In Search of Kingdom Living

Let's talk about sex, baby
Let's talk about you and me
Let's talk about all the good things
And the bad things that may be
Let's talk about sex

Anyone remember this song? I looked it up in the group's biography, and it was released in their third album, Blacks' Magic – in 1989. My goodness, 1989, I was 8 years old… in grade 3. I think I'm beginning to recognize/acknowledge that the biggest contributing factor to my sex education is due to music.

What came first, the music or the misery? People worry about kids playing with guns, or watching violent videos, that some sort of culture of violence will take them over. Nobody worries about kids listening to thousands, literally thousands of songs about heartbreak, rejection, pain, misery and loss. Did I listen to pop music because I was miserable? Or was I miserable because I listened to pop music?

Last week I was invited by Ivan and Anita to help them give a sex talk to the youth in their church. You think public speaking is scary… you think asking someone out is hard to do… well, add up all those awkward/fearful experiences together and you reach the level of fear and trepidation that I felt when doing the prep work for this talk. To make my heart beat even more unevenly, I was told that I would team up with Ivan and would just speak to the guys – 10 to 15 guys MAX. Yeah right. There ended up being 20 to 30 guys, drastically ranging in age, and having no discernable unity in the group (yes yes… but they're united in Christ…).

Before breaking off into gender groups, we showed a clip from the OC. It showed a conversation between two girls discussing whether one of them should have sex with some guy. The girl goes looking for the guy, sees him locking lips with someone else, and runs off to be with another guy. I hope we didn't get into trouble for showing some skin in a church. Next part of the night was the fun part.

So here am I sitting in a circle of 20-30 guys and without dilly-dallying, we go straight into the heart of the matter. I shared briefly about my struggles, how I was first exposed to sexually explicit material at a young age, and how the need to satisfy this sexual hunger still exists today and often causes me to stumble.

Then, of course, we start talking about something close to all guys and their hearts: video games. Specifically, we talked about GTA San Andreas and the sex mod issue. Basically, GTA is a game rated mature (17+) and the point of the game is to go around and steal cars and beat up people and potentially pick up girls as trophies of sorts. The point of controversy is that a group of hackers created a patch that can modify the game so that you can have sex with these girls. Many people have protested and now the game is pulled out of most stores until it can be re-rated with an AO rating (Adults Only). For more info check out this link.

Another relevant controversy involved Jessica Simpson and her new music video – 'These boots are made for walking'. Because Simpson is a professed Christian (and being a pastor's kid), many Christian groups have protested against the video – saying that she's degrading herself, etc. If you want to read about it, check out this link.

The main talk about the night centered around the diverse opinions that the guys had about specific issues. Collectively, we tried to define sex and it was difficult. There were many little nuances in our collaborative effort and if I had forced us to come to a common definition of sex, I don't think anyone of us could fully agree with every other guy about said definition.

The diversity of thought really began to be seen when I wrote out PT's scale of physicality. Basically, from a scale ranging from talking, holding hands, hugging… all the way to actual penetration in a sexual act – In this scale where physical things happen in a relationship, where do you think sex begins? Let's just say there were a variety of answers as I took a census from all the guys (one guy HAD TO give the standard bible answer – 'isn't lusting in your heart part of sex? so communication is the beginning of the act of sex').

On a side note, I had a similar conversation with some people in my softball team… and again there was a variety of answers. Didn't help that the table beside us was an elderly couple just frowning at us… haha.

Next, Ivan drew a different scale where he demonstrated the different standards between guys and girls. Generally, guys would want to commit physically earlier then emotionally. So if a girl wants a higher level of emotional commitment, the guy begins to think that the girl feels they are further along in the relationship. He starts feeling agitated because he doesn't understand how she can be so far ahead in the relationship as compared to him. The reverse can generally be said about girls – they want to commit emotionally earlier then physically. Of course these are generalizations but I saw many guys have that 'Ah-ha' look on their faces.

The tough part of the night was when we started speaking about the effects of lust, especially exhibited through porn and masturbation. The room suddenly became more quiet than usual, and I'm thankful that several of the older guys were still able to speak about the issues at hand. Most of the conversation than became standard 'don't judge' talks, and let's help one another by creating a more open community where such talks are not taboo.

Some resources that were valuable to me in preparing for this part of the night include the following:

Pornography
XXXChurch
They claim to be the "#1 Christian porn site". They have a very unique ministry and it would be so great if more of us can approach struggles like lust in an open manner such as them.

Masturbation
youth specialities article
Dobson's view
Variety of perspectives

My closing thoughts and observations.

When talking about sex, lust and all that goes with it, people are always interested. But, for these issues, it's hard to move from general interest to personal sharing. I found that to be the case with the talk. It was easy for us as guys to joke around, having 'locker room chats'. I was pleasantly surprised that we could even handle a more mature approach and try to look at issues like masturbation objectively. But, having to cross the line from 3rd party observer to be a personal confessor and fellow struggler – that's hard.

In trying to gauge how effective the conversation was throughout the night, I was constantly looking at facial expressions and other non-verbal clues. I still remember this one younger guy who didn't look up the whole night, just kinda stared at his feet and playing with his chair. I remember the awkwardness of that age, and hopefully in the future if I have to share more about sex,etc. I will keep people like him in mind.

I'm thankful that at the end of the night, one older guy approached me and said that people brought up great issues in our conversations. He asked if I could go and speak to his sunday school class… haha (instead, I should talk to MY ss class about this stuff). What was even more surprising is that he brought a seeker friend. I think the talk was constructive and was the beginning of removing any barriers of honesty/judging that people may have with one another.

I'm hopeful that these guys can continue to grow together and really desire to speak the truth in love to one another. A common thread in our conversations was that the church needs to be more open, more loving and less condemning (not necessarily less sexually restrictive). It will have to start with these guys forging a brotherhood amongst themselves.

On a totally different note, I've been officially accepted into Tyndale as a fulltime student pursuing a Masters of Divinity with majors in Christian Education and Theology. We'll see if I can stick to this double major craziness.

Man… who needs to lie down?

Tune in again after a nice, long, vacation of the mind.