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In this heartfelt conversation, author and speaker Ashlee Kasten, host of The Purpose of Motherhood podcast, explores motherhood as sacred mission work.

We discuss planting eternal seeds like a farmer, overcoming feelings of insignificance amid daily routines, and reclaiming joy in creating beauty and discipleship in the home.

Christian parents who feel overwhelmed, isolated, or undervalued will gain renewed vision for their role, practical wisdom on prayer and perseverance, and inspiration to view everyday tasks as holy, long-term investments with eternal impact.

Episode Transcription

Note: This transcription may vary from the words used in the original episode.

Marlin Detweiler:
Hello again and welcome to another episode of Veritas Vox, the voice of classical Christian education. Today we have with us Ashlee Kasten. Ashlee, welcome.

Ashlee Kasten:
Thank you for having me.

Marlin Detweiler:
Ashlee has begun. Has started a ministry that's been going for several years now. Called The Purpose of Motherhood. But before we get into that, and I'm sorry that my wife interviewing you. That would have made more sense, wouldn't it? But in any event, I know a little bit about motherhood. Only by observation. But tell us about yourself personally first.

Ashlee Kasten:
Sir. Yes. That would be fun. Maybe one day we could do that. So I am Ashlee Kasten, and I was born in Florida, so I have a little history around where you've been as well in Florida. I was raised a pastor's kid, raised in ministry, had it. You know, basically, we like to say, like stamped on my diapers, right?

I was raised in it, and then went to college in Florida and during that time, I kind of had my, I guess, kind of question not necessarily questioning faith, but not really fully following the Lord. And then I go and get married. My husband and I met when we were at church, actually in high school, and then got married right when I was graduating college.

And we found out really fast that the Lord is really important in your marriage and that prayer is really important in your marriage. And so that's really when I learned how to pray was when we got married and it became not just a oh, I should pray, but I have to pray like that was my survival mode was praying.

And I started to see the Lord do this tremendous work in our marriage. And so I developed this deep passion for prayer and helping other people learn how to pray. Well then fast forward a couple of years and now we have a baby and I have a whole new reason to pray. So that kind of shifted my view from praying you know just for myself or for my marriage to then prayer.

Like what does that look like for our family and for our mom? And now we have five beautiful girls. We have a house full of little women. My oldest is 14. My youngest is two. So it kind of makes sense for me to have a ministry for moms, right?

I know a little something about that. And we're like the real life little women over here. And it's so funny because everyone talks to my husband and they're like, oh, you poor thing, or what are you going to do when they're all teenagers? And they have all these comments? And he always responds, he's like, are you kidding me? I'm king of the house and I don't have to have the tough conversations. So he loves it.

Marlin Detweiler:
All right, I would say it this way. There are pluses and minuses on both sides of what sex our kids are so true.

Ashlee Kasten:
It's so true. Yeah. We have less broken bones, but more emotions. Yeah.

Marlin Detweiler:
That's what we had our share of those. Four boys. Yeah.

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah. So that's kind of where I'm at now. And now I have them somehow, by the grace of God, written two books. I have a podcast and ministry for moms. I run a homeschool co-op here, homeschooled the girls. My husband is a pastor at a church here. So we do ministry alongside each other and somehow squeeze in laundry in between all of that.

Marlin Detweiler:
Well, you're in the Raleigh area frequently. A specifically, what's the name of the church?

Ashlee Kasten:
Focus church. My husband is a campus pastor at one of the locations of Focus Church.

Marlin Detweiler:
Okay. Very good. Yeah. So this this question is really intended to be a bit of an equivocation, to answer it in two ways, both in your ministry and in reality. What is the purpose of motherhood?

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah. Okay. So the purpose of motherhood, to me, this is my ministry, right? And I really set out to really make it a place where moms could come and get filled up and connect with the Lord, connect with each other. Kind of Titus model of discipleship where the older are pouring into the younger. And that's so needed in our generation.

Just a place where we can be poured into by the moms who have gone before us and have that wisdom. So I really wanted to just have a place where moms could come and get filled up, have resources for their own walk with the Lord and for their kids to and to learn how to disciple their kids.

And the Lord just dropped that name on my heart one day, and I thought, man, that's so profound. The purpose of motherhood. Like what really is the purpose of motherhood, which that sent me on this deep dive to really just think about what is our job as moms? We live in a culture that has and probably with the rise of feminism, I mean really, that was such an attack on motherhood and on the homes to make moms feel like motherhood was such a burden that it was this ball and chain that traps you in the home and that now you couldn't have you know the grass is greener on the other side.

You couldn't have this thing out there that was somehow greater than the work that you were doing in the home. And so women started to resent that and started to fight back against that, against marriage and kids and all that. And so while I do think that there is a big wave now of moms coming back to the heart of the home and a lot of moms choosing to homeschool or just really stepping in that role and creating beauty in the home and discipling their kids.

There definitely is a huge remnant left from that. I think we're still kind of fighting against that. And so when I look at the purpose of motherhood, it's a mom who understands that her role is it's almost like you're doing mission work in your very home. You don't have to go overseas to do mission work. It's in our very home.

It's the little hearts that are entrusted to us that we're entrusted with in order to raise them up in the ways of the Lord and to draw them closer to Jesus so that they don't depart from them when they're older, so that they walk a life of faith.

Marlin Detweiler:
On that point one of the things I've been impressed with for decades and it has been a sobering consideration is the primary evangelistic field for human beings is parent to child.

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah.

Marlin Detweiler:
What do you think – you wrote this in something that I read. It may have just been anecdotal on your website. But it's the truth of what you're dealing with. What is it? It's understandable that somebody standing over a baby who is soiled and needing a diaper change or standing in the kitchen doing dishes it's understandable that someone that may be well-educated with even a classical education a college degree standing there doing these things will have time to think,

“This is really demeaning. This is really menial. I could I'm capable of being in a boardroom discussing billion dollar deals. And here I am doing something that's completely mindless.” So we have that as is part of I think the influence that we have to attend to as we think about the value and the purpose of motherhood.

How do you how do you address that in yourself and with your the people you have the opportunity to minister to?

Ashlee Kasten:
Absolutely. Well I think first we have to recognize where those thoughts come from. Right? There's such an attack on the home the enemy is trying to always. I like to think of it this way. It's like the enemy is always trying to pull our head this way away from our home and away from where our work is most important because he knows if he can get his hands on the next generation he can.

I mean the influence is huge. I mean that the impact that for negative for or for good that you can have when you get your hands on young people is astronomical. And so we have to recognize that first that the feelings of and I'm not saying that that you can't have things outside or be a working mom or is not about that at all but the feeling that you have this is insignificant comes from the enemy.

Where we feel like this work doesn't matter whether it's changing diapers or putting a kid down for bedtime or disciplining all those things all of it matters. This is what I like to say to moms. Our work in the home is like the work of a farmer. You go outside every day and you put seeds in the soil.

And every day at the end of the day you come in tired you come in dirty your hands are filthy you're covered in sweat and you look out in that field and you go that is the same field that I was in yesterday and it looks the same way that it did yesterday and the day before that. And you if you're not careful you can lose sight of the long term picture because you look out there and you don't see anything happen.

Marlin Detweiler:
Doesn't change in 24 hours from what I did 24 hours ago.

Ashlee Kasten:
No you're doing the same thing. You're changing the diaper all over again. Yeah. But if we have eyes to see ears to hear and eyes to see we will realize that that daily watering, planting the seeds and going up there and watering and tilling the soil all of that. One day we'll look out there and there'll be a sprout and the next day it'll be bigger.

And all of a sudden you know down the road as we're grandparents or great grandparents we'll see oak trees where there was once these tiny little seeds that we felt like we're so insignificant and there was no change happening. So I always tell moms just don't lose heart. Just realize you're the farmer and it's going to take some time.

But don't let the enemy deceive you into thinking it doesn't matter.

Marlin Detweiler:
Thank you. We're you mentioned this before and I think everyone listening has a sense that this is likely the truth, but I want to challenge it for the sake of at least considering if there are other reasons. Where did a negative vibe for motherhood come from? We want to say feminism did that and that's a pretty quick likely, filled with truth answer. But it's a bit dismissive without really digging into it. Can you help us with that?

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah. Well I now go back to really where I believe it all stems from. Let's go to the garden with Eve. “Did God really say?” The enemy, his divisive his deceptive plans are always to make us question God's design to make us question our purpose our worth was all of that. And so these feelings of, “Is this really it? Are our kids really a burden?”

And is this really all that I'm created to do comes from that very place of is this really God's design for me? Did it really all? Is this all that it boils down to that that his plan has not changed from the beginning. The enemy comes to deceive to kill and steal and destroy.

And we see that very thing in the garden where he makes us question God's design for us. Did God really make me to be a mother? Is this all that it's character to be? Yeah and actually we're really good at it. We are really good at it because we are naturally nurturing and we are artists and beauty in the home.

If mothers could just see that too that helps some of that negative vibe that you're talking about. We have we've bought into the lie that motherhood is just awful and it's hard and there's a there's no fruit from it. But if we could see for a second that we are created to be these artists of beauty in our home that the Lord's actually gifted us naturally making the home a place that's enjoyable to be in that we have tools and resources and that God's given us gifts.

God's given us that we can use in a home that will be a blessing to asked her husbands to our children and to the community around us. That's when when we start experiencing that joy and kind of shed that negativity.

Marlin Detweiler:
Yeah. What is it about going back to, you went back to the garden. And what we would probably agree on is that feminism brought that lie into the 20th century and convinced many people, a lot of women, that motherhood was not enough. And a career was one of the things that was its replacement. And I'm not going to – we're not getting into the topic of women in the workforce and those kinds of things.

It's a it's not an either or set of circumstances as far as I'm concerned. Though it does need to be considered. What is it about though having a career that becomes contrasted with being God forbid a stay at home mom that that is frequently said in a pejorative way. How did where did that come from in the 20th century? And why has it captured so many people?

Ashlee Kasten:
Oh I can speak specifically to why it captures us. I know this for a fact and where exactly it came from I'm not totally sure but I do know that why it's so attractive to us is because when a mom goes to a workplace when you go into a corporate job here's what you'll get. You'll get kind of goals and you'll have things that you would like to achieve your goals set out to achieve.

And you'll have praise and affirmation. When a mom is in the home you know you don't have any. You have goals that you set for yourself maybe but there's no one saying you know what? You potty trained your toddler you get an award. In fact you're going to get a raise. There's none of that. So all of a sudden all of that is stripped away especially if you're coming from the corporate reward world which a lot of moms do.

They're you know they're working women. Then they have children and they want to be at home with them. And in our mind we think well gosh this is such a beautiful thing to be at home with their kids. And then we do it and we're like wait a second no one's patting me on the back. I'm not getting a raise.

I'm not getting paid for this. But there's certainly a complaint department here. And every day the kids complain that or whatever. There are high standards and the hours the demands of this job are huge. But the reward is usually very little. And a lot of us do have husbands that you know will praise us and you know tell us we're doing a good job.

But it's not the same as in a workplace where you're able to measure these things and have accolades or things to show for it where you're like well look look at the promotion I got. Look at the raise I got. So and I think that's the draw.

Marlin Detweiler:
But you used the metaphor of farming because if a farmer says okay in 24 hours nothing changed. But in three weeks that corn that I planted yesterday is going to be maybe knee high. I don't know how long it takes for corn to go from planted to knee high. Well let's just assume three weeks for the moment. Yeah.

Now we've got something changing. Now we've got something I can show for it. And when it comes to children that time is years to show for it. And I think it is. Is there any connection to the disdaining of motherhood and the convenience have to have it now mindset? The drive through mentality and not the at least certainly in America an inability to be or a resistance to investing today for something that may not be realized for a few years?

Is that related to think to the negative vibe I mentioned of motherhood?

Ashlee Kasten:
Absolutely yes. Because we have become very impatient people. That's part of our culture we live in and the fast convenient culture and the rise of social media and so many things that pull our attention away and really dumb us down is the best way to say it that it just makes us like toddlers. So a lot of us have the brains of toddlers because we're so used to right now.

And instant. If a video doesn't catch our attention in the first millisecond you know we're on to the next thing. So then you compare that to motherhood which is very slow and very intentional. And at the same every day.

Marlin Detweiler:
Payoff is way down the road from the day that they're born.

Ashlee Kasten:
Right? Yeah.

Marlin Detweiler:
It in some respects not in all the. Yeah like of a toddler around your knee is certainly meaningful and not as long as it is to see them become mature godly adults.

Ashlee Kasten:
Absolutely.

Marlin Detweiler:
Yeah. Well you've written two books. I know of one. Tell us about that one first and then mention the other one and maybe answer similar questions on it. But tell us about Lessons I Found in the Laundry Basket. Why did you write it? What would you do differently if you wrote it today? And what is it? What do you want it to accomplish?

Ashlee Kasten:
Yes. That was the very first book that I wrote. The Lord put on my heart and I didn't feel like I could even write a book then because I had never done it before. And also I had little ones undertow. And I just felt like I mean I felt like I was a little bit drowning in that season.

And so I thought well Lord how in the world am I going to write this book? And so I thought about the woman at the well and how she wasn't doing anything extraordinary that when Jesus met her there at the well in fact she was doing a story that she likely did every single day going to the well and our well as moms as laundry basket.

We made that laundry basket every single day. And I thought well Jesus if you met her there at the well then you can meet me here at the laundry basket and teach me something that I can teach other moms. And so that's where that name came from. Lessons I found in the laundry basket. And it was all the things that I had dealt with and or overcome or things that the Lord had taught me on things like mommy guilt or feeling lonely feeling isolated feeling burdened and overwhelmed.

The Lord would come and meet me in those places I would spend time in prayer with him at the laundry basket was folding clothes and I just started to write those things down and it turned into this kind of devotional style books for moms. And that is it's the first book I wrote and it's still my favorite book out of the two of them because there was such a deep transformation that happened in me as I wrote the words of this book of that book.

And so it's just one of my favorites. What I would do differently now I probably have even more lessons in there. I think I would just extend the book and add in 20 more lessons.

Marlin Detweiler:
Well you've talked a good bit about some elements of feeling alone at the laundry basket maybe doing the dishes maybe changing the diaper you're you know you're the only adult in the room so to speak the only adult in the house sometimes. And yet what you're promoting is a sorority a connection with other women to help them.

How far does that extend? Does that become a community that provides mutual encouragement and support for those thoughts and concerns? That's the negative side of it, the positive side of it. Does it where does it go in terms of really building up more women who want to be mothers without reservation?

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah. Do you mean personally in the community that I've built?

Marlin Detweiler:
Communities that you've built the whole idea of the purpose of motherhood your. Yeah your ministry is at some level building a community of support isn't it?

Ashlee Kasten:
Yes absolutely. That's actually the next direction that it's going to take this year as a community. Because I just heard this the same message over and over again with moms saying not just wanting friends to vent to about the daily struggles, which can turn very negative like you mentioned. Or it's not a place to like bash your husbands or all that all that that's so common in our society.

It ends up being so toxic but a place to come with real problems because those feelings can be real. But to be uplift and to be in a community of women who are similar minded and that will bear each other's burdens. I love that verse excuse me in the Bible about bearing one another's burdens.

And I once heard a pastor speak on this and he was saying that word bear actually means to lift. And so our job as a community of believers is to come alongside each other not to bear as a now we're all burdened down because we know that that goes against what Jesus tells us. But to actually lift that burden off in prayer lift it off up to the father.

And so I think like for me that's my heart now for this next step is to create that community where moms are surrounded by the other women who will help to lift that burden like we're praying for one another while we're also growing closer to the Lord and growing in His Word which then trickles down to our children. So it's just like you know beautiful. Just kind of circle.

Marlin Detweiler:
Yeah. It's easy for me to talk about motherhood because I've never done anything wrong as a mother. So let's talk about fathers now. Let's talk about husbands for just a moment. Yeah. Provide us some thoughts to husbands so that women that might be listening to this can say here you need to hear this. I'm kidding. But so that the men that do listen to it are also challenged for how they help their wife and support her as the field general of the home.

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah absolutely. As women our desire is for the men to lead. And that is a God given desire. Now women I will speak to you for a second. Our tendency can be to try to lead them into leading. Right.

Marlin Detweiler:
Or we call that supplanting. Leading.

Ashlee Kasten:
Yeah. Which is not biblical. Okay. But that desire to want them to lead is. And so for men I would say be strong and courageous and be leaders in the home because when you lead a home it flows from you to your wife to your kids. And there's such a blessing that comes on the home where the father is leading.

And if you don't know how to lead then get in a community of men who are leading. Be around the people you want to be like we can't ignore that command. So for both women to submit and for men to lead just because we don't feel like that really fits us or we don't feel equipped or you know whatever the case may be it is a command for us to do that. And it's for our good because that's when the home works at its best.

Marlin Detweiler:
You mentioned that there are no accolades, there are no awards. There are no raises. But talk to me about what the equivalent dynamic or the equivalent might be for a husband and father to provide those kinds of things to his wife the mother of his children. What would they be like?

Ashlee Kasten:
So she says she feels seen and heard. Well I would say know her love language. We my husband figured that we love to do premarital counseling with couples. And that's one of the things we always tell them is find out love languages.

Marlin Detweiler:
Because what moves what moves your spouse.

Ashlee Kasten:
Right. Yes. Yes. Because if she's not words and you give her words that may not do anything for her. But acknowledging the work that she does and that might look like if she acts of service it might look like you coming home from work. And instead of just sitting on the couch even though that's what you want to do because you worked all day long doing the dishes you know or just taking the toddler for a walk because she's had it and she needs the kids out of the house or something like that.

But you'll never know unless you ask them. So having that on this conversation just saying like hey how can I support you? And what you're doing in the home or saying you know I value what you're doing in the home. It's very important. My husband for a very long time didn't see the value of me being in the home because he didn't have a mom that stayed at home.

She's a wonderful mom so nothing. But she always had a corporate job and they went to public school. So when I first brought up the idea of being a stay at home mom he was kind of like what does that even mean? Like why would you stay at home? That doesn't make sense. Now he's the biggest proponent.

He's right behind me going oh yeah stay at home. My home school the kids are like that. So he champions for me in that. And one thing that I really appreciate about my husband I know personally what makes me feel appreciated is just him using his words to say you know I'm really proud of you.

What you're doing is really great. And I appreciate you sacrificing to be at home. Although I don't feel like it's a sacrifice at all. But the way he wears it I appreciate you sacrificing to be at home and everything that you pour into the girl. So something even as simple like that as that can really make a difference.

Marlin Detweiler:
That's great. Well one last question actually. Maybe category it may spawn some corollary questions but as you look back maybe 50 or 40 or even 30 years from now on your initiatives with The Purpose of Motherhood what does success look like? What do you hope today you'll be able to see and say thank you God to in what you're doing?

Ashlee Kasten:
Kids who love Jesus I our homeschool motto is Heaven not Harvard. And I constantly at mirror reminding myself of that that if my kids grow up and they become these successful doctors lawyers all these things but they don't know Jesus none of that none of that matters. We can't take any of that with us. And so success to me looks like kids who love Jesus, and you know, and a loving home where they experience to our the best of our ability the love of God. That's success looks nice to me.

Marlin Detweiler:
No doubt. But I'm going to push you a little bit on that because I couldn't agree more that that is a one. But is there also where does it fall into a realizing the potential that's got God has given you that the educational rigor and the challenges and those kinds of things help produce people who are meeting as Colossians encourages us to an ability to use the gifts God's given us.

Ashlee Kasten:
Well so for me personally yeah I think if I'm able to help other moms discover their purpose and like looking back if I was in my community helping other moms connect to Jesus and helping them pastor their kids and I mean writing more books continuing to do podcasts and pour into moms as I'm pouring into my own children.

That's. And I know without a doubt that that's what God's called me to do. And I think that's such a great thing as moms when we've discovered that like how we're gifted and how God's designer. So what we're created to do yeah I would look back and be like yeah that. Yeah. Did you get you used what got the little he gave you in the small pockets of time that you had and you wrote those books anyways and you spoke at the moms groups and just kept trucking on.

Marlin Detweiler:
Yeah. Very good. Ashlee thank you so much.

Ashlee Kasten:
Thank you for having me. It was fun visiting with you.

Marlin Detweiler:
I'm a bit out of my element trying to interview you and learn the way motherhood should work. You know it's only by observation. And thanks for really encouraging our audience. Very kind.

Ashlee Kasten:
You did great. Thank you for having me. It was a pleasure.

Marlin Detweiler:
And folks thank you for joining us on this episode of Veritas Vox the voice of classical Christian Education. We hope to see you next time.