Latest / The Family Teams Podcast / Ep. 124 | Three Reasons to Have More Kids in Your Youth

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Ep. 124 | Three Reasons to Have More Kids in Your Youth · The Family Teams Podcast

• 0:00
  What's up, 5-Minute Fatherhood listeners? Have you guys seen that Family Team's Weekend Live is officially open? You can register. You can claim your spot. A two-day event, Cincinnati, Ohio, October 18th and 19th this year. We're going to pack 250 couples in a Memorial Hall historic theater downtown where we're going to lean in, roll up our sleeves, and we're going to be able to pack a couple of people.
• 0:20
  and have a workshop about building a multi-generational family team on mission. You're gonna get practical tips, you're gonna get practical tools, you're gonna leave with a family blueprint and manual, and officially you're also going to be not alone and realize there's other people who want to do the same thing as you. We want you guys there, it's selling out fast, so make sure to go to familyteams.com slash weekend to register and claim your spot. And there's also a special little discount code if you're part of our Facebook group, which you can find a link to that,
• 0:48
  in the info section on audio or the info section on the YouTube channel. So again, familyteams.com slash weekend. It's selling out fast. Claim your spot. We'd love to see you there. This guy who was, I think, in his 90s in Jerusalem, he had 1,500 living descendants. Not recommending it. I'm not going to have that many.
• 1:13
  Hey guys, welcome to the 5-Minute Fatherhood Podcast. I'm your co-host, Jeff Bethke, along with my friend and mentor, Jeremy Pryor. Join us Monday through Friday as we chat about quick tips, skills, and ways to help equip you on your journey as a father to build your multi-generational family team on mission. Stay tuned.
• 1:35
  All right, guys, welcome to the Five Minute Fatherhood. Jeff and I are gonna jump on a landmine today. This conversation around three reasons to have more kids in your youth. Okay, so this is not a conversation a lot of people have, but when you're trying to build a multi-generational team, there are, I've never heard people actually consider
• 1:54
  the implications of what happens when you wait for a long time to have kids, what happens to your family multi-generationally. Like one way to think about this, just to set this up is do the math, right? If you waited 40 years, which is, if you guys look at the trends, people are waiting longer and longer to have their first child.
• 2:12
  Let's say you wait until you're 40 years old, just an extreme example, to have your first child. And your child, your children wait 40 years to have their first child. Then your first grandchild is being born when you're 80 years old, right? So that's one extreme example. So your multigenerational impact is starting to be felt more in that second generation in your 80s.
• 2:34
  Contrast that with somebody who has their first child at 20, another extreme example. A lot of people don't have them that early these days, but let's say they did, and your children did the same thing. Let's say you had three children starting when you were 20, and your children had three children starting when you were 40.
• 2:51
  Your first grandchild will be born when you're 40. You'll have nine grandchildren between your 40s and 60s. You'll start to have your great-grandchildren in your 60s, right? And if they have three, again, you'll have, what is that, 27? Like it starts to compound, right? And then your great-grandchildren will start to be born in your 80s. You can see these are totally different kinds of families, totally different kinds of experiences, totally different kinds of lives. And so there's three different reasons you guys should really consider this. And there's a great verse in the Psalms, right, that talks about...
• 3:20
  that there's a blessing in having children born in one's youth. It says that in Psalm 127. Why is it a blessing to have children born in your youth? There's three reasons. One is that each year you wait is one less year your children will know their grandparents. That's just math, guys. Every year you wait—
• 3:40
  That's one less year your children will know your parents, their grandparents. So if that's a big value to you, then that's a big consideration that a lot of people just don't even think about. Okay, each year you wait is one less year you will know your grandkids. Like I just kind of laid out how that works. Again, it's simple math. That's what's going to happen if you wait more and more years. Okay.
• 4:02
  And the third reason is each year you wait shrinks the opportunity that you will have to have more children. If that's a value to you, you want to have a larger family, then waiting obviously puts a damper on that as well. And so, again, I've never heard—and Jeff, I'm curious how you're reacting to this—I've never heard this conversation being had in public. Like, the simple math of what happens when you have children earlier versus later. And one of the times that I actually—that struck me the most is I read an article once about a man living in Jerusalem.
• 4:32
  who had 1,500 living descendants. And I was like, you know, I actually sat down and did the math. Like this guy was having 20 kids and his kids. I'm not recommending this, you guys. But just to show you how fast this math compounds, this guy who was, I think, in his 90s in Jerusalem, he had 1,500 living descendants. Not recommending it. I'm not going to have that many. Jeff's not going to have that many. But this math in even much smaller numbers makes a big difference. But, yeah, how do you react to that?
• 5:00
  Yeah, well, it's funny you brought this up because I've actually thought about the same thing. I've never thought about it exactly like this. But yeah, I remember. So we got married and started having kids pretty young. I was 25 by the time we had Kinsley. That's not crazy young, but it's certainly young by these days. And yeah, I remember I never thought about it. Like it was not a reason for why we had kids then. It just was like that was just kind of our lot and just why we did. You know, it just ended up happening then.
• 5:23
  And I remember once we had Kinsley, though, I just kind of started thinking about like doing the math like, oh, I'll be X when she's X. I'll be this when she's that. And yeah, like if she gets if she starts if she you know, she gets married, start having kids when we did. I'll be 50. Potentially, if it's a couple years before that, I'll be in my 40s as a grandparent. That's amazing. Right. Like that's.
• 5:42
  I just thought about that. Like, that's awesome to be in my 40s as a grandparent, potentially, depending on how quick we can, you know, continue the generations that could go great, great grandparent, which is crazy, like crazy to think about. Now, of course, that doesn't mean we're like pushing kids to get married and all these different things. It's just interesting to think about with like generational multiplication. And like what you said, it's just it's a different family.
• 6:02
  If you can actually get kind of one more generation in, it's a different family. And we also are receiving the benefits of this. So we're on the young side of like Kinsley knows her great grandma, which is crazy, and great grandpa. That's really cool. And they're only in their 80s still, which is like insane too. So like, man, that's just really crazy, right? That there will be hopefully a longevity relationship there hopefully.
• 6:24
  Lord willing for a little bit longer. And I just think that's so special to think that, man, what a legacy, what a testimony. And for her to know, you know, her great grandparents, and then for them to, you know, like you've talked about before, for them to know, you know, three or four generations ahead of them when they were kids and they can connect those dots. We're going like eight generations now.
• 6:42
  which is just crazy. Like, you know, they can tell stories that their parents told them about like before the automobile and electricity, all these things like that's crazy. Right. And so, yeah, I just think it's really, really cool to think about. I don't, there's no shame here. There's no pressure. There's no guilt. It just, your lot is your lot. Your family is your family. The Lord, you know, writes all of our stories.
• 7:05
  Um, but I do think for the couple percent of people who are only thinking through the American lens of the classic American story of wait, wait, wait, get a job, build a career, do all those things. And then basically the finish line is the kids. Like once we're steady, once we're stable.
• 7:23
  I would just say, let this actually then pressure you or let this challenge you. That's the only scenario where I would say this is actually really important to think about. But if it's like, you know, if it's infertility or some of these other things or just you already have kids, like that's not who we're talking to. I think this is just a really good topic to think about.
• 7:39
  for those people who are kind of living in a story that just kind of falls in line with actually like putting kids as a checkbox, you know, once you're 45, which is just that's really unique. And that's not normal in culture. And I think to actually consider that and rethink that is really important.
• 7:56
  Hey guys, if you like this short content on 5-Minute Fatherhood, then you're going to love long-form interviews that Jeremy and I do with other dads just like you over at Dads Building Teams. We go much more in-depth hearing the stories, challenges, and journeys of different dads who are trying to build multi-generational teams on mission. Just go to whatever podcast platform you use and search for Dads Building Teams.