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iQuestions Faculty, Joe White 
 
 
Question: 
 
How did you deal with your kid's friends coming over to your house 
when they had different rules in their home? 
 
Answer:  
 
Friends. That can be the greatest word in the world, or “friends” can 
be the worst word in the world, when it comes to raising kids.  
 
Our kids had all kinds of friends. It all began when they were first 
ready to go spend the night at somebody’s house. Well, we would 
always say, “It’s fine for you to spend the night with so-and-so, but 
you make sure she comes over here until we learn more about her and 
her family.” 
 
We had kids at the house a lot. With two boys and two girls, we 
wanted our house to be the funnest place to be. We wanted kids to 
want to come to our house. We lived on the side of a cliff, so we had a 
tall ceiling. I found a trampoline for $50, and I put the trampoline in 
that room, and then one Christmas, I put a basketball goal on the 
other side of the trampoline. So, we had a full-sized trampoline and a 
basketball goal in there. You can imagine what kind of house we have. 
Lots of dents in the walls. But raising four kids, I wanted that home to 
be the place that friends wanted to come. 
 
Now, we had rules in our house, and our kids were in football, 
basketball, cheerleading, volleyball, gymnastics—you know, they did it 
all—and they had a lot of friends. And when they would come over to 
our house, first of all, my job was to get to know their friends. In fact, 
 
 
twelve of the best years of my life were leading small group Bible 
studies for my kids’ friends.  
 
And parents, one of the greatest gifts you can ever give your children 
is to help them get in a small group with their friends, with 
somebody—hopefully you—leading that small group. 
 
Well, I would lead my kids’ friends in a little Friday-morning Bible 
study. I’d buy the donuts, I’d go get them in my car sometimes, until 
they learned to drive, and I would lead them in Bible study. 
 
Not only could I teach them the Bible, but I also taught them how to 
grow up. A lot of the kids didn’t have a dad, or didn’t have active 
parents in their life. A lot of them didn’t know Christ, in our Bible 
study, but I wanted to influence my kids by influencing their friends—
so when kids would come over to the house, they knew where I stood.  
 
My ultimate goal was to lead them to Christ. My second goal was to 
help build a climate that hopefully would help my kids make good 
decisions.  
 
We made a joke—and we made fun out of it—but we made the kids 
obey our rules. In our house, our kids would stand up when my wife 
would come to the table. When my wife would come to the table, I’d 
say, “Stand up, guys. A lady’s at our table.” 
 
And these were just big, gregarious hoodlums—I mean, we’re talking 
just boys—but they’d open the door when Debbie Joe would get into 
the car. I mean, they would treat her like gold, because she deserves 
to be treated like gold. 
 
We’d take our kids’ friends to church, and if they spent Saturday night 
with us, the rule was we’d go to church together. Now, folks, I made 
my boys’ friends take notes in church, and if they would write down 
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five things they learned in the sermon, I’d take them to lunch, and I’d 
take them to the biggest smorgasbord in town, and they could eat 
anything they wanted, if they could tell me five things the preacher 
said. And if they stood up and sang the hymns during church, I’d give 
them dessert.  
 
Now, do you want to see the football team on the front row of the 
church, standing up and singing hymns? It worked! 
 
Well, we had fun with it. But at the end of the day, not only we were 
able to influence my kids—sometimes we fell apart, but a lot of times 
we got some things done that were positive. But it was really fun to 
watch my kids’ friends change. 
 
I told my son, when he was in 9th grade, my second son, who was the 
quarterback of the football team, I said, “Cooper, when you’re 
graduating from high school, I have a dream for you, and my dream is 
that when you walk across the platform to get your diploma, some of 
the boys who are your friends are going to say, ‘You know what? If it 
wasn’t for you, I wouldn’t know Christ today.’” Well, that went in one 
ear, and out the other, in 9th grade—you can imagine. 
 
Three years later, I walked by his room, and I saw him leading his 
best friend to Christ. They were praying together. He came upstairs 
afterwards, and his face was aglow—you would have thought he had 
been on Mt. Sinai with Moses—and he said, “Dad, you’ll never believe 
what just happened down in my room.” And I said, “What happened?” 
And he said, “I just led Jared to Christ.” 
 
And I said, “Cooper, was that as good as your goal to be state 
champions in football?” He said, “It was better than that goal.” I said, 
“Was it better than your goal to be all-state at football?” and he said, 
“Yes, sir. It was better than the chance to get to be all-state.” 
 
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He said, “Dad, you know, a couple of years ago, you gave me that 
dream that one day, my friends would tell me at graduation that 
because of my life, they would become Christians. You know what? 
When you told me that, that’s the last thing I wanted to hear. But,” he 
said, “now it’s the only thing that’s important to me in my life.” 
 
Getting to be a little bit of influence on my kids’ friends is one of the 
greatest things I got to do as a dad. You’ll have a great time.  
 
 
 
  
 
 
 
 
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