Recovering the Productive Household

His role is to create a household that is economically productive . While Christians today are quicker to acknowledge many of the spiritual roles that a father must carry out and these are no doubt important Wiley rightly asserts that fathers must also establish well-ordered , productive homes that bind the family together in economic pursuits .

The knee-jerk reaction is to think this means everyone starts a hobby farm , but that's not really the point . There are a plethora of ways that a father can work within the grain of his household to establish productivity , build wealth and pass on vocations to his sons .

Among other things , this means fathers need to understand and rightly apply the right use of real property and the work ethic that is to be employed in the aim of creating a home economy . The goal of all of this is to create multi-generational household structures that leave a lasting impact .

Traditionally , the Christian household served many roles it was a nursing home , a school , a charitable institution , an apothecary , a place of warmth and hospitality and dozens of other things as well . Wiley writes people in a household shelter each other by working together and protecting each other .

It is the working together that makes a household an economy and it is the protection that makes it a polity . We don't think of houses that way anymore , largely because the economy has moved out of the house . One thing we can say for modern life is that it has a way of cutting things up .

We work downtown , we get our food at the grocery store , we go down the block to learn at school and we get on a plane to go somewhere and relax . Our lives are divided up among highly specialized institutions , but a household is a general purpose institution . Before we segregated everything in the interest of efficiency , houses were not only economically productive .

They were schools and nursing homes and dozens of other things . This is a book about building an old fashioned general purpose shelter , a real house , not a house made out of sticks and bricks . This is a good time to build one too . The conditions haven't been this favorable in a long time . End quote .

In our modern day , the home has often become nothing more than a hotel where people meet once a day to eat a meal and maybe watch Netflix . Family members go out to do work or school or sports in the world . Beyond that , they have little in common by way of vocation or mission .

When they're gathered together , husbands and wives , daughters and sons share no common tasks or work , all of which has been exported to somewhere other than the home . The net effect is that homes have been robbed of significant meaning and become fruitless wastelands for consumption rather than production .

Marriages and familial relationships languish because they don't do anything of real importance together . In order to rebuild productive households , as Wiley argues we must , there has to be first a revitalization of the meaning of fatherhood .

While many fathers today rightly seek to nurture and build friendships with their children and wives , they're all too often mere lightweights in the polity of justice . They lack the gravitas or weightiness required of their station . Wiley explains quote as with any institution , nurture and friendship are just not enough to keep a household going .

Even in the best of circumstances , sooner or later you'll need justice . Even in the best of circumstances , sooner or later you'll need justice . And when it comes to justice , nurture and friendship can actually get in the way A judge has to separate himself from people and rise above them . Paradoxically , to do that you need to put on weight , you need gravitas .

I think you know what I mean . We've all known people that just can't be taken lightly . When one of these people enters a room , you feel his presence , your eyes lower , so does your voice . In the high school I attended , we had a vice principal charged with school discipline . Talk about gravitas . He weighed a ton . His name was Shu , mr Shu .

To you and me , no one knew his first name . He probably didn't have one , or maybe his mother just named him Mr . All I know is that he was universally feared . Even teachers feared him . Now you may be thinking how awful . No one should be feared . Really , here's a little anecdote to show you just how wonderful it can be to fear someone .

I recall an incident on a school bus . At the end of the day . The bus was full and we were waiting to leave behind a long line of buses . Some of the rowdier guys in the back tough kids , drug users , you know the sort were teasing and bullying kids near them . Our fat bus driver was a lightweight .

He squeaked from the front , something that might be interpreted to mean please stop . There was laughter and someone shouted shut up , old man . Other kids , nerds and such slid down their seats and prayed for a quick ride home . They had seen this movie before and everyone knew how it ended . Then a voice from the back said cool , it , it's Mr Shoe .

Mr Shoe was walking toward the bus no hurry . Just a man in a dark suit looking in our direction . You could feel the atmosphere change in the bus . The burden of dread oppressing the weak now shifted and began to weigh down the strong . When Mr Shue stepped onto the bus and ascended the short set of stairs , he was greeted with silence .

He looked us over , scanning faces . He didn't say anything , just stood there projecting authority effortlessly like a fireman shooting water from a hose . Then he pointed at the two boys in the back and beckoned them to follow him . Then he stepped out of the bus and walked away . The boys silently got up and went .

We all watched them follow Mr Shu into the building . If I recall correctly , mr Shu never looked back to see if they were coming . That's gravitas , man , you want it ? End quote . If we , as heads of households , want to be men of weight or gravitas , we must build weighty households that shape our communities .

If we want to lead as heads of household with realized authority , then we must take our responsibility to lead our families in dominion realized authority . Then we must take our responsibility to lead our families in dominion-oriented pursuits of fruitfulness and productivity .

In this episode , we'll sit down with Adam Madden , a pastor in Brigham City , utah , whose passion is helping men rebuild productive households . He's built several businesses with his wife and nine children , including a trout farm and multiple dog kennels that serve as the economic engine and glue for his productive household .

Today , we'll talk with Adam about three different models for household structures , as well as how we got to the point in our culture that the standard household makeup is highly fragmented and ineffectual . In addition , we'll talk through biblical structures for the home and how to rebuild them today .

On top of that , we'll get very practical , as Adam gives us a window into what daily life for his family looks like . We hope that it inspires many of you to start or continue building your own uniquely productive household in a way that brings glory to God and helps extend Christendom .

The King's Hall Podcast exists to make self-ruled men who rule well and win the world .

If you're watching on YouTube , leave a comment . Leave a pro Ben Garrett comment .

You're building one of these households , doing my best , doing your best , but one of the questions I have , just right off the top , is what do you think happened to the productive household , particularly in Christian terms ? It seems to be something that just isn't addressed often in the modern church . Sunday , you were preaching about this .

You said we did a long series on the natural family and guess what ? We're going to keep talking about it . Yeah , but there's a reason that we have to do that .

God made humanity to constitute himself societally and culturally into units of families , society and culturally into units of families , and not just nuclear families of father and mother and their children , but also extended families and tribes and communities .

He built us to be a social creature where most of our Christian duties are actually going to be carried out in , not in a neutral context , that's sort of abstract but most of our Christian piety is going to be lived out in a family . I would guess that 80 plus percent of our Christian piety is going to be lived out in the family .

But what we've done in the post-enlightenment and a post-industrial revolution world is that , like Chris Wiley points out in the book , we've pulled all of the constituent parts of life into their elements and we've tried to make each of them an isolated end in and of itself .

So , rather than families and tribes and communities being a hub where all of our duties are lived out , now we have the home as sort of a train station where people go to get on a train to go to the next thing , and they go to get on the train to the next thing , and so , in a lot of ways , I think we underestimated , as this economic transformation

happened in society , the impact that that had on all of these other aspects of life and culture , which is why I'm really excited for the listeners to hear this interview with Pastor Madden , because he really cuts to the heart .

Not only does he cut to the heart of a lot of these issues , but he's also living them out in the world that we still live in , because we can't go in a time machine and say , okay , well , the industrial revolution really jacked up the family . Therefore , let's hit Command-Z on the Industrial Revolution .

So , right off the top , how would you counter that sort of critique ? Yeah , that we're not just trying to . This isn't like a boutique thing , but we're saying let's take the tools we have now . And Pastor Madden , I know him . He has an iPhone , so he's using social media , he's using some of the tools that we have today . Still , but why is it ? I guess ?

How would you respond to that sort of critique ?

John Moody is very much in the agrarian world and if you don't know who John is , john's a great man . He does a lot of work with Joel Salatin and is super knowledgeable on food issues , agricultural issues . It's more homesteading . It's more homesteading kind of side of things .

And then you have Chris Wiley , who's he's not homesteading but he is involved largely in productive real estate and real property .

And then you , you know , we have guys like Tim Sixth that we interviewed , that were more on that side as well , and you can you can find examples of Christian families living out productivity and bringing productivity back into the household so that it's not a train station anymore where people just happen to go before they get on the train to the next activity .

You can find homes like this across the spectrum of economic activity , from digital entrepreneurs who are working in an online economy all the way back , certainly , to a more agrarian world .

But even in those , the people I know that are involved in those agrarian things , they're very much knowledgeable and savvy when it comes to the internet and selling things on the internet and leveraging those technologies .

So , frankly , it just shows me that people they're not aware of who's involved in these things , not aware of who's involved in these things , and their imagination is really stunted where they can only think of fixing the problem by traveling back to the little house on the Prairie time when really that's you simply can't do that .

But what we can do is we can look back and start questioning the presuppositions that we've inherited and think , like a household must be ordered this way A man must have a nine to five job , he must have this kind of thing that they must , you know , daycare , wife works , kids go to school , like this . Kids do that . You know .

We , instead of just receiving those things uncritically many of which are very novel in terms of human history , for certainly and say how can I look back at the principles that marked those earlier ways of being and adapt those principles and land them in the modern day and that's certainly possible , you can do that in a lot of creative ways .

That begins to press back against this atomization and anti-family , anti-human economic world we find ourselves in .

There's this idea embedded in all of this that you cannot fully recover the biblical household until you've done something about the economic productivity . Now it's interesting to me if you read older reform guys , if you read Bovink or Gouge , they would have talked about this standard as a requirement for the home .

But I want to ask you , particularly with Christendom , we're about this bigger project of Christendom . Wealth becomes a part of this . And economics but why then ? Economics in the household being so pivotal for the rebuilding of Christendom together ?

One of the ways that they've sought to undermine the power of the family because statism , like one of our biggest enemies , is statism is this like secular , humanist , deified state attempting to swallow up everything .

One of the ways they do that is by taking the power from the family and forcing you to live on somebody else's reservation when it comes to all of your economic productivity . Like you now must work for this globo homo corporation , they're going to make you put your pronouns in your bio and get vaxxed or you're fired , all of this sort of stuff .

And you start to see how powerless they've made the household , where it can't fight back because it doesn't have the economic weight .

But if you imagine on the other side of things not just families but tribes and communities , what we call Christian boroughs at New Christendom Press , beginning to reclaim that economic center and forming businesses and entrepreneurial exercises and bringing back that economic engine into the household , the tribe and the community , all of a sudden you have real cultural

power . You have real political power . You have real power all over the place Because you've rejected , you haven't let them plunder and take away an engine of culture and power , which is economics .

You know , if we have public education , we're probably still going to lose a lot of our kids .

But then you get , especially with men , into this issue of economics , if you don't find vocations that are meaningful and economically freeing , if they're still beholden to the corporations which , by the way , during COVID it was really the corporations acting as the strongman of the state , and so you've got to free men from that .

I want to ask you in the episode Adam talks about three models of household which we'll get into with him . One is the fragmented home , and I think this is the one that is so problematic . But in the fragmented home you have mom and dad going to work , they have their separate jobs , you have kids going to daycare or public school .

This one's obviously a problem . But then he kind of talks about a middle one . He said I think there's a lot of people here and this is the 1950s model which he describes as it's more of a domestic focus . Right , mom stays at home , does some domestic duties , but dad goes off to work and you're still , generally , kids are going to public school .

This is kind of the leave it to beaver . They're not doing a lot of things together . And then the third one would be kind of the historic norm , which is a highly integrated family culture , people working together in business . My question for you is why would that fragmentation be so destructive ?

And I think about it like even in the overlapping spheres we tend to have here with New Christendom Press , the church and the school , I mean , we've got so much overlap where it's like our kids are right upstairs . We're interfacing with our spouses regularly throughout the day . We probably experience a lot of freedom that a lot of people don't , yeah .

So why is that so destructive to have this fragmentation ?

And then your neighbor , as you seek biblical definitions , works itself out in concentric circles .

Vocationally , my most immediate neighbor is that I must rule my own spirit , basically treat myself like someone I'm in charge of yeah , you know , then my wife , then my children , then my brothers and sisters , my , you know , family members of my own household , extended family , church , business relationships .

When you fragment everybody all out in a million different directions , they're never pushing the plot , pushing the same plow in the same direction , and so they're basically developing off in all these different directions , naturally , and that's where their strength and focus and affection goes and that's how you end up with , like this phenomenon that's common , where a

husband and wife . They get married , they love each other , they're , you know , very relationally close , they start having children and then they get sucked into all the things and then , when their children leave the home , fast forward 25 years and the last kids leaving , they find that they have nothing in common because they haven't actually done anything together .

They've been sort of pursuing these isolated roles , that 1950s model , but they're not all linking arms together on the same project . And it leads us even to ask questions that , like the question itself , shows how far we've come , gone from the .

I think the ideal Questions like can a woman work , and what people mean by that , is like in a patriarchal home , should a woman have a job ? And our answer is nine times out of 10 . Well , no , because what you mean by a job is should she go out and get a career and be gone 40 hours a week ?

And now the kids need to be in daycare and she's taken out of the home and Titus 2 isn't happening . She's not doing those duties . So the word of God is being reviled just like Paul said , serving another man , not her husband . Yeah , she's doing all these things .

But if you go back further you find that that's almost an incoherent question for most of history , because she would have been deeply involved in the economic productivity of the household that the man was certainly the breadwinner in and it was his trade or his business or his farm . But she was deeply involved .

And so when you start to move back to this , it's like John Moody's really good on this too .

He does a lot of explanations of how , when you bring the economic productivity back home , your wife is deeply involved in the economic productivity as well , which isn't just measured in dollars in , but it's also in dollars not burned doing something meaningless , Like when my wife is home canning food and preparing us .

We have like huge store of shelf , stable food that my wife has canned and she's gone out and she's taking dollars that I've made and economic productivity in many ways that we work together on as well , and she's now made every dollar I make more efficient and effective , because we don't need to go let's say something comes up in the day .

We don't need to go to a fast food restaurant to eat our dinner because she's economically productive . We've got food stores . We've got beef stew on the shelf . That's better than anything you'll get a can in the store .

So this is just one example of a way that , working together economically , my wife is very much contributing to the economic picture of our household , and not just by opening an Etsy store , which is fine , but I mean it's . It's much deeper than that .

And you know , part of it could be ignorance , I think for some people it probably is , but it seems like also a big part of this is also cowardice , that you've got to confront the idols of the day , and I think sometimes it's helpful . I want to read a Boving quote .

But this is where this is early 1900s , this is where our reform fathers were on issues like this , particularly with women and their roles . So he said this . He said the woman can know her land in a better situation than in the family , at the side of her husband who loves her , surrounded by her children whom she tends and nurtures .

Her nature is designed for that . Her orientation lies in that direction . There she best fulfills her calling and best reaches her destiny .

So I just want to ask you , in the church particularly how did we get to the point where Bobbink is seen as a total weirdo and what we're going to say in this episode is going to seem very foreign to a lot of Christians . What happened with the church ?

Like , you have to have a society with so much excess and security that basically women are able to go out into the workforce and in the way that they do . But I really think of it as death by a thousand cuts , where you have all these small movements and you can trace them to .

You know , take the way we think about education , where before education for a long , long time would have been something that was considered very important , particularly in Protestant America , the concept that we would educate children , boys and girls , so that they would be able to read and know the scriptures themselves . And again we've talked about this before .

You can go back to the old deluder Satan Act in the 17th century , even pre-revolution America , and you see the roots of these things . But then what starts to develop ? As you go into the late 19th and then early 20th century , education starts to creep up and consume more and more .

So no longer do we have a model where young men , as they get from about 14 to 16 , are either preparing for university , which was very common in the founding .

You'd have men going to university , to Harvard or schools like that at 14 , 15 , 16 , or going out to work in their father's trade or vocation on the farm , or learning , starting to enter the workforce at these ages , and young women then entering into much more focused on learning the arts of the home and caring for the home and the way that those trade and

home interlocked . Well then we said actually now let's extend universal education to 18 . Well then , what happens after that ? That's a cup , that's , you know , maybe the first hundred cuts . And then then we say that's not enough .

Higher education , which goes from a very specialized thing that's going to be useful for certain trades or certain locations and mostly Now it's everybody . And mostly men . Now it's going to be men and women and eventually mostly women , which it is now majority women in university .

Yeah , I think it's like over 60% women , very heavily skewed towards women , and it's going to be something that's now universal , so everyone should go to college . So now we have an extension of adolescence through 22 to 26 .

And on top of that , instead of being economically productive from 14 , 15 , 16 and on , people are not contributing economically until they're 22 to 26 . And once they start that , they're often now starting with six figures of debt , which does what .

It forces everybody , men and women , to go and get a high enough paying job that they can now pay off all of that debt . It's like starting a race with , you know , like a hundred pounds of weight on your back and every mile you run you get to take a pound out .

And when I look at the New Testament , even in the raising up of elders , certainly Paul says to Timothy don't let anybody despise you for your youth . Absolutely , there are young men , younger men , who go into ministry , but a general model would be that elder would mean something .

I didn't have anybody telling me these things when I was 20 . That's fine . I didn't have anybody telling me these things when I was 20 . But now at our church , like we don't , we're not asking 24 year old men to enter elder candidacy .

No , we're telling them build productive households , show that you can do something competently , show that you can manage your household , show that you can care for people and rule well and lead and govern and you know all of the things that it takes to build a productive household .

And then when you're in your 30s or 40s , some of you are going to be dynamite elders in the church .

But there's a lot of young guys , for example , who are 14 , 15 , and they need to legitimately start thinking about what are you going to do vocationally ? Yeah , and I think to enter the workforce full time at 17 or 18 , and then , before you're 20 , you have three years of vocational training .

Financially , this is actually going to be , you know , a huge advantage for them .

Lexi and I just did an episode of Bright Hearth which is about productive Christian households , particularly leaning towards equipping women in the home to think about productivity in the household , and that we did a series on the four cardinal virtues of fortitude , temperance , prudence and justice and Lila Lawler , who is an older lady .

She wrote a work called the Summa Domestica . She's a Roman Catholic lady but she defined justice as the virtue of giving everyone his due . I thought that was such a it's an old way of thinking about justice giving people what they're due .

And as I thought about how this related to the household for that episode , things clicked into place about the productive , economic aspect . Because how am I going to tell a young man getting married and I want him to be able to get married and start having kids when he's 20 to 24 .

I mean , like not everyone's going to get married at 18 or 20 , but some of them will , some of them 24 , 25 , you know whatever . How am I supposed to tell that young man to give in his marriage , everything that's due to a wife , which is children , her being home and productive at home , all of those things if he's not even capable ?

Because I've taught him that the pathway to mature manhood is something that basically begins after you're done getting a college degree when you're 22 . And now you can start your vocational training . That's one of the final things you can't give your wife and kids what they're due .

You know some of these higher education models , because fundamentally , what will happen is , you know , you end up saying to girls , well , don't get married until after you finish your degree , right , and then you finish your degree and you have debt , and so you're like well , I got to work first , yeah , and so the biblical priorities of household , family , et

cetera are naturally , it's easy going to get pushed off . It seems like one of the things we're also trying to correct here , which again is going to seem so foreign , I think , to the modern listener , is we're saying no .

I think ideally , having young people in their sexual peak in those years , trying to not commit sexual sins and not fall into these follies while delaying all that is probably a recipe for disaster .

Yeah , but what if she had a dowry of $60,000 instead ?

We need lawyers and civil experts who probably have degrees in law , financial , financial experts , engineers , things of that sort that genuinely require technical licensing and expertise .

A lot of our young men are going to go on a higher education in those , but let's imagine that they knew that and they started at 16 pursuing that , and then mom and dad were helping them .

And then he finds a Christian wife whose father was helping prepare a dowry for her , and then they get married and they're able to start with a lump sum or with a head start in their early marriage . So it's not even a question of can we have children ? It's like , of course we can have children . Mom and dad helped us prepare . We were set up for this .

We were set up for this from our early adolescence coming into adulthood . We were set up for this trajectory . This is how we're trying to train our people in Ogden to think , especially as we have many , many children under the age of 12 .

Right now we have a school and we're looking , as we did , at the founding of St Brendan's , where we said we don't need to pursue the model of school that requires you to charge $8,000 per student per year of tuition or more , which again think of the economic impact of that kind of model on what a father can give to his son when he is 18 .

Then he's given him a great thing in the education . But are there other ways ?

And when we looked back at the way education had been handled in ages that were producing brilliantly competent men and women , men who were going to Harvard at 14 , right , who knew Latin and Greek , okay , and we looked at it , we said I'm pretty sure that if we just do what they did , we can have students who are classically educated , know their Latin and

Greek and know their classics and know their logic , know their rhetoric , know how to think , who are 14 , 15 , and 16 . Rather than 24 . Rather than 24 . Yeah , and some of them certainly are going to go on and become experts in Latin or law or mathematics or something else , or engineering , you know , fill in the blank , but most of them probably aren't .

which means , like , you get to take vacations One of the things that we've done , and you and I were talking about this this morning . You drive , let's be realistic , a quite opulent vehicle .

In fact , I didn't put any of the stickers on that are there but it looks off , yeah , uh .

He had the dog kennel and it was doing quite well , yeah . And he said , look , this is you know , I'm taking care of my family . I'm doing quite well with this . But he said that's not why I started the other businesses the trout farm and a second dog kennel .

He said , and I thought this was just a great picture of post mill legacy building type of thought . He said I need businesses for my sons and son-in-laws to run .

Yep , because for my sons and son-in-laws to run Yep , Because he's thinking about the future and he said look , I can hand him $70,000 , but what if I give him a job and a business that they can ?

I had a conversation with my sons on the way to school the other day to St Brandon's and they were saying you know , they rib sometimes about the car because it's a funny car . It's ridiculous . They're like Dad , you know , why don't you get a Tesla ? Why don't you get a cool car , like you know ? Why don't you get a Tesla ?

Why don't you get a cool car , like you know ? Why don't you get a Tacoma or something awesome ? And and I explained to them uh , I was like okay , son , you know , I could go get one of those today . It wouldn't be a problem , I wouldn't even be financially irresponsible . I could go buy a new one of those tomorrow and it would be fine .

Um , pay our bills . All of that's great . But I said , son , would you rather dad drive a Tesla or a Tacoma or whatever it is now , and then in or in , seven years oldest son , when you're hitting 18 and you're you're looking to start a business or get established in a home or get married , would you rather me be able to help you significantly with that ?

And he was like I want the Tesla . The younger one said the Tesla would be better , but the older one it got through . He was like , oh oh , no , I want you to do that . So I was thinking about my wife and I talk a lot about this the two stages of inheritance for our children .

And the first stage of inheritance is that when they're coming out of childhood into adulthood , right at that critical moment when I'm wanting them to be starting their own households , establishing in businesses you know , my daughter's getting married to competent men I want to be able to inject help there , like to Adam's point , a business , or help them build

something or hire them , because that's , quite frankly , that's when you need a lot of the help . It's like why do people think we're doing New Christian Impressed so we can hire our sons , and we already do ?

That's the first stage of inheritance . Is right there . The second stage is when I die or I'm about to die or I'm in my old age and , lord willing , at that point I am trying to leave inheritance to my children , but they're going to be in their 50s I hope , lord willing , older .

That's the point when I'm actually wanting to then give inheritance to my children's children as they're starting to enter into adulthood . So then I actually , as one man , have injected help into this foundation stones of two cycles of households forming my children and then their children .

And then they grow up with the head start that they got and now they're going to be able to do that for their children's children , and you see how this can form family dynasties . This is how you end up with a company in Ogden in 20 , 40 , 50 years that employs 1,500 people and is propping up huge aspects of the economy of our local church community .

It's those kinds of decisions being made now , when you're in your 30s , that are difficult because the shiny thing is getting a new car or getting lots of consumer debt , or living above your means and thinking like , well , they'll just get college debt to go to college and then they'll be able to figure it out . I did .

It's like we need to be thinking not about ourselves but about building engines of economic productivity in our households that then continue to grow in their orbit . They never leave the center of the household , but they grow and they encompass more households intergenerationally and in our tribe and community .

Man , that's powerful and that's why I'm so excited about this interview , cause it's like . Adam Madden isn't a guy probably any of you have heard about before . He's not like doing conference circuit or something like that , but here's the guy we know personally and Eric knows really well and he's in our community .

He's a pastor , um , but man , he has skin in the game , he's doing this and has done this and his children are entering adulthood with strength . And I look at that guy and I go if we can get more 20s and 30-year-old guys and women , men and women thinking this direction now . The fruit that it could bear in 20 years from now is unbelievable .

You can preorder now , but the Haunted Cosmos book yeah , we've got Patreon . You can support this show , haunted Cosmos . I think one of the really cool things about this is that , like my oldest son will be shipping the books . Things about this is that , like my oldest son will be shipping the books . We're actually doing that with this business .

So when people support , it's not just some ethereal thing you're supporting , it's real people in a real place .

But Benjamin also works really hard in researching and writing for our shows and is getting training from like Ben right now , who writes for Haunted Cosmos , so Ben's really good at that .

He's now helping Benjamin level up even more in becoming great at that , which is an amazing skill that not very many people can do , and he's been doing this since like was he 17 when he started , or 16? . He was actually 16 . He was 16 when he started and people look at that and they go . How could you have a 16-year-old helping with writing , you know ?

Deep historical analysis of the first Christendom for a show . It's like of course they can . They were going to Harvard when they were 14 .

You know , take a couple , some of them will clear it first try . But if you don't put the bar there and you're just like , eh , snooge your way out into the future , collecting debts and so in porn use and all this stuff until you're like 23 , and then you'll and then you'll figure it out .

And this is Adam like oh boy , this should be interesting , but it was great they learn it . And it's like you have that high expectation and the high bar , brian , for the Haunted Cosmos book . I believe it's on newchristianimpresscom .

So everybody that's pre-ordered , thank you . Pre-orders for a company like ours helps us quite a bit because we do have to pay for all those books before we sell any of them .

So if those of you who are pre-ordering , you're helping us pay our employees pay for that tens of thousands of dollars in inventory and continue to hopefully publish legacy content , books , media . That's going to help build the new Christendom as much as we can contribute to that . So check it out .

It's a book about how to do your duty in this world that God made the seen and the unseen . It's a book about how to do your duty in this world that God made the seen and the unseen . It's not just to read . People ask like , is it a rehashing of Haunted Cosmos episodes ? No , not at all . Completely original . It's .

If you've read something like Notes from a Tilt-A-Whirl by ND Wilson or Death by Living by him , or , you know , discarded Image with CS Lewis . It touches on a lot of different aspects of the world that God made and how to do your duty in them , but it's much less . It's not like . Here's a series of stories about Bigfoot .

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Adam , thanks so much for joining me for this episode .

But one of the things that we've been talking about on the show I know you've listened to the podcast episodes as well is building wealth , and so what I wanted to do in this episode was talk through just kind of how you got into kind of the small business world , productive household , thinking through that Um and so uh .

For people who don't know , you run a uh , it's a pet hotel right .

And our kids are getting older and so they're like , hey , we're like , can we rent this farm ? A little piece of paradise . And they're like , sure , and so we kind of stepped into that and been learning aquaculture and all those good things .

They would sit in the corner of the coffee shop and do their studies or whatnot . So , you know , full-time ministry enabled some integration of my household and work and so we did that for a long time . But as our kids are getting older we have nine children , so we're just trying to think that we have a lot of margin now and their assets .

You know these kids are assets and so how do we use that well and set them up for their future , potentially ? And all of that , eric , comes back to the idea I think you know when we came out , usually a church planning vision is three to five years , three to ten years .

Our way of thinking has changed on that and it's more of a three , four hundred year vision . Yeah , that's right , and so we would see faithfulness in church planting in Utah being , you know , multigenerational instead of you know , often they're short-lived , people move in and out and so you know that's a different story .

But along those lines , yeah , kids are getting older . Looking at responsibilities towards them , looking at what we want to do with the church plant where we'd like to see that go , putting down roots , all that has to do for us with entrepreneurial thinking then .

That got you there , and part of the reason I asked that is because I remember , like in Kentucky , when I was in seminary Wendell Berry is from pretty close to where we were going to school , and I remember reading some of his stuff , and I'd never heard this in Christian circles , but he was talking about , yeah , the most basic economic unit in society is a

marriage , and I was like I'm sorry he's talking about , yeah , the most basic economic unit in society is a marriage , and I was like I'm sorry he's talking about marriage and economics , what is happening here ? But that was the beginning for me . You get into some Alan Carlson .

Later we get into , like Rory Groves , but I'm curious , was there stuff you're reading or what kind of ?

You know way too young , and this is a longer story but the short part of it is you know , about four or five years in the ministry and marriage , paige and I look at each other and we're just we don't know anything about being . I don't know what it's like to be a head of a household .

Puritans come across , guys like Baxter , and they're talking about simple things like family worship . And you know Votie Bauckham's kind of on the scene when I'm cutting my teeth in early ministry and I see him .

You know he's like , you know , when my son's 13 , he goes with me now and I'm thinking you know , I haven't thought through philosophy of education , how we're going to approach this with our children , and we were normies , you know .

So , but you know , little things like the introduction of a tool like family worship began to change my mentality about , okay , I'm the leader of my household . And then it's you know , everybody should have a man crush on the Puritans .

I've been doing what's right in my own eyes , doing what I've seen in the past , which oftentimes was unfortunate , and so , you know , trying to get back to the Word convictionally so , which you made the point about , there's kind of three ways or three paradigms for viewing a household , and so over time that's helped me think about how do I want to approach my

family structure . So I would call like the pretty normal today , eric , what I think is like a highly segregated or fragmented family structure . The husband wakes up , he goes off to his career , and the wife wakes up and she goes off to her career , and you know , the kids get dropped off at whatever .

You know , uncle Sam has footed the bill for daycare or public school or whatnot , and so at the end of the day these folks typically wake up and well , at the end of the day they go to bed , I should say , and they rarely have seen each other after all the extracurricular activities and so forth . So that's the normal family , I would say .

The next one down , I would just say , is kind of that 1950s , 1960s traditional family where dad wakes up , he goes off to his career . Mom is more domestically focused , you know she's homeschooling kids or taking them to private school and participating in that sort of realm .

Many , I think , in our camp have moved towards that which to me is for the better , camp have moved towards that which to me is for the better . And for the past couple hundred years , you know , since the industrial revolution , you have you have had kind of those two options as a household paradigm .

But what's , over the years we have kind of woke up to is the idea that is the idea that I think , eric , we've all been riding the yellow school bus so long that we either don't know that there's another option , another paradigm , or we've sort of never seen it in action at least , so it's foreign to us .

But you know , prior to a couple hundred years ago , the norm , the historical norm , was a pretty highly integrated family culture , meaning dad is around , you know a lot , and all of that's tied into also a productive property , whether that I mean usually that was the farm right or agriculture of some type or some sort of business .

But what that productive property provided was a lot of overlap through a day or a week for mom and dad and kids . And so no matter , I think , where your family structure currently falls , I think it is important to wrestle with a couple of questions like how did we get here ? What ideology , potentially , has led us here ?

Why has there been an integrated family paradigm as the norm for the bulk of civilization ? And just now we've sort of rounded a corner and boy , the norm again is that highly segregated structure . And then , practically speaking , is family life healthier today ? Are things getting better as a result of this ?

And so you and I have talked about you know , guys like Richard Baxter would say , you're not likely to procure family or general reformation until you procure family reformation . Right , and I think this is one of the top things that men should be thinking about . What is the current paradigm of my household ?

How did I get here , and is this where I want to keep going ?

It seems so foreign and weird , sort of like Joel Salatin would talk about . Before the mid to late 1950s , there really weren't grocery stores like we know them today . Right , I'm like wait , I can't even envision a world without Walmart , exactly , I mean , because we grew up with it , right . But it is interesting to me some of the effects of these things .

So , if you have a highly segregated and fragmented family structure , you know , mom goes to her thing , dad goes to his thing , daycare , all that , public school , whatever One of the things that you start to realize is you're like okay , I have these biblical commands to raise my children in the fear and admonition of the Lord Ephesians 6.4 , deuteronomy 6, .

Especially , though , where I'm like wait a minute . How am I going to do this if I'm not physically with them for at least a good percentage of the day ? Right , if I see my kids for like an hour a day , you know , like they wake up , you drop them off at the school bus or wherever you take them to school .

You don't see them for eight or nine hours , cause , realistically , it's like you know , you know they're going to go to school and then you know they're going to have like practice for an hour and a half or two hours after school . So time together is very minimal .

And then it seems like correct me if I'm wrong but it seems like it just gets hard to actually say how do I fulfill all these duties ? You know , even we've inevitably , like in the church , we've talked to families about , okay , one of the things that we require for church membership .

This is an old , puritan thing , but you have to be fathers leading in family worship . In fact , the Puritans would put you under church discipline , you'd be under censure if you weren't regularly doing this . But the first question for a lot of moms and dads is , well , you know , shoot , given my structure of our days , like how's that even possible ? Right ?

So I think if you start looking at the biblical command and working through like how do we actually do this , for a lot of people that's when you start to realize like what if this is different ? What could be different ?

So we've been doing something as simple for the last couple decades as beating the drum to say , hey , churches , you might consider bringing your children into worship with you . Radical , like more of a age-integrated gathering . I'm just talking about one or two hours a week . Let's start baby steps here .

And people would often either think or say out loud , right , that , what are you some sort of ? You know wide-eyed radical fundamentalist . And usually the word's we don't even know . So we have all fell to Kant's theology that we're an end in and of ourselves , which plays into all kinds of things . But I would say that that is the essence of fragmentation .

Is that individualism run amok ?

Now there's not really a desire for the household , and in a way I kind of understand it , because when the household is nothing more than a hotel room that you come to in the evening to watch Netflix , it really it loses the productive value .

And this is something that guys like Rory Groves have been really good about hitting upon , which is that when you remove productivity from the household , you're taking away some of the core values and virtues of the home that just in the end you're like well , if it really is just a hangout place for Netflix , I could go to Buffalo Wild Wings .

Why do I need a marriage to make that happen ? And then I think that the other model which is really interesting to me is Proverbs 31 , because particularly the woman of the home , I mean she is just hyperproductive in her home for her husband , like for her people . She's not working for another household or another boss out there .

But it's a very different picture of what home life would look like . I mean , you've got real estate involved , you've got land , as you mentioned , productive property .

He said the loss to the nation as a whole was vital , if not irreparable . And it was simply just because men like this could see what was coming down the tracks when you started taking the family in different directions . Interesting and so normal . You know , these were normal things guys were wrestling with back in the day .

Let's just move into the cities , sort of like . Ironically , a lot of people are willing to parrot the world economic forum like you own nothing and you'll be happy , but it's interesting . I've kind of wanted to push back against that . I think you probably would too and say it's actually not inevitable .

Not all progress is good and I think partially why this episode is because you could actually do something different . Yeah , like you can actually make a dent in these areas .

But all that to say is , I think starting points matter and for us , irregardless of what the world's doing past or present , where the culture's currently pressing , I just think for us we're always coming back to do we actually believe the doctrine of the sufficiency of Scripture , and I mean , do we believe that convictionally ?

I think it was Bridges who said that a conviction is a determinative belief , something that you believe so strongly that it affects the way you live , that a belief is what you hold , but convictions are what holds you . You may live contrary , he says , to what you believe , but you cannot live contrary to your convictions .

And so we're talking about belief and practice . What has God's word ? It's everything we need for life and godliness . What has God said to us ? It's everything we need for life and godliness . What has God said to us ?

And then we just want to try to walk that out as best we can and look at all the things that are trying to push us in this direction and that direction . You know worldviews and ideologies , and so for us , you know you come to 1 Timothy , 3 , 4 , a man's supposed to manage his household .

Well , that word well , attached there , it's not a subjective well , it's not do what's right in your own eyes . Well , it's an objective of well , and it's laden , I think , with responsibilities .

I think in the 66 books God has , you know , when I think of the duties and responsibilities he has given me as a head of a household , I'm humbled , and I'm just overwhelmed , frankly .

And so it's actually the sufficiency of Scripture that drives us to think about these household paradigms and how we're going to fulfill , you know , god's commands and principles , and so I don't know if that's a good segue into that , but you had mentioned , you know , concepts like family worship and so forth .

But if you were to just think about what God has commanded heads of households and their helpmates toward the next generation you know Bible saturation , one of them , you know , coming from the Puritans that tool of family worship would be a good example . Other formal things like your household ought to be in the Word habitually .

You know everyone in that household . Fathers ought to be like the psalm singers . Fathers ought to be like the psalm singers .

We're establishing an environment where there's meditation on the word , catechism , scripture , memory , that sort of a vibe , and so , additionally , I think men ought to be leading their families to be fairly fluent in how to actually read and study and apply the word . There ought to be theological studies .

We ought to be introducing our households to spiritual forefathers . There ought to be a lot of understanding regarding delighting in the law and delighting in the gospel . I think there's a ton of confusion there today that our kids need to work them through Proverbs , I think , should be in front of our families .

Wise and foolish living , and that's just one category . And then you know to think we ought to immerse our children in a biblical worldview , which is likened to that first point , but it's broader meaning . We want our children to see things the way God sees things . We want them to see His world , you know , through His Word , every detail .

And that neutrality is not an option , right , it's either of Christ or anti-Christ . And I mean , you know , there ought to be , there ought to be , spiritual protection . They ought to understand the ideologies that are after them . They ought to understand false worldviews and how to interact . They , there's physical protection . I think that's a .

Those are , these are obvious things . But the world is full of effeminate men and and daughters and moms that are putting on , you know , military garb and police uniforms , and so it has to be said , uh , there's a physical inheritance . That should be , you know , uh , as a duty of fathers .

Uh , uh , that idea of I'm spending my kids inheritance , uh , is a sad bumper sticker , right . Yeah , driving around the country in your RV . That's right , but that's how that's going . You know the reformers . Like the Swiss reformer Bullinger , he would say even like manners and skill of occupation .

In fact , most of the old guys that are dead would say you need to bring your children up knowing how to carry themselves . Young men ought to be able to carry themselves well . Young women ought to be able to carry themselves well , distinctly right .

But you think about the vocational training , like Bollinger and others would say , like this is actually a duty of fathers that you have to prepare and pass on vocational training , and certainly for sons that's important , whether you're going to give them a trade or whatever you're going to do , we'll get into some small business stuff that can be part of that .

But I think , especially on that point , maybe who suffers most is daughters , because you know where are you going to learn your primary vocation in life . Eve is the mother of all living , even Paul commending that . Young widows , I would have them get married and manage their households well and be an oikos despot , and this will keep her from temptation .

You have things like she'll be saved , uh , through child rearing , the importance of motherhood , but it seems like correct me if I'm wrong but like if you lose the household , an integrated , productive household , one of the things you're inevitably going to lose is strong mothers and daughters being prepared for that yeah , absolutely .

So I think I would just view that as another duty and responsibility , a duty toward what is our duty towards sons according to God's word , and then what is our duty toward daughters ? You know same fashion .

So if you have when I think I've got a stature in my household in the word , they have to understand worldview and immersion and all of those things Spiritual protection , there's physical protection , there's provision , there's a physical inheritance , there's manners and skill of occupation , and the reformers would even go on to say you need to be thoughtful towards

spouses , for your children , all kinds of I . Just you would probably appreciate this . I just read a book called A Little Commonwealth . Yeah , he would go on and talk about how the household was a house of correction discipline , it was a self-sustaining business , it was a vocational institute , it was a school , it was a little church , it was a welfare institute .

And so , again , when I just sort of read the Word and see all of these responsibilities and duties I have as head of my household and consider those implications , I you know , I think I'm reminded of what Dietrich Bonhoeffer said , and and he he wasn't always right , but when he was , he said things like the righteous man lives for the next generation , meaning

like it's an all consuming endeavor . And so when I think about paradigms , household paradigms , meaning like it's an all-consuming endeavor .

And so when I think about paradigms , household paradigms , when I think about responsibilities just toward the next generation , I think the million-dollar question for Paige and I has been what do all of these responsibilities given to a family leader assume ?

Responsibilities given to a family leader assume , like , what is the presupposition behind this huge , overwhelming list of duties ? And what am I going to have to leverage as a husband and a father to accomplish these kinds of things ? And the only reasonable answer I can come up with , eric , is I have to leverage time .

I have to leverage an incredible amount of time to be able to accomplish these things , and I think you alluded to Deuteronomy 6 . I mean , I have all of this content and I think context plays a portion in this , because we were just talking about paradigms , right , and here's the content and the context .

And so , when you look at Deuteronomy 6 , dads teach their children to give their allegiance to the one true God . Love Him with everything they got , and you've got to pass this on to the next generation . And how do you do it ?

Well , when they sit down , when they walk by the way , when they lie down , when they rise up , and to me , when I think of all the commands and responsibilities that God has given us , that begins to sound—I used to think that was hyperbole like that was sort of an over-exaggeration .

But when I take all of these things into my mind , I can't help but think this is probably not an over-exaggeration .

I have a lot of responsibilities here , and so I'm going to have to think about I'm going to have to get my butt out of bed pretty early in the morning and I'm going to have to work till dark 30 , from my children's birth through maturity , while they're under my roof , to see that these things are accomplished .

And so so content and context I think are super important for men to be thinking about in just regard to their household in general . What , what have I been called to put into it and what , how much time am I going to have to leverage to do that ? And you know , and I talked to dads and it's like , yeah , I can pretty well get this done twice a week .

During family worship we're reading different .

I walked away Like I have not even begun to fathom how weighty my responsibilities are and I have to take this so much more seriously .

Because , as you said , this isn't you can't do this , you can't even do this in 30 minutes a day If you really take the commandment and you can tie it even , I think , to the Great Commission , a phrase like teaching them all that I have commanded , teaching them everything that I said .

I had a pastor say one time he's like that's gonna take a long time to be able to teach them all that Jesus said , and not only just to teach it to them but to live it , to embody it in every walk of life .

And I think too , it's like I look at our family and you know I'm fortunate to get to like work with the kids on a daily basis , spend , I don't know , a bulk of my time with them , and so it really does become like on the car ride to work and school , which is the same place on the car ride home , as we're working in the office together , as we're

working on stuff at the house , you're having these conversations that I just don't think again . I don't think it could be 30 minutes in the evening .

I think Matthew 28 , the Great Commission is basically a regurgitation of Deuteronomy 6 . One God , one allegiance , one love . Teach them everything . And then I think you see the early church get that . I mean , you read the book of Acts and it's content and context , a ton of it . And it's content and context , a ton of it .

And it seems like pretty much everybody gets this idea of content and context and disciple-making , except Christians , right . And so my point being is who controls the world ? Well , it's whoever controls the content and the context of children .

And so I just—this is not even getting into like an Ephesians 6 , right , where , same idea , this Greek understanding of paideia , say the word .

I mean , but meaning is it's going to , and he's , I think he says it's , it's everything from why , uh , garden hoses are green and school buses are yellow , meaning this idea of training your children up is well , it's just like Moses was talking about way back in Deuteronomy six . And so content context leveraging time .

I think those are the starting points , eric , that led us toward productive property , meaning small business , and just the simple idea of leveraging time and trying to fulfill responsibilities responsibilities .

It was like , okay , well , we have to . Also , you know , if I'm going to be with my kids all day or a majority of the day , a natural question would arise what are we doing ? What's the mission of this household ? Is it we're together all day and we just do Bible study all day ?

Or , you will notice , if you have kids , especially like I think I'm thinking like teenage boys , especially because that's what I got right now , but , man , every day , adam , I'm like God gave these boys so much energy and I , as a father , I'm like I got to direct that energy to something and the thing that they seem particularly well suited to is heavy hard

work , right . So is that what you were thinking ? With small businesses Like we , we got to have like missional , uhional things that we're actually doing together as a family .

And then the second piece is especially as my children are getting older , how do I integrate them into sort of all of life ? Because it's bigger , you know , when we read about the duties and responsibilities , it's more than just a formal education , it's more than just making money , it's more than just passing on inheritance .

It's , you know , it's more than just serving your church family . It's actually all of those things , um and so , uh . So that that pushes that . That pushed us toward the realm of okay , what , what is there out there , um , there where we could be together more , make a living , get to know people in our community .

So we're adding up a lot of things here and we're just keeping our eyes open . And so what happened in our situation is , I was in full-time ministry but as the kids are growing , we're giving them opportunities to do kind of small business , productive household stuff at home .

We're homeschooling at the same time , and so one of my kids has a German short hair pointer and a lot of homeschool families are . You know , that's kind of a known thing you can breed dogs and make money off pups or whatever . So we was sort of doing that just on a you know , for fun level at the time and so .

But we like to hunt and I grew up on a cattle ranch , and so I , you know , I do know animals , and so as I'm researching , brainstorming , I come across a dog boarding facility . Okay , was it just for sale or no ?

Well , it was actually something that I just thought I think we could do this , and so I was looking for property or a place to rent that you could build out or whatever . And so this COVID , um , the dog boarding facility in our hometown had closed down , and I wasn't sure why .

We had actually boarded our dog there before , um , but didn't know much about it and hadn't thought , you know , uh . So so I , you know it was shut down . I thought , well , maybe I'll just reach out . So I just sent a cold email , you know , to whatever email address was on the website .

That was said closed and I just said , hey , this is our family , these are our hopes and dreams . You know , uh , would you be willing to sell ? And lo and behold , they sent me a message back , said that actually we would . They're , they're boomers . Um , their kids didn't want the business , and they were .

They had had a few offers on the business , but they were also , uh , they , they wanted to be a family business . You know , they didn't want it to just be sort of something that was going to add , be added to a , you know , a big conglomeration , and so so they love the idea of the kids being involved and teaching the kids how to groom or whatever .

You know the whole bit . And so , and would you , you know owner finance , say owner finance . I think you guys have talked about this in previous episodes , so that sort of played out just like that . So we owner financed to help them on capital gains .

They were masters , right , they'd been doing this for 20 plus years , and so they eased us into all the ins and outs .

You know , we tweaked some things , made a few improvements here and there , and we're maxing out that facility . We've doubled our revenue . You know , in a three-year period we're about to sign a lease on another facility closer to our good , good friends in Ogden . Yeah , that's right , and and so I mean it's just , it's been great , you know .

And then , and then the whole aspect of I mean we're in community , we're building in our community . If you take care of somebody's dog , their cat , they love you . You know , if you take care of them .

So what a great thing from a local church perspective , what a great thing for our kids getting rooted in the community that we're really not part of , even though we've been out here for 15 years .

It takes a while to be Utahns , right , and so , man , in the course of that again , I think if you're being productive and looking for those kinds of things , your kids are getting older , you have some more margin and range .

Then other things come along , and if that's the way you're looking , if that's your bent , like this trout farm came along we'd have never dreamed that something like that would have came along .

of it or they're just not going to pass it on to anybody . And so you have this great measure of wealth that's going to go somewhere and , you know , I think the potential for a lot of Christian families is let's not have it . Go to BlackRock , you know , let's not go that , that route , but you can buy some of these .

And one of the things one of the guys who was doing this purchasing businesses told me was he said it's really interesting because if you take a business that's been around for 30 years , he said , and you look at the finances and you know we go through all that and see if it's , you know , profitable business , usually if it's been around that long it is .

But he said what's interesting is they're they're usually , you know , in that space where they're making money but maybe it could be run a little bit better . And so you , like you said you're taking on a book of business , you're not starting from zero , you're actually getting out of the blocks pretty good and then , if you can , a lot of them .

He said it's like just implement some better calendar scheduling type stuff and some stuff that maybe the boomers , when they started the business in 1980 , didn't do , and you can implement a lot of that stuff , make them pretty efficient If you get good customer service .

Whatever he said , we're very profitable on those businesses , absolutely , and there's a lot of them . I think this is the other thing that a lot of people think , that we're saying , oh , you got to go homestead or , you know , grow all your own food , or something like that . But it's not that .

I mean you know we're doing fine , like if just we're doing great , you know we're fine , I'm not looking for more work to do per se , but we're also thinking about , I guess , some kids that you know are getting close to being able to get married and they want to be around , they want to build and as far as an inheritance goes , I would like to be able to

pass them something like , to be able to pass something along , not just cash but productive property that actually that lends itself to a pretty healthy family paradigm , that integrated structure right . And so if I could do both those things , both help them financially and it's not only good financially . But , man , this is a pretty nice way to raise a family .

You can be together as much as you want .

Okay , there's that , there's the financial . It's not just a one-time blessing , not just a one-time you know blessing , but then also all the work , as you said , being able to pass on the , the idea and the legacy of productive household . Yeah , because that . That was one of the things Adam honestly terrified me .

I spent 15 years in corporate America and Brian is is phrased it this way . He said you know I would do everything as I could as a dad to keep my kids off the corporate plantation , because I know what it was like to work there . For the most part it was soul destroying .

The people who own your business is just a nameless , faceless group of hedge fund managers who their only interest was buying , gutting , flipping , running skeleton crews . You would look . I remember one of the businesses I worked for for two years .

We got to the end of the two years and they had reported the CEO salary is like $620,000 that year , and that's not including , like , stock options or whatever else . And then I'm looking at like all the production is coming from the magazine staff that I was working on . It's like five people and nobody made more than like 45 grand a year .

And I'm thinking these people hate us . To them we are like disposable cell phones , like use abuse , throw away . Get another one . We'll get another kid out of college who's young and dumb and doesn't know any better . So for me , I was like hey , I want to get out of that , I have no desire to be in it .

But then if you escape from Egypt , like you got out from under Pharaoh , you're not to your next generation of kids going to be like hey , you know who'd be really good to work for is Pharaoh ? No , and that means you've got to have other options on the table . So I love some of this .

The other one I think that is so important , though , is the idea that generationally like , let's say , you pass a business onto one of your kids it's not like and this is something I think , just that mindset from the world that you got to jettison .

It is not your 18 , see you bye , hope your life's good , right , right , like it's no , like yes , there's a leaving and cleaving and there's all those things . Those are real . You got to establish your own household , all that .

But I always liked the idea , which used to be very common where it's like there's still your kids , you still have obligations to push that next generation into the future , and I think a business , particularly a household based , this productive type business , can be a really great way to do that .

He's been with me since Every step of the way , every step of the way . That's been his high school , so to speak , experience , and so he can just naturally just keep going , yeah , keep running with that , and he's excited about it . I mean , you know it's a part of this . Is this relational aspect in households too ? Like our kids aren't ?

You know they're not . We have great relationships , we're for one another , we're generous to one another , we're building things together . I think that creates unique bonds . Like you know , I've built a couple of businesses now with my children that I could not have done without my children , right , and so I think Wiley does a good job of talking about this .

But he's , like you know , if you have this sort of mindset and you in your productive household , when children work for their dads or for their families , they're actually working for themselves , because this is all theirs .

Yeah , but when you get into this way of thinking and you really are like in a very real way you know , ron Swanson was right , child labor laws are destroying this country but in a very real way , when I'm working with my kids , I'm like , wow , they're actually wildly productive , even at 12 .

Oh , yeah , at six , yeah , and so there is a difference in the way that love happens in the home in very practical ways . It's not like Hollywood romance type love , but I think it's a much deeper and more robust and biblical form of love , which is we all depend on each other . Yes , that's right On a daily basis .

It's more about me trying to keep up with them . I am not a slave driver , you know . Running the ship here , this is something everybody's bought into , which is interesting .

I mean , you know , not that there aren't hard days and we get calluses and sweat it was a hot summer , you know so we sweat a lot Because things are easy , but there's just a lot of joy and a lot of life . And when your family can kind of see where all this is going right , it's like , oh , this is God's economy , this is what he .

I mean , wow , what a blessing .

You know , and we can be generous and other people can come under the you know , quote unquote shelter of our household , like we can have employees , people we love , that can work for us and we've seen this in our church family too , like in guys in real estate and like , wow , look , god's enabled them to build a pretty integrated family economy here , great

business . And you know what ? There's five other Christian families that we know that work under that and it's a , you know , so it's . I think there's a great momentum that begins to stir up and I mean , you know , we're kind of first generation starting .

I just can't imagine what you know , nine kids , or multiple families with the love children right that are kind of doing these things . Once this just takes off for a generation or two , you can see how , oh , this might be the idea of dominion that we're kind of talking .

I was reading a book on family life and it said , hey , if you're not sort of evaluating your household economy , you are definitely going to be more fragmented year to year , but generation to generation , and so the kind of the charge was well , I want you to look at the day in one day in the life of your family .

Oh , that's good so what's what's one day in the life of a household look like ? Cause you take that day , you put it with seven , you put it with a month , you put it with a year , you put it with years . Right , and that that is what everybody has a household economy , uh , but what does yours look like ?

And so after I read that , I thought you know , what . that is a good idea . I mean , a man ought to be evaluating that . One way or the other , you're probably going to go backwards , and so I've got like a journal entry .

But I would just say , paige and I have been laboring at this for a couple of decades now . This is not something that happened overnight . A lot of baby steps , you know , in that direction and so , irregardless of where you're at or how you hear this , you know , just know that .

So on this particular Monday morning , my three boys I got I got five boys total , but two of them are already grown and out of the house . But I got a 17 year old , a 12 year old and a nine year old still in the house . So they're , they're up with me . Six in the morning . We're out the door , take care of the kennel where we're , we're .

We got , you know , 50 , 60 dogs over that weekend . A lot of those will be going home and so we work together . Me and those three boys work together until about 10 , 30 in the morning . During that time there's a little bit of downtime , so we had time to knock out a couple formal school subjects . So that's what we're also doing during that period .

My oldest daughter , who's 20 now , which might be kind of another subject we talked about daughters for a minute , but she also followed us to the kennel shortly after that . I think she got there about 7 . She's grooming a dog or two that morning . So the five of us are together , we're working , we're interacting with clients , we're doing schoolwork .

You know all kinds of things during that three or four-hour period . I will just because you probably want to do this . So as a side note , I think older daughters in a productive household economy are just absolutely irreplaceable . You know my oldest daughter . Her desire is to be a helpmate , a wife and a mom . That is her one longing .

She's not looking for anything else and so she's looking to be a good helpmate to me as well in all of this . But lots of times people are like they'll look at her and say you know , why aren't you in college ? Or why aren't you in a trade school , like , don't you like to learn ? And so I just that infuriates me to no end .

And so I would just like to say you know that you're talking to my daughter who just finished up reading a lengthy commentary on the 1689 London Baptist Confession . She's , you know , I think I caught her yesterday reading Honor Thy Fathers , which is , you know , coming out of you guys .

And so , you know , just in the last couple of years , when she finished up what we call , you know , most people would call formal education , formal homeschooling , you know , last couple years she's been learning agriculture . She started her , you know , an offshoot from our trout farm , so she's started a flower farm . You know , tied into what we're already doing .

She's learned aquaculture with that trout farm , with that trout farm . You know , our goal has not ever been to teach her a vocation , but she has only known small business , dogs grooming she has . Although this is unintentional , she , at 20 years old , has more vocational , you know , wherewithal , than most young men can even comprehend . Yeah , it's amazing .

And so , Annie , I probably shouldn't have went down that road .

There's an endless amount of things that you know a vibrant , young 20-year-old is doing in our household to be , you know that's just we're so happy about , you know that's just we're so happy about . And so so anyway , back at home that morning , paige was also up and around with the three other girls , and they're 16 , 15 , and 13 .

We had had a couple of young men staying at our house for the last couple of weeks . We often have I mean , it's pretty normal for us to have young men interns living with us or whatnot , and so Paige interns living with us or whatnot , and so Paige , those guys are out the door . So Paige is cleaning up after guests .

She's also got breakfast for everybody that's left . Then they're doing all their normal chores and they're doing their formal schoolwork . They're also taking care of our personal dogs , so at this point in time we've got several gun dogs .

We sell puppies from time to time , and so we just got rid of a litter of 11 pups of which those kids have been handling for the last eight , nine weeks and dealing with clients and registrations and all of those kinds of things . So part of them are doing that . We're late morning .

Paige drops off a couple of the girls to uh go babysit for , uh , uh , a family in our church . They have a doctor's appointment or whatnot , so they're taking care of their littles . Uh , most of us all but two of us are then regathered at the house at 11 . Um , so prior to lunch one of the boys mows the yard .

I talked to my co-elder about church stuff for about an hour . The rest are doing school stuff . Paige gets lunch ready in the middle of all of that and most days we sit down and eat lunch and dinner together as a household another beautiful part of a family economy . As soon as we get done with lunch , a couple of the kids go with me to the farm .

We have fish to take care of , we have chickens and pheasants and chucker and patting a calf and flowers , and you name it .

So there's fence to be built , there's raceways to be cleaned , there's a couple of days a week we harvest fish to take to a couple of restaurants in Park City and Salt Lake City , and so that's going on While I was at the farm with two kids , my oldest daughter's at a nursery getting stuff for the flower portion of the business .

She will then meet me back that afternoon to groom . Paige is doing more school stuff with the younger boys now . She goes to the grocery store . She picks up the two girls from babysitting .

A couple of the kids and myself were back at the kennel in the afternoon with my oldest daughter again , so from 2.30 to 5.45 , it's busy , busy at the kennel , and so we got rid of about 35 dogs that day . Checked in about 15 more .

By the way , when I'm at the kennel I'm usually answering emails , doing business books , engaging with chefs , doing sermon prep between people and kids .

There's usually candles on the table , there's usually food that I couldn't have prepared , like , if there's bread , it was made from scratch . If there's pulled pork , paige smoked it , I mean . So dinner takes a minute , is all I'm saying . Dinner is kind of an event for us . We love the family table and so it's a priority , and so she's done all that .

At dinner we sit down and talk about the day things . We've learned business books we've read . One of the younger sons had , hey , he loves CS Lewis , and so he was reading something on Narnia in his spare time .

And then one of my sons was reading Mere Christianity for some school , informal school work , and so that night , particular night , was a CS Lewis discussion . And there you go . So after a big meal , a lot of people , a lot of cleanup , you know a lot of dishes All of that's done while some of the family's doing that .

We had an issue at the farm that I went and took care of with a couple of the other kids . I got back about 8.30 with them . We had family worship On Monday nights . For us , we review sermon notes from the Sunday before . So that's what we did Showers , bedtime rituals I was currently reading the little boys' Lord of the Rings , and so that's what we did .

Nine or 10 o'clock we're wrapping things up . We're tired at that point . But I just say this that throughout the day kids were educated , books were read , devotions were had , essays were written , legos were played , pictures were painted .

We everybody plays an instrument in our house the musical instruments were practiced , small army was fed , four dogs were taken care of at home , 50 plus at work . Bank accounts or bank deposits were taken care of , bills were paid .

Extended family phone calls were had , exercise happened , elder conversations occurred , garden beds are watered , household chores , farm chores are checked off the list , households left orderly . A couple businesses were maintained , lots and lots of in-person discussions between husband and wife were had , parents with children were had . We served one another . By God's grace .

We served others outside of our home through hospitality and our church family as well . And again , that was our Monday , and so that wasn't about making money , business or just schooling the kids , or just serving , or just the dinner table , or just farming , for better or for worse , that is how Paige and I are leading our family economy right .

That's where we're going . That's where , over the years , we've decided that this is the best way that we can figure out how to fulfill those duties and responsibilities God has given us . And so when you add that up over a week and a year , that's how that begins to flesh out .

But you know , let's say , like you know , we've been over to your house , we've had dinner , and it's sometimes hard to describe what it's like , but you go there and you see the kids and , like you know , our kids are playing with your kids , we're enjoying the hospitality .

And then you drive home and I've talked about Brian , about this but it's like when there's good hospitality , like that in a healthy family , you walk away and you're like I don't know what that was , but I want that , and there's something that actually pulls you in .

So then you think about okay for your kids , just knowing that they're growing up having in all of those ways whether it's early morning at the dog kennel , learning to wake up on time , learning to do your schoolwork , learning to interact with the other kids they're doing all these things , but really what's happening is the affections of their heart are being trained

and they're being oriented , and it's all being oriented in the grain of . We love each other as a family , we're doing this together and that is just so . Again , it's it's , I think hearing that is really helpful because it's more than you could just describe . There's a bit of a like you know helpful because it's more than you could just describe .

There's a bit of a like you know I think of , like Psalm 34 , this is one of those like taste and see moments .

He says , and I think that is just so , so true and so deep in the text , right of of for God's people . But so I , I , we , we want to grow in generosity , we want to grow in giving .

And that happens between one another , you know , in our household , and if it's not happening there , doubtful right that it's pouring over into love for neighbor , uh , love for the church , family . And so I just think , um , if you don't begin with the household right and that generosity , that spirit , hard to think it's going to move much farther .

But there's also , it seems like a generational aspect to generosity right , yeah , yeah , absolutely .

Uh , he says for people to start having children again in the old fashioned way , which I don't know if there's another way to do it , but he says we need to get children back in the asset column of the household books .

And I think when that begins to happen and I mean it just builds on itself and you're transferring all kinds of things right , you're transferring love , knowledge , productive property and these things continue to spiral , by God's grace , I think , just hopefully out of control in really good ways .

So I just think you're just passing on so much more than you could dream or imagine , right ? Yeah , yeah , yeah , that's incredible .

And so we had the opportunity to rent this farm and for me initially it was , you know , it's kind of like , well , this is probably this is going to be an investment into their education .

You know , I'm not sure that because we didn't know anything about trout farming , I'm not sure that this is , you know , going to be that productive financially , but we're at least going to get some calluses productive financially , but we're at least going to get some calluses . And so we've .

You know , paige and I are always looking for ways that our kids can , you know , get some grit , chores , whatever , right , and so they need to learn to work .

And so that , yeah , again we met this couple , again just a little bit older than us , that has quite a bit of productive property , you know through the generations and their family , and they have this beautiful , picturesque trout farm that they're just not really doing anything with , but it's so special that they don't just want it to sit there , and so , okay ,

well , so we figured out a lease agreement and we thought , well , we'll start learning how to hatch eggs , I mean the whole kit and caboodle . And again , my mind is like this ought to be productive . I mean , it will be productive , at least intellectually , for my kids and calluses on the hands . It will be productive in that way .

But can we make this productive financially ? Because our hope was , well , if it could generate some income , maybe another one of our children could maybe earn a living off of it , and so , sure enough , just by God's grace , we began to . So this business was completely built off Instagram , so that is 100% .

We started posting a few things and family story , what we're doing , and it is like , when I say picturesque , it's also the perfect environment , health-wise , to raise these beautiful fish . Oh yeah , to raise these beautiful fish . So the water is pristine and it is perfect for healthy , clean eating these rainbow trout . And so we- .

I mean , it's a drop in the bucket compared to , you know , what most people are doing , so it's not a it's not a big thing , but it is special , uh in in what we're able to provide . And so we've had these really incredible chefs reach out to us from park city and they found out through Instagram .

Yeah , yeah , they reached out to us and we're like , and we're like , you know , just so you know , um , we're trying to make this sustainable and meaning , like we're not mass producers of meat here , and so this is what the price will be for us to be sustainable . And they're like we love it , we love the family concept .

We love the fish and so we're willing to pay . They could get their fish cheaper somewhere else , but they're . But they're , they're happy to pay for quality , and that's a new move . That's another . I mean , that's another thing to be thinking about . Right , when you think about starting a business or whatever .

Um , in at least in the restaurant business , people are actually looking for these kinds of sustainable regenerative . You know all the buzzwords are looking for that , um , and so here we go . Now I'm just like trying not to oversell it , cause , uh , you know , we got it . We're off to a good start and so many fish , so I want to . Yeah , but so that's .

business might be able to sustain a household . Wow .

Like , I mean , we're just going to pass this on . Yeah , I mean it'll just continue to be passed on , and that's the beauty of it . You know , I think of all . Yeah , so paradigms matter . Yeah , you're setting up your household structure matters . Be careful , I think , who's driving the ship for you . Don't let the culture dictate .

You know where you're going as a household . Make sure your starting point is with the word of God what has God commanded you to do ? And in any way you can start taking baby steps backwards to leverage your time you know , communicate well what you're doing . I think it's so important .

I think a critical piece for any household is to know when you sit down at the dinner table tonight , everybody knows why you're doing what you're doing . You know , and if God's word is driving that , I think you're continuing just to dump into them . God's Word is sufficient . It's everything you need for life and godliness . Build your life on His worldview .

Things aren't smooth every day . Nobody's saying any of that . There's plenty of hardship and all , but I think just the whole environment is just saying keep your allegiance on one true God . Love Him , you know , pass this on to the next generation . Look at the generosity that should be flowing out and love for neighbor as well . Prioritize your church , family .

Build things together . Try to help them , you know um yeah , I love also the relationships like we're doing here , yeah , um , and let's keep cultivating these .

let's let's create more opportunities for more guys that are saying , yeah , look , I want to leave the corporate job , or I'm out of my house 60 , 70 hours a week week , I don't , you know , it's not the best . I just want to head in a different direction .

Because then you think about like multiplications , like okay , yeah , it's you and your nine children , but what about when it's you and your nine children and their spouses , and then your grandchildren ?

I mean , I listen to these podcasts . A lot of these guys are from Refuge Church and I just think , man , they're so articulate , so intelligent . You know faithful men leading their households well . That's the kind of environment you want these young men growing up in .

You want these young men growing up in Health , wisdom , accountability so important , I think in all of this . I think what you kind of see in some of these highly integrated household economies too is we're sort of lone rangers out here we're doing our own thing and the local church is sort of an afterthought . That is not how we think of all of this .

We think of a highly integrated household in a very integrated church family , you know . And so I think you can kind of be that lone ranger and I see a lot of that , especially in homeschool kind of movements .

But that is not the kind of be that lone ranger and I see a lot of that , especially in homeschool kind of movements , but that is not the kind of thing that we're talking about .

When I listen to the other podcasts , I want to buy Bitcoin and gold and I just want to do everything that's going on , but that's just I mean for a guy like me to sit with a guy like you and these other guys , we get excited about that thing , yeah .

But also children and wives right I mean like families get excited too , and so I think it's great I see a good like men's culture being built , but also that ought to be stirred up in the family , in the home , and children ought to be seeing these kinds of things and well , that's the incredible thing too .

And I'm like I just want you to meet one of these ladies one time , you know , and then compare them to like the man on the street , like young girl at college , the average college campus in America , and then talk to one of our young ladies and it's like , yeah , I mean , they're just brilliant , they're amazing women .

I think the other thing that's really stuck with me is that a woman and a godly wife , a helper , she is designed to put her full energy and weight into her husband's mission , and a lot of times what we do , we take her and we go put her in like a corporate mission for a man who doesn't love her .

But it is so cool to see like these ladies , just when they are just tapped into , like you know who they , who God made them to be , who they are man , what they can accomplish , their love for their children . I mean the other one too is funny . It's like , oh , you know , like you just want her to be like homeschooled and dumb .

And then I'm like having a conversation with like a 14 year old girl and I'm like they're like brilliant , they're reading like Dostoevsky and you know , Jane Austen and Virgil and the Aeneid , and I'm like , yeah , you have no idea what's actually happening in these circles .

And for us , all of this is , I think , when I talk to a lot of guys about this and building and business and economics , one of the things that they usually say is you know what I noticed ? You don't say I a lot , but you say we a lot , yeah .

Meaning is yeah , yeah , because we , the family , is how this is happening , you know , is how this is going on . So we're doing this together , which is the beauty . I mean , that is the critical piece of all of that . So , yeah , I agree . And these , you know , these children never cease to amaze me , all the potential God's given them .

You can see a little bit of what's going on there yeah , and come out to the annual conference .