Messages From Heaven: How do I teach my children about sex so that they ...

Messages From Heaven: How do I teach my children about sex so that they ...: Talking about sex may be the single most powerful way you can enter into the lives of your children. Why? Because sex education means mor...

How do I teach my children about sex so that they will stay pure until they are married?

Talking about sex may be the single most powerful way you can enter into the lives of your children. Why? Because sex education means more than teaching them the facts of human reproduction.
Of all the discussions we have had in our family about sex, probably 95 percent of them have concerned character issues. We've had discussions about God's purposes for sex, the importance of sex and marriage, and why you should wait for marriage before you have sex. We talked about how to avoid situations in which you are tempted, how different types of media shape our thoughts in this area, the types of movies to see and avoid, how to respond when someone challenges your convictions, and many other topics. We have found that the issues surrounding human sexuality, such as self-control and obedience to God, are the foundational character qualities every parent wants to build into his teenager.
Five Steps for Developing and Implementing a Sex Education Plan
Step One: Evaluate your frame of reference
For this topic, it's critical that you think through your own experiences to determine what has influenced you up to this point. How did you learn about sex? How have you been influenced by your parents, by your peers, and by the culture? What mistakes have you made over the years in this area? How much do you know about what the Bible says on this subject? What were the most important events that shaped who they were as young people growing up to become a man or a woman?
It's also important to examine what fears you may have about interacting with your children about sex. I am convinced that fear is one of the primary emotions we feel when it comes to discussing the area of sex with our kids. We do not feel like experts as parents. We're afraid of not knowing the answer to a question, or of giving an answer that is not appropriate for a child's age level. We're afraid of those awkward moments.
But that's okay. You don't need to be a professional. You just need to be a parent. God will give you the power and the courage to tell your children about His perspective of this sacred area of life. It is a great privilege.
Many parents today also fear that their own sexual sins in the past may disqualify them from speaking to their children with authority. This is a fear of every parent who has failed in an area and is attempting to lead the child to do what is right.
Past failures must not prevent us from calling our child to the standard of God's Word. We have all lied, yet we still teach our children to tell the truth. We have all stolen something, but that doesn't stop us from teaching that stealing is wrong. The same should be true for those who have been sexually active outside of marriage in the past. In fact, you should feel a greater urgency to stand up for the truth because you know the consequences of not waiting until marriage.
The only thing that, to us, can disqualify you from being able to talk to a child about sex is if you are currently involved in sexual sin—a present sexual addiction or an adulterous affair. If this is part of your life today and you have not repented of it, your sin is just not going to impact you. Your sin will have an impact on your sons, your grandsons, and your granddaughters. It is going to affect your daughters as they grow into adolescence and on into adulthood and become married. That is why it is very important as we talk about sex education right at the outset that you as a parent as much as possible have your conscience forgiven and cleansed by Jesus Christ.
Step Two: Clarify your convictions
In the next step, we will list some basic scriptural truths to teach your children about sex. Right now we'd like to challenge you to clarify your convictions in one significant area—God's standards of purity and innocence.
If you were asked, "What are you teaching your child about sex and morality?" my guess is that you might say something like, "We are teaching him that he should wait until he is married to begin having sex."
In the process of raising our own teens, however, we have developed a strong conviction that virginity is not a high enough goal. Nor is it the ultimate biblical goal. Unfortunately, studies have found that even our Christian teenagers are engaging in sexual activities reserved for marriage, yet are maintaining a technical virginity.
The Bible presents a number of pointed principles to ensure that our relationships with the opposite sex are appropriate and rewarding. The key words underlying all of them are purity and holiness. Here are two basic passages:

"For this is the will of God, your sanctification; that is, that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor, not in lustful passion, like the Gentiles who do not know God. . . For God has not called us for the purpose of impurity but in sanctification" (1 Thessalonians. 4:3-5, 7).

"Now flee from youthful lusts, and pursue righteousness, faith, love, and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart" (2 Timothy 2:22).

Abstinence is a part of the answer. It's just not the total answer.   Step Three: Teach what God says about sex
The best way to combat the world is by teaching the truth of the Scripture. Here are some major points you will want to share with your child:
God created sex. Genesis 1:27 tells us, "And God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them." The Creator of the universe stamped and embedded His image within us in a way that is somehow mysteriously tied to our sexuality. God designed the parts of their bodies and He blessed the union. When God made them male and female, He said it was "very good" (Genesis. 1:31).
Sex is for procreation in marriage. God created sex so that we can reproduce after our own kind. Genesis 1:28 tells us that God blessed the man and the woman and commanded them to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth.
Sex is for intimacy in marriage. Genesis 4:1 says, "Now the man had relations with his wife Eve, and she conceived." Adam did not shake Eve's hand. He had sexual relations with his wife, and she conceived because they had intercourse. God intended us to become one flesh to draw us together. It's a wonderful aspect of sex.
Sex is for pleasure in marriage. God approves of appropriate gestures of love, romance, and pleasure within marriage. Look at Proverbs 5:19: "As a loving hind and a graceful doe, let her breasts satisfy you at all times; be exhilarated always with her love." That is not Playboy 5:19; that is Proverbs 5:19. God said it. He also wrote an entire book of the Bible about sexual love in marriage, The Song of Solomon. God is not down on sexual pleasure in marriage.
Sex was created to be enjoyed by a man and a woman in marriage. Today our media bombard us with the idea that God created and blesses other kinds of sex, like that practiced by homosexuals. You will need to share with your child that there is a radical homosexual element in our culture saying, "We're going to be in your face. You're going to see us kissing on television and in movies. We want to become acceptable."
Sex outside of marriage is a sin. God very clearly forbids fornication (1 Corinthians 6:9, Matthew. 15:19). Some believe only a cruel God would give teenagers a strong sex drive but then order them not to act upon it until marriage. But when God forbids something, it is for our own good.
Use the following points to develop a clear, thought-out explanation on how God uses sexual purity for our good.

• You feel no guilt, no shame, and no emotional scars when you hold to a standard of sexual holiness
• You don't hear any accusing voices in your own conscience.
• You will not be tempted to compare your future spouse with a past lover.
• You have no risk of sexually transmitted disease.
• You will not face the possibility of bearing a child out of wedlock.
• It gives you much needed training in self-control and self-denial.

Step Four: Challenge your children to maintain purity and innocence until they are married
Let's say your thirteen-year-old comes to you and says, "Mom, Dad, how far should I go (sexually) with the opposite sex?" Do you know what your standard would be? For example, what standard on kissing will you present to your child? We have been challenging our children to set a goal of not kissing anyone until the wedding ceremony. Now, that may sound preposterous to you, and that's fine, but if that standard seems too high, answer this question: What line will you challenge your child to draw? If you do not challenge your child with a specific standard, we can promise you that your child will most definitely turn to his peers to develop his own standard.
We believe that the spiritual awakening that is begging to erupt in America may well occur through our youth. Moreover, it may be advanced by a band of parents who say to young people, "We want to lead you to the moral high ground." That high ground is there to be taken if we love our teens and develop relationships with them so that these standards can be implanted in their hearts.
Step Five: Create a home environment that provides love, security, and physical affection for your children
In many cases the teens who become snared in the trap of illicit sex are emotionally needy because of they don't live in a loving, supportive home environment with strong standards and encouraging parents. Your home needs to be an emotional watering hole—an oasis where your children learn about trusting Christ. A place of refreshment for their souls, where they go for love and affection (even when they don't seem to want it from you). If your home life is characterized by fear and legalism, your children may rebel.
As a child grows up and develops physically into a young woman or man, a concern may grow in the parent about how much physical affection should be given if the child is of the opposite sex. The tendency is to think he is grown and doesn't need the affection. Don't stop lavishing your child with physical affection; he needs those hugs and kisses more than ever! A mom hugging her son and a dad hugging his daughter will send the message to both—you are a young man or a young woman who is worthy of attention and affection from someone of the opposite sex.
How many times have you heard young women say that they sought affection from boys because they never received it from their fathers? Don't make that mistake with your child.
As you look to teach and train your children about sexual intimacy, remember God designed sex as part of a married couple's relationship meant to glorify God. As you lovingly invest in training your kids about God's intention for sex, you will help counteract all the sick and sorry messages that the world has to share.

The Distortion of Gender

Messages From Heaven: The Rise of Extreme Tolerance!

Messages From Heaven: The Rise of Extreme Tolerance!: Many evangelicals (once known for a very prudent and biblical approach to doctrine) are fast becoming as doctrinally clueless as the unc...

The Rise of Extreme Tolerance!

Many evangelicals (once known for a very prudent and biblical approach to doctrine) are fast becoming as doctrinally clueless as the unchurched people they are so keen to please. At least three decades of deliberately downplaying doctrine and discernment in order to attract the unchurched has filled many once-sound churches with people who utterly lack any ability to differentiate the very worst fast doctrines from truth. I constantly encounter evangelical church members who are at a loss to answer the most profound errors they hear from cultists, unorthodox media preachers, or other sources of false doctrine.
In the church today, there is a growing reluctance to take a definitive stand on any issue. Discernment is frankly not very welcome in a culture like ours. In fact, the postmodern perspective is more than merely hostile to discernment; it is practically the polar opposite. Think about it: pronouncing anything "true" and calling its antithesis "error" is a breach of postmodernism's one last impregnable dogma. That is why to a postmodernist nothing is more uncouth than voicing strong opinions on spiritual, moral, or ethical matters. People are expected to hold their most important convictions with as much slack as possible. Certainty about anything is out of the question, and all who refuse to equivocate on any point of principle or doctrine are therefore automatically labeled too narrow. Zeal for the truth has become politically incorrect. There is actually zero tolerance for biblical discernment in a "tolerant" climate like that.
In the secular realm, postmodernism's extreme tolerance has been foisted on an unsuspecting public by the entertainment media for several decades. A plethora of talk shows on daily television have led the way. Phil Donahue established the format. Jerry Springer took it to ridiculous extremes. And Oprah made it seem somewhat respectable and refined. Shows like these remind viewers daily not to be too opinionated — and they do it by parading in front of their audiences the most bizarre and extreme advocates of every radical "alternative lifestyle" imaginable. We are not supposed to be shocked or notice the overtly self-destructive nature of so many aberrant subcultures. The point is to broaden our minds and raise our level of tolerance. And if you do criticize another person's value system, it cannot be on biblical grounds. Anyone who cites religious beliefs as a reason to reject another person's way of life is automatically viewed with the same contempt that used to be reserved for out-and-out religious heretics. The culture around us has declared war on all biblical standards.
Some Christians unwittingly began following suit several years ago. That has opened the door for a whole generation in the church to embrace postmodern relativism openly and deliberately. They don't want the truth presented with stark black-and-white clarity anymore. They prefer having issues of right and wrong, true and false, good and bad deliberately painted in shades of gray. We have reached a point where the typical churchgoer today assumes that is the proper way of understanding truth. Any degree of certainty has begun to sound offensive to people's postmodernized ears.
One young pastor told me he didn't like the authoritarian implications of the word preaching. He said he preferred to speak of his pulpit ministry as "sharing" with his people. He didn't last long in ministry, of course. But sadly, his comments probably reflect the prevailing mood in the church today.
D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones noticed the same trend several decades ago. His marvelous book Preaching and Preachers began by noting that modern society was becoming uncomfortable with the whole idea of "preaching":

A new idea has crept in with regard to preaching, and it has taken various forms. A most significant one was that people began to talk about the "address" in the service instead of the sermon. That in itself was indicative of a subtle change. An "address." No longer the sermon, but an "address" or perhaps even a lecture...what is needed is a chat, a fireside chat, quiet talks, and so on! 1

Lloyd-Jones was simply noticing one of the subtle harbingers of postmodernism's contempt for clarity and authority. A problem that existed in embryonic form in his era is now a full-grown monster.
At the "Emergent Convention" in 2004, a gathering of some eleven hundred leaders in the Emerging Church movement, Doug Pagitt, pastor of Solomon's Porch (an Emergent community in Minneapolis), told the gathering, "Preaching is broken." He suggests that a completely open conversation where all participants are seen as equals is better suited to a postmodern culture. "Why do I get to speak for 30 minutes and you don't?" he asked. "A sermon is often a violent act," he declared. "It's violence toward the will of the people who have to sit there and take it." 2
Rudy Carrasco, a Pasadena-based Emergent pastor, agreed that preaching is simply too one-sided, too authoritative, and too rigid for postmodern times. "Every day, every week, there's stuff that pops up in life, and it's not resolved, just crazy and confusing and painful. When people come across with three answers, and they know everything, and they have this iron sheen about them, I'm turned off. Period. I'm just turned off. And I think that's not unique to me." 3
Many in the church, caught up in the spirit of the age, think Christians should never take an uncompromising stand, should never argue about anything. We're not supposed to engage in polemics. I hear this frequently: "Why don't you just state the truth in positive terms and ignore the view you disagree with? Why not steer clear of controversy, forget the negatives, and present everything affirmatively?"
That ethos is why it is no longer permissible to deal with biblical issues in a straightforward and uncompromising fashion. Those who dare to take an unpopular stand, declare truth in a definitive way — or worst of all, express disagreement with someone else's teaching — will inevitably be marked as troublesome. Compromise has become a virtue while devotion to truth has become offensive.
But many of the issues being compromised within the evangelical movement today are not questionable. Scripture speaks very clearly against homosexuality, for example. The Christian position on adultery is not at all vague. The question of whether a believer ought to marry an unbeliever is spelled out with perfect clarity. Scripture quite plainly forbids any Christian to take another Christian to court. Selfishness and pride are explicitly identified as sins. These are not gray areas. There is no room for compromise here.
Nevertheless, I constantly hear every one of those issues treated as a gray area — on Christian radio, on Christian television, and in Christian literature. People want all such matters to be negotiable. And too many Christian leaders willingly oblige. They hesitate to speak with authority on matters where Scripture is plain. The lines of distinction between truth and error, wisdom and foolishness, church and world are being systematically obliterated by such means.
The world needs Christians who embrace an antithetical worldview, a biblical mindset that answers questions of truth and morality in terms of black and white. Why? Because there is no salvation without absolute, unshakeable truth. Compromising, changing, tolerant opinions don't provide answers for the "crazy and confusing and painful" issues that confront pastor Carrasco every day. Only truth saves and sanctifies and gives hope.
What's needed today is a generation of men and women who will take a stand on biblical truth. People like that fear the Lord, not men, and will find power and courage from the Lord to uphold His truth in an age of extreme tolerance.

Messages From Heaven: The End of the World As We Know It?

Messages From Heaven: The End of the World As We Know It?: Like many others on the morning of September 11, 2001, I turned on the television to see the World Trade Center on fire. Was it an acci...

The End of the World As We Know It?

Like many others on the morning of September 11, 2001, I turned on the television to see the World Trade Center on fire. Was it an accident? But when the second plane crashed into the other tower, it became clear that this was no accident. It was a terrorist attack on the United States. Then to hear that the Pentagon had been hit...and then to see the World Trade Center collapse...what seemed like the impossible unfolded before our very eyes.
The inevitable question arises after a tragedy like this: "Why?" Some have even asked, "Why did God allow this to happen?" But God did not do this at all. This was done by the wicked heart of man, because deep inside, humanity is twisted and sick spiritually. As Jeremiah 17:9 says, "The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked; who can know it?" (NKJV).
When God created humans, He gave us something called a free will. This means that we all have the ability to choose right or wrong. You might say that free will is our greatest blessing, and in other ways, it is our greatest curse. We were uniquely created in the image of God Himself and have been given this ability to choose. But we usually make the wrong choices.
If you don't believe the human heart is wicked, then visit the Yad Vashem in Israel, a museum dedicated to the memory of the six million Jews who were senselessly slaughtered by Hitler and the Nazis.
If you don't believe the human heart is wicked, then recall the reactions when the news of the attacks reached Osama bin Laden, who thanked "almighty Allah," and some Palestinians, who rejoiced and danced in the streets.
If you don't believe the human heart is wicked, then take a long look at what you saw on September 11, 2001.
Some well-meaning but misguided people might say these events must have been God's will. I disagree. It wasn't God who did this. It was Satan, working in concert with wicked man, who did this. The Bible tells us that the whole world lies under the sway of the wicked one (1 John 5:19). Satan did this through wicked people who were bent on destruction.
What should we do as we see horrible things happening? Jesus gives us some important answers in Luke 21. He says: "Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near" (v. 28 NKJV). It's a reminder that He is coming soon.
In light of that fact, how should we be living? We find the answer a few verses later: "But take heed to yourselves, lest your hearts be weighed down with carousing, drunkenness, and cares of this life, and that Day come upon you unexpectedly" (v. 34).
This means that if you are waiting for the return of the Lord, you need to be living a godly life. You don't want to be doing something that is displeasing to God. Instead, you want to have your life right with Him.
In His Word, God has given us His warning about these things. Each of us must ask ourselves: Am I doing anything that I would be ashamed to be doing if Jesus Christ were to come back tonight? If the answer is yes, then you need to stop doing it right now. The Bible says that He will come again to those who are looking for Him.
Is it the end of the world as we know it? Only God knows that. But I will tell you this much: It was the end of many people's world on September 11, 2001. What if you died tonight? What if Jesus came back today?
That is why you want to be ready. That is why you need to be sure you're right with God. You don't know when death will come or when Jesus will return. The Bible says that we don't know "the day or the hour the Son of Man is coming" (Matthew 25:13). Be ready to go. All of the time.