Saving Our Children

The Bible, from beginning to end, unequivocally stresses the importance of caring for and protecting our children. Deuteronomy 6 required the Jews to teach their children regularly, extensively, intensively, and faithfully, that it might be well with the Israelites when they entered the land God had promised to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob. The Psalmist expressed the Lord’s view of children. “Lo, children are an heritage of the Lord: and the fruit of the womb is his reward. As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man who has his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate” (Psa. 127:3-5).

The New Testament is no less explicit on the value of children. The disciples of Christ, like little boys, were disputing about who was the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Jesus called a little child to him and set the child in the midst of them. He urged his disciples: “Verily I say unto you, Except you be converted, and become as little children, you shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven. Whosoever therefore shall humble himself as this little child, the same is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receives me. But whosoever shall offend one of these little ones who believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea” (Mt. 18:1-6). Incidentally, if children were born in sin, why would Jesus use a child as a model for his followers?

In his letter to the churches at Ephesus and at Colosse, Paul discussed the importance of following God’s instructions in the rearing of children. “Children, obey your parents in the Lord: for this is right. Honor your father and mother; (which is the first commandment with promise); that it may be well with you, and you may live long on the earth. And, you fathers, provoke not your children to wrath: but bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord” (Eph. 6:1-4). “Children, obey your parents in all things: for this is well pleasing unto the Lord. Fathers, provoke not your children to anger, lest they be discouraged” (Col. 3:20-21). I have read these passages from the Old Testament and from the New to provide a foundation for our study today on the topic: “Saving Our Children.”

The study demands that I answer three questions: Saving our children form what? Saving our children for what? And, how do we save our children? The expression, “saving our children,” implies that there are certain elements in our society that threaten the physical, moral, and spiritual welfare of our children. It is simply not possible to examine every modern threat to America’s children and young people, but I shall briefly outline some phases of modern society that constitute grave dangers to our children.

Do you have any idea how many of our children drink and use other dangerous drugs? The Tennessean (Wednesday, Feb. 27, 2002) published a brief article entitled “Underage drinking now epidemic, Califano says.” In case you have forgotten, Joseph Califano, Jr. served the federal government for a number of years in the Carter administration. Since leaving government, he has devoted his life to teaching children and young people about the dangers of alcohol and of other drugs. The article in the paper says that nearly one third of all high school students binge drink at least once a month. Binge drinking for males means four to five drinks back to back. For girls, binge drinking would be three to four drinks within a very short period. Do our high school children know how extremely dangerous such drinking is? The young people who drink that much can die of acute alcohol poisoning. In addition, they can kill themselves and others when they drive after they have indulged in binge drinking. And oddly enough, many young people, and older ones as well, think they are better drivers with a few drinks under their belts than when they are completely sober. Califano says that children and young people between the ages of twelve and twenty account for 25% of all alcoholic beverages that are consumed in the United States (p. 13-A).

Dewayne Hickman, a popular syndicated columnist, wrote an article on binge drinking among college students. His article in The Tennessean (Monday, April 1, 2002) has the title, “Colleges must get a handle on binge drinking.” Hickman tells of a student at the University of Maryland who lapsed into coma after drinking at a fraternity party. He died four days later as a result of binge drinking. Hickman says that binge drinking in sorority and fraternity houses is epidemic. About 75% of the students in those houses engaged in binge drinking compared to about 44% of students who did not belong to sororities and fraternities. Binge drinking at women’s colleges rose almost 125% between 1993 and 2001. Hickman deplores what is occurring on American college campuses. He says very plainly and succinctly, “This has got to change” (p. 9-A).

I have no doubts about Dewayne Hickman’s honesty, but he is naïve if he thinks any of this will change in the near future. Alcohol is available in every town and city in the United States. If children are too young to buy alcoholic beverages, they can always get some stupid adult to buy them. The majority of college young people have seen the adults in their lives--their parents, their neighbors, their favorite stars on television and in the movies, and even their religious leaders--consuming beverage alcohol. I had a friend in Georgia tell me that the preacher at the church he attended drank more at fellowship gatherings than any other member of that church. How effective could parents be in telling their children about the evils of strong drink when their preacher or priest was the heaviest drinker in the congregation? Do you wonder why millions of Americans--including hundreds of thousands of high school and college students--become drunks and alcoholics?

Are we doing enough to save our children from the ravages of beverage alcohol? Tragically, one family in the city of Nashville lost a handsome young man to strong drink. He was killed in an accident after he and his friends had been drinking. The mother explained: “We taught him about the dangers of drugs. We talked with him about sexual promiscuity. But we never thought of warning him of the dangers of drinking.” I grieve for those parents in the loss of their child, but how could parents fail to teach their child about strong drink? They almost certainly watch television, read the newspaper, and go to church somewhere. Do they not read of the tragic deaths of those who have been drinking and driving? Has their preacher or priest or rabbi been silent on the evils of strong drink? All students of the word should be familiar with this powerful verse: “Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging: and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise” (Prov. 20:1). And do those parents not know what alcohol did to Gordon McRae, Doc Severinsen, Congressman Wilbur Mills of Arkansas, Billy Carter, Sid Caesar, Jason Robards, and a host of other capable Americans? Ignorance on the damages alcohol does to the brain and to other organs in the human body is inexcusable. And did you know that the founder of Mothers Against Drunk Driving actually went to work for the sleazy beverage industry? What was it Paul said about the love of money (1 Tim. 6:10)?

Parents and others who love and work with children and young people must be deeply concerned about the damaging effects of pornography. Pornography reduces women to sexual objects, makes addicts of those who use it regularly, interferes with the sexual functioning of men in the marriage relationship and contributes to the abuse of women and children. Most of the men who abuse children have been accumulating pornographic materials for years. Tragically, many of the children whom men sexually abuse develop a warped view of sex and live to abuse others, that is, if they do not die at the hands of their abusers. Do our children need to be protected against some of the most perverted and immoral characters who ever lived? You know we have an obligation to save our children form pornography.

And yet our all-wise Supreme Court has virtually legalized child pornography. The very liberal and very foolish members of the Court--Anthony Kennedy, John Paul Stevens, Ruth Bader Ginsberg, and Steven Breyer and others--rendered a decision that will have severe moral repercussions in the years ahead. They decided that actual children cannot be used in pornographic movies, but computer-generated children can be. Do they not know or do they not care, that lustful young men and older ones as well will use the virtual children to whet their ungodly appetites and to seduce innocent children into destructive sexual behavior? And yet, the infallible editors of The Tennessean (Wednesday, April 17, 2002) published a very foolish article approving the decision of the Court. I wonder if any of the editorial writers of Nashville’s largest newspaper have children or grandchildren. How are they going to react if one of their children is abused and even killed by the sleazy characters who consume virtual child pornography--pornography, incidentally, that the editorial writers approve or, at least, do not disapprove? Are the editorial writers not wise enough to know that those who do not oppose pornography--whether child or otherwise--support it? The influence of such articles will have a decidedly detrimental effect on our children. Such foolish thinking probably will cause some of them to lose their lives to pedophiles. It can also cause them to be lost eternally.

As parents, as teachers, and as religious leaders, we have a moral obligation to save our children from the teachings of secular humanism, including its emphasis on evolution, on atheism, and on freedom from following any absolute moral values. We must warn our children about the immoral values that are promoted on television, on the Internet, and in the movies. Do we want our children to follow the advice of the people who perform on MTV and on similar programs? How can reasonable people approve of calling mothers and wives prostitutes, of encouraging the killing of one’s sexual partners and policemen and of committing other crimes? Do parents know that many children and young people imitate the violence they see on television, in the Internet, and in the movies? Do they believe they have an obligation to speak to their children about these matters and to use their voices against such evils? Do parents and other influential people in children’s lives not know that silence can be sinful?

Now that I have given a brief glimpse into some of the dangers our children face, it is time to answer the question: “Saving our children for what?” I have given you some insight into the answer to that question when I read from Ephesians 6. God wants it to be well with us while we live in this world. He desires that his creatures avoid the heartaches and headaches that come from the use of alcohol beverages. You know he does not want anyone to become a drunk or an alcoholic. He demands that we keep our bodies morally pure and free from debilitating illnesses. How can we use our bodies to serve him and one another if they are racked from pain because of some foolish behavior, such as drinking and using other drugs? If we have developed cirrhosis of the liver from drinking or lung cancer from smoking, our ability to serve the living God may be severely limited.

God wants parents, school teachers, preachers, and other leaders to help our children avoid sexually transmitted diseases such as syphilis, gonorrhea, genital herpes, and AIDS. What an absolute shame that thousands and thousands of otherwise fine young people have destroyed their usefulness by sexual promiscuity! One million young women become pregnant out-of-wedlock every year in the United States. Many of those girls will have little or no support to take care of their children. They will have to quit high school or college or never even start to college. They will miss out on advanced education. They and their children will likely live in poverty. And, tragically, the children are far more likely to be uneducated, use alcohol and other drugs, become involved in criminal activities, and engage in sexual promiscuity at very young ages. Many of the boys will be imprisoned because they do not have fathers to love and to guide them. The girls will become pregnant--not necessarily because they prefer to be sexually immoral--but because they are seeking the love of a father they never knew.

As vital as it is to prevent our children from getting into trouble with the law and to prevent them from destroying themselves through stupid behavior such as gambling, drinking, committing fornication, and engaging in homosexual conduct, that is really only a part of a larger problem. If there be no life to come, there would be no basis for opposing any choices young people or older people make. I remember a s country song which advocated a purely humanistic goal: “Live fast, die young and leave a beautiful memory.” The ancient Epicurean philosophers preached: “Eat, drink, and be merry. For tomorrow you die.” Based on the philosophy of secular humanism, no one can condemn any kind of behavior. All he can consistently say is: “I do not like for people to drink or use drugs or engage in premarital or extramarital sex or to rob banks or to kill innocent children.” The secular humanist can never consistently say “never” or “always.”

What if your beloved child achieves personal and professional success, but dies separated from God and from the saints of all the ages--do you believe God and right-thinking people would praise you for what you had done for your child? Molly and I want our sons to be successful in their chosen careers. We especially pray that they will be good fathers and husbands and have wonderful families. But if they do all of that and miss heaven, what is the ultimate meaning of it all? Incidentally, that was one of the questions the book of Ecclesiastes was designed to answer. The author of that book sought happiness and fulfillment through worldly wisdom; through wine, women, and song; through great wealth; and through worldly power. He wrote concerning all of those attempts to find joy: They are all vanity and striving after the wind. Then what is the real meaning of life? Please listen to the answer God has provided through his word. “Let us hear the conclusion of the whole matter: Fear God, and keep his commandments: for this is the whole duty of man. For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good, or whether it be evil” (Eccl. 12:13-14). Incidentally, the word “duty” does not appear in the original Hebrew. The inspired writer said very plainly: “Fear God and keep his commandments; for this is the whole of man.”

But how do we go about the task of saving our children from body-contaminating and soul-destroying sin and for eternity with God? In the beginning of our lesson today, I referred briefly to Deuteronomy 6. Will you please listen to a few verses from that powerful passage? “And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might. And these words, which I command you this day, shall be in your heart: and you shall teach them diligently unto your children, and you shall talk of them when you sit in your house, and when you walk by the way, and when you lie down, and when you rise up. And you shall bind them for a sign upon your hand, and they shall be as frontlets between your eyes. And you shall write them upon the posts of your house” (Dt. 6:5-9).

As you can easily discern from a careful reading of scripture, God expects parents to provide whatever information the children need to grow into maturity in Christ. Parents have an obligation to teach their children at home, but they must take them to all the services of the church. Please notice that I emphasized the word “take,” not “send,” your children to the services of the church. Parents who send but do not take their children to the services of the church are telling their children they ought to go to worship, but, like their parents, they will soon grow out of that responsibility. If you think children do not understand that message, you are not properly estimating the intelligence of children. Children learn from what their parents tell them, but they learn more from what they see in their parents.

Christian parents must work at instilling in their children a desire to live for God in this world so they will live with him forever in the world to come. Is that an easy task in view of the negative influences that exist in our world? You know it is not, but it probably is easier than it was for parents who lived under the cruel Roman Empire or in the Soviet Union or for those who live in Communist China. But who said that living for God and teaching our children to love and to obey him would ever be easy?

None of this should be presented in a morbid way. But living for God in this world is really the only life that has eternal promises and blessings. The apostle Paul informed his Corinthian readers of some of the heartaches they would suffer. He knew the outward man would perish, but the inward man would endure. “For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, works for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory. While we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things that are not seen: for the things that are seen are temporal; but the things that are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. 4:17-18). I urge you to do all within your power to help your children to avoid the tragedies of sin and to seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness (Mt. 6:33).

Winford Claiborne

The International Gospel Hour

P.O. Box 118

Fayetteville, TN 37334