Raising Grateful Families in an Entitled World, with Tricia Goyer

What could happen if you challenged your family to take grumbling off the table this Thanksgiving? Guests Tricia Goyer and Ray and Robyn McKelvy will help you raise grateful kids in an entitled world in this Grounded episode. 

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Episode Notes

The Grumble-Free Year by Tricia Goyer

True Girl’s No-Grumble November Challenge 

“Cultivating a Contented Heart” podcast series

“Nancy Shares Her Gratitude Wall” video 

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Portia Collins: Instead of dreaming about what we're going to put on our Thanksgiving tables next week, we want to encourage you to take something off the table. And listen, I'm not talking about the turkey or the mashed potatoes or the macaroni and cheese. I'm Portia Collins, and this is Grounded. 

Erin Davis: Oh, look at that picture of mashed potatoes. I am ready for the mashed potatoes and the mac and cheese and the turkey. All of those things will be on the table at the Davis Thanksgiving. I'm Erin Davis. We're not here to talk about food, as much as I would love to. We're here every week to give out two things: hope and perspective. 

So, here's what we want to encourage you, and encouraging you and definitely encourage ourselves to take off the table for the rest of November and beyond . . . grumbling. You can call it whatever you want. It's complaining. It's fussing. It's griping. It’s groaning. It doesn't matter what you call it. 

Today's guest is a mother of ten. Yes, you heard that right, and a grandmother as well. She and her family took on a major assignment. I want you to know how many kids she has because when I say next you're gonna think, Is that even possible? Here was the assignment they gave themselves: no complaining for an entire year. 

Tricia Goyer is here, and she's gonna tell us what happened. And I hope she's gonna give us some coaching on how we can head into Thanksgiving with hearts that are truly, truly grateful. We’ve got to deal with the grumbling first for that to happen.

Portia: Listen, I'm amazed already because there’s only three people in my house, and we have not achieved this. 

Erin: I know.

Portia: So, there's a lot of wisdom I know that she's gonna share for this little three-person family.

Erin: Yeah, I lost my cool with my boys this weekend because they were grumbling about this piece. I cleaned out drawers. It was like this little piece of metal that had been tucked in a drawer for years. And all of a sudden, their fights. fussing about it, griping because they can't have it. I was like, “Okay. Can't have that.” So anyway, I hope I learn a better way today.

Portia: Look, who would think that a four-year-old would have something to grumble about, but yet, here we are. 

Erin: They do. 

Portia: Well, the McKelvy’s are also in the studio with us. Get this, between Tricia’s family and the McKelvy family, there are twenty kids

Erin: 2-0

Portia: Plus grandkids. So look, these folks have been in the trenches. I am confident that they can help us raise grateful kids, and not only that, they can help us to be more grateful adults, even in this entitled world. 

So, we want you guys to share this episode, because I'm pretty sure there's a lot to glean from, and we don't want anybody to miss out. 

Erin: I'm 100% sure. It’s definitely a shareable episode. Yep.

Portia: Yes. Erin, do you want to know something that I'm grateful for? 

Erin: Yeah, for sure. 

Portia: That we get to start every episode with good news, and you're the person that's bringing it today. 

13:27 - Good News: The Power of Gratitude

Erin: Yeah, I love it when I get to be the Good News correspondent. I get to be the bearer of good news, not bad news. So, I'm gonna keep today's good news segment short and sweet, because I want to hear from our guests, and I know that you do, too. 

So, here's the good news today. This is true: being grateful is good for your brain. It's good for lots of things, but it's good for your brain. That's important. It matters because gratitude works like an antidote to grumbling. So, we're going to talk about grumbling, we're gonna talk about taking grumbling off the table. But those go hand in hand—gratitude and not grumbling. 

I don't want you to take my word for it, that gratitude is good for you. Here's what the research says about the power of living thankful. “Gratitude causes synchronized activation.” I don't really know what that means. It seems like a good thing “of multiple brain regions.” In other words, it lights up different parts of your brain. “It also lights up the brain's reward pathways.” We know this because they can now study these things on scans and the hypothalamus. Now you should pay attention to that because the hypothalamus’s job is to keep your body in homeostasis. How do you like it, all these big words I'm using today?

But homeostasis means keeping you okay. So that happens in some ways at a brain level. The job of that hypothalamus is to keep you in that okay state. It controls your hormones. And listen, every woman listening knows that when our hormones are out of whack, we have trouble feeling okay. Researchers have tracked this, and they found that when we are thankful that little command center in your brain reduces a couple of chemicals: serotonin and dopamine. Those probably sound familiar because those are your pleasure chemicals. And that's the same part of your brain that controls your emotions and your behavior. 

You hearing this women? The part of your brain that regulates your hormones, that controls your emotions . . . I had some spikes in emotions this weekend.Your behavior, it also controls your higher order thinking skills, like your focus and your attention. All of that gets activated when you are thankful. 

So over and over studies have proven this act of gratitude, actually acting on the feeling of gratitude, it improves your relationships. It motivates us to exercise more often and to attend regular checkups, which then, that just helps everything else work more smoothly. Gratitude on a brain level somehow frees us from envy and resentment. 

Portia, are you Emmi back there, I feel like you probably should be okay. It enhances our empathy, which is our ability to feel compassion toward other people. Gratitude does that; it decreases our aggression. I feel like we could put this one into practice today. You're feeling angry, you're feeling annoyed, try gratitude. See what happens to your brain. 

So go ahead and try to yell at someone right after you've expressed your gratitude. I do know it's possible, because the Davis family tends to pile in the boy mobile after church and start bickering. I know we're not the only ones. I'm not saying it's impossible to be grateful and gripe at somebody, but it is harder. 

Gratitude helps us sleep better. It reduces our stress. That's a long list of the neurological benefits of gratitude, and I could make a much longer list. 

So, the bottom line is that being grateful, which is a choice that every single one of us have every single day, is not contingent on our circumstances. Now, there may be times it's harder to be grateful. We can always find something to thank God for.

And as Christians, we don't just send that gratitude into the universe and hope that somebody hears us. We direct our gratitude towards someone—towards Jesus—who Scripture says is the giver of all good gifts. So, here's the bottom line, thanking God helps us flourish at a neurochemical level. And we think that's pretty good news. 

Portia: Absolutely. You know, I love it when science backs up what the Bible says.

Erin: Me too! I love it when they make a discovery of something that Scripture has been telling us about. 

Portia: Yeah, but the Bible tells us this when we are grateful everything is really abundant in our lives, our health, everything. So yeah, they just told us something we already knew.

Erin: We should have already known it. You're right. I love it.

17:57 - Grounded with God's People: Tricia Goyer

Portia: Well, ladies we've got Tricia Goyer with us today. She is a mama of ten, a wife and the caregiver of her 88-year-old mom. A few years ago, Tricia and her family set out on an interesting journey to cultivate hearts of gratitude by committing to a grumble-free year. Oh, mad props, girl. I can't wait for you guys to get the details on this. I know she's gonna share a lot of things that we all need to hit here, so hit the share button again so your friends don't miss out on this. Welcome, Tricia.

Tricia Goyer: Thank you so much for having me. It's great being here today.

Portia: So, let's just get straight to it. 

Tricia: Okay.

Portia: Because I have totally missed it, I have been reading about you and your family. I just want to know, what even led you and your family to consider a grumble-free year? 

Tricia: Well, what led us to it is we took eight of our kids, we have ten kids, but eight of them went on a trip from Little Rock to Seattle, Washington. I was speaking up there. I'm like, let's make it a family trip. By the time we got up there. I thought, we need to do something about this rumbling, “You're touching me. It's my turn for the DVD player. That's my seat belt.” I mean, just the grumbling all the way there. And John and I talked about it, we said, let's try this. We're just going to try to go without grumbling. And at the end of it, maybe we'll take you guys on a cruise. 

Now, that got some of their interests. They didn't know that they were already planning to take them on a cruise. But it got us looking at why we grumble, how we grumble. We started thinking about how we can stop grumbling. So, this was a process. It wasn't like one day everyone woke up and said, “We’re not going to grumble.” It was really digging in deep and going into our hearts and talking about the root of grumbling.

Portia: Hmm, I can think of a ton of scenarios. My little family has been in the same situation. So, I get it; I get it. Well, I want you to give us two details on this little experiment on how this actually panned out. What were the parameters? What did this look like? Give us all the details.

Tricia: Okay, so first, we sat down, and I thought, Okay, we need to talk about what grumbling is. And it's not just the words, because I had five teenage girls in the house at the time. I said, ‘“It's the eye rolls. It's the heavy sighs.” And so, one of my daughters said, “Let's figure out our grumbling styles. And so, they got a whiteboard out, and we started rambling. “Mom, you pick at us. You pick on us—your don't this, do this.” I'm like, “You're right. I do that.” One of our daughter's whines. One of them said, “I roll my eyes.”

And so right out there ended up being more of a lighter. We started laughing about our grumbling styles, which I didn't plan to start it that way. But it just got us aware of how we grumble in many, many ways. 

And then we started thinking, Okay, what do we do? 

Well, right away, we realize policing each other does not work. “You're grumbling.” “No, I'm not.” Like that's just cause for rumbling and more grumbling, more grumbling. We said, “We need to start looking at ourselves. We need to start catching ourselves.” 

And I realized, as soon as I would see them start to grumble and stop, I would start praising them. Great job. I know you almost grumbled. And so, instead of trying to catch each other doing wrong, we started catching each other doing right and started praising us. 

Now, we also dug into God's Word. We started reading through Exodus and into Numbers, which the Israelites, it was like chapter after chapter of grumbling. And so, as we went through that, we realized like this is something that God takes seriously, because they were grumbling and complaining, the Israelites did not go into the Promised Land. 

And then one moment that really changed everything was we were trying harder and working harder and trying to do it in our own effort. During this time my grandma ended up living with us. She ended up breaking her back. She was in bed, and she had to have a back brace. She could hardly get up, we were tending to her a lot. 

One day, we were sitting there doing a read out loud, and we heard her praising in the other room. She's flat on her back in the back brace, and she's just singing hymns, and thanking Jesus. One of my teen daughters said, “If Grandma can do that, maybe we can too. Like we're complaining about little things.” We started seeking God's help, and started actively praising Him more. 

So, it was months and months of thinking about it, talking about it, trying to catch each other doing good, and then turning to God and asking him to help us because we can't do this in our own strength at all.

Portia: Oh, so let me get this. I thought this was your mom, but this was your grandmother that you were caring for. 

Tricia: That was my grandmother, yes.

Portia: Oh.

Tricia: She’s still here. 

Portia: Hey, look at that. I am just so touched to see my elders praising. If anybody has got anything to grumble about, it would probably be them. For them to praise and just be availing themselves to God in that way, that is such an encouragement to me.

Tricia: We still hear her. She loves this thing in the middle of the night, and her bedroom is right next to mine. I know I'm gonna miss this someday. But I really just want to sleep right now, but she's just singing, clapping her hands and praising Jesus at three o'clock in the morning.

Portia: Like, you can't grumble about that. You can't.

Tricia: I can't grumble about that.

Portia: Well, I think a question that everybody wants to know is, basically, what were the results of your decision to be a grumble-free family for a year.

Tricia: So, what it took was some of the results didn't show up right away. In fact, because we planned on a year, like four to five months into it, I was thinking, What am I doing? This is not working. What is going on? Then I realized, I need to start apologizing for when I grumbled. So when I would start grumbling, and you need to pick up your shoes, or have you done your chores yet, or all the different things. When I started, “I'm sorry, that wasn't a good attitude. I'm so thankful for you.” And again, going back to that praise, once I started apologizing, then my kids started doing that, too. 

So, that was the first thing: not only trying to stop ourselves, but then when we did grumble, because nobody's perfect . . . We did not have a perfect year at all. But when we started apologizing to each other, it made a huge difference. 

And then as the year went along, and we started praising God more. We had a gratitude jar where we would write things we were thankful for, and we put them inside it. We started journaling different things we were grateful for. We saw that we noticed not only the things that were struggles are wrong in our life, we saw how God was showing up again and again in a daily basis, how He was providing for us, how He was taking care of us. So it just made us more aware of the good things in our lives. 

And then when we were on our way to the cruise, which was at the twelve-month mark, I remember we went into a gas station. Some of the kids went in; some of the kids stayed in the big twelve-passenger van that we have. Some of them got snacks. We went to the car, and I heard the other kids say, “Wait, they got snacks and we didn’t.” And I'm like, “Oh no, here we are. The grumblings are gonna start. Here we go. It's gonna start again.” I was shocked that the kids that had the snack said, well, “We'll share our snacks with you. And next time we stop, you can get snacks, and you could share with us.” 

And in that moment, I thought, This has been worth all the effort. Because I remembered that trip before when we were in the twelve-passenger van and grumbling all the time to, in that moment, the kids instead of the ones in this, once in the car just mentioned that, “Hey, you got snacks we don't, the other ones offered to share.” And it turned into this, this peaceful moment, this giving moment instead of the grumbling and complaining. That made me realize like all the time in God's Word, all the time in prayer, all the time writing our gratitudes down really made a difference. 

So, we're still not a perfect family. But even now, it's something I'll see the kids catch themselves. Or I'll say, “Oh, I'm sorry. I was grumbling and apologize.” So, it has made a difference in our family dynamic and how we handle those things. And sometimes I'll even say, Is that a grumble?” And then quick to turn it around. So, I'm not grilling. It just gave us a common language for our family to talk about gratitude instead of grumbling all of the time. 

Portia: Yeah, you know, it's almost like being in the gym. You start to build that muscle memory. You're training like the first day that you're in the gym, you don't really see any results. And the second day that you're in the gym . . . 

Tricia: She’s like I don’t feel good.

Portia: I know. It's like building that muscle memory. That first day you don't really see the results that you're looking for. But then when you do that six-month comparison, or the eight-month comparison, you really start seeing, “Oh, well, yeah, this has been working.” 

So, that's super encouraging to hear that you guys had a system that worked? 

I want to ask one more question, then I'm gonna ask you to pray for us. As I think of myself as a mama and a wife, even as a sister, as a daughter, I think the most pressing question here is how do we allow God to transform our hearts toward contentment? I love that you were like a catalyst for your family and cultivating contentment. So, how can we cultivate that within our own families?

Tricia: Absolutely. Well, Philippians 2:14 says, “Do everything without grumbling and complaining.” And then a couple of verses down, it says, “because we will shine like lights.” And so really just going before God and asking Him to transform my heart, all the things where I have unrealistic expectations, or I'm feeling overwhelmed. We could take those things to God. 

In the morning when I spend time with Him, when I read my Bible, when I pray, when I asked Him to work on my heart, before I get started with my day, I enter my day with a better understanding of God and His Word, and that He's with me, and that He loves me, and that He can walk with whatever challenges come into my day, that I can face them with Him. 

And so really, whether it's one minute or five minutes of taking my heart, my attitude, my unrealistic expectation, my worries to God, and giving it to Him. Sometimes I'm laying in bed and sending up a ten-second prayer. Sometimes I'm praying in the shower. Sometimes I have that time to sit down with God's Word. But when I get my heart changed, and I remember that I shine brightly like a light in a dark generation when I have gratitude, instead of grumbling, it makes all the difference.

Portia: Yes, yes. See, you took us to the goldmine. Absolutely, it that is absolutely it. And it's so encouraging. Well, would you mind praying for us for our Grounded sisters, that we can cultivate contentment for ourselves, but also for our families? And that we would really begin to set the tone for gratitude in our own homes?

Tricia: Absolutely. Well, dear heavenly Father, I thank You so much that we could come to You and our weakness. Your strength is complete. I thank You, God, that even when our days are not what we expect, even when there's challenges that we don't want to face, that You are there with us, I pray that our gratitude will start by us just opening our hands and lifting our hands and our eyes to You. 

Lord, I pray for each woman out there who is often facing very hard things in her day. And in this season, I pray that You will come to her and give her peace and give her joy and that will flow out of her in the form of gratitude. I pray she will be a shining light to her family, to her neighbors and to everyone she comes across. Lord, thank You for the opportunity as women to be an influence on those around us. Thank You, Lord, in Your name we pray, amen.

Portia: Amen, amen. As you were praying that, I put my little hand on my baby, and I was praying that for her too. So, I am so grateful for you Tricia. Thank you so much for being here with us today. This has been a blessing to me.

Tricia: Thank you, Portia. I really enjoyed the time.

Portia: Good deal. Well, Tricia shares a lot of tools and practical insight for cultivating families of gratitude in her book and on her website. The title of her book is, check this out, The Grumble-Free Year, and the subtitle is 12 Months, 11 Family Members, and One Impossible Goal. We will drop a link to both of those to the book and the website so you can check it out. 

32:11 - Grounded with the McKelvys

And now the moment that I've been waiting for, our beloved pastor and wife duo Ray and Robyn McKelvy are here. Hey, I hear that you guys are on an awesome staycation. So, like, I'm kind of jealous, but I'm not gonna grumble. But you know. 

Ray McKelvy: Hey, it is much needed.

Portia: Absolutely. Give us what you’ve got this morning.

Ray: Okay, well, first off, we are on a staycation. So, who knows how the internet and the sound are. So, we apologize for that right off, but we are so glad to be with you. That was convicting, hearing about not complaining and grumbling. 

Robyn McKelvy: Well, about two or three weeks ago, I was fasting. I know the Bible says for us to do everything without complaining and grumbling, but groceries are getting expensive. 

So, I walk in and there are a bunch of ladies sitting around the eggs, and they are grumbling. And so, I told these ladies, “I told my husband, I was not going to fuss about the prices anymore, but you are making me sin, because I need to get in on this conversation.” But anyway, there is some bright light. That's so true, Tricia, there are some bright lights that shine, if you can do things without grumbling. 

Ray: And you know, we have ten children as well. I just think about these lessons that we can teach our kids and, of course, ourselves as well, four, five lessons that we believe will help, especially in an entitled generation. So, let's just jump right into it. Rob, you know, the first one we have is the lesson of delayed gratification. You know, just the fact that they don't have to get things right away.

Robyn: That's our son right now. Can't wait to get a cell phone. His friends call Ray and say, “Ryland needs a cell phone.” But delayed gratification is worth it. 

Ray: Now, listen, this kid is fourteen. 

Robyn: That's right. 

Ray: And so, I'm starting to feel badly for him. He's gonna be fifteen pretty soon. I mean, he plays basketball, and it is a difficult thing. But the delayed gratification, having to wait, makes you appreciate. You know, it's so true. Having to wait makes us appreciate. And so, teaching our kids to work for things, to wait for things, to pray for things.

Robyn: And then even to help save for things.

Ray: Yes, yes. So, delayed gratification. Another one is a lesson of hard work.

Robyn: Our special gift to all of our kids at the age of fourteen is an application to work at Chick-fil-A. Every one of our kids, we have child number ten, working at Chick-fil-A. And it's been a great experience to learn how to say, to learn how to give. It's so important that we teach that, and the kids see us not only do it, but they do it. One of the things I say to kids as they're going to work every day. I say, “Have a good day and be kind to the people.”

Ray: You know, I remember when we got to our youngest son, and I said, “Ryland, you're about to turn fourteen. Do you know what that means?” And he said, “Chick-fil-A.” But it is so great for them to learn hard work and learn how to serve others. I remember at one point, it was like the McKelvy’s were running the entire Chick-fil-A. We had three working the front counter, one working the drive thru, one in the kitchen back there. It was just amazing. But you know, teaching our kids to work hard. What's another lesson?

Robyn: Let's first add this, Scripture?

Ray: Yeah, go ahead. 

Robyn: It's one of the things that Proverbs 14:23 says is that “all hard work brings a profit. But mere talk leads only to poverty.” And a lot of things in this entitled world . . . Our kids think they're talking says that they've accomplished something. But a lot of times we just talk about it, and they haven't done one thing. So, we need to lead and teach them. That hard work is putting your hands to do something and doing well.

Ray: And as parents, I know we're talking specifically about children. We need not be so fearful. We're afraid that our kids won't like us, or we're going to harm our children. We're so fear based, but it's okay for our kids to work hard.

Robyn: It's biblical. 

Ray: It is. And it's alright if they have to be delayed for something that they really want. So, teaching them to wait for things, teaching them to work hard for things is wonderful.

Robyn: And then the third thing is teaching them to share chores. We know that many hands make light work. One of the things that I love is, I went back to school and Ray did a family meeting and sat everybody down. He said, “We're gonna have to share these chores because Mommy can't do them all.” So, it's really sweet watching our kids cook every day, watching our kids clean every day. And then on Sundays, we get the privilege of sharing the chores to get it all done, so we can rest.

Ray: And you know, it's interesting, when we talk about shared chores, we didn't know, every family is different. You do what fits for your family. We didn't give allowance for chores. Because our thought is, “Hey, we all live here. We're not going to pay you so that you can live here, in the sense of serving the family.” 

So, everybody has shared chores. I remember teaching the kids how to clean the bathroom. I was like, “When you get down to that toilet, you need to hug the toilets, I don't want you lightly touching it. You put your arm around it, you spray that thing down, you clean it, you clean that bathroom.” I think that teaches our kids not to be so entitled, but how to serve others. 

Robyn: So, lesson number four is serving others. I think that's something that we forget to do even as parents, so not only serve others, but lead in serving others. One of the beauties of our church family is we do these meals, you know the way they call it, the meals online. And so, it's so important that your kids learn how to do that. I made a meal the other day for a big family that was going through a death in their family. My daughter took the meal to their family, helped take it in, help serve that. That's something that we can all do, learn how to serve others.

Ray: As I say it, remember, we have six daughters, and many of them would babysit. I know occasionally Robin would say, “I want you to do that for free. I want you to serve that family; don't charge this time.” And you know, I would come to my girls’ aid and go, “Wow, are you sure about that?” She says no. Sometimes we need to learn to just serve to give to other people, not for our own profit, but for them as well. 

Robyn: Yeah. 

Ray: All right. I know our time does go so quickly here. Let me give you one more: the lesson of generosity.

Robyn: I think that's so important. I think that when we talk about how much we have, it's so important. Then this one is also biblical. First John 3:17 says this, “If anyone has material possessions and sees a brother or sister in need but has no pity on them, how can they say the love of God is in you?” How can the love of God be in that person? If you see a need and you have so much, we need to learn how to live a generous, very generous life.

Ray: One of the things that really touched me was were away in Cincinnati, Ohio. We were at a restaurant, and we had seen several homeless people just sitting on the street. And so, our family, I don't know how many were at home at the time, but we went into this restaurant. We ordered our food, and we started eating. But I noticed one of my daughters just asked for a to-go box. I look at my daughter and go, “Renee, aren't you going to eat?” And she says, “No, I'm not going to eat right now. And she had all of her food in a box.” So, after everyone's eaten, we walk outside, and she takes her food and gives it to a homeless person out there without saying anything. She didn't say look at what I'm doing. And I can tell you that's one of the things that we need to teach our kids, to be generous instead of just being entitled. I think we're out of time. 

Robyn: Okay, but this last little tidbit. Your kids can only live generous, your kids can only have delayed gratification, all of these things, if you lead in that. 

Ray: That's so true. 

Robyn: So, make sure that you spend a lot of time talking to the Lord about it, and then lead and lead courageously. 

Ray: All right, Portia, I know that we have to send it back to you. I pray that your daughter is doing well. It was so precious just to see you holding that beautiful baby. Well, I see Erin there. So, Erin, is it back to you?

Erin: I'm here. Yeah, I'll take it. Actually McKelvys, you solved the problem for me, because I also have a fourteen-year-old who's almost fifteen. He's told me he is the only fourteen-year-old in the world who doesn't have a cell phone. So, I got ammunition now to tell him no. There's a boy in Tennessee. He doesn't have a phone either. 

Ray: He does not. 

Erin: So we're gonna hold it together. Thanks for being with us. 

Ray: Thank you. 

42:56 - Grounded in God's Word: Numbers 12

Erin: I loved everything you said, and want to implement it in my own home. 

Well, there's a story in the Old Testament that I think in a really profound way reveals God's heart toward grumbling. That's what we're about here on Grounded. We have guests who are so wise and have really wonderful things to say. But they're all speaking out of God's Word. So, what does the Bible say? 

We already got that verse in Philippians, that tells us we're supposed to do all things without grumbling and complaining, well, why? Numbers 12:1–3 tells us a story. I'm going to read it to us. It's about Miriam, Aaron, and Moses,

Miriam and Aaron spoke against Moses, because of the Cushite women whom he had married, for he had married a Cushite woman, and they said, “Has the LORD indeed spoken only through Moses?” 

Now, I'm adding my inflection there. But I think we can take from the fact that they were grumbling, that there might have been some sarcasm involved. 

“Has he not spoken through us also?” [And this should make us tremble in our slippers in my case this morning.] “And the LORD heard it.” 

Scripture says, “Now the man Moses was very meek more than all the people who are on the face of the earth.” So, you're tracking with me. Moses is appointed by God to lead the Israelites out of Egypt and into the Promised Land. They weren't wrong. They had actually been given God given assignments. 

This is a message for us, right before Thanksgiving if ever I heard one, because what exactly were Miriam and Aaron grumbling about? Their in laws, we see it right there in verse one, they were also grumbling about Moses’ spiritual gifts. And Scripture tells us that God heard it, and He did not take it lightly. 

There's this moment that happens in my house pretty regularly. Our house has an upstairs with two bedrooms and a bathroom in-between. Those two bedrooms are inhabited by four boys. Sometimes when I'm downstairs, it sounds like they are doing some common combination of wrestling, bowling, and yelling at each other. And so, I will come to the bottom of the stairs, and I will say, “Boys!” 

Well, that's exactly what happened to Miriam and Aaron. He called for Moses, Miriam, and Aaron to come to the Tent of Meeting, the equivalent on a much higher stakes, that scale of me calling those boys of mine to the top of the stairs. 

I want you to hear God's response to their grumbling. We find it in Numbers 12:6–8. 

And he said [he here is God], “Hear my words: [Listen, that's parenting language. He's saying, listen to me.] If there is a prophet among you, I the LORD make myself known to him in a vision. I speak to him in a dream. Not so with my servant Moses. He is faithful in all my house. With him I speak mouth to mouth clearly and not in riddles, and he beholds the form of the LORD. Why then were you not afraid to speak against my servant Moses?” 

Aaron and Miriam were face to face with God's wrath towards grumbling. They had to see that he didn't brush it off as no big deal. We have a saying in our house. Sibling rivalry isn't normal, it's sinful. That's what we see here. It may be normal, but it's also sinful. So, God called a spade a spade, and He said what grumbling is. It is sin. Listen to numbers 12:9–12 to see what happened. 

And the anger of the LORD was kindled against them, and he departed. When the cloud removed from over the tent, Miriam was leprous like snow. Aaron turned toward Miriam and behold, she was leprous. And Aaron said to Moses, [he changed his attitude pretty quick], “Oh, my lord, do not punish us because we have done foolishly and have sinned. Let her not be as one dead whose flesh is half eaten away when it comes out of his mother's womb.” 

Suddenly, instead of grumbling about Moses, Aaron is groveling and saying, “Don’t make this punishment go on.” 

Why was God so mad at Aaron and Miriam? Why didn’t He have that “come and talk to Me” moment? Why did he give Miriam leprosy which is a pretty severe punishment, and it goes on, to cast her out of the camp because she was unclean. What was the deal? Why was grumbling against her brother, which is something that we normalize really easily, why did it make God so mad? Well, for the answer to that, we need to head to the Damascus Road. 

Turn in your Bibles to the book of Acts, chapter 9. I want to read verses 3–4. This is another “come to Jesus” moment. Except this time, it's Paul. 

Now he went on his way he approached Damascus, [this is Paul] “and suddenly a light from heaven shown around him. And falling to the ground, he heard a voice saying to him, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?”

Now was Paul really persecuting Jesus? Well, not really, because Jesus had already died and resurrected and ascended to heaven. So, it's not like Paul was personally attacking Jesus Himself. And Paul asked the same question. Let me read us Acts 9:5–6. 

And he said, “Who are you, Lord?” And he said, “I am Jesus whom you are persecuting. But rise and enter the city and you will be told what to do.” 

Grumbling is a sin, which makes it deadly serious. And there's two reasons why. One: when we grumble against a person, we are grumbling against an image bearer of God, someone who Christ died for. Think about that when you're tempted to grumble. That's why Jesus said, “Why are you persecuting Me, Saul?” Because in persecuting Christians, Saul was persecuting people made in the image of God who Christ had to hang on the cross and die for. 

So that coworker, that family member who drives you crazy at holiday gatherings, I think I am the family member who drives people crazy all-day at gatherings, or even when we grumble against ourselves, we are grumbling against an image bearer of God, who Christ went to the cross to save. 

The second reason why rumbling is deadly serious is because grumbling reveals an ungrateful heart. I've said it before, I'll say it again. I don't know how we can grumble and be truly grateful at the same time. 

And Miriam's punishment was that she got that leprosy, and she was set outside the camp. And actually, that's our punishment too. Grumbling sets us outside the camp of God's presence, because it's a sin, and God cannot tolerate sin in our lives. 

So, what are we going to do? I've already grumbled this morning. I will be tempted to grumble when this episode is over, and probably all day long, because things rarely go my way. What do we do when we're tempted to grumble? What do we do when our families get on that grumble track, man, it happens every time in the car, as Tricia was saying. We have to shift to gratitude instead. 

So, when you want to grumble today, it's so easy. Just tell the Lord some things that you're grateful for. See what He does. 

Portia: Oh, Erin. Always taking it home. 

Erin: Come on.

Portia: Okay, you gotta come in here and hear Ms. Erin talk. 

Erin: Hi Emmi.

Portia: Erin said, “Hi Emmi.”

Erin: She’s our favorite Grounded cohost. 

Portia: She's waving. She's sitting here beside me. 

Erin: Oh, sister.

Emmi: I’m sick. 

Portia: We’re going pray for you to feel better. Okay. 

Erin: Well, we should pray for her before we go. 

Portia: Yeah, we can. Alright, can you sit tight for Mommy while Mommy finishes. Thank you. 

Erin: You're doing so good with not grumbling, Portia, which is good because we’re talking about it. 

Portia: Yes. We want to give you some tools to help with this because you may have some kiddos in your home who whine or grumble. I know I do. And you know, now is the time to change the habits of how your family or my family communicates. So what's really cool is this month, Dannah Gresh’s True Girl ministry is focusing on just that . . . and let me just quickly say we miss you, Dannah.

Erin: We do. Dannah is gonna be back soon. She's been on vacation with her man, Bob, which we support, but we miss her. 

Portia: Absolutely. She will be back, but in the meantime, her True Girl ministry is offering a free download right now. The True Girl no grumble November calendar. You've still got time to jump in on this. We all hit the halfway mark of the month. So, use it to participate in a no grumble November. The challenge is based on Philippians 2, verses 14 and 15. Those verses admonished us to do everything without grumbling and complaining so that we can shine in this dark world. 

And so, the challenge is easy. Every day you agree to do everything without grumbling and complaining. Speak life and leave a little sparkle by doing the activity of the day. All right, you can check this out the True Girl  no grumble November. That's a tongue twister. 

Erin: No grumble November.

Portia: No grumble November challenge. We will drop a link in the chat in the show notes for you to check it out.

Erin: Lest you ever wonder who's the real producer of Grounded, it's the Lord. So we knew we wanted to talk about grumbling and gratitude before we met Tricia and knew about her book. Dannah was already planning this challenge for her True Girl team before we knew we were going to book Tricia. And all of it came together for an episode that I'm going to be thinking about for a long, long time. So, sign me up. I'm not sure that the Davis boys are down for the leaving the sparkle. But we are definitely down for kicking complaining to the curb. And we want to continue to equip you to do that. 

There's a Revive Our Hearts series called “Cultivating a Contented Heart.” So all of this fits together. It's hard to be content when you're grumbling. It's hard to grumble when you're grateful. We want to be grateful, contented followers of Jesus. So, we're gonna link to that podcast series. Maybe listen to it as you take your walk this morning or maybe as you're cooking next week for Thanksgiving. We want to help you see the series will help you see how grumbling really impacts your heart and your life. So, we're going to drop the link to that series so that you can listen while you're whipping up those mashed potatoes that I'm still thinking about. 

Okay, P, we got some comments. I want to mention, Kristin says she's so convicted and challenged and encouraged by today's Grounded she's gonna watch it again and take notes. Actually, Kristin, as I was listening, I thought, This is one to watch with my whole family and just have a conversation. We always say, Grounded is not the end of the conversation. It's a beginning. So maybe that's a family activity. 

Mabel says that there is another fourteen-year-old in Boca Raton, Florida who doesn't have a phone. So next time my boy tells me he's the only one . . .

Portia: Tennessee and Florida.

Erin: And listen, Jenny says my hair looks beautiful today. So, I hadn't read that one. Here's what happened. Jenny. I went to bed with wet hair. And I woke up and it was insane. So, I had to curl it so glory to God it turned into something usable this morning. 

Hey, I want to say one thing. I'm the cook. I'm the Thanksgiving cook at my house. I cook no less than two kinds of meat, thirty-seven side dishes, and fifty desserts. I want it that way. But if I'm trying to bless my family through all that and I'm griping the whole time, I'm complaining the whole time, I might as well go buy store bought food. Yeah, the grocery store will actually roast your turkey for you. They will give you the sides; they will give you the pies. I'd be better off. I mean, you buy them, but I would be better off to buy all the food and not gripe at my family than to do all of that in the name of blessing them and have a bad attitude about it. So, ladies, a reminder as we head into next week, we're the thermostats. We set the temperature in our home. And so let's head into it without complaining—no grumble Thanksgiving. Here we come. I'm ready.

Portia: Yes, yes, absolutely. But we've got another grounded episode to do before Thanksgiving. So, we want you guys to hurry back next week. We will be here to kick off the festivities with you. Our dear Grounded sisters don't miss it. But we don't have to wait until the turkey is in the oven to tell God how grateful we are.

Erin: Here’s a little tip, when you start watching Grounded a next week, take that turkey out the freezer and start thawing it, because that'd be about enough time. 

Portia: Deal deal. That's a smart thing. So yeah, we're here to help you out. We're here. Way more than just open perspective. Practical practicality too.

Erin: That's right. 

Portia: Absolutely, absolutely. Well, we're gonna send you out today in a unique way with a video from our very own Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth sharing how she uses sticky notes to express her gratitude during a time when she could have been complaining. So, I'm excited about that. I've been using sticky notes this month to check this out. Let's wake up next week together on Grounded.

Nancy DeMoss Wolgemuth: Well, here we are nearly at the end of 2020. And what a year this has been. I mean, think about this time last year. Could you have imagined that we would be telling the kinds of stories we'll be telling for generations about what has happened in 2020. 

And for Robert and me, as you've been aware, throughout this year it's been quite a ride. Of course, COVID has affected everyone in ways that we just could not have imagined. And right in March, when the COVID was starting to take on a life of its own here in this country and around the world, Robert received his first of two cancer diagnoses this year—unrelated to each other. Melanoma, that all went well. We were so thankful he had two surgeries and things were looking really good. 

And then he started having some other symptoms. We went to a different set of doctors to get that checked and found out lo and behold, there's a different kind of cancer, lymphoma. And he's, as I've shared with you, going through chemo now through Christmas, to deal with that. Thus far, the reports are really good, and we're so grateful. 

But along the way, there have been points where we had no idea. In fact, at one point, they kept us in the hospital overnight, because they said, “If this is acute leukemia, they had to rule that out. If it is, then we got to get you to Grand Rapids.” And well, we would have been planning a funeral right now, instead of planning for Christmas. 

So when we started doing the first treatments back in early September, I just had on my heart, how can we honor the Lord with this journey that we're on? How can I encourage my sweet husband, and how can we encourage each other in what has become just a difficult season?

I'm sitting in this sunroom in our home, that's what we used to call it. Now we call it the “gratitude room.” Because I got this idea. Let's take these little Post-it notes, and we have all different colors here. We have this basket of Post-it notes and all different colored pens. And each day, usually the last thing in the evening, we sit down and grab some post it notes and a pen, and whoever is with us . . . Our nephew is here with us right now, Robert’s daughters have been to visit whoever is with us, they grab some too. And we just write down something from that day that we're thankful for. 

So, we started over on this side of the room, and we started coming down the window frames, and then we moved around the room. We already had a Thanksgiving sign: In Everything Give Thanks at the top of the room that was already there. So this has now become our gratitude room and our gratitude wall. We've written down the names of friends who've called us or written or emailed to say they were praying for us. We've written down days that people brought meals or sent meals, days that we got good reports. We also said, as we were getting these different, different medical reports, we're not just going to thank the Lord on the good days, and for the good things. But we're also purposing that we're going to thank the Lord for the hard things and on the hard days. 

So, we set out on this journey. We said we're gonna make it a journey of gratitude because heaven rules. We've said that to each other maybe 1000 times. God is good, and God is faithful. God can be trusted to write this and every chapter of our story. 

So, now as I walk into this room, and I've looked around, I see now hundreds of these little Post-it notes, each one of them with a date and something very personal that we're thankful for, for that day. It's just a reminder of how many blessings we have and how kind the Lord has been to us. In fact, remember that old gospel song, Count your blessings name them one by one, and it will surprise you what the Lord has done. 

So, in a year of political unrest, racial unrest, cultural challenges, COVID challenges that are continuing to this day with spikes in our area at this moment, and cancer times two you say, “How can you find things to thank the Lord for?” Listen, gratitude has been a life preserver for our souls. It has kept us from going under more days than I can count. 

I know that gratitude does the same for any child of God, who instead of just looking around and saying, what is there bad about this day or just listening to the news and taking our cues from that, we've lifted our eyes upward and we've said, “Lord, we're grateful.” And we've tried to name those blessings and to give thanks for them individually. 

So as we come into this season, I just want to say how thankful I am to the Lord for His kindness and His mercies to us. Each of those blessings is a reason to thank Him. This gratitude wall is . . . I don't know if we'll keep those Post-it notes up forever, but a gratitude wall has been written in our hearts. We just want to give thanks to the Lord for He is good. Thank You, Lord.

Erin: Grounded audio is powered by Skype. Grounded is a production of Revive Our Hearts calling women to freedom fullness and fruitfulness in Christ. 

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