Art of Parenting Review: The Importance of Modeling
My wife hates watching herself on video but my kids see her every day and are the better for it
At the end of 2017, Judy and I were invited to appear as contributors to FamilyLife's Art of Parenting video series. It was a great honor and privilege to appear in the series. However, when it came out, Judy refused to watch it. She didn't want to see herself on video and I joined her in not watching. It was a bad choice. Due to a ministry trip to Japan where Judy and I will be teaching a parenting workshop, I recently decided to watch the 8-session video series.
The sessions are organized around five topics: parenting goals, building character through discipline, building relationships, nurturing identity, and life on mission. Each session opens and closes with remarks from Dennis and Barbara Rainey, founders of FamilyLife. The bulk of the content consists of a series of interview clips from prominent Bible teachers/Christian celebrities like Alistair Begg, Kevin DeYoung, Bryan and Korie Lorrits, Phil Vischer and then more ordinary people like Judy Mok and yours truly. Interspersed between those curated clips are humorous segments from Christian stand-up comedian Michael Jr., a teacher asking a group of children funny questions about their parents, and movie clips from FamilyLife's production, Like Arrows.
I want my kids to be happy, normal, and extraordinary. The first session discusses the importance of keeping the end in mind when it comes to parenting. Among the college-educated middle class, parenting goals might sound something like:
I want my child to be happy and normal like everyone else but also extraordinarily successful in good ways with none of the downside. Also, please assure me I'm not a failure as a parent and that I'm also normal like everyone else and at the same time, extraordinary as a parent in all the good ways and none of the bad.
Pastor Bryan Lorrits would beg to differ. In the first session, he says about parenting: "I am hand-delivering their perception of who God is". That's the first thing and the last thing. That's why we need the gospel because we are so broken and desperate for a savior and we need a new heart to be able to raise our kids the way God would. We need a value system overhaul. That's also why the curriculum recommends parents have mentors. It's also why it's vital to watch the series and do the workbook exercises in a small group. Finally, for married parents, the relationship between husband and wife is the first priority. What we model in marriage plays a far greater role than any lecture we give our kids.
This is NOT gentle parenting. The second and third sessions teach that you can be a trusted authority in your children's lives - helping them grow in character through discipline. Parents, do not be friends with your children, especially when they're young. And yet you are not a tyrant. Art of Parenting also distinguishes between discipline and instruction. Discipline is required when addressing attitudes like defiance whereas instruction is required for inadequacy and ignorance. Discipline is not about behavioral modification but rather causing your children to confront sin and sow desperation for a savior.
Session three discusses the details of how to apply discipline by strategically introducing what's uniquely painful to your child as a means to build character. God often uses pain to get our attention and it can look many different ways. The Art of Parenting is explicitly pro-spanking and makes a strong biblical case for it. At the same time, they recognize instances where spanking is not appropriate for a family such as when a parent comes from an abusive background.
Three realities: God wants parents (and really, everyone) to receive three realities: 1) the pervasiveness and depth of our brokenness and sin 2) how deeply God loves us and provides us with a secure identity 3) the mission of God to use us to discipline our children and help them use their gifts for others. FamilyLife's Art of Parenting video series is strong on the second and third realities. It is a little weak on the first. In the sixth session, Tim Kimmel, author of Grace-Based Parenting, says: "The Bible makes it clear that we have a propensity towards selfishness and it explains everything, because their selfishness is normal". This is an important statement that bears expanding on as it relates to our culture. For instance, the sixth session has a seven-minute segment on the difference between boys and girls. It might have been more helpful to discuss sexual brokenness, the elevation of emotions as reality, the idolatry of the individual, and distrust in institutions as underlying causes for the gender war and youth mental health issues. Brokenness and sin are everywhere - hiding in plain sight. But this is 2025 and there's no way FamilyLife could have predicted how much our culture has changed in eight years.
Summary: Overall, I thought the content was fantastic and would lead to deeper and more vulnerable levels of sharing for a small group. It is an excellent guide for parents to foster community and help parents feel seen and encouraged by Jesus' love. As with any parenting curriculum, it does present parenting principles that can be misapplied like a performance standard but overall, it is nuanced, saturated with grace, sprinkled with humor and compassion, and presents a diversity of ways of loving your children. Throughout the sessions, there's also interviews with Dennis and Barbara Rainey's adult children about how they were parented. One of their children, who was adopted, says: ""They chose to adopt me and go through all the difficult times that we had. And have a person in a family choose you." It moved me to tears. The Raineys live out their faith.
Reflection: My emotional response after watching was immense gratitude for the privilege and honor to be a parent and the joy of being a Christian. Along with my marriage, being a parent is one of life's greatest accomplishments and joys. I enjoyed watching the series. It was rewarding, it was convicting, it was reassuring. It made me miss the early years of raising our children. I remember being stressed out and harried. I remember worrying about how to pay for college. More recently, I recall comparing my kids to my peers' children and what college they would go to. I remember deciding I didn't want to be a tiger parent and then realizing their academic future was important to me and then when Micah got into Berkeley, I realized my unconscious parenting aim was impressing those in my broader social circle.
I look back with regret and sadness about not being able to fully appreciate the joy and wonder of my children. I'm saddened by missed opportunities and how my anxiety and reactiveness caused me to withdraw, speak critically, or lose my temper. At the same time, I am grateful for the mentors in my life that helped me to enjoy and lead them in the LORD.
Judy the GOAT: But most of all, I'm grateful for Judy. As far as parenting, there is no single greater decision than my wife's choice to stay home to raise them. I know that's not an option for many parents, especially in Silicon Valley. It may not have impacted their faith as much I'd like to think but it has fostered a tight-knit family culture. We just did our first backpacking trip as a family, at Judy's initiative. And as a church planter, I have a heightened appreciation for the importance of logistics and execution. And my wife is a master of logistics and execution and she persistently and faithfully loves the LORD and serves Him wholeheartedly and it's incredible.
In the fourth session about building relationships, Judy says she sometimes needs to give herself a time-out in order to calm down when she's about to lose her temper with our kids. In that segment, I share about giving myself a time-out when my oldest son lost his passport on a youth Mexico ministry trip. In the sixth session, Judy says in the context of modeling faith: "When I read the Bible, it's not for them, it's for me". Judy still reads the Bible for herself today. In fact, with only two mostly self-sufficient teenagers at home, she spends much more time reading the Bible than she used to. She shares with me and the kids about what she's learning from the scriptures. The Bible reading wasn't lip service for a video. She is the real deal. In the seventh session about life on mission, Judy says "[Our children need] godly people who would speak into their lives and people they respect" and she prays for mentors for our children. Judy continues to grow in learning to love me, our kids, and God the Father. She models a humble, growing faith and that has spoken volumes to our children.
It's easy to get down on one's self as a parent and fixate over regrets and failures. That's why my favorite line in Art of Parenting comes from Susan Yates: "My ability to ruin my child is not nearly as great as God's power to redeem her.” It is of such great comfort to me knowing that Christ's resurrection power can overcome any garbage I can throw at it. I told that line to my son, Micah, and he laughed. He said it sounded like an excuse for me to screw up my kids. That's one privilege of being a parent - to be fully known.
👋
❤️this!