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PARENTS STAGE BOYCOTT OF PLANNED PARENTHOOD’S SEX ED IN SCHOOLS
TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, I want to take you to an article out of PJ Media. “Sex education in public schools has gone off the deep end. Gone are the days of the handing out of birth control devices and showing how they’re used.” Harry, the article goes on to say, “These days, your kids are more likely to come away from school with sexual deviant knowledge thanks to Planned Parenthood’s comprehensive sex education program that has somehow made it into public school curriculums. These programs teach dangerous and violent practices. However, on April 23rd, parents around the nation will be pulling their children out of school for the day in protest of these dangerous practices and uniting at various locations to hold press conferences and field media questions.”
DR. REEDER: Right, if the media will cover this. But it is a reality and because of the parental response, that surfaces something we wanted to talk about today. Now, one of the obvious things that we have to at least mention is something that we referred to in a previous program, the fact that here was an entire political party that ran on a platform of defunding Planned Parenthood and it seems as if what they really meant was, “Well, we’re going to give $500 million to a year to them,” but in September they have an opportunity to undo that.
It was asked in that article how did Planned Parenthood get into the local school systems whereby they have moved from their previous practices of handing out contraceptives and demonstrating their use — we weren’t even going to talk about what they used to do and we certainly can’t talk about what they’re now teaching. What they’re now teaching are the practices that you would find in the darkened halls of various brothels of depraved practices and so we certainly aren’t going to talk about that.
SEEK THE LOCAL SOURCE OF THE PROBLEMS
However, why are they able to teach that in the public school system? Well, that’s not a problem with the federal government and the Congress. That’s a problem with your local government. They allow it because of the infiltration of the Progressives and their election on the school boards and then they are the ones who are promoting this. School board elections should not be ignored. You need to run good candidates who have a concept of what education is actually about and a good philosophy of education that’s rooted in an appropriate world and life view that values the dignity of humanity, the sanctity of marriage, the sanctity of sexuality and the sanctity of life.
I would even go further than that, today, Tom. I would talk about when you see the moral freefall of a culture, Tom, you have to assume that the church of Jesus Christ — and, in this case, I’m speaking of the evangelical church — has either lost its voice or lost its influence because it has either gotten off of mission which is evangelism and discipleship or it has gotten off-message and it is not teaching the whole gospel of God with the spearpoint of the gospel of saving grace in Jesus Christ and this is the way our Lord warned that if the salt loses its saltiness, it is of no value — it’s just thrown out and trodden underfoot.
What we need to ask ourselves is not should we be surprised that the world is actually on the trajectory of Romans 1 from atheism to secularism to pagan worship, which then leads to God giving them over to pagan immorality, as Romans 1 describes, of promiscuity and then perversion in the realm of sexual rebellion and anarchy. The question is where is the church of Jesus Christ in this?
FAMILIES CAN TRANSFORM THEIR CULTURE BY SPEAKING UP
And the answer is not for the church to try to transform the culture — the culture transformation takes place with the church’s focus and one of the areas that the church ought to focus in its evangelism and discipleship is in parenting and that is the strength of the family. And, if there were stronger marriages and families being nurtured within the church based upon the gospel, directed and taught by the Word of God and therefore those marriages engage in parenting that’s making a difference and children making a difference.
And then, parents, if they’re in the public school system, speaking to the system when it raises itself up in opposition to these sanctities of life such as marriage, family and sexuality and then also when it invades the realm of parental rights by overriding parental instruction. If believers were functioning the way they ought to, it doesn’t take a lot of salt to affect the entire system or the impact in a school system.
And then, of course, in some cases, parents have said, “No, we’re not going to sacrifice our children to Moloch. We’re not going to let you put the marks of Moloch on our children as you desire to do in this ideologically-driven public school system. We’re going to raise our children and take hold of their education.” And some of them will use private schools, some Christian schools and some are doing home schools and home school co-ops — I meet that all the time.
Tom, could I just maybe conclude our program today by not only applauding these parents who are saying no to this mind-numbing and heart-devastating ideology that Planned Parenthood brings under the guise of sex education.
PRACTICAL TIPS FOR PARENTS
Let me just give you five things quickly, as parents, that you can move ahead in as Christian parents which would have an effect of salt and light within a society and the culture.
— Your number one responsibility as a parent is to evangelize and then disciple your child. Your child comes to you with a promise from God as a believer. “I’ll be a God to you and to your children after you.” Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you shall be saved, you and your household.” But the promise comes with a means and that means is that you, wrapped in the nurturing ministry of an evangelical faithful church, your number one responsibility is to evangelize your child — that is, to bring your child from being born as a sinner under the judgement of God, yet you have a promise of God working through your parenting and in the family to bring them to a saving knowledge of Christ. And then, upon their confession of Christ, you can kick in the whole dynamic of discipleship so that they learn to love the Lord with all of their heart, soul and mind and their neighbors as themselves.
— The second thing that you need to do is to carry that discipleship out with a full-orbed commitment to the education of that child. And the best roadmap for education is given in the education of Jesus in His childhood. It’s found in Luke 2:52: “And He grew in wisdom, stature, favor with God and favor with man.” In other words, you’re developing their intellectual wisdom that transfers into lifestyle decisions — grow in wisdom. In stature, you are making sure of their physical formation. In favor with God, you’re teaching them the spiritual disciplines of the Word of God: prayer, sacrament, worship, fellowship. “He grew in favor with man,” you’re teaching them Biblical relational and social skills, including the dynamics of marriage and family, church, state and relationships.
— The third thing is that you raise your children to leave you, not cleave to you. You’re not your child’s friend — you are your child’s father or mother and you parent them to cleave to not only Christ, but to a spouse or to cleave to a calling of singleness if that’s what God has given to them.
— You prepare them with a skill for life so that they can engage in work to the glory of God and enjoy the glory of God.
— And then, fifthly, you teach them the Great Commission, their dependence upon the Gospel as the foundation, formation and motivation of life and you then also teach them the Great Commandment — how do you love the Lord your God with all of your heart, soul and mind and how do you love your neighbor as yourself?
As much as we rightly try to speak from a Christian world and life view to the arena of public policy in the public square and how important that is, what we just said is more important than anything else and that is Christian families, Gospel-saturated, embracing a Biblical world and life view where parents are parenting their child. Your friendship with your child will come later.
COMING UP TUESDAY: CULTURAL MARXISM AT WORK IN SOCIETY?
TOM LAMPRECHT: Harry, we are out of time for today. On Tuesday’s edition of Today in Perspective, I want to take you to an article by Michael Walsh, “Cultural Marxist Left Doesn’t Like the Term ‘Cultural Marxism.’”
DR. REEDER: Claiming that it’s a fabrication but the question is, is it a fabrication and, if it is not, what is it, and how does it work and is it at work in our society?
Dr. Harry L. Reeder III is the Senior Pastor of Briarwood Presbyterian Church in Birmingham.
This podcast was transcribed by Jessica Havin, editorial assistant for Yellowhammer News, who has transcribed some of the top podcasts in the country and whose work has been featured in a New York Times Bestseller.
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