2/26/18

For the next couple of entries I am going to focus on pornography.  I would like to walk you through the basics so not only will you know what I am teaching your son, but also so your own parenting methods can have some food for fodder! I am currently taking them through The Conquer Series which is a good conversation starter.  None of the DVD series or YouTube series we watch here are truly stand alone for any young man.  We need to spend at LEAST an equal amount of time as the series is teaching to interject/explain/and add personal stories to help them understand.  I am also taking them through the general principles in Finally Free, as well as Wired For intimacy, How Pornography Hijacks the Male Brain.  These are both excellent books geared towards helping us to understand how exactly porn is hurting us.  I was talking to a student this morning, and he told me he didn't have any problem with porn whatsoever.  I'm glad he said this, but when I pushed him just a little he admitted to looking at porn on a daily basis (before coming to Future Men) for about 20 minutes a day.  I told him this sounded like a problem to me.  His response was that it didn't control him,and that he wasn't controlled by it.  Clearly there is a problem with understanding porn, as well as understanding how porn effects the brain.  Let's start by talking for a minute about God's commands on the subject.  In Matthew 5 we see Jesus talking to His disciples (as well as a crowd of others) about the Old Testament laws.  He told them "...you have heard it said, thou shalt not commit adultery, but I say unto you do not even look on a woman to lust after her..." So this is one of many directives from the Bible we can go to and give our sons a direct command from Jesus to stay away from porn.  Looking at a naked (or close to naked) woman and not lusting after her is pretty much impossible.  To say that we are only after the artistic inspiration of a naked woman is a lie.  God has made man responsive to the image of a woman (made in His image like our own).  Seeing her elicits a response, and it is supposed to.  The problem is, like in many other areas of our son's (or our own life) we have awakened these passions BEFORE we are ready to act on them!  So, is God a killjoy?  Does He not realize He has made the woman's body a thing of great beauty, and then not allowed us to gaze upon it?  Seems like God is kind of mean...doesn't it?  Our sons think so.  As fathers, I think we see His kindness in His laws and we know His laws are not prohibitions, but rather protections.  We just have to trust Him.  In an earlier blog I talked about the idea of just blind obedience, and how if we can truly submit to our authority, even when we don't understand or agree, then we will win!  This is so true in this case!  God has given us a way to truly enjoy our future wife in a manner that doesn't bring mental baggage to the wedding bed.  Sadly, many of us have not obeyed our Heavenly Father, and have instead filled our heads with images that will one day compete with our wives for our attention.  They also get us in a bind of coveting, wishing for our wives to be more like some memory in our past, whether real or in pixils.  God's Word teaches that our bodies are not made for porn (I Cor 6:13), we should run from it (I Cor 6:18), we should not seek it out (I Cor 7:), and we should repent if we fall prey to it (I Cor 12:21).   With the boys this week we talked about the three "A's" that make internet porn so easy and "fun."  The three A's are Accessibility, Affordability, and Anonymity.  I took some time to discuss each point, I am sure you understand these three.  The fight against porn isn't the fight it was 15-20 years ago (or more), it has turned into quite a monster, and Accessibility of it is killing our sons.

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