Episode 3: No Good Boys

Joy McClain: If you’re a parent, are you ever tempted to think, Someday this household is going to run smoothly! Someday these people will get their act together! Erin Davis reminds us, that isn’tthe goal of parenting.

Erin Davis: The message of gospel homes is not, “Do better, try harder!” The message of gospel homes needs to be, “We failed again, and we’re going to run to Jesus.” 

Joy: This is The Deep Well with Erin Davis. I’m your co-host this season, Joy McClain. Parents expend so much effort into raising “good kids.” But the gospel of Jesus points us to a much greater goal. Here’s Erin in part 3 of the series, “Lies Boys Believe.”

Erin: There is a younger couple that we adore, and they recently stopped by the farm for a visit. They actually got married in the barn in our backyard. And as so often happens: first came love, then came marriage, and the last time they stopped by they were pregnant with their first baby!

In fact, that sweet baby was born just a couple days before this recording. And so they sat in our living room, and they had a lot of new parent questions, like: “What do we put on our baby registry?” and “How do we decide on the name?” and “Do we need to buy a house?” They were living in a little apartment.

We assured them everything was going to work out. They didn’t necessarily have to go get a bigger house, and they would get things that they need at their baby shower—and a lot of things they didn’t need at their baby shower!

And so we just smiled and listened, and we just kept assuring them, “You’re going to figure it all out!” And in the middle of that conversation all the sudden the new dad’s eyes filled with tears, and he kind of leaned forward towards my husband and he said, “What's it like to tell your kids about Jesus?” And we told him that’s the best part of the job!

Isn’t that really the goal of running the gauntlet of getting everyone to church every week and signing them up for Vacation Bible School when they’re little and taking them to youth group when they’re bigger and reading them The Storybook Bible every night? 

These are not just things we want our kids to do, these are things we want our children to become. As Christian parents, we affirm the words of 3 John 1:4: “I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth.” 

Witnessing our children accept Jesus as their Savior is a moment that all Christian parents long for and pray for. But if we’re honest, most of us have a secret fear that we’re going to mess it up. So let me give you a pep talk: you will mess it up! (How’s that for peppy?) 

The good news about the Good News is that it’s not just about saying certain words in a certain order. It’s not just about praying a certain prayer. And the best news about the Good News is that it’s the Holy Spirit’s job to open your son’s eyes to his need for Jesus. On your own you can never change the heart of your son. You can’t change the heart of anybody!

But you have been given the awesome, eternity-shaking responsibility to share and live out the gospel in front of watching eyes for the next generation. And as I think about this, I think it might require a fundamental shift in our goal as parents.

We’re going to be in the book of Romans in this session; we’re going to start in Romans chapter 7, verses 18–20. As I read these verses, try to imagine them painted over every crib! 

For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh. For I have the desire to do what is right, but not the ability to carry it out. For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I keep on doing. Now if I do what I do not want, it is no longer I who do it, but sin that dwells within me. 

That passage is every Bible teacher’s worst fear because it is hard to read!

I love though that Paul puts us on a hamster wheel here, because can’t life feel so much like this? “I want to do what is right . . . but I don’t follow through. And I don’t want to do what is evil, but I do it anyway.” And we reach the same conclusion Paul does, “Why am I like this?!” Paul gives us the answer in verse 18: “Nothing good dwells in me”—that is my flesh. 

Ezra, our baby, was about eighteen months old, but somehow he must have been exegeting Romans 7 from his high chair. He was crawling one day. Jason and I were sitting in the living room watching him, and he crawled toward an electrical outlet. Now he’s baby number four, and with baby number four you don’t buy the fancy little outlet covers, you just hope it all works out!

And so Ezra crawled over to the power outlet. He looked over at his daddy and me, he smiled, and he reached that chubby little hand toward the outlet. We said, “No!!” and he crawled over to safer territory for a minute. (And he thanked us for protecting him, right? No.)

Ezra looked at us, he looked at the outlet, and with that adorable little hand, he reached toward it again. Again, more sternly this time and with a little slap on his hand, we said, “No! Not safe!” And a few crocodile tears and a few minutes later Ezra reached toward the outlet again.

Now, is Ezra an especially naughty little boy? No, not typically. But like you and like me and like every person born east of Eden, Ezra is a sinner. And so, like Paul, the good he wants to do he often does not do, and the evil he doesn’t want to do he finds himself doing . . . sometimes over and over. Why is that? That’s because every single one of us is stamped with depravity. 

This is what caused the psalmist to write in Psalm 51:5: “Behold, I was brought forth in iniquity . . . in sin did my mother conceive me.” Now he’s not talking, necessarily, about the circumstances of his conception. He’s saying, “Since I was conceived I’ve been a sinner, and I’ve been brought forth in iniquity.”

It’s what made Paul write in Ephesians 2:3 that by nature in our flesh we’re all children of wrath. Here’s an important realization: your child doesn’t disobey you because you are a bad parent. Your child disobeys you because, without Jesus, that child is enslaved to their flesh. And without Jesus, you are enslaved to yours.

So, ultimately, in the spiritual sense, it’s not really about the fact that they won’t eat the broccoli; it’s not really about the fact that they won’t do their chores; it’s not really about the fact that they think it’s okay to punch their brother in the face over a toy they haven’t played with in two years. (I’m not the only mom where that happens, I’m sure!)

What’s really going on, and what we need eyes to see, is that there’s a spiritual reality for each of us, and that is that your child is made of flesh. I’m not just talking about their skin and bones. There’s a part in each of them, because of the fall of man, because we are born sinners. 

Our flesh is always trying to pull us away from God, and our flesh is always trying to pull us toward the exaltation of ourselves. Flesh is out for number one all day every day! That’s true in your child, and it’s true in you.

This is why our families and homes make such remarkable incubators for the gospel, and why we need to be really careful. Because if we aren’t careful, we will exert all of our relational capital with our children, teaching them directly or indirectly that God cares very much about them being “a good boy.” But that’s not what the Bible teaches.

Here are some of Paul’s words again, this time from Romans 3:10–12, but Paul was actually quoting from Psalm 14 and 53. Paul said, 

As it is written: No one is righteous, no, not one. (paraphrased)

Did you hear the argument there? He said, “No one is righteous,” and the flesh in each of us wants to say, “Well, maybe I am.” 

And Paul says, “No! Not one!”

No one understands;
   no one seeks for God.
All have turned aside; together they have become worthless;
   no one does good [And in case our flesh wants to rise up there again, he says,]
   not even one. 

Gospel parenting sets the bar higher than just raising good kids (which is a challenge all on its own). Your children don’t come into the world knowing God. They actually come into the world intent to rebel against God.

They aren’t born reaching for the Word of God. They don’t have an innate desire to be conformed into the image of Christ. Those are all things that have to be taught and then believed and then embraced and then lived out.

And while that feels like bad news, what it means is that our homes are actually “ground zero” for spiritual formation, which is good news! God has a plan for this. When my children sin, which is daily, the conversation becomes less about a new punishment or a new incentive to motivate them to choose differently next time . . . although those things exist. 

But I hope that they would affirm that those conversations are really—at our house—more about a deeper reality that goes something like this: 

Bud, there’s a part of you that wants to be in charge. There’s a part of you that wants to get the most for yourself!

There’s a part of you that wants to have all of the power over your brothers. There’s a part of you that’s always thinking about you. And that part of you will always run in glad rebellion away from the safety of our love.

And the reason that part of you runs away from the safety of our love is because that part of you is always running away from the safety of God’s love. [And then I say something like this:] This is why we need Jesus so much!

This depravity that you just put on display, you just exposed your flesh. I saw it. You saw it. This is why we need Jesus so much!

I feel like I say this a lot on The Deep Well—and maybe it’s a bit of a soap box for me—but I think somewhere along the line we got the idea that Christian families put the gospel on display by being perfect. Well that’s fine, except it’s totally anti-gospel. 

Christian families put the gospel on display by being very broken—which exposes our need for Jesus, and we run to Him together! 

So the message of gospel homes should not be, “Do better, try harder!” The message of gospel homes needs to be, “We failed again! We fail each other. We’re going to run to Jesus and we're going to ask Him to redirect us. We’re going to ask Him to help us to crucify our flesh and to teach us to walk in the Spirit.” 

Parents who parent perfectly, and children who always obey, and marriages that don’t have any fractures . . . what need do we have for the gospel?

But that doesn’t exist. We do need the gospel because, praise God!, the book of Romans isn’t the trajectory of the gospel. This book doesn’t end with chapter 7, the hamster wheel was not the point. Let’s turn to Romans 8. I’m going to read us a long passage, Romans 8:1–11. 

This is still Paul writing. Every text is part of a context, so the context here is he was just talking about . . . He was just having a moment where he was saying (Paul, the apostle Paul!), “There’s good that I want to do, and I can’t seem to follow through with it. There’s evil that I don’t want to do, and I keep doing it!” 

And then, right from there, he takes us to Romans 8:1–11: 

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. [Can’t you see how good that news is, compared to the hamster wheel of sin?!]

For the law of the Spirit of life has set you free in Christ Jesus from the law of sin and death. For God has done what the law, weakened by the flesh, could not do. By sending his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, he condemned sin in the flesh in order that the righteous requirement of the law might be fulfilled in us, who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. 

For those who live according to the flesh set their minds on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit set their minds on the things of the Spirit. 

For to set the mind on the flesh is death, but to set the mind on the Spirit is life and peace. For the mind that is set on the flesh is hostile to God, for it does not submit to God's law; [this is so important] indeed, it cannot. (vv. 1–7)

So, strictly behavior modification parenting will not work. That’s what Scripture is saying. It’s saying even if your kids want to follow the law—and here we’re talking about the Law of God—in their flesh they can’t!

I once heard Dr. Dobson say, “Don’t ever ask a boy, ‘Why did you do that?’” Because they genuinely do . . . not . . . know! The answer is, “My flesh made me do it! I’m a person of flesh and my flesh rises up in me and it makes me do all manner of crazy things! Verse 8, 

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God. You, however, are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if in fact the Spirit of God dwells in you. Anyone who does not have the Spirit of Christ does not belong to him. But if Christ is in you, although the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit is life because of righteousness.

If the Spirit of him who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, he who raised Christ Jesus from the dead will also give life to your mortal bodies through his Spirit who dwells in you. (vv. 8–11)

Whew! That’s a heavy hitting passage, and I assure you, it’s a concept your boy needs to hear!

This is the Good News your son needs to hear; this is the Good News you need to hear. This is the Gospel. The gospel must start with, “We are not good! Left to our own devices we will reach for the outlet every single time!

But we are not left to our own devices! That’s what Paul is saying. He’s saying, “Yes, this flesh exists in us and yes, this flesh is always pulling me away from God. It’s always making me think of myself and making me want to elevate myself.”

But Jesus has done the transforming work and the Spirit now lives in me! When we surrender our lives to Jesus, unfortunately we don’t turn our flesh in on that day. I wish we did. We still exist as people of flesh, we still have a nature bent by sin, but the Spirit indwells us and He is ever moving us from death to life!

So the conversation with our boys needs to be less, “You can do it,” and more, “You can’t do it. You can’t on your own. You will keep repeating those mistakes. You will drive your own life into the ditch over and over and over again. I’m not asking you to muscle your way into something. I’m asking you to live surrendered to the work of God in your life and ask the Spirit to help you.” 

We stop and pray a lot. We should. It’s the spiritual equivalent to “stop, drop, and roll.” You are on fire! You will light your own life on fire! Stop! Ask the Spirit to help you! The Spirit’s job is to move you from death to life; the flesh is trying to move you from life to death! 

This gospel work that happens in our families happens because our sin and selfishness is exposed so often in the context of our families, isn’t it? I mean, we’ve all done it.

You’re as nice as can be to the stranger at the checkout, and then you get in the car and all of a sudden your flesh is behind the wheel! I say all the time, “My flesh is like an ambulance—first one on the scene.” Right? 

And so God has given us families, in part, because they expose how sinful and selfish we really are. Family life is what reminds us that, “Oh, yeah! I’m a person of flesh.” And a gospel response is that we repent when our flesh is exposed. 

We believe the gospel, which is that God has done the work to redeem us from our flesh, and He’s sent the Spirit to live inside of us. And we choose life—not death—the next time. This model of families being a place where our flesh is exposed and we turn from it and trust the gospel, makes our families a tremendous force in pushing back the darkness of the evil one!

My husband and I just celebrated our twenty-second anniversary, and I like to use that time to reflect. I was amazed in thinking back at how just the mundane parts of a twenty-two-year marriage, just a family with a few kids like every other family with a few kids, but a family grounded in the Word, a family in love with Jesus, a family that doesn’t want to live in sin . . . When our sin is exposed we try to turn from it together. I’m amazed how God has used just an average family—we’re just an average family—to push back against the darkness. It matters!

Robert Wolgemuth has been in the studio with us as we’ve recorded this series. I want to read a quote from the book he wrote, Lies Men Believe. He said, 

Don’t let fear keep you from the battle, but trust in our Commander. Don’t settle for a clean stable and an unfurrowed field if He wants to give you an abundant harvest! Remember that because of our children we are changing the world one child—one diaper—at a time. [Then he wrote the truth:] Children are a gift from the Lord. He wants to use them to spread the gospel in our messed-up world. When we embrace children as a gift, we partner with God in changing that world!

God’s design isn’t that your son is an ambassador for the gospel because he’s so perfect. Your son is an ambassador for the gospel because he needs Jesus a whole lot, and he lives that out in his life. You, too, Mama.

It’s in your imperfections and in your sin that you demonstrate, “Yeah, I can’t do this on my own! I need someone bigger than me. I need Spirit-infused parenting.” Robert was really quoting the gist of something that King David wrote in Psalm 127:3–5: 

Behold, children are a heritage from the Lord,
   the fruit of the womb a reward.
Like arrows in the hand of a warrior
   are the children of one's youth.
Blessed is the man
   who fills his quiver with them!
He shall not be put to shame
   when he speaks with his enemies in the gate.

To be a Christian parent means to be equal parts missionary, teacher, and warrior. Through His Word God has called you to fight for the hearts of your children and your grandchildren and to fight alongside your children in the battle for Truth.

This grand reality will transform how you respond to everything from spilled milk to temper tantrums to battles with your teenager over curfews. The goal changed. It’s not just to raise good kids, because, according to Scripture, that’s impossible!

So if you think your assignment is to raise good boys, we’ve got to reorient to the gospel. They’re not good, no not one—even that one that is the best behaved in your group. Compared to God, he’s not good!

Your goal is to see your family the way God’s Word sees it—as an elite military unit essential in the battle against the enemy and the armies of darkness. We do that by living out the true gospel.

Perhaps you’ve heard the words of missionary Jim Elliot, who laid down his own life for the sake of the gospel. As you consider how the gospel is taught, caught, and lived out in your family, I hope these words will inspire you to pick up the weapons of warfare. Stop just trying to raise good kids. Try to raise gospel-oriented kids by being a gospel-oriented mom, and fight the good fight! Jim said, 

Remember how the psalmist described children? He said that they are as a heritage from the Lord and that every man should be happy who has his quiver full of them. And what is a quiver full of, but arrows? And what are arrows for, but to shoot?

So, with the strong arms of prayer, draw the bow string back and let the arrows fly! All of them! Straight toward the enemy of hosts. 

Joy: So I loved this because we have four kiddos. And if the first three did not teach me about my selfishness and my immense fear, the fourth one did—in ways I could never have imaginged. Our fourth came to us by way of adoption. We started that process when he was eight and the Ukrainian orphanage would not get him until he was nine. That's a lot of years of brokenness and baggage for him.

I want to paint this picture for you really quickly before I pose my question for you. Luke came to us biting, thrashing, breaking, destroying. He was so fearful. It was really difficult.

One particular day he was in his room beating the walls and beating his head against the wall. He'd bloody himself. He was just destroying everything. My patience was so gone!

I kind of tore into him. We ended up with us both in a heap on the floor; him in my lap (because he was very, very tiny), and both of us just weeping. And being very honest with each other, this adoption if hard! I don't know how to step into your brokenness. He didn't know how to love me, but he needed me. He despised me because he missed his own mother.

So it was a very difficult time. But I remember in that time just sitting on the floor weeping with him, eventually being able to mutter, "We need Jesus! That's the only thing that is going to help us."

As we kept walking through that journey together, my brokenness and his, Jesus is what got us through. Because sometimes our good kids aren't so good. There no such thing. But sometimes we have that defiant child, or that strong-willed child, that we go, "I just don't know what to do with this one!" I didn't know what to do with a little guy that was so broken and had known such abuse. God directed me. But oftentimes in our parenting, we see our fear and our own failure and our own struggle. And it's not a pretty picture.

That's my one little example of how God took what might look like an ash heap of destruction and really turned it into an opportunity to speak grace and redemption into my son's life.

It ends up that now my son who is almost twenty-three being something that out of the ash heap has come such beauty. The gospel just played out because he saw my vulnerability and how I need Jesus.

Erin: Joy, what a powerful story! That image of pulling your boy into your lap and, at the end of yourself, just expressing, “We need Jesus!” Our kids are all going to see us at a point of need and in a point of weakness, and it’s so gospel rich and gospel true to, in that moment to express, “I need Jesus!”

Joy: I loved your teaching, Erin, and the way you pointed us to the gospel as the purpose of parenting! Do you talk about that in the book Lies Boys Believe?

Erin: Yes, we changed their names, but the boys in the book are loosely based on my own boys. And one of my boys is—by all outside appearances—a good boy. He doesn’t misbehave, never really has, kind of flies through school, always has. He’s never one to rock the boat.

And actually, the gospel conversations we have with him are maybe a little different than the ones that we might have with one of his brothers who is persisting in rebellion. And that conversation is this: “There are no good boys. You have a tremendous need for Jesus, and it’s not something you can measure in a checklist or a grade card.”

And so that conversation actually happens in the book. In the book, one of the boys in his heart is very angry at his brother. He’s disrespectful of his dad. He doesn’t want to be on the trip. He doesn’t express any of those things, but in a moment of understanding the gospel for the very first time, he realizes and feels the weight of his sin.

He’s kind of crushed by it, because he’s been kind of held up by this idea that, “I’m a good boy! That’s my role in the world.” But he has this conversation with one of the cowboys on the trail, and he realizes his own need for Jesus!

I’m tearing up even talking about it, which you can’t tell if you’re just listening. But I’m telling you, every time I worked on that section of the book, and every time I read it out loud to my husband or my sons or editors, I got a lump in my throat because we need a right understanding of the gospel.

Far too many of us have convinced ourselves we’re good compared to somebody else. It’s part of our flesh rising up and comparing notes. But the reality is what Scripture teaches, and it could be a hard pill to swallow: “No, none are good. No, not one!” And while that’s the bad news, the good news is: One who is good, Jesus, paid the penalty for our sins!

So that section of the book is really tender. I think it’s going to ring true with a lot of boys that are like, “I don’t get in trouble at school, and I make good grades. I don’t get in trouble with Mom and Dad a lot. What is my need?” Well, that need exists in every human heart.

Joy: I love that Erin, because how many of us struggle with a works-minded mentally? And how many little boys—or little girls—struggle with that from a very young age, thinking, “If I’m just good . . .” But the gospel of grace is really what you’re giving to these parents and to these little boys. I love that!

So to get a copy of Lies Boys Believe visit ReviveOurHearts.com. If you contact us when this series comes out in November of 2023, we will send you a copy when you support Revive Our Hearts with a gift of any size.

The Deep Well is possible thanks to those who support Revive Our Hearts financially. If you benefit from Erin’s teaching, would you help the podcast continue? Again, you can donate at ReviveOurHearts.com, and would you use the “Contact Us” form to let us know the ways The Deep Well podcast enriches your walk with Christ?

Joy: It’s time for Erin Unscripted, and I have a few questions!

Erin Unscripted

Joy: Alright, I have two sons, eight grandsons. There are some who are more Type A. They have a tendency to lean more toward, “If I’m good I’m rewarded. That’s my affirmation. That’s my place in the world, to be a good boy.” 

So, how does the book not so much speak to the boys, but how does it speak to the parents in the teaching moments they can use and, “I don’t want my son to get a theology of being a good boy”? What does that look like in the book?

Erin: Yes, I think that’s why this episode of this podcast series and this theme that’s in the book, which of course just comes straight out of Scripture, is one that we can’t revisit too often. I mean, I’ve heard it said that legalism isn’t legalism if it’s things you’re doing because you love Jesus . . . not to get Him to love you!

And that sounds like, “What a nice little tidy checkbox that is!” And Type double-As like myself think, “Okay, I can check the box!” But we’ve got to come back to the gospel over and over and over, and we’ve got to come back to the fact, “No! Your boy is not good! No, you are not good! Not on our own.” And your son has to understand that too.

And so I say what Scripture says in my house: “Actually, according to the Bible, none of us are good!” Now that’s not being the same as saying, “You are a bad boy!” I don’t ever want to say that to my sons. But we have to share the gospel at every intersection.

And like I said in the teaching in this episode, if we’re not careful—if we’re not intentional—as well-meaning Christian parents we will communicate to our kids, “God wants you to be very good! That’s very important to God!”

Well, God knows you’re not good! That’s why He sent His Son to rescue and redeem you from your sin! So I think we celebrate the goodness in our boys . . . There’s a future episode in this series coming up about the fact that any goodness we have is from God, and that God is good and we can mirror His image by 

I think also when they fail—it’s when, not if they fail; it’s when, not if they disobey—we remind them, “See? This is why you need Jesus!” And so, it’s going to sound like a broken record, like it’s the only record I have to play, maybe, but we’ve got to keep going back to, “This is why we need Jesus; this is why we need Jesus; this is why we need Jesus!”

I’ve shared on Grounded before, Joy (which maybe we’ll talk at some point about your connection to Grounded), I will sometimes write on my sons’ hands “NTL,” which stands for “nothing to lose.” The idea is that God’s love is never on the line, and my love is never on the line.

So if you have an amazing basketball game . . . Say you score thirty-eight points, which would be a really high scoring game in basketball, God and I do not love you even a little bit more. And then you have the opposite. Maybe they don’t ever get off the bench, or they do get off the bench and they blow the game winning shot! They still don’t have anything to lose. God’s love is not on the line.

So then it doesn’t become this works-based identity. There’s no lever you pull. There’s no “easy” button, it’s just an ongoing conversation. We want to bring out the best in our boys, and we certainly want to encourage them to make wise choices and to work hard and to be leaders. 

We also need to be sure to communicate that God’s love for them is not contingent on that. God loves them because they’re His, and He went to the cross because they needed it a whole lot—and we did, too. So I think the gospel, the gospel, the gospel is the short answer.

Joy: I love that, Erin. I have another question for you. What about the woman whose husband is not in the game? He’s not even scoring the points, and he doesn’t even have the basketball. He’s left town; he’s not even home. She feels rather defeated, and she’s trying to raise godly sons. And you know, it’s a very difficult thing for her! It’s kind of a tightrope walk at times.

How does this book help her have the confidence, “God is for my son and He’s for me,” for a single momma or a momma kind of spiritually raising sons on her own. Dad’s not going to church or whatever.

Erin: Yes. Don’t you love Romans 5:20 where it says, “Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more.” I’ve heard that translated as, “Where sin abounds grace superabounds!” So it’s like, “There’s a bumper crop of grace” where there was sin or destruction. I think we see that in our families. 

I was raised in a fatherless home. My dad left when I was ten, so he was there for the first decade. I know my mom felt the weight of that, and I know she probably especially felt it with my brother because he had lost the man in the picture. All I can say is that it’s not all on you, Mama.

And even if your husband is in the picture, it’s not all on you, Mama. And even if your husband is righteous and godly, it’s not all on you, Mama. It really is the Spirit’s job to woo and win your son. But I can attest that it’s not when the family breaks apart or doesn’t look like God’s design, that’s it. There’s no chance then of your kids growing in righteousness.

Absolutely there is! Because God is a God of redemption. And there is no family—including the first family—who gets this right. If you follow Adam and Eve and their sons, you realize that this has been a challenge to parents since the fall of man.

So first, Mama, check that idea at the door that it’s all on you. It’s not; it never was. And second, trust in the redemptive plan of God! I’ve said many times that God’s plan was that my earthly father would show me what my heavenly Father was like, and that in seeing a good, loving earthly father, I would be drawn to a good, loving heavenly Father. 

That’s not what happened in my life. What it did instead was it made me long for a heavenly Father who means it when He says, “I will never leave you or forsake you,” who doesn’t abandon His own. So God uses it, and I would just encourage that mama.

And something I say about my kids a lot is, “The jury hasn’t even started deliberating yet.” Where they are right now is definitely not indicative of where they’re going to be or where the Lord is taking them. It’s not like the jury’s out trying to decide whether they’ll be righteous or not. 

Nope, the jury hasn’t even started deliberating yet, because God is still doing what He’s going to do in their lives and will always do what He’s going to do in their lives. We’ve talked a lot in this series about praying. 

I guess the practical place I would point that mom is, “Okay, you’re discouraged. You are tired—you are bone-tired! You’re grieved that you see other families at church and the dad is there and he’s actively worshiping, and your kids don't have that. Ask the Lord to bring superabounding grace into that situation! He will.

Joy: That is so encouraging to that mom, that there is hope! God cares. God sees. It’s not just her responsibility. There is a great and awesome God giving super, super grace and the ability to raise her son—to be able to do this. I love that!

Erin: I know this is Erin Unscripted, but I also knew I wanted you to be my co-host for this season, because you have so much wisdom. Take us back to that two-decade timeframe when your husband is . . . It’s not just that he’s not walking with the Lord. He is deep into addiction to alcohol, and you’re raising sons in the midst of that. What hope did you have in those years?

Joy: [Sighs deeply] Yes, those were dark days. That’s why I always try to identify with that woman out there saying, “What about me?! I’m over here in the corner. I feel like I’m cowering in the corner.” It’s almost like, “God, where have You gone!?”

So I always try to make a point to say, “I see you. God sees you, more importantly.” But they were difficult days. My greatest fear was for my children, my greatest fear was for my sons, that they would not see what a godly man looks like, what a man who cherishes and loves their mother looks like. All these things played out in great tremendous fear.

The Lord took my hand, as He is so gracious to do, and redemptively walked me through those very trying and sorrow-filled years. But I will say, “God is faithful.” And we prayed, and we prayed. The Lord taught me so much through that.

It was a difficult season, but I think if I have anything to give, if there is any wisdom I can speak, it is, “Hang on, Mama!” because your story isn’t finished yet. God is still working; God is moving, and He does see, He does know. He will be your Help, your Defender, Your Provider, everything you need—your Rock, your Sustainer, just like His Word says.

Erin: That’s so good! We’ve talked in the beginning of this series about the fact that God is generational. Part of my story is: the hurt did not get redeemed in the generation it happened. I’m fully estranged from my dad. I haven’t spoken to him in several years.

So, the wonder for me of watching my godly husband raise his sons . . . I hadn’t ever seen it. I didn’t know it was possible. But it’s happening in the next generation, and it’s really beautiful! So, you know, we prayed and we prayed and prayed. 

My mama, like you, prayed and prayed and prayed. The story never got a bow put on it and won’t. I mean the Lord is redeeming it of course, but there’s no reconciliation of the marriage or repentance or any of that. 

But I get to be a mom who watches it happen, by God’s design, in the next generation. It’s probably sweeter for me than it might be for somebody who had a Christian dad, because I’m amazed—amazed!—by what God can do and what He is doing!

Joy: I love that, Erin, and how you hold that in such awe, of what God has done! I do the same. This side of redemption, it’s not perfect, you know. No relationship is, as is no marriage, no parental relationship. However, a couple years ago during covid, when there was no vacation Bible schools and everything was shut down.

Well, Mimi here had to have Vacation Bible School! So I had all those kiddos that were potty trained over at my house every day. It was an exhausting week but well worth it! We had a guest speaker one day. Since there were no “guest speakers,” because you couldn’t go anywhere, Papaw was there. It was just the sweetest moment when all the little kiddos were sitting on the couch and my Beloved is telling them his testimony! They only know him as a sober, wonderful, dependable, loving, nurturing, sensitive, and caring Papaw! They don’t know him as the man who he was.

But there he stood! And what really grabbed me was his humility. You would have thought they were watching the most exciting movie! Their mouths were open. Their eyes were locked, and they were just like . . .

My children did not have the blessing or the experience, just like you. Their dad was stumbling about, sometimes in embarrassment to be quite honest. But their children have seen the redemption of Jesus!

And we do not know, Erin, what your four sweet little boys, what the redemption they’re going to taste or what beauty from the ash heap of your sorrows is going to take place and bloom and blossom and come as fruit. 

We cannot see, we cannot know. God says the good that He has planned for us. So, hold on no matter who you are, no matter where you, no matter what your circumstances are. God is still writing the story!

Erin: Well, even the image of your grandchildren, I can see it: stacked on the couch, body-to-body, Papaw telling his testimony. I love the thought of a legacy of righteousness and of people looking at me as a godly woman. But that is only compounded and exaggerated when they know the “before” or the struggle or the hardships.

I think we can over-polish that a little bit. I’m sure what made them so riveted is realizing, “Wow, this is real to him! He was a different kind of man without Jesus!” I would just continue in the sentiments of this episode of like, “Let’s give everybody the whole gospel!”

We don’t have anything on our own, and we are a mess, and our relationships are a mess. We’ve all made mistakes, and we sin perpetually . . . but Jesus! So we need all the sides of the story, I think. 

Joy: “But Jesus!” Oh, thank you, Erin, and to your husband, Jason, for being obedient, digging deep, and walking through and writing the epic tale for boys!

Erin: It was our absolute great pleasure! 

Joy: I love that. Erin, you talked about that there are no good boys. But could you address the fact that oftentimes as mamas, we make it about us. When our little boy does something wrong, we take that on ourself. We think about what others might think about us. Can you address that? Because it will happen to the mama bear.

Erin: It will. We don't just feel that way, it is true. The way parents look at each other without a gospel grid is: good kids equals good parents; bad kids equals bad parents. Certainly, that's an example of where our flesh rises up and we take on our boys' sin as a reflections of us.

That's something I can really default to: making it about me. It really not about me. I get to be a part of what God wants to do in that boy's life, but his sin is not a reflection on me. 

I've heard this said; it is not original to me. Adam and Eve had the perfect parent in God, and they still sinned. My children do not have a perfect parent in me, and they still sin. I feel it is a bit self-absorbed to think that every mistake our children make, or every sin they default to is something we did or didn't do. It's freeing to realize that no, they are sinners. I am a sinner. And not take that on as a reflection of ourselves.

Joy: And you can focus actually on your son, rather than focusing on, "What is everybody thinking . . . my reputation . . . this is going to ruin everything." This piles on more shame to that little boy which makes him in the long run afraid to go to anyone and confess. It makes him afraid, perhaps fearful of confessing to his almighty God.

Erin: Recently, one of our older boys didn't actually come to me; he came to my husband. Essentially he was saying, "Mom's been really checked out." I had been. I was dealing with some long-term grief. He wasn't ornery about it. It wasn't about hurting my feelings. But my default was, "Doesn't he see how hard I'm trying? I do everything for him!" I was just ugly on the inside! But by God's grace, I had some time to think that through and realizing that, "I'm making this about me."

And really, he was coming saying, "I need more from my mama. Her body's there, but her mind is somewhere else." I felt like he handled it really beautifully. But I wanted to default to, "Me, me, me. Feel sorry for me. Feel sorry for me." It was ugly. So I think we have to be on guard for that as moms, for sure! 

Joy: We do. Wise advice, Erin.

What are we going to hear on the next episode?

Erin: Okay, Joy, have you ever heard the phrase, “family secrets”?

Joy: I have! I probably have a few of my own!

Erin: I’m sure! It has become kind of this thing that we take for granted, “Families have secrets.” But I actually believe to be a Christian family means to adopt a “no secrets” policy. So, we’re going to talk about why that matters and how to do it in the next episode.

Joy: Oh, we’re all going to be able to relate to that! To close our time, let’s hear Erin’s prayer that she prayed over the moms who were with us in the recording session.

Erin: Jesus, thank You for today. Thank You for these women with attentive hearts. I would just love to know the number—but You know the number—of boys this group represents—from children to grandchildren to Sunday school classes, to neighbors. There are maybe hundreds of boys represented just from this small group of women! And then you multiply that out, and there are a lot of boys who need to know Your Word and Your Truth and that You love them. They need to walk by Your Spirit, not by the flesh.

So we pray that You would do that. We continue to ask earnestly that You raise up a generation of young men fully committed to You. You are our only hope for a redeemed world, but You use men—You’ve always used men for that. So I pray that You will raise up men to be Davids and Joshuas and Pauls and Peters, God, until You tarry.

So, I pray that You would just seal this content, that You would use it, I pray that it would ultimately hit its mark and that it would transform homes and hearts, Lord. We love You. Thank You for this day and for Your Word. It’s in Your Name I pray, amen.

One of Erin’s sons: The Deep Well with my mom, Erin Davis, is part of the Revive Our Hearts podcast family.

All Scripture is taken from the ESV.

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