Father’s Day: Becoming the Upside-Down Dad w/ Christian Greig | Ep. 49

Episode 49: 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 of the Upside Down Parenting Podcast features Christian Greig, the husband of host Janel Greig. Their conversation centers on celebrating fathers ahead of Father’s Day by exploring how Christian and Matt approach simple, family-focused traditions, and the deep spiritual responsibility of modeling faith for their children. They also discuss practical ways dads can point kids to Jesus in everyday moments. Christian and Matt reflect on how fatherhood reshapes their understanding of God as Father, emphasize character and a relationship with Christ over worldly success, and share honest stories about discipline, grace, and learning from mistakes.

Episode Transcript

Janel Greig (00:00):
Well, welcome to the Upside Down Parenting Podcast. Today we’re celebrating fathers in preparation for Father’s Day. Father’s Day is more than a celebration. It is an opportunity to reflect on the joys, challenges, and sacred calling of fatherhood. Whether you’re a new dad navigating sleepless nights, a father raising school-aged children or a dad helping teenagers find their way, this conversation is for you.

Today, I’m so excited to be joined by Christian, my husband, father, and partner, not my father, father to our children, and partner in parenting for an honest conversation about what it means to faithfully lead and love your family in today’s world. I’m also joined by my co-host, Matt Jones, who is also an amazing father.

Dr. Matt Jones (00:49):
Oh, that was added to the script, Janel. Thank you very much. I appreciate that addition there.

Janel Greig (00:56):
Well, welcome. And welcome Christian. We’re excited to have you on the show today.

Christian Greig (01:02):
Thanks for having me on.

Janel Greig (01:05):
Christian, every family celebrates Father’s Day a little differently. How have we, in our house, can you share with our listeners, chosen to celebrate it over the years? What’s it kind of looked like and what has made the traditions that we’ve embraced, if we’ve embraced any, meaningful to you?

Christian Greig (01:23):
Yeah, we don’t celebrate Father’s Day. That’s not really a thing for us, but with a big caveat and that is we have three tremendous kids and I feel honored every day that I’m in the household so I don’t feel that I’m this person that’s a glutton for punishment and everybody kind of piles on dad and then I get that one day a year where there’s reprieve. The house is structured a lot differently than that. So I don’t need that and I don’t desire that.

Every day in a sense is going to be Father’s Day. And with that said, I think you, Janel, usually ask me what I’d like for dinner, maybe a week out. So I do get to pick the meal. And then if we play board games that night, I get to pick the board game. So there’s a little something there, but really all I want is what we always have.

(02:17):
And I want time with the family apart from distractions and we get that on Father’s Day and that’s all I need. And that’s how our Father’s Day looks like.

Dr. Matt Jones (02:28):
That’s pretty great. I’ve got a question. What’s the favorite dinner? Do you mix it up or is it something each year? Something specific each year?

Christian Greig (02:37):
Yeah, I would probably change it up, but I mean maybe it’s been something as simple as hamburgers or Parmesan chicken or something. I don’t know, something with meat.

Dr. Matt Jones (02:46):
Okay. Something with meat. That sounds really good. That’s good.

Janel Greig (02:51):
How do you guys celebrate Father’s Day, Matt? Do you have traditions?

Dr. Matt Jones (02:55):
Well, the kids kind of like what we did with Mother’s Day. It’s the kids’ responsibility. So what we’ve been thankful for is the kids have wanted to celebrate Father’s Day, even though I haven’t been deserving of it. And so they usually plan something and then I’m with Christian. Something that involves meat usually goes a long way. So meat and a card is pretty much the extent of the celebration.

So looking back on your journey as a dad, remind us, if you wouldn’t mind, the age of your kids. What has surprised you most about fatherhood that no one prepared you for?

Christian Greig (03:34):
Our kids now are 17, 15 and 13. I’ll use an example. I think I’ve shared this with Janel probably more than once, but it was when our middle child, Keaton was two and I think we were at my folks and they have an orchard and it was actually a family reunion, but I wanted to show Keaton something underneath the apple tree. There’s all these apple trees and they’re pruned, but I have to crouch pretty low to walk underneath them.

Little Keaton followed me under there because I asked him to. It was probably just showing him how to pick a ripe apple or something. And I noticed he was crouched also. Now he didn’t need to crouch. He could have stood up and jumped up and he still couldn’t have touched the bottom of the apple tree, but he was absolutely watching his father and completely hunched doing exactly what dad did.

(04:28):
And it’s like over the years, I think back to that moment and especially as Christians, I think we work so hard, how can we impact people with faith? How can I reach out to all these people? And it’s so easy to forget or ignore or your impact with your own family and it’s great and you don’t even have to try. And even if you’re not trying, you’re still impacting your family. You’re impacting those people in your household more than probably anybody else you’ll ever touch for your whole life and they see everything.

So it was in that moment and then looking back at that moment, just how much impact that I have over them and how important that is and that no matter what as a Christian, sometimes it can feel that I’m not reaching people. I’m always talking to people at work when I can about Christ and sometimes with some sort of results and sometimes with nothing or you don’t know, but it doesn’t matter. It’s like when you have kids, when you have a family as a father, amazing things are happening and that is enough.

Dr. Matt Jones (05:42):
Yeah. And that’s amazing. Yeah, you’re modeling, right? And I just go, “Man, as a dad, I can’t be fake, but I also realize as you pointed out, those kids are watching even how I stand.” And it is pretty amazing and it’s an incredible opportunity, but also an opportunity for you to go, “Wow, I let my kids down here. How can I ask them to forgive me?” So thanks for sharing that, Christian.

Janel Greig (06:09):
Yeah. All right. I’ve got one for both of you. So from both of you, how has becoming a father changed your understanding of God as father? And then can you think of a specific moment with your children that gave you new insight into the way that God relates to us as his children?

Dr. Matt Jones (06:31):
You want to go first on that one, Christian?

Christian Greig (06:33):
I don’t.

Dr. Matt Jones (06:34):
No? All right. I like the honesty there. You grow up, my dad, him going through that process whenever I was disciplined and believe me, I was disciplined a lot because I just talked too much and a lot of times the things that came out of my mouth weren’t always the best. And he would say, “Listen, I’m disciplining you because I love you.” And then he would show me discipline. And I did not understand that until I had to or had the opportunity to discipline my kids lovingly.

There was one night where my youngest was bit by my middle and he bit her and so we had a very long discussion and that night after he bit her and there were some consequences for the biting. And so the next morning I come out and he’s laying down with his mom because we said, “Listen, we’re doing this because we love you and we’re trying to show you that the Lord disciplines those he loves.” And this was about an hour conversation with some consequences at the end.

(07:48):
And the next morning I walk into the bedroom, he’s laying down with his mom and he goes, “Dad, you sure showed me a lot of love last night.” And it was at that moment that I was like, okay, he understands that connection quicker than I did, but that was a big, big moment for us that first of all, there’s a connection between love and discipline and you just pray the kids, the kids pick up on it.

Janel Greig (08:14):
Yeah. Go for it, Christian.

Christian Greig (08:16):
That’s so good. It’s so good. That was actually what I was going to use.

Dr. Matt Jones (08:21):
Oh, well, you should have gone first, man.

Janel Greig (08:26):
And he’s not just saying that. We talked about this yesterday and it is, which is so interesting.

Dr. Matt Jones (08:31):
Right? Because it’s hard, especially in our culture where we’re kind of saying, “Listen, it’s wrong to discipline your kids.” And I’m like, no, it may be one of, if not the most loving thing that you can do as long as you’re doing it in a loving way and that involves both grace and truth. And so that’s funny we both have that same thing because that was a big stretch for me to believe that about my dad whenever I was a kid.

Christian Greig (09:02):
But I thought of a second one, right on the spot. But I think it’s just sharing the emotional highs and lows with your kids. And I wouldn’t have thought that as I became a father or whatever, that their experiences would impact me so much. But if something fun happens, in a sporting contest or grades or they’re recognized and likewise, if something doesn’t go their way, that impacts me. It impacts me greatly.

And then to think that if it impacts me greatly, how much more does it impact our father, God, when we go through these emotional highs and lows, he is absolutely invested in us and it’s just a good reminder to know that there is this all powerful personal God that cares that much about what I’m going through even more than I care about how much my kids are going through, which is a lot.

Dr. Matt Jones (10:03):
Good. Well, you kind of pointed to this, so I’ll ask a follow-up. So when you look at today’s cultures, what do you think should be celebrated more? I mean, we kind of said what qualities are most often celebrating father’s success, but what do you think should be celebrated more, Christian?

Christian Greig (10:25):
Yeah. So what does society celebrate? And I think often obviously society doesn’t celebrate the right things. I think I used an example with Janel and I’m going to go ahead and use it, but it doesn’t work quite as well now. But I used to actually pose this question to people I worked with, and that was Tiger Woods. Is he successful?

And a lot was made of Tiger Woods’ dad and how he was raised. And is that a model of success? And most people, and Tiger Woods was starting to go through some hardships at that time, I guess, some of those early ones. And a lot of people at work would say, “Yes, yes, he’s very successful. I want to raise my kid like that. I would be very proud if my kid was like Tiger.” And I would redirect him and I’d say, “I don’t.”

(11:14):
What is important? Is it to make a bunch of money? Is it to have people know who you are? Is it to be a celebrity? That’s not what I desire for my own children and as a father, it’s not what I’m trying to model or create. So it’s I guess the biblical principles, what am I really trying to, I want my kids to have, obviously it’s a relationship with Christ and what can I do for that? And yeah, I’ll leave it right there.

Dr. Matt Jones (11:51):
Yeah, I appreciate that because the relationship with Christ will affect their character, it’ll affect their integrity, it’ll affect how they pursue and what they pursue is faithfulness to loving God, loving others and making disciples. So that’s awesome. Thank you, Christian.

Janel Greig (12:06):
That’s great. Hey, are you ready for a speed round Christian? Great. Matt and I, this is one of our favorite parts of the show.

Dr. Matt Jones (12:14):
I like this part. Yeah, this is great.

Janel Greig (12:16):
I love it too.

Dr. Matt Jones (12:17):
And I actually, I’m really interested in the first question because of how you guys celebrate Father’s Day. So you go first, Janel.

Janel Greig (12:23):
All right. Christian, the only rule for this part is short answers, okay?

Dr. Matt Jones (12:29):
But understand, many people have been breaking it. So if you break it, it’s okay.

Janel Greig (12:35):
First one, favorite board game?

Christian Greig (12:38):
Dwellings of Eldervale, but I recommend it for nobody, but for us it’s awesome. Yeah.

Dr. Matt Jones (12:44):
Okay. Wow. Okay. I have not played that. All right. Let’s see. One quality you hope your children remember about you?

Christian Greig (12:55):
That I was willing to be present.

Janel Greig (13:00):
Good. What’s your signature dad joke?

Christian Greig (13:09):
I’ll just tell the one I’ve been telling today. Every day I’ve got a joke.

Janel Greig (13:15):
He does.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:17):
You have a daily joke?

Christian Greig (13:18):
Yeah, every day I’ve got a joke. It’s awesome. What kind of pants do ghost hunters wear? Nothing special, just a paranormal pants.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:34):
Okay. We should go on. Coffee or tea?

Christian Greig (13:37):
Coffee.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:38):
Coffee. All right. Do you guys get up early in the morning and share coffee, Janel?

Janel Greig (13:42):
No, I’m up and there’s coffee ready for Christian when he gets up. He doesn’t get up too far after me, but just a little bit.

Dr. Matt Jones (13:51):
All right.

Janel Greig (13:52):
Christian, best book you’ve read in the past few years?

Christian Greig (13:57):
Strange New World by, is it Carl Trueman?

Dr. Matt Jones (14:03):
Yeah. Cool. And then one word, two more. One word your kids would use to describe you?

Christian Greig (14:17):
Friendly and, I don’t know, nice.

Dr. Matt Jones (14:25):
Okay. Friendly and nice. All right.

Janel Greig (14:26):
I feel like I should follow up and ask them.

Christian Greig (14:29):
Yeah. I am going to ask them.

Janel Greig (14:32):
What’s one thing that you pray for our kids regularly?

Christian Greig (14:38):
I pray for that relationship with Christ above all else. That is always the linchpin, the key.

Janel Greig (14:47):
Yeah. Good. You survived the speed round.

Christian Greig (14:50):
Thank you. That wasn’t bad.

Janel Greig (14:53):
All right. Next question.

Dr. Matt Jones (14:54):
Relatively painless. Yeah. Other than the dad joke.

Janel Greig (15:00):
There are so many, Matt.

Dr. Matt Jones (15:01):
Are there? Okay. All right.

Janel Greig (15:03):
What are some practical ways that dads can point their kids to Jesus in ordinary moments, Christian?

Christian Greig (15:11):
And I know you talk about this a lot, Janel, but I’m a systems guy. I think we’ve talked about that a little bit. I like to understand the world through systems, just how my brain functions. And so I understand reality through a Christian worldview framework. And so there’s always opportunities when you’re in the car, especially when you’re just picking up a single kid and we live in Seattle and there’s lots of interesting things that happen right outside the car’s windows.

And so the kids have all kinds of questions and they will pose a question. And I think rather than giving a speedy answer, I like to explain it with the framework, with the system of a Christian worldview. So this is the question that you have. This is how I’m examining the question. This is how it works into this system where we know what truth and reality is.

(16:08):
And let’s examine this and let’s see how this all works together and how this all pieces together. And when you can start to build this big giant structure like that and make everything fit together in this God-centered reality, you basically can make everything about God. Everything is about God. So why not approach life that way?

And it’s neat because you absolutely see the evidence for that when sometimes one of the kids will ask another kid a question and you’ll see them start to use this Christian worldview framework to examine and understand those questions.

Dr. Matt Jones (16:48):
That’s great. And I’m just curious, I’m going to ask more of a personal question. At what point in your walk or in your faith journey did you go, “Wow, this patterning and this framework really does work and I want to teach that to my kids.” At what point in your journey did that occur?

Christian Greig (17:10):
I’m going to just briefly touch on politics, but I was trying to understand politics. How do I understand politics? And so this isn’t a Christian answer, but there’s a book called The Road to Serfdom by Friedrich Hayek and I used to read these political commentary books and it would be kind of this whack-a-mole where here’s all the political problems that are occurring today and here’s how I see them.

And then the following year, you have new crazy things kicking off in politics and then you read the latest book and I didn’t like that. I wanted something broader to understand it with and Hayek presented a framework. I like his framework, but obviously you should be able to have something in terms of your whole worldview. If it works for politics, then what is the answer? Well, I was already a Christian, so how can I apply that?

(18:04):
And that was my own fault that I hadn’t searched that out sooner. I should have arrived at it in the other direction. I should have the Christian worldview framework going and then maybe that guided me through politics, but it happened backwards. But once I got into that, then I have to share it. So of course I was going to share it with my kids because I find it interesting and I want to share it.

Dr. Matt Jones (18:30):
I think it’s great that even if it was a backwards approach, it brought you to the realization of the truth and the importance of that even with our children, because we need to engage in even that topic with our children. So thank you for giving a little insight on that. Janel?

Janel Greig (18:45):
Yeah. If you could go back and tell New Dad Christian, and this is for you too, Matt, and New Dad Matt, maybe we’ll start with Christian this time so that you don’t have the same answer. But if you could go back and tell New Dad Christian, New Dad Matt, one thing as they started out in fatherhood, what would it be?

Christian Greig (19:06):
And I still, I need more grace for myself and I get hung up and I have gotten hung up on these little decision points. Sometimes it’s, how do I discipline my kid or my kid doesn’t want to take a class, they want to take another class. What’s the right answer? And you grapple with that. And am I making the right decision? And then sometimes I reexamine these decisions years later and I made the wrong decision.

So this is a horrible story, but it’s a good story. And it was 2018, I think, when the eclipse started. It actually started in Oregon, the big solar eclipse that went all over the US. So we drove down to Oregon so we could see this thing and we saw it, and the eclipse happens. It starts to happen, and you’ve got the funky shield that you’re kind of looking at it with. And so my daughter’s probably 8, I’m going to guess something like that.

Janel Greig (20:07):
She was 10. You’re close.

Christian Greig (20:08):
All right. And then we drop the, well, I didn’t know this. So when it becomes the full eclipse, you don’t need the stuff anymore. You have like a minute or two there where you can just look and I didn’t know that. And I look at my daughter and she’s just staring at the sun and I think that her eyeballs are going to melt out of her head. So I yelled at her. I was worried.

But I was too aggressive and then now she’s crying and then everybody else around me informed me that no, you can look at it. And so you have this moment in time which lasts for about two minutes or whatever it is in a full solar eclipse and it’s the only time I’m going to ever experience this with my entire family and my daughter’s bawling and I’ve destroyed it like this whole event and this moment of me just, like I was trying to protect her but I did the wrong thing and it’s like, this is horrible.

(21:04):
So I tried to, of course, counsel her and get her to re-engage with the sun and everything. So we’ve talked about that since then. Of course, my daughter and I, she is fine with it. She laughs about it. It doesn’t matter. You have, our kids will be in our house for 18 years or more. Those single moments, they don’t matter. They see everything. And so I think we get hung up on these moments and it’s really, it’s the big picture. And every day you get another chance to do a good job at the big picture.

Dr. Matt Jones (21:41):
Yeah. appreciate your humility in sharing that because, and I’m going to kind of bookend how you started in terms of being a new dad. If I had, if I were able to go back and speak to myself, I’d say, “Listen, you know, you have about three issues,” and we all have multiple issues, but they’re three primary. And I would have said, “Matt, get earlier help with those issues because your kids are going to have them and they’re going to model them if you’re not careful.”

(22:11):
And obviously the the issues that they have, like for example, I have a temper and I see that in my son every once in a while I’m like okay ultimately that’s his responsibility but I wish I had modeled something different. And so I would say listen. Have the humility, new dads, to say, recognize what are the strengths and what are some weaknesses that you need to be mentored along out of or at least minimize because you’re not going to do this perfectly.

And then whatever you do, have the humility to say, “Hey kiddos, I let you down. I’m sorry.” And because as Christian talked about earlier with the whole tree and his son kneeling even though he didn’t need to or stooping down. I mean, it’s just it’s just something as simple as that.

(22:58):
So Christian, it’s been great to have you on today. And as we close today’s episode, we want to offer a word of encouragement to every dad listening. Fatherhood can be both deeply rewarding and incredibly challenging. And it’s easy to feel the pressure to have all the answers to get everything right. And I’m so glad Christian spoke to that. But as we’ve discussed today, faithful fatherhood isn’t about perfection. It’s about showing up. So again, connecting to what he said, being present earlier, loving your children well, and trusting God to work through everyday faithfulness.

This Father’s Day, remember that your influence matters. The conversations, prayers, hugs, and apologies, and ordinary moments of life are often the very things that God uses to shape your child’s heart. So, take courage, be faithful. The same God who entrusted you with the calling of fatherhood will also give you the grace you need to walk it out.

Thanks for joining us on the Upside Down Parenting Podcast. Thank you again, Christian. Janel, thanks for sharing your husband. Have a happy Father’s Day and we’ll see you next time.

Janel Greig (24:02):
Happy Father’s Day, Christian and Matt.

Christian Greig (24:05):
Thanks.

Dr. Matt Jones (24:05):
Thanks, Janel.