Day One:
John Trent: And so I fall down on my knees, and she falls into my arms. And you know how when your kids are little, they go, uh-uhh?
Jim Daly: Yeah. They kind of convulse.
John T: They just do that cry thing where their whole body cries, you know? And so she finally calms down, and I go, “What’s going on?” And she goes, “Well, I just realized Grandpa’s gone and I never got to hug him.”
Jim: Oh yeah.
John T: Now, I hadn’t talked about attachment theory with her, right? She’s five, you know, I hadn’t talked to her about, but man, these elements of the blessing, when they’re not there, the body keeps score.
John Fuller: That’s Dr. John Trent, describing how the absence of a blessing in your childhood can create a lot of challenges later on in life. Today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, we’ll be exploring what blessings are and why they’re so vital. And thanks for joining us. I’m John Fuller.
Jim: John, I think so many people are broken. Some know it, some don’t. And, uh, it’s part of life to begin to think about those things. Where have I fallen short? Where have people disappointed me? How much of this shapes the way I look at the world, the way I treat my spouse, the way I treat my kids?
I mean, there’s so many good things, and I think there’s a lot of blind spots. I consider myself pretty healthy, but man, I have been working with Jean, and she’s been very good about saying, “Well, you might wanna look at it a little differently.”
John: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Finding those blind spots. Um, yeah, I’m in my 60s now, finding those blind spots, but it’s a good pursuit to stay on that.
John: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And, uh, today we’re gonna talk with some great guests about how to know that brokenness and then how to seek the healing necessary to be whole, and then how to pass that on to your children.
John: Yeah. We’re gonna hear about the blessing and, uh, its application to each one of us. Uh, the concept was introduced years ago by Dr. John Trent and the late Gary Smalley. And, uh, that unique ministry continues on today.
We’ll hear more, uh, as John is working with his daughter, Kari Stageberg. Uh, they’ve joined us here in the studio and head up strongfamilies.com. And they help moms and dads and children improve relationships within the home as they grow in their faith.
Now, John and Kari have written a lot of books, uh, they’re speakers, they do a lot of work together. The book that really forms the foundation for our conversation today is called Your Journey from Broken to Blessed: Finding the Love You Didn’t Receive, and it’s published by Focus on The Family and Tyndale House.
We’ll have details about the book and our guests, uh, online at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.
Jim: John and Kari, welcome back to Focus on the Family.
Kari Stageberg: Yeah. Thank you.
John T: Wow. What an honor.
Jim: You guys have been here before.
John T: You know, um, it has. Almost 40 years ago, hard to believe. Uh, you know, started talking about the blessing right here on Focus.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: We had just done the book, Gary Smalley and I, uh, The Blessing, and we show up in Arcadia, California.
Jim: Wow. That goes back.
John T: And, uh, Dixie. One person at the front.
Jim: Dixie. Wow.
John T: Uh, and they had a little broadcast thing in a closet, uh, there it wasn’t real big, uh, but man, um, you really helped get the word out. And what’s really so exciting about today for us is, you know, for all these times where we’ve come back, we’ve had the chance to talk about the blessing with parents and how to give it. But that’s, it’s always been how do you do it? You know, this is really-
Jim: That’s what we’re gonna talk about.
John T: Yeah.
Kari: Yeah.
John T: But, but so much of what we’re doing with Broken to Blessed, as you mentioned, you know, there’s so many of us that are broken. Well, now, we’re trying to give a blessing that we never got.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: Yeah. And-
Jim: That’s so true.
John T: Oh man.
Jim: You know, I’m thinking about that. The Lord, uh, you know, in His way weaving something together. So Gary’s son, Greg-
John T: Yeah.
Jim: … Smalley heads up our marriage area here at Focus probably for the last 10 or 12 years.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And, uh, you know, it’s just been, it’s a small world-
Kari: Yeah.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: … when you look at it that way.
Kari: Yeah. We love Greg and Erin.
Jim: Yeah. Greg and Erin, they’re doing a great job with us. But, you know, John, let’s get going to give people the help they need. And it starts by explaining what you mean by blessing. I think it was, as you said decades ago, that you discovered this looking at the story of Jacob and Esau in Genesis.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: What, what jumped out at you that, you know, we can apply a what, 4,000-year-old thing that was going on in the Jewish tradition.
John T: Yeah. Well, it, it was, but boy, it goes right to the heart of where we’re at today. I was a, a doctoral student. I was working at a psychiatric hospital in Dallas as a part of my internship. And there was a young man that I sat with for four and a half hours who had tried to take his life.
And, um, he had just gotten his first B as in boy, not D as in dog. Okay? And he was a straight A student. This was a non-major PE course.
Jim: This is what triggered him?
John T: Yeah. And he just,-
Jim: Wow.
John T: … it literally, if his roommate hadn’t have come back, it would’ve been catastrophic. But, um, they get him in the hospital, and I remember sitting with him for several hours, and there’s this deep longing. Well, that night I go home and the next day… So you’re on a 13-hour shift, you know what I’m saying?
Jim: Yeah.
John T: And, and so you’re there all, you know, all day. And, uh, that night I go home and the next morning I’m teaching Genesis 27, and it’s Jacob and Esau. And one of them gets the blessing, and one of them doesn’t. And so, you know, you look at Jacob and boy, he walks outta the tent and he’s got his dad’s… He had to trick his way into it and all that kind of a thing.
Jim: Yeah. Because he was the second born, not the first born.
John T: Yeah, right? But, um, then Esau comes in and he, he’s waited all his life, and now it’s that close, this blessing, okay? And then he realizes he’s never gonna get it. And he cries out with an exceedingly great and bitter cry and says, “Bless me, even me also, O my father.”
And I’m telling you; it was right then. It was almost like one of these God moments. I wish I had more of these times where you just feel like, you know, it was like scales fell off. And I thought, “Oh my goodness. That’s what”… I had a name for it.
So in other words, I’m sitting with this young man that’s broken and hurt, and he’s wants something so much, he’s never, he’s not gonna get it. He’s gonna try to go home and he doesn’t have a four point like he… And all of a sudden there’s this deep sense of loss. And I had a name for it.
It was the bl- you know, that, “Oh, it’s the blessing.” As I began to study it and that became my doctoral dissertation and the first book Gary and I did. But man, what we get to do today is not just talk about the, the broken part. I mean, that’s so important, and we’ll get into that.
But I’m telling you, once we get to the part where you can get God’s blessing to help reverse this, I mean, we’re gonna be dancing here in the studio. Is that allowed? Can we dance in the, I mean-
Jim: Sure. Why not?
Group: (Laughs).
John T: So, and, um, you know, I mean, you keep your hats on ’cause man, once you realize in Christ, you really can reverse all that hurt, it’s so exciting.
Jim: Well, you’re, you’re giving the overview because we’re gonna unroll this.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: But we need to start with the pain of it all ’cause that’s where people are living.
Kari: Yeah, absolutely.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: And Kari, you grew up in a loving home where you, uh, received your father’s love. He’s sitting right here.
John T: I did.
Jim: If you didn’t go ahead and give him a smack.
Kari: (Laughs).
Jim: Oh, it was a hug, that’s perfect. But, uh, that doesn’t guarantee anything. Uh, you know, for parents, –
Kari: No.
Jim: … I, and I, maybe I could direct it this way. You know, we, we try the formula, especially Christian parents we’re so into that, you know, that if we do A, and B, and C, we get the product of D.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: A great kid who loves the Lord, prays four hours a day. But, you know, you’re coming from a home that knew all the Christian things.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Your dad’s writing books about the Christian life, and, but you kind of went into a dark place.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: What happened?
Kari: Yeah. You know, that’s a really great question. And I think the reality is, is I mean, I am incredibly blessed that I did grow up with a dad who is the real deal, who practiced what he preached and with a mom. And there really wasn’t a day where I didn’t know that my dad or that the Lord was crazy about me.
But it really felt abstract to me. And, um, your kids have a choice. I had a choice. And for me it was, “Yeah, that’s, but I, like, I don’t get it.” Like, it was up here, but it wasn’t here. And I didn’t know how to make that transition.
And then the world had some really appealing options that seemed like, “Well, maybe that will answer the question that I have for myself.”
And so, yeah, I did end up walking away from faith and family and ended up eloping, which is probably, like, not the best thing to do when you have a dad in marriage and family ministry. And found myself in the middle of brokenness and an abusive relationship.
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: And I think for some of us, you know, maybe we grew up without the blessing, but maybe others of you were like me, where you went through a season of brokenness where any of that attachment was just ripped away.
Jim: Mm. Uh, John, I’m gonna back the truck up a little bit.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: Because, you know, I wanted to jump to Kari and make sure we understood her perspective in here. We’re gonna get of that story in a little while. But you came from a home that was pretty dysfunctional. You and I have talked about our similarities-
John T: Yeah.
Jim: … being, you know, growing up with single parent moms.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: But what, for the audience, just hit that, your situation growing up, what you were facing.
John T: Yeah. Well, I think, you know, again, like Kari was saying, as we talk about this whole idea of, you know, being broken, missing the blessing. You know, for me, I had a, like you, a wonderful, awesome great mom, uh, was very grateful for her.
Uh, by the time we were about in seventh grade though, she got rheumatoid arthritis. And this, today they’ve got some great RA drugs and, you know, there’s much more. But, uh, her life just fell apart.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: And she had two artificial ankles, two artificial knees, two artificial hips, um, and an elbow replacement that didn’t work. And there was… So she was back in Indiana, we were basically raising ourselves. Today you’d, you know, that wouldn’t work.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: My older brother was, uh, really helping raise us.
John: Hmm.
John T: So you, I had never met my dad. He bailed out when I was two months old. Uh, he took one look at twins, and, and so, you know, your dad leaves, then your, you know, here’s mom. And we thought for sure, you know, man, we’ve won, won the lottery with her. Now she’s gone.
And there’s something that’s called a primal panic with, with attachment, meaning, man, when you all of a sudden wake up… Kari, share with him about Lincoln.
Kari: Yeah, yeah.
John T: It’s a great story.
Kari: Yeah. So, just to give you an example of primal panic in action, um, I’ve got an incredible three-year-old, and we just had transitioned him to his big boy bed. Um, so, you know, now he knows he can get out of bed, which is like a blessing and a curse in so many ways.
But that, uh, a couple nights into this transition, we had gone down, we call it Narnia. It’s basically just this big crawl space that had been finished out. And Joey had just put a TV in Narnia. So we’re like, “Okay, we gotta watch a movie and, like, you know, enjoy Narnia.”
And so we’re down there and Lincoln’s upstairs and we can’t hear him, and he can’t find us. And so finally we hear just this huge wail, and we’re like, “Oh my gosh.” And so we come running upstairs and he’s just hysterical. And it’s like, “I’ve been looking for you and I couldn’t find you.”
And you know, as a parent, you’re like, “Okay, well come down. You can watch the movie with us. What snack do you need? Who cares about bedtime?” Like, whatever, you know? We’re here for you. But I mean, you could just see the panic in his eyes of, “I was looking everywhere”-
Jim: Mm. Yeah.
Kari: … “and I couldn’t find you.”
Jim: Wow.
Kari: “I’m on my own.”
John T: Yeah. And see that’s where that journey starts. When we get attachment that gets broken or severed, or maybe it was never there, you know, and we’re trying to do life, you know?
And then boy, that journey, you start looking and you start thinking there are these basically everyday needs, uh, that can, you know, solve everything. Well, they really can’t. Surface needs aren’t gonna solve our deepest needs.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: And so what the blessing does, man, when we get into what the blessing is, all of a sudden you realize that, oh my gosh, once I get God’s blessing, it’s gonna fill in so much of this hurt. And, but you got, it was like you said at the start, you’ve got to be really honest with that, you know? Life is difficult.
Remember Scott Peck, 100 years ago, uh, who, uh, wrote a great book called The Road Less Traveled, you know? And he goes, “Life is difficult. Once you understand that, it becomes easier.”
And so part of this broken to blessed is we’re trying to get people to just really realize, oh my gosh, okay, maybe there was some hurt there. And you can’t just go the past. That doesn’t affect me, you know? Um, it really does if you’re not really dealing with it.
Jim: Yeah, thinking about it.
John T: Yeah.
John: This is Focused on The Family with Jim Daly, and our guests today are Dr. John Trent and his daughter Kari Stageberg. And, uh, as John alluded to, we’re talking about some of the concepts in the book, Your Journey from Broken to Blessed.
And we’ve got details about the book, other helps for you, uh, and our guests at our website, and that’s focusedonthefamily.com/broadcast.
Jim: Kari, you’ve identified five, uh, key elements of a blessing. Let’s list those quickly and then we’ll come back and highlight a few of them.
Kari: Yeah, absolutely. So, those five things that were always given in scripture, and you know how science is kind of always catching up to the Bible? Now, after decades and decades of research, they’ve realized that these are the same five things that actually create secure attachment in a relationship.
Jim: Yeah. That’s interesting.
Kari: And so those five things are appropriate, meaningful touch, spoken or written words that attach high value and point to a special future. And then it’s really cap stoned by a genuine commitment, which is, “Hey, I’m gonna be there for you.”
Jim: Yeah. And when kids feel that especially, it just creates a secure future.
Kari: Absolutely.
Jim: I mean, they don’t panic. They’re not in the panic mode, right?
John T: Yeah.
Jim: That they’re not getting something.
John T: Yeah. And when you miss ’em, I mean like appropriate, meaningful touch, you know? You think, “Eh, is that really that big of a deal?” ‘Cause touch is so broken today, and people are fearful of hugging or touching or something.
I remember when my dad died now, I finally met my dad just before college, and then I didn’t grow up in a Christian home. I used to hate my dad. Then when I met him, you know, after I became a Christian, I just intensely disliked him. Did you know what I mean? You know?
Jim: Sure.
John T: And then, then I began to grow in Christ and realized, “Well, maybe I had to forgive him because I’m becoming just like him and I don’t even know him.” You know?
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John T: Um, so I tried to build a relationship with my dad. I never really could. Um, he was a angry alcoholic and was still fighting World War II.
And, um, when he passed away, I’m a slow distance jogger, you know, I, I don’t go, you know, I kind of trundle out there, you know? And I, you have to go early in Arizona because if you’re not, you know-
Jim: 3:00 AM I think.
John T: Yeah, yeah.
Group: (Laughs).
Jim: It’s only 90 at that time.
John T: That’s right. Well, he died in August, and it was really hot. So, I come in about 5:30 in the morning and Kari’s up. She’s about five years old at this point. So she doesn’t know my dad real well ’cause she’s only met him a couple of times. But she knew he had passed away, you know, the night before. And she’s weeping, she’s in the hallway and nobody else is up.
And I’m trying to think, “What’s going on,” you know? And so I fall down on my knees, and she falls into my arms. And you know how when your kids are little, they go, uh-uhh.
John: Yeah. They kind of convulse.
John T: You know, they just do that cry thing where their whole body cries, you know? And so she finally calms down, and I go, “What’s going on?” And she goes, “Well, I just realized Grandpa’s gone and I never got to hug him.”
Jim: Oh, yeah.
John T: Now, I hadn’t talked about attachment theory with her. I, she’s five, you know?
Jim: Yeah.
John T: I hadn’t talked to her about, but man, these elements of the blessing, when they’re not there, the body keeps score. And man, we’re dealing with the tough stuff right now. There’s lots of hope coming, but man, you gotta be, be aware. So, did you grow up with appropriate, meaningful touch?
Jim: Mm, yeah.
John T: That’s one thing to ask.
Jim: Yeah. Kari, another one is, uh, attaching high value.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Uh, appropriate touch I think we get.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Uh, attaching high value may be a little more elusive even for adults.
Kari: Yeah. You know, I think if I were to summarize that in one sentence, it really is helping people get a picture of how uniquely they were created.
Jim: Mm.
Kari: What are their unique strengths? What are their unique gifts? And pointing them out in what, in what you see in them. And you know, the incredible thing about that is that everyone has something unique, but scripture gives us so many examples of things that we can use. Um, you know, you are chosen, you are wanted, you are redeemed, you are valued.
Jim: You were created.
Kari: You were created, um, specifically on purpose,-
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: … you know? And so there’s so many examples, just straight outta God’s word. If we’re struggling to come up with something for ourselves or for a loved one of, you know, these are all true-
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: … about us. And so really, it’s helping people get that picture of why am I so valuable?
John T: Mm.
Jim: Both of you can respond to this, but people struggle to believe those things.
Kari: Absolutely.
Jim: It’s one thing to hear it.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And then you can have that child that even though you say the right things as a parent, they don’t believe it as a child.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: I don’t feel special. I’m bullied at school.
Kari: Yep.
Jim: Um, people tease me, um, for whatever reasons, my freckles, I mean, kids are cruel,-
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: … right? They just pick up on something and then they drill that home.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: For that person, maybe now the adult that always struggled to believe those things. When we talk about identity now-
Kari: Yeah.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: … this is rooted in that.
John T: Oh yeah, –
Kari: Absolutely.
John T: … yeah, yeah.
Jim: And so many young people, let’s say 15 to 25-
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: … are in this battle for identity.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And we have that answer as Christians with all the right things that you said, but how do we help open their ears to these things-
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: … so they can not only hear them, but believe them?
Kari: You know, I think it really comes down to an attachment moment with Jesus. And let me give you an example of that. Um, we, uh, do these book clubs where we walk people through the various books that we’ve written. And actually, while we were working on this book Journey from Broken to Blessed, we were doing a book club on the blessing.
And so there was a lady named Nancy who was on our book club. She was 74, um, incredible lady. But for the first like four sessions, she didn’t say a word. You know, she was kind of just listening and observing. And she was really there because her son was struggling, and she wanted to learn how to bless him.
Well, session five hits and she hops on, and she goes, “Look, I need to start this session. Before we go anywhere, I need to say something.” And so you’re going like, “This is either gonna be really good or really bad,” you know, “which one is it?”
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: And she goes, “Okay. I was reading chapter 13 of the blessing, which is where we give them a blessing.” And she’s like, “and I got to line three of the blessing you provided. ‘You are chosen, you are wanted, you are redeemed.’ And she goes, “and I am weeping.”
And she goes, “For the first time in my life, I felt like Jesus had his hand on my shoulder and was looking at me and saying, ‘Nancy, I believe this about you. I really believe this about you.'” And she’s crying. We’re all crying. And she’s like, “My vision’s different. I feel like I’ve lost a weight I didn’t even know I was carrying.”
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: Um, so she had this really amazing attachment moment with Jesus. Well, the next week shows up and she comes back on and goes, “Well, I gotta start again.” And again, you’re going like, “Oh, great. She probably had like the worst week ever. She doesn’t believe any of it. We’re gonna have to do crisis intervention.”
And she goes, “Look, I have been rereading and rereading that, and it has just been getting deeper into my heart.” And she goes, “Last night I went to bed and I had this dream.” And her mom was really the reason that she had broken attachment.
Um, her mom was incredibly abusive. She had mental health issues. She ended up committing suicide. Um, but she was a huge piece of just the brokenness that Nancy had grown up with.
And she goes, “I had a dream where my mom was sitting in a chair and I walked over to her and I was able to put my hand on her shoulder and tell her I forgive her and give her a blessing.”
Jim: Uh.
Kari: And she’s like, “I woke up and I have never felt more different.”
Jim: Wow.
Kari: And so I think for us, it really is, “Hey, what is that? Have we had that attachment moment with Jesus?”
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: And maybe it’s not like Nancy’s, you know? For you it was really, you know, uh, reading a verse again and again in God’s word and it finally made its way in.
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: For me, it was someone showing up at the door and giving me a picture that maybe God’s real, you know? What is that attachment moment?
Jim: And I, I think what I have compassion for is that person that can’t move it from their head to their heart.
Kari: Abs- and that was me. Absolutely.
Jim: It’s all of us actually.
John T: Yeah.
Jim: And that mechanism, you know, I think this is even true of people who won’t believe in Jesus.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: It’s faith.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And you have to find that mechanism that way to believe.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Whether it’s believe for your eternal soul, or to believe that God can heal you in a place that you may never have told anybody about.
John: Mm-hmm.
Kari: Absolutely.
Jim: Like a bad relationship with your mom, with your dad, whatever.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: John, let me come back to you for a moment ’cause this is a powerful story in the same place where picturing a special future, another one of the five that you mentioned, Kari.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: But you had a teacher. I mean, when I read that story, I was like, I would’ve loved to have been your friend in that class-
Kari: (Laughs).
Jim: … and told that teacher, “Let’s go outside for a minute,” because I’m a little bigger than John. And, but it was, that was such a sad thing to say to a student.
John T: Well,-
Jim: To, tell people what it was.
John T: Yeah. That, that’s true. What the story is, is, you know, I’m in high school. Now, you two have, you know, you’re the really smart ones in your family.
Jim: Yeah. You’re the one with the, the PhD, by the way, but go ahead. (Laughs).
John T: Yeah. My twin brother’s a MD-PhD-
Jim: Yikes.
John T: … and you know, is, was the scientific director for the Human Genome Project. And so, so Jeff’s brilliant. I called him the other day and asked him, “Hey, what are you working on?” He goes, “You wouldn’t understand,” you know?
Jim: (Laughs).
John T: “It’s something to do with genetics.”
Jim: He knows his brother well. (Laughs).
John T: Um, but, um, but Jeff, you know, all, my whole career in school, I had teachers telling me, “Why can’t you be like,” what?
Jim: Oh, Jeff.
John T: Jeff, you know?
Jim: Oh, okay.
John T: And, but it’s senior year and it’s, it’s a toss-up on whether or not I’m gonna graduate, uh, from high school. And so I had to pass senior English with the mother of all term papers. Remember that one?
Jim: Yeah, sure.
John T: Senior year? The big one?
Jim: Yeah. You did it the night before. (Laughs).
John T: Yeah. Well, that’s it. And, and, but I turned it in and I’m thinking, “I’m finally gonna beat Jeff,” you know? “I’ve done such a good job in this paper.” And, uh, I get the pa- she passes it all back, you know? Um, this is two weeks before graduation, okay?
This is just, you know, I’m, and I start looking at all this red, I get to the very end, and she’s written in big letters, a D minus.
Jim: Oh.
John T: Not B minus, D as in dog minus. And then underneath it, she writes, “The only reason I’m passing you is because I don’t want to see you next year.”
Jim: Oh, what?
Kari: (Laughs).
John T: That’s what I mean.
Jim: My word.
Kari: And I’ve seen the paper.
Jim: What a two by four.
Kari: He still has it. I’ve seen it.
Jim: Did you frame this thing?
Kari: No, it’s in a box of mementos.
Jim: It’s in a box. Okay. [inaudible] look at it and be really happy.
John T: But, but I mean, at the time I’m thinking, “Well, man, they don’t give away D minuses,” you know?
Kari: (Laughs).
John T: I mean, I, “This is great.” That’s what I’m telling my friends, you know, “cause I’m gonna graduate.” But really, what am I thinking? “What a pathetic loser,” you know? And here’s Jeff. What did Jeff get?
Jim: He got an A plus.
John T: Yeah. He wasn’t in my class. He was in advanced English. But anyway, he gets an A, you know, that’s all he ever got. So I get home and here’s my mom. Now watch how the blessing kind of comes together.
We’re broken. I mean, really and truly, I’m making a big joke out of it. You know, like, “Oh, you know, I passed.” And, you know, great, I got a D but I’m feeling miserable.
And she come, you know, I come home and there’s my mom sitting at the kitchen table and she goes, “Well?” ‘Cause Grandma wanted to know if she, you know, am I gonna graduate, you know? Mom wanted to know. And, and I go, “Well, you know, I passed, you know?” “Really? Let me see your paper.”
And I go, “Oh, you don’t wanna see it?” And she goes, “No, I wanna see it.” So I’m sitting there at the table, and she reads the whole thing, all the red ink, all this stuff. And at the very end, and I’ll never forget my, by this point, my head’s down and she goes, “John, look at me. Look at me.”
So, really good eye contact. We’re gonna see man, when you, you bless somebody, just how you look at ’em. And my mom was great at looking at us and loving. She goes, “Look,” she goes, “I don’t care what that teacher says. You do such a good job of using words, I wouldn’t be surprised if God used you someday to help other people with your words.”
Jim: Wow. That was a prophecy.
John T: Well, I-
Kari: Yeah.
John: Yeah, oh.
John T: And, and I mean, at the time, do you see what I’m getting at? You know, it is just God’s… And, and so we need people in our life to bless us.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: But if it’s not there, then man, we’ll be able to get into that.
Kari: Yeah.
John T: That in Christ, man, we can, we’ll be dancing again because he can fill in those missing pieces.
Jim: Yeah. See, now one of my mischievous thoughts would be to look that teacher up back when you got your PhD and say, “Hey, Mrs. Smith, check this out.”
John T: Yeah.
Group: (Laughs).
Jim: How about that? Thanks for all your instruction.
Kari: Send, send her your first book. (Laughs).
Jim: Yeah, your dissertation.
John T: Yeah.
Kari: Edit this.
Jim: With an A. That’s so funny.
John T: Hey, just, can I close the loop on that?
Jim: Yeah.
John T: I never knew this until literally probably 30, I, I, I don’t know, 20 years later or something. I’m speaking at a church in Phoenix, okay? And I mean, you know how you have a line of people where some people want to talk to you at the end?
Jim: Uh-huh.
John T: But there’s this one little old lady and she’s all bent over, and she waits and she keeps putting people in front of her. So she’s the last one. And then when she looks up to me, it’s my teacher.
Jim: Oh, wow. That teacher?
John T: That teacher.
Jim: Yeah.
John T: And she told, I didn’t know that, she told me my mom had gone and talked to her and said, “You shouldn’t be tea- if you’re saying this to children,” and stuff. But I never knew that. I, I never knew that. And, and uh, so there-
Kari: Did she apologize?
John T: She did. And so that’s just-
Jim: (Laughs). He didn’t wanna work that in.
Group: (Laughs).
Jim: Yeah. Thanks, Kari.
Kari: Sorry. We’ll have to know, like, you know? Not just, “Your mom told me”-
Jim: Oh yeah, she apologized me.
Kari: … but like, “I’m actually sorry for what I did.”
John T: I, I smacked her and we had… No, no, no, no. It was, but there was that. So, you know, God can change other people’s lives-
Jim: Yeah.
John T: … as well.
Jim: Well, it’s all about what happens to us and then what we do to put that on a better trajectory.
John T: Right.
Jim: We need to come back tomorrow. This has flown by. I mean, it’s been really good. But let’s come back next time and talk about the blessing, talk about how we do it, and then how we hopefully have it done to us.
John: Mm.
Jim: That’s nice too. Thanks for being with us.
John T: Thank you.
Kari: Thank you.
Jim: Yeah. It’s been good.
John: Well, we have so much here at Focus on the Family to help you at your point of need. Uh, for instance, our donors have made it possible for us to offer a free over the phone consultation to you if you’re in need.
Um, we’ve talked about some pretty heavy things today. So if you’d like to set up a time to talk with one of our caring Christian counselors, uh, just call 800 the letter A and the word FAMILY. Uh, that’s 800 232 6459. We’ll set that up for you. You can also learn more at our website.
Jim: We also have this wonderful resource from John and Kari, Your Journey from Broken to Blessed. And this is packed with spiritual encouragement and reminders about God’s love for every one of us.
And we recommend you get a copy and make a monthly pledge to the ministry, and we’ll get this book out to you. And that’s our way of saying thanks for helping us strengthen and equip families. Uh, research shows that strong and stable families can lead to more stability in our culture. That is a great thing.
John: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And that’s accomplished when we work together. We can help more marriages and parents and children to thrive in Christ. So please, pitch in and do what you can, a monthly pledge or one-time gift, whatever you can afford, we really need to hear from you right away.
John: Yeah. Please donate today when you call 800 the letter A and the word family, or at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. Well, thanks for joining us today for Focus on the Family with Jim Daly.
I’m John Fuller inviting you back as we continue the conversation with Dr. Trent and Kari Stageberg, and once again, help you and your family thrive in Christ.
Day Two:
Kari Stageberg: I was so locked into my own brokenness that I couldn’t see past that. And so I know a lot of parents are going, “Gosh, like, did they not realize how much this is hurting them or other people or us?” And the reality is, is no, I had no idea. Um, because I couldn’t see past just the situation that I was in in that moment.
John Trent: Yeah.
Kari: And so I think just staying consistent. I mean, my parents had wonderful boundaries in that season, but they also took the opportunities that they could to speak life, and the door was always open.
John Fuller: That’s Kari Stageberg describing a difficult season in her life as a prodigal, and how she and her parents navigated that season of, uh, wobbling faith. Kari is back with us today along with her father Dr. John Trent. And our topic last time, and again today is the idea of giving a blessing to someone and what it looks like when that blessing has been withheld. Welcome to another episode of Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, I’m John Fuller, and thanks for joining us.
Jim Daly: John, you mentioned that the blessing, I’m not sure most people even understand. What does that mean? And, uh, we talked last time about Dr. Trent, John as we know him, observation of Esau and Jacob, you know? Jacob stole the blessing from Esau and it, uh, basically disrupted a lot of history, right?
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And, uh, you know, it’s just part of what we go through. And I think so often in modernity, we just don’t have that blessing from our parents. Sometimes we end up with curses from our parents, and if you didn’t hear last time, go to the website and get the download to listen in or get the app so you can hear all the library of great programs.
John Fuller: Yeah.
Jim: But, uh, it would be good for you to catch the program last time because we kinda set the stage to talk about the blessing this time.
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And I’m sure most people, as I said last time, we’re living in this place, we don’t even know maybe that we have never felt or been given a blessing.
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Jim: That John and Kari were talking about. So today we’re gonna continue that discussion. If you feel broken in some place, which if you’re human, you probably do.
John Fuller: Yeah.
Jim: Uh, you need that blessing. You need to feel like people see you. You’re known, you’re created for a purpose.
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Jim: That your identity, especially for Christians, is in Christ. What does that mean for you now? And of course, the Lord’s blessing to us all.
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Jim: I mean, he is the ultimate father of blessings.
John Fuller: Indeed. Yeah. And John and Kari have written a number of books. They speak, they head up Strong Families, which is a terrific ministry, and we’ve got details about them and the book that forms the foundation for a discussion today. Your journey from Broken to Blessed. Uh, it’s all about what Jim was just talking about. Get a copy of that book from us here. You’ll find it at focusonthefamily.com/broadcast.
Jim: John and Kari, welcome back.
Kari: Yeah.
John Trent: Hey, great to be back with you. Thank you.
Kari: Thanks for having us.
Jim: Yeah. It’s, it’s so good, and it’s always fun and interesting to talk with you about what’s going on. And as I said, we covered a lot of that last time. Kari, you did go through that prodigal stage-
John Trent: Absolutely.
Jim: … And kind of wondered, and were in an abusive marriage and thankfully the Lord, uh, provided a way to a healthier place for you.
John Trent: Absolutely.
Jim: And John, you talked about your childhood, you know, growing up as, uh, you know, with your twin brother and with a single parent mom, and I certainly can relate to that. You know, it’s something like 40% of children today are in that situation, a single parent, a lot more dads. You know, we talk about single parent moms. Boy, we hear from you, the audience. You’re going, “Hey, I’m a single parent dad.”
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: That group is growing, you know, where the dads are taking over, or parents, 2 million kids are now being raised by their grandparents in America today.
Kari: Yeah, yeah.
Jim: Just because the adult children have lost their way.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And so much of this is wrapped up in the gnarled-ness of our childhood and our teen years, and all the addictions and all the coping. John, let me ask you this. Uh, when it comes to those things, the way we medicate, you know, that’s a common thing to say we create coping mechanisms.
John Fuller: Yeah.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: Um, you know, some of those things are maybe not that bad. Biting your nails, you know, whatever it might be. There’s small things that we do to medicate our anxiety, maybe our depression. There’s bigger things like drugs, alcoholism, pornography. So often in the Christian community, we’re quick to attack the symptom as behavioral problems. But those symptoms are really signs of deeper things going on, which is where Jesus would go, right?
Kari: Yep.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: It’s not the fact that you’ve lived with five men, you know? (laughs).
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: It’s this, and he goes more to the core of that woman at the well, or the woman caught in adultery, what have you. Speak to that and how we as Christians could be more effective to look beneath behavior to the core problem.
John Trent: Yeah. Well, man, um-
Jim: That’s a big say.
John Trent: No, that’s a great-
Kari: No, it’s good.
John Trent: … Uh, that’s such a great introduction to this whole broken to bless journey, because I think for a lot of us, you know, we don’t set off to be miserable (laughs).
Jim: Right.
John Trent: We don’t set off to have a-
Jim: It’s kinda like marriage.
John Trent: Yeah. (laughs). Exactly. You know? Uh, no. Uh, but man, um, we start thinking that when you’re lacking that sense of blessing and, and, and it’s so vital, it’s so crucial. Um, if you, you know, weren’t able to hear last time, you know, when you do have somebody that speaks into your life, when you have God’s blessing in particular, and we’ll get into that, there’s deep sense of finally being able to relax. You, you were an awesome athlete, and John was phenomenal, so you guys didn’t have to worry about this. But remember, remember in like, you know, eight or nine years old and you’re on the playground and they’re divvying up teams.
Jim: Oh, yeah.
John Trent: Okay.
Kari: And that was the worst. As a five-foot tall girl, that was the worst.
Jim: Yeah, yeah.
John Trent: Lemme tell you, you know, you’re waiting to get chosen, you’re waiting, you know, and I think for a lot of us, man, we see this person going, this person, and, you know, but when you finally get chosen, okay? Um, guess what C.S Lewis says, he’s talking to the weight of glory about, you know, God loving us, God, you know, blessing us. What’s the weight of glory? He goes, “It’s not that God is glorious, it’s that God loves us.” And he says, “It’s as if the door we’ve been knocking on all our life is finally opened-
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: … And somebody welcomes us in.” And so what I’m getting at is, is we are created for connection. So when we keep knocking on the door and we get rejected and we get hurt, well, that’s where all the self-medication comes in.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: And we can start thinking, “Well man, I’m gonna …” Uh, or we medicate ourselves like, “Oh, I’m just gonna become, if I become famous, that’ll help.” Now, how many times-
Jim: Pursuit of money, whatever it might be.
John Trent: Oh yeah, yeah. And, and, um, you know,
Jim: Wow.
John Trent: When you get fame, when you get things, when you get all this stuff, guess what? That’s not gonna do it. So guess what? You need to be praying to God. And that’s where we’re at. Man, when you get to the place, and for me, it was in high school, who knows, you know, again, with Kari, it was in her, you know, journey. But in Psalm 120:1, it says this, “I cried to the Lord in my trouble, and he answered me.” I mean, that’s that attachment moment. That’s when you realize, “Okay, I didn’t get something. I’ve got all this brokenness, but man, am I tired of it?” You know, we just get so sick and tired of being sick and tired.
Jim: That’s true.
John Trent: You know?
Jim: Yep.
John Trent: And then, um, but man, once we realize in Christ what can happen to us, it’s, it is, it’s just amazing.
Jim: It’s so true. I remember, I remember being at, it was the Seattle Mariners baseball stadium.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: With Dr. Dobson. And he was addressing a group there, a large group, and LGBTQ folks came in probably 30 or 40. And they had tambourines and drums. And when he got up to speak, they began to bang them and hold up signs. There’s probably 40,000 people there. And I remember he just looked, he was on a stage at second base looking toward home plate, and he looked over to the right, right by third base where they had collected. And he just said, “I know there’s pain in your heart.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: And it went silent.
John Trent: Wow.
Jim: They stopped and he said, “You won’t be able to fill that void until you reach out to Jesus.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: And they just stopped, and then he went on with his presentation. They didn’t disrupt any more of it. And I think it’s such a quintessential thing that you’re saying there that I want to highlight it is that no matter where you’re at. With God, without God, believing in Christ, not believing in Christ, that hole in your heart-
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: … Is not gonna be filled with sexual situations, with money, with fame, with a title. You’re gonna get there on that side.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: Which I’ve talked to some of my gay friends, and they’ve said, “Even now we have marriage, it hasn’t filled this hole in my heart.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: And I said, “It never will.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Kari: Yeah.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: And that’s the point of humanity.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: But here’s the follow-up question on that, John or Kari, either one of you-
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: Or both of you.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: This life is set up; it’s rigged for that.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: It’s like the Lord wants us to go through the valley.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And either we go through with our fist shaking at him.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Or we go through humbly saying, “Lord, help me.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Why do we have to do this? Why do we have to be broken?
Kari: (laughs).
Jim: I mean, to go through the brokenness. I love that scripture.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Says he’s close to the broken-hearted.
Kari: Absolutely.
Jim: And saves those crushed in spirit.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: But the person right now listening that’s going through that valley going, “Yeah, I want an answer to that question.”
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: Well, I, I can take that one because I’m coming out of a valley. Um, you know, we’ve talked about my past and, and experiencing abuse, but, you know, brokenness doesn’t stop once you’ve found Christ, you know, things can still happen.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Kari: Life still happens; challenges still happen. And, um, it’s been, I can’t even believe it’s been almost two years, but I was three weeks postpartum. I had a three-week-old, my almost two-year-old, my husband Joey and I, we were in the car driving to go see Thomas the train. And a kid was, two kids were street racing, one lost control their vehicle, hit the back of our truck and we flew into the air, into the median, and then kinda like an action movie caught air and rolled four times on, on I-5 in Seattle. Um, and we, I didn’t know if Joey was alive when they put him in the ambulance. Praise God. My, my two little boys were safe.
Jim: Wow.
Kari: Um, but I just remember while we’re rolling, just saying, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus.” You know, and, and we landed on our wheels. Praise God. Um, but Joey broke five vertebrae in his neck. He suffered a traumatic brain injury. And all of a sudden, I went from being a mom of 202 to, a mom of 202 and a full-time caretaker. And there’s no answers on how long is this gonna last? What does this mean for our family? Um, you know, what is new normal gonna be for Joey?
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Kari: And so the last two years, um, really has been that valley. And I think what has helped me so much is going, I have this journal, um, and it, I call it my blessing journal. And it’s, I’ve gone back, I started a long time ago, but it’s every place that God has shown up, every time he’s shown up big or small. And I go back to that all the time. “Okay. He showed up here, he showed up here, he showed up here.”
And after, you know, five or six of those things, you’re going, “He’s gonna show up here. It may not be different today, but he’s doing something even though I don’t see it.” And that’s not to say that I was super happy the whole time. I mean, it was hard as, as anything. Um, there were some really, really tough moments. And I probably called you crying more in the last two years than I have ever going, “I don’t know how I’m gonna do this. How do, how do you do this?”
Jim: Yeah.
Kari: And so, but God is so close in those moments, and he shows up when we’re, when we’re looking for it, and when we ask for his help. And he, he really can meet us in that brokenness.
Jim: Think of this perspective, Alistair Begg, I just caught sermon that he had on the radio. I was listening, and he said, “If that scripture is true, that he’s close to the broken-hearted and saves those crushed in spirit.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: Why as Christians, we don’t run to that place?
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: To meet God there?
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: That you gotta stop and think about that statement.
Kari: Yeah.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: You know, we want comfort.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: We want quietness, we want peace. We want all those good things. But it’s like, you wanna be close to the Lord, then put, put yourself at risk.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: Or be in a place where you desperately need him.
John Trent: Yeah.
Kari: Well, and I, sorry to piggyback on that because I think that’s so critical, a practical way to do that that really helped me and Joey in this situation was, um, we’ve referenced my uncle a couple times, but it was like three or four days after the accident, my uncle sent us a text message and it was a quote on gratitude. And basically it was, you know, gratitude is the antidote to fear.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Kari: Gratitude is the taproot of joy. And it was something that we could go back to again and again and again. When you’re starting to go through, my husband is alive, my kids survived, I’m still here. You know, we’re, you start listing gratitude, all of a sudden, the fear doesn’t have a place.
All of a sudden that anger is gone. All of a sudden, you are able to really look at it and go, “You know what? It might not be okay today, but God’s not done with the story.” And so that gratitude really was the piece that helped us tap into that joy.
Jim: Yeah.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Yeah. And last time, John, you mentioned your dad very quickly.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: And I wanted to circle back on that because this fits with the concept you have in the book about change pictures of your past.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: You know? And I want you to connect this, but hang on, wait for the question.
John Trent: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jim: The, uh, you know, your dad was disconnected from you. You had an attempt in high school. He didn’t show up and then later connected, but it wasn’t good. He was an alcoholic man. I could relate. So was my dad.
John Trent: Mm-hmm.
Jim: Died of alcoholism.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: And, uh, I want you to speak in that context of that with how to change that picture. I mean, all of us that have abusive substance-abusive fathers, whether it’s drugs or alcohol, and they’re, they’re just not there. They’re not dad.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: They’re not playing the role. How do we change a picture of that?
John Trent: Yeah. Well, you know, two things really jump out at me. I mean, the first one is, is something that happened to this guy named Josiah. Now, Josiah was an Old Testament king. He became king when, as a very young age, right?
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: But guess what? His grandfather was literally so evil, he did child sacrifice. He just was a horrendous person. He dies and then guess what? He does? He goes, “I wanna be buried, okay, in the garden in my home there.”
Jim: Yeah.
John Trent: You know, so here’s grandpa’s memory right there, okay?
Jim: In the palace?
John Trent: Yeah. In the palace there. Well, then his son takes over. He’s horrible and wicked. And he’s literally, it says in Hebrew, he’s slaughtered by these guys. He’s so wicked. He only about three years and then is, is slaughtered. And he gets buried right in the garden in his home.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: Now think about those pictures. Every day you’re walking by the-
Jim: Grandpa and dad.
Kari: Yeah.
John Trent: And so, I mean, you, you would almost think, well now Josiah. And so Josiah walked in the way of his father’s, you know, Manasseh and his dad, you know, well, it doesn’t, it says, and Josiah became in, uh, became king, and he walked in all the ways of his father David.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: Okay? Now wait a minute, David, that was hundreds of years earlier, but what was he doing? You know, when you look at your dad, so I would look at my dad and God bless him. Um, I, I tried to honor him, honor your father, mother. I took, I got all of his war medals, you know?
Jim: World War 2 Vet.
John Trent: Yeah, World War 2 Vet, I got all of his medals and put him in a shadow box. And I put it above the piano where Kari and Laura would practice because I wanted them to realize, “Okay, there’s a good side to dad.” Okay. But I had to choose a different dad, in essence, some different pictures. And, uh, it was this guy, this six foot four ex-Chico state offensive tackle who shows up at our football practice.
Jim: (Laughs). Big dad.
John Trent: And yeah. And I’m, I’m, you know, I’m a stud linebacker. I’m, I’m s- small, but at least I’m slow. You know what I mean?
Jim: (laughing).
John Trent: And, and, um, and this guy is standing there. “Well, I’d never had a dad come to my game, uh, or a practice. Who comes to practice.” Well, here’s this young life leader that shows up. And he would go to our games and go to practices, and then he invites us home. And, uh, what Doug would do, um, is he had, you know, a bunch of us, his wife would cook, you know, these great meals, and we’d sit around the table.
And the first time I ever sat down at the Barham house, um, you know, I, I just dig in, the, put the food down. I don’t know the Lord. You know, this is a Christian family though. And so he goes, “Hang on a minute. Hang on a minute. I’ve already got food in my mouth.” You know? And he goes, “We always pray for the food.” So I’m going. And he goes, “And we hold hands.” And I’m sitting next to Doug and I have never held hands with a grown man. Okay?
My mom never remarried. And, um, so I’m holding hands with Doug, and he prays. And so I don’t know if I was supposed to spit it out or what, you know, but I, but, uh, after dinner, we’re all talking. And then it’s time to put the four-year-old and a five-year-old to bed. And he would walk us down the hall. So picture, here’s four, five football guys, uh, with Doug and the two little kids. Right. You know? And so he puts down one of them and holds Andy. It was Andy and Mike, and let’s say his Andy is in his arms. And so he prays a blessing over him in the hallway.
Oh my gosh, I hadn’t seen something like that. See what I mean? You know? And, and, and then he goes, “All right.” And you know, his beds across the room. And he goes, “Are you ready?” And he goes, “Yeah.” And he goes, “Shadrach, Meshach, and to bed we go.”
Kari: (Laughs),
John Trent: I didn’t get the Bible humor, but he throws it up and he hits the bed and hits the wall. Bounces. And what does a kid do when they’re four or five?
Kari: Again.
Jim: Okay, go.
Kari: Do it again, do it again. (laughs).
John Trent: Do it again.
Jim: Yeah.
John Trent: And he jumps in his arms. Well, I’m telling you, I literally, the next Sunday, I get my Volkswagen van, put the mower in there, uh, drive over to Doug Barham’s house and start mowing his yard. And he comes out and what do you, you know, “Hey, what’s up?” And he knew we’d had no money, you know? And he goes, “Do you need some money?” I go, “No, no, no. I just happened to be out here with my mower.” You know, kinda a thing.
Jim: (laughs).
Kari: Driving by, totally normal thing to do. Yeah.
John Trent: And he goes, “Well, you want, you want to come in for dinner?” Because I had waited right at the end.
Jim: Yes.
John Trent: You know, and I got to have dinner with the Barham’s. And I’m telling you, when you see God’s love, and that’s what he does so often, he gets somebody out of the blue.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: To step into your life. And that starts your journey from broken to blessed.
Kari: Yeah.
John Trent: Because for you, it might have been, you know, a coach or, or that keeper. You see what I’m getting at?
Jim: Oh, yeah. Somebody.
John Trent: All of a sudden, there’s somebody. And man, it can change our life story.
Jim: Mm-hmm. Absolutely.
John: Well, it’s so important to lean into these moments where you’re feeling lost or broken, and to look for God and his provision. And, uh, today on Focus on the Family with Jim Daly, we’re hearing how to do that from Kari Stageberg and her dad Dr. John Trent. Now we’ve got their book, uh, Your Journey from Broken to Blessed and other resources for you, uh, stop by focusonthefamily.com/broadcast to learn more.
Jim: Kari, as we’re zeroing in on this idea of the blessing, I, I wanna bring us back. You talked about your story last time.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: And, uh, you know, having prodigal years and those difficulties and, you know, sorry, but that’s the testimony the Lord has given you.
Kari: Absolutely.
Jim: And so you gotta come back to that. But you came home.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: You had to go to the doorstep and ring the bell and your parents opening the door. What did your dad do that meant so much to you?
John Fuller: Mm-hmm.
Kari: Yeah. You know, I had actually, I had gotten out of that abusive situation a couple of weeks before, and I knew that physical proximity was kind of a key to staying away. So I had actually, uh, gone to Washington State to, um, get some help and some counseling. And he, my ex did not know where I was.
And so that particular time I was flying home, and I showed up at the front door and unbeknownst to me, my ex had shown up several hours before I got home. Um, threatening my family, their physical safety, trying to figure out where I was, and also sharing a lot of embarrassing and probably inappropriate details about what had happened over the last several years. So I didn’t know that I was walking into that.
Jim: Right.
Kari: So I’m coming home thinking, well, I’ve just had a couple of weeks of trying to put my life back together. And I’m finally feeling like there’s some hope maybe, uh, for me to do that. And I get home and discover what I’m walking into. And I remember thinking, “Well, it’s a really good thing my bags are because-
Jim: Right.
Kari: … I’m just gonna be heading right back out.” And I’ll never forget it as long as I live. My dad just put his hand on my shoulder and just said, “Kari, it’s not about where you’ve been, it’s about where you’re going.” And he gave me his blessing. And I wanna be really clear on this, that doesn’t mean that trust was restored in that moment. That didn’t mean that there wasn’t still work that had to be done to heal and, and reconcile things, but I knew in that moment that there was literally nothing that I could do that would cause my parents to say, “That’s it, we’re done.” And that there really was a future for me if I wanted to continue down that path of, of healing. And I had parents that were gonna stand by me and help me walk through that even after they faced something horrible.
Jim: Right.
Kari: Um, and that also I think was the first catalyst for me of realizing my decisions impacted other people.
Jim: Yeah. Yeah.
Kari: Um, it wasn’t just me who was impacted by what had happened. My parents were, were as well, and my sister.
Jim: John, let me, let me ask you this. We’re winding down on the second day here, and of course, we scratched the surface of the book.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: So people need to get the book to get more of the concepts, et cetera. And that’s, that’s what we do. We’re not gonna give you the whole thing ’cause we just can’t do it. And you guys had done a terrific job writing this out, but that the last moments with your dad.
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: I wanna come back there. You’ve described kind of blessing by drip irrigation, if I could say it that way. There is that moment for the big blessing, but even welcoming Carrie back and putting your hand on her shoulder, “We’re always gonna love you. You can’t do anything to knock that love out, but we gotta talk about boundaries.”
John Trent: Yeah.
Jim: You know?
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: However, even that in a way is a blessing. An irrigation, drip irrigation blessing.
Kari: Yeah.
Jim: You’re with your dad on his deathbed, you’re hoping for something I’m sure. Describe what happened.
John Trent: Well, that was kind of a difficult time in the standpoint that I’d had him in three different nursing homes. Now, this is later in his life. He is, you know, a chain-smoking alcoholic. He was still fighting World War 2 and trying to drink away all the bad pictures and memories. And so he is dying of congestive heart and lung failure. And I’d put him in, you know, this one and he had no money. And so I had him in this one nursing home, and he gets kicked out of that because some elderly lady would get invade his space and then he’d get kicked outta that one. So I had him in three different nursing homes.
Jim: Wow.
John Trent: You know, and so the last day of his life, um, you know, we’re talking and I’m praying for him because it’s a really tough way. You know, he’s choking to death.
Jim: Yeah.
John Trent: It’s a really tough, uh, and I’m just praying God have mercy. I wasn’t preaching, you know, and he cusses at me for preaching at him, you know?
Jim: Uh-huh.
John Trent: So I do think for some of us, we’re gonna end up, you’ve had Gary and Barbara Rosberg on?
Jim: Yes. Yes.
John Trent: You know, you know where his whole thing about closing the loop.
Jim: Mm-hmm
John Trent: You know, I was never able, he died at 4:14. I was staring at this clock in his hospital. It was 4:14 in the afternoon. It was about 112 degrees in August in Phoenix when he breathed his last.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
John Trent: And you know, when somebody does that, you know, and I mean, it’s just you, that moment, I mean, you do, you just cry out. Bless me, even me, also my father. But I’m so grateful. Man, I had, you know, Jesus, you know, chooses us, loves us, redeems us. You know, I had Doug Barham, I had my mom.
There’s those people you, that God had put in your life that can help you reverse the curse. But for some of us, um, you know, you gotta prepare for that last day where maybe they won’t, you know, uh, we hear from people all the time, “Oh, I read your book and I went back and talked to my dad and we, everything, everything worked out.”
Jim: And you’re going, “Oh, good for you.”
John Trent: I just love it. No, and you, you’ve done that. Yeah, sure. How many times you’ve done that. But you realize, “Okay, that’s not gonna be true for everybody.”
Kari: Yeah, Jesus is gonna have to close some loops. And you know, same thing with my ex-husband. There’s appropriately no communication and Jesus is the one that has had to close that loop for me.
Jim: Mm-hmm.
Kari: And, you know, he’s able to do that.
Jim: He is able to do that. And what a wonderful reminder from John and Kari today about how God wants to patch the holes in our heart with his unconditional love. That’s what motivates us here at Focus on the Family to spread this good news message to as many families as possible. Uh, we recently heard from a man named Vic who listened to this broadcast every day during his commute to work.
And Vic said this, “Your programs taught me to be a better Christian, husband, father, brother, and more. And I wanna support focus in spreading the gospel and helping families be stronger.” Whew! That’s why we do what we do here at Focus. And with your monthly support, we can encourage the faith of even more Christians like Vic.
John Fuller: Right, and, uh, right now we’re trying to recruit more people to join our Friends of the Family program, uh, where you’re, uh, committing to give to Focus on a monthly basis that really gives us the stability we need, uh, from month to month to respond to hundreds of thousands of families who contact us every year.
Jim: And John, uh, we’re not asking for a huge amount. It could be $10 a month. That collective effort is what makes the difference. $10, $20, all of it helps. And this is a great opportunity for you to do ministry through your giving to Focus. So we want to invite you to make a monthly pledge if possible, or send a one-time gift. And we’ll say thank you by sending you a copy of John and Kari’s book, Your Journey from Broken to Blessed.
John Fuller: We’d love to hear from you today. Uh, just call 800 the letter A and the word FAMILY 800-232-6459 or of course, online, you can donate and get the book. Our site is focusonthefamily.com/broadcast. And you might wanna reach out to us for help if you’ve experienced brokenness in your family. Uh, maybe you really resonated with the stories from John and Kerry today and, you know, a similar kind of pain.
Uh, if so, we’d be happy to connect you with one of our caring Christian counselors. Just call 800 the letter A and the word FAMILY, and we’ll set that up for you. We hope you have a wonderful weekend. And then join us again on Monday for some practical advice about how to have a conversation with someone who doesn’t believe.
Justin Brierley: People want to feel that they’re actually being heard at their end. You know that you’re taking a real interest in them, that you’re not just seeing them as a sort of project if you like. And that’s where the gentleness and respect comes in because the way you say things matters just as much as what you say.
