Liz: 0:13

Okay, welcome to our One Blessed Mess with Ben and Liz, and we are so excited that you're here today because we are telling our story of raising six kids in eight years while having an entrepreneurial home, homeschooling and also currently raising four teenagers Four right Soon to be how many then Soon to be five, soon to be five.

Ben: 0:36

Yes, it's still crazy to think about that.

Liz: 0:39

It is because it's so loud in our house.

Ben: 0:42

It is.

Liz: 0:42

We thought it was really loud when the kids were little, which it was loud when they were little, but now that they're older it's like booming men voices.

Ben: 0:50

Man voices screaming, yes. Female voices screeching voices, women voices yeah, it's like not little kid cute voices anymore. It's like no oh my gosh, that like splits my ear.

Liz: 1:01

Yeah, it gets oh yeah, and it gets pretty loud and then like the logic as they're forming, their logic is quite hilarious and also, too, is just like big feet and flappy arms and I feel like laughing, but it's true. Well, they're just like they're not because they're growing so fast, it's like their arm like go go gadget arms.

Liz: 1:21

Like it's too big for their bodies too big for their bodies and for the riches, but no, seriously, like it's. It's very interesting because they're still like puppies in a way. You know they think they're all big and bad, but really they're super tender. And somebody gave me some great advice about teenagers this mom who had 10 kids and this is back when the kids were really little and I was so nervous I just kept thinking what is it going to be like? It's going to be, you know, is it going to be terrible?

Ben: 2:11

no-transcript they might look done, but on the inside not so much.

Liz: 2:18

They're not so much.

Ben: 2:19

Got to bake a little longer.

Liz: 2:20

Yeah, they got to bake a little. Yes, they got to bake a little longer. And then also too, you know, they are trying to formulate their ideas and all that kind of stuff and it's really a fun stage. I mean, somebody has asked me recently I forget where I was I think it was a grocery store, because I'm at the grocery store and they said you know what is it like with teenagers? And I said it's awesome. I've loved every stage of our children growing up. There has not been a stage that I haven't enjoyed. I mean, yeah, I didn't enjoy sleepless nights and the puking and some of those kind of things, but I've enjoyed them developing and growing in every age and every stage, and there's not one that I've not enjoyed. You know, and I think it's all about perspective, but this is not what we're talking about today. This is such a rabbit trail.

Ben: 3:05

We're known for the rabbit trails.

Liz: 3:06

Yeah, we're known for the rabbit trails, but what we have to talk about today is pretty awesome. I mean, it's a good topic.

Ben: 3:12

Well, it's slightly controversial. I guess you could say yeah, we are going to be talking about obedience, okay, so that's our big topic today. Yep, we might do two episodes with this. I'm not sure, it just depends on how we go with this first one, but there's a lot of content here and there's a lot of nuance too, so we want to take our time with this. We want to try to explain this concept of first-time obedience. That's specifically what we want to talk about.

Liz: 3:38

F-T-O.

Ben: 3:40

F-T-O first-time obedience.

Liz: 3:42

F-T-O.

Ben: 3:42

You might not have heard of that before. You might be thinking what is first-time obedience?

Liz: 3:46

Well, I'm glad you may be thinking that, because we are going to try to answer that First time obedience is Wait before you jump into that, before you jump into the definition of it, I just want to say that what we're about to share is something that we wish we had learned early on, when we were raising our kids. We did not know about this until probably, I mean, we had four or five kids, yeah, and there was like a whole group of them, yeah, and we are definitely outnumbered, way outnumbered.

Ben: 4:17

But even when there was a group of them, we're still talking about what like six and under.

Liz: 4:20

Yeah, age-wise, yeah, age-wise, probably four or five and busy, busy, busy lives with raising and all the things that that involves and we were trying to figure it out. He had his experiences and how he was raised. I had my experiences and how I was raised.

Ben: 4:38

We were in some parent.

Liz: 4:40

Yeah, family of origin. We were in some parenting books. We did a parenting class at our church. We're still trying to figure it out and then we landed on this and I wish that I had known about this earlier because it would have made things easier. But I just want to say to our audience like, don't feel pressure. You know, take this before the Lord, pray about it, do some more research, talk it over with your spouse. If you're a single parent, you know, find someone that you can discuss this with, and maybe another single mom and kind of. You know, talk it through. But we're just wanting to pass on some gold nuggets. We're wanting to pass on some pearls that we discovered in the midst of all the muck and the mire that has changed our family.

Ben: 5:21

I mean literally changed our family Do you want me to tell them what it is?

Liz: 5:24

Yeah, go ahead, go ahead.

Ben: 5:27

So the definition of first time obedience, as we understand it at least now there could be multiple is basically to train your child to obey you the first time an instruction is given. And you might think, oh, that sounds kind of prosaic, or you know outdated, or you know too authoritarian, or insert whatever you think about it and that might be right, like yeah, it might be a little old fashioned, but here's what it affords us. Let's go into the pros and cons and we'll let you decide, like is this right for you and your family or not? We found that it was. It completely transformed our family and helped us live a lot less stressful life.

Liz: 6:04

Much more peace. Much more peace. Like way like stress level Jump into the pros. Yeah, the stress level totally came down. So, yeah, peace, much more peace. Like way like stress level Jump into the pros.

Ben: 6:11

Yeah, the stress level totally came down. So yeah, peace. Number one for us was establishing a culture of peace and safety through obedience. That sounds crazy, but if you give it a little time you might understand how that would work right. Think about our situation. We had roughly four children. I think it was four children, it might've been three. I mean, you're pregnant with the fourth.

Liz: 6:29

Who knows?

Ben: 6:30

I don't remember exactly when we established this. I was always pregnant, but it was right around that time, right and so having children that are five and younger, and then all try to be on the same page and all try to obey one of us parents because, let's face it, you were home with the kids a lot.

Ben: 6:46

Obey one of us parents because, let's face it, like you were home with the kids a lot, and then, when you weren't there, I was there with the kids, and so we were trying to like not feel overwhelmed and outnumbered.

Liz: 6:58

Right.

Ben: 6:58

With all these children running around and we're the ones responsible for them and they don't know safety.

Liz: 7:05

They don't know these things that adults know Well and also, like you, don't want to have to keep repeating yourself. I think, yeah, you can kind of go crazy and then, before you know it, you're like you're hitting octaves that you don't want to hit. And I mean, I know you people out there watching this or listening to this definitely know what we're talking about, and so it's like we've got to change this, because I don't like who I am. I don't like who I'm becoming. What can?

Ben: 7:29

we do.

Liz: 7:29

Nobody's listening to me, I didn't even want to listen to me. You know, and and and, truthfully, like I wanted to be able to go to a store, and we've told you before, in a previous episode, that we have a son that was diagnosed with autism, and so you know his processing. You know my eye has to be on him because he was a runner. He would run.

Liz: 7:48

And as soon as we got out of the car I'd have to hold on to him. I mean, it was just. It was hard, hard season and we began to actually start praying and asking the. Lord to help us. Like how can we parent our kids? And this fell into our lap. So the pros are. It gives you peace and safety. It gives it Because there's a clear expectation.

Ben: 8:11

So that's another pro is a clear expectation. You're training your children to respond and be responsive, um, and then there's also consistency, right? So like if I'm telling someone to do something and expecting that it to be done immediately, that's different than like when you're talking to a kid and you give them an instruction, they don't do it. You know, I'm counting to them an instruction they don't do it.

Liz: 8:30

I'm counting the three, then no, how about 10? They still don't do it. How about the 10?

Ben: 8:32

There's not this consistency where I say it it should be done. I'm not going to play a game where I'm going to try to incentivize you to obey me. It should be obeyed the first time I do it. And again, we're talking about small kids here.

Liz: 8:46

Yeah, it's a little bit different. We want to set the expectation, yeah, yeah.

Ben: 8:49

Yeah, this doesn't necessarily happen now that the kids are 15. There's definitely more dialogue and there's more give and take, and sometimes it doesn't make sense for them to obey me the first time because I don't have all the details right. Right so they come back to me and say, dad, listen, I know you said this, but this is really what's happening. Oh okay, yeah, totally, you know I'm sorry, and it's relationship.

Liz: 9:09

We'll get into teen years, and all that too at some point in time.

Ben: 9:12

But but, really you know when it's a foundational and when it's with young kids, the expectation is that they obey immediately, because you're able to see things, you're able to be aware of things, that they're there, you know they're small enough to there. They don't have that, that history or to understand, or just the life experience. So three things we've talked about so far establishing a culture of peace and safety, clear expectations, consistency when directives are given, and then also this one's going to sound like the bad word, but learning about authority Ooh Ooh authority, ooh Ooh authority. Mufasa, shaking my boots.

Ben: 9:54

Mufasa Say it again Mufasa Ooh Authority. Okay, that word gets misused and we understand it right, we do, and it's been abused. There's a lot of bad authority figures out there and it's unfortunate that we have that Unfortunate. However, if you try to run a family without any kind of authority, it's a madhouse guys.

Liz: 10:16

It is a complete madhouse and you have a very stressed out parent, or parents, very stressed out Like we. We just know. Maybe you can do that with one.

Ben: 10:28

You definitely can't do it with the six, and even and guys listen, sometimes we don't want to jump ahead to too much, but in our story we we have a story about a kid we think of as a family of just one, or maybe there was two, one on the way, but this kid was out of control and didn't understand authority. Anyways, we'll leave that, we'll get to it.

Liz: 10:50

Yeah, we'll get to that. So some cons.

Ben: 10:52

Let's throw in some cons. If it's done incorrectly this concept of first time obedience, if it's overblown or outdone, or if you only relate to your kid in first time obedience and they're 15 or even 18. Yeah, something's going on, Something's wrong here.

Liz: 11:09

Well, you haven't, you haven't gotten past like.

Ben: 11:12

You haven't transitioned.

Liz: 11:13

You haven't transitioned Like it's different when they're yeah, we'll get into that.

Ben: 11:16

So one con can be that it is perceived as like militaristic Right Like you. It's something you might see in an army, a chain of command where, where there's a clear authority and a clear structure and so families obviously can't be run like a military. We understand that we're not advocating for that, and so it can be perceived as militaristic and so you've got to work around that. So what's the number two, another con? Yeah, what do you think?

Liz: 11:40

Oh, basically you're creating robots.

Ben: 11:43

Yeah, if you never progress beyond the first time obedience, the first time directive, listening and responding and all that, and that's all your kid knows, right.

Liz: 11:52

Yep.

Ben: 11:53

And that's only how they relate to you is through obedience. Then you're essentially creating a little robot.

Liz: 11:59

A robot and we are raising not human robots, we're raising human beings, so this is just to help them develop, so they're safe and they can actually get to develop. I mean, there's so many stories, yeah, and then go ahead.

Ben: 12:15

Third, it can also be repressive, right? So if you only relate to children in this first time obedience concept, the kid might not be able to express their true feelings or get to the bottom of things. And then fourth, real quick, is that it's too simplistic. I think it's. The idea behind all these cons is that if you just camp out on this first time obedience premise and you never go beyond that, then you're not truly developing the child.

Liz: 12:40

So it looks like it's too simplistic.

Ben: 12:42

Yeah, it can look like it's too simplistic. So what we propose is this concept of first time obedience be the foundational layer that your kid understands who you are as the authority in the family. They understand that their willpower doesn't supersede yours. Right, and that's healthy, because we feel that's a great way to learn about selfishness and it's also a great way to know that we're not the center of the universe. Too much I think this is just my opinion too much of how we parent today is coddling our kids and we want them to feel loved.

Ben: 13:22

We want them to feel nurtured. I'm not saying that feel nurtured Absolutely. I'm not saying that that's wrong.

Liz: 13:26

Absolutely.

Ben: 13:27

But we also want them to understand that they aren't the driving force in the universe, that there are others besides them, and also that as they grow up and as they realize, like hey, in this dynamic of the family the parents are the primary lawgiver, if you will Right, right.

Ben: 13:49

That's the authority structure and that's important to understand, because in society you want healthy individuals who obey laws and who submit to authority, and it's even biblical to submit to authority. You know there's verses in the epistles that talk about submitting to the authorities. It's a God-given authority and that it's our right or sorry, our responsibility to pray and to submit to those authorities. And so we want to make sure that we are raising healthy children, obviously, children who are creative and who are self-starters and are thinkers. Obviously children who are creative and who are self-starters and are thinkers, and we don't want to obviously just make them obedient.

Ben: 14:28

No we want to start with obedience. There has to be a foundation before we can move on and realize what some of these other development issues are.

Liz: 14:38

Right, and you know, I'm just thinking back to our experience with raising all these little ones and you ones, and just having that foundation it makes the kids feel safe, they know what's expected of them and they know how to act in situations and they learn that when I say something, I mean it.

Liz: 14:59

When I say stop, there's a reason why I said stop. They don't get to turn around and debate as they're running into traffic, right, I say stop, they have to stop, yeah, and there are some things that I did, like when we were growing up. I mean, I think you kind of laid it out like what a first time obedience is, you know, and we want to say we're not psychologists, we're not psychiatrists, like you know. We're just a mom and a dad that happened to have a very large family, not as big as some of our friends have. Some of our friends have many more kids, you know. But we, you know, figured this piece out and we want to pass it on if it serves you, right, and so I'm thinking of some ways that I started out with. You know, when we got this concept, we learned about first time obedience, which basically is is when we say it the first time you do it.

Ben: 15:44

Right, so so how do you? So let's talk about implementing that.

Liz: 15:48

Well, there's a song. What's the song? I don't know it's like this slow oh BD and says no obedience, okay, so if you're slow to obey, is there a dance too? I mean, I made that up like right here while I was sitting with you Slow obedience is no obedience.

Ben: 16:07

Maybe we shouldn't dance.

Liz: 16:07

Okay, maybe not Okay. So, especially for our friends that are not watching the podcast, maybe listening.

Ben: 16:13

Yeah, what were they doing?

Liz: 16:14

Just delete that from your brain, All right. So that's true, though, Because if you're slow to obey and I see parents have friends and what's at stake- right, yeah.

Ben: 16:29

I think we need to set the stage. So when you're small and you're slow to obey, so let's say like a toddler, maybe even three and four, yep, you could be running out.

Ben: 16:41

In the street Right Like Zeke. You could be running out in the street right or about to touch something like a stove, or about to go down some some place that you're not supposed to or you know. Danger, I think is the context that I'm trying to set here is like when there's that slow obedience, then it could actually be harmful if the kid doesn't respond quickly.

Liz: 17:00

Right? Well, there's an example. So we have a friend who's in the medical field and we just went and saw him and he was telling us you know, we were telling him we're doing this podcast, our One Blessed Mess, and he goes I know what one episode is that you should speak about and I said, oh, really, what he says. How about first time obedience? I thought, oh, it's so controversial, really. And he said, no, I'm going to tell you why. Because he was just on holiday with his family and with some of his brother and his wife, so brother and sister-in-law, and they had a great time.

Liz: 17:37

They're finishing up and she went to give him a hug and when they hugged she had a wine glass in her hand and it dropped and it broke and glass went everywhere, all over the kitchen and the little boy who our friend told us he's like hey, he doesn't really listen. And obey, um, you know they, they they're literally screaming at the top of their lungs to get this kid to do anything. They're counting all this kind of stuff. And I thought, oh, I know I've witnessed that. And as this child was running in, she said stop and he just kept coming. She said stop and he just kept coming. He's barefoot, he's about to walk into the glass. He's like six, seven years old. And finally, our friend said that she had this mom had to hit decibels that were so high. She's like stop. I said stop, you're going to step in class.

Liz: 18:29

And it just unnerved the whole family. Then the kid listened. Now there has to be somewhere along the way there has to be where you don't have to get to that. And I get it. I was there. You know I'm not saying, you know it's been all perfect, but I understand that because you know I want, when I say, stop my kids, stop Cause they know I, I, for some reason they trust me that I know what I'm talking about you know and listen because of training.

Ben: 19:02

Yeah, it's cause of training. So why don't you talk about like um?

Liz: 19:05

how we did it. Yeah, like some of the ways that I did it.

Ben: 19:07

Yeah, I remember you mentioning like the red light, green light, kind of thing, right. So, yeah, no, no, no, that's good.

Liz: 19:13

So, you know, Ben was working when the kids were little, he was gone and so I was at home for many, many hours with these kids and we lived in a very cold state, that actually with snow, and so I'd be snowed in sometimes for days. So you know, you kind of need some help and we were praying about it. What should we do? I didn't like you know all the yelling and the screaming to get kids to pay attention, especially with multiple kids. And finally we found this and I started thinking about ways that I can implement it. And so our son that we've told you about, who has the diagnosis, he was a runner and you know, he because of his processing being a little bit different and how he perceives things, obviously the way that I was doing with the other kids wasn't the same way that I could do it for him.

Liz: 20:03

And so I'm thinking how can because he almost got hit a couple of times in the parking lot, I'm telling you I would have, you know, four kids get the baby out in its bucket seat, get the toddler in the seat, you know, locked in. I put one kid on, you know, holding on the car seat, I mean the cart, and then I'd have him and I'd have to get him last and hold his hand. But sometimes, you know, there's other things going on. He'd break and he'd just take off running Cars are backing in and out. I mean it was terrifying. And this is before you guys, they had like grocery pickup and now you can Instacart yeah, Instacart, and you can door dash, you know, milk to your door.

Liz: 20:46

I didn't have that luxury right and I didn't have any family at the time living in the area where we were living, so it was very minimal help. It was on me to go get the milk and the cheese and the things that we would need. Anyway, because sometimes you run out of stuff life. So I thought about playing red light, green light. Any of you ever play red light, green light in elementary school? I thought, okay, that would be great, and so I would go on walks with my kids and pushing the stroller and we would play red light, green light, and it was fun for my kids, but what it was doing was training them to listen to my voice. And so I say red light, and they all stop Green light. They all run Red light, stop Green light, run. It was also a great way to get out energy, but it was a fun way and it was training. That's really what it was. It was training to learn mom's voice. And so then I would start saying things like go, and they would run and say stop, because it wasn't just red light, green light, now it was I'm commanding you to stop, and they knew my voice. Then the other way that I really enjoyed doing this one this one was really fun is when they were all little.

Liz: 21:46

We talked about being the army and you know what do you do in the army? You're good soldiers and you listen to the commander. Okay, so this is. It was kind of like Simon says, but it would be like all right, everybody get ready. You're going to pick up 10 toys and put them in the bin, you know, because the rooms would be a wreck, or I'm like okay, now you're going to stand here, you're going to jump up and down, you know. So it was kind of like um Simon says, and then what it was is they were listening to me and they. It was a fun play to learn and we would have lots of conversations. You know where it'd be like. Okay, guys, remember, today we're going to practice first time obedience. When mom says, do it, you do it the first time. Do you do it the second time after I ask you no, you do it the first time, because slow obedience is no obedience. So when mommy says, go get your shoes on, you go get your shoes on.

Ben: 22:33

Yep.

Liz: 22:36

I don't have. I don't have the brain space. I don't have the wherewithal to have to keep coming back and say why don't you have your shoes on? I've told you three times that is energy, that is exhausting and it's too much. So putting this first time obedience in place and there could be a lot more other fun ways to work with your kids, to train, but they're learning my voice and learning consistency in what I say. I mean it.

Ben: 23:02

And we've seen times where it's not consistent and when you notice a parent that has to keep repeating themselves, and typically it's not like a good crescendo, right, like it's a repeating, and then it's a louder or more intense and then it's like even more and then it's like anger, and we don't want to be parents like that right.

Ben: 23:23

We don't want to have to figure out ways to incentivize our kids to obey, we want it to be automatic and immediate, and if we start with that point right, it just brings so much more consistency and we don't have to worry about being stressed out and our emotions being spent. So that's the real benefit from this type of parenting style, or this exercise and obedience is that you get so much less stress.

Liz: 23:50

Yeah. And we were able to take our children out to eat, even on our own. So like this was something really cool.

Ben: 23:56

Right, this is super cool we would be able to take six kids to a restaurant by ourselves while they're young.

Liz: 24:06

Yeah, you guys we're talking like six kids, eight and under, even after Ethan was born going out to dinner and the kids are sitting there happily. Now they're normal kids, they're spilling milk and there's all kinds of things happening.

Ben: 24:21

But I mean we and we would do it by ourselves occasionally, because either you were working or I was working, and there were times where we needed to be out of the house and we had to take all of our kids. Or I was out of town and you had them all by yourself, yeah, and so that happened a lot as they were growing up and we were able to manage six children by ourselves and we would go in to stores, we would go out to eat.

Ben: 24:47

Everybody would obey. If there was someone cutting up, we would just say hey, listen, don't do that. And they would obey.

Liz: 24:53

Or we would say remember first time obedience. So I want you to put your chair down and stop rocking it, because I'm afraid you're going to rock out of your chair. I mean just simple little things, and we have more to share I know we're.

Ben: 25:10

I'm wondering if we should wrap it up. Oh yeah, because we might have to do a part two. Yeah, let's do one story and then maybe okay we can break there um, and do you want to talk?

Liz: 25:17

about. I'm thinking of one. So when the kids were little we would go to um a and then after church we would frequent this restaurant often because it was like a brunch lunch kind of place a popular place that we love, and mainly we went there because the food would come out so fast and while you're waiting they have free coffee.

Liz: 25:37

So we would strap the kids in. They'd be watching a movie and we'd park right in front waiting for our name to be called and I go get a cup of coffee for him, a cup of coffee for myself, and we kind of have like a mini date before we actually go in and have our lunch for Sunday and we would come in. I mean, you know we went there for four or five, maybe even longer, six years, I don't know consistently. So so this the wait staff watched us raise our kids, watched me be pregnant, watched me come in with more kids.

Liz: 26:05

I mean it was like they were all part of the story of our clan growing right Our tribe and the kids. We would train them at home so that when we came out in public it wasn't like a fiasco.

Ben: 26:20

So that's important, right yeah, is making sure that you don't try to train when you're actually out.

Ben: 26:26

Yeah, you know like you want a consistent place to do this type of training and maybe we can go into just a little bit of like the actual training and maybe we can pause after that. So what she's talking about is like when we were out, we developed this habit at home and so we would practice, we'd be at home, we would do the red light, green light thing. But sometimes we would notice, especially with the younger kids, that there was a time where they would make a choice and it was like the light bulb inside their brain went off and it was like oh, I have a will, my parents have a will, this is a perfect time for me to exert mine against theirs. Right, and it happened like that for at least the last three. I don't remember so much the older ones because we had older kids when we implemented this. Yeah, not super old, but you know.

Liz: 27:20

Older, older yeah.

Ben: 27:21

But the younger, the last three in particular, when they were younger we would see this little light bulb turn on and it was like oh.

Liz: 27:29

Yep, little light bulb turn on and it was like oh, I can now disobey my parent and I'm going to try Exerting the will. They found their will, which is great. We want them to find their will. This is part of developing, but at the same time you're going to have to learn, you also have to learn how to submit that will.

Ben: 27:44

Yes, we're going to have to learn about that, that's crucial to becoming an adult and being a well-adjusted individual in our society.

Liz: 27:52

Human being yeah.

Ben: 27:53

Is to learn how to submit. I mean I hate to say that word because it sounds so gross to submit. But you know what? It's true, we all do it, we do it with one another, we do it to authority structures and anyways, it was important to see that that little light bulb moment was a invitation into the hardest part of this training. So that's what I want to talk about is one of our daughters. We saw that light bulb moment go off and she had a dirty diaper. I think you had just told her to go put it in the trash, or I had just told her.

Ben: 28:27

And we were both upstairs at the moment I think I was taking a break from work, because I normally would work downstairs and so we said Bria, go, take this diaper to the trash can. And so she looked at us and it was like no, no. I'm not taking it, and so we knew right then and there.

Liz: 28:47

I'm like, oh, here it comes, here's the moment. Here's the moment.

Ben: 28:50

Here's the moment. This is where the rubber meets the road. This is where the training happens, yep, and so I sat there. One important thing to note is typically there's one parent who is better at like this type of moment where you know there's going to be a battle of the wills, and so typically it's the parent who's got the most discipline.

Liz: 29:10

It's not me.

Ben: 29:11

That's what we're saying, and neither of us have high discipline, but apparently I have more discipline than Liz. Yeah, so I get to be that parent, but you have to be cool, calm and collective.

Liz: 29:20

Right.

Ben: 29:21

And you have to basically sit there like a broken record and tell the child again and again, and again what you want them to do, and you don't move from that spot until they do it.

Liz: 29:32

Right.

Ben: 29:33

And it's like a battle of the wills, and this was the most effective way for us to train the first time obedience.

Liz: 29:39

Yeah, and it's about 18, 20 months, yeah, so anyway, she said no. And then both of us are like, oh, this is that moment. And so Ben faithful Ben sat there on the floor next to the trash can and worked with her. I told her what was going to happen.

Ben: 29:55

I was like you are going to put this diaper in the trash. I'm going to sit here until you do.

Liz: 30:00

And just as cool as I'm talking to you right now.

Ben: 30:02

Oh, totally cool as a cucumber, like right now, you know it was like we took all the emotion out of it and it was just like this is what's going to happen. I'm going to wait here until you do. And so she started getting frustrated and she threw her diaper at me. And if there's things that she does or the child does that are something you need to correct and you actually need to do some disciplinary action, then that's fine too. You can do that and then come back to the directive. And so there are a few things where you know we needed to pause and come back to the directive, but we never left that space of just trying to implement this, this directive. And so I sat there and you know she would get upset and mad and I just said Nope, we're going to. You know, we're going to. I'm going to be here until you put this in the trash.

Liz: 30:45

You kept handing it back to her and she'd put it down.

Ben: 30:47

Yeah, she'd throw it away or do whatever she kept putting it down. Bring it back. Here's your diaper. I mean that poor diaper, poor diaper.

Liz: 30:54

It's amazing, it stayed together yeah.

Ben: 30:56

But we sat there for about 45 minutes, yeah, it was 45 minutes.

Liz: 31:01

You guys Like he's not exaggerating, it was very long. I mean we were continuing on with the family activities. Yeah, and she. But what happened?

Ben: 31:10

So at some point she got her hand close enough to the trash, and whether she dropped it in by accident or did it on her own, we're not quite sure. But as soon as she obeyed, or at least had the outward expression of obeying, we praised her.

Liz: 31:23

Yeah, we gave her a treat.

Ben: 31:25

We were super excited.

Liz: 31:26

We told her how proud we were yeah, we were like jumping for joy excited. We told her how proud we were. You're clapping yeah, we were like jumping for joy. It was so sweet. And from then, on.

Ben: 31:32

We never had an issue with our daughter. That is the craziest thing.

Liz: 31:38

And she is vibrant and expressive, extremely creative, very creative. This young lady is so wow, just such a treat. But that was the moment and it was before two.

Liz: 31:51

You know it wasn't the terrible twos and actually she didn't really have terrible twos at all Like not at all, you know, and and even at three, you know cause three was especially three-year-old little girls can be intense Three nature. That's a very intense time. She didn't even have that Like she just for whatever reason, the diaper and you know, and it was something different for other. You know two boys but yeah, it's true and you know, because that happened what I was saying before, like we would go out to eat on Sundays and because our kids we created a culture of first time obedience and were they perfect all the time? No. Were we perfect all the time?

Ben: 32:27

No no, but we always got back to that but we got back to it.

Liz: 32:30

We would come back and be like okay, guys, let's talk about it again. You know we got to. What do we do? And we kept it lighthearted and fun. So much so, you guys, that when we would take all of our kids in as we're a growing family to this particular restaurant, we had servers begging to take our table. And you know, it was not just because we were regulars, but because our kids were well behaved and they would come and ask us what do you do? And they would tell stories about other tables. Or we'd be there and there'd be other tables, kids throwing food on the floor, throwing themselves on the floor like scream. I mean, you guys know what I'm talking about. I'm not trying to paint, you know, a picture that you're not aware of. And really, like, our kids just didn't do that because we had worked with them so much. They just knew how to behave. And also, when we said, don't act like that, they knew what to do.

Ben: 33:16

Well, we even had other families that would come up or other couples. It was mostly other couples that would come up and be like I just want to let you know your kids are so well behaved, or your kids are the most well behaved we've seen in the restaurant. And it was kind of shocking to us because they're like we didn't really think they were that great today.

Ben: 33:33

But we had such a baseline for obedience that if there was anything that was out of whack, if they were like doing cutting up like kids, do I mean they're going to mess up, they're going to be kids, they're going to rub up against your will and it's just going to happen. But we would be very quick to be like all right, hey, stop that. We want to make sure that we're you know, we're acting correctly in a restaurant and they would obey. It was like it was like magic.

Ben: 33:58

It was like you would just tell them and they would do it. You didn't have to raise your voice, you didn't have to threaten anything, right?

Liz: 34:05

And we've got some more stories. But even last night the kids went to a game game uh, board game night with a bunch of other families. They had a blast, and we show up and and uh, towards the end of the night we're like, hey guys, it's time to go and I witnessed another family where the the mom and dad were like, hey, we need to go, and there was like, not the leaving, not right you know, and you know and I didn't even think about this until today that we're doing this, but because we instilled it.

Liz: 34:34

You know, before, when we said last night, hey, it's time to go Like, our kids were like all right, they put everything down, happy hearts. It still pays dividends. Decades later, it's paying dividends. Yeah, that's a good point.

Ben: 34:46

And maybe that's a good place to pause for here, but let's just read a few verses. And maybe that's a good place to pause for here, but let's just read a few verses. And specifically in Colossians 3.20, we have children obey your parents and everything for this pleases the Lord. In Ephesians 6.1, children obey your parents and the Lord for this is right. And then Proverbs 6.20, my son, obey your father's commands and do not neglect your mother's instruction. Guys, obedience is biblical.

Ben: 35:11

There's no other way to cut it. It can feel outdated, it can feel antiquated, but when we operate in rebellion and that's the norm instead of obedience, that's actually satanic. I hate to be so black and white about it, but obedience is the foundation that we're trying to set with our kids. We don't want robots. We don't want them to just obey every single thing that we're trying to set with our kids. We don't want robots. We don't want them to just obey every single thing that we're doing, especially as they're teenagers.

Ben: 35:37

But what we do is we set a baseline, we set a foundation, and as they grow and mature and our relationship dynamics changes, then that relationship blossoms the right way, not the wrong way, not in rebellion. And so we want to talk to you more about it and, uh, we're going to take a pause here and again, it was very messy doing doing this kind of uh training and God blessed it and you know it just goes right along with our theme. You know we we are blessed in our mess and, uh, we're happy to pick it up again and uh talk more about it next time.

Liz: 36:09

Well, and so we just want to say thank you for being a part of our one blessed mess today. Don't forget to like, share, comment, subscribe, pass this on to somebody that you think would enjoy or it would bless them. An encouragement, because everybody needs some encouragement. I know I needed encouragement along the way. Also to follow us on Instagram. Our handle is our one numeric one, just like the sign blessed mess. And until next time, just embrace your beautiful mess, because what we always say is if our mess can be blessed then so can yours, so can yours.

Liz: 36:43

Have a great night.