How to Raise Kids Who Love Jesus as Adults
w/ Dr. George Barna
Happy Friday, Everyone!
Here’s a fun/frightening fact: A person’s worldview starts developing in the 15-month to 18-month age range and is largely in place by the age of 13.
This means that who your child will be as an adult–their core beliefs, morals, values, desires, and lifestyle– is essentially determined by the time he is 13 years old.
We have the exciting opportunity and daunting task as moms to shape whether our kids will be disciples of Jesus or adopt a worldview that ultimately opposes scripture.
Today in EP201, I welcome to The Balanced MomCast Dr. George Barna. Dr Barna is the author of 60 books, including numerous award-winners and New York Times bestsellers. In fact, Dr. Barna has sold more books based on survey research related to matters of faith than any author in American history.
This is part 1 of a 2-part conversation about his latest book, Raising Spiritual Champions: Nurturing Your Child’s Heart, Mind and Soul.
We discuss
Why moms need this book.
How to define a 'biblical worldview'
The seven cornerstones of a Biblical worldview
Why most Americans lack a coherent worldview
How is a child's worldview is developed
Why so few children these days accept worldview teaching from their parents and whose worldview teaching they DO they accept
More about Dr. Barna:
Dr. George Barna has sold more books based on survey research related to matters of faith than any author in American history.
George Barna is a professor at Arizona Christian University and Director of Research at the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University, focusing on worldview
assessment and development, and cultural transformation. He is also the Senior Research Fellow at Family Research Council’s Center for Biblical Worldview. He was the founder of The Barna Group (which he sold in 2009), the Barna Institute, the American Culture and Faith Institute, and Metaformation. Through these entities, he has conducted groundbreaking research on worldview, cultural transformation, ministry applications, spiritual development, and politics. He has provided research and strategy for several hundred parachurch ministries, thousands of Christian churches, the U.S. military and Fortune 500 companies.
Having begun his research career in the political arena, he has provided polling for numerous political campaigns and has provided polling and strategy to four presidential candidates. He has also served on multiple boards of directors and advisory boards. Raising Spiritual Champions is the 60th book that Barna has authored or co-authored. His books have addressed social and religious trends, worldview, leadership, spiritual development, church dynamics, and cultural transformation. They include New York Times and Amazon bestsellers and several award-winning books. His books have been translated into more than a dozen foreign languages. He is a frequent speaker at events throughout the world, having spoken at more than a thousand events during the course of his career, including events in 14 different countries.
Prior to joining the faculty of ACU, Barna taught at several universities and seminaries, served as the teaching pastor of a large, multi-ethnic church, pastored a house church, and helped to start several churches. He has also served as an elder in several congregations. After graduating summa cum laude from Boston College, Barna earned two master’s degrees from Rutgers University and received a doctorate from Dallas Baptist University.
Barna and his wife, Nancy, attended high school, college, and graduate school together before marrying in the Princeton University Chapel in 1978. They have three adopted daughters and three grandchildren and currently live on the central California coast and in the Phoenix area. He enjoys spending time with his grandchildren, relaxing at the beach or on a cruise, watching the NY Yankees, playing bass guitar and listening to the blues, hanging out with his blind dog, Ray Charles, visiting comedy clubs or watching comedy specials, and reading novels.
Q4U: How are you feeling after listening to Part 1? Let’s talk in the comments.
By the way, I apologize to those of you who were looking for a place to comment about this episode yesterday. I’m still trying to figure out Substack and the timing of these things. Moving forward, I’ll release the podcast episode AND the post where we can talk about it at the same time. :)
Love,
Sandy
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I love that book. I wrote out some specific prayers for my kids full of scripture for the same reason, Kelly.
For the last 4 months or so I’ve been using Power of a Praying Parent to pray daily for my boys. And I’ve found it encouraging and hopeful to pray specifically and with scripture over these different areas of their life. Sometimes when I pray for areas that I see them not walking in, I remind myself that God loves my kids even more than I do, that He is sovereign and powerful and can do anything, and I just pray - making my requests knows to God, thanking Him for hearing my prayer, and humbly asking Him to pursue my kids. Having specific scripture based prayers really helps me to diligently pray for them.
I wanted to share this because as our kids get older we have less and less “control” over what they believe and how they choose to live. So we must stay steadfast in prayer and steadfast in our own relationship with the Lord so we can be examples to them.