The Gospel-Shaped Life Podcast

*One little housekeeping note: GarageBand, the platform we use to bring together the intro, interview file, and outro to produce each episode, was not allowing me to import this week’s interview file for some reason. So, unfortunately, all I could do was upload the interview itself here to Substack, without an official intro or outro like we usually have. But you’re really just here to hear from our guest today, anyway, so hopefully that’ll be ok. I appreciate your understanding and am praying GarageBand works for me next time!

Chelsey DeMatteis is a wife, mom of two, podcast host, and author of two books, most recently the new Advent devotional, “A Thrill of Hope”. She is passionate about writing and speaking about Jesus and His life-changing truths. Today she comes on the show to share more about her Advent devotional and to encourage us with a message of the hope and light that are to be found in Christ.

What We Chat About on This Episode:

~Chelsey’s new devotional book, A Thrill of Hope, what led her to write it, and what readers can expect

~How the book is set up

~Living with the hope of heaven in the midst of life’s darkest and hardest seasons

~Jesus as our living Hope

~The metanarrative of Scripture and pictures of Christ that we see in the OT; why those are so important to see

~The redemption power of God to take the hard seasons of loss and transform them into something beauty can come from

~The light of Jesus and how it ministers to our hearts in life’s darkest moments

~The power of hope and holding onto it even when it’s hard

~Remembering the truths of Advent all year long

~The plague of darkness in Exodus and how God continued to give His people light in that time; what that means for us today

~How Jesus shows up for each of us in unique ways that mean something special to each of us

~A particular day of the devotional that is extra special to Chelsey

~Advent as a season of invitation to go deeper with Jesus and to share Him with others

~Being the hands and feet of Jesus this season

~What Chelsey’s hope for this Advent book is

~The burden of chasing the ‘perfect’ aesthetic this Advent and making the choice instead to chase after Christ, where true worth, peace, and joy are found

~And more!

Inspiring Quotes to Remember:

“Hope, as a believer, is an action. It is literally Jesus in action in my life. Not necessarily me going and doing for the Lord, but the Lord breathing life into me as I place my hope in Him. He is my hope.”

“Whatever it is we are going through, it is always His light that will be able to pull us through. If we do not bury our heads and instead look for His light, we will see such beauty He is bringing in the midst of the hard.”

“Hope it what gets us out of bed when things are terrible.”

“We need the beautiful, life-giving, joy-filled truths of Advent all year long.”

“While Egypt was under the plague of darkness for three days, God continued to give His people light. He led them by light, sustained them in light to foreshadow what Christ would come to do years later.”

“Even when we feel like we are in captivity, the Lord’s light is still over my life and literally inside me - I can carry that light with me wherever I go.”

“If we just hunker down in Luke 2 during the Advent season and instead trace the light of God from the very beginning all the way to what is coming at the end, it is amazing to see how God shows up through His light and leading people that way. Seeing the big picture perspective during Advent makes it so much more powerful.”

“Jesus shows up in our lives in unique ways that mean something special to us individually.”

“Advent is not only an invitation for us to go deeper ourselves with the Lord, but also an invitation to notice others, pray for them and love them well, and be the hands and feet of Jesus to them, inviting the light to piece the darkness in their lives. The season of Advent is perfect for that.. It is a season of invitation to go deeper with Jesus and to share Jesus with others.”

“Hope has come. Invite people to know that.”

“There is no better news to share with others. If we are ready and willing, with our hands open, to deliver a meal, to listen, to pray for someone, to love them tangibly, then we can share the light of Christ with them this Advent.”

“Stop chasing the ‘perfect’ aesthetic this Advent. Chase after the Reason for Advent instead. Feel that burden fall off and find your worth and hope in the Lord. A deeper joy and real peace are found there.”

“It’s ok to love beauty this Advent. But don’t love it more than Who we’re celebrating.”

Resources Mentioned:

A Thrill of Hope

More of Him, Less of Me

The Matheny Manifesto: A Young Manager's Old-School Views on Success in Sports and Life by Mike Matheny

Fruitful: Cultivating a Spiritual Harvest That Won't Leave You Empty

Love Lives Here: Finding What You Need in a World Telling You What You Want by Maria Goff

Everybody, Always: Becoming Love in a World of Setbacks and Difficult People by Bob Goff

The Dream Giver by Bruce Wilkerson

Where You Can Find Chelsey:

Website: Chelsey DeMatteis

Instagram: @chelseydematteis

I am delighted to be joining you on the show for the first solo-podcast episode in ages! Today we will be covering the important and timely topic of what a thoroughly and truly Christian response looks like to the election results of last week. May you come away from this episode edified and encouraged for the days ahead!

What I Cover on this Episode:

~The responses to the election results I’m seeing from various Christians online and what a truly, thoroughly Christian response would actually look like

~Understanding that in order for a response to be truly and inherently Christian, it has to exhibit the fruits of the Spirit

~A study of the fruits of the Spirit and how they each individually apply to the concept of the election and how we respond to it

~The divisive culture we are living in and the reality that if we as believers are called to be salt and light, it is actually our job alone to fix the divisiveness and to bring peace

~What Paul shows us is the key to living the victorious Christian life and living out the fruits of the Spirit

~What walking by the Spirit means and what it looks like

~And More!

Beyond the Boxes is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Resources Mentioned:

My Substack

Previous podcast episode on what it means/what it looks like to walk by the Spirit

The book I co-authored on walking by the Spirit

Quotes to Remember:

“I’m seeing a lot of responses by Christians to the election results that are not Christian in nature, responses that are beneath us, responses that do not look like our Savior Whose image we are to bare, the Jesus Whose ambassadors we are to be. So we are going to talk today about what a truly Christian response to the election results actually looks like and do so in a way that takes us through the fruits of the Spirit.”

“To have a truly Christian response to the election results, to politics, to the next four years, our response has to be characterized by the fruits of the Spirit. It has to come not from a partisan perspective, but from a truly Biblical, Christ-focused, Jesus-centered, Spirit-led perspective.”

“It is no mistake that the first fruit listed is love. Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 13 that of faith, hope, and love, love is the most important. Paul goes on to tell us in Colossians that love is the foundational attribute we must put on. John tells us God is love. The other fruits and characteristics are important, but love is the one that is foundational to all the others. It is of paramount importance.”

“For us to have a thoroughly Christian response to the election results, we must be known for loving others really, really well. Not known for our pride and gloating if we are on the side of who won, not by disdain for the winner and his supporters if we are on the side of who lost, but by a deep-seated, core-level, sincere love for all. A Christian response to the election results is that we would love one another well - Jesus said it is by our love that others would know we are His disciples - not by our politics, not by our intelligence, not by ability to win debates, not by what side of the aisle we’re on. No. We are to be known by our love. If we are not known by our love for those on all sides of the aisle, then we are doing the cause of Christ and our witness for the kingdom a grave disservice.”

Thanks for reading Beyond the Boxes! This post is public so feel free to share it.

“The next fruit of the Spirit is joy. There are many in this country who are not feeling joy over this year’s election results. They are not joyful over what the next four years will hold. So if you are a believer on that side of the aisle, it can feel incredibly hard to have joy right now in light of the results of the election. But as I read this fruit of the Spirit, I thought of the Proverbs 31 woman who is able to look with joy to the future, who is able to look to whatever is coming with a peaceful smile on her countenance, with the rest and peace and comfort that come from knowing that God is on the throne no matter who is leading humanly-speaking.”

”Whatever your voting choice was, whether your candidate won this week or lost or you voted third party or didn’t vote at all, if you are a Christian, you are to have such a deep and abiding knowledge of God and of His character, His kindness, His love, His care, His compassion, and His sovereignty that you are able to look to the future with joy.”

“This is not to say there is no room at all for grieving to be done or for feeling disappointment or fear or any of the million and one feelings you could feel over who won and what the next four years will look like. If you didn’t vote for who won, all of those feelings are understandable. The Lord does not want us to stuff our feelings but rather bring them to Him and process them with Him. But at the end of the day, if we are believers, we should be able to look with joy to the future because of Who holds the future. The same goes if your candidate won last week. It is ok to feel all the joy and excitement over our candidate of choice winning. But, ultimately, we need to come back to the center of understanding that our hope is not in politics, but in Christ, that He is on the throne regardless of what earthly leaders He allows to be raised up, and that because we can trust in Him, we are able to have joy when we look to the future.”

“We need to be known by the watching world as people who actually act as if we have hope and trust (which then leads to joy no matter where we are). If we are professing believers trying to tell the world that Christ is our Savior, our hope is in Him, and He is trustworthy, then we need to be able to share with the watching world a picture of joy and of peace in this time. That needs to be our reputation. Otherwise, do we trust God? Do we have hope at all? If we can trust God with our eternity, then we need to trust Him with our right now, because He holds it all, has a plan, and brings everything together for the good of those who love Him.”

“It’s ok to feel our feelings. But if we are struggling with the results of the election, we need to be able to do enough wrestling with the Lord that we are able to come back around to a place of peace because God holds it all.”

“The next fruit is patience, which I think will be an incredibly valuable one over the next four years. It goes along with love and also goes along with the next fruit we’ll be looking at, kindness. We are to be known for our love, patience, and kindness. So often when we are interacting with someone who votes differently than we do, thinks differently than we do, has a different political or theological stance than we do, we want do debate, belittle, put down, win the argument at all costs, and gloat when we do. But I want to issue the Church a clarion call to patience and kindness in the days, weeks, months, and years ahead, to have our list of priorities rightly ordered to where we do not put our politics above our theology and our call to love, but instead be able to sit down with each other and interact with patience, compassion, and empathy, being slow to speak and quick to listen and having concern for others’ concerns.”

“Paul unequivocally tells us that we are not to look merely to our own interests, but also to the interests of others. What that looks like is being concerned about what other people are concerned about whether or not you agree with the concern even being a concern. We can get to that, but the first step is sitting down with somebody as Jesus did with people from all different backgrounds and willingly listening to where they are coming from, being curious about why they have the stances they do. People who think and vote differently than we do have well thought out reasons for why they do so (just as we do with our stances), so if we can begin to extend patience and kindness to others and desire to get to know where they are coming from, that will go so much further than our desire to gloat or exhibit pride or arrogance because our candidate won. Trying to shut down the other side because ‘they are wrong’, ‘we are right’, and ‘they need to hear us’ bears no good fruit.”

“Paul tells us in Romans 2 that it is God’s kindness that leads to our repentance. So even if someone is actually wrong in their political stance where maybe we actually are right, we are going to get nowhere by being unkind. So a Christian response to the election results and to what will happen over the next four years is to extend kindness and compassion to those who voted differently than we did. That is the only way we are going to begin to fix the divisive culture we live in that we are all - no matter what side of the isle we are on-complaining about.”

“If we as believers are called - if it is our mission alone, not given to anyone else - to be the salt and light of the world, then we have to be the ones to go first in a divisive culture to seek to bring harmony and unity where possible, to bring peace and reconciliation as the hands and feet of Christ. It is no one else’s responsibility or call but our own. We cannot expect anyone else to do this work; it is our duty. Where we see a divisive culture, a divisive church, whatever it is, it is our call and mission to go first. We are the ones sent forth into that divisiveness to shine the light and love of Jesus into it. That is our mission.”

“Far be it from us to be the ones who are actually making things worse. Far be it from us to have our priorities so skewed as to make things worse when it is our job to make things better by the grace of God and through His Spirit.”

“Faithfulness is the next fruit of the Spirit and is yet another example of how applicable these fruits are to the election results and how we respond to them. With the results we have been given, I would issue forth to my brothers and sisters in Christ the message that we need to be known for our faithfulness - our being full of faith. May we be full of faith. May we look forward to the future with hope and trust and peace and rest as we look to the future with a smile on our countenance, not because of who is or is not in the White House, but because the good, wise, compassionate God of the Bible is the One still on the throne.”

“The fruit of the Spirit of goodness reminds us that we are to be characterized by all that is good, true, and beautiful, with our minds set on the kinds of thoughts Paul outlines for us in Philippians 4:8.  We are to be known for our goodness. Not a holier-than-thou type of ‘goodness’, but a goodness characterized by purity, child-like innocence, humility, peace, and kindness that are above reproach.”

“Gentleness is the next fruit of the Spirit to look at, and we are called to be people of gentleness. In fact, James tells us that the wisdom that is from above, true godly wisdom, is first peaceful and gentle. It is the wisdom from down under that is arrogant, prideful, gloating, and divisive. We are instead called to be gentle. There is a misconception in the church today that often says that if you are kind, gentle, and loving, that you are at risk of falling down a slippery slope somewhere into sinful living or unorthodox  principles. But that is not what Scripture says. The principles we are to be known for are literally the fruits of the Spirit. If at any point we have the audacity to, in essence, say that the fruits of the Spirit are not what we are to be focused on, there is a problem. These fruits are literally the characteristics of the Spirit of God and are to be what He cultivates in us.”

“Gentleness is not weakness. It is not a mamby-pamby ‘anything goes’  lack of standards. But your standards as a Christian must be surrounded, undergirded, covered with gentleness, with love, with these things that Paul says are the most important. So as we interact with people who voted differently than we did, with people on the side of the next administration, with those on the opposite side, and with everyone in between, we must be known for our gentleness. A Christian response to the election results is to treat others with gentleness.”

“The last fruit of the Spirit is self-control. Paul lists this one last and shows us that this is the one that we must have in order to have all the others because we must fight against our flesh in order to walk out the fruits of the Spirit.”

Beyond the Boxes is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Sally Clarkson is a wife, mom of four adult children, grandmother, bestselling author, speaker, and podcaster whose passion is to disciple and encourage women in their great task of passing on a kingdom-impacting legacy.

Beyond the Boxes is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

What We Chat about on this Episode:

~Sally’s newest book, Well Lived: Shaping a Legacy of Gratitude and Grace, what led to her writing it, and what readers can expect

~Foundations to build our lives upon so that we might flourish and live a life of legacy

~How life in the small town of Oxford inspired Sally to live life at a slower pace and according to her true priorities

~How important it is to take time to cultivate your own soul and take care of yourself

~The importance of our day-to-day tasks; understanding that it is in the small moments when the big, soul-shaping things are actually happening

~The sobering reality that half of Americans polled say they are not thriving; what we can do about this problem in our own lives

~Recognizing what some of the day-to-day causes are of our lack of thriving

~The importance of community

~The shaping power and influence of good books

~The importance of gathering ideas and insights from wise women who can speak into our lives the wisdom we need

~Understanding that your life does not have to look like someone else’s but can be lived in accordance with your own personality and interests

~The essential practice of focusing on what truly matters

~The temptations and distractions that keep us from living the kind of legacy we say we want to live

~How hardships can actually lead to growth and contentment

~Understanding that growth is a life-long process

~What it means to live wholeheartedly

~How to inspire our children to listen to our messages to them

~And more!

Thanks for reading Beyond the Boxes! This post is public so feel free to share it.

Resources Mentioned:

Well-Lived

Awaking Wonder: Opening Your Child’s Heart to the Beauty of Learning

The LifeGiving Table: Nurturing Faith Through Feasting, One Meal at a Time

The Last Bookshop in London: A Novel of WWII by Madeline Martin

Elizabeth Gouge’s books

Inspiring Quotes to Remember:

“There are certain foundations to build your life upon in order to live a life of legacy.”

“There are so many things in this life which deplete us - whether it is our day-to-day tasks or what we are hearing on the news - that it is so important to take time to cultivate your own soul and take care of yourself.”

“What you do every single day does truly matter and as you are repetitively faithful to perform those tasks, you build strength, muscle, and fortitude.”

“It is in the small moments when the big things are happening. Small moments of faithfulness are the times when our strength and legacy are being built and where souls are being shaped for eternity.”

“We were made for community and to do life together. Many people today feel isolated, unseen, and unheard. It is so important to prioritize friendship.”

“Different political views should never separate friendships.”

“Wise women copy wise women.”

“You get to write a legacy that is different from everyone else. You get to live a unique life and do not have to pattern your legacy after someone else’s. God has given you  a unique personality and capacity.”

“Focusing on what really matters is essential. If your pace of life is exhausting you, it is exhausting your children, too.”

“The more you walk with God, the more you will be able to walk well with God. The more you choose to pray, read Scripture, and walk with Him, the more you will grow strong and equipped.”

“Love deeply, live boldly, rest well. Live with your whole heart.”

“Every life can be a thing of purpose, beauty, and goodness when we realize that each moment is held by God, and He is with us in it all.”

Beyond the Boxes is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Jen Crowder is a wife, mom of 4, physical therapist, and founder of the ministry She is Emboldened. She has a heart for both the body of Christ and the lost. To that end, she comes on the show today with the desire to encourage and equip believers to truly be the hands and feet of Christ towards the LGBTQIA+ community.

What We Chat about in Today’s Episode:

~What has led to Jen’s passion for today’s topic

~Understanding that our mishandling of how we talk about and interact with the LGBTQUIA+ community is less about that community itself and more about how we tend to approach nonbelievers in general; the difference between how we address a fellow believer in Christ who is participating in that lifestyle and how we should address an unbeliever who is

~The truth that the most effective way to minister to that community is not to shout at them about their sin and that the Lord does not identify them by their sin

~Believing and presenting the fact that God’s design for us is good

~Cultivating in Christians a love for those in the LGBTQIA+ community and love for the lost in general; understanding that we must come from a starting point of loving others and God’s love for them as we present first the gospel and them go from there

~Following the example of the early church in the midst of the sinful Roman Empire

~What it looks like practically to still uphold the historical, biblical sexual ethic while also loving and respecting people in the LGBTQIA+ community

~The problems of pride and a lack of proximity and how both negatively affect the Church’s witness in this area

~Stewarding the good gift of the gospel well

~The importance of relationship when it comes to discipleship

~What Jen learned from a conversation she had with someone in the LGBTQIA+ community

~Resources Jen recommends for further study on this topic

~The importance of getting out of our little Christian bubbles and out into the world, loving others well as the hands and feet of Christ

~Studying and following how Jesus interacted with unbelievers; understanding the reality that if Jesus treated unbelievers the same way as many professing believers do today, that the Pharisees never would have gotten angry with Him in the first place

~The importance of what ambassadors actually do

~And more!

For full podcast show notes, head to www.hargraveshomeandhearth.com/podcast

On today’s re-release of a previous solo show, we are tackling the topic of how to raise your littles in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. My prayer is that you'll come away from this episode feeling equipped and encouraged, knowing that raising your littles in this way does not have to be complicated.

~Ephesians 6:4 and what is interesting about the word "nurture" coming before the word "admonition"

~The crucial foundation of nurture and why our training of our children in theology and right living must first come from a place of humility, tenderness, care, patience, gentleness, slowness, and nurture

~What we can learn from bamboo about the importance of having a strong foundation and why it is ok when our training takes a while

~The negative impact that raising children up legalistically, overly strictly, or in a domineering way can have on children

~How raising our children up in the tender nurture of the Lord gives them a more accurate picture of who their Heavenly Father is

~How failing to raise your children first in the nurture of the Lord can lead to your provoking them to wrath

~What raising our children up in the admonition of the Lord can look like practically on an everyday basis (as we're shown in Deuteronomy 6:6-7)

~Why the theological training of our children need not be complicated and instead can and should be simple - thereby showing them how applicable, relevant, and practical God's Word is to every aspect of our everyday lives

~The importance of refusing to overly shelter our children but to instead prepare them well for real life in age appropriate ways

~Why we want to raise our children not to be mere yes-men, but to instead be able to think for themselves, be critical thinkers, and interpret God's Word for themselves, applying it to every situation in life

~Equipping our children to have a faith of their own rather than piggy backing off ours, so that when we are one day not here, they will still be able to stand firm

~Practical books, media, practices, and other resources to aid you in your parenting and raising your children in the admonition of the Lord

~The power and importance of having lots of gospel conversations with your kids (and examples of some of the types of conversations we regularly have in our home)

~And more!

For full show notes, head to www.hargraveshomeandhearth.com/podcast

Terry Crist is a husband, father, pastor, and the author of the new book, “Loving Samaritans: Radical Kindness in an Us vs. Them World“. He has a heart for inspiring people to follow Jesus and love others well, and that comes through really well in our conversation today.

What We Chat about in Today’s Episode:

~Terry’s new book, what led him to write it, and what readers can expect

~How a love for the church does not negate our passion to call the church up to be her best - that that is actually an important part of loving the church well

~Jesus’ conversation with the Samaritan woman in John 4 and what we can glean from it

~How Jesus’ whimsical, loving, gracious interaction with the woman at the well enabled Him to touch on the tricky topics of sexuality, religion, politics, power, cultural identity, and more in a way that caused her to open up to Him in conversation; how this is a model for us for cultural engagement

~The folly of making assumptions about people as opposed to asking them questions and getting to know them and why they do what they do; getting to know them as individual persons as opposed to groups; the wrong decisions we make when we fail to do this

~Jesus’ model for us that all people are worthy of love and respect, time and attention, of being heard, and of hearing truth without insult

~Asking the question of who the samaritans are in our world and what we may have gotten wrong about them

~Divisiveness now being viewed as a virtue in our day; what our call is instead - to love people on both ends of the ideological spectrum

~Fear and the Pharisaical problem of a “fragile righteousness” and how it can lead to the dangerous desire of eradicating the “other”; understanding that our righteousness is not our own but rather the gift of Jesus’ own righteousness and will not be tarnished when we go into the world as He has called us to

~Asking “Where does the Spirit want me to go today?” as a way to model the way and ministry of Jesus; walking through your day with your heart and eyes wide open to where Jesus is already at work and joining Him there instead of thinking it’s all on us

~Going from religious, dogmatic strangers to compassionate, understanding neighbors and why this change is so important

~Being in it for the long game and understanding that people are worthy of love and affection even if they never come to Christ

~The importance of having both biblical orthodoxy (truth) and biblical orthopraxy (how we’re living out that truth)

~What Pastor Terry would say to those who are afraid that their children will become corrupted by the culture

~The power of the ministry of “withness”

~The problem with being a culture warrior and how it keeps us from from being kingdom ambassadors sent on a mission with a message of peace

~Daniel as a model for cultural engagement

~And more!

As we find ourselves in the middle of yet another election year, I felt it to be the right time to re-visit a podcast episode I first recorded and released 4 years ago during our last presidential election year.  Today we will be addressing again the topic of the most important thing for Christians to remember this election year.  I pray this episode will prove to be helpful and encouraging to you.

~A post ("The Most Important Thing for Christians to Remember This Election Year") I wrote back in 2016 during the last presidential election

~What our name-calling, personal attacks, hand-wringing, and political anxiety reveal about our hearts and the true condition of our faith

~The emphasis we as believers are too often placing on debate over love; how this is very different from the call we are given in the Word

~A survey of Scripture to see what our ultimate call is and what the most important thing is for us to remember and live out this election year

~How our love for America is crowding out the most important thing - love for God and love for others 

~The reality that our ultimate goal is not first and foremost to 'save America', but to fulfill the Great Commission; that our ultimate goal is not to make patriotic Americans, but to make disciples of Christ

~The way our lambasting our fellow believers in Christ over political differences is hindering our witness and our ability to live out the Great Commission

~It being love - and not being our political viewpoints-  that proves we are Christ's disciples

~How Paul tells us that truth without love is worthless

~The sobering, convicting words spoken by Christ to the church at Ephesus in the book of Revelation and what His message to them says to us today

~How grace and truth, mercy and truth, love and truth, are always paired together in the Scriptures when describing the character of God - it is never one without the other - and neither should it be with us

~The importance of being slow to speak and quick to listen, seeking to understand where the other person is coming from

~The impossibility of our wrath, anger, and hatred ever producing the righteousness of Christ in the lives of others

~The politicide going around today emulated by a Twitter thread hoping for destruction to come to Trump voters; the importance of asking ourselves as conservative Christians if we are guilty of the same thing towards Biden voters

~And more!

Kristen Lavalley is a wife, mom of 5, writer, and author of the brand new book, Even if He Doesn't: What We Believe about God When Life Doesn't Make Sense. She is passionate about helping people who have been harmed by the church or walked through pain that has left them reeling and with theological questions. Our prayer is that you will come away from this episode feeling seen, understood, loved, and helped in whatever you may be walking through.

What We Chat about in Today’s Episode:

~Kristen’s new book, what led her to write it, and what readers can expect

~The importance of engaging honestly with your pain and your beliefs and how doing so can actually save your faith - as it did Kristen’s

~Understanding that questions and doubts can actually be invitations to know God better, not automatically a scary thing that will result in you losing your faith

~The concept of the slippery slope and why it should be our aim to help those who find themselves there

~Kristen’s own experience in being able to see the goodness of God in some of life’s hardest moments

~The importance of being teachable and allowing God to re-define your beliefs and viewpoints according to what actually is true about Him

~The importance of practicing the presence of God and how impactful this is in the hardest of times

~Defining God’s goodness as He defines it, and not according to how we think goodness looks or is defined

~Coming to the place of being able to learn what God is really like, not just how we want Him to be

~Understanding that it is a mercy when God allows our hard circumstances to refine how we view Him and enable us to get to know Him better

~The problem with having a transactional view of God

~Faith over formula

~Realizing that it is a theological red flag when you are constantly being surprised by the goodness of God to you

~Understanding God’s Word emphasizes His love - not His wrath!- for His kids; the importance of knowing that it is His *kindness* that leads to our repentance

~The truth that there is comfort at the feet of Jesus, even if there aren’t always answers

~How to love and serve well those who are suffering

~Knowing that you are safe in the love of God

~And more!

For full show notes, head to www.hargraveshomeandhearth.com/podcast 

During this Valentines week of love, we are journeying back to the podcast archives and addressing the topic of love, the importance Scripture places on it, and how God's Word defines it. I hope you will walk away from this chat feeling well equipped to better understand and live out love in a culture and time that is very confused.

~The topic of love, and why it is such an important topic for believers, especially, to grasp

~The importance of understanding the Bible's definition of love

~The extremes that are on both sides of the spectrum and seen in the church and culture at large: 1) the idea that as long as you speak truth, you are ok and it doesn't matter how you present it because that is the most loving thing you can do and 2) the idea that love means you approve of and accept everything anyone does; why these are both wrong and unbiblical

~The primary call of a Christian - to love; why it is important to understand this and how we are falling down on our job

~Love as the supreme thing

~Paul's definition of love in 1 Corinthians 13

~How Paul's clear definition of love makes it clear that your presentation DOES matter, your motive DOES matter, and just "speaking truth" is not enough

~How Paul's clear definition of love makes it clear that loving someone does not mean you approve of and accept everything they do

~Paul's emphasis in Ephesians 4 on speaking the truth in *love*

~The importance of others being able to tangibly feel our love for them - even if and when we disagree

~A deep dive into Ephesians 4, 1 John 3, 1 John 4, John 13, and 1 Corinthians 13

~Love and boundaries

~The sobering reality that if we do not love others, the love of God is not in us, either

~Our call to love everyone, with no exceptions

~And more!

Elizabeth Urbanowicz is the  founder of Foundation Worldview, where her passion is on display for creating resources to equip parents to be able to help their kids carefully evaluate all the ideas that are regularly coming at them so that they can understand and enjoy the goodness and beauty of biblical truth. Our prayer is that you would come away from this episode inspired and equipped to raise your kids in a biblical worldview and with love for others.

~How Elizabeth first put this passion to work with the children she was teaching at her school

~The importance of equipping our kids to be critical thinkers and to be able to evaluate, on their own, what they are hearing on a daily basis

~The importance of not underestimating just how much our children truly can understand, even at young ages; what to do and how to start equipping your children on these worldview topics

~How Foundation Worldview came about

~How the resources are set up and how parents can implement them at home either as a part of their homeschool or in a supplemental way to their child’s education elsewhere

~Equipping our kids to know whether someone is sharing something that is objectively true vs. something that is just their own personal preferences or feelings

~Equipping and inspiring our kids to have time in the Word on their own (and to want to, as opposed to it just being a box to check!); the importance of teaching our kids the importance of context in Scripture

~How to raise your kids with a strong, biblical worldview in a crazy time like this without losing hope or feeling overwhelmed

~Understanding what full discipleship actually is

~The importance of prioritizing your relationship with your children; the impact that this has on their worldview

~The importance of knowing how your children give and receive love and how knowing that impacts our ability to grow in relationship with our kids

~Addressing our kids’ presentation of truth and raising them with the importance of speaking the truth in *love*

~Training our kids in the importance of listening well and asking good questions

~Clarifying our purpose, priorities, and goals in each season of parenting

~And more!

Head to www.hargraveshomeandhearth.com/podcast