Hello Parents! Welcome to another month of youth ministry. If nobody has told you today, YOU are exactly the right person to disciple your kids! And YOU got this! All of us at CBC Youth Ministry is cheering you on because we know how hard it is but we know our God can empower you to do what you need to do.

This month we're beginning a lifelong conversation into the world of sexuality, dating, sex, lgbtqia+, and much more. We need to do this because this is the cultural soup we're living in at the current moment and we're doing this because YOUR kids are indeed sexual beings and we want to help you disciple them through their thoughts, questions, doubts, and frustrations. A few ways we're going to think through this is

1. If you have immediate questions and thoughts, please email us at cbcyouthofhouston@gmail.com and we can either answer you questions and provide resources to you directly or we can post our response publicly so others can benefit from the answer.

2. If you would like to strategize with your student's DG leader, we would highly encourage you to do so. They are wise and we trust them to direct you well.

3. This newsletter will provide you with some top-level principles to keep in mind as you walk into this topic with your students. The videos are also a supplement for you to think through and engage with.

We have mentioned this over and over again...much of the issues you and your students will talk through (or argue through) at the bottom of it lies an authority question. And no, i'm not talking about your authority over them but where does authority come from? When talking about sexual ethics, sexual identity, sexual practices...the question we need to think about before we get into the specifics is "Who gets to set the standard here? Who gets the final say? Who is the authority on this subject?"

And if you slow down and think through a lot of those questions first, many times we understand that emotions, peers, and a billion other things serve as the "god" over those issues. But as you know right now, it's not enough to just say, "well God says _____, so there you have it." We'll need to do much more in order to build a worldview that presents God as good, wise, loving, and provincial in order for students to even trust His word. We'll need to establish Scripture as the good, right, final source of authority over and against our own thoughts and cultural progression.

Before we go into the details of sexual ethics, there's a few things we need to remember about this WHOLE thing. It goes well beyond sex and sexuality and it has more to do with God's big plan.

1. God, in his goodness and overflow of love, created man and women in his image so that they may GLORIFY him and ENJOY him forever. That's the big thesis statement for all of this. The beginning is God and the end is God. God is the main character of scripture and God is the hero of this story...not us.

2. Sin, the intentional & willful breaking of God's goodness, has destroyed everything. We are ALL broken and fallen short of the glory of God. We worship the creation rather than the creator. The lust of every single human heart is for selfish desires and we are stuck in the cycle of creating and worship false gods rather than worshipping the true God. Not only are all of US sinners but all parts of us are infected by sin (including our sexuality and desires). All people are broken sexually. This. Is. Crucial. to understand.

3. The Gospel is that Jesus Christ, the second person of the Godhead, willingly, lovingly, graciously came and took on the image of man and show us a better way. He died in our place for our sin so that we may be free. Christ, and Christ alone, is our salvation in life and death. The end goal is not marriage, it is not sexual purity, it is not a healthy and wealthy life (though NONE of those things are inherently wrong in themselves) BUT the end goal is CHRIST. The Christian claims, "Jesus is enough! Jesus is my all! If have nothing and I must sacrifice everything because of Jesus, then that is my life."

You do realize that this conversation about sexuality and romance and love will be a topic that will go on forever right? You will need to have conversations over and over and over again. Some times it'll challenge both of you. Some times it'll end up heated. Some times it'll end up in tears. The goal of discipleship isn't simply to be right, the goal of is to journey with towards Christ. There were so many times Jesus entered in with people and met them where they were at and he listened. Some times he doesn't even give a solution at that moment but he shows them that he hears and he cares and he's there. Now he doesn't just let them do whatever they want, but he invites them in and relays the notion that he is safe to the hurting and questioning and broken. In the Scriptures, he is ALWAYS gentle to the lowly and lost. Blessed are the poor. Blessed are the meek.

Parents, your child will not care about your right answers from you unless they know that you care about them. And this here is going to take a LOT of work over a LOT of time. A way you can continue to communicate this is: “You are not alone, a lot of kids struggle with ________. How can I help you think and process with you through all of this?” Before giving answers or reacting, it is 2039582034x more important to listen and hear where they are coming from (is it a question? Is it a concern? Is it something they’re currently struggling with? Is it a struggle? Be wise in how to respond (do they want feedback? Resources? Prayer? When do they want to talk about it?)

“When straight married couples get married it is NOT that all of their struggles of sexual temptations melt away, rather it is a maturity in Christ and growth of saying NO to outside temptations”….why don’t we extend this to other sexual brokenness? Christian maturity is simply laying down our desires daily to trust Christ over time. God is to be revered and trusted and we can be in right relationships.

Christian who struggle with gender dysphoria, same-sex attracted Christian…they are in our church/families. They are not far from God. We all struggle with sexual sins but how can we ALL walk towards Christ together?