Episode 296 - Dr. Gilbert @ the BSE Conference, Vancouver, WA - August 2022

Presentation @ the 

"Biblical Sexual Ethics & Integrity Conference for Parents" 

Vancouver, WA

August 2022

Episode 296's video link: https://youtu.be/LtE7gsZ0UAU  

Welcome to HealingLives with Corey Gilbert, a podcast sponsored by the healing live center, discover how to love and lead your family well and biblically God created sex marriage and the family for our stewardship growth and benefit my heart and passion is to teach, train, educate and disciple christians that want strong marriages and families. The HealingLives Center has been serving Christians since the year 2000. Its mission is to be a center for sex, trauma and marriage education and transformation, where we offer counseling, coaching courses and speaking services to you, your church or ministry check us out at HealingLives.com.

I had the honor of this past year to present at a conference entitled the Biblical sexual Ethics and integrity Conference for parents. The subtitle was inspiring and equipping parents to wrestle with and live out a biblical sexual ethic model, sexual integrity and grow the parent child connection by a host of the conference was Julia Garrison. Um you'll see here in her in the beginning um and her links to her work is might make level paths dot org, there'll be links in the description. Um so here is my presentation, so some of you, um most of you wouldn't know this actually not some, most of you would not know this uh that this conference was actually gonna be last spring. Um I was gearing up for it uh and the name of that conference again, I love long titles, I don't just the name of that conference was going to be going beyond the sex talk, how to disciple your child sexuality. Okay, A mouthful, right? But that was the whole thing, right? It was like, it was catchy, I had sex in it. Okay. Yeah, so that was gonna be the title. I had all graphics done, I was about to launch it and um, a week before launching and promoting uh, schedules changed and it was put on pause now, like any of you, you might think does God not want me to do this? That was one of the things that went through my mind, right, was like, okay, does this mean I shouldn't do it? Like, you know, you're kind of wrestling with that and in the middle of wrestling with that. Um, I decided I need to re look at this and one of the things that I was re looking at is I want a psychologist. I want, I want someone who's familiar with human and child development with human sexuality, who has, who has a different view or a different look on this, not just biblical, but also with the human development piece. Um I, I know there's a lot of stuff out there about the psychology field and it's been used in negative ways, but did you know the root word is soul care, right? Like it was something that was ours before it got changed. Okay, so it, it's a good thing. Um it can be a good thing, I should say it that way. I wanted someone who had strong biblical ethic and who had life experience. So not only the psychology background in the human development, but also the biblical ethic and the life experience. I wanted a professional who was well seasoned and working in the trenches of human suffering. That was really important to me and with parents, fears also really important to me, someone who got the context while knowing hope was alive. So I started asking around how many of you know that God's a provider. Soon after I caught wind of the name. Dr Cory Gilbert, a psychology professor at Corbin University. So I googled it and of course I'm scrolling his page and I see PhD in family psychology. I see over 22 years devoted to counseling individuals, couples and families struggling with past abuse, especially in the areas of trauma, adultery, struggles with sex, sexuality and gender identity. If my mouth wasn't open at this point, I was like, oh I see published books, workbooks uh specifically on teaching parents went right to amazon ordered it. It's out there um about biblical sexual ethics and being uh spiritual authorities in their home. He's even the founder of the healing live center, which is focused on sex trauma and marriage education and training. Then this is a big dramatic pause. Then I see his newest book and take a guess of what it's called, going beyond the talk, a teen and preteen guide. So I'm all fired up at this point. Um and so after I dug a bit deeper, listened to some things, I was like, this is this is the guy. So I reached out and eagerly waited his response. Uh, he wrote back in capital letters. Absolutely. So ladies and gentlemen, please welcome an answer to my prayer and a devoted and godly expert in the area of biblical sexual ethics. Dr Cory Gilbert set the bar high right there. Okay, I am so honored to be here. Um, this is, this is what I love to do, which is also sounds weird. Um some of my favorite counseling is actually with abuse and trauma and adultery. Why? Because God's the Redeemer and it's all about that. Why would I teach classes at Corbin about trauma and human sexuality? When I know when I get to certain topics, I'm gonna lose half the class because it hits them in their heart because God's there restore, there's a reason for it. Without it. I would, I would go be a truck driver or something. It's always been my backup job. It's not, it's not logical actually to even talk about this stuff yet. As I, as I left college and actually rewind there, I went to college to be in music, but I found out you have to have talent. That was a hard one. My junior year. They sat me down and said, you're not graduating, you're not good enough. I cried, they cried, it was a moment. Um and I had to switch my major and I was like, I'm not gonna major in spanish. I grew up in south America, not gonna major in my dojo mech. Actually, that was my, I might do that one, so art, I love art, love and stuff like that. And so then I just decided to try this christian counseling class, one class changed my whole life, my heart and desire is ministry, my heart's desire is to serve. And I never realized that I would be doing that um that I'll be switching from this passion of music into counseling into these in the areas that were to come. I'm glad, doesn't, God doesn't give us a preview, God glad that God kind of goes, you know what, I'm gonna give you this little piece because you're not gonna unnecessary like what's around the corner and we'll get to that in a little bit. But um today, as we kind of go through this definitely as Julia said, pay attention to yourself because some of this is, can be difficult, but today, what I really want to focus on is scripture, the foundation. Why are in the world are we talking about this? What do we stand on? Um the QR code here, it's here and it's also throughout the slides, just so you can grab it if you need it, but it will have the handouts and the videos and all this stuff on that page after in a few weeks in a few days. Um just so you can grab it later. But um this is what we talked about. We get to talk about sex, it's supposed to be redemptive and I bet you half or more of us, it's not necessarily how it feels inside your hearts, especially in your experiences, young people, glad you're here. We need to be able to talk about this in a way that's redemptive. There's a lot of um stuff inside of us that's actually messed up and twisted that we need to actually reexamine think through um really, really important. This is a quote that I heard from Preston Sprinkle and just really hit me said people of faith who are navigating gender identity issues. Are our people not careful, we're talking about them. No, you and I are struggling. Every single one of us is actually wrestling with something. It just may not be that piece. We're all questioning things about who God is and why he did this or why he did that. And especially after the last few years we went through, there's so many questions we have but I love that statement. They are our people. So hold on to that as we kinda walk through some stuff that's not gonna necessarily feel good. Always. This is where I'm from Temuco Chile Chile. No um I grew up in Chile grew up in the Chilean school system, the private schools missionary family missionary kid. Um so I came to America at 17 years old. I'm not liking this country because my grandmother had died right before he came to visit not knowing the culture. I mean your culture in chile was all I knew even though when I looked in the mirror I realized oh wait I'm not like them. Um but until I looked in the mirror I didn't, I wasn't treated different white redhead with a very different culture is beautiful actually, that's what I knew and I actually being someone who kind of stood out when I moved to the United States, I didn't realize that I was actually trying to stand out And didn't know why I was doing that. This is what I looked like in 92 and 93. Um mullets are awesome and I was on a mission trip to Dominican republic and a missionary there, she said cory you're doing everything you can to stand out because you grew up your whole life standing out and now you're nobody and I was like oh shoot called it and I had to kind of re examine myself but everything I liked with pink and purple and girly and I mean I crochet and I cross stitch and I do art and I um music major not realizing that in all of that. There's also certain assumptions that I just was clueless about because of cultural things, not realizing what friends were saying about me when I was actually after seminary, even I was getting new glasses and I put a purple tint to the, to the lens. It was kinda cool not realizing what I was saying, what people were interpreting from that were for a couple years later, some friends were like, yeah, we thought you were gay but really didn't say anything. I never really had girlfriends and um, so what does that mean? Well what's sad is we're constantly sending messages. Everything. We do everything, we say how we dress, everything sends a message. Even if we aren't quite clued into what that means. Um, this was me. This is me now. It's funny cause I actually, I motorcycles became a piece for me to leave where I was before. Um, I grabbed onto a pride for the wrong reason. Even I didn't want to be known as that person. And so I grabbed onto this identity. I, well the first part was I moved to America and all of a sudden there's no public transportation so I need my freedom. Got a job at Mcdonald's. So I'm making 4 25 an hour and I'm rolling in the dough. So I need freedom. And so I bought a motorcycle and that became me. Well that's just the beginning of that where it's like, that's not necessarily who I am, There's so many layers, but the world then was so different and as laura talked about last night if I were born today and being a teenager today, I worry where I would be today because of the pressures from our culture and the questions being asked by our teams that should not be being asked, which we'll talk about today. Um I had better pipes on that one. So yeah, I laugh when I'm next to a Tesla because I make them rattle a little as I go by. But um, so there's parts of me that came out that I didn't know exist and here's the coolest thing. I'm this kind of more girly girl inside and I meet this amazing woman And I have the best day of my life when I married my, my bride Kelly 19 years ago and she is such a guy inside Legal field, like analytical, her version of counseling is a two x four across the head get over it, I'm like, that's why you do your thing and I'll do my thing. Like, um and I meet this woman who I still can't believe I've been online by the way, equally yoked dot com. 10 months later we were married, I was walking with a cane at the time and doctors said I would never have a job and I would never work, I have Crohn's and I was just dying inside my body was um decaying. I was on high doses of predniSONE and other stuff and I was a mess. What's interesting is when we got married um in those 10 months, I've been in the hospital three times and my wife and her mom had talked about in marrying him. You will probably take care of him the rest of your life. Are you willing to do that? She's been a stay at home mom in the last 14 years to our kids and home schools, our kids. Well I work 2-4 jobs because God is awesome. That story didn't play out. We actually through lots of stress and struggle as a couple found other answers and got help outside of medicine and I've learned to take care of myself and I ride a Harley and I go backpacking and I go snowboarding and I do stuff I never thought I could do because God is incredible. And every time I even get on my bike, it's just from reminder of I'm not in a wheelchair. We spent our first year of marriage with a handicapped sticker and shopping for one of those motorized carts because that's what we thought we were kind of into. And um God is a redeemer. Does he always, does he fix everything? No, I actually, my own stuff started flaring up two weeks ago, Why? We started back meetings at Corbin and getting ready for school year as the stress goes up. Things go downhill every time about november, it gets worse and then depression sets in when my college students leave me in december and it hits me again in May. Um I'm human, but I'm gonna actually fight what happens with these three guys. I also couldn't have kids is what we thought too. And I married someone who was like, I don't know if I really want kids, but it's okay if we have kids. And so when she found out she was pregnant the first time, she was kind of mad because she had already given her heart kind of gone, no, we're not gonna open that door. And um so it's just kind of neat to have, I call my experiments. They would normally be here with me right now. But um my my wife's grandfather just passed away. So they're dealing with all that. But um these guys make me who I am, I only wanted daughters by the way. And so then we found out we were having a son and I cried and I was depressed for two weeks. I don't know what to do with a boy. And then we found out we're having a second sun, God, what are you doing to me? And then I had my little girl who's just my doll. I love her to death. If she had been born first, I would be a horrible dad because she would have me wrapped around her finger and she does not have me wrapped on her finger and I look at that and realized that even some of those things of who I was and who God gave me his two sons. it forced me into things that I never would have actually honestly tried and to see how Moldable and shape a ball we are that um all my shirts say Harley on them mainly because my wife was like stop complaining about the prices on at the store because they're crazy and they're all from Ebay, but it was a change from my previous clothing, if you will. Why? Because I loved her and realize that it's so funny how easy some of these decisions are to change, but why don't we? Because we dig our heels in and we actually kind of claim some identity if you will and if we're not careful, it's one that's actually us at the center which we're gonna talk about. So the topic or the more pictures you, my kids, yes, loved doing adventures with them. Um what I want to do today is this, I'm gonna walk through this. Um these are the old slides actually, Oops, okay, we'll do this anyway, create order disorder. This is the model of kind of how I'm thinking about this and we're gonna look at a lot of scripture. I'm a college professor. So, good luck keeping up again. The slides will be online. But um, we're gonna look at this kind of 33 pieces, so create order disorder and then who you are, how does this fit in with you um which is really, really, really important. So the first passage of scripture and we're looking at a created order. We're gonna go back to genesis Genesis 1 27. So God created mankind in his own image, in the image of God he created them male and female. He created them. This is the foundation. We start with that God created us male and female. And there is no other alternatives to that. That's how we're made. And we're gonna look again further at that. But there's another cool thing about the order of this. He created man. But there's something that some of us do. It's called work. But if we're not careful, we put it in the wrong order. Work did not come after the fall, work came before the fall. The Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to work it and take care of it. Remember that that actually you are meant to work. I look at this word retirement and I laugh. It's one thing to retire from a job to start something new or to go invest in something different. But how many quit living? They lose themselves or they watch jeopardy reruns I guess. I don't know. Um They lose themselves, you were called to something greater than just punching a clock in death and taxes to work. Work. Work beautiful thing. So put it in the right order. But then God even did something more incredible than creating man. He actually created this incredible person called woman. The Lord um Lord God said it is not good for the man to be alone. I will make a helper suitable for him. The model of even marriage that we're gonna get to later starts right here and society right now basically has been saying and emphasizing even marriage is just a societal contract, it's a societal construct. It's like look at the bible, go look at the bible, no, it's not, it's from design prior to even the fall, we haven't gotten gotten to that yet. So the man gave names to all the livestock. Can you imagine that? I think about what God did to Adam, He goes, I'm gonna have you try to figure out if any of these are like you in my mind, I picture this taking days and maybe weeks if not years of Adam every day going, nope, not like me, nope, not like me, God, I'm in perfect communion with you and I still have a void, this is pre fall, remember that? How incredible I feel like it was God kind of emphasizing I'm gonna make someone that's gonna be so incredible, that's gonna be a helpmate and fit with you in a way that is gonna blow your mind. Adam found no suitable helper helper. Um and then he created marriage. The man said this has been a bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh and she shall be called, wow man, she was taken out of man, This is the design, this is the start, this is the foundation, this is why a man will leave his father and mother and he has united to his wife and they become one flesh still in the pre fall. The design is beautiful what the created order is beautiful and we have to say it two sexually different people. A marriage between two men and a marriage between two women is not a marriage, I don't care what you do. Society wise you can have contracts but nothing is sealed in heaven and nothing is sealed on earth. A wedding, a same sex wedding by the way is an expensive party. Think of it that way changes kind of how you feel about it because nothing is sealed in heaven, nothing is hell on earth and someone who comes to christ and there they find themselves in that space, do I leave my husband or leave my wife, they're not your husband or wife. We have to honor God and are now now the messy part gets kids that's another and it's sad to say I hear it all the time and counseling how many all my kids are resilient. Yeah, they actually kinda are but they're still gonna be harmed by your decisions actually. Even your decisions to move across town to switch schools to leave that church and go somewhere else. Our decisions actually do cause damage and or character maybe but it's life and it's part of us teaching our Children how to handle that. And so sometimes the delusion of our kids are resilient. They'll be fine. No, they're gonna be hurt, they're gonna be harmed. So lean into that and love them and expect that all of our decisions do. Adam and his wife were both naked and they felt no shame. Do you know what that's like? I would like to say that we actually don't know what that's like. We feel shame even now we feel shame. We don't, we can't even comprehend prior to the fall what that feels like to have actually have no shame. And then God didn't stop there. He brought them together. They felt no shame. And then now enters the picture of Children procreation Proverbs 17 6 children's Children are a crowned the aged and parents are the pride of their Children. It's sad to me to think of how we even think about Children nowadays. They're a nuisance. They're, they're a problem. They're, they're a little messy and dirty and loud and actually, no, you were called to be parents in the sense of how we're designed, it doesn't mean we all get to be, there's trends right now and some couples who they come together and they want kids and then they found out one of them can't. And so they divorce because, well you deserve to have Children? No, you do not. I deserve hell actually. And so what do I do with that? How do I lean into my spouse now that we've discovered that we can't have Children And yes, there might be other ways we can try if you can afford some of that. But we lean into that new us just like you can't, you can't, there's no guarantee when you get married that that person is gonna be healthier a year later or two years later, Laura laura story that beautiful song blessings her husband ends up in a brain is a brain tumor injury and wakes up. I don't even remember her accident. It's amazing to think about. We don't have any guarantee. I know part of what shaped me as a young boy was watching my mom have cancer and how my dad loved my mom. That was a young boy. We were living in Costa rica at the time. But then at 8 18, so 10 years later at 18 I watched my parents navigate through it again and watch. My dad loved my mom and shapes us. But also think about how many of us don't have that shaping from our family. We didn't get good examples of how to love how to surrender how to sacrifice. And so we really do learn how to be about ourselves. So what do we do here? We have this created order? Well, there's the disorder. Where does disorder come in? Well, it comes in with one word and it's sin senators the picture and it all goes downhill. We're in trouble. That's where we're at now. If you think of the things getting in the way that sin the places where we get stuck at Sin Genesis 3 6-7, then the woman saw that the fruit of the tree was good for food and pleasing to the eye and also desirable for gaining wisdom. She took some and ate it and noticed he was hanging out right next to her. She also gave some to her husband who by the way, was given the command and was given the instruction and he was silent. Um, and he ate it in the eyes of both of them were opened and they realized that they were naked and they went to Kmart sending her the picture and everything changed. There's an awareness they got what they wanted they see and they actually also now have to grieve, have to hurt that to face. But here's the word that I think comes into the picture at this point when Senators the picture, this next word is where you and I actually tend to struggle. It's actually blame 3 12. The man said the woman you put here with me, she gave me some fruit from the tree and I ate it dude punk right there And what are we doing now all the time. We want to find blame for everything. It's always someone else's fault that this that or the other happened. And it's actually no, I I own my reactions and I own who I am and I own how I handle all this, even the insanity of the last two years. But we want to blame. And what's so hard is there some stuff that has happened that we have very clear blame? Some of the processes that I walk young people through that when I worked at college and stuff, that age 20s is hard step where I actually looked through. So sexual abuse, I looked through what has happened to them when they were younger and I go, who was supposed to be your protector? Mom and dad. And I go, did they? No. So where should the shame be? This is scary. This is actually kind of scary shame on them for not protecting you. And I go, well hold on, don't stay there. You even land. If you stay there for even a few more minutes, you're gonna actually just spiral Why do I say that? Why? Because you're carrying a shame that you can't bear, that's actually not yours. And when I put it in the right place, I can enter the most beautiful place. And it's called forgiveness. But if I don't tell the truth, I can't forgive. And a lot of places I find people stuck is they haven't told the truth. They're still carrying a lie. And then fighting with a lie over and over and over and over for years. And when they tell the truth, they can go and I forgive and they feel very different towards even their their parent shame on the person that harmed me. Why not to get angry and get mad And and actually now seek vengeance is to then be free. I'm so tired of that controlling me and I can be free when I put truth capital t truth in place. But a lot of us are living and playing with and dancing around in our unconscious lots and lots of lies. We're trying to make sense of things we can't make sense of and trying to believe things that are not true. Now here's what happened with blame here in the garden at this point in time. Help the helper fail. Eve, here's how she failed to the woman. He said, I will make your your pains and childbearing very severe with painful labor. You will give birth to Children and your desire will be for your husband and he will rule over you the consequences of who she was supposed to be with her with her husband at the time. But this is a scary one. Leadership failed for Adam. He was meant to be someone who actually was leading his wife and he did not, he failed here to Adam he said because you listen to your wife and ate fruit from the tree which I commanded. You must not eat from it, cursed is the ground because of you through painful toil. You will eat food from it, holidays, your life. And if you think of the picture of this, it's one of your work is going to turn into something that can actually be somewhat of a burden. It's gonna be hard to be difficult. You're gonna be stressing, it's gonna be something that's different than the way I designed it to be which all of us can probably attest to what were we supposed to be? Adam was supposed to be that that partner with his wife and she was supposed to be a partner with her husband in design. Where do we find the working of this out Now for all of us in our marriage relationship, there's this back and forth and kind of pull of helper and leadership and what does this mean? Um questions I asked Premera couples all the time. I'm like, so what does it mean to be head of the house? And then I watched the husband or the boy, the guy who's getting married dig a grave. I'm supposed to make all the decisions. I was like, okay, I'm not sure where you got that one. Well from the church sometimes, but what does it mean to be the head of the house husbands? What does the require the the burden placed on you? It is you're gonna partner with this person who is so different than you has such a different way to see the world and you are responsible for her and your kids at judgment day. That's what it means. That should make you shake in your boots. It's not telling her what to do. It's not her obeying and you spouting off stuff. Absolutely not. You're partnering and what an incredible relationship when you actually really are linking arms and making decisions together and wrestling together and seeing things different but actually coming to agreements. That is not easy. That's what a lot of us counselors are spending a lot of time helping people do and it is so beautiful from this, these leadership and and helpmate fails. What comes what comes is this man will struggle with and return to the earth but The one We have pain and childbirth and struggle with man. Now again pause and look at society and look at marriages and look at families. This is exactly what's happening. There's a constant wrestling and struggling between who's gonna be in charge. Like what do we do some for some families as if mama ain't happy ain't nobody happy and we actually almost think that's a good term, a good phrase or a good thing and it's like no, this is unhealthy actually I would say it's downward unbiblical as a partner, their husbands that walk in the house and they don't even know what to do anymore because it's like this isn't their territory, it's hers and the kids and their they feel like an absolute outsider because of a lack of this, What was designed in marriage was broken through sin. And so we have a lot of working this out. So how do we apply this to us? What do you look about you? And I'm gonna I'm looking at this through the lens if you got the created order disorder and then then you there's a certain word I'm gonna get to in a little bit as to what it means for you and me when it comes to all of this mess was what it seems like. But also the beauty in the book I wrote. Um I can't say that for parents. There's this chapter I put in there that my wife was like you need to delete that chapter. That's just but it was the one on the neuroscience side. So all of the way that God made our chemistry and our neurobiology and hormones. And it's fascinating because it shows a perfect design of husband and wife male and female coming together and how we're meant to be by design. Yet for so many of us we just don't understand how that how they can think this way or how they can act this way or why are they so emotional or why are they so heartless or why are they so this or that and we gets lost. But yet again God's design is perfect and sin enters the picture, we lose each other. I had a client recently. He just said you know what When I'm gone to work, we should just expect when I come home that we're gonna have to get back on the same page because when I'm gone out during these, you know, 8 to 10 hours a day, of course we're not on the same page yet. The assumption was before were always supposed to be on the same page. It's like, so what needs to happen is you come home and there's a committee meeting, we get back on the same page every day. Yeah. What is the average that couples talk per week, anybody know? Yeah. It's just actually a handful of minutes per week. Sometimes I've seen some studies that say maybe an hour total a week kind of terrifying. Think of all the little exchanges. And it adds up to just a little bit of time and you're supposed to know me with that. No, you're not gonna know me. It's it takes intentionality. It takes investment. Yet we're so busy. So I want to kind of switch gears with this and look at it through the lens of gender and sexuality. Then so psalms 1 39 30 13 for you created my innermost being you knit me together in my mother's womb. There's a design from the beginning from the beginning of when you were conceived, we know that a baby in utero experiences the world, you adopt a child from this the day they're born and they have trauma based off what happened inside that mom in her life chemically and then also around her we know that that's not even a question. Yeah we still have questions about where life begins which I think is such an interesting, I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made, how many of us don't believe that through our actions, every one of us can actually probably list some things we don't like about ourselves and God's up there going, I made you, you're dissing me. I haven't talked to a woman in my office ever who hasn't had a list of what they don't like about themselves breaks my heart. That's not what it's about having the perfect body or having the perfect mind or having degrees or having status or having the perfect person on your arm isn't gonna make it. Remember this lady that I was a single lady that lived next to in Kansas, she was so excited she brought me down to the garage because she had the first ford um escape the only one in the state just so proud of this thing and I just laughed was like there'll be like 1000 of them in like two weeks but we do that plus it was a ford escape anyway. Like we get all excited about. I have, I've had Hondas and Yamaha's and Kawasaki's and different bikes and Finally finally finally sold sold the one I had and I got a Harley that one you saw and I remember after a few weeks I was kind of depressed because you realize it's just a stupid bike and I missed my Honda because it started this year and it was very humbling. It is, it doesn't matter what you get of stuff. It's amazing how many of us have vacations and then we have to have a vacation from the vacation after the vacation because it was so exhausting. American version of vacations is just whack to me. Just, you're so exhausted and you have to go back to work and you're worse off than you were before and in debt. Um, do I believe that I am fearfully wonderfully made my life and my actions will show that this is still that foundation of even who we are that were either living from or we are making my own path Colossians 3, 5 put to death therefore whatever belongs to your earthly nature, sexual immorality, impurity, lust, evil desires and greed, which is idolatry and think about any of these lists here in in other passages, a list of these things and sometimes we look at it and we can, we just go right into one and we obsess, we don't see the other two or three that are pointing right at us and we need to deal with. Um, but they're also not exhaustive trying to call out something and say, hey, these are some of the things they need to think about to consider. We don't think this way put to death, we're in a place in our culture where it's, don't you tell me what to do first of all? But also, if I claim this is who I am, well, it's that word identity. This is who I am. This is not how God designed us to be. And we actually have losses there. Well, here's two of those areas, the actually idea of attraction and desires. I think we put these in the wrong place Galatians 519 when you follow the desires of your simple nature, the results are very clear. There's a list against sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling jealousy, Alberts finger, selfish ambitions, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties and other sins like these. This is what comes from this. Well, right now we have in our culture, attraction has become such a big deal. When I met my wife, I was not attracted to her at all. Why? Because in my mind, she didn't fit what I actually saw as attractive. What's really funny about that is I grew up in a different culture, even though I may look this way again, I was attracted to me was not a white redhead. Just to put it bluntly there. And what's funny is our kids are, there was actually bets when we had our first kids that's gonna be a redhead and he's a little blonde, but um, like that's not what was attracted to me. And I remember the day when I actually, it was like something came over me of, oh my gosh, this woman is amazing and it was so much bigger than just physical beauty. It's who she was, it was her character. It's what she stood for, what she believed in, her christ her God, all of who she was and how big of a deal that is attraction to me is that I'm gonna put it this way, it's bad data. Just to put it kind of in a weird way, but to stand out, it's bad data who you're attracted to great and it changes and it morphs and it it turns into all sorts of stuff. It actually has actually a short shelf life because then I get bored with you and I want something different. Same for your desires. Your desires are fickle, you're fickle. I'm fickle. Kind of scares me a little. How in the world do you last beyond a few years of marriage then? It's that's another whole question. I'm at 19 years of marriage and it's like we're just getting started. It's such a cool thing to see that now and go, wow, it's like we're just just getting going We're at that stage where Miley is 12, so we're like six years in six years, they're all gone and we'll move and like not even give them our address. Just kidding. Like what are they gonna do? Where are they gonna be? I don't know and just how excited us because the executive team, we get to actually decide where we go what we do even though that doesn't always work out that way. I have a sister who's in and out of living on the streets and doing stuff in texas and she's a mess because of choices doesn't always work out that we wanted to work out. It's scary. I remember my kids when they were eight or nine, I would tell them I hate that you have free will. You don't have free will. I hate that you actually have free will. You don't have free will. As in you can walk around the corner and do something that totally is against what we've taught you and that's on you. I will feel it and I will feel responsible for it. But that is on you. You go to a friend's house what you do all these things. The way that we handle our attraction and desires are critical because we want to fit in and we want to be cared, love, we want to be a part of something. It's actually scary what this looks like at times Galatians 5 22 with the Holy spirit produces this kind of this kind of fruit. This is the other side of that coin. Who are we supposed to be love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness faithfulness, gentleness and self control. There is no law against these things. This is who we're meant to be. Don't go look on facebook because everyone else is, everyone's yelling at someone or mad at something and it's probably a space that none of us should actually hang out by the way. Really, really careful with that. What am I attracted to? What are my desires? How much are those shaped by what I've done that I would that sin? How many marriages are impacted by pornography? Yet a lot of sex therapists, most sex therapists would encourage you to look at porn to spice up your sex life. No, no, no, no, no. When I went to my post doc work was in sex therapy, I went back to the Institute for Sexual Wholeness in Atlanta. The only place you can get this training from a biblical worldview, from a godly Godly men and women that that went and did some of the other gross training and we're protecting us from having to do that. I'm so thankful for them. Um, that one of the founders doug Rose and I just passed away a few months ago. I just love him, wrote the book celebration of sex, kind of one of the pioneer books in this area. Um kind of giving a biblical view of sexuality, Who you are is not your desires and who you are not your attractions. That's a really important thing for us to remember because if you're not careful even as a married man, it's easy to look around and be attracted? And the word I like to think about there is, and it's laughable. So what do we do instead? We play mind games and we're like, oh, they're not really attractive and we tell ourselves lies, thinking that's gonna protect us. When really what that actually does is I put it into the darkness and into secrecy. I started and we'll talk about this more this afternoon. But I started with my sons, even when I would see see someone see a girl that I know they noticed, I would point her out so that it moves moves out of their unconscious to the conscious and go, we'll talk about her later. And so then later when their car in the car, I'm like, okay, what's your story? You start talking through who she is and why she's a value and why when he, when my son looked and glanced, what did you do with it? Did you file it away for later or were you a man of integrity? These are conversations I was having with them when they were 5678, not teenagers. Now they're teenagers. Now to be blunt. I ask them every few weeks, So what are your masturbation practices? They don't, they're not honest with me anymore. They were before. Um, but we have the little dialogues that are incredible. Just them going, knowing I'm gonna ask this. They've got to kind of have a reckoning there, what does it do? It moves it out of their unconscious to the conscious and they have to take their thoughts captive. What kind of man are you gonna be? What kind of man are you gonna be? This is a constant. We talk about pornography in our house, almost every meal comes up somehow. I remember the day my daughter realized penis vagina, Like we're all sitting at the table, she's she's 11 at the time and her eyes just like got big and it's just like we all bust out laughing And she kind of put that together, why are we even talking about it since she was one and they'll catch on when they as they get older and as they put pieces together. No pun intended. Um and they they wrestle it out and they're either doing it internally or we are creating the environment for them to do it externally Galatians 5 24, those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their simple nature to his cross and crucify them. There. I need to start there sometimes for some of us where do I need to actually what I need to die to what needs work versus what we tend to do, which is distract distract distract, go, go, go, go, go, go, go why we have a self centered bent. I believe that we are incapable of having relationships, Why you think you're right about everything you believe, just to put it simple, you wouldn't believe what you believe if you didn't think it was right? So the only way to be in a relationship is to find an absolute cookie cutter of yourself and then you get canceled out because when there's two of the same, they fade into oblivion. So what did God do? He designed marriage to be between a man and a woman and two very different people who have very different upbringings and different world views and different, which also means the more different you are in other areas, the more struggles you're gonna have and the more similarities, like I used to, I used to jokingly say I'm only gonna marry a southern baptist girl because I grew up southern baptist. Um and then it was funny when I met my wife through this dating service thing, it had under her name, methodist, and I'm like, I'm gonna marry a methodist, methodist, like jolly, she has challenged me and grown me in ways that God is so incredible why she sees the world different, her dad's a pastor and and being able to come into that with her and where was actually a lot of her own trauma was from southern baptist kids in school, telling her she's going to hell because she wasn't southern, like so then she married one, like, okay, so we've got some growing to do God is incredible and even those pieces of how he opens that door for us to come together. We have a self centered bent, which means we can't do relationships. So how do we do him? It's dying to self, it's learning to withhold being right to be in a relationship, which is really, really difficult, do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit rather in humility, value others above yourselves. We know these passages, but it's like we get lost in the day to day facebook fights and other craziness and we lose each other, we get really stressed out over money, we get stressed out over, you know, life and drama. When I work with couples, uh work with a lot of couples where kids are either transitioning or something's happening with their teens. The first thing I do is I look at the mom and dad and I'm like, how's your marriage? Because one of the first things that I see is on the chopping block is they're about to divorce because they don't handle it the same. How do you be a unified, even though you're not handling the same and I don't want you to expect the other person to be like you, that's not the goal, but how does your perspective add value to me? And how does mine add it to you and how do we work together? And yes, at times we have to come down to a decision that is gonna be difficult. I'm on the deacon board at our church, one of the most beautiful things that has been, I'm one of the young guys to the most beautiful things about the last 2.5 years. I don't speak almost ever in there. I listen and I learn, but to watch this group of men never leave a meeting without being unified. Has taught me so much, especially as we were wrestling, do we stay open and defy the governor's orders And us going to coming to 100% agreement. We are to be incarnation, we have to be in the body as a body of christ, I think of so many friends of mine and even family who have been lost because of a shutting down and because of other support groups shutting down and it was like if I go here I might die, what if I go here, I might die. And so which one do I do? And many are back in their addiction because they had the lack of support, we have to be incarnation all this is so beautiful to even now be um, be together now. One of the things that feeds into this bent nous is, we actually have language is a really important thing, how we talk about things how we understand. And I actually kind of like this the first time I saw this is the gingerbread person. Um, if you haven't seen it, it's quite fascinating how complicated we are honestly for me from years before, I'm like, I didn't see it as complicated. But as I kind of saw these parts parsed out, I'm like, actually I can see that that we have the identity and attraction and sex and expression. And there's even what I was actually sexually attracted to and also romantically attracted to these different parts actually helped me kind of wrestle with more layers, I guess you could say of myself. I like that at first at first gender identity. This one starts has started to worry me more than ever in the last few years. Actually, I heard a person finally say what I've been thinking for a while and afraid to say sometimes is what we've, what's happened with gender identity is basically, it's given permission for narcissism. It's back to that self centered thing. It's all about me versus God has a design that is perfect. And what do I do with that? How do I wrestle with that? Because it doesn't get rid of the actual wrestling. But if I don't have a foundation to stand on, I'm up to my own devices where I end up and I actually end up somewhere based off culture or based off friends or based off online chat forums are based off anything. But the biblical is why it is important gender expression. When I met my wife, I show up to our, it was our second date, second or third date and I'm wearing my purple suede coat. Love that coat and she's so embarrassed to be in public with me. I didn't know this at one point. She was like, are you hot? I'm like, I am, She's like, I'll be glad to carry your coat for you. I'm like, what a nice girl. And I never saw the coat again. She stuffed it in the bag and hit it. And I remember actually previous relationships where I was like this coat, I'm gonna die in this coat. I love this coat because that identity pieces like this is who I am not realizing. Kind of I was standing on something I didn't really want to stand on but also realizing, you know what? It's actually quite easy to change in our, in our history. What's happened is up until when gay marriage was voted in as legal. Everything. And all the conversations was born this way born this way born this way. Thanks lady gaga. That's what it was. Until two weeks after the vote. It was all about fluidity as we heard last night. It's only validity in one direction. But it's it's scary what we're giving to everyone to wrestle with. I wrestled with who I was. I wrestled with understanding why I wasn't like all the other guys and all that. I did wrestle with that. But I'm not asking questions like are being asked today. That's what this is actually opened up, which is scary, really, really scary, what's doing what it's doing. But it's also this piece here that sexually attracted to versus romantically attracted to? What does that mean? If I if I boil things down to the kind of base level, we have this sexual attraction and that we would eliminate all sorts of people because we're not sexually attracted them. We would have this pool of the kinds of things we're attracted to. And I say things on purpose because they're not people, we turn it into something very animalistic, even versus even romantically attracted to. There's a desire to get to know you their desire to have relationship. There's a desire to even nurture that there's something different there. What's funny for me is I am like this hopeless romantic and I married the most unromantic human being on the planet, man. It's hard to know how to love her. God's up there just laughing. And I do believe that, that he's just going, yeah, and the rest of your life, you get to learn to pursue her and whatever like you would naturally do isn't easy. It's kind of like the love languages. If you've seen the love language is the five love languages, it's interesting to see how many, which is most couples I've seen. You don't have the same ones or if they are the same. They're a different dialect, why it means you gotta work at it. My wife's bottom two at the very bottom or words of affirmation in touch. So what am I talked to, which means like if I put my arm around her at church, she's more like get off. But she puts her arm around me, I melt. But I also know that she consciously chose to do this, going, I know cory will like this, so I'm gonna put my arm around him. It was not an act of kind of out of the unconscious, it was a conscious choice when she complements me and she says something I know that it actually took effort and it was thought through. She's an internal processor. One thing that I missed about like today, normally she would be here with me and at the end of this I will go to her and she'd give me a list of what to fix next for next time. Um Like my power points are the wrong ones. And so I'm kind of going, whoa! Um but she's great at that. But what's the other side of that equation I have to receive. It doesn't always work when we were editing my book. So the first one I wrote, I hired a person that actually I would send stuff to them every week. And the number one rule is don't show any of it to your wife Because she'll shut you down tomorrow, which has happened in the past. So 70,000 words later, I hand it to her and she was like, oh my gosh, this is so bad. She's an english lit person. Everything was in passive voice just don't even know what that means. But in spanish everything is reversed the way that the order of it. So everything I wrote was sounds right to me. But she had literally we had to go sentence by sentence and and I remember at one point just having to go, okay any change he gives me, I just submit to because I'm dumb. It was so humbling and it was good for our marriage. Ironically some of the hard things too when I've been hospitalized were hard but they were good for our marriage. The times when we struggled with kids were hard but they were good for our marriage which is really really important. And how do you lean into growing as a couple now? What this has done with our with our culture, society conversations is you've probably seen these the L. G. B. T. Q. Q I A. Plus letters. It's created a mess when it comes to even what's going on culturally, L. G. B. Is actually fighting against T. Right now. I don't want to be a part of that. The experiments you're doing on Children are not okay. There's some that are saying that and hopefully more and more voices will come. It's interesting to think about that sexual identity is. And attractions are coming back to that word bad data, careful where we place these things because what we've done cultural is we've put those front and center as my identity and who I am and in that I lose actually who I am. The marriage is between two sexually different people period. And that's the design from the beginning and where are we at now? We're in the disordered space. We're in the sin space. What is every man or woman, boy or girl who's actually struggling with their gender identity or struggling with gender dysphoria or trying to figure themselves out if they want to be seen, they want to be known and they want to belong. What's really scary about that belonged one is there's now pushes in some schools being gay or lesbian is so old school and so outdated. It's all about trans. That is horrifying. Where is it gonna go next? What's gonna happen next? Now one of the tools that I use to think through and help someone think through where they're at and who they are and how complicated this applies to every one of us in this room is actually this one right here. These six things are parts of who you are. You have your intention, you have your biological sex, you have your gender identity, how you see yourself their persistence and direction, attraction, volition, your behavior and then your value values, your values of framework. If you think of a pie chart, you would make these parts of the pie different sizes based off how much of these, what mattered more and what mattered less. It's neat to think about that because if you did this now and you did this even a few months from now it would change, it would morph it would, it's not kind of set in stone because it's actually very subjective. But when you start thinking about that, you realize for some people for some teens especially they realize you know, their values are actually pretty strong. That keeps them where they're at or their biological sex is even though they feel and how these other parts of themselves and the goal of this is to kind of make it a little more complicated if you will. But at the same time kind of actually pull back a little so you can kind of see it from a different lens and realize I choose who I am, what do I do, who I who I hang out with, how I present myself all of it. That values peace. Am I standing on a biblical foundation? Yes or no. Am I choosing to honor you Lord? Or am I choosing actually a very different god if you will. And I haven't heard very many people speak this way or talk this way, but it is exactly that. And and I'm gonna kind of pit them against each other for a second. If we're not careful, it's either or I am choosing you Lord or I am choosing this as my God I think if you think of it that way, it changes a lot of our conversations because what we're also hearing and some of the conversations and different books and authors is it's also about, well you can be gay christian and then there's a fight about no, you can't use the words gay christian. All these different side a side b all these different kinds of conversations which is for for most of us were kind of going, well you lost me back there For the person in the middle of it. No, they're wrestling and trying to figure themselves out. Go to Facebook and click on gender. I think they're in the 90s now there's 90 something gender options. I can't tell you what 90% of them are. Um, but even if you pick the same word and pull four people that would say that's them, they would give you different definitions. So it's not about that, It's about you and I are trying to wrestle with who am I? We've always been that way by the way that's ever since sin into the world. We're trying to wrestle with who am I. And I think this is actually a really important tool now going back to the gender red person gender identity is a piece of the whole how I see myself is it congruent with my biological sex. Now the research kind of shows this is becoming those that identify as queer or basically non binary is growing by leaps and bounds in our culture. And many of the researchers are even saying it's very much more all around the social contagion piece. And what do you do with that? Actually to me? Great, that's good data. That doesn't tell me how to help, how to love, how to lead, how to guide. Um, some families that I know have actually shut off the internet to the house and they have locked things down, but that's only worked and the ones that I know where the child or the team has been like, I'm hurting and I help and I want you to do this for me. That's where I've seen beautiful things happen. What if they don't want to, I've seen this with husbands and wives even and grown grown siblings where they're wrestling and they're hurting and they're asking questions well, think about this term or this this um phrase, sex is sex is my right. So the conclusion here is that the authority of that, of that of their own experience or intuition. So my foundation of who I am or what I what I um identify as is up to me, which right there, I already kind of go, I don't trust myself on most most things, my emotions especially. So we're already in trouble. But then we have these parts that were supposed to show up separately. But sorry, God has made me and therefore made the desires I have is that foundational, everything God makes is good and therefore my desires are good and then good desires deserve to be and even ought to be fulfilled. It's just scary to think about some of the belief systems that are out there that are actually pushing for claimant grab on, this is who you are now. For me growing up, even the idea of that I'm male was understood understandable. That was not a question, but the working of that out is very difficult for some of us for lots of us. What is the biggest factor there comparison? Uh, Apple, the Apple products added the, the uh screen time feature a few years ago, shareholders of Apple demanded that they do that for one specific purpose. Girls are killing themselves at a higher rate because of social media, that was the purpose. Why did they not say guys too? Because they're doing other stuff which we're gonna talk about a minute. Girls are killing themselves, this is scary what's happening. And us as parents and we talk about this morning this afternoon, us as parents if we're not careful, were left in the dust at what they're facing because a lot of this is the kind of stuff that they believe now part of our job is to help them articulate it at times. So we're having to help wrestle through some of that, help them articulate it. Others have it very well articulated and we're left kind of mouth open and not sure what to do here are the messages that they're receiving from their friends. It used to be tolerance, then it became acceptance. Then celebration. Now it's participation. Think about that. Think about culturally we're at it's not tolerance anymore. That's actually so not even that, that's still seen as subpar. It's even not acceptance. And even celebration is not good enough. And then what do you do as a parent or a sibling of someone who's saying, well, you don't love me. We need to be careful about even how that has been hijacked the term love because the definition of love is kind of where we're gonna end up look at today because loving someone is very different than just accepting whatever they are, whatever they're doing or whoever they are. If we're actually sticking to a biblical view of that. Another quote from Preston Sprinkle, he said we need to create safe spaces where young people can open up, be heard receive godly wisdom and learn about God's expensive vision for what it means to be male and female. Where should that be our homes and our churches. Our church is actually meant to be on the front lines of some of these kinds of places and it should be also also be one of the safest places to come wrestle. But if you think of what culture and others are saying. Um Another study was, was that three of people that that leave the church left because of the theology, 97% of those that left the church left because they felt absolutely unloved and unheard and unaccepted as a person, not because of lifestyle stuff. We've made it and others have made it all about the theology. So we need to change our theology. No, we need to stand on a biblical foundation of truth unapologetically but also not with a big huge bible that were hitting people with a place where people can wrestle and ask questions. Um and not be okay. At first I was at a church one time that just visiting and the associate pastor was preaching and he made the comment. Everyone should be a part of celebrate recovery and I wanted to jump up and go, you there's something true about it. Why celebrate recovery isn't about once an alcoholic, always an alcoholic. Kind of like a it's a let's look at the beatitudes. Who am I to be in christ. He is a very different lens where you can have a table of an alcoholic and a mother dealing with our team and someone whose spouse just left all at the same table because you're not focused on your problem or where you're stuck. We're focused on who you are in christ very different. Do I still need some space to probably work those other pieces out. Yes. Do I sometimes need some serious help. Yes. But um yeah, we need community to get to as well. People of faith who navigate gender identity issues are our people, these are our sons or daughters are best friends. Sometimes our moms, our dads, but where we're going and our culture is kind of scary what's happening with our teenagers and the questions about who I am, something I want you to hear. I'm just gonna kind of plant the seed right now to kind of think about. I spent the last summer wrestling through nancy Pierce's book, loved my body. Really important work. I've read it over and over and over and over the summer. I read it a while back. Um, probably best protestant look at the theology of the body, which the only other one I know of is um, Christopher West wrote it. But from john paul, the second's teachings incredible. Beautiful, redemptive. But she finally helped me see where, how did we get here? And it's this split and it's a split between human, human being human and being a person. How do we get away with abortion? Well, it's a human, but it's not a person where the ethics is saying, well, there'll be a person when I say they are. And some ethicists are saying, by the way, that's around age 12 when they can do algebra. What are the implications there that if you're not a person I can offer you, I can end you, I can kill you. Well that just goes for abortion. It goes for infanticide, which is we're gonna start wrestling and fighting within our culture more than ever. It starts with euthanasia or continue with euthanasia. Or if you are downs or if you are, um, any kind of mental incapacity. But it goes into gender identity and it goes into homosexuality and it goes into um, transgender as well. But how do we end up accepting is when we actually make a duality out of it? There's something my body is a piece of material. It's expendable from the person. How do I have sex with whoever I want to have sex with? And I'm actually living the lie of culture of my body is expendable and we see the research actually shows how many do it and try to and it's empty on the sex part with anyone. How many of those that have transitioned are de transitioning. What I want to start seeing is more lawsuits to these doctors and counselors sue the life out of them. That's to me the next step because it is utter abuse. That's where we're at this duality. If we're not careful, what scares me is you and I actually have elements of belief in this most likely why? Because my body is sinful. We talked about this in the church. And so the body is almost of the devil and then my spirit is of God. So we start talking this way in church and we're careful. We've just done the exact same split that has led to our culture accepting all these things that are absolutely not okay. When I start putting that together, my mind goes okay, I can start understanding why if someone believes what they believe, but we need to put this back together as a whole. Well, here's the coolest part think of when scripture, I think of when Christianity entered the picture in history, Christianity entered the picture in history at a time when men especially you had your wife, she was to make a baby babies with that our boys to carry on the name. That was it. And then you had sex with your concubines and with your slaves, male and female. What did the bible come and do? What does Christianity come and do it. Come came and said, husbands love your wives as christ loved the church Christianity came in and raised the bar in a society that was more debased than we are now. Or maybe we're kind of close to it. Where's the answer? Here is Christianity. Where is the answer? It's christ Where's the answer? It's jesus, where's the answer? It's surrender to all these things. I don't know about you? I start getting kind of excited because we live in a time where we're gonna see jesus work if you haven't already. I have in my own life over and over and over and over and over. Have you heard of the maps this is the new term that we have to learn now. And I guess the letters will be added at some point. Minor attracted person. It's called pedophile, but we can't say that because that's too mean. We have to find they found a term that's acceptable. That can be palatable because it needs to be part of that protected class. This is where we're at. And it started a number of years ago and I've been speaking about this for four or five years. This is the next step. Well it is, there's a ted talk that started it and there's been multiple smart psychology people yikes. Um sometimes I don't want to be associated with them that have actually gone, well we need to someone's attractions to kids, that's not their choice. We have to actually protect them and they're not endorsing pedophilia. But then in the end they are. But no, we're not. Yeah, it's kinda it's scary, it's horrifying what's actually happening. But another one that's happening here in the northwest more than across the country is this one polyamory. As I was writing my second book, the one that's for teens, we were about to go to publish and my wife was like, we've got to add another chapter and so kind of at the last minute we stuck this chapter on polyamory, why I had read this article on Preston sprinkles website, the camera who was written by but he was actually saying how most christians could not tell you if they were asked why marriage between one man and one woman from scripture. Why when it was written back in a culture that was polygamists and polyamorous and you name it, everything went. And so that's why I wrote that chapter in that book. It's like you need to be able to answer that question. Why why did God have a design that was actually perfect and a husband and wife, why does polyamory not work basic step to do? Which is careful with this. But go to Youtube and type in polyamory testimonies and you'll watch the video after video after video of people explaining why they have found the answer to life so much easier to take care of kids when you have four or five of us. That's true. But every story I've ever heard of anyone from their own mouth has shown why this doesn't work, jealousy sets in turf wars territory scary. Actually kind of actually need to see what's been happening with those crazy, like the way they do these tv shows, these reality shows with the polygamy groups and some of them have been blowing up to pieces. It's kind of nice to see. But why do those women actually end up in those places? It's all they know, it's all they know. And so being able to actually help free. That's important to realize that God actually actually has more for you. He's got something much more beautiful, where are we losing our kids and some of this stuff online peers, how many christians I know in christian homes I've sat in and they're like, we know their friends, we do this and we do that. Where's their computer in the room? How much time are they on their always where have you lost them? You literally opened your front door and had all of those unknown people walk into your living room, sit down, set up camp and just indoctrinate through chat rooms through discord channels, through headsets. It's tough. It is a nightmare actually in some ways, how do we navigate this stuff? How do we, what do we do? And that's, that's the question that many of you are asking. Um, and for simple answer is some of that those cars need to be cut the harder, harder thing is once you've opened the door, it really is hard to shut it. So one of my was kinda mentioned last night, one of my ways of doing that, which will hopefully talk more about this afternoon is you partner with your son or your daughter. It's a relationship with them, not a top down in the end, us, you are the parent, but when you can partner, it's negotiating and it's back and forth and it's gonna be a lot, it's gonna go a lot better versus them just being told, but be careful who you allow that coach, that's that team, you may have invited a horrible influence into their life, but it's a good thing, know who they are coached by matters who they are taught by matters and I'm kind of biased about being at Corbin University in Salem um where they go to school matters, they're going to become like their teacher. So if they go sit under someone who believes a very different ethic, don't be surprised when they graduate and ditch everything that you taught them. So that's a big deal. Um and what you, how you do this now, I mentioned earlier how we're losing girls, remember what, what it was social media in comparison. We're losing boys in a different area. Here's the list from different research, porn, excessive video game play And absent fathers of the top three porn, excessive video game playing absent fathers. Richard Richard, Is that Richard Zimbardo dr Zimbardo, he came up with in his recent studies on this and I added these three other ones that are actually really important to think about, We have a skill lys group of kids growing up, you get a flat tire on the side of the road, you better know how to fix it. Call electrician to change an outlet, really learn how to fix it was a great Youtube channel. Some dad is making all these videos on how to do basic things like we should know how to do that. It's like if you didn't have a dad watch these, but they're so great and we've, I fix everything. I can, I love tinkering and fixing and love cars and how stuff and Um, but now it's my daughter, she's 12, so helping her learn how to fix Alice, we do American heritage girls with her and so she's been learning the home repair badge and things like that. So much fun cause man it feels good when you can do it. Remember when I was really sick and I was stuck at home and I tore my motorcycle engine apart in the garage just everywhere and then I put it back together. What's the best thing besides not the best thing is when you have extra parts left over. But the best thing is when you started up that first time I did that when we had wiring problems in our house that actually almost burned it down and I was able to go to the breaker and figure it out and figure it out. And it was horrifying what was about to happen. I love that we have a skill us, we have an irresponsible society. They opened a chick fil a and Salem I can't even eat there. But um they opened it up, they hired 150 employees and my son was gonna apply and his, one of his other Boy Scout friends already got in and I was like, oh and then they said no, they already had their 150 I said I'll give it two weeks what happened two weeks later, half the staff's already quit. Why? Because they actually have to work. Really, I don't get paid just to be on your roster. Like, so it's scary what's happening and social media, I mean, I don't know what to say. Social media should be an absolute no. And how do you, what do you do with that? What do you do once that they already have it? That's a hard one. Really, really difficult. I watched, I love watching my older son watch their friends and their phones and their relationship with their phones and go, I don't want anything to do with social media. That was actually been the easier one. Our Middle one is gonna be another whole case. We named him blaze and he's got bread hair and he's psycho and he's gonna be another whole experiment careful. You name your kids too. Um, excessive video game play is also, it's not video games, having your house void. The video games isn't gonna save your kid. But it's my relationship with that, that thing, there's a study that showed that if a 15 year old 15 to, I think it was 30 in that what 15 years, the amount of time a boy spends on video games, they could have mastered an art, but it became a cellist at the highest level, became an artist at the highest level. The amount of time is horrifying. I have a really hard time not getting sarcastic, that's our spiritual gift in our family. When my son goes, I finally won and I finally got this and this and this on the game. I'm just like you do, I had to really have a hard time not being sarcastic because it doesn't build a bridge. That's some of those areas I have to work in learning from last night. But um this is what's happening and this is why this matters. This is why you studying and you preparing yourself? The first book I wrote, I can't say that is the title, it's meant to be a walkthrough of gender and sexuality from a Biblical worldview. Looking at scripture to help you understand what you believe, why? Because half of this stuff you haven't thought about then I can now teach my kids the problem. So I wrote this book, I'm so excited and I was at a homeschool conference and I watched mom after mom walk right past my table and not give me the common day, why they're holding a little one. And in their minds is I'll get to that when they're 15 and I'm like, no, you mothers and fathers of one year olds and two year old and three year olds, you're the one I'm actually wanting this for. So then I get into my session where I speak and then we sell tons of books. But um this is for the one, the when your kids, 123, I would say your parenting is done when they leave the single digits. That's scary to think about the parenting is, you know it, if you don't morph with them, you just get against them and teenage years are very different. They don't have to be a nightmare. Um they definitely can be difficult. So we have a created order, we have a disorder. And what is it that I must do? What do I need to do here? Who is it that I'm innocent called to do called to be in all of my relationships really. But then this plays out very much so in marriage and even in this relationship with my kids is this word surrender? We don't like that word that you're called to give up the right to be right, You're called to be in relationship with people that you may be strongly disagree with and you surrender. You don't quit. It actually turns into this other word. I love this word service. It's serving other people investing in other people. I'm calling you up to something greater to my son, to my daughter, to my best friend and my coworker. You've got a life that you've got and we're in relationship and maybe things aren't working too well. I'm calling you to something greater, which is really, really important. So a question that tends to come up right here in, this is, so then how do I live with people messed up others that have a different worldview. How do I live with people with a different worldview? Well, here's the passage that comes to my mind for us to kind of lean in on. I thought I fixed that says flee the evil desires of youth and pursue righteous righteousness, faith, love and peace along with those who call on the Lord out of a pure heart. Don't have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments. And it says on facebook too, just in case you didn't know that, because you know they produce quarrels and the Lord's servant must not be quarrelsome, but must be kind to everyone able to teach. That's an interesting piece there. What are they supposed to be able to teach? And then it says, not resentful opponents must be gently instructed. We actually are called to actually call people to something better in the hope that God will grant them repentance, not you, that God will grant them repentance, leading them to a knowledge of truth, of the truth and that they will come to their senses. I love the wording of that and escape from the trap of the devil who has taken them captive to do his will. That is our instruction. How do I live with people? It's hard, it's difficult, but I am called to speak carefully gently. But truthfully as we talked about it last night, you kinda have to earn it to with people. It's not something you just have. Therefore as God's chosen people? Holy and dearly loved clothe yourself with these things, compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness, and patience. This is who we're meant to be now thinking of even as a church, what are we supposed to do? What is the model of church? And you may have seen this before and I just really love this is that we have this model here to be a redemptive voice of we want you to behave first then to believe in christ and then you can come be a part of our fellowship, straighten yourself up first, then you can be a part of our fellowship or what if it was actually this one come be apart and at some point you might come to believe as the holy spirit works in you. But I can't guarantee that that's not what it's about. But you're actually the goal is for you to become, it changes how we do ministry. It changes how we have relationships. It changes everything of how we this isn't about being right, this is about christ and this is about heaven or hell, but not because someone's trans or because someone is gay or because someone is having an affair because someone's sleeping with their girlfriend or boyfriend. So kind of what I wanna focus in on to wrap this up and kind of land, this is looking at a biblical sexual ethic and why it matters that that's kind of title at different ages. So what do we need to, to think about when it comes to kids. You were designed male or female with a purpose. It's interesting how we have to really emphasize that more than ever. Now we need to your, your born male for a reason. I didn't have that planted in me. I didn't, I really, I wrestled. I'm, my dad is a former Nasa physicist who became a missionary. Like he takes these pro, you know, profiles about like personality. He needs zero affirmation from people and zero, I don't know how my wife, my mom and him have made it 50 something years of marriage like he is so not needing you at all And he had the most emotional basket case of a son. I cried everything. My wife laughs at how much I cry whenever. Every time I watch cars at the end, when he goes back and doesn't win and goes and pushes the old guy through. I cry every time. So you're made male or female for a purpose and that purpose as was mentioned even yesterday I became a shrink. This is my 23rd year of being a counselor. Thank God he made me the way I mean he made me, I spent a lot of years hating God for the way he made me and it's so cool to see that God knew exactly what he was doing. I don't like sports, don't have time for sports. Have them have a body for one either. But Um, after my 15th cast in high school, I got into other things. Um, but I've learned to do other things too that I've actually learned that hobbies, you know, my hobby is more work. That's awesome. I get to serve more people. And when I actually gave myself permission for that, I got to serve more people. It's kind of cool. But our kids, this is the time to plant those seeds of being kind to those that are different. We were skiing in, um, who do a few years ago, my sons and I, and we came up to, it was the last day of the season, so it's hot and the snows, it's kind of, you know, at the end, there are people like jumping off the top and with parachutes and doing all sorts of stupid things. But my sons were noticing there's a lot of girls wearing um, sports bras. And so my loud mouth middle son walked up to some girl and was like to some guy and girl, why is she wearing that? Like, oh gosh! And the guy's like, cause she's hot, He's confused which 1? Hot Hot. Hot Hot. So we had to talk. I was like displays first. All shut up. Don't go there. But he was judging. He was like, she shouldn't be wearing that. It's not allowed. I was like, you don't have to say what she wears. Okay. We have some more teaching to do to my sons. Okay. Okay. Then a girl comes flying by topless big girl too. Big girl was that blaze, luckily didn't see this. So he had gone because that would've been hilarious. My older had oldest son. So I just took off after my oldest son got to the bottom of the ski slope, caught up with him and I'm like, and he's just kind of like, I was like, so first time he's like, I was like, how was it? He's like, I'm not gonna answer that question. I've always asked was, who's gonna show my kid porn first, me or him or me or someone else. I'm not gonna open it up and say, hey, let's look. But what that did is it opened up a conversation that we got to talk again. Like I said earlier about her story, why would she do that? Why why what's going on with her? Maybe her relationship with mom or dad or we made it up. We didn't get to ask her. Um, that'd be awkward. But um, it's, it led for for months and months and months of conversation and me realizing I had failed about telling them about, you don't have a say in what someone else does or doesn't wear. You don't, you can't do that. You can't dictate that and we need to be full of grace and how we teach this when they're younger as they, as we prepare them for teens. Stand strong in your beliefs and convictions. This is the hardest season to stand strong on anything social pressure, peer pressure is to fit in somewhere in some crowd even better be an example, be someone that stands out because you stood on something. The irony is that's actually a much better foundation. If you stand on anything that's different than everybody else. The sad thing is just becoming more on just being, um, accepting an affirmative and celebrating and um, be a leader in Biblical living. Have the conversations where when a friend whips out a phone and opens up something that's unacceptable, they're the ones saying, hey guys, we don't do that when someone cracks a joke, there's a person that says, hey, we don't talk like that here and boy, do we need some reining in that? They don't joke around with the gay word. I hated it back when I was a kid, not realizing how much it was, how painful it was back then. We don't go there now be kind the way you are, who you are in relationship really, really matters. Single adults. You need a community period. I believe we would have better marriages if we learn to do single life better in community with other males and females, Both having healthy, appropriate touch and conversations and intimacy and friendship and depth. Not you should go it alone. I used to tell my college students, it makes me sad how many of them would graduate and go get an apartment alone. Now I tell him, ha ha prices are so high, you can't. So, so maybe you'll actually have roommates, which is iron sharpens iron because it's, that's tough. You're meant for community. We have seen that more than ever. The last few years you were meant for community. I have close friends who have died. Obviously not from Covid from other reasons, but Covid did them in older individuals who basically said, I'm not living the way they're telling me to live. I would rather die and be a part of my kids and my grandkids lives. I was like, good for you. I'm proud of you. Which is hard. This is difficult. Have high expectations. I teach a marital premarital counseling class at Corbin. And one of the comments at the end every time is I had these standards for who I was gonna marry and because of your class, I have higher standards. I was like, yes, that's part of my goal. You raise that bar to where it almost seems like it's impossible that God could ever bring someone like that in your life. Not because you're focusing on the physical because you're focusing on their heart who they are. You would never settle for anything less live on mission with a vision. So, so important from those that are those of us that are married, be all in for your partner. They are your calling to love them to protect them to make them the best version of themselves to point them to christ you are to be their biggest champion hurt together. You may not be hurting. My daughter came in my office last night yesterday afternoon in tears because kelly's grandfather passed away a few days ago or a day ago. And she's like, is mom okay? I was like, she's okay now. But when she gets to Georgia around family, she's gonna fall apart. What do I do? I just, I just hugged her. It was so beautiful. But it was like, you love her and you shut up. Nothing. There's no words you need to say because she's like, what do I do? It's all of us. What do I do? Nothing just be just be wife. That last night was like, she's struggling and because they're going together grieve together. You ought to be best friends from too many couples. I hear the husband say they're married to some foreign alien. No, that's gross. By the way, someone you have sex with, you don't know that's disgusting. But that's not okay. This should be the person, you know, at the deepest levels. You know what their dreams are. You know what their passions are. You know, them teach and lead your Children intentionally. That's what this is all about. We have to go there. My wife two weeks ago took Miley out and did passport two purity with her. You know, we kind of have that anti purity culture thing. I love tools like that. Um I did it with my boys and they're both dying. I went and redid it a few weeks ago with my middle son because yeah, I didn't quite land and it was beautiful. It was hours of conversation about girls and about dating and about all this stuff with them committing at the end that I'll tell you when you're ready as a parent, which is kind of the model of it. Our rule of thumb at home is you can start dating when you're a junior or senior in college by the way, not because that's when they're gonna wait too. But it's the expectation. Stop trying to think because of pressure around you that you have to. But if you meet someone we're gonna have to steward that but careful with the pressure And so we our oldest has been more squirrely on that. That's been a fun experiment if you're widowed or single again, community is critical and your life's not over. You have so much to give if you're widowed or single again, you are now in a place of serving the body of christ and serving others in a way that you know, you probably never could before even because you're not as divided, How to serve others, how to be an example. One of the things that I was talking to a client of mine in the 70s. He's a professor and I was like, you know what? I actually wonder if we should change the age where we allow a person to be like a full professor at the university, but also senior pastor of a church and say basically you have to be 60 or 70 or up. I was like, you know what that would change. We've devalued the wisdom of the older generation having a church where we have intergenerational relationships are so critical and so lost at times and so widows and single again, we need you, we need you on the front lines of loving our teens having hard conversations. Part of the reason I even do Boy Scouts is we have a christian troop and it's dads that have been curated since for me that I trust them with my son and they trust me with their son and the single parents, we tell the moms and guess what? You're not invited. It's just dad's, it's under our men's ministry at church and it's dad's mentoring sons. And we get to partner with single moms and say I get to take your son and have these adventures and teach them love that We need that Number one priority. Here is the long game. And I mean biblically to the foundation is to scripture as we talked about today. Know your theology and beliefs live ordered thriving community, be an example and be patient. What is the long game? Your son or daughter might not get it Now the person you love your best friend may not get it now. You're not the holy spirit and you live life with them and you hurt with them and you're there and what happens is their life will fall apart. Promise just like yours probably has as well and then you're there, you're available. It's just so, so important live the long game there. It's gonna be tough. It's gonna be hard. You wanna give up that live that long game. By the way, the long game is Biblical love loving someone by saying it's just acceptance is the cheapest, most frail foundation you can ever stand on. That is not love. Biblical love is actually full of limits and full of calling to and dying too. And it's it's difficult marrying well is the phrase I love to use because you very well you have someone that's your best friend and that you allow them. You invite them to speak in your life. I don't like it when my wife corrects me. My first thought is defensive because I'm human. My second thought is I'm so glad she feels safe enough to come to me. That's so glad because that's the test. You don't know sometimes what kind of environment you created or who you are until some someone won't come to you when you find out later Romans 1 24-32. Therefore God gave them over in their sinful desires of their hearts to sexual impurity for the degrading of their bodies with one another. I don't like that first part gave them over. Stop it. God will you just be my puppeteer and make me obey? And he's like, nope, I love you so much. You choose. Oh I hate that because as parents sometimes we want to do that with our kids we want to control. No, that's not gonna turn out too well. They exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served created things rather than the creator. It was forever praised. Amen because of this. God gave them over to shameful lusts. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do these are such things deserve death. They not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them. So what we're seeing in our culture and what we're seeing our families who approve of stuff in an attempt to love, I get the heart behind it. It's wrong. That's not love holding to a standard. But even being silent is better than than some of the stuff that I've seen from families where they believe they're supposed to clothe themselves in rainbows to be loving or be okay with the boyfriend and girlfriend sleeping over and that's their version of a long game. Like no keep strong and hard fast on those standards. Um because people of faith who are navigating generating issues are our people. This is our sons and our daughters. Our brothers and sisters and our friends who they're struggling play that long game, engage in difficult relationship. This is what we're meant to do. This is what the church is meant to do. One of the things that bugs me about church, but also about counselors is you have office hours. So when I look at the community over here church and look at the community over here, if you think of Rosaria butterfield, any of her writing incredible story. Most of her friends when she came to christ and others, they all went back to to the other the other culture. Why? Because of that office hours thing Josiah talks about when she was three a.m. If you struggled, you knew which house to go to. You get a hot meal and a bed because they were such community that I think it puts church to shame. Church shouldn't be a place of office hours. Do we need boundaries? You know, especially those in ministry. Yeah, that's really important. But it's ministry isn't office hours. Ministry is really, really tough. I hate when I hear young, especially young youth pastors like man, my youth ministry is going great. And I'm like, then you are not safe because if you were doing youth ministry, you would know so much muck about your kids, you'd be hurting so much. I want to quit. That's youth ministry and you go back and you do it again because you love these kids. But for a lot of people in youth Ministry, they don't know their kids because they don't trust you. Same for us as parents. At times we need to initiate these conversations. They may not come to us actually, most likely they won't come to us. We need to initiate again with our family. We talk about this all the time. Um, lately, the other conversation has been about marijuana and that book Tell Your Children by Berenson just having that conversation. Why is the door that once it's opened, it works. Why wouldn't you do it? So we need to talk to what the boundaries should be. Um alcohol money, there's so many areas. So my my labor of love has been this over the last few years. Um, I work at Regent University as well and do chair of dissertations and it's been really neat. I when I did my dissertation, I had a brand new baby born right at the very end of that. And I remember looking at that going, you're supposed to go publish and I won't be a dad or publish. I want to be a dad. So about 15 years later when I finally did this at a different season of life and that was my, my journey there because I wanted to be a dad that was actually present with my kids. Um again, the first ones for moms and dads. The second one, I've actually had a lot of families that do it as a as a family. And like almost like a bible study at night And it walks through scripture helps you think? My favorite review of that second was an 18 year old who said thank you for giving me like in a sense, the data to think about in scripture, but you didn't tell me what to believe. That's so, so important. We're leading you up to it. The Holy Spirit does the work, God does the work not us in that sense, but we have to take those steps. And so the um QR code there, that is again, they're gonna be linked to the power point here and then um also videos and stuff for this. But anything I can do for you, that's my heart is this kind of stuff and helping families. Um let me pray for wrap up here. Thank you so much that you called us to be in the position that we're in, whether it's in ministry, whether it's in um as a mom or a dad, as a brother or sister friend to someone in need, which is all of us got to just help us do that. Well, help us think through some of the stuff that we talked about today, um, to really choose to lean on your word, what you're telling us to do, what you're calling us to do is men and women that love you Lord for us not to be other people's Holy spirit, but to draw people to to you to the cross to to repentance. But do that in relationship. God, thank you for each person here and the influences they have, the others that are not even here, that will be impacted by how they live and the choices they make. Um and how they talk and I just I think you it's also kind of scary to think about that, how others are always watching. Maybe may we reflect you Lord maybe reflect your heart, maybe be redemptive people that draw again others to you. Thank you for this time as we continue on today and look into um the age appropriate stuff even later today and I just I just pray for an equipping today that um extends literally generations in jesus name. We pray Amen. Yeah, I can only speak for myself, but I came in a little like and dr Gilbert, once you start speaking, I was like ready to learn, there was something about the way that you presented that I felt like everything there was just I could receive it. So thank you so much. That was amazing.

Thank you for tuning in to the HealingLives with Corey Gilbert podcast. It has been an honor to serve if you are struggling have questions or in need Dr Gilbert offers a free consultation for new clients. Check us out at Healinglives.com to book a call. If this has been helpful to you, please share it, leave a review and help us get the word out so that we can see lives changed marriage is transformed and more people come into our life changing relationship with Jesus Christ. The HealingLives Center offers online courses, programs, books intensive and other services to help you live biblically and well, discover more resources on Youtube and Dr Gilbert's Healing Marriage Facebook group, The Healing Marriage.