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Tips for Raising Servant Type Children

By Debi Pearl, Kristen Victory and No Greater Joy Ministries

Episode Transcription:

Kristen:  Hi! I'm Kristen. I'm here with Debi in her much‑loved herb garden. Whenever I come here, this is usually where I find you.

Debi Pearl:  That's right. [laughs]

Kristen:  And we're answering questions. So, the question for the day is, in her book "Preparing To Be a Help Meet" she describes three different types of people. It's the servant or steady‑type woman or child, and it's the queen or go‑to type young child, and it's the dreamer. Now we're talking about the steady and servant‑type and tips on raising kids that have that personality.

Debi:  Yeah, the servant‑type child has to be more protected than the others. The go‑to girl will have a strong, dominant, confident personality as a general rule. The creative girl is going to be dreamy and all the time coming up with good ideas. Neither one of them will be easily influenced either by bad or be crushed as easy as a servant. A servant child wants to please. A servant child wants to do everything they can to help you in any way whatsoever, but a servant child you have to watch out that they don't have bad influence among their peers and they don't have an adult that wants to use them to serve them all the time or influence them into the wrong way.

I always felt like of my three girls I had a go‑to girl, which was my first one. She was dominant and forceful. Then I had my visionary, which was my youngest. She was like a wild card. I was going, "What is she doing now?"

Kristen:  She was?

Debi:  And then my middle one...

Kristen:  [laughs] Here she is!

Debi:  Here, she is! [laughter]

Debi:  And then the middle one was my servant, and I always felt like I had to watch out for her. Of all my children, I had to limit who she was going to be a friend to. Perfectly good girls that were go‑to girls, but I knew those go‑to girls could walk the line that I didn't want to walk and come back OK. But my sweet little servant girl could not do that because she would want to please even those that weren't good to please. So what I needed to do is find a place for her to serve where she would be appreciated, serve where she would learn, and so what she chose on her own was to get into helping people medically. So from the time she was like 10 or 11 she started helping take care of old people, which worked out real good for her.

But their servant, gentle personality girls can get into taking care of babies, babysitting, just anything where they're able to give them themselves and be appreciated, and learn while they're doing it.

Kristen:  But also be able to be in a safe environment.

Debi:  Their safe environment. Right now Shalom Wright, and she was my servant girl, writes some of the wisest articles because she had to become more attuned than the other girls in order to grow and be self‑disciplined, to stand firm on her own. She was the hardest one to raise because I had to protect her, but she was definitely the sweetest.

Kristen:  [laughs]

Debi:  And [laughs] you'll know when you have a servant‑hearted child because they will be very sweet. Everybody will love them. Then what aspects do you see in there?

Kristen:  Well, what about teaching them how to protect themselves? Do you have to go the extra mile in that?

Debi:  You have to go the extra mile in teaching them how, and you have to go the extra mile in building their confidence because they don't have that assertive personality and want everything in order.

Kristen:  [laughs]

Debi:  They don't have that dreaming, "I've got something going." Theirs is focused on someone else and what they can do for that other person. So you have to constantly be allowing them to grow and yet bringing to their attention this might not be good and this is good.

Kristen:  So they might have the tendency to have their self‑esteem wrapped up in what others think of them?

Debi:  That's exactly right.

Kristen:  You've got to not let them do that, right?

Debi:  That's exactly right, yeah. That's your servant girl. Everybody wants to have a child like that, but that child is the one you need to focus on in protecting and helping to grow in wisdom. The first thing I did with Shalom was start, from the time she was three or four years old, "Pray for wisdom. Pray for wisdom so you will be equipped to know what is good and what is evil, so you can choose to serve the good and not the evil."

Kristen:  So you told her to pray for wisdom.

Debi:  Yes.

Kristen:  OK.

Debi:  She started as a very young child praying for wisdom, and she knows today that the deciding difference in her life has been that she asked God for a gift that he freely offers to her.

Kristen:  And she's got it.

Debi:  Yeah, she's got it. She's got it. No question.

Kristen:  [laughs] Yeah. Thanks, Debi.

Debi:  OK.


Pearls of Wisdom follows the No Greater Joy team as they discuss and answer questions about raising children, marriage, simple living, gardening, homeschooling, and more! Each week will cover different topics - topics that YOU - the viewer choose! This is a great show for the whole family and anyone who wants some extra "Pearls of Wisdom" to come their way.

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