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Posts Tagged ‘sexuality’

The Church Has Failed the Culture

Posted in Commentaries of others, Culture Shifts, Faith & Practice, Life issues, Parenting & Education, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on August 8, 2013| Leave a Comment »

John StonestreetIn my vocation of helper, I sometimes have to do difficult things.  It’s not easy for me as a Christian to point out that the Church has failed the culture, but it has.  Keith Getty’s song “In Christ Alone” and Rachel Held Evans’ blog on why the millennials are leaving the church were already added to my Facebook page.  John Stonestreet’s commentary reminds us that Jesus — as He defines Himself and what He has done for us — is all that matters.  Thank you, sir!  As for the rest of you, tell me.  Do you agree with John who writes:

Recently, the Presbyterian Church (USA) dropped the hugely popular hymn, “In Christ Alone,” from its hymnal after its authors, Keith Getty and Stuart Townend, refused to omit a reference to Jesus satisfying the wrath of God.

In a powerful response over at First Things, which we’ll link to at BreakPoint.org, Colson Center chairman Timothy George quotes Richard Niebuhr who, back in the 1930s, described this kind of revisionist Protestantism as a religion in which “A God without wrath brought men without sin into a kingdom without judgment through the ministrations of a Christ without a cross.”

The response from the PCUSA, that their problem was not with God’s wrath but with the idea that Christ’s death satisfied God’s wrath, doesn’t change the fundamental problem of what George calls “squishy” theology. Theology is supposed to be true, not palatable.

Along these lines, maybe you’ve seen the recent viral opinion piece on CNN by my friend, Christian blogger and author Rachel Held Evans. In it, Evans offers her answers to the truly important question, “why are millennials leaving the Church?”

To counter the exodus of young people from American churches, Evans says it’s time to own up to our shortcomings and give millennials what they really want—not a change in style but a change in substance. The answer to attracting millennials, she writes, is NOT “hipper worship bands” or handing out “lattés,” but actually helping them find Jesus.

Amen. I couldn’t agree more.

Then she goes on, “[the Church is] too political, old-fashioned, unconcerned with social justice and hostile to [LGBT] people.” Well, okay—anytime political programs co-opt our faith, or we ignore the needy and fail to love those with whom we disagree, we do the Gospel of Christ great harm.

But when she writes that attracting millennials to Jesus involves “an end to the culture wars,” “a truce between science and faith,” being less “exclusive” with less emphasis on sex, without “predetermined answers” to life’s questions, now I want to ask–are we still talking about the Jesus of biblical Christianity?

The attempt to re-make Jesus to be more palatable to modern scientific and especially sexual sensibilities has been tried before. In fact, it’s the reason Niebuhr said that brilliant line that I quoted earlier.

He watched as the redefining “Jesus Project” gave us mainline Protestantism, which promotes virtually everything on Evans’ list for millennials. The acceptance of homosexuality, a passion for the environment, prioritizing so-called “social justice” over transformational truth are all embodied in denominations like the United Methodist Church, the Episcopal Church and the Presbyterian Church (USA).

But religious millennials aren’t flocking to mainline Protestant congregations. Mainline churches as a whole have suffered withering declines in the last few decades—especially among the young. What gives?

Well, in an another essay which appeared in First Things over twenty years ago, a trio of Christian researchers offered their theory on what’s behind the long, slow hemorrhage of mainline Protestant churches:

“In our study,” they wrote, “the single best predictor of church participation turned out Newsletter_Gen_180x180_B to be belief—orthodox Christian belief, and especially the teaching that a person can be saved only through Jesus Christ.” This, said the researchers, was not (and I add, is still not) a teaching of mainline Protestantism. As a dwindling denomination rejects a hymn which proclaims salvation “in Christ alone,” this research sounds prophetic.

Evans is right that evangelical Christianity is responsible in many ways for the exodus of millennials. But ditching the Church’s unpalatable “old-fashioned” beliefs to become more “relevant” to the young won’t bring them back.

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Want to Make a Difference? View Children the Way God Does

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Identity, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Relationships, Sexy or holy?, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on June 22, 2013| 2 Comments »

teenagersI will never forget the mom and professional church worker who told me she hoped her sons and daughters would practice safe sex.   We were serving together on a life task force and, during lunch break, she confided, “I raised them to be chaste . . . I want them to wait for marriage.  But, once they started college, I encouraged them to use protection because, after all, they’re sexual, too, and I’m scared to death they’re going to be like everyone else.”

I remember the grandma who toured our local pregnancy center.  She thought the best thing parents could do for their daughters was to get them on The Pill so they wouldn’t need a pregnancy test.

Then there was the single father who raised his daughter to believe in Jesus, but made sure she had the Gardasil shot and was using birth control.  “I know what I was like at her age and I know she’s just going to sleep around so I have to look out for her.”

And there was the pastor who told me that he’s taken some girls from his congregation for abortions because “their parents wouldn’t be supportive of an unplanned pregnancy.”  These girls are “just going to do it,” he explained.  “They can’t help it . . . so I need to be there for them.”

Can’t help it?  What does this say about the way adults view children?

Children are sinful human beings born into a love-to-sin-world.  Do we say, “My child is a sinner.  It’s just who he is, so I’m going to help him lie, cheat, and steal with the least amount of damage.”  Is this how God sees children?  Is this how He helps them?

When we don’t see children the way God does, then our mentoring role in their lives is compromised.

Yes, children are sinful… just like their parents and grandparents.  But baptized in the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, God sees us as His adopted sons and daughters in Christ.  Jesus won for God’s children the privilege of becoming heirs of the heavenly kingdom.  This not only bestows value but defines purpose.

Identity matters!  Our sons and daughters are not “sexual from birth” as Planned Parenthood sees them.  They are not captive to instincts and desires.  They are persons created more in the image of God than the image of wolves and rabbits.     To see children as God does is to realize they are more than flesh and blood but spirit and, because they are spirit, every choice they make will take them either closer to — or farther from — God.

It is the children who suffer when we fail to see them as God does.  Expectations for their purpose and behavior are lowered.  Their future appears grim.

Identity matters.  And, because it does, my grandchildren need me to remind them of what happened at the baptismal font.  Their baptism “is an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to Him” (1 Peter 3:21-22).  I can literally tell my grandchildren that their Lord and Savior rules!  This means that someday, when they are teenagers, they won’t have to be subject to raging hormones or made foolish by lack of judgment.  In remembering who they are, they will know the source of their wisdom and strength.  This will affect their choices and behavior.  But that’s not all.

When boys and girls see themselves the way God does, the way they view each other will improve.   Relationships will take on new meaning.  Think about it.  If boys see themselves in light of their baptism as sons of God and girls see themselves as daughters of God, then all baptized people become brothers and sisters in Christ.

Can you imagine?  I mean, really!   Can you imagine the impact this would have on high school and college campuses… at the beach… in the workplace… around the neighborhood… and for society as a whole?

I can.  And it renews my hope.

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Gosnell, Abortion and Identity

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Identity, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Sexy or holy?, tagged , , , , , , , , , on May 14, 2013| 1 Comment »

newborn babyThere are no words to describe what abortionist Gosnell did.  I won’t try to come up with any.  What he did in his little shop of horrors is no different than what goes on every day in abortion clinics across this country.  Gosnell is guilty of murder.  So is Planned Parenthood.

Abortion is the greatest child abuse.  But it is also abuse of women.  Abortion ends the life of a child God calls by name, but it forever changes the mother of that child.  Babies carried into an abortion chamber by their mothers never exit.  Mothers may exit, but they are physically, psychologically and spiritually altered.  The way they see themselves and life itself is never the same.

What happens in abortion clinics will continue to happen until we all begin to see ourselves the way God sees us.  Women will continue to seek abortions, men will pay for them, and churches will defend them until we stop identifying ourselves the wrong way.

Never – ever, has God identified boys and girls as “sexual from birth.”  Before Alfred Kinsey, no one ever labeled children in such a way.  But, for the last 60+ years, children have been told beginning as early as kindergarten that they are “sexual from birth.”  Can we be so surprised that abortion was legalized some twenty years after men and women took on this new identity?  If we’re told from childhood that we are “sexual,” then it can’t be helped.  It is, after all, who God made us to be.  Abstain?  It would go against nature, wouldn’t it, to abstain from what is natural.

There is this one thing.  Behavior is shaped by identity.  However we see ourselves and others determines how we treat ourselves and others.  Gosnell looked at the women and children who entered his clinic as less than human.  He saw the women as sexual beings and the babies were products of that sexuality.  Gosnell failed to see them all as God sees them.  When we mis-identify our children as “sexual from birth” (which is taught in every sex education class) then we are failing, too.  We are failing to see women, men and children as spiritual beings.  Sexuality may have something to do with our bodies and minds, but it has nothing whatsoever to do with our spirits.  Our spirits will live forever, you see, either with God or apart from Him.

Abortion, I’m afraid, is a sinful choice that will continue for as long as we sinful people inhabit this earth.  However, people who love the lives that God creates could remove many of the excuses for abortion if only we would stop telling our children: You are “sexual from birth.”  It’s just not true.

Repeat a lie often enough and many will believe it.  They will act upon it.  But, I’d like to be one of the different people God calls followers of Jesus to be.  The kind of people who resist being labeled by the world and who call other people by their rightful identity.

To do so will make a difference, one man, one woman, one child at a time.

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Stonestreet Writes on “Sisters and Daughters”

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Identity, Parenting & Education, Sexy or holy?, tagged , , , , , on July 20, 2012| Leave a Comment »

What follows is an article by John Stonestreet published July 19 in Breakpoint.  I was going to quote John, but you need to read his article in its entirety.  Thank you, John, for sharing the experiences of Timothy Dalrymple and Martin Daubney — for the sake of our sons and daughters.

Writing at Patheos.com, Timothy Dalrymple tells perhaps a familiar story for many: “I first saw pornography by flashlight in an underground fort I had built with my brother and friends,” he said.

When he first looked at those pictures at nine years old, Dalrymple says they were “seared into his mind.” And the way he viewed women was deeply changed.

He explains, “It was not the last time I would see pornography, or naked women when I shouldn’t…Whether they’re photos in magazines, images on the internet, scenes in movies, or stolen glances, their imprint sinks deep into the male mind, it shapes its patterns of thought, and remains there for years, even decades. You cannot unsee them…”

But Dalrymple says all of that changed when he became the father of a little girl. The images remained, but he was forced to ask himself a painful question: What if these images were my child?

That’s the same question Martin Daubney, longtime editor of the British magazine “Loaded,” asked himself when he became a father in 2009. Last month in the UK Daily Mail he told the story of how he spent eight years pushing this “soft porn” magazine to raunchier extremes to compete with rival publications and the internet.

He thought of his work as “harmless fun,” and dismissed his critics as “party-poopers.”

But when his son was born three years ago, Daubney had a crisis of conscience.

“It…changed my views so forcibly that within a year I’d quit a dream job… I started seeing the women in my magazine not as sexual objects, but as somebody’s daughter. To think that girls who posed for our magazine had once had their [diapers] changed, had once been taught to take their first steps and had once been full of childlike hope…it was almost heartbreaking.”

After Martin quit his job and began devoting more time to raising his son, things became even clearer.

“I am ashamed at the way I used to defend the magazine…” he says. “When I edited Loaded, I’d often get asked ‘Would you want your daughter to appear in topless photos?’ and I’d squirm, but I’d feel obliged…to say ‘yes’.”

If asked the same question today, Daubney says he’d have a different answer: “Not on my life.”

Becoming parents drastically changes the way we think about things like pornography because we’re forced to remember that these de-humanized objects are those made in the image of God. As Chuck Colson used to say, and my colleague Eric Metaxas points out in his book on Bonhoeffer, the first step to destroying or abusing human life is always dehumanization.

And that’s why one of the great tasks of the church is to continue sounding wake-up calls whenever we can — to each other and to the culture. Lives are at stake.

And that’s exactly what was done recently by Robert George, co-author of the Manhattan Declaration, and Muslim professor Shaykh Hamza Yusuf in a letter they co-authored to hotel chain executives. In it, they petition for the removal of pornographic movies from hotels by asking the same question Dalrymple and Daubney asked.

“We beg you to consider the young woman who is depicted as a sexual object in these movies… Would you be willing to profit from her self-degradation if she were your sister…[or] your own beloved daughter?”

George and Yusuf are putting a face to pornography, and reminding us that those depicted aren’t just images but real people; and it becomes infinitely harder for us to use them for our selfish pleasure once we see that.

To read this letter, come to BreakPoint.org. And I’ll also link you to today’s “Two-Minute Warning” video. In it, I deal with how deeply pornography and other aspects of our culture’s sexual brokenness have victimized women, and men. It’s part two of our four-part series.

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Sexuality & the War on Women

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Culture Shifts, Identity, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Sexy or holy?, tagged , , , , , , on July 19, 2012| 2 Comments »

My left-leaning “sisters” claim there is a “war on women.”  They’re right about the war, but they’re confused about who is waging it and why.

John Stonestreet, writing for Breakpoint, quotes from The Screwtape Letters.  (It is, I believe, my most favored work of C.S. Lewis.) “In an especially prophetic chapter,” notes Stonestreet, “Uncle Screwtape explains to his demon nephew Hell’s strategy for using imagery to derail human sexuality: ‘We have engineered a great increase in . . . the apparent nude (not the real nude) . . . It is all a fake, of course; the figures in the popular art are falsely drawn; the real women in bathing suits or tights are actually pinched in and propped up to make them appear firmer and more slender than nature allows a full-grown woman to be.  As a result we are more and more directing the desires of men to something which does not exist.’  If there’s a more perfect summary of how our culture views women,” writes Stonestreet, “I haven’t found it.”

Our culture’s perspective on women opposes God’s.  I sometimes trip over myself in the excitement of sharing the truth: We are creations of the holy God… real women in all sizes, shapes, and colors.

Often, I quote from the book What A Young Woman Ought to Know written by Mary Wood-Allen, M.D.  I found it in my grandmother’s collection.   Dr. Allen, a physician in the late 1800s and early 1900s, wrote, “The reason we admire the tapering waist is because we have been wrongly educated.  We have acquired wrong ideas of beauty.  We have accepted the ideals of the fashion-plate rather than those of the Creator.”  Then, she detailed the corset, a hideous contraption worn by women — pre or post pregnancy — who coveted a 17 inch waist.

The corset shaped a woman’s body so that a man would be attracted.  But, at what price?   Dr. Allen wrote that Hiram Powers, a great sculptor, once attended an elegant party where he was observed watching a beautifully dressed and fashionable woman.  A friend noticed, and said to Powers, “What an elegant figure she has!”  “Well,” said Powers, “I was wondering where she put her liver.”  As a sculptor, Powers had studied the human body.  He knew that some internal organs, stomach included, had to be displaced in order to create that tapering waist.

A corseted waist made breathing so difficult it was not unusual for a woman to faint.   Yet, it was viewed by the culture as a way to increase beauty.  False beauty.

The corset.  How barbarous!  Now, think our culture.  Bulimia.  Anorexia.  Piercings.  Tats.  Cosmetic surgeries.  Girls pinched in, propped up, and covered only by fig leaves.  All of this is addictive.  All of this is false.

Focusing on sexuality, we mis-shape the image our youngest women have of themselves.  We deceive them into becoming “fake” women.

Only later in life did I realize that my Barbie doll, if a real woman, wouldn’t be able to stand.  Top heavy and with pencil-thin waist, she would fall face down.  How embarrassing.  More than that, what a sad and dangerous mistaken identity.

For many years, I’ve listened to women tell me about the sorrows and false hope of their abortion experience.  There is an identity issue long before the choice of abortion.   These women have helped me understand what happens when we see ourselves from the world’s perspective rather than God’s.

Wrongly educated and believing the lie, men and women are stripped of true identity.

More than sexual beings, we are human beings – male or female – with the attributes of our Creator.  We are each His special possession designed for the purpose of living a life that reflects those attributes.  We are more than bodies, but heads to think and souls that never die.

There is something wrong and potentially dangerous about being defined as a “sexual being.”  Yes, we have sexual thoughts and desires.  But, what if we never marry?  Are we less of a person?  No!  And, if we do marry, but our bodies don’t function as we think they should, are we “junk?”  No!

It is most certainly true that we procreate sexually, but again, what happens if we never marry or can’t have biological children of our own?  Are we mis-fits?  No!  Jesus tells us that there is no marriage in heaven.  Oh my!  Then, do we become floating, bodiless souls?  Angels?  No!  And no!  We maintain our identity as God’s magnificent and beautiful creation.  Our identity as His priceless possessions never changes.  From the moment God thought of us right through eternity.  Can this change the way we see ourselves?  Yes.  The choices we make?  Yes. The life we live?  Oh, yes.

Never once does God tell us to stop being a male or female, but He does tell us to guard against sensuality.  To not let sexual thoughts and desires determine every behavior.  God designed male and female to fit perfectly together in marriage, but He said: Have no other gods before Me.  Might it be that obsession on sexuality is putting something else before God?

There is a “war on women.”  (Therefore, on men, too.)  Dear parents!  Which of us wants to put a daughter at risk?  To sexualize her… and tantalize boys and men?  To distort both male and female ideas of what real women are actually like?  To deceive all the way to the pharmacy… the abortion clinic… or where after that?

Resources for you to consider:
Dressing for Life: Secrets of the Great Cover-up
(a ten-lesson Bible study for girls) (Available here)
Titus 2 for Life, a mentoring ministry

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President, Pentagon & Schools

Posted in Citizenship, Culture Shifts, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Vocation, tagged , , , , , on July 11, 2012| Leave a Comment »

Mr. President, isn’t it your duty to do all you do in the best interests of the future of this country?  Aren’t children the greatest natural resource this country has?

Pentagon officials, isn’t it your duty to guard the citizens of this country from those who would bring harm to us?

School administrators, isn’t it your duty to respect the role of parents and instruct their children in ways that will build a vibrant and thriving society?

Then, why o why, do you celebrate gay pride?

There can be no pride in any behavior that endangers health, marriage, home and family, the nation’s security, or the lives of children — America’s greatest natural resource.

There can be no pride in immoral gay behavior any more than there can be pride in immoral heterosexual behavior.

In what way does “it’s my right,” “I’ll do as I please,” “I just have to be who I am” behavior help develop sound character in children?

Are those who insist on teaching “tolerance” for homosexual – or heterosexual – behavior to children K-12 interested in guarding the innocence and well-being of this nation’s sons and daughters?  Or are they more interested in some other agenda?

Mr. President, you have celebrated “gay pride.”  You see it as an expression of diversity.  At what price?

Pentagon officials, you have celebrated “gay pride.”  You see it as, well, I’m not sure how you see it.  I don’t know how messing around with issues of “sexuality” makes for a stronger national defense.

School officials, you have opened the door to ideologies and agendas that have nothing to do with nurturing stronger minds, healthier bodies, and hopeful futures.

It isn’t too late to apologize… and do better for the sake of the children.

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Abortion But a Symptom

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Life issues, Parenting & Education, tagged , , , , on June 8, 2012| Leave a Comment »

I’ve recently returned from leading another Titus 2 Retreat.  As always, the women are free to make comments on an evaluation sheet after the last session.  Here’s one that I received:

“You helped me think of abortion in a different way when you said it is a symptom of what is wrong.  While abortion is wrong, we need to protect our girls so it does not get to that point.  I thought that was enlightening.”

Enlightening?

Could it be that this faithful Lutheran woman had never thought about the behaviors that must first be chosen before a girl finds herself in a place where she even considers an abortion?  Did her church never explain this?  Did her church call abortion “wrong” and warn “don’t do it,” but fail to dig to the root of abortion and why too many people cling to it as some sort of “salvation?” Was she perhaps in agreement that children should be “more comfortable with their sexuality,” but then surprised when as many Christian as non-Christian girls seek abortions?

It seems so.  And, for that reason, Titus 2 will continue — for life.  It is in the best interests of boys and girls to be mentored in Biblical manhood and womanhood — before they learn about the procreative act of sex.  Their lives — and those of the preborn — are worth it.

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No Heckling Someone Different

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Identity, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Relationships, tagged , , , , , on January 28, 2012| 5 Comments »

“Myinnermostthinking” responded recently to “Religion, Sex & Biology.”  It would seem that he wants very much for his god to approve his chosen lifestyle.  Christian or not, how many times do any of us try to make God in our image?  Tell ourselves that He, the Creator of life, would certainly accept our self-shaped world… and make us happy in it.  Imagine that!  The pot telling the Potter the way things should be.

Taking the time to respond may not be as productive as I’d like because “Myinnermostthinking” and I don’t speak the same language.  I trust that the Word of God is what God says it is.  “Myinnermostthinking” does not.  Regardless, I’d like to take a stab at this.

Three women, so far, have responded to “Myinnermostthinking.”  What strikes me about their responses is that none of them are heckling a man who thinks and lives very different from them.   Each one of these women have uttered not a single word that could be interpreted as “hate speech.”  Each one has taken the time to study God’s Word and respond in a way that honors that Word.  Each one has responded to a person different from them with patience, kindness, and words of hope.

These women speak from a worldview “Myinnermostthinking” seems to reject.  It is the worldview that determines how I identify myself and make the choices I make.  That worldview — the Biblical worldview — is this: Creation — The Fall — Redemption.  That worldview explains the origin of my life, why things go wrong in my life, and where I’m going when this life is over.  The Biblical worldview trusts that God really did say what He said, when He said it, to whom He said it, and why.

There is one thing that I would like to clarify based on this worldview.  There is a fine line between saying God created us the way we are and saying that He allows us to be the way we are.  MommyLiberty stated that, personally, she thinks “God did allow for some people to be straight and some people to be gay . . . some to be prone to addiction and others not . . . some to struggle with anger, pride, gossip and worry.”  My husband appreciated her husband’s observation: “He gave everybody a different car to drive.  Some  people’s cars are harder than others’ to steer.”  🙂  But, here’s the thing.

God’s original creation was perfect.  Happily, joyfully perfect.  Anything imperfect, unhappy, or without joy is the opposite of God.  God would not create us to be in opposition with our own anatomy.  To be tortured by feelings we shouldn’t have.  To be at risk physicially, emotionally, and spiritually.  But, after the first man and woman sinned, everything changed.  The relationship between God and His creation changed.  The relationship between men and women changed.  We live in a sinfully changed world.  A struggling world.  An unhappy world.  Unhappy, not because God doesn’t want us to be happy, but because we keep doing the things that put us at odds with Him.   Hetero.  Homo.  Bi.  Trans.  Focusing on our “sexuality,” our flesh side, we are hard pressed to find happiness.   Because of sin, we all die. 

But God, in spite of sin, chooses life.  He allowed Adam and Eve to go on living.  He allowed them to do so, — not by changing His design and intent for them, not by throwing all warnings and caution aside — but by mercifully covering their new emotions of embarrassment and shame.  Never before had their nakedness embarrassed them.  Never before had they felt shame.  God covered their embarrassment with clothing (neck to knee) and their shame with the promised Robe of Righteousness, the Savior Jesus Christ.  All of the Old Testament points to the Christ who did, indeed, come to be our Robe of Righteousness.  To cover the sins of the world (all of us) and then ask: “Will you follow Me?” 

Jesus Christ died.  Conquered death.  And returned to the right hand of God.  But, God in Christ will return.  Will He find us striving to follow Him… or doing what is right in our own eyes? 

“My ways are not your ways,” says the Lord.  So, I guess it comes down to this: How we see the Lord Jesus — who calls Himself the Word for life — determines how we choose to live.  Do we seek His way to happiness… or our own?

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The Church & Planned Parenthood

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Faith & Practice, Identity, Life issues, Parenting & Education, tagged , , , , , , , , , on September 3, 2011| 5 Comments »

Christians have taken up with a man named Alfred Kinsey.  Knowingly or not, we embraced his worldview and adapted it as our own.  We rejected whatever seemed perverted, but quickly wrapped Jesus around whatever appealed to our (sinful) human nature.

Has the church paired with the “Canaanite woman?”   Have little icons of Kinsey’s religion been placed in the house?  Are not we all under the influence?   Have not the heads of two or three generations been turned by a worldview contrary to Christianity?

Kinsey’s worldview promoted the idea of total sexual autonomy even for girls and boys.  His beliefs were shared by Margaret Sanger, the founder of Planned Parenthood.  Together, they determined to free every man, woman, boy, and girl from the restraints of Biblical bondage.  They have accomplished what they set out to do.  It was not difficult.  One phrase — one simple distortion of truth — was repeated over and over: “Children are sexual from birth.”  If indeed “sexual,” then “sexual needs” cry out to be met.  “Sexual rights” must not be denied.  “Sexual expression” must take its “personal course.”

Once deceived, it was not long before fear took root.  “If children are intrinsically sexual beings, they will probably ‘do it;’ therefore, we have to help them ‘do it’ safely.”  No parent wants to see their son or daughter suffer HIV/AIDS or the new “illness” called pregnancy.  PP stood ready to help with a plethora of services including the s0-called “planning of parenthood” or practice of “reproductive choice,” a.k.a. abortion.

Parents — those to whom children are entrusted — doubted Biblical instruction in purity and stepped into the quicksand of sex education.   One worldview was exchanged for another and association with PP was rationalized.  But, Jesus — The Word — does not wrap Himself around opposing worldviews.

Jesus — The Word (John 1) — does not say that children are “sexual from birth.”  He says that children are knit together by God in the wombs of their mothers as human beings of the male or female sex.   He says that dads and moms are to guard the innocence of boys and girls, equal but different, as they also mentor Biblical manhood and womanhood.  Good parents do not rev up their son’s engine nor encourage their daughter’s provocative dress.  Good parents, according to the Christian worldview, instructs sons and daughters in patience.  Purity.  Wisdom.

Stealing away — child by child — from the Biblical worldview is the institutional monolith created by the Kinseyites and Sangerites.  Can we be so foolish as to not learn from history?  Just as the Canaanites had their way with the Israelites, do these modern “ites” have their way with us?  Does the modern church think itself beyond temptation? Can Christian parents — in any way — defend the work of PP?

Some Americans are calling for a full-scale Congressional investigation of PP.  In recent years,  PP clinics have been caught placing girls and young women at further risk.  PP employees have assisted pimps and sex traffickers, misled girls and women about the dangers of abortion, refused to comply with parental-notification laws, and misused millions of taxpayer dollars.  Evidence reveals PP’s failure to report child sex abuse.  Instead, PP clinics have been caught advising under-age girls and those who exploit them on how to circumvent mandatory reporting laws on rape and abuse.

PP needs to be investigated.  But, at the same time, Christians should be calling for full-scale investigations of their church’s educational sources, teaching, and practices.

We should clear our houses of Canaanite icons.

As people of God’s Word — both Old and New Testament — we should repent of our failures to guard the innocence of the little ones He calls by name.

We should contrast the Biblical worldview with all others.

Then, remembering that we have forgiveness in Jesus Christ, we can leave wrong ways behind.  Resist temptation and doubt.  Push back against ungodly-ites.  Restore and rebuild.

Early Christians knew they should stand in protection of their children.  That is why they instructed sons and daughters in patience.  Purity.  Wisdom.  That is why they encouraged modesty of dress and behavior.  That is why they taught that God’s Word can be trusted.

Modern Christians are compelled to do the same.

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Planned Parenthood: Oh, What a Web It Weaves

Posted in Biblical manhood & womanhood, Culture Shifts, Life issues, Parenting & Education, Relationships, tagged , , , , , , , , , on August 4, 2011| Leave a Comment »

What web does Planned Parenthood (PP) weave, its victims to deceive?

What is the deceit?  Who are the victims?  How is it funded?  Why?

The web begins to spin in public elementary schools.  It seems silly to help first graders plan parenthood, so perhaps something else is going on.  “Obstacles that make young people uncomfortable about themselves, their bodies and their relationships should be removed.”  Would that be parents? (“Manifesto” of PP, April 2001, CITIZEN, 7-01, p. 17)

More spinning.  “Society may frown on sex play between children, but we have to remember that society disapproves of a great many sexual acts that take place, and there are two sides to the story.”  (Girls and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy, a member of Kinsey‘s research staff, 1981, p. 48 and 52)

More spinning.  “If [your parents] seem to fear your sexuality . . . you may feel you have to tune out their voice entirely.”  (Changing Bodies, Changing Lives by Ruth Bell, 1980)

More spinning.  “. . . Boys and girls who start having intercourse when they’re adolescents, expecting to get married later on, will find that it’s a big help in finding out whether they are really congenial or not . . . it’s like taking a car out for a test run before you buy it.”  (Boys and Sex by Wardell Pomeroy, 1981, p. 117.  This and the two books above have been used by PP.)

Pause spinning.  Did you note when these textbooks were written?  Do you realize that as early as 1970, PP encouraged homosexuality as a way to reduce U.S. fertility?  So, should we be surprised that PP shared their key to the schoolhouse door with LGBT advocates?  Should we be surprised by the boldness of GLSEN, Dan Savage’s “It Gets Better” program, and same-sex marriage proponents teaming up with PP in public schools?

More spinning.  Working hard to preserve “reproductive freedom,” PP disconnects procreation from sex.  In PP’s Young Woman’s Guide to Sexuality, girls learn “we are all sexual” and “sexual expression is one of our basic human needs, like water, food, and shelter.”  But, as Dr. Miriam Grossman asks, does PP mention that a girl is born with all the eggs she’ll ever have, and that when she turns thirty, her eggs do, too?

More spinning… and spinning.   Oh, my!  Our kids are sexually active!  (Does PP feign surprise?)  We can’t let children have children.  And, HIV/AIDS isn’t just for homosexuals anymore.  PP stands “ready to serve”.  Contraceptives all around!  Sixth grade girls practice putting condoms over the finger of sixth grade boys.  By freshman year, girls are on The Pill.  But, even after lessons on how to have sex without getting caught, pregnancy happens.

More spinning.  “These girls are much too young,” laments PP.  “They have college, careers and marriage ahead.  Let’s help them out of a difficult situation… by postponing their parenthood.”  In 2009, PP in the U.S. performed 332,278 surgical or RU-486 “home” abortions.  How many were on minor girls?  I’m not sure.  Parents aren’t always sure, either, because not every state requires parental notification.  Alternatives to abortion?  PP, last I knew, performed 134 abortions for every 1 adoption referral.

Certainly, the spinning stops here.  But, no.  Once a girl or young woman agrees to let PP help them and consents to an abortion,  she may be asked if she’d like to have “some good come out of a difficult situation.”  Fetal tissue “banks” stand ready to receive human embryos and, if a young woman is a certain number of weeks along in her pregnancy, she may choose to “donate.”  Human tissue “banks” don’t pay abortion clinics for the “products of conception.”  However, money may exchange hands for “handling, transportation, and/or storage.”  (WORLD, 8-13-11)

The web is tight.  Well financed.  Government is complicit in the deception and entrapment of our children.  PP is tax-payer funded.  SIECUS is tax-payer funded.  The California Teacher’s Association which supports the LGBT-friendly textbook is tax-payer funded.  The National Institutes of Health (NIH) which funds grants to fetal tissue distributors (WORLD, 8-13-11) is part of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS); and, yes, is tax-payer funded.

The web is spun.  The child deceived and caught as prey.  The spinning continues night and day.  “Once I had an abortion, what did it matter?” a 40-something woman told me.  Her life, for many years, was a blur of promiscuity, alcohol, drugs, and two more abortions.  Until, one day, she heard the words, “The Spirit of the Lord . . . sent me to bind up the brokenhearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and the opening of the prison to those who are bound” (Isaiah 61:1).

The web will be spun as long as the culture allows it.  But, one life at a time can be kept from the snare.  And, even after becoming prey, a single, precious life can be set free.  Free to begin again.  To heal.  To better navigate the journey.  To warn others away from the web.

The Failure of Sex Education is a short booklet written by L. Bartlett
for parents, educators, and church workers who want to protect children
from PP’s web.  Available from Lutherans For Life or CPH

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