Announcing…
Posted August 19, 2008, by Anna Sofia

We are proud to announce our family’s latest project: “Father to Son: Manly Conversations That Can Change Culture” — a six-part DVD series on the father-son relationship, coming this Fall.

We’re moving into the post-production process right now. We consider this to be one of the most significant productions our family has ever embarked on. We’d appreciate your help circulating the news about this exciting new series! Please also feel free to send us your marketing ideas. Your prayers, help, support and ideas are always welcome!

A Letter of Gratitude
Posted August 7, 2008, by Anna Sofia

Dear Sisters in Christ,

Thank you for your latest posts talking about boy and girl interaction. I am only 14, however, this subject has been the talk between my friends and I as we fight against the demands of this culture. The young women in my church (including myself!) are looking for guidance in this area, and your posts have helped “spread the word”. Just today, my friend was asking if we should pursue “just friends” relationships with young men. I didn’t know, but I asked the Lord for His guidance. Later on, I looked on your website, and right there was the answer for our question. He is faithful! Thank you for all the work you do to build His Kingdom! Your work has changed my life…

In the name of Jesus Christ,

D.

Can guys and girls be “just friends”?
Posted August 1, 2008, by Anna Sofia

Where young men and women are friends, is there too great a danger of emotional entanglement?

Few of us have ever seen friendships between young men and women conducted in an entirely pure and honorable way. The guise of “friendship” is often used to excuse a kind of relationship which is inappropriate. All of us have seen a superabundance of pointless and destructive flirtations, and lots of “friendships” that spun out of control and ended in broken hearts and broken relationships. After doing the math, some conclude that it’s safer to avoid co-ed friendships entirely.

We believe the problem is not with friendship, but with sin. Sadly, sin and selfishness are what drive most the relationships of today’s youth.

The word “friendship” has been sullied. The Christian concept of deep, sacrificial friendship has been replaced with something vapid and selfish. We’ve inherited a culture of shallowness, sensuality and consumption, and of friendships only about as deep as our text messages. Many of our generation and our parents’ generation learned how to interact with the other sex in public-school hallways and school buses, and assume that foolish or exploitive relationships are the natural recourse of young people. Many of us now can’t imagine how good Christian boys and girls could engage each other in a safe and constructive way.

Maybe it’s time to redefine “friendship” for our generation.

In 1828, Noah Webster defined it as, “An attachment to a person, proceeding from intimate acquaintance, and a reciprocation of kind offices, or from a favorable opinion of the amiable and respectable qualities of his mind. Friendship differs from benevolence, which is good will to mankind in general, and from that love which springs from animal appetite. True friendship is a noble and virtuous attachment, springing from a pure source, a respect for worth or amiable qualities. False friendship may subsist between bad men, as between thieves and pirates. This is a temporary attachment springing from [self-]interest, and may change in a moment to enmity and rancor.”

A more relevant example than Webster’s “thieves and pirates” (a real threat in his time) might be gambling partners, drinking buddies, or rumormonger friends – people who like to involve others in their folly or sin. In other words, a relationship that exists for what the parties can get out of each other: a fun time, an ego boost, the latest gossip, an opportunity to show off, a romantic thrill-ride, or companionship in their guilt. Webster calls this “false friendship.” It’s not the kind of friendship we’re talking about.

John 15:13 declares, “Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.”

True friendship should involve respect, trust, sacrificial love, and unity in the cause of Christ. There is no room for posturing, foolish bantering, self-interest, or defraudment in friendships like these. This kind of friendship with young men can be extremely edifying and God-honoring.

However, let’s not kid ourselves that there aren’t still dangers crouching at the door. We’re all still frail human beings, even if our motives are good; and we’re still wired to be attracted to one another. Having the right understanding of friendship doesn’t guarantee entanglement-proof relationships. We still need boundaries and safe-guards.

These will be different for every family. Once again, we must stress the importance of submitting to the standards and boundaries established by your parents. Please read the note at the beginning of this series.

In our own family, friends were always something all of us shared in common. We girls have always been friends with our brothers’ friends, and they’ve always been friends with ours. Our friends loved our parents, and our parents were often as close to our friends as we were. We’ve never had an individualistic attitude toward friendships, or an age-segregated or gender-segregated attitude either. This always made our friendships with men more natural and less complicated – they were not our personal friends, but our family friends. Thanks to our wonderful mother, hospitality is a hallmark of our family, and even when we were children, our parents taught us to welcome our guests into the arms of our home and our warm family circle.

As an entire family, we befriended people of all ages and situations and enjoyed their company together. The family context itself is a powerful safeguard in our friendships with young men. It brings a high level of accountability, and a down-to-earth, real-life quality to our interaction.

Our friendships with young men still look somewhat different than the friendships we have with other girls. The young men are not our buddies, companions, or confidantes, and we are not “one of the guys” (or even two of them). With girls we are more casual, intimate and familiar; with the young men there is a level of restraint.

The benefits of friendships with young men are also different. We’re extremely grateful for all that we’ve gained from our discussions with the young men we’re proud to call our friends. Talking to men is iron-sharpening in different ways than talking to women. And hearing a man’s take on life, and getting familiar with how men communicate and think, is extremely helpful for any woman who hopes to spend any part of her life with… well, a man.

Are friendships with young men risky? Well, surely, as any relationships between sinners are. We should take into account our own weaknesses by making sure our friendships with fellows are dignified, restrained, under accountability, and within the family boundaries.

And maybe, in the process, we’ll model godly friendship to a generation that has forgotten what the word means.

What is a fool?
Posted July 27, 2008, by Elizabeth

Our dear friend Jasmine Baucham has just written something that complements our last post beautifully. In our previous post, we admonished girls to choose their friends carefully; particularly, to avoid friendships with fools. Avoiding fools certainly does not mean turning a deaf ear to the spiritually needy — the ignorant but teachable — but rather means not casting our pearls before those who stubbornly reject teaching (one of the defining characteristics of a fool).

What is so deplorable to God about the fool, that He would command us to “forsake the foolish” (Pro. 9:6), “go from the presence of a foolish man” (Pro. 14:7), and rather meet “a bear robbed of her whelps…than a fool in his folly” (Pro. 17:12)?

Jasmine has written an excellent post on identifying the characteristics of a fool. Quoting from her blog, a fool is:

one who despises wisdom and instruction (Proverbs 1:7; 10:21)
one who lacks sense (Proverbs 8:5)
one who utters slander (Proverbs 10:8)
one who does not heed advice (Proverbs 12:15)
one who does not control his feelings (Proverbs 12:16; 29:11)
one who flaunts his folly (Proverbs 12:32)
one who is reckless and careless (Proverbs 14:16)
one who has a quick temper (Proverbs 14:17)
one who despises his father’s instruction (Proverbs 15:5)
one who despises his mother (Proverbs 15:20)
one who does not accept reproof (Proverbs 17: 10)
is bitterness to his parents (Proverbs 17:21, 25)
one who would rather express his own opinion than gain understanding (Proverbs 18:2)
one who loves quarreling (Proverbs 20:3)
one who despises good sense (Proverbs 23:9)
one for whom honor is not fitting (Proverbs 26:1)
one who trusts in his own mind (Proverbs 28:26)
and the list goes on…
….

We live in a culture that expects teenagers to behave foolishly, and to seek friends who will behave likewise. Anyone who strives for a higher standard is often considered a holier-than-thou joy-killer. And most of us, instead of rising to the standard laid forth clearly in the Bible, accept the low expectations of the culture around us and act accordingly.

But the Bible is clear:

Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, making the best use of the time, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what the will of the Lord is. ~Ephesians 4:15-17

Go here to read the whole thing.

Question from a 14-year-old girl
Posted July 25, 2008, by Anna Sofia

We’ve received a number of great questions on our last article, “How to Think About Young Men,” and would like to post a few, with our answers, over the next few days. We were proud of the young lady who asked this question, for her thoughtfulness in taking even the relationships of her youth seriously.

How should a 14-year-old girl interact with boys? Should it be different than how a grown young woman interacts with young men, and if so, how?

We believe the principle is the same, regardless of your age or theirs: view them as brothers. Treat them respectfully, look out for their best interests, view them with charity and understanding, and do not put stumbling blocks before them.

However, when wondering who a 14-year-old girl should interact with and how, there is more to the equation than the gender factor. We know from Scripture that young people can be foolish (Proverbs 22:15). Scripture also says that “He that walketh with wise men shall be wise: but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.” (Proverbs 13:20

The danger here isn’t just boy-girl relationships. It’s fool-fool relationships. There is this danger in friendships between girls, too. Yet age shouldn’t really be the basis of “discrimination” either, any more than gender. The issue is spiritual maturity.

We ought to choose our friends on the basis of their maturity (or if they’re younger, teachability) and interest in the things of God, and spend time together depending on how edifying and constructive that time can be. Proverbs 14:7 instructs us to “Go from the presence of a foolish man, when thou perceivest not [in him] the lips of knowledge.”

There are occasional exceptions to the following observation – but, at your age, friendships with peers will generally be less fruitful than friendships with those older and wiser than you, whom you can learn from, and those younger than you, whom you can invest in.

Age 14 is a very formative time, when most of us are developing our habits of interaction. We personally would advise you to spend as much of this season as you can around adults, especially the older women in your church. If you also have opportunities for worthwhile brother-sister interaction, by all means make the most of them! (Presupposing that you have the blessing of your parents to do so – see note at the beginning of the previous post) But also be sensitive to the weaknesses of your young brothers — and yourself — at this age of heightened self-consciousness and vulnerability.

A last word: Don’t worry about immature people viewing you as a prude, if you put these principles into practice. Remember, there are worse things to be viewed as than a prude. Like, a fool.

Brothers and Sisters in Christ
Posted July 15, 2008, by Elizabeth

How to Think About Young Men

A number of young women have asked us about relationships with young men. They want to know how a young woman should interact with those of the opposite sex, or should she at all?

Note: Every daughter should look to the guidance of her parents on this. She should know what her father (and mother) think about conversations with strangers, friends, suitors, and potential suitors. The advice in this article presupposes that your father approves of pure conversations and interaction with young men, and that our suggestions would only be applied in the situations and manner he has approved. If the thoughts below represent a different practice than what your father or elders have prescribed for you, continue to follow the direction you have been given by those in jurisdictional authority over you.

The issue of how eligible young people can interact in a pure and comfortable way has been considered by wiser and more mature minds than ours. However, we would like to submit a few thoughts as two young people currently navigating these waters ourselves, and having listened to the perspectives of many friends, both male and female, on this issue.

In this post we will be offering some collected observations from the most mature young people we know (with a heavy dose of advice from the older and married, our parents most of all).

It is generally known that Christians are supposed to interact as brothers and sisters in Christ, but during the highly-charged season of eligibility, young people in the typical church are not sure how to do this.

Even in family-integrated churches, guys and girls often don’t know how to interact comfortably as brothers and sisters. We usually see this expressed in one of two ways: either flirting and posturing, or shying demurely away from any interaction with the other sex. These two symptoms may seem opposites, but they both stem from the same root problem: a failure to think of the other as “[brothers or] sisters, with all purity” (1 Tim. 5:2)

In other words: thinking of the other sex chiefly as marriage material. This problem can be intensified by the fact that most of us don’t know what a real brother-sister relationship looks like, thus having no foundation or framework to transfer over to our spiritual brothers. Our father has always taught us that understanding the fraternal relationship can help us understand why men and women in the Body of Christ are referred to as brother and sister, and give us the wisdom to gracefully maneuver a season so (potentially) fraught with complexity.

Obviously, there must be some distinctions between how we treat family members and young people outside the family. Because this “eligibility” phase can be volatile, young people need to be extra thoughtful in how they deal with these relationships – not excessively worried about convention, but always thinking carefully about how to love the people around them, considering what is appropriate for the situation, and submitting to the guidelines set by their parents.

In this article, we will not attempt to set forth a code of conduct, or rules of “engagement” between the sexes – rules and safeguards are for your own family to determine as you seek the Scriptures. What we want to explore here is a sisterly attitude toward young men. Remember, our patterns of conduct begin in the heart and mind. We cannot treat young men as brothers until we think of them as brothers. It does not follow that we should throw propriety to the wind and embrace all young men with unconstrained sibling familiarity, but we can identify and follow many of the same principles that we do with our own brothers, without the same level of intimacy.

What does it mean to think of young men as brothers?

What principles of sisterly love are applicable to other young men?

A sister should be looking out for her brother’s best interests. Of course she doesn’t want to see him get hurt, defrauded, or painfully disappointed.

She prays for him, for his future wife and family.

She understands that he is an imperfect human being, with flaws and weaknesses that should be viewed with charity, patience and understanding.

She views him as a fellow human made in the image of God – neither more nor less.

A sister should realize that her brother will answer to God for every word he says, every thought he has, every deed he does – including in his dealings with women. This should put the fear of God into her to not want to see stumbling blocks put before him.

A sister should realize that young men are supposed to be seeking the Kingdom first (as are we! Matt. 6:23). We should not willfully distract them. Ours should be the kind of relationship that will encourage them in their focus on serving God, in their manly endeavors, rather than the kind of relationship that would feed their weaknesses and vanity. Young women can fuel or even ignite a man’s penchant for mere “interaction” – bantering, toying, dallying, trivial exchanges about nothings — a shallow (and selfish) substitute for hearty friendship and substantial conversation.

What the young men say

We have an advantage many girls would love to have – we have five brothers, who all talk openly with us about what they do and do not appreciate in the conduct of young women toward them and their friends. Our brothers have told us they find it easier to think of and treat a young lady as a sister in Christ, when she acts like a sister in Christ. Solid young men can usually discern fairly quickly whether a girl is unselfishly looking out for the best interests of her Christian brothers, or views them simply as prospective marriage material – or worse, as objects to sport with. They’re inclined to feel more comfortable around a girl who clearly has no designs or expectations, and uneasy speaking to a girl who seems focused on her eligibility, the matrimonial possibilities, the deep significance of their interaction… (Among other things, the guys can be concerned that their brotherly friendliness will be misconstrued as a mark of intention.)

According to our brothers, they appreciate it when:

A girl seems comfortable and at ease.

A girl talks to them in the same spirit that their sisters do.

A girl is a good conversationalist, well educated and with interesting things to say. (Able to speak intelligently on subjects that will be of general interest to a mixed audience – e.g., topics other than sewing, fad diets, clothes, chick flicks, themselves, etc.)

A girl has a genuine interest in the things of God, and an eagerness to speak of them and discuss them.

They do not appreciate it when:

A girl seems excessively self-conscious and distracted by the fact that AN ELIGIBLE YOUNG MAN IS TALKING TO HER!

A girl exhibits leech-like behavior – however flattering it was intended to be.

A girl is over-aggressively friendly.

A girl demonstrates a Deliberate Shunning of Young Men, complete with avoiding eye contact and hiding behind human shields.

Conclusion

Knowing how to interact with all purity is a test – parents and young people have had to deal with this throughout history, sometimes trying to solve problems through strict societal conventions and rigid codes of conduct.

Standards and rules of decorum should be regarded. The trouble is, they don’t ultimately fix the problems. Only treating the attitudes of our hearts – cultivating agape love, wisdom, thoughtfulness, and the perception and intuition to discern the need of the moment – will help us act like the sisters in Christ we should be.

Girls – consider the young men you know as the future husbands of women the Lord has already chosen. In fact, you can be praying for their wives right now (note: not match-making), and don’t forget to pray for the men themselves, that the Lord will guide and protect them in the choosing of a wife.

Try to act like a sister, not a prospect. Don’t be obsessed with your own eligibility, or theirs either, for that matter. Selfless, honest interaction with young men has the potential to edify, stimulate, educate, inspire and encourage both parties. Don’t complicate, or hinder, these friendships by playing psycho-romantic guessing games.

And finally, ladies – relax! Be joyful. Trust in the sovereignty of God. Be thankful for these opportunities for friendship with the children of God. Remember that these young men are precious souls blood-bought by Christ, and fellow soldiers in His cause. Let us build friendships that will continue long after this season of singleness is past, and into eternity.

A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I have loved you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye have love one to another. — John 13:34

Supporting Our Boys Out There
Posted July 3, 2008, by Elizabeth

How to Help Our Men Fight the Real Battle (On the Home Front)

Watching our five brothers grow up has been fascinating and sobering, especially when we consider the amount of influence we have had, for good or for ill, to affect the men they have become. Scripture and history are replete with examples of women either building men up or tearing them down by how they relate to them. We personally have seen in numerous cases how much damage a sister can do to her brother’s manly confidence, his willingness to take on responsibility, and the way he views and treats women, if she is not careful. We have also heard some of the manliest young men we know speak glowingly of the positive influence from their sisters. In fact, many of these young men attest that it was their sisters’ love and support that inspired them to become responsible, bold, protective, and confident. [1]

As we look at the battle that surrounds us, we have come to believe that one of the most important things we will ever do, as daughters and sisters and wives and mothers, is to build strength into men and help make them great.

America’s war against manhood

There is a crisis facing our nation’s boys. Their masculinity is under attack. This is no longer a debate; it is a copiously documented fact, actually old news. Bold, commanding masculinity has become pathologized and penalized. We’re not just talking about the rise of metrosexuality, either; over the last century, men have been taught that their leadership is oppressive, their protection is insulting, their authority is tyranny, and their position as the head of the household is utterly illegitimate.

Feminist leader Andrea Dworkin said in her “Root Cause” speech: “Only when manhood is dead - and it will perish when ravaged femininity no longer sustains it - only then will we know what it is to be free.” [2]

Emasculating men was not a new idea, even in the ‘70’s. The cultural revolutionaries who got the foothold in American education and media in the 1930’s were primarily working toward a goal Karl Marx articulated: “to dethrone the patriarchal power in man.” [3]

Men are under constant assault from the media, re-written history books, [4] psychological studies, political correctness and many other weapons of the neo-marxists. Even entire girls’ clothing lines have sprung up to tout misandrous slogans to teach girls to ridicule boys for being boys. [5]

Can’t the nation see that this hurts boys? – it makes them ashamed of being boys, and afraid to become men. They learn that being masculine, responsible and authoritative is a social offense. And the pundits wonder why boys’ performance is plummeting; why their suicide rates are skyrocketing; why their criminal activity has been rising; why so many grow up directionless and afraid of commitment, and why so many refuse to grow up at all. [6]

We’re hearing a cry resounding from women the world over – “Where have all the real men gone?”

Note that even Andrea Dworkin (in the quote above) acknowledged the influence of women on men, and credited femininity with “sustaining” manhood. In a way, her statement was almost prophetic, for the slow, painful death of manhood (largely at the hands of women) is precisely what we are facing thirty years later.

When tempted to bemoan the fact that the men are not rising up to where we think they should be, we should seriously ask ourselves if we have been a part of the problem. Too many sisters spend their youth teaching their brothers to sit down, be quiet, stop asserting themselves, stay in their place, and take orders, only to grow up and wonder where to find a husband with guts and a backbone. The ones who pushed down their own brothers now pray fervently that somewhere out there, there were some sisters who did not do the same to theirs.

Our brothers are already up against a great deal. This man-depleted world needs them to rise above their challenges and become real men, men who can lead families, start churches, reform cultures, make disciples, lead in the gates, and act the man. Our boys need their sisters to stand beside them and help them become these men!

Our Brothers’ Keepers?

Does this place an unnecessary burden on girls, to feel responsible for how their brothers turn out?

Men will answer to God for their own actions – on Judgment Day, they will no more be able to escape responsibility for their sins than was Adam, pointing his finger at Eve and claiming it was all her fault.

And yet Jesus also said to His disciples, “It is inevitable that stumbling blocks come, but woe to him through whom they come!” (Luke 17:1, emphasis added) People are culpable if they sin, but people are also culpable if they cause someone to sin. In addition, we are guilty if we withhold good when it is in our power to give it. (Pro. 3:27)

The fact stands – people do affect and influence each other, and we should feel the weight that responsibility carries. We can make each other stumble (Rom.14,15), we can wound each others’ consciences (1 Cor. 8 ), we can edify each other (Eph. 4:29), we can win each other (Mat. 18:15), we can disciple each other (Mat. 28:19), and we can bear each others’ burdens (Gal. 6:2). [7] This gives all people responsibility in all their relationships. We should love others enough (and be mature enough) to accept this responsibility and use it to help them, rather than protest, as Cain, “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

How to Support our Boys

In addition to talking extensively with our brothers about this, we’ve had long conversations with several young men about the things they appreciate in how their sisters treated them. What we’d like to do now is offer some practical advice on how sisters can encourage their brothers to be men. Here are four of the more important ways we can do this:

Demonstrate Respect. This must be begun by thinking of our brothers as men, and not despising them in our hearts.

There was a time when we withheld demonstrative respect out of a concern that it might swell our brothers’ egos. We also held back giving them our approval or letting them be right, so they would know they had not “arrived” yet. We were sure if we gave them an inch, they would walk all over us, eventually becoming swaggering chauvinists who expected admiration and deference from women as their due.

What we found was the opposite. When brothers are brushed off, they often resort to bravado and bluster to try to impress their sisters into noticing them, but the sense of responsibility that comes with actually being taken seriously tends to sober them up.

As we began trying to demonstrate respect to our brothers, they actually became more humble, more protective, affectionate and generally thoughtful of us, and, interestingly, more respectful. (We found that fighting to maintain a position of superiority did not inspire their respect, and that even little brothers have a justified disdain for high horses.)

Let them assert themselves, lead, and teach you things. As sisters it’s our natural, sinful inclination to suppress our brothers when they try to assert their leadership or authority. We want to rule over them. We want to be better. This is as bad for us as it is for them. It’s time for us to realize that we were created to help, and they were created to lead. Applying this will look different with younger brothers than older, but there will always be areas in which little boys can be trusted to “be in charge,” and you will see them flourish under the responsibility. There will also be subjects they know more about than you (e.g. dinosaurs, weaponry, computers…). Not only is it good for them to be the teacher for a change – you might actually learn something!

Talk with them. Boys are full of ideas that want to be expressed. The ideas may seem silly to you now, and not worth your time to listen to, but it’s good for them to practice thinking through and communicating their thoughts, beliefs, and plans. Our own brothers often tell us how much they appreciate having a sounding board and hearing a woman’s feedback on their developing ideas.

Repent of past wrongs. If you are guilty of pulling your brother down, or have not been as supportive as you should, you should repent, ask your brother’s forgiveness, and resolve to do better. Yes, it is hard – but it is necessary. So that one day when you look at your grown up brother, you will feel thankfulness for the way you invested in him, and not regret.

Today every corner of the globe is crying out for great men. Many women recognize this need, and foolishly try to fill it by dressing up and acting the men themselves. But America doesn’t need pseudo-men. America needs real men that are supported by real women. Those of us who have brothers need to recognize the incredible opportunity and responsibility we have been given – to invest in the lives of tomorrow’s greatest men.

Footnotes:

1. There is a fine line to walk between holding ourselves up as teachers and authorities over men (which Scripture forbids, 1 Tim. 2:12), and using our natural, God-given feminine influence on our brothers carefully and humbly. (You will also notice that in this article we are only speaking to young women, though there is certainly plenty to be said to fellows about how to be better brothers to their sisters. We’re just not the ones to say it.)

2. Andrea Dworkin. “The Root Cause,” speech, 26 Sept. 1975 at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (published in Our Blood, ch. 9, 1976).

3. For more information on the war against men, hear our father’s lecture
“Hollywood’s Most Despised Villain.”

4. “All of history must be re-written in terms of oppression of women.” – “The Declaration of Feminism,” November 1971

5. Florida company David and Goliath began in 1999 with a line of “Boys are Smelly” T-shirts. The line became successful and new slogans were added, such as “Boys are stupid, throw rocks at them,” “Boys lie, poke them in the eye,” and “The Stupid Factory, where boys are made.” More information is available here.

Strangely, these T-shirts also come in mens’ sizes.

6. “Statistics collected over two decades show an alarming decline in the performance of America’s boys–in some respects, a virtual free fall. Boys were doing poorly in school, abusing drugs, committing violent crimes and engaging in promiscuous sex. Young males lost ground by many behavioral indicators at some point in the 1980s and ’90s: sharp plunges on some scales, long erosions on others. I was forced to confront a fact that I had secretly known all along: that teens of 30 years ago–my generation–were the leading edge of an epidemic of thugs, dolts and cads.” (“The Myth About Boys,” by David Burnett, TIME Magazine, 2007)

7. More Scriptures on our responsibilities to others:

Rom 14:21 [It is] good neither to eat flesh, nor to drink wine, nor [any thing] whereby thy brother stumbleth, or is offended, or is made weak.

1Cr 8:12 But when ye sin so against the brethren, and wound their weak conscience, ye sin against Christ. 1Cr 8:13 Wherefore, if meat make my brother to offend, I will eat no flesh while the world standeth, lest I make my brother to offend.

Rom 14:13 Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in [his] brother’s way.

Rom 15:1 We then that are strong ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Rom 15:2 Let every one of us please [his] neighbour for [his] good to edification.

Title image by Norman Rockwell, Advertisement for Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Company, Springfield

When Brothers Become Men
Posted June 21, 2008, by

Our youngest brother, Noah, has just celebrated his 13th birthday, and according to Botkin family tradition, is considered to have now joined the ranks of the Botkin Men. The age of 13 has been traditionally considered the threshold of manhood, something that we as older sisters take very seriously when prayerfully considering how to relate to our brothers.

Here is an excerpt from the speech Noah gave shortly before his birthday:

“This year I turn 13. This year I will become a man, and this is one of the great turning points of my life.

“When I was a child, I used to speak like a child, think like a child, reason like a child; when I became a man, I did away with childish things.” (1 Corinthians 13:11)

Now that I am a man, I have to do away with childish things. I have responsibilities. I have work to do for Christ’s kingdom. My conversation must glorify God. And I must study God’s word with a new passion, and unfailingly.

“Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are {just} a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away.” (James 4:14)

Now that I am a man, I need to be ready to die like a man. In a Titanic-style situation, I wouldn’t get on the boats safely with the women and children. I would stay and sacrifice my life with the other men. But not only would I have to stay on board, but I would be honored to stay on board and die. And not just for the women and children, but also for my faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.”

It is a fine young man who has just been added to the numbers of the men of the world.

A birthday outing at one of Noah’s favorite places, where he has come to enlarge his personal library

It is sobering to watch a roly-poly little boy grow into a man of strength and stature, a man with big ideas and a mission, a man who will someday have great influence. We both remember helping baby Noah learn to lisp out our names; recently we heard him speak out about his willingness to die for his faith in front of a crowd of hundreds.

It’s interesting to now be grown women in a houseful of grown men, for all of our brothers have now (mostly) grown up. Instead of running to us to show us their latest Lego creations, they now come to us with their latest theological hypotheses. Yesterday they were picking out tunes on the piano and learning how to type — today they are writing books, making films, starting businesses and composing music professionally. Our childhood scheming together on how to build tree forts has matured into planning for projects that will impact the nations.

The five elder Botkin brothers and sisters, sixteen years ago

In the last sixteen years, family dynamics have only gotten better. As children, we were apprehensive about becoming grown-ups, afraid that the close bonds we reveled in would dissolve as new friends and interests would draw us apart, and become replaced by cool indifference. But instead, the years and shared experiences (and shared friends and interests) have only brought us closer.

Planning a sequence for Return of the Daughters

In those years, both we and our brothers have learned a great deal about the inherent differences between men and women, and why the two need each other.

We shall presently be posting more about our thoughts on the brother-sister relationship.

How to be a better daughter to your father
Posted June 17, 2008, by

This Father’s Day, we and our father would like to suggest 10 Ways a Daughter Can Bless and Honor her Father.

Honour thy father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise;) That it may be well with thee, and thou mayest live long on the earth. — Eph 6:2,3

1. Be grateful for your father

Gratitude is the beginning of honor. Fill your mind with gratitude for all that your father has done for you, beginning with giving you life. Consider
all that your father sacrificed to be a father to you, and the responsibilities that weigh on his shoulders. Think of him as the man chosen by God out of all the souls on earth to be a father to you, because in His infinite wisdom, He knew that you and he would be the perfect father and daughter for each other. Study to understand how this is a peculiar blessing to you both.

2. Appreciate his strengths

All fathers, whatever their level of maturity, have strengths. Be quick to notice them, appreciate them and praise them. You may have to discipline your mind to correct old thought patterns — train yourself to think of your father’s qualities before his frailties.

3. Pray for him

All fathers also have weaknesses. When you notice your father’s frailties, think of them as things to pray about, not things that annoy you. In addition to this, you should ask your father what he would like you to pray for him. This shows your father that you are serious about helping him and that you are dedicated to seeing him become the kind of man he should be. It can also help him think about his faults and how to overcome them.

4. Be content in his protection and provision and leadership

Don’t panic if your father makes a decision you don’t agree with. Have faith in God’s ability to lead through your father, imperfect though he is,
knowing that God will bless your obedience.

You can help your father by being different from the average girl who is never content and pressures her father to give her a more “normal” life. Some fathers are afraid to lead their families into more biblical paths because of what they know would be their daughters’ response — “No, Dad, that would make us look too different, and all my friends think I’m really weird already.”

You can also help your father by letting him know that he has a daughter who wants to give and not take, and isn’t thing-hungry. Some fathers can’t focus on leading their families spiritually or on fighting the Lord’s battles because they have to work themselves to death as wage slaves to satisfy their wives and children, who are clamoring for more things.

When husbands and fathers know they can depend on their wives and daughters to be content and confident in their leadership, it gives them the confidence to be more peaceful, more visionary, more entrepreneurial, more full of faith, and more bold in their leadership.

5. Ask him to help you pray for your weaknesses

Your father isn’t the only one who’s not perfect… Let your father know that you desire his help and prayers for your character, and be humble enough to tell him what faults in particular you need help with. …and ask him what he thinks you need help with.

6. Repent and confess any sins against your father, if necessary

Think back on past interaction with your father, for either unconfessed grievances of yours, or unforgiven grievances of his. Examine yourself for any bitterness you may be harboring against him.

Many girls have lamented to us that their fathers are not involved in their lives and refuse to offer guidance. In some cases, the reason fathers become afraid to “interfere” or “intrude” in their daughters’ lives is because their leadership and guidance have been pushed away in the past. If this is your story, repentance is called for. But it’s not enough to merely repent in your heart and then expect your father to automatically reciprocate; you need to confess your error and ask him to forgive you, and then you will need to demonstrate in word and deed that you have repented, that you have given him your heart, and now seek his guidance.

7. Communicate with your father

Build the kind of relationship with your father that involves a lot of comfortable communication between the two of you. Develop habits of talking together about everything. So many problems daughters have with their fathers could have been solved by talking freely, deeply and frequently all along — by talking about issues before they become “issues.”

Go ahead and initiate the communication yourself. Our father says it is often difficult for men to know how to reach their daughters, and it’s helpful when their girls come to them with a seeking heart. As Deuteronomy 32:7 says, “Ask thy father, and he will show thee.” It’s a father’s duty to tell, but it’s our duty to ask.

8. Give your father your heart, learn his ways and delight in them

Proverbs 23:26 says, “Give me your heart, my son, and let your eyes delight in my ways.”

The heart, called “the seat of the affections,” is the source of all passions, desires, loves, interests, likes and dislikes, convictions and opinions. Our hearts and all that they contain need to be surrendered to our fathers, someday to our husbands – and ultimately to God – to be molded and directed. You don’t need to give your father a perfect heart. Give him an imperfect heart, and talk to him openly about your struggles and your weaknesses.

How do we let our eyes delight in our fathers’ ways? We should begin by wanting to really understand who our fathers are and why they do the things they do and think the things they think. Develop an interest in the things that are important to them, and the battles they are fighting.

Again — initiate. Don’t wait for your father to come down to your level — step up to his.

9. Treat your father with respect and humility even when it’s hard

No father will be consistently honorable and respectable in his daughter’s eyes. What do we do when our fathers aren’t behaving like Christians (or aren’t Christians)?

In times when you may have to make an appeal to your father, make sure your words and manner solidly reaffirm your respect and loyalty. Your father will be more likely to hear you if he knows he can trust you to honor and not defy him.

Of course all earthly authority is limited, and there are biblical grounds for disobedience to an authority who’s trying to play God. A father’s unbiblical demands may be impossible for a daughter to obey, but they do not negate her duty to be respectful and honoring. Remember the attitude of young David as he continually appealed to his insanely jealous and murderous father-in-law as “My lord the King.”

10. Remember that your relationship with your Heavenly Father is the most important thing

The ultimate goal in all our earthly relationships is to please our Eternal Father, the Father to the fatherless. Whatever kind of father the Lord has given you, remember that it is to honor the Lord that you honor him. If we love Him, we will keep His commandments — all of them — including the commands to honor our father and mother.

This is important to Him. Remember why God sent John the Baptist: “to turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the disobedient to the wisdom of the just; to make ready a people prepared for the Lord.“

A Unique Opportunity
Posted June 3, 2008, by

There is a unique opportunity standing before our family right now. Doug Phillips was very kind to mention this on his blog.

As our family has been studying the history of Christendom, we see Britain featuring prominently, sometimes as the leading Christian nation in the world. The Lord has given them unique success, influence and power for the past 1000 years, using them to civilize and Christianize nations all over the world. But in more recent times many there have turned their backs on Him, and Britain is now a post-Christian society. The surviving churches there are smoldering wicks, surrounded by a secularism that belittles the Faith and Christian families in ways Americans can hardly imagine. Christianity has been marginalized to near extinction. But there is a remnant there: families who desire to turn back to the biblical model for family life, to raise up their many children to turn Great Britain back to Biblical foundations.

Homeschooling Families in Britain
With little to no biblical teaching, like-minded fellowship, encouragement, or practical advice in their own country, these families are starving for truth and good teaching, and they are asking for some outside help.

“Come Over and Help Us.”
In the last two years, we’ve received many letters asking that the Botkin family come over to speak to their nations about family life and family culture. These English, Welsh, Irish and Scottish families want to hear our family’s message of multigenerational success, and be able to ask practical questions about parenting, about sibling relationships, and how fathers turn their hearts to their children, and to hear from mature children how they work together as a family.

Our experience of living in the British culture of New Zealand for seven years gave us a real heart for the people of the U.K. We recognize our time in New Zealand as Providential, believing it makes our family uniquely suited to ministering to our British brethren.

If you would like to help make this opportunity possible, you can donate here.

Here is just a sample of the correspondence we have received in the last few days:

“Thank you so much for your book, it has been a blessing to me and I am so thankful that I read it! It has been such an encouragement for me to realise (through your book and your web-site) that although I do not necessarily know many people who share this vision, yet there are others out there who are living it out daily and God honours those who honour Him.” — Rachel

“Scotland is definitely in need to hear the message about the restoration of the Biblical family…May the Lord open a way to make that happen.” — James

“The Botkin family would bring a message to the UK that would speak to the very foundations of the nation’s heritage and shake the pillars upon which she stands. To truly call men to the age old foundations of biblical justice, morality and religion would be a call for men to remember the honor, dignity and godly character of their forefathers. It will shame the lethargy of the men of modernity and enrage the feminist agenda. It will also answer the prayers of those crying for revival. Please, Mr. Botkin, would you teach and train our family how to be key leaders in the Cultural Reformation of the UK and to the uttermost parts of the earth?” — DR

“Birmingham is quite a good spot really - just a little plug for you to consider us!” LA

“Come to [Lancashire!] The shape of Britain’s future can be seen here (unless the Christians get their act together): there’s a group here that has seized the dominion mandate with both hands, that have opened their own schools and do homeschooling, that have taken the principles of cultural distinction, modesty in dress and duty to the family seriously, that live close to one another in the terraced houses and care for their elderly in multigenerational housing units. It’s not the Christians, but the Muslim community, whose parents and grandparents were brought over from Pakistan to shore up the postwar cotton industry.” — CG

“The decline in the West is more advanced in Europe so we believe that your ministry is key to a revival of true Biblical concerns.” — Steve

“The main problem we seem to face here in the UK is the number of men who are prepared to take a stance on this from the pulpit is virtually zero. We, as a family, are thankful to ministries like yours who have helped us and others here in the UK.” — JN

“The Biblical message on family life which the Botkins live and share are what we in the United Kingdom need to hear.” — JH

“The message the Botkin family would bring to the UK would be very important. The UK has slipped even further into a post-Christian era than the US. The media will outright mock Christian initiative. The state schools have rewritten our history books. There is a deep-seated socialist agenda. It is an egalitarian society. I remember as a child my mother working as a bookeeper would calculate income tax for upper level income earners at 75% income tax. Nowhere have I seen the application of Scripture to every sphere of life other than personal piety. Feminism is of course rife. To ask a Christian man what is the condition of religion in his home is to ask a question that he no longer understands.

“There is tremendous need to shepherd and train these families in the right way. The process of discipleship of church leaders and heads of households will take generations to see men stand in the gates and lead in parliament for England’s revival.” — Father of six

“The Christian household here does not seem to know this biblically founded message of the daughters at home. It is on our heart to see this encouraging and eye-opening message to be brought to many here.” — Andreas

“We are excited about the opportunity to meet with the Botkin family and hear some of their teaching. The UK is in dire need of a spiritual reawakening and a turning back toward the biblical model of family life. The messages and testimony that the Botkins will bring will stir us as Christians, and encourage us as we seek to be salt and light in our communities.” — Liz

“It would be wonderful to have the opportunity to hear insights and wisdom from a home-educating family who have successfully raised their older children to adulthood.” — Nigel

“I have found all your materials an answer to prayer. When can you come to our city?” — David

“I would sadly have to say that the truth you espouse would be like a foreign language to most, so far have we fallen from such scriptural fundamentals. However there is a remnant and God is able to “turn the hearts of the fathers to the children”. — DW

“We need this inspiring family message!” - Beatrix

Please consider helping us spread a gospel message of family discipleship to Europe. If you want to help, or for more information about this trip, please visit this link: www.westernconservatory.org/donate.html

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