Encouragement from Hal & Melanie Young
{Parents of SIX boys and authors of one of my favorite books on raising boys, Raising Real Men.}
The past ten years have brought a brutal assault on the purity of young men. Where it used to be that a young man had to happen upon a stash of wickedness in an uncle's footlocker for a few stolen moments or risk his reputation to go buy something in person at a store, now the evil comes looking for him. The average age of porn exposure is now 11 years old!
So how do we prepare our guys for this huge battle that is about to face them? How do we help them be strong and stay pure, so that one day they'll be knights in shining armor for their brides? We've got to get there first and be "the first with the most," as General Nathan Bedford Forest, the Civil War cavalry commander used to say. We need to be open and honest with our boys starting while Mama still gives them their bath and continuing through graduation and beyond--explaining and answering their questions, but especially putting it all in to the context of God's gift for marriage alone. Establishing that frankness and communication from the very start will really pay off when they enter the testosterone years.
Understanding what's going on is not nearly enough for our boys, though, especially as they become teens. We need to prepare them to look for the snares our enemy lays for them, give them tools to help them fight temptation, and make sure they have accountability that helps them stand firm. Too many mothers we talk to are in denial that their sons are old enough or sinful enough (hint: we all are) to face these temptations. That's sad, because their sons need their help!
We can help them, too, by praying for them. We need to pray for protection for them and pray they'll be strong enough to flee temptation - and pray for the princesses they will one day claim!
"And all who have this eager expectation will keep themselves pure, just as He is pure." ~1 John 3:3, NLT
An Except from Warriors Prayers: Leader’s Guide
Purity is something we worry about with our son. We live in a small community and our church has very few members and even fewer children. All of the kids are at least 2 years older than my son, which means he is unlikely to have any church friends at school with him. And our community is "under-privileged" and we have a bad drug problem here. Most of the people we meet are wonderful, but we are concerned about who his friends will be once we don't know them. We just have to set a good example for him and hope that he picks respectable Christian friends. And if he doesn't then we need to be strong enough and caring enough to let him know that he needs to sever ties and choose his friends more wisely.
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