Encouraging a Woman’s Heart

Recently, Pastor Steve filled in on the Pastor Scott Show on KKLA, and through one of the segments, he took the time to interview me, on Encouraging a Woman’s Heart. We speak candidly about how to focus on Christ through singleness, marriage, and in motherhood, as I share some of my own personal testimony. Below you can read the transcript of the show, but you can also listen to the full episode here, or by clicking the image above.

Interview with Laurie Wilburn = Encouraging a Woman’s Heart
KKLA Special Guest Host: Pastor Steve Wilburn

Pastor Scott
Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Pastor Scott Show. Hey, I’m on vacation, but sitting in for me today is Pastor Steve Wilburn of Core Church, Los Angeles. Pastor Steve, thanks for sitting in for me. And take it away.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
All right. Well, here we are. We’re sitting in the same seat that Pastor Scott sits in. And as you know, we have our program, Core Truth Radio. And it plays every day right here on KKLA at 5:30 p.m.. Well, hey, listen, on this hour, we’re going to talk about how God uses women. Now, men don’t check out on me right now.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But as you know, men and women are many times completely and totally opposites. It’s like our mainframes are different, like we’re wired differently. And guess what? We are. For God in His infinite wisdom, made us with different skill sets. And if you men are expecting women to think like you think, or you women expect men to think like you think, you’re going to be, well, greatly disappointed.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But if we’re able to take a couple steps back and recognize that we both men and women, both have strengths, and we allow women to be strong in their skill sets and us men to be strong in ours, the union between men and women cannot be beaten. And as a senior pastor, we have many men that serve, but we also have a tremendous amount of women that also serve and our women are extremely faithful.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
They anchor our children’s ministry, our greeting ministry, our worship ministry, our design, our accounting. Yes, we have many faithful men also on our pastoral staff -they’re incredible! But today on the Pastor Scott Show, I wanted to set time aside to encourage women. They have a lot on their plates, as you know. So whether you’re single or married, I pray our show today will be an encouragement to you.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
My quest is that that a woman would be able to speak to you, and now this woman that we have on that I’m going to be interviewing today, she’s been a Christian for decades. She’s a mother, she’s a grandmother. She’s even a great grandmother. Yet she still gets mistaken for one of her daughters sister. How do I know this?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Because she is my wife, Laurie Wilburn. Now, you’ve heard her here multiple times on a with her radio spots called Open My Eyes. She’s been the wife of a construction worker, as associate pastor’s wife for 15 years, and now she’s been a senior pastor’s wife for 16 years. Yes, she’s been married to me for decades. This woman deserves a gold medal, a trophy, something like that.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So give this woman a blue ribbon. Laurie I don’t know why I’m calling her Laurie. She’s always sweetie to me, but. Laurie, welcome to the Pastor Scott show. So let me ask you, since you’ve been ministering to women for decades, what are some of the battles that wives and mothers face?

Laurie Wilburn
Well, first of all, thank you for having me on today. You could have chosen just about anybody. So thank you for asking me. And it is a joy to be here. And more importantly, it is just the joy of my heart to encourage women in their walk with the Lord. Yeah, so when we first got married, I was set on having a career and I thought that was the road I was going to go down and.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And let me talk about that. You were going to cosmetology school and you are a licensed cosmetologist for cutting hair?

Laurie Wilburn
Yes, I am, and with that said, you know, when we first got married, I was a brand new baby Christian. But with that, you know, with that being my course and my goal and you know, where I thought I was going to go with my life, I, you know, as I grew in my walk with the Lord, something began to happen.

Laurie Wilburn
I grew in my walk with the Lord by studying the scriptures, and I was involved in a women’s Bible study very early on in life. I think I was 20 years old, and it was in that Bible study where we were challenged to study God’s Word every single day. We had homework, then we would come back together once a week, and we would be taught that that passage that we had studied all week long, and then we would break up into small groups and we would talk about the Bible study.

Laurie Wilburn
So talk about a word saturated study. But it was through that that God began to change my heart. And there was a shift. There was a definite shift from wanting to be a career woman to wanting to be a homemaker.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah. That’s kind of looked down on nowadays, which I don’t really understand that, you know, from the beginning of time, Adam and Eve, the first woman up until like 50 years ago, you know, women were mostly in the home and being an encouragement to their husbands and raising children.

Laurie Wilburn
Well, I don’t, you know, as far as it being looked down upon, I think I think it’s not celebrated, that’s for sure. If you’re a homemaker and you are dedicated to your your home and your children. It’s not as celebrated as if you go out and you go to, you know, a college and get your scholarship and, and you know, your degree and all of those things.

Laurie Wilburn
And you, you chart your own path in life. That is what celebrated in the culture in which we live. And so I would say that, you know, one of the struggles even back then was really knowing that I was in God’s will. And number two, wanting very much to follow God’s plan for my life. I mean, it was a major shift, you know, I thought it was going to be a working woman.

Laurie Wilburn
And, you know, I would have a babysitter for my kid and, you know, so on and so forth. Yes. But as time went on, as I said, my heart began to change. The study of God’s Word is what really transformed me. And over the course of time, that desire to to be, you know, to take my life and make an investment in my home really started taking shape.

Laurie Wilburn
It didn’t happen overnight. It was a slow, very slow process. God is so patient and merciful. But I also was surrounded by like minded women who also had that same goal. And I think that was so, so necessary. And it is necessary now. But I would say once I started going down that path of choosing to be a homemaker and a mother, the battles that I faced was comparison.

Laurie Wilburn
Lack of feeling appreciated or noticed. Was I doing something that was really worthy? And you know, was I going to be able to stay with this for the long haul. Yeah. And so, you know, I faced the pressures just like I think every woman faces the pressures of the culture of the time even back then, you know, in the, the, the 80s and 90s, there was, there were those pressures.

Laurie Wilburn
But, you know, as I look into the word and I read about women like the Proverbs 31 woman or the Titus 2 woman. I think they had the same pressures, I really do. I don’t think it was any different. And I’m sure that they had their doubts. Maybe they didn’t feel valued or esteemed or if they were really making a difference in their world.

Laurie Wilburn
But when I go back to the word and I see these women’s lives, they were grounded and founded in the scripture.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah. That’s really the key, isn’t it, for every woman. Because obviously there’s a lot of women today that have to work. And, you know, there are a lot of women sitting on the freeway right now driving home from work. And so really, for every woman being, well, how did you put that grounded and founded.

Laurie Wilburn
In the word of God? Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. That’s critical. You know, I do empathize with the women that that do have to go to work. But I do see a culture where we’re brushing with very broad strokes when we say we have to go to work.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah, we expand on that.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah. You know, I think that, you know, when it comes to income. Yeah. It’s scary. It’s just scary to say, well, we can live on one income. We can trust God for this. It it’s just it’s one of those leap of faiths, so to speak, where you’re, you’re going to say, okay, Lord, I’m going to do what I believe you’ve called me to do, and we’re going to trust you with the finances, and maybe we’re going to scale back on some of our spending.

Laurie Wilburn
We’re going to scale back on our lifestyle in order that we can pursue what we believe is God’s will for our home and our children.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
I’m gunna key off on that, just for a second. You know, like I wonder if someone did like a legitimate cost if they really analyzed like, well, this is how much money we’re spending on another car that has to go back and forth to work every day. The insurance, the rate, the gasoline.

Laurie Wilburn
Baby sitters.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
The baby sitters, and you know, the extra attire that has to be bought, you know, looking professional in whatever industry you’re in, if you really took all of those costs and those were eliminated because those are the same things that we had to face decades ago. And I remember us, we had to do without.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, it’s funny that you had mentioned that because Elizabeth Elliott in her book Keep a Quiet Heart, it’s an excellent book. She does the full breakdown of what it costs for a woman to go out and get a job compared to her earnings. Right. When I saw that, I thought, oh my goodness, boy, talk about, you know, unnecessary fear and concerns and and what an oxymoron to think that there’s just no way we can make it if we don’t have this added income.

Laurie Wilburn
But you and I did make that choice. It was collective. And I’m so thankful that I had your support throughout the years. But we made that choice collectively that there would be certain things that we were willing to do without in order that I could stay home and raise the children. And did our children have all the latest and greatest toys and gadgets and all of those things?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
They did not.

Laurie Wilburn
But you know what? They had what they needed.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Oh, absolutely.

Laurie Wilburn
They they were clothed. They were fed.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
They were not lacking bicycles. And they were skateboards.

Laurie Wilburn
And were not lacking roller skates and birthday parties or things like that. But there were other things that were more important to us as parents than me going out and getting a job, providing a second income that we could provide our children with the extras or even ourselves with the extras. Yeah, that did not matter in light of eternity.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
You know, I think about just I just want to make a comment there. Since we live this life together, we did do without like the bigger TV, the bigger screen, the newer dining room set, the newer couches and all of that stuff. But, you know, as the years went on, we lacked nothing.

Laurie Wilburn
God was faithful.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah, we it just took a little bit longer. We still ended up with everything that everyone else had. I think if you want to say it that way, it just took a little longer to get it, but it was worth waiting a little longer by having you at home and stabilizing that home.

Laurie Wilburn
Absolutely. And did I have my struggles, like I said, did I have my doubts? Did I have days where I just woke up and I felt so insignificant and unappreciated? I absolutely did, but I always had my nose in the word and my heart towards the will of God for my life. And again, I had your support, which was so awesome throughout the years.

Laurie Wilburn
And you know it is a thankless job many times. Absolutely. You know, your children don’t always wake up bright eyed and bushy tailed and thanking you, you know, for pouring that, you know, millionth time of, you know, bowl of Cheerios or or the babies don’t thank you for changing their poopy diapers. And, you know, oftentimes not always, but yes, it is a thankless job.

Laurie Wilburn
And your husband comes home from work tired, and you put a meal on the table and everybody goes to bed and and there you are. But again, keeping the eternal things in mind. And what was the what was the end game? The end game was that I would be the one who would raise our children in the way of the Lord having those Bible stories, having those devotions, getting them involved in church myself as well.

Laurie Wilburn
We have to lead by example. And that was just that was our center. That was absolutely our center.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
I remember coming home from work in our, you know, we had three daughters and a boy. So I was a girl dad. But way before the boy came, he was a little surprise package on the end. But when we were in the midst of the three girls, I remember coming home and our middle daughter met me at the door.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
She was like three. And she’s like, daddy. Do you want to hear my verse? And I’m like, yes, I do. And you had sat down with her and you were memorizing scripture with her. So she quoted Psalm one, verses one and two. How blessed is the man who does not walk in the council of the wicked, nor stand in the path of sinners, nor sit in the seat of the scornful.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and in his law he meditates day and night. And you know what? I can’t even tell you the joy that that I had in my heart, like, I cannot believe it. I got this little midget here. She’s three years old and she’s quoting scripture to me.

Laurie Wilburn
Absolutely. I wouldn’t change it for the world. Yeah, I’m going to be 65 in December, and I look back on all the the decades that that we invested in our home and that I stayed home to, to raise the children. And whether you were working in construction or serving in the ministry. I have no regrets. I don’t feel like I missed out on a thing.

Laurie Wilburn
And but I do want to say a word to single moms. Those of you who may be in traffic right now or listening on your phone, or maybe you’re at home. Single moms, my heart goes out to you. And this is this is certainly not saying that that you’re not doing the best you can because you are. The Lord knows he knows you.

Laurie Wilburn
He knows you by name. He knows the hairs on your head. He knows your situation through and through. And he loves you with an everlasting love. My my encouragement to you is take them to church on Sunday. Be very involved in your church. Surround them with as many God fearing influences as you can. Read them those bedtime stories, those Bible stories get the Word of God into their hearts whenever you can.

Laurie Wilburn
I know you’re exhausted. I know you’re tired. I know you’re weary. And this world says me first. Self-love. I have to come first. But may I, may I gently and lovingly encourage you, single moms, that Jesus said, deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me. You have a full time job. You come home, you have to put dinner on the on the table for the kids.

Laurie Wilburn
You have to get them ready for bed. God knows what you’re carrying. He does, but he carries it with you. Make him your companion. Yeah, you may not have a husband, but make the Lord your companion, your strength, your refuge. He will not fail you. He will not let you down. And he will be faithful to multiply what you can.

Laurie Wilburn
invest in your children as far as time and spiritual investment into their little lives.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
This is Pastor Steve Wilburn, Core Church, Los Angeles, filling in for the Pastor Scott Show and Scott Furrow, And I’m interviewing my wife of all people that I’ve been married to for 47 years. And she has a program here on KKLA, Open My Eyes. You probably hear the little spots, you know, 1 or 2 minute spots. And what would you say?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
We got about three minutes left in this segment before we have to go to commercial break. What would you say to the single girls now? You know, at our church, Core Church LA, we have a tremendous amount of young people and we have a lot of young women in their career minded women they’ve been raised with. Hey, that’s all you think about is career.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
What do you say to that girl that’s just being raised with everything around her is like, away from what would be the traditional family that has been in America forever, you know, until this last, you know, really 40 years. What would you say to that single girl? She’s not married yet. She’s not engaged. She doesn’t have a boyfriend, you know.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Is there any hope for her?

Laurie Wilburn
Well, first of all, I think singleness should be celebrated. Amen. It is not a it is not a death sentence, a prison sentence. You can live life fully while being single. You know, the apostle Paul said in first Corinthians chapter seven, you know, the married woman has to concern herself not only with the things of the Lord, but with the needs of her husband.

Laurie Wilburn
So her devotion is divided. But if you are single, you can have wholehearted, undistracted devotion to the Lord. And yeah, we do have a lot of single ladies in our, in our church. And, and I would just say that single women basically are not being encouraged right now to have undistracted devotion to the Lord. They are definitely consumed with wanting to find a mate, which the marriage is a beautiful thing.

Laurie Wilburn
Marriage is a gift from God, and if God allows that in your life, then wow, it is. It is going to be a whole new chapter and a life shared with another godly man is a tremendous blessing.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Well, let’s let’s end on that. Before we go to commercial break. We’re going to pick back up again after the commercials. But it’s like so a single young woman, she should really be focusing on really her relationship with God so that she can become an and attract a godly young man.

Laurie Wilburn
Yes. Let’s talk more about that.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah. Let’s talk more about that when we come back, you know. So again, this is Pastor Steve Wilburn, Core Church, Los Angeles. We’re heard on our program here. Core Truth Radio were heard at 5:30 p.m. Monday through Friday. We’re at 8:00 on. Let me see. What is that Saturday night? I think we’re on 9:30 on Sunday morning, but our church is Core Church, LA we’re on the intersection of La Cienega and the ten freeway.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
All right. Hey, we’re back. And we left off. You know, I’m interviewing Laurie Wilburn. She has her program here on KKLA, Open my eyes. And so we left off talking about singles. Why don’t you just add one more little thing about what should a young single that’s, you know, getting her career going and everything? What should she really be focused on?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Like, okay, she already has her career going. What should she focus on, spiritually?

Laurie Wilburn
Serving the Lord. Amen. Serving the Lord and growing in her walk with God. There is nothing more important ever, whether you’re married or single. That’s right. But yes, I know that there, you know, many singles who get caught up into dating apps and, you know, sites that just really can trip them up and hold them down.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Well, let me, let me. Is God capable of bringing a godly young man into a godly girl’s life?

Laurie Wilburn
Well, you know, God parted the Red sea, right?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yes He did.

Laurie Wilburn
And then. Okay, so but he also says I am the same yesterday, today and forever. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So a single girl doesn’t have to date 500 guys to find the right guy?

Laurie Wilburn
No she doesn’t. You know, whether you’re 25 or you’re 65 and you’re still single. If this is God’s will for you to be married, trust him to bring the man that he has for you. He will. He is able.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So let me just say, girls, become the woman. Become the woman that God desires you to be, and he will bring that that man into your life. Hey, let me ask you another question here, because I’ve watched this. What is your daily routine like? You know, because I have watched you grow and blossom as a woman of God.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
What is your basic daily routine in your devotional life to the Lord?

Laurie Wilburn
Well, again, I go back to the Bible study that I was involved in at 20 years old, and that really set the foundation for my quiet time. And not much has changed in the last 47 years. So I wake up in the morning, and as soon as my feet hit the ground, I make a cup of coffee and I open the word.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah. And it’s just it’s just that. And I hold myself accountable to Bible study still after all these years. I want to hear from the Lord before I want to hear from anybody else. I want to hear his voice before I hear even my own voice and my own thoughts. I want him to rule over my day, over my heart, over the things that I’m thinking and over the steps of my feet where I’m going, what I’m doing, what I’m involved with.

Laurie Wilburn
And so, yeah, it.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Never.

Laurie Wilburn
Really that.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
I never really had, you know, here I’ve been a pastor for 30 years and what have you. And I felt like the main person that discipled me was the Lord, just my Bible at the kitchen table kind of thing. But there’s three things that I feel that I’ve really adapted, and I’ve adapted them from you. I feel like you have discipled me more than any any human being has discipled me.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And the three things that I, I have followed from you. And this is again, just watching you for 47 years. This is Pastor Steve Wilburn, Core Church, Los Angeles. I’m interviewing my wife, of all people. She has a program here on Open My Eyes. And the three things that I have grown from you is that devotional life. It’s what you just said.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Oh, that’s fact of life, man. You hit your feet, hit the ground. It’s coffee first, but the Bible is right. After that, you open the Word of God first thing you do in the morning, you get your Bible, you read it. So I’ve I’ve developed a devotional life based on that. The second thing I’ve, I’ve really grabbed from you is memorizing scripture.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
You’re the one that started that in our home. Like, I don’t know, 35 years ago. And, and I really have, you know, just embraced embracing God’s word and writing it upon the fleshly tablets of my mind. In my heart. I got that from you. And the third thing is always praying. You’re always, well, let’s pray about it. Let’s pray.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So I have witnessed that myself, and I’ve seen it in your life.

Laurie Wilburn
Well, I am so grateful for the examples that the Lord has put in my life. I’ve read many biographies over the few decades that that we’ve been together. Biographies like Amy Carmichael, Elizabeth Elliott, Lillias Trotter, Susannah Wesley, Susannah Spurgeon, I just great great women of God, also great men of God. D.L. Moody, J.C. Ryle. Yeah, and, you know, I think good reading is is very, very important.

Laurie Wilburn
I tend to go towards the biographies. Yeah, I love to read about dead people. Yeah. I, you know, people who lived in days of yore. Yeah. You know, back in the 17, 1800s, early 90s.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
When there was a deeper relationship with God back then. Just let’s face it, it was absolutely.

Laurie Wilburn
And their commitment to the Lord, to his word, spending time with him. And I just want to speak to something, you know, I said, I when my feet, you know, hit the floor in the morning. I want to talk about that. I’ve heard many women say I’m not a morning person. I can’t do it. Yeah. You know, but then they struggle because after noon they’re tired.

Laurie Wilburn
Evening. They want to go to bed. There’s so many distractions throughout the day. It’s so hard to get our mind focused back onto the word. But, you know, I think about two examples. Number one was Moses. Yeah. God commanded Moses, come up in the morning. Meet me in the morning. Yeah. There was a reason for that. Moses mind would be fresh.

Laurie Wilburn
There would be less distractions. There wouldn’t be other people around awake in the morning clamoring for his attention. Yeah. And he was able to put his focus upon the Lord. And then I think about Jesus. Yeah. If you read the Gospels, we read that Jesus awoke before it was day. Yeah. So that tells us Jesus was probably in the dark.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah. Maybe I’m going to just speculate here. I’m going to say maybe four in the morning. Yeah. Ish. Probably five ish, you know. But but he he always slipped away and he met with his heavenly father in the morning. And I’m sure he prayed throughout the day and well into the night as well. But I, I think anything is possible if you have a heart to do it, if you want to do it.

Laurie Wilburn
And before you know it, it starts becoming something that your body gets used to. I battle with insomnia- I am a chronic insomniac, so I have every excuse under the sun to say I ain’t getting out of bed. I had a really bad night last night. Yeah, but you know, my time with the Lord is so crucial for me.

Laurie Wilburn
I just. I know what I’m like if I go a day or two or 2 or 3 days without the Lord, it ain’t pretty. Yeah, I need the Lord.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah, well. And I can just speak for myself. If I don’t have my devotional time in the morning. I don’t have it, you know, because, you know, it’s the text messaging. It’s this. It’s social media. I mean, everything just gets going. It’s before all of that gets going. So I would just really encourage men and women alike, you know, look, get up a little bit earlier.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
You might be thinking, you know, well, I already get up at five or something. Well, look, I worked in construction here in Southern California for multiple years in our marriage. And, you know, I had to be out the door by 4:45 or 5 or whatever. And, you know, you just have to get up, you know, a little bit earlier and you think, oh, I just I can’t do it.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But if you don’t get it, you won’t get it. And, you know, it’s the really the source. I just think about, you know, Romans 1017, faith comes by hearing and hearing the word of God. And as you develop that time with the Lord, it will it will strengthen your faith, and you will become a solid, more solid man or woman of God.

Laurie Wilburn
Well, to that point, even using that Scripture, faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God. I’ve heard so many folks say, well, I listen to to radio programs. I listen to Bible studies all day long. Yeah, you know, I have a Bible app and I do a devotion or, you know, in, in my, you know, busyness of my day that’s not meeting with the Lord.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
That’s right. You need total silence with him in the word open.

Laurie Wilburn
Like Mary who sat at his feet. We as God’s people, not just women, men as well. We need to be at the Lord’s feet. There is something. There is a transaction, a divine transaction that happens when you open your Bibles and you sit and your your intent on habit. Habakkuk. We just did a series in our women’s group on Habakkuk.

Laurie Wilburn
Habakkuk chapter two. He says, I will stand on my guard post. I will station myself in my watchtower to see what he will speak to me and how I may respond when I am reproved. Habakkuk said, you know what? I’m going to climb that watchtower. I am going to stand on that post. I am going to wait until the Lord speaks to me.

Laurie Wilburn
Talk about intentionality. Yeah. He was a busy guy. He was a prophet. And he had his hands full with God’s people. And and yet he said, I will, I will do this.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And I just know for me that the majority and I’m saying like 90% of the time that I hear the Lord actually speak to my soul, I’m in his word. Amen. 90% of the time, I mean, there would be times I’m cruising down to 405, sitting in the parking lot, you know, traffic and whatever. And God will leave something in my heart.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yes, that happens to. But 90% of the time, that’s when God speaks to me, when I’m meditating on his word, just reading, not doing the, you know, speed reading, but just kind of cultivating the scripture into my heart.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I have favorite Bible teachers, but they do not replace my time with the Lord.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yeah. Listen, this is Pastor Steve Wilburn, Core Church, Los Angeles, and I’m interviewing my wife. She has a program here on Open My Eyes. And we’re, you know, we’re here just talking about and encouraging women and men in the relationship with God. And we’re going to talk about a few more things here. You know, the Proverbs 31 woman, you know, how does she relate with her adult daughters?

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And so we’ll be back in a few minutes. And so don’t go anywhere. We’re going to be right back.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Hey, here I am. I’m back. You know, our show is heard here every day at 5:30 Core Truth Radio. But, hey, I’m interviewing. We’re doing a little session here talking about women and encouraging women in their singleness and married and maybe motherhood and all of those things. And so we’ve covered a lot of topics up to this point.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But now I want to ask my wife, Laurie Wilburn. She’s been a pastor’s wife for 30 years. She’s been a mother her whole life. So you have three adult daughters and they’re all gorgeous. They’re beautiful, and they love you, and they can’t stand you at times because they you get they all think people think that you’re their sister.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
It’s like, yes, you do. Hey, hey, never apologize because you have a beautiful wife. But anyway, so what is it like just having that relationship with your adult children?

Laurie Wilburn
Yes. Well, we have three adult daughters, and we also have an adult son.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
That’s right. The man child.

Laurie Wilburn
Yes. And he serves at our church. And we’re so thankful for him. So, yeah, that’s a whole new, a whole new chapter that you have to learn how to navigate. You know, you start out changing their diapers and teaching them how to feed themselves and.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Tie their shoes.

Laurie Wilburn
Tie their shoes, and, you know, all of those things and doing their homework and, you know, and I remember just praying, praying, praying as a new mommy and praying as a mommy of teenagers.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
That was an experience.

Laurie Wilburn
That has its own challenges. And I actually lived to tell about it. Thank God. Yes. But yeah, just praying, praying, praying. But you know, I have to say that having adult children is definitely a whole new wheelhouse. And once they leave home, you have to commit them to God.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But you never stop being a mother, though.

Laurie Wilburn
You never stop being a mother. It’s just different. Yeah, it’s very different. You can still have tremendous influence in their lives, but you have to entrust them to the Lord. You know, you invested all the years when they were little in Scripture, Bible studies, praying together, taking them to church, going through all the ups and downs of life together as a family.

Laurie Wilburn
And then one day they walk down the aisle and you realize that they they are no longer your own. You have committed them fully and completely to the Lord. They’re always the Lord’s. But when they get married, yeah, there’s there’s definitely a letting go in a whole new way.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Which I didn’t do good on before they got married. I was falling apart. But then you were like, rock, you know, the Rock of Gibraltar. Like you were so strong. And then it was the day after they got married. Oh, sure. That you didn’t do so good.

Laurie Wilburn
Oh, absolutely. I bawled like a baby. It was the ugly cry. It was the snot cry. It was a drooling cry. It was like, where is my child? But yes. So yeah. Absolutely true. But, you know, you still can be a tremendous influence. And, you know, they continue to watch you as a parent. That’s right. And it takes about maybe 10 or 15 years before they come back to you and start asking for your advice.

Laurie Wilburn
That’s right. But you’ve got to give them that space. But with that said, let me just let me just say I will not withhold biblical counsel from my adult children.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Okay. So let me let me call you on the carpet on that. So a lot of parents, a lot of parents, they will they feel like once the children move out, they don’t really have that influence anymore. And they will not make the stand because they don’t want to cause any division. They don’t want to ruffle any feathers with their kids.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So what do you say?

Laurie Wilburn
I say that we are responsible. Amen. To hold out the word of truth. That’s right. The word of life to our adult children. They may disagree.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Yep.

Laurie Wilburn
They may not. They may not even appreciate what you’re saying. But I will not side with a philosophy or an idea or a decision that is against the Word of God. They know that I love them, and I will always affirm my love for them. But Jesus first.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Amen.

Laurie Wilburn
His word. Yeah. First. And I am the one who’s going to stand before God as a parent and a grandmother one day. And he’s going to ask me, you know, I am going to have to give an account for what I, what I said or withheld saying to my adult children. Yeah. With my dying breath. I’m going to point them to the scriptures.

Steve Wilburn
That’s right.

Laurie Wilburn
And like I said, if if I have to jeopardize them, maybe there’s going to be a little bit of distancing, maybe there’s going to be.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And we’ve had that with with some of our kids.

Laurie Wilburn
We have had that. Absolutely.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
But they’ve always come back because they know that you speak the truth to them.

Laurie Wilburn
Absolutely. I speak the truth in love, but I’m not going to withhold to say it. And if they they want to bounce something off me or an idea or a possible decision that they’re making, I always say, well, this is what God said. You remember we talked about this when you were at home. Let’s go to the scripture or, you know, I’ll share a particular scripture.

Laurie Wilburn
And, you know, like I said, it’s it’s you’re you’re risking a lot. I understand parents, I understand, mom, I just had a dear lady tell me that she’s afraid to share God’s word with her adult child, because the adult child will end up hating her. And I said, well, that’s that’s just that’s the risk you’re going to have to take.

Laurie Wilburn
Jesus said, anyone, anyone who loves father or mother or sister or brother or child above me is not worthy to be my disciple. And you know, he’s not. He’s not talking about, you know, hating your family members or your children or people who disagree with the scripture. But what he is saying is, you know, your love for me, your devotion to me, your loyalty to me has to trump if if you are called my disciple.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Well, think about what it says in Proverbs 27:6. You know, faithful are the wounds of a friend, but deceitful are the kisses the enemy and a friend. A true friend loves you enough to tell you the truth, even though it’s not what you want to hear. It’s just like, you know, the Bible is not always what people want to hear, but it’s always what they need to hear.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
And but yet it’s deceitful or the kisses of an enemy. We need to love them enough. And that’s what a mother does. And that’s what a dad does. You love your children enough to tell them the truth.

Laurie Wilburn
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, like you said, we’ve had to encounter disagreements with our adult children many, many times. But later on down the road, whether it’s months or even years, they come back. That’s right. And they say, thank you for being truthful.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Well, listen, as we kind of wind down here, you know, I’m thinking about the women that are listening here and maybe even some men, but, you know, maybe they’re thinking like, boy, you know, I’m not even anywhere close to this, you know, like, I’m not this Proverbs 31 woman. I’m not this great mother. I’m not this. I have a lot of failures in my life, or I’m not really walking with the Lord right now.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
What would you say to those singles, those moms, wives, even the men out there. If they’re just, you know, like, man, I don’t even know. I’m so caught up in the world right now. I just feel distance from God. What would you say to them?

Laurie Wilburn
Well, I think about Peter, good old Peter. You know, he was so passionate. He was so vocal. He was so out there with his faith. And, you know, he made he he made a lot of really cool statements. You know, when he was at the height of his walk with the Lord before Jesus was crucified, and I’m sure he astounded and amazed a lot of the other disciples.

Laurie Wilburn
But he you know, he did get his foot in his mouth occasionally as well. Yeah, but there came a time that even Peter denied the Lord. Yeah. And he was so full of shame, so full of guilt, and he ran away and wept. And yet after the crucifixion, the crucifixion, when Jesus rose, he said, tell the disciples and Peter, that I have risen.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So there’s hope for women that have been broken and crushed.

Laurie Wilburn
There’s hope for men and women who have been crushed, who have walked away from the Lord. God is not going to give up on you. He’s not going to shame you. He is ready to welcome you back with open arms. I think about the the the dad of the prodigal son. Before the son could even confess, or say anything, the father ran up to him and embraced him.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Why don’t you? You know, if there’s someone that’s listening right now and they’re like, I don’t know if God, you know, really loves me still, I’m not sure where I stand. Why don’t you lead that person in a prayer of just getting right with the Lord? Because, you know, I believe what you said is true. Because that’s what the Bible says. God loves these people.

Laurie Wilburn
He first John one nine. Yeah, if we confess our sin, he is faithful and just, faithful and just, so ready to forgive us of our sin and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. So let me just lead you in a in a just a brief prayer. If you’re listening and you want to come back to Jesus.

Laurie Wilburn
Jesus, I have walked away, I have failed, I have sinned against you. I have gone my own way and try to do life on my own. I come back to you, cleanse me of my sin. Forgive me, wash me clean, take me back Jesus into your arms and help me, Jesus, to walk with you, to become your disciple, to become that woman after your own heart. To become that man after your own heart. And please renew a steadfast spirit within me. In Jesus name, Amen.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
Amen. Amen. Listen, if you just prayed that prayer, we would love as a gift from my wife to you. You know we’d love to send you some materials to help you and encourage you in this. You know, kind of just getting back with the Lord. And if you email us at Bible@corechurchla.com that’s Bible@corechurchla.com, we would love to mail you some materials to help you and encourage you.

Pastor Steve Wilburn
So hey, this was Pastor Steve Wilburn with his wife, Laurie Wilburn from Core Church, Los Angeles. Pastor Scott will be back next week and so may the Lord God bless you.

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