Who Will Teach Your Kids About Sex?

Today, Nebraska legislators will hear testimony “for” and “against” comprehensive sex education.

The resolution being discussed is aimed at understanding the “integral link between academic achievement and risky health behaviors.”

According to the resolution, the effort is to find “strategies in schools proven to simultaneously address and improve academic achievement and health outcomes.”

So what’s that have to do with comprehensive sex education?

Sadly, quite a bit — at least in regard to what comprehensive sex education has come to mean.

Comprehensive sex education across the country is a broad initiative to teach students not only about abstinence and contraception (such as condoms and other birth control methods), but also about abortion, sexual identity, masturbation, etc.

Planned Parenthood, no surprise, is intent on seeing comprehensive sex education become the standard in schools.

Clearly, I’m not a big fan of comprehensive sex education, at least how it is commonly defined right now.

And I am grateful there are voices on the state and national level who are trying to slow the relentless momentum of the liberal agenda.

BUT equally important is that you as a parent recognize that you have great influence in your own home.

Regardless of what happens in school curriculum, you have to be willing in your own home to look intentionally at this question:  “Who is teaching my kids about sex?”

I have a 17-year-old and a 10-year-old, and the reality is that their generations are growing up in (and will eventually be adults in) a society that is increasingly accepting of a more liberal sexual agenda.

By this point, none of this should surprise us (evil constantly comes masquerading as light).  It certainly does not surprise God.

My children and your children will go to school among, work among, live among and possibly go to church with people who are homosexual, transgender, cohabitating with partners, having sex outside of marriage, viewing pornography, etc.

There never has been a more vital time to teach young people how to exhibit Christ’s love AND simultaneously hold to a biblical framework that God designed sexual intimacy as an exclusive gift only for a husband and wife.

That’s. Not. Easy.

I know.

Our children are exposed to more sexual images, references, innuendos and discussions than any previous generations.

It can feel scary and confusing to talk with your kids about sex, sexual identity, gay marriage, abortion and so forth.  But having those discussions, against a backdrop of God’s truth and Word, is vital.

And you are better equipped than you realize.

You can give them a solid foundation and vision of God’s design for sex.

At the same time, you can equip them to feel confident that “loving their neighbor” (or coworker, classmate, etc.) does not mean they have to agree with everything that person does.

You can teach them that God offers hope and forgiveness for anyone (including ourselves) who repents of their sins and seeks God’s truth.

Abortion, homosexuality, and sex outside of marriage are no greater or smaller sins than gossip or theft or idolatry. Sin is sin, which is both a humbling and an encouraging reality drenched in God’s relentless pursuit of us.

You can help your kids be kind and Christ-like toward people who are gay, transgender, are cohabitating, support gay marriage, have had abortions — and still know that it is fine to not agree with those choices.

Probably one of the best places to start is to talk to your kids about sex as God designed it.  It’s not a “one time” talk, but rather a lifetime of age appropriate conversations.

You have to be intentional, though.  These conversations don’t just materialize out of thin air.

How do you do that?

Below are three blog posts I’ve written on talking to your kids about sex.  Whether your kids are little or almost on their way out of your home, I highly encourage you to read all of these posts.

10 Worst Mistakes You Can Make When Talking to Your Kids About Sex (Part 1)

10 Worst Mistakes You Can Make When Talking to Your Kids About Sex (Part 2)

The 5 Secrets to Talking to Your Kids About Sex

Let’s do this, okay?

And I also encourage you to find out what your schools teach about puberty, sex, sexual choices, birth control and sexual identity.

You can seek to opt your children out of those courses (a friend of mine in Minnesota successfully did this with her children in public school, without it detrimentally impacting their school transcript) and/or you can have your children take the coursework — and then use it as a springboard at home for discussion about ultimately following God as our authority.

Copyright 2015, Julie Sibert. Intimacy in Marriage Blog. Links may be monetized.

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