From Strong Families = Strong Churches (Wake Forest, Aug 28–29, 2026). Alan Hillman on practical parenting techniques for Christian homes.

Well, it's a privilege to be here and just so you know, I am not a public speaker, so forgive me. In 10 minutes it's crazy, so we're going to, we're going to bulletproof it, but let me just say real quick just to give credit where credit is due, what Growing Kids God's Way is. It was created actually back in 84 and then published in 86 in the curriculum, which is what we use. It's created by Gary and Marie Ezzo, and it's a Christian parenting curriculum, 18-week course designed to help raise moral responsible and biblically responsive children. It's got three core principles, obedience and respect, the moral foundation, and parental partnership.

So this is an 18-week course that we're going to kind of condense down into 10 minutes here. So We kind of picked out four of the main things that kind of hit us over the years. And I know I can look back, and I'll use a couple seconds, but we were at a really large church, sitting in the back row, and we saw this family walk in with five children at the time. And Mom and Dad walked in, and the children walked in behind them, and this mega-church with all these kids programs and stuff, and they went and sat down way up in the front, and we're like, looking at them like this, like, wow, what just happened, you know? So I didn't hear a thing the rest of the sermon, I admit it, I'm sorry.

I was focused on them and how amazing their family was, and the service ended, and we might have heard a couple people trying to get to them, and then that started this long-life friendship of eventually teaching and doing the Growing Kids Guards Way curriculum with them. So we're so grateful for what it did in our lives. So we're gonna hit on a couple things. The first would be the moral reason why. We just want to change behavior, we want to train the heart.

We want to teach why behind the instruction. You want to give a couple examples of teaching the moral reason why? Okay, so one would be respect, kindness, honesty, patience, responsibility. Like with our kids, If we were walking through a park and my son is going to destroy one of the shrubs, like he used to love to do, he would want to jump in a shrub or whatever. And I'd say, no, we're not going to do that.

Well, why do we not do that? We don't do that because we want to consider the preciousness of the people coming behind us. They want to enjoy those shrubs, not just us. And so You're giving that little snippet of why we don't do things, just as well as why we do do things. Absolutely, yeah.

And it moves kind of from mom said to, I understand why this is right, right? And This is what we've already heard teaching this morning, right? We don't just tell them, don't do that and you move on. It's don't do that and this is the reason why we don't do that, because it's un-Christ-like, it hurt that person, we did this and you kind of go through the teaching on that. Second thing would be first time obedience, which is also has some of a childishness versus foolishness with consequences.

So just a couple points on that. Give a clear age-appropriate instruction and an expected response. Yes, Mommy, yes, Daddy, eye contact so you know that they heard you, and you're getting acknowledgement that they heard you. We don't wanna train the children for repeated instructions, and we don't wanna do counting threats with an angry voice, right? It's not one, two, three, it's first-time obedience, right?

If it's not first-time obedience, it's disobedience in there. You have any examples for something with that? I mean, it's pretty self-explanatory. Yeah. Johnny, come here.

Right. No. Johnny one, Johnny two, Johnny two and a half, Johnny two and three quarters. Johnny, I said, get over here right now. And then you're angry and flustered.

That's not setting a good example for others or teaching our children. We need to expect them to come when we call them. One thing that I did with our kids was I would call their name, look at their eyes. When they were very little like my grandkids age I would just touch their face with my hands and make them look at me and say, say yes ma'am. After I gave them what I, an instruction of what I wanted them to do, I did require a yes ma'am.

And if they did not want to give a yes ma'am, then they got a little, a little correction, whether it was a verbal correction or a physical correction, but they had to have a consequence. And the touch my face was, you're my treasure and you cut them. It's not. We've all been there. But yeah, and With these two principles, think of, and we've talked about this, right, Ephesians 6, 1-4, but verse 4, and you fathers do not provoke your children to wrath, bring them up in the training and admonition of the Lord.

If we're telling them and training them, and this is what you're training either way, right? If we call them and then call them again and then call them again and then call them again, we're teaching them that, well, just as long as we don't get to number three, life is good. If we get to number three, dad loses it and then we go on. So when he gets to two and three quarters, we do this. No, it's first time And that teaches them also how to kind of fall into that line there.

And just real quick with childishness versus foolishness, right? There's things that are accidents. The child spills his milk. Was there evil intent there? No, he spilled his milk.

You don't need to light them up for that. But if they look right at you and you say, don't do that, and they take the milk and they throw it across the room with their sister, now we've gone into an actual disobedience thing which needs correction properly. Correct. Right? Third, which is correction, encouragement, and restoration.

You know, for correction, ask, what does my child need to learn? Correct them calmly. Sometimes, maybe it's, let's try this again the right way if you're kind of in the heat of the moment. Then you have encouragement. And the one thing that stood out to me in this class was, I am the one here, catch them doing right.

We so often, and I can picture all the times, but no, don't do that. No, you didn't do that right. Why did you say that? Pick that up. Do this.

Well, guess what? In between all these things, they've done 100 things right. We never once said anything about that. You see them pick that book up, great job picking that book up. You see them being kind to their sibling, that was such a wonderful job.

I saw you do that. I had a young man today, really small, that when he was introduced to me, he shook my hand and looked at me, and I said, I just want to tell you that you made eye contact with me and you shook my hand. That is wonderful. I bet your daddy taught you that. Right?

We caught him doing something right, but that response, you can see that little child's heart, right? I'm an old guy, right? And I said that. But his heart, it did well. And we want to catch our children doing right as well so we can be building them up during the day as opposed to always shooting them down during the day.

Anything else on that? There were just a couple of things that I, little bullet points real quick. This is just very broad. It doesn't specifically have to do with this, but number one, don't take your child's disobedience personally. That's something I really struggled with, with my children.

They are sinners and we are sinners and try not to take it in offense like they've sinned against you. They've sinned against a holy God And we need to train them that they need to love the Lord with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength. And help them overcome that. Help them to overcome the disobedience with good. What God says is good and what is right.

There were a couple times that I would have to leave the grocery store if I had a child pitching a fit. I would take my cart to the front and I'd say, I'd be back in an hour. And I lived a long ways away. So sometimes you do, you have to remove your children from the situation to deal with the situation. And don't be afraid to do that.

It's okay. Their heart is far more important than the act that you're involved in, whether it's getting groceries or at the bank or fill in the blank. So just simple things like that, that Just think through it in the moment. Take a breath. Looking back.

Take a breath. Looking back, I mean, here we are. All of our children are grown. We have five adult children, one still unmarried at home, and she'll be 20, and we have 11 grandchildren. And looking back, I know, I know, I know, I know, right where you're at right now as parents with young children, you think, oh, is it gonna get any easier?

There are days you will fall into bed sobbing. I did it all the time. But I'm telling you what, you will look back and you will go, oh wow, those were precious days and you can't get them back. So take it from an older couple that you can't get it back. So seize the moment, seize the day.

They are a delight. I call all of my grandchildren. I grab them and I tell them, you are my treasure. Jesus says, where your heart is, there your treasure will be also. And my heart is with my children and my grandchildren and our family.

They are our true treasure our true joy and so remember that as You're frustrated as you're working through everything with your children moment by moment. I know it's exhausting but take a breath, step back, this is not the end of the world. If you need to take a minute before you correct them physically, take that time, go before the Lord. I can tell you The times I went into physically chasing my children, I was weeping, weeping before God. How do I do this?

And he got me through it. He got me through it. And it's by God's mercy that my children are well and great kids and married and having children and they're raising their children for the glory of God. And then just to close up with the parenting toolbox which we gave you I'm just going to give you one of these that stood out, and then you guys have this, and we're happy to talk about any of these things after. And we, you know, someday would love to run this.

It's a commitment. This is an 18-week course, but it changed our lives. But one of the things you'll see in here, it says interrupt courtesy if you down. We called it the interrupt rule. So you're talking with somebody, I'm having a conversation with Mr.

Moody and your little one comes up, you're daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy, daddy, right? That's not the best way. What we taught them was, is you come up and it's the interrupt rule. You don't say anything, they simply put their hand. Now what I'm gonna do is I'm talking to Mr.

Moody as I'm gonna put my hand on here. They know that means that I've acknowledged them. I'm not ignoring them, I'm not saying that he's more important. My child is more important in a sense, right? But I don't wanna interrupt and be rude there as well.

So we do this, and then after a few seconds, we'll say, excuse me, yes, what is it? I gotta go pee. Right, yeah. Did you know you're talking to Mr. Rudy?

Right? Whatever it is. But there's a lot of practical, simple things that are laid out on here. There's couch time. There's sleeping and bedtime routines and sitting and waiting.

There's just a ton of things on there. Sign language. Sign language. Teach your baby sign language. It's amazing.

Little little babies, six month olds, eight month olds, eat, drink, water, sleep. I was a worship leader, so I would be standing up there and my kids would be in the front row and I'd go, sit down, stop, usually at one child more than the other. Those that know them would know. Sit down, stop, turn around, look, pay attention to the pastor. Just very, even if it's not true sign language, give them a sign that they can understand what it means.

And I think our time is up, isn't it?