Christian Parenting Q&A: Social Media, Horror Movies, & Raising Kids in a Divided Home | Ep. 55

Episode 55: Summary & Transcript

Disclaimer: Please note that this is an automatically generated transcript. Although the transcription is largely accurate, it may be incomplete or inaccurate in some cases due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

Episode Summary

This episode addresses how to raise children to follow Jesus in a spiritually mixed marriage, whether or not Christian parents should allow their kids to watch horror movies, and how to wisely navigate social media use. Hosts Matt and Janel emphasize the importance of establishing simple spiritual rhythms at home, developing worldview awareness, delaying phones and social media, and modeling healthy habits as parents.

Episode Transcript

Janel Greig (00:00):
Well, welcome back to Upside Down Parenting. Every parent has questions, and if we’re honest, some of them can feel overwhelming. In today’s episode, Matt and I are going to answer some of the most common and sometimes the toughest questions that Christian parents are asking. My hope is…

Dr. Matt Jones (00:15):
And Janel, let me jump in real quick and just say I’m overwhelmed by today’s questions, so we’ll see what happens.

Janel Greig (00:21):
It’s going to be great. It’s going to be great.

Dr. Matt Jones (00:22):
Okay. All right.

Janel Greig (00:23):
Our hope is that the conversations are going to encourage you listeners, equip you, and remind you that you don’t actually have to parent alone. And as a reminder, please send us your questions. You can send those to podcast@summit.org, and we would love to tackle some of those on our future question episodes. So let’s go ahead and dive in.

Dr. Matt Jones (00:43):
And I’m going to start with the first question from Emily. She says, “How can I faithfully raise my children to follow Jesus when I’m the only spiritual leader in the home? My husband is a loving father and a provider, but he doesn’t share my faith. And I often feel alone, uncertain, and hesitant to lead my children spiritually.” What encouragement and practical advice would you give to parents in a similar situation?

Janel Greig (01:08):
Yeah, that can be a heavy, heavy question. It is. I think this hits home for me too, because when we were pregnant with our first, with Reagan, that was when Christian, my husband, really had his faith crisis. And it was one of those, well, not a moment, but lots of moments of, “Oh Lord, what is this going to look like if I’m walking with the Lord and we’re trying to raise our kids in a certain way and my husband is wanting to do something different?” So it’s very real.

I spent 10 years in MOPS, mothers of preschoolers, and there were a lot of women that this was the reality of their scenario. They were a follower of Christ, their husband was not. So what do you do in those scenarios? I think for encouragement for Emily and other mamas or fathers in this scenario, it’s, find your community. You need to be with fellow believers.

(02:02):
So for parents, maybe that’s a Christian parenting group, for sure. Get plugged in at your church. Mentors, people that can come around you and encourage you, stay in God’s word. The culture is discipling our kids. School, friends, media. So mama or dad, your intentional influence day in and day out is powerful even if you feel like you are doing it alone.

In our early, I’m thankful that Christian, the Lord used the doubt that Christian had to bring him to a firmer faith foundation. And he is a fantastic spiritual leader for our home. But when the kids were little, he traveled all the time for work and was gone. And so there was a load that I carried as a mama wanting to instill those rhythms and a focus on the Lord.

And so for Emily or anyone else listening, I would just say find some sustainable basic rhythms that you can implement in your household to keep pointing your kids towards God.

(03:04):
Prayer, Bible reading, those open up further conversation too, depending on your kids’ ages. I think, and Matt, you would probably agree with this one. I think for a situation like this, it can be divisive. If you are a parent trying to raise your kids with a focus on the Lord and with a Christian worldview and your spouse is not, but to continue to honor your husband as a loving father and provider, even if he isn’t the spiritual leader is so important to model that for your kids.

Dr. Matt Jones (03:38):
I would add to that also, is to try to find the family shared values also because Emily did point out, listen, he’s a loving provider and a loving father. And so let’s figure out, what are the shared values? So we can have that conversation.

And I’m okay with saying as the spouse, “Hey, are you okay with me leading going before the kids go to bed at night? Do you mind me praying with them?” And just maybe that opens the door. And please, as a woman, please give insight on this also. But I would hope that a loving and a provisional father would say, “Yeah, I’m okay with that.”

And so I do like bringing in 1 Corinthians 7 in terms of remembering that your testimony as a spouse and how you handle those situations can be instrumental, but not dependent upon you as a spouse in terms of potentially that husband coming to Christ.

(04:36):
And so man, and I would add one more thing. I really like the mentors. My observation is, a lot of times if the church is big enough, there are some women and even sometimes men in a similar situation where they have been and there’s been a redemptive story as a result.

And so my wife and I went to a church where the pastor was not a believer whenever, I forgot the timeline, but either the wife became a believer afterwards, and it was just a really long process, but she was such an instrumental voice for other women at the church who were experiencing the same thing.

So I really like the community piece, and I would even drive down a little bit further. If you can find a couple who have been through something similar because that has examples of redemption over the years. Would you add anything else on that one, Janel?

Janel Greig (05:29):
Yeah, no, I love that last part, Matt, and that’s something I always think about. I think about Lee Strobel and what an impactful platform the Lord has brought to him. And one of the things that I always appreciated was his wife was a believer and he watched her. She was a witness to him.

And I think whether in this scenario, the question that our listener sent in, or it’s the kids, maybe they find the Lord and they accept him and they’re living and their lives are witnessing. We’re always witnessing to those believers, and the Lord is able to redeem that. So yeah, no, I think that’s on point.

Dr. Matt Jones (06:06):
Yeah. And thanks for bringing in Lee Strobel because The Case for Christ, I’m not a huge fan of Christian movies, but this one was not one of the cheesy ones. And just reading The Case for Christ, he talks about his wife having a role, but then also seeing that in the movie. Another one would be just Christopher Yuan and his story. Yes. I think it’s called Out of a Far Country or From a Far Country, but it talks about how his mom came to Christ, and then the dad, and then the son. And so that would be another example.

So finding people in church, reading these stories. And don’t lose hope, Christ works. And hopefully there’ll be redemption there. Yes. Yeah. But yeah, that’s tough. I’ll pray for you, Emily, as we end this podcast today in my heart and head after we have the podcast done.

Janel Greig (06:55):
I love that, Matt.

Dr. Matt Jones (06:56):
But thank you for sharing.

Janel Greig (06:57):
Yeah. Yeah. Speaking of movies, a little bit different than Lee Strobel’s movie. How about a question surrounding horror movies, Matt? How do you feel about this? Should Christian parents let their kids watch horror movies? Are they simply harmless fun? Or can they shape the way that our kids are thinking about fear, evil, supernatural, and the cold?

Dr. Matt Jones (07:19):
Yeah, this is really tough to unpack. So as we’re thinking about this podcast, I like some language as I was talking to the producer the other day and one of the other guys involved in the podcast, he says, “Listen, we want to provide a playbook for you guys to navigate some of these difficult things because there are matters of conscience within Christianity.”

I know there are some movies that my wife can watch that if I see them, my mind goes and doesn’t end up in a place it should be. And vice versa, there are some that I can watch and my wife’s heart and mind goes somewhere where it shouldn’t be. And so I think we’ve got to be very careful with the question, are horror films harmless fun or can they shape the way our child thinks about fear? I don’t want to limit that to horror films.

(08:11):
Everything we watch affects us. And so I just want to frame it that way, that we’ve got to recognize that every movie that we watch has a worldview and it’s presenting a worldview. And so I’m more concerned many times, and I’ll share this in a minute, but we don’t watch horror movies at our house. I don’t see the thrill in them.

So I got some advice from a guy who is a believer who does love them, and so we’ll talk about that in a minute. But everything you watch has a worldview. And I’m more concerned initially with what’s the worldview being presented? And are we teaching those who are watching the ability to recognize it?

Because Frozen 2 or Frozen can be just as harmful as some of these horror movies because we’re not picking up on the subtle messages that reflect new spirituality. And so while the harm might be less observable, if our kids can’t pick up on the deception in something as Frozen or in Pocahontas or in Brother Bear, and the list really goes on and on, that is a big concern for me. So any thoughts or response to that before I go on to another point with that?

Janel Greig (09:29):
No, but I think it’s a great opportunity to plug in the importance of understanding other worldviews and equipping our kids with a foundation of that. Otherwise, you are playing whack-a-mole for whether it’s a movie or a book.

I can think of some book series my kids have read and they’re avid readers and they get to book 12 in a series and oh, they’ve introduced a gay character. Mom, can we keep reading this? I like the book. So those conversations are going to come.

But I do think also you’re, nod back to Matt, to have an understanding and equip your kids with what different worldviews teach so that they can be identified when you’re watching these movies. Do the pause, the movie pauses that my kids kind of cringe over when we watch movies as a family, but they are so important.

Dr. Matt Jones (10:11):
We have that problem too. Did you just catch that? Did you just catch what that person said? Yes, we have that same problem or good problem. So then we’ll focus on horror movies for just a moment. I just think now that my kids are older, there are a few things I wish that I had not watched with my kids because I recognize, wait a minute, I was a model here.

Second of all, I really think it matters what. I’ll say it like this. We do research on each movie we watch, and there are just some things that we say, no, we’re not watching. And so we as a family have established some family values that essentially say here, while this may be “good” in terms of people liking it and stuff, doesn’t mean it is good for our hearts and heads in light of Philippians 4:8.

(11:04):
And so there are some movies I’ll do some research on or my wife will, and it really doesn’t matter the genre. We just know the worldview and some of the content that makes it a thing for us not to watch. What I’ve read of horror movies, my understanding is a lot of times they’re not great at, how do I say this? Treating women in particular with the level of respect, but you could say that of other movies.

The other thing too is, how do I say this? When I think about some horrific things, so watching Schindler’s List, watching the Passion of the Christ, there are some horrific elements of that. But if you don’t see those, you don’t understand the significance of how bad human nature is. And so I want to be careful with making a blank statement with horror movies and say no, never.

(12:06):
However, I’m really concerned for our kids because of what they’re being exposed to at a young age. The other thing too is when I was talking to a parent at Summit about this recently, if your kid’s really committed to watching it, I would not let them watch it alone.

(12:26):
I would watch with them and then we would have a discussion and ask, “All right, what was appealing to you about that? What was this teaching? Is this something that we really would want to model or imitate?” And I have a friend who watches these movies and I ask him, “Well, why do you watch them? Why do you like them?” He says, “I like the twist.” I was like, “Okay, well great. You can find twists on a lot of different movies. You don’t have to go to horror for this.”

Second of all, and this is an interesting point, it keeps you on the edge of your seat. And so I’m like, okay, I get that because I do like some thriller movies like Quiet Place. That was awesome. Have you seen Quiet Place?

Janel Greig (13:07):
Just the first one. Yeah.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:09):
Yeah. Well, three was, two was okay, but one was great.

Janel Greig (13:13):
Yeah.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:14):
Yeah, no, I agree. And that kept me on the edge of the seat. And so I’m wondering, well, if I haven’t had my conscience seared a little bit, I wonder if that would be sufficient for keeping me on the edge of my seat. And then he did appreciate there, at many times in the movies that he watches when it comes to horror, it’s that, there’s sadness that leads to healing through the trials that they have to go through. And that was the language he used.

And so I’m like, interesting, but do I have to watch horror to experience those things and see those? So that’s what I’m asking. What does it teach? What does it model? How is it treating people? What do I walk away with in light of Philippians 4:8 and 9? And then it’s just a blanket for me. If it involves witchcraft, demon possession, there’s just some things I don’t want to fill my heart and head with. So I talked way too long on that, but I’m just curious, anything else that you would say on that, Janel?

Janel Greig (14:08):
No, I think those are all great points. And I think for a number of these questions that we’re talking about today, it’s maybe not necessarily a yes or a no or a checklist for each household is going to have to evaluate based on convictions, based on what are their conversations happening with their kids.

I think one of my concerns with horror movies is the desensitization. Desensitization to violence. And it’s that dark theater, that dark movie theater theory where when you’re in it, when you first walk into a movie theater and it’s pitch black, you can’t see anything. But when you’re in there long enough, you start to be able to see you adjust, your eyes adjust and it’s normalized. And we’ve used that analogy with regards to sin in our household for our kids to talk about that over the years, but it’s the same thing to me.

(14:56):
If you’re watching too much of it, does that become normal? And then yeah, that throwback to 4-8, it’s just, fill your mind with what’s pure, what’s holy, what’s lovely. So no, I think a lot of good thoughts there, Matt.

Dr. Matt Jones (15:10):
Yeah, I appreciate what you were saying on that, because it really is tough. But I want to take advantage of my child’s interest in things, depending on what it is, to have conversations. And my kids, my son and I watched a movie one time, he says, “Dad, I don’t ever want to watch that again, that style of movie.”

And so sometimes removing the curiosity can be helpful also, but it also could open a door for further interest. And that’s where prayer, knowing what your child’s struggling with, being able to have those conversations is key.

Janel Greig (15:46):
Yep.

Dr. Matt Jones (15:46):
All right. So Janel, you’re going to have to talk more on this one than I do because I really don’t have social media. I have LinkedIn, and then I get on Facebook once a year.

So what do you think about Christian parents letting their kids use only certain social media platforms? Are apps like TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, Facebook, and YouTube equally safe, or are some significantly more dangerous than others? How can parents wisely evaluate the risk and benefits of each platform while helping their kids develop healthy digital habits? And this question may take us to the end of our Q&A episode. It’s like a three-episode question. But go ahead. What do you think?

Janel Greig (16:33):
Yeah, I guess first framing it, there are some fantastic resources out there and research done on social media, just the digital age that we’re living in. And I think this is a question that’s similar to the last question that maybe it’s not a one-size-fits-all answer. It might not be, yes, this app is, we want, just like with parenting, we want the list. Yes, do this, don’t do this, and then you’ll get this.

(16:59):
But I think rather than starting with the question, which app is safe or which platform is okay for Christian parents to allow for their kids, look at each platform through the frame of what kind of person is this technology shaping my child to become or would it shape my child to become? And I’m pretty sure that comes directly from Andy Crouch. He wrote The TechWise Family. Again, some great books. If you’re looking at giving your kiddo a social media account and devices, he has a parent book and a youth book that you can read together.

But I think that’s more the question. Look at each platform in that way because not all platforms are created equal. There are apps that are built around that endless personalized feeds, captures your attention and keeps people scrolling. TikTok, those Insta reels, YouTube shorts, Snapchat. And the intent there is to keep that mind busy.

(17:51):
And that to me is a little bit different from YouTube if you have a kid that’s wanting to use YouTube to learn a skill because they’re, man, I can learn to change my drier heating element on YouTube. So there are some good things out there and there’s educational content out there too. So I think it’s important to look at each platform individually and evaluate it.

I think there’s four Cs that we like to use in our household, and I’m sure I picked these up from somewhere, I just don’t remember where, so I can’t give the source credit. But when you’re looking at the platform, and we do this with our kids. Content: What kinds of messages is my kid being exposed to on this platform? What’s there? Is it sexual? Is it identity questions? Look at each platform in that way. Connection: Who can contact them?

(18:44):
Can anyone contact them? Must it be people that are on there that are friends? Do the messages disappear? Because as a parent, that leads into the third C, which is control. What parental tools are available for me to monitor this platform with my child? And it may be as your kids get older and you widen up those rails and give them access to platforms. I would encourage our parent listeners to be with them in it.

I think there is, in our household, we have done dumb phones. We have a dumb phone for the kids still. We’re talking about getting our daughter a smartphone as she starts to drive just for accessibility there. But the research is very clearly showing, delay that as long as you can. Delay the phones, delay the access, delay the social media platforms. And so the four Cs, content connection, control.

(19:36):
And then the last one is culture. What type of behaviors is this platform rewarding? Is it comparison, self-promotion? Am I trying to get as many likes as I can and then becoming overwhelmed? What’s it doing? Or is it something that’s creative, promoting creativity and learning? So I think that’s a little framing hopefully for our listeners. What kind of thoughts do you have on that, Matt?

Dr. Matt Jones (19:59):
Yeah, I really like your four Cs there. And what we think about, we waited until our kids were in ninth or 10th grade before they got phones. And a huge way we did that, and I think we’ve shared this before, was, “Hey, you can’t have a phone until you can buy it and you can sustain the bill you pay for it.” And so that kind of put things off and they were left out of some things at school.

And we said, “Listen, the research is showing this is not great for your heart and head.” But then after that, they had to wait to get social media. But we wanted them to have social media whenever they were in our home. So I think it was Hannah’s junior or senior year and Kenzie’s junior or senior year before they had it. And they had to demonstrate a level of discernment in terms of that our youngest had some pretty significant issues with texting, and we’ve had to work just being unkind with texting and hiding behind texts.

(21:02):
And we’ve had to work really hard. And so as a result of her misuse of just simply texting, we put off her having access to social media because if she can’t handle texting well, then probably she is not going to handle social media well. And so that’s where engagement, asking questions.

One of the things is sitting by your kid and saying, “Wait a minute, what algorithms, what ads are being produced by your phone?” Because those are indicators of essentially what your kid’s looking at whenever you’re not around. What ads are coming up because these things are so designed with these algorithms.

So you had a note in our notes as we were talking about this. I really would, parents, do some research on the effect that this stuff is having on your child’s mental and social health. And there are great parents out there that are trying and are loving their kids well.

(21:58):
But I was speaking at Summit recently, and I did a talk on why Gen Zers are losing their jobs. It’s an article put out by Forbes, and they give six reasons that a lot of managers are hiring. 6 out of 10 managers are firing, excuse me, Gen Zers within six months.

Janel Greig (22:18):
Oh, interesting.

Dr. Matt Jones (22:19):
And one of the key things was lack of communication skills. And moms and dads, having worked with college students for 25 years, having them in our homes, many of your children lack communication skills. And I think one of the biggest deterrents is they’re not learning to communicate face-to-face. And what enables that is social media. And so just from observation, I know it’s anecdotal, but there is research to back up that we’ve got some pretty significant problems.

And it’s not all social media’s fault. I actually would say moms and dads, what’s been your responsibility in giving your kids the wisdom and discernment to know how to use it as a tool and not a deterrent to experiencing life? And many of them are using it as a deterrent to experience life because we’re hiding behind that rather than learning to look face-to-face. And my heart breaks on that. So you got me fired up on that one, Janel.

Janel Greig (23:23):
Yeah. No, there’s so much and so many different directions we could go with that one to unpack the relational component. I do think that communication, parents, you can do that with your kids, practice that, show them, be intentional. If they’re of an age or if you feel like you’ve over widened the gap too much for them and need to pull that back in and de-access what they have social media-wise, have that conversation with them.

Because again, that’s that intentional conversation and telling them why it’s important to you. I think as you’re looking at platforms with your kids, think about basic questions. Is this helping me love God and love people more? Is it encouraging truth or comparison? Does it deepen relationships or replace them? Does it cultivate gratitude or envy? There’s these basic questions that I think any of us that have been on social media or any of these platforms, we can answer those questions.

(24:16):
And if we answer them honestly, we’re probably going to get off of that platform. And then the last nugget I would throw in on this question is parents, you set the example. So those digital habits that are happening in your home, they’re set by you, not by an app.

So I encourage, and we haven’t been perfect at this, but it’s a remembrance. Device-free dinners. There should be no phones in bedrooms. And there’s tons of research on why not for this one besides the accessibility, but the impact and effect it has on sleep. Practice, regular conversation. And again, parents model this in your home. So I don’t think this is a one-size-fits-all, but requires intentionality.

Dr. Matt Jones (25:04):
Oh, I was going to add, I think the name of the book is by Doug Smith, Unintentional: How Screens Secretly Shape Your Desires and HowYou Can Break Free. I would just recommend it. I read it this past year, and it is worth your time to wrestle with and engage. And I would add one more thing based on a conversation I had with a parent this past weekend. Don’t be afraid of your kids being mad at you. That’s going to be part of it.

There have been several times where we’ve had to withdraw a privilege because we were noticing some poor trends in our kids because of what they were being exposed to. And yeah, it’s painful, but a lot of times it leads to having to talk more with your kids. So that can be a good thing. Well, thank you all for your questions today.

(25:54):
These are challenging. And again, we want to give you a playbook, ideas for you all to wrestle with, some specific principles to help address some of these questions. And we thank you for the great questions. We know parenting doesn’t come with a manual and every family faces unique challenges. And our prayer is that today’s conversation has encouraged you, equipped you, and reminded you that God is with you every step of the journey.

As Janel mentioned in the opening, please send your questions to podcast@summit.org. And if today’s episode encouraged you, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, or share it with another parent who could use a little bit of encouragement. So thank you for listening. We’ll see you next time. Thanks for partnering with me on this, Janel.

Janel Greig (26:36):
That was great. Thanks, Matt.