Sex Education

The Overall Task of Parents: Shaping Children for God's Purposes

0:00 Wife to husband is, of course, the relationship of each individual to the living God who made them. And then in the structure of the home, everything is to follow that two-fold pattern of what I have called the creative order and the redemptive pattern. That is, everything in the husband-wife, parent-child relationship is to fit with what God originally intended in creation and is to be reflective of what he is doing in the new creation in Jesus Christ. Hence, the scripture tells us that the relationship of the church to Christ and Christ to the church is to be reflected in the relationship of the husband to the wife and the wife to the husband.

0:44 Then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the husband. Particular role, the wife's particular role, and then their joint responsibility with regard to their children. And just briefly to catch the main thrust of that, their overall task with regard to the children is to seek to be the means in God's hands to develop these little lives to the place where they will be ready as mature adults to take their place as a husband or wife in the home under the direction of scripture in the power of Christ and also in the direction of God. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ.

1:19 And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ.

1:21 And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. And then we looked at what scripture gave us concerning the relationship of the wife to Christ and Christ to the church in Jesus Christ. and in the church as loyal subjects of Jesus Christ.

1:27 And nothing less than that is the overall task of the parent to seek to furnish that child with all the necessary knowledge, disciplines, patterns of life, habits, and all the rest that will make them that which is in some measure commensured with the pattern of the Word of God in their homes, in the society in which they will move, and in the church where they will take their place. Now, one of the most vital issues in the whole shaping and molding of the children for this threefold role is the matter of the biblical application of the rod of correction. And so vital an issue is this that we spent a whole evening dealing with the principles of correction, which again are to follow the creative pattern or the creative order and the redemptive pattern. Our discipline. Our discipline is to reflect God's discipline. Whom he loves, he chastens.

2:25 If we're without chastisement, the writer to the Hebrew says, it's a proof we're outside the orbit of God's love. We're bastards. He doesn't claim us as his children. Implication being, any parent who doesn't discipline his child doesn't love him.

2:38 He's treating him as a bastard child whom no one will claim. In other words, God says you may as well turn him loose on the street to be nobody's child as to have him under your roof and not discipline him. God's discipline is always motivated by love. So is ours.

2:54 God always has a specific goal in mind, namely that we might be partakers of his holiness. Our goal is the subjugation of the will of our children to constituted authority. And so we went through a number of those passages dealing with this area. Then having concluded what we might call the formal instruction dealing with the basic structure of the Christian family and the ordering of that family, we then moved on last week to what I called some peculiar problems regarding the Christian home.

Proposition 1: Sex Education is Primarily a Parental Responsibility

3:26 And we dealt with two last week, the matter of the family devotions, family worship, and then the area of the use and abuse of the television set. Now tonight we come to another very vital area of the parental responsibility and one which causes great confusion and no little consternation on the part of many parents, namely, the Christian parent and his great privilege and responsibility in the area of sex education. Now God is often pleased to use the sinful movements of society and the pronouncements of sinful men to cause the people of God to grapple with issues that otherwise they might normally skirt. And I believe that the present preoccupation with sex in our day, both illicitly and in a, in a very legitimate sense, has driven some of God's people to grapple in a new way with this whole area of their responsibility, for they know if they don't give proper directive, the world and the school are going to give improper directive, and so it's forced the people of God to grapple with this issue. And from that standpoint, I think God has brought good out of that which is evil in itself. Now to think our way through this subject tonight, I want to lay out three basic propositions and then build our study around them

4:54 and make them the point of reference for our question and answer time. Proposition one is this. Sex education is primarily, now don't you put the word exclusively, I didn't use it, and I've chosen my words carefully. Sex education is primarily a parental responsibility.

5:14 That's our first proposition. Now to develop that. In our previous study, we saw that, God has constituted the Christian parent. God has constituted, he has made the Christian parent to be to his children, a prophet to teach them the way of God, a priest to bring them to God in intercession, and a king to impose upon them the rule of God while they're under your house.

5:42 If any man rule not his own house, as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord. Now it's not a matter of, we take this by faith or we ask the Lord to give it to us. It's a matter of whether or not we discharge this stewardship. He has constituted us prophets, priests and kings to our children.

6:03 If this is so, then as prophets to our children, it is our responsibility to declare to them the mind and will of God. That is God's interpretation of all of life. Deuteronomy chapter six was the basic passage that I used a few weeks ago in establishing this principle. Let me just remind you of the content of that passage as we build upon it tonight.

6:30 Deuteronomy chapter six, verse six. And these words which I command thee this day shall be upon thy heart, and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thy house, and when thou walkest by the way, when thou liest, down and when thou risest up. Then he goes on to say you'll even put them on the doorpost, have them continually before you and before your family, that any Israelite who looks out through his eye into life views all of life through the screen of divine revelation. All of life is to be interpreted accurately, and the only way it is interpreted accurately is when it is interpreted according to divine revelation. For only God who gave life understands life. Therefore he alone can interpret life to us. Well then, one facet of life and a very vital facet of life is the whole matter of the creature's sex capacities and his sexuality.

7:40 These are part of the creative order and they can only be understood and rightly used within the circle of the will of God.

7:52 Now if you as a parent have the main responsibility to declare to the child God's interpretation of life and sex and sexuality is a vital part of life, then it's by logical deduction obvious that your responsibility and primarily your responsibility, it is yours primarily, to instruct the children in this facet of life. Now you have a beautiful example of someone doing this in the book of Proverbs. And I think we so often, in focusing upon the content of what the writer to Proverbs is saying, we miss the beautiful context in which he is saying it. Notice the beginning of chapter 5 of Proverbs.

8:35 Here is a father speaking to his son. He says, My son, attend to my wisdom. Incline thine ear to my understanding that thou mayest preserve discretion and that thy lips may keep knowledge. And then, beginning with verse 3, down through verse 14, he gives a warning.

8:58 He gives a warning against the abuse of his sexual powers. In very explicit, clear terms, he is warning his son about the ways of the wily woman. But the negative instruction is not all he gives his son. He starts in verse 15 with positive instruction.

9:18 He says, Now my son, this is what you are to steer clear of. You are to steer clear of the foreign woman and her wily ways. And he warns him of the latter end of such a course of harlotry and whoredom. But then he says the positive way.

9:33 This is God's way of averting illicit sexual experience. Drink waters out of thine own cistern and running waters out of thine own well. Should thy springs be dispersed abroad in streams of water in the streets, let them be for thyself alone and not for strangers with thee. Let thy fountain be blessed and rejoice in the wife of thy youth as a loving hind in a pleasant doe.

9:58 Let her breast satisfy thee at all times and be thou ravished always with her love. And the Hebrew word is a powerful word. It means go astray. Be utterly ravished with her love.

10:13 He says to his son, Now my son, I don't want you to infer when I warn you of the evils of illicit sex that this is something dirty, something filthy. No, no. God is pleased when dwelling with the wife he has given you find such complete satisfaction in her sexually that you'll not want to go seeking satisfaction elsewhere. When anyone says the Bible is prudish and unrealistic about this matter of sexuality, they show their ignorance and tell me that they have never read their Bibles.

10:47 For right in this context he says that the ways of a man are before the eyes of the Lord. In other words, when you conduct yourself in this way, avoiding illicit sexual experience, enjoying to the full the God-ordained channels of sexual experience with your life fully known before the eye of God, he is well pleased. Now here is a father, you see, giving this very clear, practical, biblically sound interpretation of sex and sexuality to his own son. He does essentially the same thing in chapter 6, beginning with verse 20.

11:24 My son, keep the commandment of thy father. And then he goes on after this general instruction to zero in in this whole area again, verse 24, to keep thee from the evil woman. Lust not after her beauty in thy heart, neither let her take thee with her eyelids, etc. Chapter 7, the whole chapter is dealing with the folly of a young man who abuses his sexuality.

11:49 But how does it begin? My son, keep my words. Now if there were no other portion in scripture, this would suffice to underscore this principle that sex education is primarily a parental responsibility. Now why did I use the word primarily?

12:09 Well, because the church has a measure of responsibility insofar as the church The ministry of the church is to be a declaration of the whole counsel of God. Part of the counsel of God deals with sex and sexuality, so whenever the subject comes up in the regular exposition of the word or by periodic topical treatments, there is a sense in which the church is responsible. Some of you will remember when I preached through 1 Thessalonians and came to chapter 4, the first eight verses deal very explicitly with this whole subject. Well, because that passage does, I dealt with it explicitly.

12:52 But I do not make a habit of once a month bringing a sermon on what the Bible says about sex. Now some preachers are doing it to get an audience. You can get an audience anywhere, anytime in our day if you have the word sex in it. But this is certainly not pleasing to the Lord and it certainly is not doing what God commands us to do to preach the word, the whole word, the whole counsel of God.

13:14 And in the whole area of premarital counseling, which I believe is a pastoral responsibility, the church discharges some of its obligation in this area. So the parents do not have an exclusive responsibility, but the primary responsibility for the sex education of our children lies at the feet of the parents. All right, that's the first proposition. Proposition number two is this.

Proposition 2: Parental Sex Education is Conducted in Two Fundamental Ways

13:47 Parental sex education is conducted in two fundamental ways. Now you forgive me if I don't look at you and I look at my notes. I find the longer I preach, the less confident I am of my extemporaneous statements and the more notes I use, because the more I'm aware of the awesome responsibility of rightly representing God's mind, the more I want to know that I've thought things through. And so as I've pondered and sweat at my desk and come up with the right words, sometimes I sit for two or three minutes before I get the right word in the sentence.

14:21 That's why I'm doing this. It's not that I'm afraid of your faces. Proposition number two. Parental sex education is, and I use that word purposely, I had in there parental sex education ought to be, and I scratched it out.

14:37 I said, no, parental sex education is conducted in two fundamental ways. Every parent is giving sex education to his children. The right kind or the wrong kind. For good or for evil, you are giving your children sex education.

14:53 I never said a thing about it. That's right, and you're educating them in that very fashion of your silence. So sex education is given. Parental sex education is conducted in two fundamental ways.

Informal/Indirect Sex Education: The Climate of the Home

15:05 The first one is what I'm calling informal or indirect. That would be A under Proposition 2. The other is formal or direct sex education. First of all then, the informal or the indirect sex education which the parent gives to the child.

15:24 This is the education which is given by virtue of your whole attitude and your actions as husbands and wives. Just as with your attitudes and actions with respect to work, the Lord's Day, discipline, church, keeping the speed laws, respecting your government, in all of these areas your total life pattern is constantly educating your children. Your children are absorbing those life patterns just as much as they breathe the air of that house. They are breathing the attitudes that you reflect in the total spectrum of life's experience.

16:08 If you make no great distinction between the Lord's Day and any other day of the week, your children are learning that the Lord's Day is not a special day. You see. If you show disrespect for speed laws, for governmental regulations, honesty in the paying of your income tax, you're telling your kids civil law is not a vital thing and obedience thereto is no real part of Christian experience and Christian duty. In the same way, your attitude, your basic, honest, gut-level attitude to the whole matter of sex and sexuality is creating a climate which the children are breathing and this in turn becomes a tremendously powerful educational factor. God recognizes this principle everywhere and this is why he continually admonishes people who profess the truth with the lips to constantly demonstrate the truth with the life. Several classic examples, 1 Timothy 4, 12. He says to Timothy, Let no man despise thy youth, but be thou an ensample of the believer in love, in faith, in purity, etc.

17:26 Same thing in Titus 2, 7 and 8. In all things show thyself a pattern, a typos, a type of good works. Titus, it's not enough that you tell people that they must be careful to maintain good works. You yourself must be the living embodiment of what good works are.

17:44 You must reflect in your life what you are seeking to pronounce in your teaching. Many things, good or bad, right or wrong, true or false, are more caught by the climate of the home than they are taught by the formal instruction of the home or the church. May I repeat that? Many things, sex education included, good or bad, right or wrong, true or false, taught by the climate of the home than taught by the formal instruction of the home or of the church.

18:26 So this matter of our informal education as parents in this area is a most vital issue. I'm not just touching on it for filler until I come to the real meaty issues. Not at all. I put it first because in many ways it is first in importance.

18:43 All right? What are the prerequisites for correct teaching in this area? If you are to teach your children the biblical concept of sex and sexuality in your informal teaching by the general influence of your life, what does this require of you if you're to have your teacher's certificate? May I suggest two things.

19:07 You must first of all be sure that you yourself have a scriptural concept of your own sexuality. Do you think biblically about sex? And sexual roles as a husband, as a wife? Do you have a biblically framed idea of the nature, the function, the purity, the sanctity, the abuse of your sexuality?

19:35 Now I'm not asking if you have some deep convictions that you may have picked up along the way. I'm asking you when it comes to this whole matter of your sexuality, is that thing which sits in there, and you all have one, has it been marinated in the Word of God? Now just try to picture your brain being taken out and the Word of God being fluid and it's laid in there long enough until it's marinated, you see? And has the very flavor of Scripture permeated your head?

20:12 And then, of course, gotten down into your heart and your affections with regard to your sexuality. Or, have you absorbed the attitudes that perhaps your own mom and dad imposed upon you? The attitudes that some distasteful experiences of the past have imposed upon you? The attitudes that society would impose upon you?

20:33 Are you sure, as you sit there tonight as a parent, that your own thinking with regard to sex and sexuality is in some measure an accurate reflection of the thinking of the Bible? Is it true that the blessed man is he who meditates in the law of God day and night? Yes, Psalm 1, you'd all agree to that. Well, that's no less true in this area.

20:57 And true blessedness in the area of one's sexuality comes in the same way that true blessedness comes in any area as the person meditates in the law of God day and night. That is, when his thinking about any facet of life is a reflection of the teaching of the Word of God. If you don't have this biblical concept of sex and sexuality as a part of your own being, how can you convey the same to your children? And left to ourselves, as with anything, we'll always miss the biblical mark.

21:36 We'll either go off here, influenced by crudishness of the past and by unbiblical views based in heathen philosophy into what I said in my series on 1 Thessalonians is an unscriptural asceticism, that is, a lowering of the dignity, the purity, and the, in many cases, I think it's an accurate word, the centrality of the sexual relationship in the marriage union and in the life of a husband and wife. Or we'll be influenced by our own society into what's called today the pop hedonism. That is, the philosophy that enjoyment and the titillation of physical senses is the end and the goal of all of life. But when we soak our minds in the biblical concepts, we'll not end up over here in asceticism nor in hedonism, but we will in some measure have restored to us through the redemptive power of Christ a view and an experience of our sexuality that will cause God to look upon it and say as he did of Adam and Eve in that original creation, behold, it was very good. Marriage is honorable in all and the bed undefiled. So the first prerequisite, if you and I are to conduct our informal or indirect teaching of our children in this area,

23:01 is that we ourselves have a scriptural concept of our own sexuality. And then secondly, and this flows out of it, we must have a practical subjection to and expression of those biblical concepts. They must not only be resident in the mind, but they must in some measure be operative in the life. Our Lord said, If ye know these things, blester ye if ye do them.

23:33 So there must be this practical subjection to and expression of the biblical concepts. Are you working out that good, acceptable and perfect will of God in the area of your sexuality? If so, then your natural actions and reactions will evidence this with relationship to your children. One of the greatest forms of sex education is a mother and dad who are natural and who are unembarrassed in expressions of their affection to each other in the presence of the children.

24:13 I don't mean that you go around in each other's arms waltzing from room to room three hours a day, but I pity the child who grows up in a home and doesn't have the fond memory of seeing a dad with his mother clutched in his arms by the sink, maybe with her hair a mess and all the rest, and mummy very obviously enjoying that being clutched in the arms. Maybe even those times when you've got a clutcher from a distance because there's another little one on the way. What a hallowed memory for a child to have. I was so tickled the other day when Joel said something, and we've been kidding him about it.

24:50 He said, Oh, you two, you're always smooching. I said, What do you mean we're always smooching? He said, It's all right for you to come home, but when I do it, then it's smooching. I said, How come?

25:00 And so we were having a good time just joshing about this, but it tickled us so that there was the climate in which there was this kind of openness and freedom and a feeling at home in a situation where a husband and wife were obviously at home with one another. Now I've just singled out that as one little thing, expressive of the principle, where there is a practical subjection to and expression of this biblical principle of our sex and sexuality and the delight that a husband and wife will have not only in each other's persons generally, but in those limited expressions of affection that are perfectly proper and right in the presence of the children, this goes a great way toward rightly conditioning their minds. So in summary and conclusion, let me say under Proposition 2, as with all the other aspects of our parental responsibility, there is no shortcut, no gimmick, to adequately equip us for our role as parents. The price of adequate parental influence in this area is that of personal sanctification in the same area. See, wouldn't it be wonderful if there was just a little book on ten of these lessons on how to teach your children about sex, and then so we'd read the little book and go, like ten little lessons on how to witness, no?

The Prerequisite for Effective Informal Teaching: Personal Sanctification

26:22 There is no form or aspect of the Christian life which is not ultimately dependent upon the believer's relationship to his Lord, and his present tense abandonment to and appropriation of the ministry of the Holy Spirit in his life. And so we're shut up again. Everywhere we turn in this whole series, you see, we're pressed back to where we started. The key to everything is the individual relationship to God, and you can't get around it.

26:50 All right? So much for Proposition 2. We've had two propositions so far. Number one, sex education is primarily the responsibility of the Christian home.

Formal/Direct Sex Education: Four Characteristics

27:02 Secondly, parental sex education is given in two ways, informal and then formally. Now, we come to this whole matter of the formal. That's not the third proposition. That's B under Proposition 2.

27:23 I'm sorry. I got lost with my notes here. All right? This is B.

27:28 Informal, the prerequisites, now formal. And I want to make one, two, three, four statements about this formal sex education, and then look at three prerequisites for that kind of education. All right? Number one, our formal sex education or our direct sex education of the children should be, first of all, biblical.

27:56 Whenever and wherever we are dealing with this subject, it should be, wherever possible, from an open Bible. How beautiful when sitting with a child to take them to Genesis 1 and 2 and read the account of creation and show how God made them male and female. Whose idea was this, that Adam was not complete as a male? It was God's idea.

28:21 It was God who said, look, Adam, you're not complete. It's not good for you to be alone. And I'll make someone answering to your needs. And so he didn't bring to Adam an asexual creature.

28:32 He brought to Adam a woman, one who would compliment him. And then God looks upon all of this and sees what he's made, and behold, it is very, very good. And some of the most fundamental principles that we can teach our children from an open Bible regarding this whole matter of sex and sexuality is that God made us this way. God is pleased that we are this way.

28:56 God gives us directions how to conduct ourselves in this area of life that we might please Him and find the joy that He intended we should know when He made us. I want to quote from an excellent little book which I highly recommend. I wouldn't embrace every sentence in it of Sex and Saints by Donald Tweedy, a Christian psychotherapist who deals with sex. And he's tried to grapple with a biblical philosophy of sex and sexuality.

29:27 And he says under this matter of the fact that our teaching in this area should be biblical, several very cogent statements, let me read them. The theology of sex refers to the concepts and commandments of the Scriptures or at least those which are readily derived from the reading of the Old and the New Testaments. With regard to sex, the Bible is very realistic. One gets no attitude of Victorian prudery or shamefacedness in the discussion of sexuality.

30:00 On the contrary, sex is presented in an extremely forthright manner. This is a bit startling to one who reads the Bible for the first time and expects it to be the origin of the common Christian attitude of extreme reticence in discussing sexuality. Then he says further on page 73 of his book in a little epilogue, it seems to me that the biblical message concerning sex is a realistic combination of one, a positive presentation of the purpose and potentiality of one's sexuality, and two, straightforward admonitions concerning the consequences of its perversion. Isn't that a great statement?

30:44 What does the Bible teach about sex? It teaches a positive presentation of the purpose and potentiality of one's sexuality and on the other hand a straightforward warning concerning the consequences that I would add the word the nature of its perversions. And so we as parents should be acquainted with those portions of Scripture which most clearly deal with this. And if we have our own minds oriented by biblical truth we'll know where those passages are.

31:19 Perhaps it would be a bit embarrassing if I asked you tonight what are the pivotal passages in Scripture that set forth in the most succinct and clear way the biblical philosophy of sex and sexuality. What are the passages that you meditate upon as you seek to know and to do the good and acceptable and perfect will of God in this area? Some of you might say, well I never thought that God wanted me to take any serious consideration of what the Scripture says. Well, how can we cut out this vital area of our lives and put it out in a no man's land undisciplined by constant meditation in the Scripture?

31:55 We'll not be that blessed man, that blessed woman who meditates in the law of God day and night. And so our formal or direct sex education to our children should be, first of all, biblical. Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my pathway. Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way?

32:15 By taking heed thereto according to thy word. Second thing, it should be occasional. That is, it should be triggered by the occasion which demands some formal instruction. Unless your children are dumb, and I don't mean stupid, I mean dumb, they don't have the proper use of their speech apparatus, they can't convey to you in verbal symbols what they're thinking, they inevitably will ask questions that fall into the orbit of the whole subject of sex and sexuality.

32:51 This is one of the ways that God intends they should be acquainted with these basic things. They notice that mommy gets bigger and she's told them that a baby's coming along, and so they ask the question, is there any relationship between mommy's size and the impending event of a baby's coming? And woe be unto the parent who tries to get around that and say, no, the baby's come somewhere else. No, no.

33:20 Just as with every other area of the training of our children, it is in the great measure occasional training. When you see the child being lazy, it's then that you stop the child. And you seek to admonish the child about the evils of laziness and the honorableness of disciplined, hearty endeavor. And you'll quote a verse like, whatever your hand finds to do, do with all your might as unto the Lord.

33:44 Or you'll quote that verse in Proverbs, he becometh poor that worketh with a slack hand, but the hand of the diligent maketh rich. So likewise, when the child asks those inevitable questions, where do babies come from, you have a wonderful opportunity to tell him. And later, they begin to ask, how does the baby get out of mommy? And you've got to tell them that God's made a special place.

34:08 And then when they want to ask, and they do, how does the baby get started in mommy? What are you going to do? Just run out of the house and hope that the Lord will come? I've seen some people just so absolutely flustered when questions like that are answered.

34:23 You can almost hear them say in the words of one of the Old Testament men, that which I have dreaded has come upon me. The child is asked the inevitable question. No, no, no, no. These are wonderful opportunities.

34:35 And the parent who sees his tremendous privilege in the context of the love and warmth of the home, where alone sex has its true perspective, in the security of the bonds of the love of the home, in the intimacy of the family relationship, to take those questions as an opportunity to discharge your glorious privilege in this area of responsibility to your children. Then, not only is it occasional in terms of their questions, but in your observation of their development. When you see the child approaching puberty, what a shame for any girl to begin her menstrual cycle uninformed. Not having had the privilege of having a mother sit down and talk with her and tell her what's going to happen in her body, and this wonderful process that's about to begin to unfold, a process that she'll be reminded of every monthly cycle. What a shame, as happened in a case I heard recently, a mother not doing her job in this area, and a daughter so frightened that she just wanted to get rid of anything of her apparel that was the first signs that she was becoming a young lady. What a terrible thing, and the sense of guilt and fear and all the rest never should have been. A parent who sees the child approaching the age of puberty ought to have the privilege and has the privilege and ought to capture it of sitting down with that young lady.

36:04 Shame on the parent who's not explained to a fellow what's happening in his body and some of the evidences that a boy will have that he is approaching that time when he's maturing physically. When they then approach the dating age, here's the time for mom and dad to sit down with that fellow and with that girl and explain to them that when they're in the presence they're going to get a nice warm feeling and they're going to want to hold the hand and they're going to want to kiss them and tell them what this feeling is and what it is in the purpose of God and what it can be in the hand of the devil. I pity again the child that goes out into pairing off with others in a dating relationship who hasn't had parents who sat down and explained to them what those tremendous strivings and powers are that suddenly are awakened within them and they advance to the stage of courting. It's time to talk with them again and when a young lady's approaching marriage who better to tell that young woman the beauty and the privilege of her role in sexuality than the mother who herself has displayed before this daughter a tremendous sense of gratitude for her role as a wife and as a mother who has earned the right more than that mother to sit down and talk with that daughter. How often is this done? It's a shame

37:32 especially when we who claim to be able to interpret this in the light of the word of God and have the only answer to it. What a privilege is ours. And so I suggest it should be not only biblical but occasional occasioned by their questions on the one hand and occasioned by our observation of their development on the other hand. Then thirdly our formal sex education of our children should be proportional.

38:01 Let me quote again from Mr. Tweedy on this point and I only quote him because he's got a PhD and I had it all written out and then I looked at his book and heard he said it but I'll add a little academic respectability by quoting him. Parents should provide children with sexual information in terms of the questions that arise. Specifically the changes and feelings to expect in the period of sexual maturation.

38:33 It's important that simple concepts are used for younger children. Technical language should be avoided. Usually the inevitable question of where babies come from is satisfyingly answered by responses saying that daddy puts a seed in mummy's tummy. Children who receive natural unembarrassed answers to their sexual questions will obtain the information they want and help them develop healthy attitudes toward their sexuality.

39:01 In any case they'll learn about sex. The parents will have to decide whether it's learned in the context of misinformation and gutter language or in a context which presents sex as a gift of God's grace. And this is why I say it should be proportional. There is no fixed age when a child is ready to know this much and then another age when he's ready to know this much and this much.

39:29 That's one of the basic fallacies behind the planned sex education program that's going into the public schools and even into some of the so-called Christian schools. It assumes that a child at age 4 to 6 is ready to know X and from 7 to 9 he's ready to know Y and from 10 to 12 he's ready to know Z. But this is a denial of the great variety that there is in the maturation process in the circumstances that elicit questions just a different state of mind. Some people can sit down in the midst of a thousand things to observe and that ought to provoke questions and after sitting there for 10 minutes they say, what are you thinking?

40:12 And they say, well I wonder if the Mets are going to beat the Astros tonight. I mean they just don't see anything. Their minds run down a very narrow channel. Other people set them down in the same thing for 30 seconds and they say, what are you thinking?

40:24 And they'll come up with 45 questions all based upon what they've observed. They couldn't care less about where babies come from. So if they're not asking questions, why answer them? If they're not scratching and not itching, why scratch?

40:37 So our teaching must be proportional then, not only occasional but proportionate in terms of the interest and development of each child. And this will differ from child to child so you cannot have any fixed rules. Then the fourth thing I want to say about our formal education of our children is it should be textual. Technically accurate.

41:02 By that I mean beware of old wives' fables that will undercut their confidence in you as a sex educator. The parent who sees the child touching parts of his body that he ought not to be and says, if you don't stop that your hands will rot or you'll end up losing your mind, he may keep the child from doing what he should not do but he's also undercut all confidence in any future instruction that that parent can give. This is what I mean. Be technically accurate when you make statements to the children.

41:44 Make sure that if the questions are such that they demand technical answers, that you give accurate answers. We don't need to make budding gynecologists out of seven to nine year olds. But if a seven to nine year old asks a question which demands a technically accurate answer, let's make sure we give the same, though we may do it in non-technical terms. Well, if these four things should characterize our formal or direct sex education in the home, biblical, occasional, proportional, and technically accurate, what are the prerequisites then if we're to be qualified to give this kind of sex education?

Prerequisites for Formal Sex Education: Communication, Knowledge, and Tools

42:29 Well, let me suggest three things. Number one, we must first of all establish strong lines of communication at every other level. To state it the way I have written it, strong lines of communication must be previously established. If there's any area where a parent will feel awkward in talking over things with the child, or where a child will feel awkward with the parent, it is in this area.

42:59 And they're not going to ventilate with you, and you're not going to be able to be natural with them, unless your lines of communication are cemented in the overall relationship which you have with your children. And this is one of the beauties and one of the rare privileges of the parent who under God has established good lines of communication with the child on a general basis. Then when he has a question about this, he's as free to ask that as he asks how come there's noise when it rains, and where does the thunder come from, and all these other questions that children will ask. Why is it that so many parents fail as sex educators down here, say, from age ten right through to the time the person leaves the house and gets established in his own home? May I suggest it's because the lines of communication in every other area in this age bracket have been absolutely lost, or they never were attained in the first place. You can't have the luxury of living in your own little world, uninvolved with your children, and then suddenly you say, hey, you know they're about getting to the age where I ought to tell them about the birds and bees. Hey Johnny, come on in, Pop's going to talk to you.

44:16 Well, you'd do far better sending them to the preacher, give them a book. Because, you see, it's a whole context in which there's not going to be the kind of rapport which makes this kind of instruction natural and gives them confidence in the instruction you give. So let me emphasize this as one of the most essential prerequisites for formal or direct sex education of your children, namely that you establish strong lines of communication with your children previous to an attempt to communicate here. Secondly, you must have accurate knowledge of human sexuality, and by accurate knowledge I mean two things.

44:58 I'm underscoring something I said before. You must have knowledge that is biblical. You yourself must be thinking and talking biblically, and wherever anything you say touches anatomy or physiology, that is the structure of the body, the composition of the body, the functions of the body, you must be speaking according to facts. And so one would be biblical, the other would be again this matter of technicality.

45:26 It may mean that you as a parent ought to read a couple of good books, and we'll have some of these in our library available to you. If you are to convey accurately to your children, then you must be conveying biblically and with technical accuracy. And then thirdly, you must have the right tools to help you in this task. Or I should say you must have the right tools.

45:51 If you have your Bible, and you're living in the light of the Bible, and that's all you had available to you, that's all that would be necessary. But if God has put other means at our disposal, I believe he expects us to use them. And if we are his people, part of his church, and teachers have opened up the word in these areas, then God expects us to profit from them. And may I suggest tonight several books that I think ought to be household items where there are parents, and especially at different stages in your working with your children.

46:25 Perhaps the best introduction to the whole matter of human sexuality from a biblical standpoint that I've ever seen barring one other little book that I saw up in New Hampshire years ago and I've never been able to put my fingers on it since, is a book called Susie's Babies. Let me read from the inside of the cover, and this will tell you what this book is about. This is a word from the author to parents and teachers. And the author, by the way, Margaret Clarkson, a Christian teacher with 25 years of experience with her third and fourth graders.

47:00 And all the questions they asked and how she handled them and the implications for the book. But this is what she says. This story, born of genuine and honest experience with hundreds of young inquiring minds, is a sincere attempt to help parents, teachers, and other children's workers to meet the first serious questions from their youngsters about the origin of life. There's her purpose.

47:24 To confront the first serious questions coming from children about the origin of life. The questions answered in this book may be asked by children of seven or eight to thirteen or fourteen years of age, since young folks vary widely as to the age at which full information of the facts of life is needed and sought. It is suggested that parents of young families read and discuss this book well in advance of any apparent need and so be ready to use it as soon as the individual requirements of their children become evident. Parents wish to be the first persons to discuss the holy mysteries of life with their youngsters, but they may be somewhat at a loss as to how to get started.

48:08 Often parents are aware of the child's need, but the child asks no leading questions, even though he is of an age when such things are likely to be talked about freely among his friends. This forthright and charming little tale provides an ideal opening. Although this book is written and illustrated in such a way that it may be given to children to read for themselves, she goes on to say it would be better if the child were to read for himself. While this book answers fully and frankly all the child's questions as to how he has originated, it makes no attempt to deal with the deeper values of sex or the role of sex in the child's future adult life.

48:47 Of the many hundreds of children whose questions form the basis of this book, not one seemed to display any interest in sex other than to discover the answer to his question where did I come from? The many other important aspects of sex education seem to arise at a later stage and call for separate and quite different treatment. Now again, this is one of the fallacies of the sex education program as it's outlined in the public schools, giving the impression that children ought to know things that should be reserved for engaged couples back when they're about ten years of age. And this book is a charming story quoting from the cover about a mother hamster and the birth of her young that will help parents explain with reverence and wholesome frankness how children are born. And it's done from a thoroughly biblical perspective. When the little child asks, well how come God's made that little hamster so that she has sixteen little spigots to feed her children? And the person answers, because God knows that they have litters up to sixteen, many times eight, ten, twelve.

49:57 And then when the little children see the blind, hamsters being able to find their way right to mama's little spigots and the children say, how come? And she answers and says, well it's another evidence that God has put it into their hearts and into their natures. God has made them in such a way that all of their needs will be supplied. And that's the way the thing is handled.

50:21 When she explains that the hamster whose name is Susie has been mated and explains the significance of this in terms of the beginning of life, and the question is asked, how come there's a lady down the street who works for Mrs. So-and-so and she's not even married and she's going to have a baby. And she very discreetly and beautifully answers this from a scriptural standpoint, how though God has ordained the family relationship, men can abuse what God has given and violate His holy law and handles these things so beautifully that I heartily recommend this. I know the joy it was in using it and I'm sure it'll get some more use in the years ahead and I shall never forget as a parent of the first time going over this when the questions were such that I knew it had to be faced when after going through about two-thirds of that book my son looked up and said, Boy, Daddy, isn't it great how God's made us. And I thought, how different. When I got, quote, the facts of life I was so mad I wanted to go home and punch my father in the face because I got them in the gutter. And I did. I was so mad.

51:32 Close to 30 years ago that I can remember the spot there in Stanford, Connecticut when somebody first gave me the facts of life in the gutter. What a terrible thing. How much more wonderful to have your child look in the face and say, Isn't it great how God has made us? And to stand amazed.

51:50 And this book will serve much to put it in that perspective. Then, when they get a bit older and then they're up in the age of puberty, there is a book written by non-Christians but certainly not Christians. Certainly not anti-God the way so much is. And this is the best I've found so far.

52:08 I wish I had one written by a Christian called Sex Facts and Fiction for Teenagers. And it deals in a very basic way with anatomy and physiology in terms of a teenager's vocabulary and on some of the things that are of particular concern for teenagers. I have given this to several of our parents of teenagers who have come to me and asked me if I had something that would be helpful for them to sit down and read through. And any of these, I'm not in any way suggesting that you hand them to your children to read, but you sit down and read through with them.

52:44 And then the areas where the Christian perspective would cancel out a statement, you're able with discernment to deal with that area with them. And then, when someone gets up to the age where they're thinking of marriage and beginning to date with seriousness and in-laws, in the realm of courting, there's an excellent little manual towards Christian marriage and intervarsity publication. Again, very biblical in its orientation, very helpful. The section in here on disorder and self-discipline and the way to freedom is one of the most helpful sections I've ever read on the whole matter of why has God ordained that the full expression of our sexuality await the sanctity and the security of the marriage bond.

53:28 And then for you as parents who may be concerned that you couldn't answer that question honestly when I said, is your mind thoroughly marinated with the biblical perspective of sex? I would heartily recommend as a general book for the biblical view of Christian marriage as a whole, designed for Christian marriage by Dwight Harvey Small, but then he has a chapter in here dealing with a biblical philosophy of sex and then this book by Tweedy that I mentioned of sex and saints a Christian psychotherapist who deals with sex. And then this book, I can't recommend the entire book because there are sections where I feel the author has been too much influenced by secular thinkers, but as a Christian seeking to write a book that would be helpful to couples just prior to marriage and in the early stages of their marriage, he lays out in this book, this is called Sexual Happiness in Marriage by a Mr. Miles, in his first two chapters he deals with these two subjects, a servant of Christianity and a Christian interpretation of sex in marriage. And these two chapters are excellent where he sets out very basically and clearly some of the most salient biblical materials relative to the whole matter of a Christian and his view of this area of life. So those are some of the tools.

Proposition 3: Sex Education is No Savior

54:50 It's not right for me to say the prerequisites are that you have the right tools and use them and not tell you what some of those tools are. There are two propositions. Our education is primarily, a parental sex education is primarily a parental responsibility. Proposition two, sex education is to be conducted or is conducted in two fundamental ways.

55:17 And then proposition three, I didn't work out the way I wanted to, but it would have gone something like this, that sex education of itself is no savior. And what I meant to say by that is this. Seek to biblically instruct your children or to instruct them biblically. This does not mean they're never going to have problems with sex and sexuality.

55:47 For contrary again to the philosophy that lies behind the present emphasis on sex education, it is not ignorance or lack of information that leads to sin. And anyone of you who knows a page of your Bible knows this. What leads to sin is man's corrupt and fallen nature. And in many cases to feed that fallen nature with information is to stir the flames which lead to experimentation.

56:17 See? And you watch proportionate with this new plan of sex education will be a tremendous rise in sexual promiscuity. Anyone who knows his Bible will know this. Because the idea you see that ignorance is the fall and information is the savior is a purely humanistic concept.

56:46 It is not a biblical concept. And so if your child is not subdued by the grace of God, if there is not the proper influence of your own life, don't come back and say, well, Pastor, I did everything you said to me. I'm getting married. My son got somebody in trouble.

57:04 No, I don't want to disillusion you. Information is no savior. It is no savior. All of these things we've covered.

57:11 They are but means. And the means in themselves have no power. Those are the means. The means have no power of themselves to accomplish the end.

57:25 What is the end you have in view? That your son or daughter think biblically about his or her sexuality and by the grace of God walk in the path laid out by the word of God. That's the end you have in view. Now the means is your role as the sex educator.

57:45 But unless the means are blessed by the influence of the Spirit of God in answer to the prayers of God's people in godly example, then the means have no power of themselves. And I did feel that I would be incomplete in my presentation if I didn't underscore that, though I didn't have the time to work it out as I wanted to. So let's state Proposition 3 that way, that information or proper sex education is no savior. It can be a means to the end that the child, our young people, may be saved from the ways of sin in this area unto the paths of righteousness.

58:23 And to that end, let's pray and labor and work and instruct our children.