Family Ministries with Pastor Tommy October 2026

Welcome to Celebration Baptist Church Podcast, where we help people connect with God and others.

Each week you'll find biblical teaching, practical encouragement, and conversations designed to help you follow Jesus in everyday life.

To learn more about Celebration Baptist Church in Tallahassee, Florida, visit iCelebration.org.

Now let's get started.

Hey guys, welcome back.

This is Pastor Tommy here at Celebration Baptist Church.

Our purpose here is to connect people with God and others.

We're here with episode two again for our second podcast for families and anybody that wants to listen.

So just a little rundown of the day.

I'm going to give you a little joke.

We're going to talk about a little church stuff.

Give you some resources at the end.

But the meat of today is going to be introducing two new staff members.

Well, not new, one's new to our church family.

And then also we're going to be talking about screen time, use of phones.

Everybody deals with it.

And if you don't, you're not there yet and you got kids, you will be there.

Trust me.

Okay.

You can't avoid it.

Well, let's get started with who's sitting around the table.

So we'll go to my right, to your left if you're listening.

Let's start with uh who are you, lady?

Tell me your name and your story, real quick.

Carolyn.

I am the uh kinder school director here at Celebration.

I'm married to Roger.

We have two kids, two boys, um, Jacob and Zachary.

And they are both married to Neva and Callie.

You got them all in there.

I did, got them all in there.

You got grandkids?

I do.

I have three grandchildren.

Um, two attend CBK.

They come to school every day with me.

CBK.

Yes.

Help me.

What's that?

Celebration Baptist Kinder School.

That's right.

Oh, so the preschool here.

The preschool here.

Monday through Friday.

Monday through Friday.

And you are I am the director.

You're the director.

I am the kinder school director.

We are so glad you were here.

Thank you.

Hey, speaking of being here, why don't you tell us your story real quick, how you got to celebration?

Okay.

So my story, um, I had been in preschool, elementary, middle school, high school back and forth over the years.

I felt like God was directing me back to a K-12 school.

Um, I was helping down um in a Christian school down in Wakullah and driving to school one day.

And a friend had been talking to me about um uh working in a preschool again.

And I felt like God was saying, Why are you looking at this secular preschool and you're not considering a Christian preschool?

And I said, Okay, Lord.

And I knew that there was an opening here at Celebration.

And so I went to school that day and I pulled it up on the website.

But you knew because you had a grandkid here.

Yes.

And my kids told me that there was an opening.

And so I pulled it up on the website and I saw the job opening, and the posting closed that same day.

There you go.

So I applied, and then I met Tommy.

Here you are.

So that was about a year and a half ago.

Somewhere this is your second school year.

Yes.

So you've been a year plus the summer, and you started something summer we've never done.

Yes.

We had kind for the first time.

It was so much fun.

Here at Celebration, we do have a kinder school.

We have kinder camp.

We also have after school, and you might meet them on the next podcast.

But that's our Cindy CBK Kinder School during the week.

You are the director.

Yes.

And we're so glad you're here.

I do want to ask a question about your husband, real quick.

Yes.

Your husband did something crazy recently.

What did he do?

He did.

He quit his job as a civil engineer.

He had been working as a civil engineer for over 30 years, and um he felt like God was telling him, quit your job and go to seminary full time.

And he did.

What is he doing right now?

He is going to seminary full-time, Liberty Online, taking classes full time.

That is amazing.

He's going to school.

So we have a group in our church of potential pastors, ministers down the road.

And we actually had a situation come up.

We had another church approach us and they needed some pulpit supply.

Yes.

So Roger is one of those guys who's been preaching at another church.

Yes.

Isn't that crazy?

Yeah.

So hopefully, guys can keep opening doors and we'll see where he ends up in ministry.

Yeah.

So that's fantastic.

Exciting.

Glad you're here.

Thank you.

Hey, also to my left, to your right, if you're listening on the stereo or in your house, are they still have stereos?

You guys can see the player.

In your car.

On your phone, your device, whatever you're listening to.

Another person, now she is new to the staff, but you've been here a little bit on staff before this position.

Yes, I have.

So why don't you tell us your name, a little about your crew, and about how you got here?

Okay.

Um my name is Sandy Leva Ortiz.

I'm currently the preschool ministry director at Celebration Baptist Church.

And I got my start here actually as a lead teacher.

So we got a kind of school director, preschool, and you're the other preschool director.

So you're the church side.

Yes.

You're the Sunday, Wednesday.

Yes, I am child care, children's ministry.

All right, keep going, Sandy.

Didn't mean to interrupt you.

Oh no.

And um, I'm happily married to my husband of 30 years.

I have six children, ages four to twenty nine, and I'm originally from New York and moved to New York too?

Yes.

Yes.

Queenside, um, Long Island.

Oh, Oklahoma.

Okay.

Let's keep going.

How did you get here to celebration, Sandy?

Well, we moved our family in August of 2024.

My son uh received a scholarship to attend Florida State University.

And we moved here because at the same time my husband got a promotion.

And we moved here, and I worked in healthcare, uh, which is something I've been doing since 2006.

However, the Lord really was directing me into a new career.

And I happened to type in church secretary jobs, and for some reason, Celebration Baptist Church came up and it said looking for substitutes, you know, part-time.

So I went and applied in the summer of 2024, but I didn't hear from them till November.

That's on you, Care.

And that was me.

2025 was 2025.

Okay.

And I started my job as a lead teacher of the ones in December of 2025.

So preschool teacher, preschool teacher.

Yes.

We're talking algebra, English, colors, letters.

What are we talking about here?

Oh, I mean, those things, you know, letters and numbers are important, but really what I loved most is teaching them about the Lord.

That was the first thing we would do in the morning, right after they're all checked in.

All right.

So I'm sitting here with those who are in charge and teach our little ones here at our church.

Yes.

So we've got our midweek preschool director, Cara.

We've got our church side now, brand new.

First week on the brand new.

Miss Sandy sitting here.

So you guys work with kids and families.

Yes.

So today's topic, we're gonna be talking about phones.

We'll get there in just a minute.

So you guys have some experience because you've been around a lot of families.

Sure.

A lot of kids, and it's something that everybody as a parent has to deal with.

Too much, too little, what age to give a phone, all that good stuff.

But first, give me a little bit more about your ministry.

So back to the kinder school.

I sign my kid up, I come here.

What's some things that we focus on in the kinder school that might be different than a a place down the road?

So our main focus is teaching children about the Lord, teaching them about the Bible.

And um, you've taken a part in that curriculum that we get to use every day.

We get to go to chapel once a week, where we teach the children songs about the Lord.

We actually teach them how to praise and worship God.

And it sets them up for later in life when they're in church praising and worshiping God.

Those little sponges.

Yes.

So we get that opportunity.

Yeah, we get that opportunity to do that.

So I know the teachers get to read Bible stories.

Yeah.

Wednesday, we do have chapel uh with the staff, myself and some others.

And so that's great to hear.

So as people bring their kids here, they know, hey, this is a church.

Yes, it is a Christian preschool.

We're gonna teach your kids about God and his word.

Yes, absolutely.

How about church side?

Brand new first week.

What do you think so far?

What do you think about it?

I love it.

I love it.

And one of the things that I've come to really learn as a as a Christian is really to follow God's call.

And sometimes the unfamiliar can be, you know, different and a little bit scary because it is a brand new position for me.

However, I'm not trusting in my own confidence.

I'm really relying on God's guidance for this position.

And one of the things I really, really love is coming alongside families.

I mean, we're coming alongside families and teaching their children about Jesus, not just knowing things about the Lord, but not from the mind, but from the heart.

That's great.

And also being able for them to eventually share that with their friends, their family, and really to know them, you know, to know Jesus as their best friend and be able to have a relationship with him.

So one of the things we're always going to talk about in our family ministry podcast is that as a church, we're just simply there to partner with parents.

Right.

That's it.

And everything we do, we want to resource, pray for, encourage, give advice when asked.

Uh, but if nothing else, we're gonna tell your children about who God is and his word, how he can change your life.

So as we get kind of started into our next section here, we're gonna be jumping into the topic of the day about screen time, phones, what age again to give a kid a phone, should we do that or not?

So here's a good little joke for you guys.

So a father who had the great idea says, Come on, kids, pack it up, we're going away for the weekend, and don't even worry about bringing your cell phones because you're not gonna need them.

And did you hear what the kids' guesses were where they were going?

When kids like, we're going camping where there's no Wi-Fi, and the other little boy jumped up and says, I know exactly where we're going, Dad.

Oh yeah, where where are we going?

Kid says, We're going to the 1800s.

I don't know.

I don't know if that was funny or not.

Hey, let's get started with a little game.

So these are some tech terms when it comes to kid and phones.

Okay.

I'll give you a word.

You guys try to give me a definition.

Tell me if you've heard of this word.

Okay.

How about the word doom scrolling?

Have you heard the word doom scrolling?

No.

Any idea?

Nothing?

It's just scrolling.

It's just scrolling, but you're scrolling things out.

Mindless things out.

It's hurtful for you.

Right.

So it could be a bad topic and they just keep feeding yourself, and it could be negative thoughts leading you down the wrong way.

Yes.

How about brain rot?

Have you ever heard the word brain rot?

I never heard of that.

I think I've heard of it.

Brain rot.

You're just doing stuff, you're not thinking about it.

You're just rotting your brain.

Mindless scrolling.

How about rabbit hole?

You guys don't know what Rabbit Hole is.

Alice in Wonderland.

Thank you.

Yeah, I know.

Who's in the rabbit hole?

Do you remember cards and Yes?

It's craziness.

Craziness, right?

Well, rabbit hole is you know if you hit something, that algorithm is feeding you the next thing and it just keeps going and there's no end to it.

That's one thing we're gonna talk about.

When it comes to the internet, it never turns off.

It's endless.

It runs 24-7.

So as parents, we might have to take the device away to turn off.

Because it itself will never turn itself off.

A couple more words.

How about ghosting?

You ever heard of ghosting?

Yes.

When people just disappear on you.

Day gone, not responding, day out.

You ever been ghosted?

Yes.

Oh, okay.

Me too.

As an employer.

Wow.

How about catfishing?

Heard of that.

Yeah.

What do you think catfishing is?

Isn't it when I'm afraid to guess?

You go fishing and catch a catfish?

No.

Yeah, no, it's it's something with A catfish is kind of what it sounds like.

It's a fake.

Yeah, pretending to be somebody else.

They're pretending to be somebody else they're not, leading you down maybe a bad road.

Uh how about rage bait?

Oh yes, those those uh type of posts on social media that really get people angry, but they get clicks.

Yes.

You you don't your kids don't use the words rage bait?

No.

And mine do all the time.

So I got seven, but at home I got a senior, tenth grader, and a seventh grader.

And I rage bait my kids all the time.

It's like the spouse.

You know exactly what to say to push their button to get them mad.

That's some rage baiting.

How about skibbity?

Never heard of that.

I've heard the word, but Skibbity.

All right, we'll leave that for the kids to tell their parents what skibbity means.

It's just nonsense, funny stuff.

Uh two more.

NPC.

NPC.

What do you think it stands for?

I don't know.

I know what NPR is.

Not NPR.

This is not NPR.

This is NPC.

No.

So it's a non-player character.

You play a game sometime and they just have bots.

You think there's a hundred people playing on online, but there's really like 13 and the rest are just bots.

But non-player character in real life is just somebody who's kind of in the conversation, but they're just not really paying attention.

They're not even there.

They're just there in name only.

Last one.

All right, get this one.

It's fubbing.

Fubbing.

You ever heard fubbing?

Say it.

It's just kind of fun to say fubbing.

Fubbing.

Fubbing?

How does New Yorker say fubbing?

Fubbing.

Fubbing.

Fubbing.

Fubbing.

P H U B B I-N-G, Fubbing.

Take the words phone and you take the word snubbing, you put them together and you get fubbing.

Oh.

Examples.

You go out to dinner, dad's on his phone, checking email from work, mom's scrolling Facebook, or to see the latest info about whatever she's into.

Kids on TikTok, and your little one's sitting over there.

He's playing a game, but everybody's on a device.

You're all sitting around one table, but snubbing each other.

You're not really together.

Your phone is a little bit more.

And I've seen that at a lot of restaurants where families are gathered together, everybody has their phone, and they're just scrolling and not even having conversation with each other.

All right, so we're going to get into the screen time thing.

Inventions that have changed the culture.

Would you guys agree that the printing press changed the culture?

Absolutely.

Y'all remember the telephone used to be on the wall?

Yes.

I had the receiver, you had to pick it up.

In my town, you only had to dial four numbers and you had to memorize people's numbers.

I do remember when there were letters and numbers.

And today, I mean, how many phone numbers do you actually know?

You know, you push a name, right?

You don't know their phone number, you just push them up.

How about the television itself?

Did that change culture?

Yes.

From certain black and white to color.

Well, not only that, you might just have one TV in the house.

And everybody would at least gather together.

Yes.

Y'all remember Dallas?

Friday night show, Dallas, Knott's Landing.

Are we allowed to admit that we remember that?

Who killed JR?

You don't remember?

Did he get killed?

I thought it was a dream or something.

No.

I remember Friday nights in our house.

My mom would always want to watch Dallas.

All right.

So these things have come into our culture and now they're just normal.

One of the biggest things, at least in our lifetime, that's changed everything is the smartphone.

I mean, what can you do with a smartphone?

Name everything.

Give me some.

What can you do with your phone?

Look up a recipe.

Keep it going.

Directions.

It's a camera.

Yes, it's a dictionary.

It's your everything.

It's a computer.

Everything we've ever thought about is now on one device we call the smartphone.

Now we don't have a choice as parents.

We have to deal with it.

All right, so let's give a little history of you guys.

So you guys got you said six kids, you got six.

Grandkids.

What's a good age do you think that we should give a kid or not give a kid a phone?

What do you what'd you do?

So for me, um I waited until m my boys were in eighth grade, both of them.

That's when they started taking trips.

That's when they played a sport where they were gonna be away, away from campus, away from me, um, where they needed it.

I needed to get in touch with them.

Basically, it was for my convenience, not for their convenience.

But they didn't have access to the internet.

It was just for calling.

They didn't have the app uh the capabilities to text.

Um so but they also would say to me, Well, how old were you when you first had your your first phone?

And I could legitimately say 34.

That's wrong, yeah.

Well, speaking of kids and ages, so you're a little bit different.

You've got a couple of teenagers over here.

Yes.

And if you say they don't have a phone, my girls, 14 and 16, do not have phones.

So you're just different.

Kudos to me.

How did you do that?

How do you still live with the phone?

Well, first of all, my oldest son, for instance, who's 29, he got his first phone at 17 when he started working.

And he wanted to get his own phone.

He paid for it himself.

However, at the same time, when my girls ask me, Oh, can I borrow your phone?

I'm constantly reminding them, well, if you have my phone, what are you looking at?

And they're like, oh, I'm just looking at some, you know, random things.

And I'm always mindful of what type of content they're looking at.

But the only time they really use my phone is when they ask me for it.

Other than that, they don't own their own phone, they don't stay up all night looking at their phones.

Uh when we go out to eat, they don't have their phone, you know, they don't have a phone.

So Okay.

Yeah.

Now I will say for parents, younger parents or kids, most kids are gonna have a phone.

Matter of fact, it's 95%.

Right.

So 95% of kids 13 plus are gonna have a phone.

Yeah.

Another crazy one 40% of two-year-olds have a device.

That's crazy.

40%.

So almost half of two-year-olds have their own iPad, whatever you want to call that device.

I remember my first kid, who's now 26, getting ready to get married.

Congratulations, Joey.

His first phone was a flip phone.

Do you remember you had like ABC on number one?

Yes.

So in order to text, it'd take you about a day and a half to say happy birthday.

Right.

That's what he started.

But now, you know, when you give a kid a phone, an iPhone or Android, whatever you have, literally they have access to anything in the world at the touch of their fingers.

Yeah.

So as parents, we're gonna have to set some kind of perimeters on that.

So I want to give you a acrostic that we're gonna talk about.

It's called bad.

B A D.

Before we get to bad though, we need a filter.

So what's gonna serve, no matter what the invention is, I mean, we had to deal with TVs.

We had to deal with refrigerators.

You know, that changed the world.

And we had air conditioning.

Who's not gonna live without air conditioning?

Not me.

Certain inventions have come that have changed the way we live.

Phones are one of those.

You have to deal with it.

So we need a filter.

So we have this thing around here at church we call Megaverses.

There's a great app, Megaverses 2.0.

It is free.

Go get it.

But each podcast, we want to highlight one of those scriptures.

And today's scripture comes from the book of Romans, Romans chapter 12, verse 1 and 2.

Romans 12:1

Sandy, once you read that verse for us, and this is going to act as our filter as we think about telephones and screen time.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God.

This is your spiritual act of worship.

Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will.

All right, so what you hear playing in the background here is that megaverse song.

This is one of the few songs that has the spoken text in the middle.

And so this song we want to use as our filter.

So Lord, take my body, Lord take my life, and help me to be a living sacrifice.

So in the middle of this song, when we were recording this about, I don't know, had to be almost 15 years ago, our daughter Alex, who is now 23 and married, and they have a dog.

I guess that's what young couples do.

They got a dog now.

Oakley, what's up, Oakley?

Oof, oof.

This is her voice.

As we sing this song, she speaks the scripture in the middle.

And as she speaks it, I just want you to think about what are the filters for anything that my kids or our family have to deal with that I can apply to say, is this helping me or is this hurting me as I'm trying to disciple and raise my kids at home?

So here comes Alex.

Alex, take it away and give us that verse in your six-year-old voice.

Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies this living sacrifices holy and pleasing to God.

This is your spiritual.

Do not perform any pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.

Then you will be able to test and approve God's weapons.

It's good, pleasing, and perfect well.

Alright, thank you, Alex, there.

So it's talking about this.

We're not to be transformed by this world, conformed to this world.

We're to be transformed by the word of God and who he is.

So the basic question we're going to start with is this thing, this phone, is it helping me or hurting me?

So here's B A D.

B.

It's going to stand for boundaries.

Name me some other areas of life that you guys might have boundaries.

Do we have boundaries in the area of life?

Not phones, but anything.

What do you have boundaries in?

Eating.

Eating.

You don't overeat or you watch what you eat.

Yeah, you watch what you eat.

You don't eat late at night.

You may not eat certain things depending on your dietary restrictions.

Give me another area that you might want boundaries in.

I would say I have boundaries when it comes to cutting off like the phones so that I can spend time with my husband and my family because it's very easy, especially with my husband's job.

He gets phone calls.

He could if he like till eleven o'clock at night.

Yeah.

So he's actually implemented a rule where he shuts his phone off at nine o'clock.

That's gonna be part of the tech talk here.

Other areas might be relationships with people.

Maybe there's some people that are just negative, right?

They bring us down.

Yeah.

So we set boundaries in those relationships.

Uh maybe even if we're married, we're all three married here, somebody.

Yeah, yes, and our spouse, we have to have boundaries with other people in our life.

Right.

We're not gonna do things and say things and treat people differently because I'm married.

Correct.

So when it comes to the idea of phones, then yes, we need some boundaries.

So here's some basic boundaries, parents, you can think about that we need to have for our kids.

First, when we say the word screen time, there are ways you can limit screen time on your phone.

So if you give a kid a phone, then you need to understand screen time.

You can open it up, you can check, see how long they've been on it, see what apps they've been on, and you need and even how long that they have it with them in their hands.

So you mentioned putting your phone away.

You guys ever done the dock station thing?

I've heard families say that when they come in, they all dock their phones, charge their phones in one spot, and not the bedroom.

You know, I think that'll be one of the boundaries.

Correct.

Is when your kids, no matter the age, when they get that in their bedroom with no boundaries, the phone's gonna win.

We did that when our kids after we gave our kids phones, like they had to charge them downstairs.

Their bedrooms were upstairs.

They had to charge them at night downstairs.

So setting boundaries, even about where that phone's gonna live, maybe time frame.

I don't know, the age of the kid, my kids to about 10 o'clock.

But I have a senior in high school.

I'm not gonna take it away at 7 o'clock.

But yes, and hopefully we're teaching them to set their own boundaries.

That is the goal because one day they won't be in our house.

Another couple of ideas would be mealtime.

Come to mealtime, whether you're out to eat.

We went out to eat last night.

We went to Zaxby's.

Uh we only have like four places with my kids to go eat, but we stack our phones in the middle of the table.

And I put mine out there and said, hey, I'm gonna be an example too.

I got 10 things I could be doing.

I could get it done right now, but I don't know.

We're here to eat and to be together.

Which is important that we set the example because the kids, you know, our children are watching us.

If we're on the phone, they're thinking, oh, look at mom and dad.

They're on the phone.

Why do we, you know, why can't we be on the phone?

And the same is true for your married life.

You climb into bed together.

You climb into bed with you and a phone.

Right.

Or, you know, you got to set boundaries.

Yes.

So parents definitely have to lead the way.

One more area I want to give you is just the actual apps that are on the phone.

So phone comes with whatever devices and apps it comes with.

But you don't have to have TikTok.

You don't have to have Facebook, you don't have to have WhatsApp, you know, group me.

You go down the list of your apps.

You can delete those apps.

You can set a password where they can't get download an app without your permission.

Going through the teenage years, we have had to do that.

Why can't I have TikTok?

She's got it, you know, all that good stuff.

But you know what?

When you come of age and you show more maturity and decision-making ability, maybe you get it.

But maybe we just have to say, you know, that's there's nothing positive in this app for you.

It will only hurt you in the long run if you go down this road.

So B stands for boundaries, time limits, you know, where you're at, charging, uh, apps on the phone.

Let's go to the A.

The A is going to stand for attitude.

Y'all say attitude.

Attitude.

How does somebody from New York have attitude?

They live it.

They live it.

There's no attitude in New York.

Oh, there's lots of attitude in New York.

You guys have you guys are too nice.

I mean, I thought New Yorkers had a little more attitude.

But have you noticed when you give a somebody something and you take it away, their attitude changes.

Oh, absolutely.

So let's think about a phone.

Kids had a phone for a while and you take it away.

Yeah.

How does that change their life?

They get mad.

If they go ballistic, you're probably that's a good telltale sign that they're probably not mature enough to handle this yet because they're addicted to it.

They think they can't live without it.

Everybody else has got one.

Attitude means a lot.

But not only just attitude toward that, attitude toward their schoolwork, to other activities, you know, sports.

I mean, we're talking about trading time when you spend time on a phone for what else?

What's something else you could be doing with that time?

I tell my kids all the time, man, you could be learning Spanish.

You speak Spanish, right?

Give me some Spanish about phone.

Come on.

I don't want to buy phones for my daughters, they don't need them.

They don't need them.

Okay.

All right.

I would say you're on the extreme side, but that's okay.

You're the mom.

I'm the mom.

When we think about attitude, though, we're also talking about toward their friends and toward family.

You know, are they treating us differently?

And they see how other kids get away with it and other kids do things and they think they can do that.

Yeah.

If we got an attitude problem tied to the phone, then we need to get rid of something.

I'm not getting rid of my kid.

But I can get rid of the phone.

Or at least put limits on it and boundaries.

Say, you know what, this is not helping you.

You see the way you're treating your siblings, your friends.

And have you ever seen your daughters?

You got two sons over there.

But you ever seen how girls they make each other mad and somebody comments on one post or something, it just destroys the world.

So I would say if the attitude's not good, then the phone use needs to be limited.

You gotta take that out of the hand.

It's not being helpful for them.

And then back to parents, parents, we have to model the same thing.

I mean, you tell your spouse to put your phone away.

Sometimes it's a fist fight.

Right?

Because they think maybe it is important, but is it really that important that you finish the show or check the score or get the news or whatever it may be?

So I would think we think of B A boundaries.

We've got attitude.

So if they're ignoring people, they're just having a bad attitude, and the phone is part of that.

Parents, it's time to step up and do something.

So the last one is the word, the letter D, and the D is gonna stand for discipleship.

Discipleship.

We mentioned a little bit earlier what they could be doing if they weren't on the phone.

I was gonna say there are kids, I've challenged them musically.

So my daughter, I gave a guitar, she's playing guitar.

My kid, I said we have a piano in the living room.

It's been here for like your entire life.

Why don't you give it a shot?

The kid's Mozart.

He's just taking off.

Wow, that's great.

Another kid I got, he's into soccer right now.

He'll go out in the front yard and play by himself.

But think, think about that 30 minutes hour that you've been doing that activity.

Look at the skills now that you're learning for the rest of your life.

Yeah.

Those go with you.

Because come on.

My my older son was 29, he said, Mom, I developed my guitar playing skills because I wasn't on the phone all the time.

I mean, he literally would spend hours and hours after his homeschool studies just practicing his guitar skills, and grandpa would come over.

But if he would have been on the phone, you know, he would have probably doom-scrolled and wasted time doing something else.

So really it comes down to being intentional.

What are you doing with your time?

Are you wasting it on a phone or are you using it for something like developing your skills, building relationships with people?

Yeah.

We had contracts for our boys.

Oh, good.

Yeah.

We wrote contracts for them before they got their phone.

And the contract listed certain things.

And one of those things was that I could check their phone at any moment and I could take it away if I saw something that was on there that I didn't like.

That's good stuff.

And they signed it and we signed it.

I'd always say in Parenton, too, if you're going to have discipline, it's better to explain that up front.

Yes.

Know the rules.

When we have an issue, hey, we already talked about this.

Yeah?

And that's it.

If you do this, that's the punishment.

That the contract helped with that.

Yeah.

Because then we could point back to it.

We put it up on the refrigerator and reminded them like, hey, you signed this.

Another part of the phone I just want to mention, there are some good parts of a phone.

Absolutely.

I mean, I'm an audio Bible guy, and I've probably listened through the entire Bible maybe six or seven times.

I don't know.

I'm doing it again right now.

I'll just finish Leviticus.

I'm in numbers.

But it's convenient.

It plays when I get in my car.

It's automatic.

And I like it there.

So that it's not that the device is bad, it's how we use the device.

It's not our kid, it's the device and our kid.

So B A D, boundaries.

Parents, you gotta set some boundaries.

You're the parent, you set the rules.

Explain it.

If you gotta change it, change it.

It changes as the kids get older.

Changes for multiple kids.

You know your child, set some boundaries.

Attitude.

Hey, if it's affecting their attitude, it's time to step up the game.

You can't have a bad attitude in your house, especially if it's coming from a device that you're paying for, that you gave them to control the thing.

And then lastly, think about discipleship.

Are they trading something that they could be doing for screen time when they could be in the Word or something that's more productive, helping them?

Uh we're trying to raise our kids to know him, love him, serve him.

Discipleship is a big piece of that.

And that phone is a gigantic chunk of a teenager's life.

We get it.

Correct.

So, parents, you're in charge.

Just want to remind you that.

Think about boundaries, attitude.

Am I discipling my kids?

Want to give you a couple resources as we wrap up today.

Uh, first of all, I mentioned Megaverses 2.0.

It's just a great way to memorize scripture.

We're not selling it, it's free, people.

Just go get the app, Megaverses 2.0, list to it in the card.

You will memorize key passages from the Bible.

And then another great resource I want to mention is focus on the family.

Focus on the family.

Y'all heard of that one?

Yes, awesome.

I've been out there.

Great ministry.

Everything you can think of as a parent you're dealing with, they're gonna have articles and podcasts and resources.

They've got magazines, they've got everything.

But if you're whatever you're dealing with, you're not alone.

Obviously, we're not the first podcast to ever talk about phone and screen times.

We're just here at our church a celebration, dealing with the same stuff.

Everybody else says, just want to remind you, you're not alone.

There are resources to help you out.

Hey, thanks again for joining us here on the Philemon Ministry Podcast.

Uh so this is PT.

Who are you again?

Carowyn.

Which preschool are you in charge of?

I am the Kinder School.

The Kinder School.

Monday through Friday.

Monday through Friday.

And you are Sandy Leva Ortiz Preschool Ministry Director at Celebration Baptist Church.

So we're going to be introducing different staff throughout our different podcasts, but just want to say, hey, thank you.

Our job is to come alongside and help you out.

That's all we want to do.

And so thanks for checking out the podcast.

Look forward to listening to you or hearing from you.

Next podcast we have.

Thank you guys.

See you later.

Bye-bye.

Bye-bye.

Thanks for joining us on the Celebration Baptist Church podcast.

We hope today's conversation helped you take another step in your faith journey.

For more resources, upcoming events, and to join us live, visit iCelebration.org.

Until next time, keep connecting with God, connecting with others, and living on mission.