Fam – The Power of Connection

This podcast is presented to you by Pastor Jason Burns and Access Church in Lakeland, Florida.

For more information, visit Access.tv.

And today we are going to be talking all about family.

And it's funny, when Pastor Jason asked me to write a message about family, I'm like, great.

I've read all the books.

I've done all the research.

I have four kids of my own.

So first of all, none of that matters.

Let me just tell you right now, when you're talking about parenting, when you're talking about family, there are no experts.

I want you to know that I am very much with you today.

I have four kids.

The oldest is 17.

The youngest is eight.

There's a couple in the middle there.

I am very much on the journey, grasping my pearls, fasting and praying, hoping it all turns out okay.

So know that I am with you and for you.

I am no expert.

I am not perfect, but we're gonna get through this together as a church family.

Amen?

So today we are talking all about the power of connection.

Because when I sat down and prayed for everyone who would be in this room today and prayed for this message, it became evidently clear that Jesus was like, you could try to talk about parenting, make it cute, say all the little one-liners, or you could let people know that the best way to be a good parent is to connect with Jesus first.

If that's all you get from today, we have to connect with Jesus.

So today we're talking about the power of connection.

But before we get started, I want to lighten the mood.

I want to prove to you that I am with you in the trenches.

So we're gonna play a little game called Have You Ever.

Okay?

This is to prove that there are no perfect parents.

Nobody, nobody on this stage, nobody on our staff, nobody that's on the PTA with you that you just think she thinks she has it all together.

Guess what?

She's not perfect either.

There are no perfect parents.

So I humbly ask that you play along with me and simply raise your hand if you have ever.

You ready?

Have you ever rolled your eyes at your children?

Hallelujah.

I'm not alone.

My people are here.

You know what?

I'm gonna argue for us that many times they deserve the eye roll.

That's probably why I shouldn't be preaching to you today, right?

They ask something a million times and you're like, ugh, right?

Have you ever rolled your eyes at your children?

The next one, have you ever told a little white lie to your children?

Like, we'll see, right?

If you are a child or a access youth student in the room, let me enlighten you.

We'll see means you will see me in my bed at 8 p.m.

I am not taking you to that place.

We it's a no.

We'd like to keep the hope alive, so we tell these little white lies, like, oh, that's a great idea.

We'll see.

But guys, we all know we will not see.

It's a no.

All right, the next one, these are very personal to me.

Have you ever lost a child at Disney World?

Hallelujah, I'm still not alone.

And to be fair, if my daughter Eleanor is in the room, I did not lose you, you lost me.

I promised her we would get Mickey ice cream bars.

She was about three years old, and she is just determined.

So she said, I'm tired of waiting, and she marched herself to an ice cream stay and guess what?

I was freaking out.

I couldn't find her for probably 30 seconds that felt like three years.

And she came back with an ice cream, an employee gave her an ice cream.

What in the world?

All right, the next one.

Hopefully, I'm still not alone.

Have you ever lost your ever-loving mind at one of your children's sporting events and had to go give yourself a timeout and sit in the car?

Oh gosh, the crowd is thinning.

The people with their hands up, so still, you are my people.

Let's meet for coffee tomorrow.

Like you guys, I text Pastor Liz and Pastor Jason almost from every sporting event.

I have four kids, so it's a lot.

And I say, thank God I work for a church, because if I did not, it would not be good.

But I want to honor this house and I want to honor my pastors.

Plenty of timeouts in the car for me.

And now perhaps the very worst of all, this one goes out to all my homeschool parents.

If you don't know, I've homeschooled some measure of my children for 14 years now.

And it is tough out in these streets, okay?

It's tough.

Have you ever tried to teach your child a math concept, but instead threw the math book across the room and screamed, I hate math, the internet can teach you now.

Anyone, just me?

Oh, I have some fri yes.

Yes.

I'm not alone.

So thank you for playing along.

I'd like to tell you that I made this up to be funny, but you can ask my daughter Aurora after service if it's true.

I will pay for her counseling.

It's going to be okay.

So today we are talking all about parenting and we are talking all about connection.

You guys, there are no perfect parents, but we serve a perfect, perfect God.

Amen.

There are no perfect parents, but we serve a perfect God.

You see, God knew that we would blow it.

He knew that we would make mistakes, he knew all of our inadequacies, and yet he still gave us children.

And if you're in the room and you're like, here we go, another parenting message, and I don't have kids, I don't want kids, I don't even like kids, these principles still apply to the other relationships in your life, okay?

There are no perfect parents, there are no perfect spouses, there are no perfect coworkers, there are no perfect siblings, but we serve a perfect God.

God knew that we would fall short, but he valued connection with us so much that he made a way for us to know him now and forever.

If you've grown up in church or if you've ever read the Bible, you have probably read John 3, 16.

So say it with me now.

For God so loved, let me hear you, the world that he gave his one and only son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

I could literally go home now.

This is the message on parenting.

We get Jesus, he gets to help us, we get to follow him.

What a holy gift.

You see, God gave us his perfect son, Jesus.

And God could have sent Jesus to the earth in any way.

He could have been high and mighty and exalted and lifted up and celebrated.

He could have been great in power.

But if you know the story of the life of Jesus, you know that God sent Jesus to a family.

What does that tell us about God?

That God values families.

And your church family, Acts as Church, we also value families.

You see, this is from the New Testament, but if we go back to the book of Isaiah, in Isaiah 11, we read a prophecy about Jesus, and it says, A shoot will come up from the stump of Jesse.

From his roots, a branch will bear fruit.

If you don't know, Jesse was the father of King David, the most celebrated king, high and mighty.

All was going right.

This family line looked beautiful until it looked like a stump.

What was once a flourishing family tree, a flourishing kingdom.

In Isaiah, we read the stump of Jesse.

So maybe you're in the room and you're like, my family feels like a stump cut to the ground.

What I love about this verse, we read this in my family around every Christmas time.

We do an Advent reading, just that counting the days till the birth of Jesus, a shoot will come up from the stump.

There is hope when we feel like all hope has been lost.

This verse points to Jesus who would come, who would live a perfect life, fully God, fully man.

God would send him to us as a baby in a family, and he would redeem us and he would make way for us.

So when I started preparing a message on parenting, God made it very clear that I just needed to encourage every parent in the room.

It's all about knowing Jesus today.

Take the pressure off before we go any further.

And another thing, God's plans are not thwarted by human imperfection.

That lineage of Jesus, have you ever read about the families in the Old Testament?

You think you think your family's crazy?

I know some of y'all will be watching some wild reality TV.

I want you to take that times a hundred.

That's basically every family in the Bible.

You have sibling rivalry, you have sibling murder, you have affairs, you have manipulation, you have stealing, you have every manner of sin.

In Jesus' own line, you have prostitution.

But God's plans are not thwarted by human imperfection.

Thank God, because I get it wrong every single day.

So, God, He sent us His Son Jesus.

Jesus was born into a family, he grew up like a boy, like the kids over in Axis Kids.

He did great and mighty works for the kingdom of God.

He made it a way for us to know God and be made right with him.

And the night before his crucifixion, I love the humility of Jesus.

He could have been doing anything.

I mean, if it was me about to wrongfully die, I would be saying a lot of choice words.

I would not be being kind.

I would be throwing a tantrum and I'd probably be running away from God's plan.

But Jesus is sitting in a room with his disciples, he's washing their feet and he sort of gives them their final marching orders.

And in John 13, we read that he says, Love one another as I have loved you.

So you must love one another.

By this, everyone will know that you are my disciples if you love one another.

This is our Jesus.

This is our Jesus who is born into a broken world, born into a broken family.

He's modeling for us the only way that we could do relationships, that we can do parenting well.

We must love one another.

And I'll tell you right now, I love to do missions work.

We've taken our kids all over the place.

I love to be over the top, kind to my baristas.

I know like their birthdays, their anniversaries, when their pets die.

I bring them flowers, right?

I put my cart back at Publix, and I hope you do too.

That's a side note.

Please put your cart back.

I'm nice to the little Chick-fil-A teenager because some of those kids are mine.

Be nice to them.

They're doing their best.

It's not their fault.

They don't have the chicken you want.

Trust me, it's not their fault.

I'm so good at loving the other, except for the others in my house.

Anybody else relate?

It is very, very difficult.

But we must remember that our children are the others that we are called to love.

Jesus called us to love others, and that includes the people in our home.

That includes children.

It matters to him, and it matters to our kids.

This generation is watching and waiting to see if we are who we say we are.

You want to know what's really scary preaching in front of my own teenagers today?

Because they know me.

They know the times I've blown it, they know the times I've fallen short.

They know the times I've screamed, I've given a hundred reaction when really my reaction should have been a level two, probably.

Anyone else?

But today I want you to take the pressure off.

Because parenting isn't about being picture perfect, because pictures are all about us, right?

In this selfie obsessed culture, we take pictures of ourselves doing literally everything.

And I am guilty.

Y'all better believe if I run like 16 miles, I'm taking a picture of myself, posting it in my story, and yes, you can congratulate me, right?

It's not all bad, but pictures are all about us.

Parenting is not about being picture perfect.

Parenting is about being a mirror, reflecting the light of Jesus to our children.

Anybody in this room can do that.

It doesn't matter what mistakes we've made in the past, it doesn't matter that I threw a math book across the room, and all cading aside, it doesn't matter if you're walking in here with some real shame and some real heaviness over your family relationships.

Any of us can reflect the light of Jesus.

C.S.

Lewis says it like this we are mirrors whose brightness is wholly derived from the sun that shines upon us.

In my own strength, in my own self, I am not very bright.

But as I walk with Jesus, Jesus who is the light of the world, Jesus who promises to light my path, I get to reflect his joy and his light and his peace and his brightness to my children.

This is the message today.

Follow Jesus.

Know Jesus.

Know Jesus.

Know the word.

Great parenting isn't found in a formula, it's forged as we simply follow Jesus.

So today my message is all about connection.

If you read any stories about Jesus in the New Testament, he was undistracted in his connection with others.

He was undistracted.

When he connected with the person in front of him, he was fully where his feet were.

We have to value connection with our children, but not just connection, undistracted connection.

They are watching us, and I am the most guilty in the room.

One of my four children will be talking to me, and it's a lot of talking when you homeschool, so shout out to anybody who understands.

There is no quiet, there is no clean, it is ongoing, but they still deserve my attention.

But what am I doing?

I'm halfway in, halfway out, I'm not where my feet are.

I'm on Instagram shopping, right?

And my kids can see it.

Mom, mom, mom, mom, oh, what?

Never mind.

I'm the guiltiest of all.

A study done by Pew Research in 2023 said that parents spend approximately three to four hours per day on their phones.

Now I have a job here at the church that I am on my phone a lot, right?

I contact people, I build up my teams, I check in on people, we care for our people, and that lots of that is done on my phone.

So it's really easy for me to justify that stat and be like, yeah, Pew Research, what are you doing during the day?

But if you were to really strip back my phone usage, which thanks to all of the apps we have now, we can really tell on ourselves, I'm scrolling mindless things while my children are talking to me.

The same study found out that parents spend approximately two hours per day with their kids.

Now remember, I am fighting the fight with you.

This feels really heavy right now.

I'm fighting the fight with you.

But this generation, they are desperate to be seen.

They are dying literally to be seen.

And God has given us enough hours in the day in his kindness, he created time.

We have everything we need to fully see our kids and still do our other duties.

And Access Kids, we like to say it's just a phase, don't miss it.

You only have so many years with a baby, with a toddler, with a preschooler, with a middle schooler, with a high schooler.

It goes on and on and on.

It's just a phase, don't miss it.

And if you don't mind, I'd like to share the short video with you that I like to share with our parents and Access Kids.

Check it out.

Boo me, throw tomatoes at me.

If you're a parent in the room, that hurts, right?

My oldest child is going to be 18 in September.

She has that September birthday.

She's starting her senior year.

It's just a phase.

Don't miss it.

When Jesus was with people, he gave them his full presence.

And if we are to love others, including our children, like Jesus has loved us, we have to be where our feet are.

The greatest gift that you can give your children is the gift of your presence.

And nothing says you are present more than your face in front of theirs.

Nothing says you're present than when you are looking into their eyes, just like Jesus did when he interacted with people.

It's just a phase.

Don't miss it.

And Access Kids, you'll also see on all of our team shirts.

I see some of the shirts in the room right now.

Thank you for serving on the kids' team.

We have the best team.

I'm biased, of course.

But you'll see Access Kids, where every child is seen, known, and loved.

You see, from this place of undistracted connection, this is how we've built our whole kids' ministry model.

I don't know if you know this, but in elementary alone, we have 18 consistent small groups running every single Sunday and more when fall starts again.

It's more like 22.

Yes, that's exciting.

You can clap about that.

That means at least 18 circles are circling up with a consistent leader who serves every single week with your children.

Why?

Because connection matters.

Because I don't want someone just preaching at your children.

I want you someone to know that when your goldfish dies, I want their small group leader to know.

And when parents get divorced, I want their small group leader to know, right?

And when life is fun and they make the home run, I want their small group leader to know.

And when they didn't make all-stars, I want their small group leader to know.

Connection matters.

And from that place of connection, we get to share the gospel with children.

If we are to love others like Jesus loves us, we have to live seen, known, and loved.

And that comes from undistracted connection.

Another way that we do this is we widen the circle.

What does that mean?

For my family, that means we very prayerfully and intentionally invite other adults into our children's life to take the role of a mentor.

Now, this is especially important if you're like me.

I'm an only child.

I don't come from a great, strong family.

My kids have no aunts, uncles.

It does, on my side at least, it doesn't exist for them.

So Nate and I, my husband and I, said, how can we build this community for them?

We widen the circle.

My kids have beautiful, amazing mentors.

The pressure is not all on me.

My job is to simply be more like Jesus and find people who want to be like Jesus, invite them into our circle and let them speak life and hope over our children.

That might be an Access Youth Small Group leader.

It might be an Access Kids small group leader.

Maybe you know a coach or a friend who would love to just go play basketball with your son every now and then.

Take the pressure off your shoulders, widen the circle.

And it's from the place of undistracted connection that we get to speak purpose and direction over the children and people in our life.

And this is exactly what Jesus did.

He didn't just say, fix yourself, fix your problem, do this, do that.

He was where people were, fully present.

And then he spoke over them.

Then he guided them.

You know, brain activity has proven that from having a sense of purpose can help kids combat anxiety, stress, and regulate anger and ward off depression, having a sense of purpose.

This generation is lacking purpose right now.

And not only are they lacking purpose, but we are putting so much pressure on them to be the best and the brightest, to make the team, to get straight A's, to get the perfect SAT score, get into the dream school.

It's a lot for kids out there right now.

Not only are they getting that pressure from us, but they're getting it from their peers in different ways and from their teachers and from the world.

What if we told them that they were created for a bigger purpose, that the world doesn't rest on their shoulders?

That God created them for such a time as this to make a difference.

In Ephesians, we read, for we are God's handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.

Every night when I put my eight-year-old son to bed, or when he comes into my bed and wakes me up 17 times, hence the eye rolling, right?

Every single night we go through a little back and forth callback, and it ends with God has good plans for my life.

Because he's growing up in a world and in a culture where they're like, you're just here, you don't matter, you're replaceable, you just exist, you're just gonna ink out an existence.

No.

The word of God says God prepared good works for us to do.

And I have a lot of people ask, what is the purpose for my life?

I wrestled with this a lot when I was a high schooler.

I believe we've overcomplicated it.

If your kids are looking for purpose, share this verse from Matthew with them.

In Matthew 22, Jesus says, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and all your soul with all your mind.

This is the first and greatest commandment.

And the second is like it: love your neighbor as yourself.

All the law and the prophets hang on these two commandments.

So if you are raising kids and they're just feeling hopeless, get them involved in something greater than themselves.

Baseball is cool.

My kids all play sports.

I have a vars player.

I have a lifelong dancer.

My kids do amazing things, but that is not their purpose.

They do those things, but that is not why they exist.

They exist to glorify God and enjoy Him through eternity and to bring others along into that.

We like to tell our kids we are a product of eternity, positioned in time and given gifts and talents to serve our generation.

Take the pressure off your kids.

They don't need to be perfect.

We're living in a culture of curated children where we feel like they need to be perfect so we get patted on the back.

Social media is a weird and wild and wonderful place.

But let's not curate our children to perfection.

Let's let them be works in progress, works of art who God created with intention and purpose to do good works.

From a place of undistracted connection, we can begin to speak direction and purpose over our children, and we can also begin to speak identity and worth.

In this culture where it's high achieving, be the best, be the brightest.

Our kids have to know that our worth or the worth of our children is not found or defined by our accomplishments or our achievements, but it's found in our identity in Christ Jesus.

Make the team, don't make the team.

I'm a child of God.

Get the best SAT score and get in the dream school or don't.

I'm a child of God.

Have your boyfriend break up with you, I'm a child of God.

Get the job or don't get the job.

I'm a child of God.

I can't teach math, but I will teach my kids their identity.

They are children of the most high king.

Culture is trying to define our children.

Culture is trying to rip away their identity, but they were created in God's own image.

In 1 John, we read, see what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God.

And that is what we are.

I'm gonna really make myself cry.

The video makes me cry, but check out this picture of my daughter, Aurora.

She's the one that will be 18 soon.

She's been dancing since she was about three years old.

She takes it very seriously.

She's done like pre-professional stuff.

I don't know, anyone in the arts out there, dance, theater, any kind of arts, if you don't know, it can be very, very cutthroat.

So God in his kindness, it was not an Ida idea because I don't have these good ideas, but by walking with the Lord, by following the promptings of the Holy Spirit, since she was this age, three-year-old Aurora, we have a little affirmation that we do every single class.

And I can I think I can honestly tell you over the years, 15 years of dance, we've never missed a moment to say this affirmation.

I don't care if we're fighting, which has happened, and we're like grinding our teeth saying it to each other.

I don't care if it's texted, facetimed, we never miss.

I say to Aurora, what does God say about you?

She says, I am fearfully and wonderfully made.

I say, tell me something true.

She says, I'm a good dancer and I can do hard things.

And I say, Aurora, why do you dance?

And she says, for the glory of God.

It takes the pressure off of her.

She knows her identity.

When she gets the part or when she doesn't get the part, she's a child of God.

When she falls in the show and is crushed, she's a child of God.

It's not her identity, it's not her worth.

When she injures herself and misses an entire season of what she loves and then is passed over for things she's worked her whole life for, real story, guess what?

Her foundation is not shaken.

She is a child of God.

And grown-ups in the room, the same is true for you.

Get the promotion, don't get the promotion.

You are a child of God.

We have to know and walk in our identity.

There is nothing more important than that in this world.

We have to know we are children of the Most High God.

I like to say kids will rise and fall to the height of our words.

And I am the guiltiest among us.

I grew up in a house that was very, very snappy.

Everything was a scream, everything was an argument, nothing was just simply stated.

Every reaction was a hundred, even if it needed to be a 10.

I don't know, maybe you grew up like that too.

So when we had a family when we first got married, I remember screaming at Nate, who is literally the most peaceful person you will ever meet.

Fight back with me! Like truly, that's how immature I was.

That's how I grew up, though.

We we grew up fighting.

Then we had kids, and I realized, man, I have some of these habits in me because this is how I was talked to my entire life.

But kids will rise and fall to the height of our words.

They will rise and fall to the height of our words.

So speak life.

In Proverbs, we read the tongue has the power of life and death, and those who love it will eat of its fruit.

This is another one of those verses where I'm like, the tongue, life and death, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

Yeah, I know that.

I'm not gonna talk about them, but boy, does my mouth run to my children.

Right?

Maybe it's just me.

Kids will rise and fall to the height of our words.

That is why at Access Kids, we are speaking life and hope and joy and purpose over your children.

That is why in Access Youth, we are telling them they're not just here to ink out an existence.

They don't have to live to the statistics that are happening in this generation.

They are here on purpose, for a purpose.

I know it feels like a heavy message, but you guys have to remember I'm with you.

And I have two questions for you.

If you're in the room and you're like, great, what if I've blown it?

I have blown it.

I cannot tell you how many times I've had to crawl under a table and apologize to an elementary child in my house, or how many times my reaction was insane for no reason.

For me, it's usually the fact that I just want control, right?

It's fear underneath of that.

What if you've blown it?

You are not alone.

And the next question is what if I don't know how to parent like this?

Because this is not how I was parented.

If it's okay with you, I want to get a little bit personal for a couple of minutes.

I think it's really easy, and this has happened my whole life, for people to make assumptions.

When you're up here standing on this stage, you think, oh, they have the mic.

Life is smooth sailing for them.

And while that's a really kind assumption to make, I want you to know that I was not parented in the way that I'm talking to you about today.

We talked about the families in the Old Testament having all sorts of sin issues and facing incredibly difficult, tragic, traumatic family things due to their choices.

But you see, I was the product of a green card marriage.

So from the beginning of my life, I was not exactly wanted.

Okay?

From the beginning.

My parents split.

I grew up with a single mom who did the best she could with the tools that she had, but she was from extreme brokenness that was not healed.

Um, I saw my dad maybe twice in my growing up years.

I saw what it was like to be an alcoholic, to be raised in a home where substance abuse is the way of life.

I've thought I would be without a parent many times due to poor choices and sin issues.

I've sat in a hospital room thinking, I'm 15 years old and now it's all on me.

Where am I gonna go?

Where am I gonna live?

How am I gonna do this?

I want you to know that every statistic is against me.

Single mom, no dad.

We're so easy to say, live you, oh, she's that way because she has daddy issues, right?

We're so easy to just excuse and let kids live lower than what God has called them to.

And while that pain is real, I am here to tell you today that if you've blown it, or if you don't know how to do this because it was not done to you, the ground is level at the foot of the cross.

The ground is level at the foot of the cross.

I remember crying myself to sleep many a night.

I'm an only child, just figuring this out how to do this on my own, keeping it a secret, because you don't want to let people into this part of your pain.

You want to protect the people that you love, especially when they're all that you have.

But I also remember being raised in church.

Thank God my mom brought me to church every Sunday, Sunday night, Wednesday night, Friday night.

It was Pentecostal.

I was there all the time.

And our services were not just an hour, they were like two and a half hours.

Thank God for his kindness in that.

I didn't have it growing up, but I remember the pain and the tragedy of that, but I also remember feeling the love of the Father.

And I remember God speaking to me that He was going to keep me and protect me.

I should not be standing here today talking to you about connection with your kids.

I am the least qualified on paper person to do this.

But the ground is level at the foot of the cross.

So if you came in here feeling just loaded with shame, or if you came in here just not knowing what to do, this message is for you.

Follow Jesus.

Give your life fully to Jesus, invite him in to your parenting, prioritize undestructed connection with Jesus and watch him transform you from the inside out.

You are never too far from God's reach.

You are never too alone.

God did not say I created you to be a statistic.

He said, I created you for good works before the beginning of time that you alone are called to do.

We don't serve statistics, we serve Almighty God.

So today, as I close, there are two groups of people I want to pray for.

You guys can bow your head and close your eyes.

The first group, if you'll just be honest, then I want you to know because your eyes are closed, maybe, unless you're like me and sometimes peak, that's okay too.

We're gonna pray for the people in the room that say that know Jesus already, but they say, Jesus, help me with my parenting.

Help me to see, know, and love my kids.

If that's you, just raise your hand.

We're gonna pray together.

We're gonna pray for you.

I want you to know that your Access Kid team prays for you all the time.

We pray every single day of the week for your families, it matters to us.

The other group of people that I want to pray for are in this room and they say, This is all fine and nice, but I don't know Jesus, but I'd like to know him.

If you'd like to know the unconditional love of a father, if you'd like to know what it feels like to be fully seen, known, and loved by God Almighty, if you'd like to give your life to Jesus today, I want you to raise your hand.

Hallelujah.

Praise God.

Let's pray together.

If we're gonna pray for the first group first, dear God, we come to you.

We say we are inadequate, we don't have it together, but we want to follow you.

We want our kids to see your light so beautifully reflected from us, so refine us, God.

Grow in us the grace and the strength to be more like you.

And for my second group of friends who raise their hand, I'm so excited that you are starting your relationship with Jesus today.

You can pray this prayer in your own words after me.

Dear God, I come to you today.

I need a savior.

I admit that I'm far from you, but I want to start my life with you today.

Forgive me of my sins.

Thank you for making a way for connection with me through your son Jesus.

Today is a new day.

Today I am seen, known, and loved by God.

In Jesus' name, amen.