Dr. Jessica Peck prescribes Hope for Healthy Families on American Family Radio

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Hello and welcome to the Dr. Nurse Mama show prescribing Hope for Healthy Families here on American Family Radio. Here's your host, professor, pediatric nurse practitioner and mom of four, Dr. Jessica Peck. Hey there, friends, and welcome to my Favorite part of the Afternoon, getting to spend time with you prescribing Hope for Healthy Families. This is my favorite part of the afternoon. It really is. And we are making our way through the week. It's Tuesday today. If I am looking at my calendar right, Monday felt like a Monday. So I hope that you had a better day than we did yesterday. Just wow, it just seemed like a Monday. And I'm happy to be moving on. And we've got an encouraging show for you today.

The Activate Summit is happening this June in Tupelo, Mississippi

But before I get to my guests, let me remind you about the Activate Summit that is happening this June from June 12th to 14th, 2025 in Tupelo, Mississippi. This is put on by the American Family Association. There is a program for adults. There's also a program kids age 6 to 12. And it's going to be a really exciting time of just helping to give the attendees, the people who are coming, a clearer understanding of what it means to contend as believers while living in today's culture and and a knowledge of why you can trust the Bible and a renewed desire and love for God's word. So you can register at activate.afa.net/summit that's activate.afa.net/summit And you can go and spend a few days in the very charming town of Tupelo, Mississippi. And that would be exciting to do.

Emily Assell is a best selling children's book author and speaker

So let me introduce my guest today to you. We have Emily Assell with us today and I am really excited to talk to her. She is a mom. She is a best selling children's book author. She's a speaker. She homeschools her three kids. And she and her husband Matt started Generation Claimed to self publish her first book before being picked up by Tyndale House Publishers. She's spoken at many parenting conferences, at schools, at moms groups, at special events. And she's been a featured guest on multiple podcasts and just teaches and encourages all ages about the power of God's word. But don't worry, she says her kids still have to explain all the latest slang and keep her pretty humble despite her best efforts to be cool, which we know cool is not cool anymore, right? But Emily, you are my people. You are making my four teenagers young adults. They definitely keep me humble. Welcome. We're so glad to have you.

>> Emily Assell: Oh, I'm so excited to be here. And Talk with you and your guests.

How did you get called to write and to minister to moms and kids

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, let's just dive right in and let's talk about your story. How did you get to where you are and to. How were you called to write and to minister to moms and kids?

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, you know, I, grew up in a Christian household. grew up Christian, knew about the Lord, but really didn't, understand, I guess, the power that the word of God had. So early on in my marriage we, had hit some stumbling blocks due to just some bad, bad choices, bad priorities, bad economy, and actually ended up in my mother, in law's basement with two kids. so I was.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: That does not sound fun. That does not sound fun.

>> Emily Assell: No, no. Yeah. we were next to the washer and dryer and like the leftover hand goods from like y2k did not happen. Right. Like, it's not a bougie basement. but while I was down there, the Lord really began, to teach me about the power of his word and our words. I had grown up not really seeing many people in my life who didn't really change. They had wanted to change, they had prayed hard to change, but kind of just ended up stuck in the same situation and stuck as the same person. And while I was down there, we actually had somebody come through and start talking about the power of the Word of God. And so you can go down to my mother in law's basement. There are still note cards slapped up on the wall down there for where I began speaking, praying, and believing the word of God over our life. And to kind of make a long story shorter is that I saw the word of God change our situation. and then we moved into a double wide trailer because we bought a cash, we're getting out of debt. And I began to have things raised up inside of me that I wanted. The Lord needed the Lord to deal with things like anger, jealousy, competition, unforgiveness. And I thought, okay, maybe the word of God, can do this too. And I was amazed to see that the word of God cannot just change our situation, but can also change. It can change who I am. So with that knowledge, I remember I was laying down actually, getting ready for a baby shower that I was throwing for my brother in law. And I remember thinking, lord, I don't want to just give this kid a baby blanket or a high chair or a stroller. I want to give him everything that your word says that he can have. Every promise that you died to make. Yes, and amen. And God told me, guy calls Me, M. We're tight like that. I want every child to have that and gave me this idea for a book. But of course, shouldn't say of course. Maybe some people respond immediately with yes and amen. I did not. I said, oh, someday, God, someday. My kids are not sleeping through the night. I'm homeschooling. Google tells me it's impossible. Right? When we believe Google over the word of God. but through about six months, the Lord continued to kind of keep, I think, giving me the elbow until, one day, our church does the Daniel fast at the beginning of every year. And my husband, not knowing the struggle going on within me, turned to me and said, God told me you're supposed to write a book.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Wow.

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, wow is right. And that's what I felt like. I felt like the gut punch of, okay, wow. Yes, God, you're serious. So, so I started writing a book. we always say we took it one yes, God step at a time. We wrote the book, found an illustrator, figured out ISBN, figured out a website. one step at a time until we self published the book. And then, actually we, you know, I knew where the moms were, right? I went to the consignment sales, I went to the farmers market, I went to the moms groups at churches. And I was there selling, books, actually at a MOPS group. They, were selling Lularoe and Mary Kay. It was like their big Christmas, party, I guess. And Tyndale House Publishers was there. And I felt like the Lord told me, go give them a book. And I was like, no, God, you obviously don't understand how the publishing industry works. What would you know, right? No, I was like, that's, that's not how it works. You have to have an agent. You have to, you know, all of these things. I keep making excuses to God. I actually packed up my entire car, shut the door in my trunk, and it's Chicago, it's Midwest, it's fleeting and crummy. And I felt the Holy Spirit say, emily, if nothing else in this life, have I not taught you obedience? So I went back in, waited for the table to clear handed, the girl a book, and said, you wouldn't want this from me, right? And she was like, well, yeah, sure, why not? Which again, as you know, does not happen. I handed her the book and said, we'll just see what God does with this. That was Thursday afternoon. Monday morning, the head of children's publishing contacted me and said we'd be interested in Publishing your books. and we were off and running. So it was kind of a long road to get here. But the Lord has been, faithful to our. Yes, all along.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, Emily, a long road, but the same lessons along the way.

Emily: You talked about the transformative power of the Word of God

And there are some things that really stood out to me about what you said. First of all, the power, the transformative power of the Word of God. We've heard it over and over from so many guests. And even yesterday I interviewed a former atheist for an upcoming show, so stay tuned for that. And she was talking about just the power of the Word of God, just reading it, never having been exposed to it before. And God's speaking to her so clearly through that. And when we see that, it becomes almost impossible not to obey when you're walking with the Lord like that. And so just that affirmation of the power of the Word of God I think is beautiful. Even though your life, you know, didn't look like. Like you said, you weren't in a really nice basement. You know, that there were things that were hard, but it's in those valleys that we have the best growth. That's where we're growing with the Lord. The other thing that you said that really stuck out to me, Internet searching in Google. And we know that, especially Americans, we love to get on the Internet and look stuff up. If we have a question, we go to Internet search engines. That's what we do. But we don't go. About 86% said that's their first go to. If I have a question, I'm going to the Internet. But only about 16% of people said they would go to a trusted friend. And even fewer than that said that they would go to God in prayer about that. And we have definitely got things backwards in that way. And, and you know, it's so exciting to hear your story end with the publication, but it's really not ending right. That's just the beginning of a new chapter, I think. Is that right?

>> Emily Assell: Yes. Yes, for sure. God has more things that he's always working within us. The spirit is alive and active, as is the Word.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, your kids books and your devotionals, they definitely have scripture integrated to remind us of God's promises to us. And I say this all the time here on, on my show, Emily, that kids need to hear that because so much of the world is changing. It's so chaotic. They don't know what's going to be the same, what's constant, what's going to be steady. And sure, but the word of God is something that is the same and Jesus is the same yesterday. Stay and forever. So how do, how do you use scripture in your children's books to help us hang in there during these tough times?

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, you know, I every. For those of you who don't have my books and aren't looking at them right now, every page has a declaration on it and a scripture to back it up. Right. So that when we're reading books, when we're saying these things, we know this isn't just something that I think or something that my mom thinks or something that my neighbor thinks, but it's what the Lord says. I have, a little bit of a nursing background, as you do as well. And when I grew up, we didn't do anything without the research can prove it. And I think sometimes in Christian life we don't do the same thing with the Bible. We don't say, where does that actually come from? Show me the truth. What is the truth behind what my actions are? And so when we start looking at, especially with children and they're hearing so much and they're seeing so much, and there's so much imagination involved, and we say, if it's in the Bible, it's true, and it always comes back to the word of God. And to be able to let the word of God inform how we speak, how we act, how we respond, I think it's so much, not only truth and the power of transforming the Word, but also the security and the safety that it gives kids to say, this is always true. This is where we always go. This is our foundation for everything that we do.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: you bring up an important point, because actually knowing the scripture and the reference, right, I'm thinking of old school Bible sword drills and those kinds of things. But, knowing the scripture is really important because there's actually a lot of really common phrases that people generally think came from the Bible, but they don't. Some of those examples, like God helps those who help themselves, or cleanliness is next to godliness, or this too shall pass, or God will never give you anything more than you can handle. God works in mysterious ways. You know, all of these things, they may be like, extrapolations with a range of theology on that. But it's so important to know what comes from the Bible, don't you think?

>> Emily Assell: Oh, amen. Amen. To know what it says. And, I think sometimes it's easy, and I understand because, you know, we're in a, we're in a busy world, but it's easy to just grab something off of an Instagram post or for a kid just to grab something that they hear without actually saying, okay, but what does the word really say about it instead of grabbing snapshots? And I love stories. I grew up on stories. But, yes, the word of God is our foundation, and it's so important to know what it actually says.

What inspired you to write When it Hurts? You know, many things

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, let's talk about your kids book. That is the newest one, when it Hurts. What inspired you to write this book?

>> Emily Assell: You know, we, Despite all of the other hard things that we have gone through, I was walking through a season, actually, where my grandparents, were both, in the ICU because of COVID I was the power of attorney for both of them, being a nurse and fielding all of those calls. my grandma actually ended up passing while my grandfather was in a different hospital in the icu. they had been married. It would be a month until, a month until their 70th anniversary. And I actually. He got out of the hospital. He went to, go to her funeral, and had a stroke the day before her funeral. So I sat at his bedside in the icu, which was a struggle, if, you know, hospitals, and zoomed into my grandma's funeral. I also was walking through a season. I work with an organization called Love Moves Us, which deals with kids who've been fostered and adopted. And some of their stories were heartbreaking. and some of their stories, there wasn't an easy way to tie it up with a string. And at the same time, my daughter's turtle died. And so there was this sorrow deep on different levels and different places of, where is hope? And is it okay to be sad about a turtle and be sad about my grandma and be walking through that? And so that really brought me again to the Lord and to scripture and saying, what does God really do with our pain? How do we really deal with it?

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, I want to dive into that because I think it is important for us to meet kids where they are. Sometimes we think, oh, they're too little to understand what's going on, but they do have feelings, and we need to name and claim those feelings and give them words to describe their experiences. And I know that's what you do, and I love that we have that nurse's heart and that mama's heart together to do that. We'll have more about when it hurts. And we'll also be talking about Emily's devotional later on in the show and moms who struggle with anger. You won't want to miss it. We'll see you on the other side of this break. Because of listeners like you, PreBorn helped to rescue over 67,000 babies. Your $28 to sponsor one ultrasound doubled a baby's chance at life. Your tax- deductible gift saves lives. Please join us in this life saving mission. To donate go to preborn.com/AFR will you take a moment and celebrate life with me?

Last year Preborn helped to rescue over 67,000 babies from abortion

Last year PreBorn helped to rescue over 67,000 babies from abortion. Hi, this is Jessica Peck, host of the Dr. Nurse Mama show and I want to thank you for your partnership. Think about what you did. 67,000 babies are taking their first breath now because of you. Your $28 sponsored one ultrasound that was given to a woman as she was deciding about the future of her child. Once she saw her precious baby for the first time and heard their sweetheart beat, her baby's chance at life doubled. But preborn's mission is not only to rescue babies lives but also to lead women to Christ. Last year PreBorn network clinic saw 8,900 women receive salvation. Your help is crucial to continue their life saving work. Your caring tax- deductible donation saves lives. So please be generous. To donate go to preborn.com/AFR, that's preborn.com/AFR, or dial pound 250 and say the keyword baby. That's pound 250. baby, your love can save a life. Preborn's whole mission is to rescue babies from abortion and lead their families to Christ. Last year Preborn's network of clinics saw 8,900 mothers. Come to Christ. Please join us in this life saving mission. To donate go to preborn.com/AFR. Make Room by The Church Will Sing featuring Elyssa Smith & Commu Dr. Jessica Peck welcome back friends. That is Make Room by the Church Will Sing. And we're talking today about making room to talk to kids about things that are hard. We're talking to best selling author Emily Assell She is a best selling children's book author, homeschooling mom of three and she is the author of several books. The one we're talking about today right now is a children's book that is called when  it hurts Comforting Promises for Hard Times. And as I was saying before the break, you know, it's really hard to talk to kids about things that are broken in the world. Maybe it's maybe it's losing a loved one. Maybe it's feeling hurt. Maybe it's a trial that you're going through. It's just hard to understand why sad things happen. But here is the good news that we need to make room for to tell Our kids that they are not alone, that God sees our hearts. He cares about every tear we cry. And so how do we walk through grief with faith? How do we find hope when our hearts feel heavy? So that is what we're going to talk about. And Emily was just sharing her story of walking through her own grief journey, which my listeners will know I relate with so well. Having both of your grandparents ill, and both of my grandparents were ill at the same time. During the aftermath of COVID my grandmother had actually had a stroke, Emily, because of immobility, just not getting out, not getting around. She was so active before COVID but then it was just hard when there was nothing to do but sit. And so, of course, that caused a decline in her health. But my grandparents were in a nursing home where they were right across the hall from each other. They could not see each other. But if I stood in the hallway, I could see them both. And they were married over 70 years. And it was just such a difficult thing to walk through. And if I'm really honest, I'm still walking through it. And my kids were all there. They were a little bit older, but even little kids, they see this. And so, Emily, you've written this book, When It Hurts. It's for little kids. It's a board book for kids age 0 to 4 filled with those Bible verse affirmations. So tell us a little bit more about the book and how you relate to these littles who are carrying such big burdens.

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, you know, I think it's hard. It's hard to deal with, I should say. It's hard to talk with people who are going through hard times in general, but especially when it comes to kids. Right. Because kids, I always say, sometimes we can talk in Christianese when we're adults, Right. We use the big words.

>> Emily Assell: We. We understand the big concepts. But to be able to look at a kid and break it down the way that they can understand it and to say that your pain matters. Right. My daughter's turtle died. It could be easy to push it off, or a child comes home from school feeling left out or going through those hard things. But the Bible tells us that God collects every tear we have in a bottle, whether it's the big, hard things or whether it's little things like turtles dying, which we consider little. But for her, obviously, it was a big deal. And I think that we are blessed to be able to be that conduit of God's love and how God responds to grief to our kids. I think in this book, even my prayer, of course, is that it would bring children into the presence of Jesus. But my other prayer is that it would be really kind of a way to teach parents this is how God deals with grief. And so this is how we should deal with grief. If this is what God says, we should be saying the same thing. It's okay for us to say you can be sad. It's okay for us to say, you can be angry. It's okay for us to be able to see those emotions like you said, name them, and still say, I'm here with you. Amazing to me, when you see everything that Jesus went through and the things that he said in the Bible, I don't know if it's something that starting this journey, I would have been comfortable saying, you know, why God, right? Or if only, or those things. But we see that that's what Jesus himself said. And we always get so shocked, right, sometimes when all of a sudden we're realizing that, you know, modern day research, modern day study is backing up what is already found in the word of God. but it does, because God wrote it. He knows how we work, he knows how we function. and it's so important to be able to follow God's lead in all of that.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, God made us as emotional beings. And I see this. You know, a lot of times this rears up in the teen years where kids are so emotional, right? But they don't know how to stop and recognize that emotion and respond to it appropriately. I mean, how many times, Emily, have you yourself or been with your kids where you stop somebody and you say, hey, I can see you're angry. And you see that person stop and they're like, wait, you're right, I am angry. They haven't even taken the time to stop and recognize that emotion. And that's what we've got to teach our kids when they're really little. This is what you do when you're sad. This is what you do when you're angry and having Bible verses, having scriptures that go along with those emotions because Jesus experienced those emotions. Jesus was angry when he saw the, the, the robbers in the temple, right, who were taking money from the, the Money changers. He was sad when Lazarus died. He was scared when he was in the Garden of Gethsemane. He was anxious. We see those emotions there. And so helping our kids name and claim those emotions and then directing them to a healthy coping mechanism, that's what we've got to do. But if I'm Going to be so honest. And I can say this, Emily, because I've been that moment. I didn't do that when I was, a young mom. I did not do that because I didn't know how to emotionally regulate myself. And then I was expecting, you know, my kids to carry this burden of, you know, no, you've got to emotionally regulate me, because if you're. And this is what we're gonna dive into here in a minute. But if, you know, if you're acting up, then I'm going to be triggered, and it's not gonna be pretty. I know you relate to this, and this is so hard to say, but I know you've been there, too.

>> Emily Assell: Oh, yeah, definitely. To be able to learn it for ourselves and then to do better and to be able to pass that down for our kids is huge.

Emily talks about struggling with anger as a young mom in her new book

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, let's just go ahead and go there, because in your devotional that you wrote for the mamas, or the parents, wherever you are, devotions and declarations for moms, and you say, wherever you are, whatever you have, it matters to God. And, Emily, you're pretty transparent. Transparent in the first section of this book and talking about struggling with anger as a young mom. And I think you're so right in that. There's so much stigma and shame around that. We put on, like, our little perfect mom pictures when we're out in the grocery store, you know, and we have that controlled voice. But there is something about being overstimulated, overly tired, overly committed, just overwhelmed, where it brings out that anger. And none of us want to be angry with our kids, but we'll have that, where we just get that shrill voice or. And they know. They know we're angry. Maybe we'd look back at it and think, it wasn't that bad that they know we're angry. Share about your experience that you've shared in the devotion with this.

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, you know, my kids, I laughed because I said, you know, I didn't realize I had a problem until I started yelling at stoplights one day. I was like, wait, wait. This is maybe getting out of control. Right. but in the book, I hear about how I had been dealing with anger and the Lord had been working through it again as part of using the scripture and renewing my mind and all of those things. But I still struggled. I still got overstimulated. I still had things that I was going through. And I had yelled at my son. And he walked away, of course, cowering in fear. You know, that feeling where they Just their face drops. And I remember being so angry with myself then and feeling so much ashamed and thinking, oh my goodness, he's going to be talking about me in therapy, you know, when he's 35 and what, what, what long term damage am I going to do? And, and it was this cycle of during the day I would be angry about everything and then I would lay down at night and all night long I would be angry with myself and I would be ashamed and I would sit and stare at the ceiling and think of all of the things that I had done wrong that day. And and I was living in the shame and the guilt, which obviously was not helping with the freedom work that God is doing in me. And when I began to again renew my mind with the scripture, when I started getting into it and saying, I have to believe what God says. I have to believe that when I mess up and I apologize to my kids, I can believe that I am forgiven right then I don't have to be angry with myself the rest of the day. I don't have to be sad the rest of the day. Yes, of course we feel sad when we hurt our kids, but it's not, we don't need to punish ourselves. Jesus already took the punishment for every sin we will ever commit. The Bible says he knew every word we would ever speak, everything that we would ever do, and he forgave it before the foundations of the world. I didn't have to continue punishing myself because of that. I had to believe what he said about me is that I was forgiven. And now that doesn't mean that of course I didn't care. It didn't mean that I wasn't trying to improve and continuing to walk in freedom. But I had to begin to believe what God said about me. And God said I was forgiven. God said I was a new creation. God said that he would take all things, even my weaknesses, even my mistakes, even my goodness gracious, the things that I had done wrong and turn them into something good for my kids because they loved him and were called according to their purpose. And I had to believe that. I had to stop and literally say those words to myself and literally say, God, I choose to believe what your word says over what I feel right now in this moment. And it was, it was the beginning of a life changing, especially life mothering change for me and how I mothered in the freedom that I found.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, you talked about, you know, your son saying, I don't believe you. You know, when you were apologizing for being angry. And I can relate to that, Emily. I can think of when I was not my best as. As a mom, and when my kids would say things that were really hurtful, and I would think, oh, my goodness, okay, yeah, what they said is true, and that must be everything true about me. And I'm the worst mother in the world. And exactly what you said. They're going to be on a therapy couch saying, well, it all started with my mom. You know, that's how it was going to go. But what I realized, this is one of the biggest things I've learned as a parent, is that I expected my kids to give me instant gratification on my parenting. I was insecure in my parenting, and I expected them to immediately respond. And when they didn't, like, if I would do something great and they didn't respond with gratitude, or if they weren't cleaning up their room like they were supposed to, or they weren't, you know, wanting to spend time with me, I would immediately be crumpled and think, okay, well, I must not be a good parent. And then that would bring on this little simmering anger. I felt like that was kind of the trigger there and thinking, I'm angry, that I'm doing my best and you're not responding. And I thought, emily, I was so convicted where I realized, I cannot put this weight on my kids. It is not their job to give me instant gratification as a parent. I've got to find my identity as a parent in Christ and what God says about me. And God says that he who began a good work will be faithful to complete it. And I had to start learning how to emotionally regulate and how to help my kids do that, too. And it sounds like that's exactly the journey that you are on. So what made you decide to write this specific journal for the moms?

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, I think, I always laugh, but I write the book that I needed. Right.

>> Emily Assell: But really, I remember, it really all started specifically this book is. I was talking to two of my friends, again, sitting on my back porch, and I was telling them, the word of God is so important, and you need to get in there as a mother, Because I had lived this again, this desperation and also this freedom. And I remember my friend turning to me and she said, emily, I can barely take a shower by myself, much less get into the word of God. And I remember thinking, yeah, God. And I sat down the next morning, and I was spending time with God, talking about him, praying, dreaming about, and m. Talking to him. About my friends. And that's when the idea for this really came. I wrote probably about 30 devotions, way before I ever even talked to Tyndale. Tyndall actually contacted me maybe about a year later and said, hey, we were wondering if you would want to write a devotion for Mom. I was like, well, yeah, I've already got this book here. I've already started working on this stuff. But being faithful to what God had called me to do, then God had said, this is the vision. I'm going to write it. I'm going to. I'm going to share it with my friends who need it. Because I had been so desperate and I wanted to help them out. Right? There's that verse that talks about, you know, valleys be raised up, mountains be laid low. And talking about making the paths straight for the people. That's two different verses. But, making this path straight so that people aren't stumbling over the things that they stumble over. And that was truly my heart was to be able to say, hey, I was so desperate, and I found something that worked. Let me make it a little easier for you so you don't maybe have to stumble as much as I stumbled to get into that freedom.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, it's interesting. And talking about both of our grandparents. You make me think about my granny, my sweet granny who went to be with the Lord a year and a half ago. And. And I remember her sharing with me, Emily, about when she was a young mom. And it was so different because they really parented collectively like they parented in a community. It was. Everybody knew everybody. Everybody could discipline everybody's kids. Everybody knew everybody's dirty laundry because you were literally in each other's houses doing each other's dirty laundry. Because that was the social circle, right? So she just. Just, really painted this beautiful picture for me of women, this group of women coming over. She lived in a community where the houses were kind of sparse and. And everybody would come over and they would, you know, go to each other's houses and do laundry and raise kids. And everybody knew. Everybody. And Emily, I feel like that's so different today. We parent in such secrecy. And I think this pressure of social media, we look at everybody else's curated image of motherhood, and we. We don't get to see. We're not in each other's houses like that anymore because we think, oh, I'm not ready for guests, or, you know, I've got to clean, or I have to, you know, put out this perfect charcuterie board. To have somebody over for a play date. You know, we really put so much pressure on ourselves. And when our kids are going through things, we don't share that with each other. And I think that's where some of this emotional outburst is coming, this over overflow, because we're just bottling it up inside and we have so much pressure and we're not walking in community with other people. And I think about, you know, bear one another's burdens in so doing, fulfill the law of Christ. And I feel like, Emily, that's what you're doing with this devotional. You are walking with the mamas and helping them to bear that burden and speaking declarations over them. So when we come back, I want to talk about those declarations and the advice that you got and found that was most helpful when you first became a mom. I want to know all the things don't go away. We'll be right back on the other side of this break. the month of June has been hijacked by the anti Christian culture to show their pride in something God calls an abomination. When you support afr, you help us continue to stand for godly values and provide the resources for you to stay in the know about the enemy's tactics. To say thank you for your gift, this month, we'll give you the booklet inside the LGBTQ push of the 1990s. To help strengthen your convictions, just go to afr.net/offers afr.net/offers How Great Thou Art (Until That Day) by Matt Redman To me how. Great thou art, how great thou. Then sings my soul, my savior God. To me.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: How great Thou art, how great thou. Welcome back, friends. That's How Great Thou Art by Until that Day by Matt Redman And let me tell you, God is so good. And some days when I'm feeling so overwhelmed. That's a good song to put on. blast. And know that no matter what we're going through, God is greater than our struggles. He is greater than any pain that we're going through, any trial that we're enduring. We live in a broken world. We live in a world that's not perfect. God knows that he sent his son for us. And I think of the scripture, that he who did not spare his own son, but willingly gave him up for us all, how will he not also, along with those, graciously give us all things? He will give you whatever you need to get through that situation. We can just trust him and depend on him. And that's what we're talking about with Emily Assell today. She is a best Selling author. And the. She's written two books. She has two books that have come out in the last month. One is a children's book, a, board book, which is just a beautiful, a beautiful book called when it hurts, Comforting promises for hard times. And she's also written a devotional called wherever you are, Devotions and declarations for moms.

Emily: The best advice I ever got as a mom was relax

And, Emily, before the break, we were just talking about the best advice that you have ever gotten. So I would like to know, what's the best advice you've ever gotten as a mom?

>> Emily Assell: Well, I. The best advice I ever got as a mom was relax. And I was like, what is that advice? To relax. Right. But the deeper behind it is we can rest knowing that God loves our, kids more than us, that it doesn't all depend on me. And I think when I started realizing it doesn't all depend on me, I can relax. I can rest in God's love and God's faithfulness, in his promises. It made my mothering turn so much of a different quarter. I didn't have to make sure my kids were perfect. I didn't have to make sure my kids got every Bible verse memorized, everything done. Not that we don't love them and want the best for them and give them all that we have, but I realized that God had them, and I was just a conduit for what he wanted to pour into them. That changed my mothering.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: It really does. I could feel that, as. I think that's one of the benefits of having four kids, because I was a very different mom with my first kid than my fourth. You know, my first had to be dressed perfectly to go to the grocery store. My fourth, it was like, oh, cowboy boots and shorts and, you know, a costume top. Sure, yeah, why not? Let's just go. That's completely fine. But if you can get to that place, it is a good place to be.

Emily writes about feeling too big for her own life in her new book

And I do appreciate that about your book, Emily, that you share about the different struggles that you went through. And you even said you felt too big for your own life and like, you were ruining everything. And I think there's a lot of moms out there who are in that, just in the trenches of motherhood, who feel like that. What encouragement would you give them?

>> Emily Assell: Yeah. I think that when we realize what God's plan is for us again, we can rest in him and we can trust in him. But I think that there's also, again in my own life, when I started feeling too big for my own life is because I was afraid to hope. I was afraid to dream. I was afraid to look out to what God had. And so I kept trying to kind of cram all of my hopes, cram all of my budgets, cram all of my hopes, desires, like you said, on my own kids, on my own everything. Instead of being able to say, lord God, I trust that you can expand what you have for me. If you want me to dream about writing a book, I will trust that I can look up and I can expand about writing a book. We had been through so many hard times that I had seen failure hit us really hard again as we talked about living in a basement. We had gone through bankruptcy. We were on food stamps for a while. We, had some serious problems in our marriage. And I was concerned that all of my failures were ruining everything, were ruining my kids. So I told myself, I'm not going to hope for anything more. I'm not going to reach for anything more. I'm not going to get my expectations up. I'm going to live my small life in my small. It was a double wide trailer at the time. I'm going to live my small life with my small hopes in my small house because I don't want to screw anything else up and I don't want to be disappointed again. And I obviously found myself very miserable. I remember I was standing by the side of the road and I told God, God, I'm not satisfied with my life. And he said, good, I'm not satisfied with your life either, because I have more for you than you have dared to hope, ask, dream or imagine. And that looks different for everyone. But I know that God, there's a verse in the message translation. It talks about, he did not mean you for small. You have hemmed yourself in because you have been afraid to hope. You've been afraid to dream. You're afraid to look out higher to what God has for you because you're afraid of failing. And when I dared to trust God with what I was really feeling and dared to trust God that he had something for me, it took me from a place of smallness and feeling claustrophobic in my own life to saying, there is freedom and there is so much more than I could have ever imagined if I would dare to trust and hope again.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: You know, Emily, even all this time later, I still hear the emotion in your voice talking about that moment. And you know, I. I have been there where you are. And even talking about the small things, it reminded me of something that I wrote actually a couple of years ago, I just pulled it up. It, was an encouragement for myself really, because God always gives us the message that we need. And then, and it's not that he's given us the wisdom to share it, it's the courage I found that it takes to share. But, this is what I wrote. I said, it's the mundane that becomes miraculous over time. The unseen moments that no one but heaven applauds, where your excellence in mothering is fixed as a legacy in the heart of your children. And that was it. When I think of big things for me, you know, honestly Emily, I don't think about, you know, the awards that I've gotten as a, as the success that I've had as a nurse. And I have plenty of those, you know, in my office. It is the excellence in mothering. And now that my children are becoming adults, I see broken cycles of generational dysfunction and I see the fruit of that relationship coming forward. And I had to remind myself, planting and harvesting don't happen in the same season. And you have to remind yourself to those mamas who are there, who are just, just feeling discouraged. Know that anyone can be a rock star mom for a moment. Anybody can put their best foot forward just for a big event. And it's the everyday things. Those bedtime tuck ins, the lunches you're making, the homework hassles, the carpool lines, the laundry loads, the wiping noses, wiping bottoms, wiping counters, you know, reading the same book a thousand times and kissing boo boos and hugs and understanding during all of those teen heartbreak, all of those things. Even orthodontist visits, I even did that today. It's all of those things. That's what God rewards and gives us something big.

Emily says God wants us to meet him wherever we are

And you've talked about the title of this devotional, Emily is wherever you are. And that is a message that you really want to resonate with our listeners and with your readers. What does it mean to meet them wherever you are?

>> Emily Assell: I think sometimes we think, we have an expectation that we think God has. If I show up, I have to have all my ducks in a row. I have to have not done anything. I should have met with him every other day before this. you know, all of these things we think God wants to show, us to show up perfect without sin, ready to talk with hours and hours of time. But that's not the message. Again, going back to the Bible, that's not the message that the Bible gives us. God wants us wherever we are. When I think of my kids coming and popping next to me on A couch. I don't care if he has gotten his chore list done. If my 15 year old sits down next to me and wants to talk, I am like, like over the moon excited. Right? And I think we have expectations, in different seasons of our life, we have different time availability that we can give to God. Hours, minutes, time. But if we look at the Bible and we look at, I love the story that it tells about when Jesus was in the temple with his disciples and they were watching people drop money in the offering plate and his disciples looked around and they were so oohed and awed and impressed by these people who were dropping off these large amounts into the offering parades. You know, and you probably get this picture of like they had their, you know, their outfits already. They were looking, you know, put together and they were dropping off these big, large amounts of time, these big offerings. But Jesus looked past all of that and he saw a little widow woman who gave two mites. And he looked at her and he said, she is the one who impresses me because she gave all that she had and maybe what she didn't. And as moms, sometimes two minutes is all that we have and sometimes even what we don't. But God will meet us there. God is impressed. He is overwhelmed by the offering that we give. He wants us, as we said at the beginning, wherever we are, whatever we have is important to God.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: That's so encouraging because you are so right. I have been there as a mom like that feeling like you don't even have a moment to yourself during the day. And that's where integrating a lot of these faith practices into your day are really, really helpful. One of the things is reading even a board book can be really ministerial to a, ah, mom, you know, looking at when it hurts and I can think, okay, God, this hurts today. And even that board book can speak to you. But I think just modeling those things throughout the day and showing your kids right in the middle of your struggle by praying out loud, by reading a scripture, by, you know, just going for a walk and talking with the Lord out loud, just doing those things with your kids, that is the way to go. And so how does the devotional relate to your board books? Talk about integrating that a little bit more.

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, you know, I think it was, maybe Jenny Allen who talked about how, you know, she learned scripture because she taught it to her kids first on the floor with their Bibles. Right. And I think these books have scripture in them. We have had, goodness kids take them off to College with them. We've had. I have cried reading the book many times over. My kids, when I have needed it as well. Because, because scripture is powerful. As we talked about the word of God will not return void. Whether it's next to a picture of a polar bear or a dolphin or whether it's in a mom's devotional, the word of God will not return a void in our lives. It has the power to transform us. And the board books, I have done works in my own life. when I went to Tyndale Day, came and they talked to me and I went and talked at their chapel. And the girl who got up and introduced me, she's like, this book is really impactful. It really impacts people in my family. And I thought she was going to talk about her kids. And she said, my grandmother just moved into a nursing home and one of our board books is called Chosen about how God chose you. And she said, and she brought the board book Chosen with her. My 98 year old grandma and her and her friends read it to remind them that God has still chosen them and that he still has a purpose for them. at 98, in a nursing home. Because the word of God, and that's, that's the word of God for us. It is the same. And Jesus is the same. Jesus who is the Word is the same. Yesterday, today and tomorrow, forever and ever. Amen. and that's, that's the power of these books. Whether it's with a seahorse next to it or whether it's beautifully decorated as something that would be important for a moment. Scripture is the basis for both books. And the Lord will always meet you in his word.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Well, you have this devotional separated into four parts. The first one is fully forgiven, the second is incomparably loved, the third is divinely equipped, and the fourth is kingdom called. And honestly, Emily, as I'm looking at this, I think these are messages that moms need to hear today. Because moms today, you know, I wasn't a young mom that long ago, but I was, wasn't a mom. I didn't have little kids in the age of smartphones. I did not have a smartphone until my first was a teenager. And I can't imagine what kind of pressure that is. It's a distraction and it's constant image crafting from other people that are there and telling us what other people are and what they're not. Oh, this mom has it all together. This mom, you know, takes her kids to the zoo every day. This mom makes a bento box lunch every day, and I'm, you know, giving my kids, like, I'm cutting the mold off an orange. You know, that's where you feel. But some of these messages that you have, I just want to read those over our listeners as we finish up here today. You are, you say you are all of these things, and these are from Scripture. You are free from shame. You're pardoned. You're righteous, you're faultless. You're set right. You're welcomed, you're helped, you are pursued. You are changed. You are being transformed. You're being made pure. You're going to make it. You're forgiven. You're given grace, you're comforted, advocated for. You are patiently loved. You are understood. You are given compassion. You are cleared. You are not a slave. You are free. You are restored. You are refreshed. You are not going to fail. And I am talking to that mom out there who is listening right now. You are not going to fail. You are not going to fail. Just give your burden to God. He is standing right there to walk through with you and through our weaknesses. He is made perfect. Well, Emily, tell us where we can find you, where we can get a copy of these books.

>> Emily Assell: Yeah, I am, I'm on social media. I'm on Facebook. Instagram is probably where I am most active, and that's Generation Claimed on Instagram. But you can find us wherever you find books, we are, possibly on the shelves at your local Barnes and Noble. Otherwise we are online at Amazon, Target, Walmart, Books, a million Barnes and Noble. Wherever you find books, you'll find us.

>> Dr. Jessica Peck: Wherever you are, that's the name of the book. Wherever you are, look for the book and our prescription for hope today, speak God's word over your children and speak it over yourself. And listen. I'm going to speak it over you. May the Lord bless you and keep you and make your face shine upon you and be gracious to you. I can't wait to see you back here tomorrow. We got a great week lined up. You don't want to miss a single show. I'll see you then.

>> Jeff Chamblee: The views and opinions expressed in this broadcast may not necessarily reflect those of the American Family association or American Family Radio.

Author and Speaker Emily Assell talks with Jessica about speaking God's Word over our children

Rx for Hope: Speak God's Word Over Your Children

https://www.generationclaimed.com/