Maintaining Purity

Bob:  Your children probably know the story from Genesis about Joseph; right?  About his conflict with his brothers, his coat of many colors; but do they know the story found in Chapter 39?  Here’s Dennis Rainey.

Dennis:  Potiphar was a high-ranking official in the king’s army.

Potiphar:  Uh hoob-adooba-daba-doo.

Group:  Wroo.

Potiphar:  Uh dabadoobadabadoo.

Group:  Wroo, wroo.

Dennis:  And so his wife had all kinds of authority.

Wife:  [High-pitched]  Rah budda budda budda budda riahhh.

Dennis:  And she had a lot of free time.

Man:  Ooh hoo hoo hoo hooah.

Dennis:  And so she kept trying to seduce Joseph.

Man:  Doo doo-e-ooo doo.

Dennis:  She was after Joseph, sexually.

Man:  ah oo ah oo ah oo o-ee-o-oo

Dennis:  Joseph was a pure man, and he resisted her temptations.

Wife:  [High-pitched] Uh huh?

Joseph:  Hunh-uh.

Wife:  Uh huh?

Joseph:  Hunh uh.

Wife:  Uh huh?

Joseph:  Hunh uh.

Wife:  Uh huh? [Insistently]

Joseph:  Hunh uh.  [Forcefully]

Wife:  Uh huh huh huh!

Joseph:  Hunh uh unh huh!

Dennis:  But she kept on coming on to him, and trying to entice him, and seduce him, and finally—

Wife:  Whoo ooh.

Joseph:  Hunh uh.  Hunh uh!

Dennis:  —she grabbed a piece of his clothing as he was trying to run away. [Ripping sound and distressed garbled voices]  Joseph went ahead and ran away—[Road Runner^®—beep-beep, vroom]—because he was fleeing sexual immorality.  Joseph had convictions, he had boundaries, he had standards; and he stood by them.

Bob:  And welcome to FamilyLife Today.  Thanks for joining us on the Thursday edition.

Dennis:  I think that was an Arabian bee.

Bob:  I’ve never heard—

Dennis:  Me me mee me—me me—

Bob:  I’ve never heard the story of Joseph and Potiphar’s wife told quite like that, with those sound effects; but that’s actually from the brand-new, revised Passport2Purityresource that we put together for parents to use with their children.  The goal of this is for moms and dads to be able to have a getaway weekend, father/son, mother/daughter—just the two of you getting away for your own personal experience and to listen—as you’re off doing something fun together—listen to some sessions that will help your son or daughter get ready for the adolescent years.

If your son or daughter is nine, or ten, or 11, or 12—and I know you’re still looking at them going, “No, they’re still so young, and so pure, and so innocent,”—but the reality is—the culture is working really hard to try to keep them from being young, and pure, and innocent.  You’ve got to get on the other side of the ball and say, “I’m going to have the conversation with my child before the culture does;” right?

Dennis:  Yes.  And more than likely, even if you do have this conversation with your ten-, 11-, 12-year-old, in some regards, you’re still going to be playing catch-up because the culture is just creeping in at younger and younger ages.  Peer pressure is real, and you can’t control all of the interactions, socially, that your son or daughter has with their peers.

This weekend getaway is something you host.  It’s not something FamilyLife puts on.  We create the kit and make you look like a hero.

Bob:  And we first created this kit about 15 years ago.  We have just recently refreshed it, updated it.  In fact, it’s gotten a complete makeover.  The team has done a great job in putting this together.  Our hope is that there would be tens of thousands of moms and dads going out, this summer, with a son or a daughter to have one of these getaway experiences—on a Passport2Purity getaway weekend.

Over the course of the days you’re away, as you listen to these CDs together, it’s going to open the door for conversations about peer pressure, about the “birds and the bees”, about how the body changes when you go through adolescence.  Session Four is all about the whole issue of purity.  “How do you define purity?  What are your standards going to be?  How do you decide, in advance, where to draw the line in these areas?”

One of the cool things about Passport2Purity—we’re going to give parents, today, a chance to hear a little portion of what you hear as you do a Passport2Purityweekend with your son or your daughter.  One of the cool things about the new version of Passport2Purity is we’ve included some young adults, some high school students, college students, and young couples—talking about their choices, about their experiences, about the mistakes they made, and about the good choices they made.

I’ll tell you, when these younger voices come on the CD, your son or your daughter locks in. 

Dennis:  Right.  That’s right.

Bob:  They pay attention to what these young people are saying to them.  In fact, we start Session Four with a young couple talking about their experience as they were first attracted to one another, and then as they started dating, and then as they headed toward marriage.

[Audio Clip]

Tim:  I’m Tim.

Anna:  I’m Anna, and I’m 24 years old.

Tim:  And I’m 26 years old.  And my wife is the most beautiful woman I have ever met.

Anna:  What do you want me to say about you?  That you’re a stud muffin?  [Laughter]

Tim:  Anna was actually one of my sister’s best friends.

Anna:  He was just Abby’s brother.  He was just this boy that was my friend’s brother, basically.  It was like we knew each other, but it was kind of, “Ehhh” – like I’d just see him sometimes—“Hi; bye.”

Tim:  The start of our junior year of high school—somehow that changed.  We went on our junior trip to Washington DC.  I knew of her character and I knew that she was somebody that I could definitely see myself dating and marrying because, as a 16-year-old, I was thinking—you know—marriage already.  I knew who she was as a person.  I mean, I guess it was a pretty natural thing for us to progress into a dating relationship.

Anna:  I think—well, for both of us, I know communicate.  We both have always been communicating with our parents.  My dad’s always been really good about communicating with me.  He had standards and expectations, and it was really important to me to respect that.  He’s the dad.  He’s the man in my life because knowing—even though it doesn’t always make sense—he is doing it to protect me.

We didn’t kiss for a long time, and that was a weird thing because I know junior year people are making out and doing all that kind of stuff.  We just chose not to start it.  Then, our parents would pop in while we were watching movies—

Tim:  Mm hmm—a lot of awkward moments.

Anna:  Lot of surprise—like, just come in—I mean.

Tim:  But good.

Anna:  Yes.  Siblings would be around all the time.  So that held us accountable, too.

Tim:  And mostly just through high school is when our parents had the most influence.  Once we went to college it was more—

Anna:  We had that foundation set, and it was just—

Tim:  We had that foundation set—

Anna:  It was what it was.

Tim:  Once we got to college, we needed to adjust some things because our parents weren’t really around.  I think it was more of a team effort.  Like if one of us was feeling a little more vulnerable or something, the other one would be, “You know, let’s remember that we’re not married.  We need to just remain pure.”  We would encourage each other, back and forth, and relied on God.  There was a lot of prayer, and just communication with Anna.  We struggled still.  We’re human.

Anna:  But we wanted to be able to honestly say to our kids, “It’s hard, but we did it.  We waited.”  And we can say that.  I mean, I just never questioned his love for me because there was just never any question of his integrity.  I just trusted him because he’d never given me any reason not to.

Tim:  It’s definitely worth it.  God rewards those who are faithful to Him, faithful to His Word.  So maybe we missed out of three or four years of sex; but in the grand scheme of life, we’re married, and God is blessing our marriage, and He’s going to bless others through our story.  It’s incredibly worth it.

Anna:  Yes.

Tim:  I wouldn’t change it for the world.

Dennis:  Isn’t that a great story?  That young man and woman understood the importance of pursuing sexual purity in their relationship.  As a result, they were able to reap the rewards for following God’s plan for sex in their marriage.  Even though it’s a long way off for you, isn’t that cool?  The decisions you make right now are going to impact what you enjoy later on in your marriage.

Now, turn in your journal to page 40 and follow along as we talk about the meaning of purity.  One of the things I want to say to you is I want to congratulate you that you survived that last session when we talked about sex.  Good job.  Thanks for hanging in there.  And in this session, we want you to understand more about what it means to pursue purity in this area of your life.

Here’s the deal:  God really does want the very best for you in every area of your life—and that means in the sexual area, as well.

Barbara:  It’s easy to think that pursuing purity means just not having sex, but it’s so much more than that.  It begins in your heart and in your mind.  Listen to this verse from Proverbs 4:23.

Girl:  “Guard your heart with all diligence, for from it flow the springs of life.”

Barbara:  Guarding your heart means you’re protecting it from harmful influences.  You’re careful about what you look at, what you listen to, what you allow your mind to think about, and you’re careful about the people that you hang out with.

Dennis:  It really is important, and one of the keys to guarding your heart is to understand the importance of establishing good solid boundaries.  What I mean by that is deciding, in advance, where you’re going to draw the line in keeping your heart pure and protecting it, as well.

Barbara:  Well, God has made it really clear to us what His boundaries are.  That’s the good news.  Your purity, as a young man or a young woman, is very important to God.

Girl:  Second Timothy 2:22, “Flee youthful passions.”

Boy:  First Corinthians 6:18, “Flee from sexual immorality.”

Barbara:  Both of those verses use the same word, “flee”, which means to run away from any form of sexual wrongdoing.  And then there’s this verse—

Girl:  First Thessalonians 4:3, “For this is the will of God, your sanctification, that you abstain from sexual immorality.”

Barbara:  It’s really clear in that verse that it is God’s will for you, as a young man or a young  woman, that you stay away from sexual immorality—that you avoid and don’t participate in any sexual affection prior to marriage.

Now, let me give you three points about this.  Number one, you need to trust God and what He says in His Word—that participating in sexual activity before marriage is, in fact, dangerous.  Trust Him when He says, “Abstain from sexual immorality.” 

And then number two, God doesn’t say, “No,” to sex.  He says, “Yes,” to sex—but according to His design.  And when is that design?  He wants you to experience this gift in marriage.  He’s telling us, “Wait for the plan that I have for you.”

And then number three, God wants you to be sexually pure when you enter into your marriage, someday in the future.

Dennis:  I can hear you asking, at this point, “What in the world is sexual purity?  What are you talking about here?”  Well, I’m not going to answer it fully right now, but it means going nowhere near the edge of that cliff.  It means to save the gift, that special gift of your virginity that God’s given you, until you can give it to another person within the commitment and the covenant relationship of marriage.

And let me promise you something—when you do that, when you hold on to your standards—first of all, you’re not going to experience the shame, the guilt, the emotional scars that come with wrong choices.  You’re going to have a clear conscience.  In fact, there’s not going to be any chance of somebody getting pregnant.  Also, there are some very serious diseases that you can get if you’re involved in sex outside of marriage.  Some of those diseases can even kill you.  If you don’t have sex before marriage, you’re not going to get those diseases. 

God wants you to pursue sexual purity in your life and to flee every kind of sexual immorality to protect yourself from the dangers and also enjoy the gift of sex as He intended it to be enjoyed, later on in marriage.  What’s the most important thing for you to remember?  If you protect your virginity, you will be obeying God and you’ll be pleasing Him.  That’s why you’re going to need to establish boundaries and flee immorality.

[You Are Not Your Own] 

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price,

So glorify God, glorify God in your body. 

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price,

So glorify God, glorify God in your body. 

You are not your own, you are not your own.

You are not your own, for you were bought with a price,

So glorify God, glorify God in your body. 

You are not your own, you were bought with a price,

So glorify God, glorify God in your body.

You are not your own, you are not your own.

Glorify God, glorify God, glorify God in your body.

Dennis:  How do you keep your way pure?  How do you keep your sexual affections asleep until it’s time to wake them up?  Right now your sexual affections are asleep.

[Snoring sounds]  You don’t have to wake them up.  They’re going to be waking up here before long.  Look back in your journal at Point 1.  The first thing to do to keep your way pure is by thinking the right things.  Colossians 3:2 is really a good verse.

Child:  “Set your minds on things that are above, not on things that are on earth.”

Dennis:  God has given us a wonderful thing in our minds.  It’s powerful; but we can fill our minds with the wrong thoughts about romance, about girls and boys and their bodies and what they look like, and what sex is all about.

Barbara:  Yes, and, in fact, there are lots of things on the internet that can lead you to think wrong things about the opposite sex.  There are lots of computer and video games that are not healthy.  There are movies, and music, and television shows that aren’t healthy that are going to tempt you to fill your mind with wrong thoughts.  Once you see and hear those voices and they get stored in your brain—well, it’s like we used to say to our children all the time, “Garbage in; garbage out.” 

The point is, if you put things that are unhealthy and wrong in your mind, it’s like putting garbage in your brain.  And when you fill your brain with lots of garbage, that’s what you’re going to think about all the time.  So, you have a choice to control what you put in your brain and, therefore, what you think about.

Dennis:  Colossians 3 is just trying to warn us and guide us.  We should not allow our minds to dwell on these things.  Instead, if you want to keep your way pure, then think right things in your mind.

A second way that you can keep your life pure is by guarding your heart.

Barbara:  Now, if you’ll remember, a few minutes ago, we talked about this verse.  It’s Proverbs 4:23.  You might want to think about memorizing this one.  It says, “Watch over your heart with all diligence, for from it (from your heart) flow the springs of life.” 

Now picture that just for a second.  [Nature sounds]  Your heart is like a spring—a spring of water—fresh and clear.  You don’t want to dump poison into that spring of water.  You want to keep it pure so that it provides refreshment for your life.

Dennis:  Another good verse is Psalm 119, verses 9 through 11.

Girl 1:  “How can a young man keep his way pure?  By guarding it according to Your Word.”

Girl 2:  “With my whole heart I seek You.  Let me not wander from Your commandments.”

Girl 3:  “I have stored up Your Word in my heart, that I might not sin against You.”

Dennis:  One of the ways you keep your heart pure is by storing up God’s Word in your heart.  You memorize it, you meditate on it, you think about it, you let it control and direct your choices.  And if you do, it will protect you from sin and help you guard your virginity.

A third way that you can maintain your purity is to look at the right things.  That means paying attention to what your eyes are gazing at.  I love Psalm 101, verse three—

Child:  “I will not set before my eyes anything that is worthless.  I hate the work of those who fall away.  It shall not cling to me.”

Dennis:   Now I want to tell you a great story about my son, Benjamin, who was in junior high at the time.  He was eating his lunch out of a sack lunch, in the back of a classroom, when some of his buddies brought in a pornographic magazine to the teacher’s desk.  They began to open the pages, and began to gawk, and gaze at the pictures of this magazine.

Well, at a point, they looked at Benjamin in the back of the class and said, “Hey, come on up here and look at this with us.”  And as Benjamin was telling me this story, I’ll never forget—I leaned forward and said, “Son, what did you do?”  He said, “Well, I got my sandwich, wrapped it back up in the paper that it had been wrapped in, put it back in the bag.”  He paused and he said, “And I walked out of the classroom.”  Now, I have to tell you, at that point, it was like Benjamin had just scored the winning touchdown in the Super Bowl. 

[Crowd cheering]  I went crazy!  I said, “Way to go, son!  That’s what you did?”  Well, you know why I did that?—because he had protected the purity of his heart and his eyes.  If you’re careful about what you look at, that’s going to help you stay a long way away from the edge of the cliff.

[Studio]

Bob:  That’s a great illustration and a great conversation for a father and a son to have—for a mother and a daughter to have—and yet, in reality, it would be an awkward conversation to have if you didn’t have a way of setting that up.  That’s part of what the whole Passport2Purity experience is all about.

We’ve tried to create a way for a father and a son, a mom and a daughter to listen together to you and Barbara talking about these issues.  But our goal really is that when the CD is done, that’s just the beginning of the conversation; right?

Dennis:  Right.  The whole premise here is built around Proverbs—the phrase that you hear repeatedly in Proverbs, “Hear my son my teachings,” and “your mother’s teaching and instruction.”  Why?  Listen to me.  Because one of the greatest and holiest privileges you have as a father or as a mother is that of instructing your son or your daughter about how they’re going to handle some of the most basic instincts of life and how they’re going to navigate some of the most tempting, challenging days they’ll ever face. 

It is a privilege, and I’ll tell you, the Passport2Purity weekend kit, that we put together, sets you up to be a winner with your son or daughter and sets you up to continue a conversation, all the way through adolescence, into adulthood.

Bob:  And I think every parent listening knows inside, “I need to have these conversations.”

Dennis:  We just don’t know how to do it.

Bob:  That’s right, and the kit gives you a way to do it easily, to do it comfortably, to do it where it’s fun, and where the door gets opened up for a lifetime of ongoing conversation.  Again, our hope would be that, over the course of the summer, there would be tens of thousands of parents who would be taking sons or daughters off for one of these Passport2Purity weekend experiences.

If you have a son or a daughter, who is nine, or ten, or 11, or 12, or 13, and you’ve never had this kind of a getaway time with that young man or that young woman, now is the time to do it.  Go to FamilyLifeToday.com for more information about Passport2Purity.  FamilyLifeToday.com—you can order from us online, if you’d like; or call 1-800-FL-TODAY; 1-800-358-6329; that’s 1-800-“F” as in family, “L” as in life, and then the word, “TODAY”.

Now, all this month, one of the things that we’re asking our FamilyLife Today listeners to consider is whether you would make a donation to help support this ministry.  The reason why that’s important this month is because we had some friends of the ministry who have come to us, excited about what is coming—about things like Passport2Purity, and about the Stepping Up^®video series for men, and the upcoming Stepping Up National Men’s Simulcast on August 4^th. 

They know, that with all of this going on, we’re also headed into a time of year when donations to our ministry typically decline.  That happens during the summer months.  They said, “Let’s see if we can encourage people to make a donation now so you guys will be in good shape during the summer.”  They’ve agreed to match every donation we receive this month, dollar for dollar, up to a total of $650,000. 

That’s why we’re asking you to be as generous as you can be this month.  Make a donation online at FamilyLifeToday.com, or call us at 1-800-FLTODAY.  Know that when you do that, whatever you donate, we’re going to receive additional funds—matching funds—because of your donation.  Again, our website is FamilyLifeToday.com; or you can call to make a donation at 1-800-FL-TODAY.  We appreciate you.  Thanks for your support of this ministry.  It’s great to have you as partners with us in what God is doing here through FamilyLife Today.

Now, tomorrow, we want to talk about dating because your son or daughter may not be interested in dating right now—but trust me—the time is coming when he or she will have that very much on his or her mind.  We’re going to talk about how you can prepare your child now for what they’re going to be interested in later.  Hope you can be with us for that.

I want to thank our engineer today, Keith Lynch, and our entire broadcast production team.  On behalf of our host, Dennis Rainey, I'm Bob Lepine.  We will see you back next time for another edition of FamilyLife Today. 

FamilyLife Today is a production of FamilyLife of Little Rock, Arkansas. 

Help for today.  Hope for tomorrow.

^©Song:  You Are Not Your Own

Artist:     Seeds Family Worship

Album:   Purity (Seeds Youth) (p) 2012 Seeds Family Worship

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Copyright ^© 2012 FamilyLife.  All rights reserved.

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