Knowing God Ministries: Upstream in a Downstream World

II Peter 1:3

"His divine power has given us everything we need for life and godliness, through our knowledge of Him who called us by His own glory and goodness."

Last Friday, we were so blessed to have Beth Evans, mother of quadruplets and Bible teacher, share how to have family values in a morally decaying culture.

Twenty-eight years ago, Beth and Johnny Evans were told by the doctor, "that the 4 fetus' in her womb would never be normal. They would be riddled with birth defects, blindness or cerebral palsy and that the family would be overwhelmed in medical bills. That the best thing to do would be to terminate the pregnancy immediately."

Horrified, Beth went to her quiet time place to seek God's will and His perspective. And the word of the Lord seemed to leap off the page and into her heart:

"If you do not stand firm in your faith, you will not stand at all." (Isaiah 7:9)

Beth immediately knew. She was NOT to abort these children.

Today, Beth has FOUR healthy children - loving and serving Jesus in four corners of the globe.

Asia

Manhattan

Fellowship of Christian Athletes

Raleigh, NC, at an accounting firm.

How did she raise four children to swim upstream in a downstream world?

I'll give you a few highlights from the General Session.

1. The Heart - it's all about the heart. She taught from (II Peter 1:1-9)

The only way our children can "escape the corruption in the world" is by experiencing a heart change. Scripture says "that the cause of corruption is from our evil desires" that dwell in each of our hearts."

We must go after our children's hearts in prayer, praying for their hearts to be radically transformed.

2. Prayer - stay on your knees in prayer. Pray that God will capture their hearts. She said that she would pray over them in their rooms as they slept that God would capture their hearts for Him. But warned that it may be a long time before we see results from those prayers. It's a journey.

3. Let our children see Mothers who have a real relationship with Jesus - one that's ever growing. Our children should see what we value most -

She challenged us, "What do you value most? It's not with our words that we communicate what we value most, it's with our actions."

4. Our standard for life and parenting is to be the Bible and the power of God. Not the standards of the world. This is how we understand our identities, not the identity we place upon ourselves such as: depressed, divorced, daughter of an alcoholic; alcoholic... When we belong to Christ, this is not who we are anymore. Once we realize this, we can parent our children in the same way - growing them to know who they are because of WHOSE they are.

5. She warned us of parenting out of our insecurities. She shared the story of one mother who pushed her daughter to go out with the best looking guy in high school, because her mother saw herself as a nobody in high school and didn't want that for her child.

The boy was verbally abusive - yet the mother turned a blind eye. They eventually married.

Two weeks ago, the mother was moving her daughter out of the home as the boy who was once verbally abusive had now become a man who was physically abusive.