What does it look like to build a Christian family economy in a culture that increasingly rejects the biblical vision of marriage, children, work, and human flourishing?
In this episode of Gardens in Babylon, Kevin Minnett sits down with Josh Streblow, a father of nine, cattle and hog farmer, and owner of Carl's Bakery in Granite Falls, Minnesota, to talk about what it means to build a productive household that doesn't retreat from the world—but faithfully engages it.
The conversation begins with the wisdom of Puritan pastor Richard Baxter, who understood the household as far more than a place of rest or private refuge. The Christian home is an economy, a place where husbands, wives, children, and even servants participate in meaningful work, stewardship, discipleship, and worship.
For Baxter, work wasn't merely about earning money. Diligent labor was an act of worship. Our time, resources, skills, businesses, land, and households belong to God, and therefore our work should be directed toward His glory.
Josh Streblow is putting that vision into practice. As a husband and father, farmer, and business owner, Josh has spent years building a multi-generational family economy around productive work, faith, land, and community. But that commitment has also brought him into direct conflict with a culture that increasingly demands that Christians keep their convictions private.
When Pride Month arrived, Josh chose not to hide his convictions behind the doors of his bakery. Instead, he publicly celebrated the biblical vision of marriage and family. The result was national attention, boycott attempts, hostility, and threats.
But Josh's response wasn't to retreat. His philosophy is simple: You can't just build. You also have to fight. And when you fight, you fight like heaven.
In this conversation, we explore what it means to recover a biblical vision of productive households, why Christians should think beyond individual careers and paychecks, how families can build real economic resilience, and why faithful Christian witness sometimes requires courage in the public square.
The Productive Christian Household
One of the great failures of modern Christianity has been the reduction of the Christian life to what happens inside the church building.
But Scripture gives us a much bigger vision.
The household is a place of discipleship.
Work is a sphere of worship.
Children are a heritage from the Lord.
Property is something to steward.
Businesses can serve neighbors.
And faithful Christians are called to cultivate what God has entrusted to them.
The goal isn't simply to survive the culture.
It is to build something faithful, beautiful, productive, and enduring—and to do so with the confidence that Christ is Lord over every square inch of creation.
About Gardens in Babylon
Gardens in Babylon explores what it means for Christians to faithfully live, work, build, worship, raise families, and proclaim Christ in a world increasingly shaped by competing visions of truth, beauty, morality, and human flourishing.
Keywords
Christian family economy, productive household, Christian household, Christian family, Christian business, Christian entrepreneurship, work as worship, biblical work ethic, Richard Baxter, Puritan work ethic, Christian economics, family economy, multi-generational family, Christian farming, Christian business owners, biblical family, Christian culture, productive families, Christian stewardship, Christian entrepreneurship
Hashtags
#ChristianFamily #ChristianBusiness #ProductiveHousehold #ChristianEconomy #WorkAsWorship #ChristianEntrepreneurship #BiblicalFamily #ChristianCulture #RichardBaxter #ChristianStewardship #FamilyEconomy #GardensInBabylon
