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This podcast is brought to you by our friends at Faithful Counseling.

Hey you guys, this is Heidi st John. Thanks for tuning in today. We’re going to have a great podcast. Today is Monday, April 6th. Welcome to the Heidi St John Podcast.

Thanks for tuning in today, you guys. I appreciate you being here. Hope you guys are doing good. Hope you’re doing good in pandemic land. I know that I am adjusting. I feel like every day I’m adjusting, every day, it’s a new thing that gets canceled everyday it’s a new kind of a new challenge, but it’s also been a challenge for us to rise to being the people who are salt and light, the people who are bringing hope, the people who are bringing encouragement, the people who are pointing people to the healer, and His name is Jesus.

And so I’m going to spend some time today answering your questions. It’s Mailbox Monday. And I hope you guys are encouraged. I really do. I want to say thank you to those of you who have joined me at MomStrong International. Years ago when I had a vision for doing this and I remember mentioning it to my husband, he said to me, “I don’t know how we can do that with everything else we have going on.” And then he came back and said, “Wait a minute, I have an idea.” And it’s my family, my husband, my daughter Savannah, my daughter Sierra, our son-in-law Ryan.

These are the folks behind the scenes here who are writing the content, who are doing the graphics, who are getting it up on the internet. Jen Thuen, who writes Bible studies for me, especially when I’m in the season of writing a book, like I am right now. There’s a whole bunch of us, Kay Orr, Melissa Crabtree, and Marlene Griffith, a lot of people who are putting a lot of time and energy into the online community, which is MomStrong International.

If you’ve never been over there, I want to encourage you now more than ever, go and check it out. It’s amazing what the Lord is doing and I hope you guys will be part of it. It’s also a wonderful way to support this ministry, especially now while I’m not traveling. I can’t say it strongly enough, your $8 a month’s going a whole long way. It really is, and we’re very, very thankful for that.

It’s kind of a win-win. It’s a way for you to support the ministry here at the Heidi St. John Podcast. It’s also an opportunity for you to grow and become the men and women of God that he says that you are in His Word. I’m going to be jumping right in today. It’s Mailbox Monday. I’ve got lots of questions in the hopper, as it were. If you’ve got a question that you would like me to answer, you can go to heidistjohn.com/mailboxmonday and there’s a form that’s going to pop up there. I hope you guys will take advantage of that. We love your questions. We love to hear from you. I am passionate about what’s happening in the culture. I like to talk about the culture, particularly as it relates to God’s Word and how God would have us behave in the culture today.

Also I want to say thank you very much to the sponsors here at the podcast. We’ve got a new sponsor that I’m excited to introduce you to, Faithful Counseling. Faithful Counseling is a solution for people seeking traditional mental health counseling who would prefer hearing from the perspective of a Christian. And you guys know that I’ve talked about this a lot at the podcast. Let’s be real, alright? Sometimes we need to talk things out, and counseling from a Christian perspective is vital. And I know a lot of you are going through some hard things right now. If you’re seeking a mental health professional who is a practicing Christian, Faithful Counseling may be a great option for you. You can start communicating with the counselor specifically matched for you in under 24 hours.

So I want to straighten something up really quick. This is not a crisis line, okay? It’s not self-help. It’s professional counseling done securely online. You can learn more at faithfulcounseling.com/heidi. And for the first month listeners are going to get 10% off. So check it out, faithfulcounseling.com/heidi.

All right, your questions are really fascinating to me. You guys have a lot going on in your lives, and I think the COVID-19 pandemic, certainly the crisis we’re facing as a nation, I’m seeing a shift in the kinds of questions that are coming in. Keep them coming, heidistjohn.com/mailboxmonday.

I also want to encourage you, if you’ve never left a review for my podcast over at iTunes, boy, I would sure appreciate you doing that. We read those. It’s very helpful for boosting our podcast up in the ratings and letting people know that we’re here. And I thought I would read some of the latest ones that have come in because my goodness, you guys, you sure encourage me.

This one is from Kim. She says, “I’ve been listening for about a year now and I love, love, love Heidi’s ability to speak truth in love and tackle hard questions with God’s Word. Through the Lord’s leading, I am off the bench in a very new and uncomfortable way. But I know I’m not alone in the lion’s den. Thank you for inspiring me.” Thank you, Kim. That inspires me.

Here’s another one. This has come from Mrs. Grooze. She says, “I absolutely love Heidi St. John. I anticipate listening to each and every podcast each week. They challenge me to do better for my kids and get off the bench and be a voice. Heidi is never afraid of a tough subject, a must hear. Thanks for being awesome.” Thank you for that encouragement.

Here’s another one. She says, “Heidi’s podcast is a joy to listen to as a young mother who is fearful of where our culture is and where our children are being exposed. I find Heidi so encouraging. We need leaders like Heidi who will share God’s word and fight for our children and families.”

And so, I love these reviews, you guys. And so keep them coming. Another place that we really appreciate your reviews, you guys have helped me so much over at Amazon. You finally got my little five star rating up to a five star. Sometimes people like to get on there and review the book who really just don’t like me at all and don’t like the message of Jesus. And so they get on and they leave a bad review. They say I’m a homophobe or I hate people or whatever, which isn’t true at all. And so if you guys have never left a review for my books over at Amazon, any of the books I’ve written, I would surely appreciate you leaving reviews over there. It’s a way to help me, a small way that you can help the ministry here in the middle of this crisis. Also, especially as we’re not on the road and we’re depending on the sales of books and things like that to keep going. So we appreciate you guys doing that.

All right, I want to jump right into your questions. A couple of them right off the bat about homeschooling. So several of you are looking at homeschooling for the first time, and so let’s start off with the question of socialization. “Hi Heidi, my oldest is entering high school and we have homeschooled for many years. I feel socially and academically that she should continue homeschooling. I have several co-ops, plays, youth groups, et cetera she’s involved in.” Of course, this came in before COVID-19, so keep that in mind. “We also have major tension at home and it is a cloud where she is constantly putting down her three younger sisters. I feel I correct her attitude all day long. Should I send her to school so I have the energy and positive home during the day? She also wants to go to school. We don’t have a good public school option and private school is a huge sacrifice. Lastly, if she does homeschool, any ideas on where she can do schoolwork outside of home some days to maybe add some separation?”

Okay, so first of all, your question to me is not an odd question. This is actually pretty normal. It’s pretty normal. I think a lot of us have moody teenagers in our homes. I think a lot of us have had kids who are sort of that, sort of Eeyore. Everybody’s doing fine and then the person comes downstairs and it’s just like, great, everybody just got rained on, right? Kind of rain on the parade.

And I don’t think the answer to that is to send your kid back to school. Certainly don’t put them in a public school. I would say the answer is to ask the Lord to help you really make sure that you are not overburdening your teenager, especially, with just busy work, but rather meeting her where she’s at. If you sat down recently and said, “Hey, what is it that you want to do when you graduate from high school? What are some things that we can get you involved in that would be encouraging for you to move you in that direction?”

We had a daughter in our home who really wanted to be a graphic designer, and so we had her take some online classes. There are lots of options, particularly now. And I know here at Firmly Planted, we are looking into ways that we can serve the larger homeschool community, particularly going forward now that we’ve seen what can happen when our organizations and our businesses close.

But I think it’s important for you to be having that conversation with her. And I don’t think it’s a bad idea for you to say, listen, you come downstairs and it’s like a black cloud enters the room. Nobody wants that. And I don’t think that our children, especially when the teens are so focused on themselves, they tend to be. There are seasons, and I think a particular… What’s the right word? A particular personality that is more, more drawn to being sort of melodramatic and melancholy. And that is hard on everybody. And I think it’s good for you to say, “You’re setting the tone right now for what your home was going to be like. So think about what you want your home to be like.”

But hang in there with her. I think it’s a great idea to have her do schoolwork, on days that she can, maybe from a coffee shop or something. But you can’t even do that during COVID-19. I don’t think God wants us to be separated right now. I think he’s saying, “Work it out. Work it out.”

Also, I am not the mom who, when my kids have bad attitudes in the house, I’m not the mom who lets them socially distance. I’m the mom who’s like, oh no, we’re all in the same room. I’m not going to let you go to your room and close your door and Eeyore up there. Occasionally I will. But as a general rule, I don’t like that, because I think it only adds to the attitude and this feeling that they somehow don’t need to participate in the family.

Also, and I know this isn’t a popular opinion necessarily, but it is my opinion, so take it or leave it, but I’ve always felt like if I’ve got a child who’s coming down and they have a bad attitude, I’m going to give them work to do. So I like to work my kids to a place where they have a better attitude.

So you’re going to come down and be awful? One time in particular, I remember one of my kids, I mean I’ve got seven of them, so this could be anybody, but it was probably, it’s been awhile. So one kid came downstairs and I said, “Hey, it’s your day to be, you’re my assistant for dinner tonight.” And this kid looked at me and was like, “I have schoolwork to do.” And just gave me all kinds of grief. “Why do I have to help you?” And I said, “Wow, look at that. You’re no longer my helper. You are now the chief cook. You are going to do dinner all by yourself tonight. And so I’m going to let you pick it, I’m going to let you make it, and I’m not going to help you.”

And that was actually a really good move on my part, because all of a sudden you could tell it was like, whoops, a little attitude adjustment. So stay in there, be the parent. I know that this can be frustrating and difficult, but I think our kids are worth it. And I have never been sorry that I stayed in there with my kids, even when it was uncomfortable. I think it’s worth it.

Next question says, “Hi Heidi. Could you please share some aspects of what socialization during homeschooling looks like? I’m having a stronger and stronger desire to homeschool our daughter when it’s time to start school, but my husband’s concerned she won’t have friends or a social life. From what I’ve heard, this is a big misconception. I’d like to hear your thoughts.” Okay, this is a great question and it’s absolutely a misconception. This is 100%… I always tell people, your kids are going to be as weird as you are. And so if your goal in homeschooling them is to keep locked up in your house all day long and never see the light of day, then your kids are going to be weird.

But that’s not what we do, except of course in the middle of a pandemic, but then everybody understands. I do think that this idea, I love the question of socialization, because when, please answer me this— when was it ever a good idea to decide that socialization means one really immature child socializes another really immature child? Your kids learn socialization, they learn all kinds of things from you. They learn how to brush their teeth from you. They learn how to walk from you. They learn how to talk from you. They can learn how to socialize from you and they don’t need to be around a bunch of kids who are just as immature as they are to do it. I think that’s ridiculous. I think it’s led to the immaturity of this generation who feels that somehow we need to coddle our children till they’re 26 years old. I don’t think it’s healthy.

And so when someone asks me if I’m worried about socialization, I always tell them I am 100% worried about socialization. That’s exactly why we took our children out of public school. I don’t want them being socialized in a Lord of the Flies environment. I want them home. And they can get their Lord of the Flies environment from squabbling with their siblings. So I think there’s something to be said for that. So in terms of socialization, I would just say, hang in there and talk to your husband about what it is that you want at the end of the day.

And so to me that’s the most important question. What do we want at the end of the day? What’s the net goal? I think the net goal is that our kids would be mature followers of Jesus. And you don’t need the public school for that. You can do that. And you’re going to be teaching them. I mean, for goodness sake, I always tell parents, you want to socialize your kids, take them to the bank with you. Take them to a Walmart. I mean, obviously everything’s closed right now, but when life gets back to normal, we socialize our kids by just having them with us. And then they model what we do. So guess what? If you’re kind, your kids are going to learn kindness. If you’re a jerk, your kids are going to learn how to be a jerk. It’s true. But at least you’ll be the person that they can blame and not some random kid that you never met at the school.

So I think that’s a really great way to look at it. None of our kids, all seven of them are extremely social, and they all have different personalities. And get involved. I mean, get involved in homeschool co-ops. We have the Firmly Planted Homeschool Resource Center around here. There’s lots and lots of ways for you to socialize your kids.

So be encouraged, certainly more available now than there’s ever been. And so I’m excited for you. And I’m so excited to hear from many of you who are considering seriously never putting your kids back into the school system. I thank God for that. I got a letter the other day from somebody, I don’t know where it came to me, but a mom whose kid is in the school system here in the Pacific Northwest. And she has a 14 year old kid, her boy, who was starting to fall for the lie of transgenderism, because why wouldn’t he? Right? When we indoctrinate our kids five days a week, and we tell them that they came from monkeys, and that their gender is fluid, and that abortion is healthcare, and all the lies in the school system right now, which really our schools have been hijacked. No joke. Our schools have just straight up been hijacked by wicked evil agenda.

And I kind of think that the Lord of heaven’s armies, somewhere at the beginning of March, said enough is enough is enough. I like to think that he watched the team of mothers here in Vancouver, Washington crying their eyes out and going to Olympia and begging the Governor not to sign that wicked sinful, awful law that he signed that mandates that we teach our children, starting in kindergarten, that their gender is fluid. We are teaching our children the most horrific things in the name of being woke. It’s amazing to me.

And I think the Lord sees how hard we’re fighting. And He finally just stepped in. In a week, 50 million kids don’t go to school. God’s heart heartbeats for children. He cares about our kids. And He has to care that this is what’s happening.

And so I’m frankly thrilled. And this mom wrote to me and she said her son had been considering himself as a transgender girl. And she said they were just getting ready to start him on hormones even though she had a terrible feeling about it. And she said he’s only been home for 10 days and she said I can already see him coming back to life again. I can already see my son starting to behave like the child that I know that he is. Why? Because he’s not being force fed all this garbage in the school system. Bring your kids home from these indoctrination centers. I cried when I read her her letter.

She said, “Thank God that the schools have been closed. I feel like the scales are falling off my eyes.” Wow. Wow. Wow. That’s what needs to happen. And I think God’s going to use a pandemic to turn the hearts of the parents back to their children. So that’s exciting for me.

Here’s the next question. Help define the line between fighting and standing up for our religious rights and understanding God’s ultimate plan for the end times. This is a great question in the middle of the pandemic. “Hi Heidi. I love everything that you say about getting off the bench and onto the battlefield. I love that you’re encouraging Christians to do it. I too have always been of the mindset that a Christian needs to speak up, stand up, and demand that our voices be heard. However, our current situation has me doing some deep searching. On one hand, I keep wondering at what point we refuse to let the government tell us when we can’t worship, and are we really going to let them trample on our right to gather and worship simply by suggesting it? On the other hand, I realize that at some point this is going to happen. If we believe the Bible, we also have to believe what it tells us will play out during the end times. And since this is part of God’s plan, there is no amount of standing up and speaking that will change things. Can you speak as to how you balance these sorts of things and thinking that can seem to conflict?”

Okay, so this is a great question. Thanks for sending it in. I want to point something out. So you said you’re wondering at what point do we refuse to let the government tell us that we can’t worship. Well, the Bible says that we are to render to Caesar what is Caesar’s. We are to obey the governing authority. So if the governing authorities say that we can’t meet, then we can’t meet. Now there’s a difference between obeying the governing authorities and not meeting and obeying the governing authorities and participating in the murder of an innocent.

For example, abortion. This is murder. So when God’s law conflicts, we got a real problem. But the government telling us… do I like it? No, I don’t like it. I saw in Florida last week that a pastor was arrested. I do think that we need to respect and obey the governing authorities. I don’t understand everything that’s behind this pandemic. I said the other day on my Facebook page, and I’ll say it again, I think one of the big issues that we’re facing right now is there’s a general distrust of government, and a general distrust of media. Why is that? It’s because a lot of these people have been shown to be untrustworthy. A lot of them have been shown to be… Nancy Pelosi, for goodness sake. Trying to get all this garbage into a stimulus bill when the country’s in the middle of a pandemic. This is why people don’t trust politicians.

We have good reason not to trust the news. So what does that leave? Well, we can’t understand. We’re literally in the dark about a lot of these things. But we do know that God says that we are called to obey the governing authorities. We pay taxes for that reason. I may not like it. And we obey the governing authorities by not meeting together right now.

And so, I know that’s frustrating, but we need to go back to God’s Word. To me, there’s a point in which we can say, hey, enough is enough. If they come and they start arresting us, that’s terrible. Right? But I think we just wait and we’re patient. So we tell the truth. We’re not completely isolated because of things like this podcast that you’re listening to on social media and things like that.

And so I think we balance them by keeping our eyes open, asking the Lord to give us wisdom and discernment, and then walking this out without fear and without panic. Prepping is good. Panic is sin. And so keep speaking up, keep telling the truth, but when the governor puts the State of Washington in a lockdown, which someone said, “Heil Inslee,” the other day. It is getting ridiculous. We’re going to go through the avenues that have been given to us to try to speak to the governing authorities. And more important than anything, we’re going to get on her knees and pray.

I hope you guys are spending time every single day with your families sitting in a circle on the floor in your living room and crying out to the Lord. Read His Word, come before his presence, and remember that he sees you. 2 Timothy 1:7 God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power, love, and a sound mind.

I want to thank you guys for listening so much. We love you. We thank you for your support of this ministry. You can really support us by becoming a member at MomStrong International or by sending donations to us here at the Firmly Planted Homeschool Resource Center.

I will link back to ways that you can give today and we thank you guys for doing that. We are praying for you. Stay faithful. The Lord is at work.

Write to Heidi:
Heidi St. John
c/o Firmly Planted Family
11100 NE 34th Cir, Vancouver, WA 98682

Support this ministry by donating through E-giving. You can also send donations to: 11100 NE34th Cir, Vancouver, WA 98682