So You Want to Marry My Daughter - Interview with Voddie Baucham

0:00Welcome, my friends. This is your host, Kevin Swanson with generations. And this week marks the one year anniversary since the passing of our dear brother, Vody Bacchum. Vody stood for Biblical masculinity, Biblical truth, Biblical education in a secular age. He was a stalwart for truth. And today we want to honor his legacy as we air this interview we recorded 15 years ago. That message is as relevant today as it was back then. Welcome, my friends. This is the generations radio broadcasts. Kevin Swanson here broadcasting these are planes of Colorado. So, we broadcast 80 countries around the world a message to faith, family and freedom. During a time when the family is coming apart of the seams, 41% of kids born without fathers up from 6% in 1960. 70% of kids will not grow up with mother and father, at least in this country. We have the highest divorce rate in the world right here in the United States of America. Therefore the foundations are destroyed.

1:02This nation may be the worst nation in the world as far as the condition of the family is concerned. But folks, we're doing something about it. Out here in Eastern Plains of Colorado we crisscross the nation covering conferences all over talking about the importance of restoring the family, doing some radical things as in bringing back fatherhood and motherhood. I know this is weird, establishing family economies in a fractured system we find today. And one of the questions that keeps coming back to me as I speak to homeschool audiences and audiences that are interested in renewing the family around the country is why do homeschooling moms come home in order to prepare their daughters to lead home? Time's a little ironic to me. Does it sound ironic to you? Well folks, part of the reason why is because there are tremendous social pressures about homeschool moms all the time. They want their homeschool daughters to turn out right and to survive in the next generation. One of the reasons why homeschooling moms return home to prepare their daughters to lead home is because 70% of young men have not grown up by 30 years of age. Up from 30% in 1970.

2:03I mean this is a severe problem and incredibly difficult problem. And of course that's tied into the fact that 64% of kids under six are latchkey. They don't have their mom. They don't have their dad for long, long hours during the time they're two, three, four, five, six, seven. 8, 9, 10, 12, 14, 16 years of age. Okay, we've got some social pressures here and it's a vicious cycle. So if you've got 70% of young men not grown up by 30 years of age and 64% of kids under six are latchkey, which produces 70% of young men not grown up by 30 years of age, up 30% in 1970. That will produce homeschool moms coming home to prepare the daughters to lead home, which will produce 85% of kids under six being latchkey in the year 2030 and 96% of young men not grown up by 30 years of age in the year 2020. Ladies and gentlemen, the problem is a vicious cycle. We've got to get out of this somehow or another. Do you understand the tensions here? Well the measure problem, the measure problem is a lack of fathers and the fact that 70% of kids are in the same age.

3:03That's 70% of young men are not grown up by 30 years of age. That's the big issue we're struggling with right now in the year 2010. We're going to address that next on a very important interview I am conducting with Vodipaka, the author of a great new book called What You Must Be. If you want to marry my daughter, we'll be back in just a moment as Kevin Swarsow. Back on the generations where you're broadcasted, this is Kevin Swarsow and your host with you today talking about a very serious issue. Social problems that are throttling the family, destroying the family in the 21st century, but we are going to do something about it. We must do something different for our sons and daughters and with me to talk about these issues is Vodipaka and he travels the nation talking about family issues from a biblical perspective. Vodipaka is going to have a new book out because what he must be if he wants to marry my daughter. Vodipaka, welcome back to the program, my friend. Thank you very much. It's always good to be on with you. Vodipaka, it was great to have you in Denver. You came down to our family conference, talked to 4,000 parents about family issues.

4:07You mentioned your book and you talked a little bit about it. You have been wearing out the souls of your shoes and you've been getting a lot of freaking flyer myrls, Chris crossing this nation talking about these things. What do we got? The family reformation going here? You know, I really believe so. There is absolutely a reformation happening. You see that the grassroots, but I think right now it's a painful part of the reformation where people are beginning to wake up. Sometimes that's not pretty. A lot of people unfortunately as they're waking up, they're sort of opening their eyes and asking two questions. Number one, how did we get here? Number two, where do we go from here? It's good. There is a reformation happening right now. I believe it's at a very painful stage for most people. Yes, at a time when America has the largest divorce rate in the country or in the world, eight times worse than Spain by the way. We're doing awful and just about every indication. According to Rutgers University, we have the worst families in the western world.

5:14That's Rutgers University came out about three, four years ago. We're in trouble. It's time for families just to recognize these things and do something different. I think your message is critical. Obviously we're addressing a lot of the homeschooling movement. You're off to Ohio this week. I was just in Missouri this morning at 3.30 this morning before we broadcast this program. It's been a wild, wild year. How many conferences have you done so far? I think you're four. Okay. Okay. But that's any more left. Yeah. Yeah. Well, God bless you as you talk to those folks in Ohio. Let's talk a little bit about your book. You know what's interesting? New York Times came out with an article last week. This is on my birthday, June 14. Long road adulthood is growing even longer. I guess the average marriage age now for the average young man is 28 years old. They're putting it off longer and longer into the 30s. I know a lot of Christian folks, even gelicals that are doing the same thing. The fact of the matter is, there are people aren't growing up. They're just not growing up. And I think that's the fundamental problem. We're dealing with, especially with boys.

6:23You know, it really is. And there are a number of reasons for that. Not the least of which is we're absolutely spoiled. We've got young men who don't want to struggle. They don't want to suffer. They don't want to leave home until they can have the exact same kind of middle class upper middle class life that their parents are providing for them. So you don't see young men with any willingness to sort of strike out and have to do it the hard way for a while and earn their way in the world. So to speak. So they are. It's not happened. And what happens with the secular folks is that they're just going to party through their 20s. It's really what happens. I mean, they might have some dating going on, some shacking up, hooking up, hooking up in the up and coming approach. That is you just kind of hook up for two weeks. And you're done with that girl and you move on to the next. It's a party life for the secularists. But what's happening with the nice little homeschooled kids, you know, the Christian evangelical kid that had a fairly decent raising is folks, you know, put them off in the college or what have you. But he just wasn't growing up. In fact, I had a homeschool leader from North Carolina say he was concerned. His son was going to one of the very best. I would say one of the very best Christian colleges in America. This leader was still concerned that his son was hanging out with immature people. And you know, it just wasn't clicking.

7:48He didn't think his son was really maturing in college. Well, it's interesting that my question would be what on earth would you expect? The public system is not designed to mature people. And again, the brothers make it very clear that companion of fools will suffer harm. And there are fools on Christian college campuses, just like there are fools on non-Christian college campuses. And those fools are not going to bring our children to maturity. Beyond that, if you're waiting for that period of a child's life to start working towards maturity, you've waited too long. We got to start working toward maturity long before that time train. You get there. You know, Vody, I think what helped me was my dad said, yeah, you better go to college. But he said something else because I'm not paying for it. I mean, to me, that's what really matured me. I would take an average of three to five part time jobs while I was going to college. I was working 30 hours a week and studying for 30, 40 hours a week.

8:55I was engaged in a lot of things. I graduated out of debt. I had some investments. And I was able to put a down payment on a house after my graduation thanks to my part-time work that I had done in college. In other words, work was, I think, with the thing that really matured me. Sitting around in a college fraternity and having fun is not really the best way to mature young man into life and get him ready to cut a piece out of the rock for himself. I think work is a key here. Yes, really right. Not only work, but I think marriage as one man said I can't remember who it was, but I stole it. I told him I was going to steal it. Somebody asked him where he grew up. He said, well, I grew up mostly in Texas or I grew up some in Texas, but mostly after I got married. I said, I'm absolutely stealing that because it's you. I grew up a lot more when I got married. I got married in a software year in college. So I was married a lot more. I had a daughter when I was a junior. Ten months after I got married. Of course, having to work, raising a family and doing all those things. My great actually went up.

10:03People were afraid of the opposite, but when I got married and had to work harder and take care of a family while I was going to college, my great went up just because of the level of maturity with which I've been approached that time in my life. It was good work. It was take care of your duties and responsibilities at home. All of those sorts of things. We have young men now. They go off to college. They don't have to have a job, which they can't get married until after that period of their life is over. The two main things that God uses to mature men are removed from them when they put in an environment where all of the world, the worst of all, has to offer, is readily available to them 24 hours a day. I don't know who came up with this brain scheme, but it was one of the worst probably in the history of the world. By the way, the history of college is not really all that good.

11:04Remember John Adam's son wound up getting drunk and running nude through Harvard back in the 1780s. So it hasn't been good since the 1780s. It's had a really bad record. And here's one of the real issues is there just aren't enough mentors in the lives of these young men. This is really where the discussion went with his saliter from North Carolina. I just said we've got to have more mentors out there. I mean grown men who can teach young men how to be a grown man. And you know that's not even part of the thinking process for most professors. That's not even on the radar screen. The other thing is as colleges become so lucrative, the more students you can get the better at the facilities and become just out of this world. And so you've got to have that class job full of you know 100 to 150 some classes with 200 students and there are people in upper level courses with 50, 75, and kids in graduate courses with that many people in them.

12:11And some of these large universities is no mentoring. That's a bad situation. I had a college with 17,000 students. I didn't advisor. Can I go to meet in the first week at college at my university. I went to meet him. I said I'll let come back and meet with you. Like every other week, every month something like that. He said no, no, no, no, no, no. If I had things my way, I just sit here and contemplate my navel. I did you not, Vody, that's what he said. That was about as relational as as my professors became with me. Let me think about it. This whole publisher, Parrish mentality, you know the professor who's basically ending every tower, publishing books compared to the professor who is working hard to mentor students. One of those guys is going to advance the other one is not. And I guarantee you the one who's advancing is not the one who's investing time mentoring students. It's the one who's actually publishing and is actually investing in that side. Again, not saying that it's not important to have researchers and writers and things of that nature.

13:21But the mentoring part of it is almost completely gone. Not to mention the fact that even in the home you talk about the homeschool movement. But the other things that I'm saying in the homeschool movement and beginning to speak to is the demonized boys in the homeschool movement whose fathers are absolutely uninvolved in their lives. These boys are being raised, mentored, educated and discipled almost completely by their mothers and its shows. It's a Achilles heel of the entire movement. As a leader in the movement over 12 years in Vody, I agree with you. This is the number one problem that exists within our homeschool movement. But let's get back to your book right now. What he must be if he wants to marry my daughter. Yeah, what's interesting is I read your book. You got a lot of peas in this book. You're like, I guess Vody Buckem likes peas. You talk about Protector, Priest, you know, on and on. Well, let's talk about patriarchy. That's where you really begin the book. If I think that's a really key word, not necessarily the most popular word today. Nobody likes patriarcs these days. He starts talking about patriarcs and suddenly somebody starts blogging against you within about two hours.

14:29But you talk about patriarchy. You say, this is basic. This is something our young men have to understand. Jesus Christ is King of kings and Lord of lords. Now every Christian believes that. But what does that mean for government, law, justice and civil authority? For generations, Christians have been told that faith belongs in the church and politics belongs out there somewhere. But the Bible speaks directly to nations, rulers, justice, liberty and the responsibilities of citizens. And that's why I wrote under God. This book provides a biblical framework for understanding government, the role of civil authority, the relationship between church and state and how Christians should engage a world that increasingly rejects God's law. If you'd like to learn more, visit governmentundergod.org. That's governmentundergod.org.

15:36If you ever wish there was an easier way to teach your children the Bible, I'd like to invite you to check out the Teach Me the Faith podcast. Each episode is short, engaging and designed to help children learn important truths from God's Word through Scripture memory, storytelling and simple questions and answers. Whether you're in the car, around the breakfast table, or wrapping up the day, it's an easy way to have meaningful conversations about faith with your children. You can listen to Teach Me the Faith on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube or by going to Teach Me the Faith.com. That's Teach Me the Faith.com. Thinking about homeschooling, but not sure where to begin, we would love to encourage you. At howtostarthomeschooling.org, you'll find practical, biblical guidance to help you take your first steps with confidence from God's purpose for education.

16:37To choose a curriculum and plan your school year, and while you're there, be sure to download your free copy of the first steps to homeschooling, a biblical guide for new homeschool families. Whether you're just exploring homeschooling or getting ready for your first year, we're here to help. Visit howtostarthomeschooling.org and start your journey today. Yeah, they do. And patriarchy in its simplest form is just the idea of male headship that has existed as a creation of ordinance since God created Adam first. It is an idea. Speaking of patriarchy, it's one of us. Keep on going, Voting, keep on going. We do this all the time. We do this all the time. It's just more organic this way. Absolutely. Yeah. Believe it is. It is the idea of male headship, male leadership in the context of the family, and even broader than that.

17:40So I start there because we don't get that. If we don't understand the root and the foundation, then we completely miss the whole picture. Yeah. Yeah. What is it to be a patriarchy now? Can you describe somebody who's ready to be a father, a husband, a head? He's ready to take charge. Tell us what that looks like. Well, you know, that's where those other four peas come in. You know, please profit provider protector. And I derived that from that quote, a great quote from George Whitfield who says that every man I'll look at about himself is functioning. He says in three categories, you know, priest to pray for and with profit to instruct and a team to protect and provide for it essentially. And so I look at that, you know, being a priest, a priest is one who represents his people before God. So here's a man who is an intercessor, a man who has a relationship with God who's dependent upon God, who is a spiritual man, a spiritual leader.

18:47A profit is one who represents God before the people. Here's a man who does the word, can teach the word, and communicate the word. And we know he has that responsibility and he features that the five four's wife and the future's having six first children. A provider, you know, first to be five eight, a man he doesn't provide for is his family has been either faithfully and is worse than an infidel. And then of course, a protector. A man has a responsibility to place himself between his family and anyone or anything that would do their harm. So it's not until a man understands himself and those roles and is proven himself in those roles that he's ready to assume the role that's the head of a household. How can you tell he's proven himself? I'm giving some examples. How do you know this guy is ready to be a priest and a profit in his own? Well, as far as priest and profit, that's when you have discussions with him about doctrine and theology. Does he know the word? He has, you know, not because he has everything figured out. I'm a 41 year old elder in a church and I'm growing and learning every day.

19:54So you're not looking for a guy that's got everything figured out, but you're looking for a guy who has a basic, typical worldview, a basic, typical construct. He knows the Bible. He knows his way around the Bible. He understands the Bible's storyline. He knows what the gospel is. He can communicate that clearly. He knows how to analyze scripture and scripture and think it will equate. Those are the kinds of things that you're looking for. And he understands that it is his duty to know these things. So it may matter if that's what you're looking for. So if you were to ask this young man, is God sovereign? He would first of all be able to define what you mean by sovereignty. And secondly, he'd be able to go to the Word of God and find specific passages in relation to the nature of God in his sovereignty. Absolutely. Absolutely. You should do that. And the other thing is, even if you come across things, so let's say you have a discussion with a young man that you've written up some concepts

20:55that he hasn't passed it. He can't go right through them. You've got to be able to say to him, you know what? I'll get back to you on the tomorrow. Yeah. And have some tools that they'll hire you, Phil. Go search the thing out. Know where to go and look and read. I want to know what he's reading. I want to know what books from a theological perspective he has on his show. What books, eating, what kind of things are influencing. If he's still sitting around reading Dr. Seuss and the hardy boys were in trouble. Yeah, we're actually in trouble. First of all, if he's reading, we're on the clarin. But he needs to be reading the types of things that indicate that he's thinking seriously and that he's thinking vividly. You know, he's being balanced with his mature hand growing in his face. All right. Protector, as a young man came to you, said, I'm really interested in marrying your daughter. And you want to figure out whether this guy is going to be a good protector for your daughter. How do you make that call?

21:59Well, a couple of things. The first indicator is when and how he approaches me. If a young man approaches me and says, your daughter and I, you know, this is what happens in our culture. Your daughter and I have been dating for a couple of years now and I'm thinking about asking for her hand in marriage. And I want to talk to you first. Well, that's a poster. Okay. That's not a protector. That's a poster. The protector is the one who says, I'm interested in your daughter. She's not aware of that interest yet. And the reason she's not aware is because I did not want to jeopardize her heart. I just want to jeopardize her emotion. And I know that you're responsible for that. And I wanted to come to you first and foremost to declare my interest. And to have you set me so that if possible, we can even avoid your daughter being hurt at all if I'm not a good match for her. That made us demonstrate it to me. That he's interested in protecting my daughter. That he's committed to protecting my daughter. Even for himself, you know, it's necessary.

23:05Yeah. Yeah. And you talk about a poacher and we know a poacher is out here in Colorado. I mean, he's the other guy that goes ask for the tag after they shoot the animal. Yeah. No, but see, here's the thing. I talked about this at the Colorado conference. These kids, they not only come and ask for the tag after they shoot the animal, they ask the game warden to pay for the tag. Oh, man, we've got to see some shifted worldviews and shifted perspectives in a lot of families before we start seeing our daughter's marrying well. And our son's marrying well as well. I mean, this is the foundation of new families. If we want to rebuild families in the 21st century, it really begins right here, doesn't it? It really does. I mean, it has to. We have to know we can't car was built up. You know, it's easy for us to look back and see where our forefathers have gone wrong and where this happened and that happened. And those things are important, but they're important. Again, in our therapeutic culture, we look back to figure out what we're wrong so that we have an excuse for our dysfunction.

24:09We can't do that. We look back to see where our forefathers were wrong so that we can learn from their mistakes and operate in a different way. We don't look back so we can make excuses. We look back so we can make corrections. Vody, let's talk about your own situation. You got a beautiful young daughter yourself and more along coming along. Do you ever concern that your expectations may be a little too high for a prospective suitor? No. No, I'm not concerned. It might be too high, yes, they might. But I love my daughter and I'm concerned about that. I'd be concerned there would be a low. If they're too high, we could make adjustments in that. But if they're too low, we've got a real problem. If my expectations are too high, the penultimate chapter in what he must be, the title of it is if you can't find one build one.

25:12My argument there is we're not, I don't expect for a young man in his 20s to come along and be just completely ready. As a father, at that point, it's not my responsibility to just say no so I'm sorry goodbye. But I need to actually invest into the life of that man. And just be mindful that in the nature of that young man, so that he can be brought along. It may be a good idea, Vody, for young men to come to some of the fathers, the elders in the church, men like you, before they even broached the subject of your daughter. And just say, I would like a little of your counsel. I'm like to sit down with you and I'd like you to give me some pointers and I kind of get some mentorship up front. Before they even get involved in this courtship game. Absolutely. That makes a lot more sense. Because what we're going to have to have into what I already for in that chapter is we have to have a culture of this type of ship.

26:18One of the dangers, of course, at a make-up of me, is that I tried that. But when I did it, you know, my daughter, she got a little too close emotionally and this guy got a little too involved emotionally. I said, let me ask you a question. Did you have a fake pattern of discipling young men? He said no. I said, so you have a daughter of a married couple age. You bring a young man of marriageable age along. You start discipling him, but she knows that you're doing this so that he can be prepared to be your future husband. And you wonder why the two of them got too emotionally involved. I've got the biggest saucers, you know, but if you have a culture of this where you're regularly infesting in young men, you don't have as much tendency to have to have it. Voody, I've got four daughters ages nine to fifteen and I will tell you that this year I started a shepherd's hand. Four years ago I started mentorship. Now I've got a shepherd's hand. I've got seven or eight young men in my basement three days a week. I've got four daughters doing mentorship well ahead of the game because I have four daughters Voody.

27:22Did I mention I had four daughters? We got to be mentoring. I think elders, pastors, fathers across this country by the hundreds of thousands need to be doing what we're starting to do right now. And we're not experts with this kind of thing, but we've got to create the pool. If we don't, we're going to be in trouble in the year 2012, 14, 18, 20. You know, I think it's the height of your prophecy to screen from the rooftop where are all the men and not be doing anything at all to wrap the problem. And you said it better than anybody's ever said on that program right there. I thank you for saying that right now. The book is what he must be if he wants to marry my daughter. The author Voody Bacham, Voody, thanks again for joining us on generations. Thank you for the work that you do. And folks again, let me encourage you to grab a copy of what he must be by Voody Bacham available at our website. It is a readable book. It is an interesting book. It brings up a lot of important important issues for our sons and our daughters of course.

28:25The book is what he must be if he wants to marry my daughter by Voody Bacham available at kevinswanson.com just click on store. And that's where you can hear this program anytime, anywhere in the world. That's kevinswanson.com. It's our friends and family members tuning into us at kevinswanson.com also available at the American Family Association's Home School Channel dot TV. This is kevinswanson inviting you back again next time as we continue to lay down a vision for the next generation. This has been a production of the generations media network for more information go to generations.org slash media. Thanks for tuning in to generations radio. If the conversations here have strengthened your biblical worldview, I want to invite you to take the next step with the resources at generations from curriculum to worldview books to daily discipleship tools.

29:27Everything we create is designed to help you apply the word of God to every area of life. Today listeners can save 15% on any order with the code gen radio at checkout. That's g-e-n-r-a-d-i-o for 15% off at generations.org. Thanks for being part of this journey with us.