Sexual Awareness Month

Congratulations on doing four and a half chapters of James!  I love the book of James.  It can be convicting and challenging, but we need that in our Christian lives, right!?  This time we are going to take a short break from the book of James to talk about something that is a burden on my heart.  After your prayer time we will talk about it below.

1.      Pray and thank the Lord for something He has done for you.  Sometimes we can get into a pity party thinking that the Lord has not been good to us.  I complain sometimes and get discouraged sometimes but then I look around me and realize that there are people out there who are lost and undone or sick with a disease and I immediately quit complaining and start thanking God for blessing me.  There is always someone out there who has it worse than you.  When we think about this it should also move us to pray for them.

2.      The past week I have been burdened for the purity of our young people.  Then I found out last night that the month of April is Sexual Awareness Month to aware people of the fact that 1 in 3 girls are molested and 1 in 7 boys are molested.  Child molestation and rape are crimes that are horrific and rarely reported or punished.  God hates these awful acts and He sees what is done in secret and will rightly judge those offenders one day.  One thing you can do is to protect your own children or grandchildren.  You do this by talking to them (or reading them the book “Yell and Tell” by Debi Pearl), praying for them, and watching them. 

a.      Talk to your children/grandchildren and tell them that there are some kids and adults out there who may try to touch them inappropriately and it is not right.  Tell them to YELL when it happens and TELL their parents about it without being embarrassed.  Be the kind of person/parent that your kids will feel open and comfortable talking to you about serious issues, but do not wait for them to bring these hard issues up.  You must bring these issues up with your children at home in a private conversation when your kids are at a young age (way before they are teenagers).  If you need help doing this ask Pastor John, pray, read your Bible and ask the Lord for wisdom in the matter.

b.      Pray for your children and grandchildren in this area.  Pray everyday that God will protect them from child molesters, rape, pornography and impurity.  Pray that they will be protected from witchcraft and every kind of evil that the enemy has in store for them.  Fight for your kids, go to battle for them in prayer with the Sword of the Spirit which is the Word of God.  The most powerful thing you can do is to pray Scripture out loud over your family.  (Look in the back of your Bible for a word or topic and it will give you verses on it.  Or search topics for verses on the internet KJV).

c.       Watch your children.  Your children are a gift from God to you.  They are so precious to Him and He loves them very much.  I know we all love our kids too, of course but there are times when maybe they grate on our nerves so we send them away to play…or let them go to someone’s house to play that we don’t really know.  The enemy will find any way possible to try to ruin your child’s future for the Lord.  Be very protective of your children and where they go.  Keep a close eye on your kids when they are in a public place with people all around.  Evil can happen in a few minutes when we are not looking.  Now, don’t live in fear all the time about this, but do be sober and vigilant because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour!

Ask God if He sees anything in your life that He needs to change to better benefit your children.  Let’s fight together to protect the children!