Many parents worry that speaking to their children about sexuality might create the very problems they are trying to avoid. Is it really wise to alert young minds to ideas that maybe they wouldn’t otherwise have known or thought about?

One thing I’ve learned as a father is that it is possible to introduce my children to a God-honoring versos of sexuality that leads to health and not harm.  But it takes purposeful effort and strategy.  That’s one of the greatest strengths about the Honorable Manhood online program – it helps fathers communicate about this area with their sons in a way that is life-giving, Christ-glorifying, and pure.  

In my new blog video I unpack the key principles for talking to your kids about sexuality in a God-honoring way. 

Transcript

One of the things that Leslie and I have run into over the years in dealing with the issue of sexuality is the question, how do you deal with sexuality in a way that leads to purity, and doesn’t create the very problems you’re trying to avoid? Because in addressing things, it’s actually alerting young minds to notions and to ideas that maybe they wouldn’t otherwise have known or thought about. Are you sponsoring the very thing you’re trying to quell? I would say it’s a spiritual art, because the Bible is the pure Word of God, right? Well, the Bible talks about sexuality. So how does the Bible do it? Because obviously the Bible is pure. But it can be misused. For example, people have mishandled Song of Solomon, but at the same time, the Word of God is pure.

And so there’s a key to how we relay the mystery, the magnificence, the majesty, the beauty of our sexuality where the hearer is able to receive it in such a way which inspires honor, as opposed to impurity or in perversion. And that’s one of the things in my Honorable Manhood training that has been a huge focus point for me. I want to be specific. I want to get granular in the understanding with young men of how things work and function. But I want to do it in a way that truly gives them a vision of how to rightly handle this area for the glory of God.

In other words, we need to aim to give them a vision that is always greater than the function that they are learning, and giving them an immediate application. You don’t just hand a kid a hammer. Teach them what that hammer is used for because a kid could use a hammer in a lot of bad ways. But teaching them how that hammer can be constructive. The same is true with these tools. There’s a need for young men to know and to understand, but you also want to steer them unto proper use. Give a kid a gun and don’t teach them how to use it, and it can lead to death. But teach him how to properly use it, it can lead to food on the table.

George Washington had an illustration about limited government in early American history, and he was likening it to a fire and a fireplace. And he says that the hearth of the fireplace is like government, limited government. And so there’s a power with government, but it has to be maintained. It has to be kept. I’ve always taken that same metaphor and I’ve stolen it from George Washington. Because it’s the same with our sexuality, even knowledge about sexuality. You see there’s a proper place for it, and if it stays in that proper place — just like with government — it adds warmth and beauty and romance to the entire house. But if it gets outside of that proper context, it burns down the entire house.

The desire that I have in training, both with my children and in helping other men train theirs, or even help men understand their own sexuality, is to give it to them in a way where I create the “hearth” at the same time. And then I show them, this is what fire is, and this is where it goes, and if it stays here, guess what? This is what it could look like. It’s pretty exciting.

If you’d like to take these ideas deeper, join me for an eight-week course on Honorable Manhood.

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