I’m often asked, “How can I protect my kids from pornography?” These parents are often looking for internet filters and a list of books to plan the perfect birds and bees talk.
Protecting our children starts as our primary calling that gradually gets eclipsed by equipping them. Filters and restrictions can and should be used, but they are insufficient for equipping our kids to live in sexual wholeness in a morally bankrupt world.
(I will cover how to protect kids in a later article, here we’ll primarily focus on equipping our kids to live in biblical sexual wholeness.)
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In the article, “The Flywheel of Addiction,” I share how the three spokes that propel us into addiction (deception, isolation, and secrecy) are the inverse of the spokes of sexual healing (Understanding, community, confession). By integrating the three spokes of healing into the culture of our families, we can make it harder for addiction to take root.
1. Understanding
Kids are curious, they want to know the “why” behind everything. Too often, parents resort to “because I told you so” or “because God says so,” when answering these earnest questions. This is a failure to equip them since the less they see you as an authority in their life, the more they’ll look for a “real” answer, which they’ll likely receive from culture.
What’s worse is that some kids have come to believe that some topics are off limits for conversation with parents (like sex) so they ask their peers or the internet. This too is a failure to equip.
Most people don’t understand the beauty and biblical purpose of sex in marriage beyond making babies.
Or, they have unresolved issues of sexual brokenness or addiction, causing them to feel unqualified or hypocritical to discuss it.
If you’re in the second category, I beg you to pursue healing and freedom from addiction and/or trauma, for your sake and your children’s.
Let’s play a game, how many of the following 5 questions can you formulate a coherent, biblical response to:
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Why did God create two genders?
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Beyond procreation, why did God create sex?
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Why does God limit sex to within marriage?
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Biblically, what does a healthy sex life actually look like?
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Is all sex within marriage okay?
(Remember, no answers can be, “because God says so.”)
How’d you do?
Despite sex/marriage being a common topic in Scripture, very few Christians can answer these questions.
Satan’s schemes depend on lies and deception and by understanding God’s heart for marriage, sex and gender we make it harder for sexual sin to develop roots; even more so as we grow in understanding of why we act out.
Understanding of addiction
Psychologists classify addiction as an anxiety disorder because behind impulsive behaviors are a series of negative emotions that addicts learn to numb out with the behavior. This means two great things you can do for the long-term health of your child are:
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Allow them to feel the weight of difficult emotions and learn to process them in healthy ways. The goal here is to lean into the pain so they can process it and move beyond it, NOT to avoid/numb the discomfort.
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Remove opportunities for numbing behavior. Anything we numb with can become a habit… the more mesmerizing or stimulating, the more capacity it has to ensnare us in addiction.
Early in recovery, I started playing video games to numb the pain of a struggling marriage. I thought I was doing better because I wasn’t looking at porn, but really, I was just numbing a different way without actually progressing. If we want freedom from numbing behavior, we must learn to go through pain without numbing it.
If your kids are like I was, they will have severe withdrawal symptoms if they’ve become dependent on a stimulating activity to numb pain. However, as parents, it’s our job to equip our kids to be mature adults especially when it’s difficult.
We’ll dive more into understanding addiction and healing in the Courage Reclaimed Podcast too!
2. Community
Being in a real, vulnerable community is the opposite of the isolation that addiction thrives in. By allowing your kids to see you having fun with other guys, see you processing through difficult topics, praying earnestly with/for brothers in Christ and overall modeling deep relationships, you set them up for a healthy community.
Deep community is vital to a healthy life and must be modeled for kids.
Some of the most common triggers for guys to act out include loneliness, boredom and an unmet desire to belong. Being in the deep community helps prevent addiction from setting in and helps reduce triggers to act out!
A common way kids will learn to develop deep relationships is by observing their parents. They want to see what a healthy disagreement looks like. What it looks like to pursue a relationship, how to listen well, and ask good questions.
As we model it, we can also promote opportunities for our kids to implement the same depth in their own friendships. We can encourage them to invite friends over from church for activities that promote conversation, the deepening of relationships and memories.
3. Confession
Confession is crucial to recovery, yet we live in a culture that values hiding flaws. According to 1 John, we’re called to “walk in the light” and “confess our sins” to other believers.
By creating a culture in the home where parents admit when they’re wrong without justification, we set our kids up to model the same behavior. A home where all parties acknowledge when they’re wrong and confess to each other when they make mistakes is a home where addiction will struggle to take root.
Closing encouragement
Begin where you are right now. Don’t let the discouragement of what you have/haven’t done keep you from parenting how you should now. Rather, take this as an opportunity to confess to your kids that you haven’t done a great job with ________ in your own life and would like the whole family to work together to grow.
By developing a culture of confession, community and understanding in the home, we make it MUCH more difficult for Satan to get a foothold in our lives for any sin AND if it does get a foothold, your kids will already have familiarity with the tools to pursue freedom!
Originally published at Courage Reclaimed.
Matt Willis is the founder of Courage Reclaimed. He is a broken-free husband and soon-to-be father who resides in Boise, Idaho with his wife, Sarah. He is passionate about seeing men step out of shame and live the courageous life they are called to in Christ.
