Christian Parenting.

Hey friends, welcome back to Part of the Mess. I'm your host, Courtney Defeo, and I hope you're having a great summer, and I've heard from many of you, you're listening on your walks at the beach or outside and you're doing all kinds of fun things and thanks for taking me with you. That's such an honor. I would love to hear from you on which episodes are resonating. Who did you love? What did you learn from them? And then what kind of topics or things interest you for the fall? I'm just now scheduling some things for the fall and would

love to hear what you need most because that's the reason I'm here, guys, is to help support

you and even myself and my journey as a mom that we want kids that know, love and follow Jesus,

and that can be really challenging sometimes. So we want to be practically helpful and always

encouraging to you. Today's guest is Amy Fenton. She's a mom

of three that lives in the Nashville area. Her kids are all in college right now, actually one just

graduated, and she will share about her journey as a mom. But I wanted to have her on because of her

history and children's ministry. She has been a part of children's ministry from the local church

angle to now at an organization,

a nonprofit that services churches all around the world. And so she's been doing that for over 30

years. And she has such a heart for obviously Jesus, but the local church and how it can

support and partner with us and raising our kids. As she'll share, like, it's not all up to the

church and it's not all up to us. It's actually

a partnership with the primary influence being us. But I want you to listen from one mom's

perspective. Actually, she has been a single mom, her entire time that she's been raising her kids,

and she has some really great insights and wisdom looking back over her emptiness, sees it,

and looking back over those parenting years, what God has taught her, her kids, how he's been faithful. And I think it will encourage you so much today. We will link to several things that she mentioned, including raising boys and girls. You guys probably know, Sissy Gough and David Thomas, they're with a counseling center in Nashville, and they are good friends,

and we are friends. And so we bring up their names quite a bit. So if you don't know, that's who

we're talking about, Sissy Gough and David Thomas with raising boys and girls. It's a resource

and a ministry place that we all love. So make sure you check them out. It'll be in the show notes.

Okay, enjoy my dear friend, Amy Fenton.

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