And so every day it's like, is this worth a battle? Like the fact that you left every morning. I wake up and there's food on the counter. And every day I feel like this is a battle. You didn't put it away last night. And when we really zoom out and we see that there is an actual battle, a real battle for the hearts and the minds of our children, for for their souls for all of eternity, it kind of like it helps us to realize. What is the battle and what isn't the battle? And the battle every day in our homes that we're fighting of did you put your food away? Are you cleaning your room? I really feel like sometimes those are just the giant distractions of the enemy to break down the relationships in the home so that we lose the greater battle of the relationships that ultimately point them to the relationship that is that of salvation with our Lord and Savior, right? ⁓ and so this this whole thing of battle as I was kind of prepping for this. I'm like, man, I have a lot of battles day to day in this house. And ultimately, I need to get my eyes off of those and realize those are not, those are not the focal point. The focal point is, like you said, protecting and guarding our relationships with our kids so that the enemy can't come in. And really I want you to go back to this, this marriage thing because the whole home starts with, well, it starts with our independent relationships with the Lord, right? And then the relationship of the marriage. And I think we underestimate how important the relationship of the marriage is to guard our children. So will you talk a little bit? I I love that you're hitting relationships because that's our focus. I mean, that that's really the focus in homeschool. And we we so often get the school and the home mixed up. We get that so backwards and we so focus on all the things that at the end of the day don't really matter, right? And we lose this other thing. And I really believe it's it's the enemy's tactic, right? To divide us. So T help ⁓ hel go back to the marriage. I want to focus on the marriage a little bit because homeschool moms really lose sight of the whole marriage thing when we're in the trenches. speaker-1: And it's easy to do. I mean, there are there are so many, ⁓ so many things pulling at your attention and your time and that sort of thing. And the marriage often can be put ⁓ off to the side, ⁓ for what might feel like a more important issue, but there isn't there is nothing there's no relationship other than ours with Christ more important in that home than between the husband and the wife. That they that that has to be unified, ⁓ it has to be cohesive. Doesn't have be perfect 'cause nothing none of us are perfect. Right, right. ⁓ but we ⁓ we gotta have a willingness to compromise, ⁓ to work through our problems, to be transparent, to ultimately ⁓ th I think the key ingredient ingredient here i is ⁓ humility. ⁓ and and and just r both for ⁓ the husband and the wife, that they they're humbly called to serve each other. And so ⁓ that that's where leadership comes in. I do a lot of speaking on leadership and how important that is, especially for the guy. but you know, there's a lot of leadership that the mom has to demonstrate too, right? And that and that that structure the guy created in the home is so important and the enemy has done really well at lying to the world about that and destroying that that that hierarchy. Not that any role is more important than the other. ⁓ you know, my wife, Interestingly enough, he came from a a a quite a feminist home. ⁓ wow. And so there were there was some challenges for us for the first few years. And what was really great for her though, as as she drew closer to the Lord and was discipled by some amazing godly women, is seeing how a squadron in the Air Force ⁓ worked and how you have a a commander and a vice commander and then it just goes down from there and how that vice commander was just as important as the commander. But just fulfilled a different role and ⁓ and so critical. And so i understanding that with all humility and and and not ⁓ not usurping God's design for that, ⁓ I think is key. You know, the Bible says for ⁓ for the wives to respect the husbands and for the husbands to love the wife. That's that that's not by accident. That that's what we both need, right? And so ⁓ when that's in place. Then everything else can be done. So just, you know, the proverbial don't get the cart before the horse is so true. ⁓ because the horse of the family is the marriage. And so that's that's the force, that's the momentum, that's the strength, that's the power. Yeah. ⁓ and and that's that's the vision for the family. So yeah, ⁓ so much to be said about that. ⁓ I'm not a marriage counselor and I've, you know, ⁓ but but Andrea and I are are are have now been married for 43 years and so grateful ⁓ For our time together. We had some challenging days, especially in the throes in the trenches of homeschooling with all the stresses that were there. but the Lord preserved us and we both ⁓ just did our utmost when those difficult days came to just take a breath, step back, pull, you know, pull our head out of the trench and look around and apologize and and and and then team up again. speaker-0: Yeah, I love that. And really remember what the greatest battle is. And I think you're right. It is it is the marriage in the family that is is the foundation of all this. And you can see it because that's the first place we see the enemy attacking. In well, I even think go back to the garden, and immediately the enemy tried to divide Adam and Eve, right? R immediately it was this, it was if I can get them divided, if I can get them alone. And and we see that in everything, even down to the gender thing. Like, are you even a boy? Are you even a girl? Marriage doesn't really matter. And And we see, and so wherever we see the enemy attacking, we can obviously see that those are the important things, right? That's where he's gonna go for first is right right for the throat. So we've got to be guarding our marriages as part of this, you know, when we're in a spiritual battle. And again, you guys, it really is that that there are forces all around us that are trying to destroy us and they're coming for our kids. They're coming for an entire or he's coming for an entire generation. And and it does, it starts it starts with our personal walk with God, relationship. I love how you said relationship, relationship, relationship. Our walk with God and our walk in our marriage, and then it can trickle down from there. speaker-2: This episode of Homeschool Insights is brought to you by BJU Press Homeschool, CTC Math, and the Explorer Bible for Kids. Visit the show notes to learn more about these excellent resources. And for more encouragement, listen to the Schoolhouse Rocked Podcast at Schoolhouseroct.com.