Category: Personal Reflections (Page 7 of 11)

Yesterday, I talked about how I structure my prayer time.  Today, I want to explain the system I use to keep track of prayer requests.

For years I searched for a tool that would help me to organize my prayer life.  I felt that I needed to be faithful in praying for others, but how do you manage so many names?  Some people do it “on the fly”, from memory or as God brings people’s names to mind.  Others are more proactive and make lists.  I’ve tried just about every system imaginable: index card file boxes, paper printouts, dog tag lists, Palm Pilots, Google Docs, etc.  I just wanted to find something that was flexible, customizable but easy to use, and backed up online.  I even tried some prayer apps, but none of them did all the things I wanted.  Until someone told me about Toodledo, the perfect app for managing my prayer requests.

Toodledo is designed to be a task organizer, but it works perfectly well as a Prayer organizer.

Once you set up an account at www.Toodledo.com , you simply download the app, log in and you’re ready to go!

You can set up different folders to separate your requests into categories.

You can see from my screenshot above that I have several categories of requests.  I currently have 209 prayer items altogether in ten categories including Family, Crisis, Missionaries, Friends, Leaders, Physical Needs, Others at Risk, Weddings I’ve Officiated, etc

You can arrange these folders in any order and there is no practical limit on how many items can go in each folder.

Within a folder you can easily create tasks, which in my case are prayer items.  After they’re checked off, you can set them to reoccur at whatever interval you want.  For example, under “Family” I have some requests that repeat every day.   Others, such as my New Jersey family will pop up on my list every three days, alternating days with the Hoobler family and the Forstroms.  Extended relatives will pop up less often (say, every 12 days), but always appearing on the same day as my closer relatives from that family.

I try to pray for the couples I’ve married once a month, always on the anniversary of their wedding.  Toodledo allows me to set up a monthly, repeating task on a specific date, such as the 21st. of each month  Or as you can see below, a request can pop up faithfully every Wednesday.

Once you’ve checked off an item, it disappears, but then magically reappears whenever it’s scheduled next.

I love this next feature since I tend to miss days now and then.  Tasks can be set to reappear on a predetermined calendar schedule or they can reappear so many days after the last one was checked off.  That way if you fall behind in prayer, you don’t have to worry about requests piling up endlessly!

The urgency of the request combined with the proximity of the person to me determines how many days I set between repeats.  One repeat could be “every 57 days from checkoff.”  I try to find what’s reasonable for the situation.   It may not be often, but I can honestly say, “I pray for you regularly”.

You can also add notes to any prayer item, which is nice if you want to copy and paste prayer updates from an email.  Or you can make the task a topic, such as “People battling cancer” or “Grievers” and the note can contain the names of people to whom it applies.

Finally , you can set up a “Hotlist” to immediately access the list you want when you open the app.  My “Hotlist” is set to show all tasks that are either due today or are overdue.

There are other cool features, but those are the main ones that I use.  I hope it is useful to some of you who are trying to figure out how to be faithful in praying for others.  For scores of people I can now say with confidence, “I pray for you regularly.”

Last week, when I was quarantined with the flu, I had a wonderful Skype conversation with former student AnnaClaire.  She attends college in Arkansas, and coincidentally was also quarantined with the flu.  In the course of our commiseration the subject came up about prayer.  For today’s blog post  I’ll share with you some of the things I told her when she asked about how I organize my own prayer life.

HOW I ORGANIZE MY PRAYER LIFE

Regardless of how much time I have for prayer, I have found it beneficial to divide my prayer time into two fairly equal parts: 1. Relational Prayer and 2. Requesting Prayer.

By “RELATIONAL PRAYER” I mean a time of “heart-to-heart” conversation with God.  It involves putting God in His place, putting me in my place, and positioning myself properly under His leadership.  To help me maximize this time, I generally follow this outline: ATCS.

Adoration.  Letting my mind dwell up in heaven, in eternity, and on God’s character, attributes, and worthiness.  Enjoying Him apart from the personal benefits to me.

Thanksgiving.  Here, my my thoughts are still focused on God, but trickling down to where I live — appreciating Him for all the good things He has freely and generously given me.

Confession.  After contemplating God’s greatness and goodness to me, my own weaknesses and unfaithfulness inevitably become apparent.  This is a time for putting me in my proper place.  I acknowledge my sins and apologize for how they must hurt His heart — and then I experience relational restoration with Him as I sense Him wiping my slate clean.  [One word of caution about confession:  I’ve learned to be careful to not overdue confession.  I can easily slip into self-loathing, which only serves to keep my mind focused on me rather than on God and how mercifully He treats prodigals like me.  He’s promised to forgive my sins just for the asking with no penance required, and so I need to take Him at His word and not obsess over my failures.]

Surrender.   Here, I spend some time mentally dedicating myself to His service.  I surrender my FISTS (Finances, Influence, Skills, Time, and Stuff), I surrender my day’s Calendar, my Appetites, and my To Do List.  I ask to be filled with the Holy Spirit, to put on the Armor of God, and to be prepared to finish and die well.  I also review one of my Life Resolutions each day and ask for God’s enabling to accomplish them.

So that’s “Relational Prayer.”   It’s my favorite part of prayer and never a chore — when I devote the proper time and attention to it, I  find it’s very satisfying.  Heartfelt, relational prayer like this seems to be uncommon in our times.  If you’ve never prayed like this before, I recommend you try it!

“REQUESTING PRAYER” is the kind of prayer most people today likely think about when they think of prayer.   But this kind will be less relationally satisfying when the focus is  limited to merely asking God for stuff that we want.  For many this is little different than giving Santa your wish list, or giving God a shopping list.  Others may approach it as if God’s a cosmic vending machine, ready to give us whatever we order.  Prayer like this can easily be self-centered.  When I talk about “requesting prayer” I’m not talking about this.

For me, “requesting prayer” is about telling God how much we need Him, declaring our dependence on Him, and asking for His will to be accomplished both in us and through us.  It’s not wrong to ask for things, indeed, His word commands us to ask Him for things For example, James 5:16: says, “Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.”  But it’s the attitude of our hearts that is critical here.  When I pray God-honoring prayers of request, I sense that God is using  me to help accomplish His plans for the world.  And like Relational Prayer this kind of prayer is also satisfying.  Mostly because it’s not about us.

So this brings us to this issue:  there are literally million of people and things I could request prayer for.  So how do I decide what to pray for and how do I organize my prayer lists? Tomorrow, I’ll explain how that works in my prayer life.

The problem with most Christian sex education approaches I’ve seen:

• It’s delayed as long as possible.
• It begins with and primarily addresses the question: “where do babies come from?”
• It’s characterized by shame, nervousness, and uncomfortability.
• It’s embarrassing for the kids as well as the parents—and dreaded by both.
• It’s compartmentalized, approaching it as “the talk” rather than as a process.
• Its focus is on intercourse, not sexuality as a whole.
• Delaying it naively assumes that: 1. Burying our heads in the sand will make this issue go away.  2.  Sex education isn’t necessary until puberty.  3.  Kids are not already being taught at an early age about sex by the world.  4. Kids either aren’t interested in or aren’t able to handle the truth about sex.
• It’s clinical, impersonal, and passive:  “The ahem.. penis gets inserted into the ahem… vagina.”
• It doesn’t allow for ongoing discussion day by day in the course of real life.
• It’s a subject parents HATE to talk about.

Do you suppose that’s the way God views sex?  I don’t think so.  He didn’t invent sex to be a “dirty little secret”.  He invented it to be one of his greatest blessings to humanity.

My approach.

• It begins in infancy and continues through the teenage years.
• Its focus is on marital intimacy and satisfaction, long before it’s about babies.
• It instills awe and wonder at God’s amazing design.
• It’s comfortable, natural, and anticipated with eagerness.
• It lays a foundation of truth early on and builds on that.
• The principles are modeled, discussed, and reinforced through all of life.
• Its focus is on sexuality as a whole, not just intercourse.
• It’s a subject parents LOVE to talk about because they have the opportunity to instill life-changing values that run counter to our culture.

 Three Disclaimers: 1.  This approach presented here  ideally assumes a strong, healthy marriage is being modeled—the proper context for sex.  Single parents or those in dysfunctional marriages will need to teach the same values verbally and theoretically, rather than modeling them.

2. This approach is written for those with very young children to encourage sexual education as a lifestyle.  For those who neglected to properly educate their older kids, I’ve added some suggestions at the end on how to make up for lost time.

3.  In this short format, I’m presenting 11+ years of sex education condensed down into a few short pages.  Therefore it may seem like we’re dumping a lot of information on very young kids.  Keep in mind that this information is doled out little by little over a decade or more.    

My recommended approach…

BODY PARTS

• It begins in infancy with the identification of body parts.  God made our sexual organs and they can be acknowledged and named without shame.
• Rather than identifying the sex organs (including breasts) as dirty or forbidden, they should be identified as being special and set apart from all the other body parts.  So special, in fact, that displaying or discussing them is properly kept private (within the family for now, spouse later).  It’s inappropriate to show these parts publicly—that’s why we have laws against public nudity.  But the parts themselves aren’t bad—they’re just so special and private that they’re not shared with outsiders.  You can show anyone your arm or your leg or your ear, but there’s something different about these parts.  They’re the most intimate things you have to share and ultimately you will share them with your future spouse.

SENSUAL ATTRACTION BETWEEN PARENTS

• I believe that sensual attraction between parents must be modeled in front of the kids at a very early age.  They need to see that God created physical craving (hormones) as a way to strengthen marital love and bond husband and wife.  This way when the kids reach puberty and begin to experience hormones, they’ll understand their proper context and purpose. Many parents appear to be asexual to their kids—a perception that will not help parents seem authoritative on the subject later when kids are looking for answers about their own emerging sexuality.
• The husband should show his visual attraction to his wife by whistling at her in the shower and verbalizing his attraction to her beautiful naked body. This teaches them how God has wired the male brain.  God created this attraction as a way to help make sure the husband stays delighted in his wife.  It’s a good thing so long as his eyes stay focused on his wife.  This is a very important truth to teach them and talk about regularly as they grow older.
  • Recently, I came across a web link to a Britney Spears music video and decided to have the girls watch it with me.  They were shocked to think of how Britney’s body was being shared with other boys and men who were not her husband.  We talked about what they already knew:  that boys can become excited visually by a woman’s body.  They found it sad to consider that so many boys look at her as an object.  I told them how glad I am that their mom is only sharing her body with me and how special that makes me feel.
  • One day we were at the mall and my then 5-year old ran over and threw herself in front of the Victoria’s Secret window display and proceeded to shout:  “Don’t look over here, dad!”  I was amused and proud: she knew that a husband’s eyes properly belong only to his wife and that she should be his only source of sensual delight.  I wonder how many other mall shoppers were convicted by this truth coming from a 5 year old.
• Acknowledging this truth about men being wired visually allows us to teach Scriptures that most parents avoid even through the teen years.  As soon as they began to read, I exposed my girls to the Song of Solomon and passages like Proverbs 5:19 “may her breasts satisfy you always, may you ever be captivated by her love.”  Rather than shocking them or grossing them out, this simply reinforced to them the truth that I had taught them long before: that sensuality is a healthy part of God’s design for marriage.   Bible stories, such as David gazing at the bathing Bathsheba begin to make sense and serve as a caution about misusing what God intended only within marriage.  This knowledge about guys being visually attracted to a woman’s body also encourages them to be modest, not sharing their beauty with just anyone!
• For daughters, this understanding of a woman’s body being the delight of her husband alone can help as you discuss their own physical maturity.  Learning and talking about the two Scriptural purposes for breasts (delighting your husband and feeding babies) encourages them to not base their self-esteem on their rate of breast development.  And they need to know that size doesn’t matter—their husband will be delighted in them just the way God made them.  We talked recently about the “ideal” breast size and our conclusion was that it’s whatever size God made you.
• For sons, talking about the way God designed our eyes to be attracted to women’s bodies is important in helping them understand their temptations and resist them.  They need to know that their eye attraction is normal, but that it should be saved for their spouse.  “Eye candy” is a cheap substitute and will never satisfy.
• Of course every kind of love should be modeled by the parents (encouragement, compliments, acts of service, time together, tenderness, etc.)  But physical contact between the parents must also be modeled.  Parents who reserve all physical contact for the bedroom rob their kids of learning about this important aspect of marriage.   Hugs, shoulder rubs, snuggling, tussling, and sensual kissing (not just a peck), should be regularly seen by your kids from infancy on.  They need to see these activities as belonging to healthy marriages and that God designed these as a way to provide great delight and bonding.  They learn through this that physical touch strengthens your marriage and thus their family.  They also learn that we are made with physical attractions and desires.  And that some of those desires are to be met by your spouse only.  Knowing this prepares them for the day when their hormones will kick in.  Parents who appear asexual will not be consulted when teens begin to wrestle with their own sexuality.  Knowing that the desires are good but are intended for a future spouse will give them reason to wait for that spouse.   Knowing this about physical desires also gives them an understanding of the world they live in.  Flipping TV channels has given us many good discussions about the physical attraction of those portrayed.  Couples seen “making out” are evaluated based on their marital status and those who aren’t married are viewed with pity since they’re hurting their future marriages by not following God’s design.

THE SPECIAL SNUGGLE

• Besides the physical touching parents model in front of the kids, reference needs to be made to what we called a“special snuggling” that parents do behind closed doors because it’s so private and wonderful.  This concept can be taught at a very early age (2-3).  Give this activity a code name, in case they ever mention it outside the home!  We called ours “doing the special snuggle” and we made it clear that it’s something God made for marriage, bonding, and pleasurable delight and that when they got older we’d tell them more details.  It needs to be seen as a type of “glue” that makes mommy and daddy’s marriage stronger.  It can be very vague at first, but as they age you increasingly give more clues.  The clues you drop may include these:  it starts with regular snuggling and progresses beyond, it’s something normally done in bed, has something to do with being “buck naked”, it’s best to not be interrupted during, has something to do with enjoying each other’s private parts (which we established long ago as belonging to the spouse).
• There are many advantages of acknowledging the existence of a type of “special snuggling.”  A practical one is that you don’t have to make sexuality a big secret.  There’s a difference between secrecy and privacy.  You can request the kids to give you 30 minutes privacy and they’re perfectly happy to do so, because they know that whatever you’re doing in there is a private but good thing and which is somehow like glue for your marriage. It’s in their best interest for you to have your time together. When our bedroom door is closed and locked our kids know what’s going on, but it’s not a big deal at all.
  • One night we had plans for a morning “snuggle” but to our dismay one of our girls crept into our bed after a “bad dream”.  I mentioned to her that she was welcome to stay for awhile, but later if we decided to do our “special snuggle” I’d send her back to her bed.  What was her response?  Horror?  Disgust?  Not at all.  She just said, “That’ll be just fine!”
• Another advantage of this knowledge is that they can better understand Bible stories and concepts such as “do not commit adultery” or David’s sin with Bathsheba. You simply define adultery as “doing the special snuggle with someone who’s not your husband or wife”.  They’ve already learned about the reality of physical, sexual attraction and that God made it for marriage exclusively.  So without even knowing the mechanics of sex, they can grasp these principles.  This knowledge of the existence of intimate physical contact also helps them interpret the sex-saturated world around them.  Teenagers making out on the street corner or a racy scene flashing on the TV or a provocative billboard now elicit comments like: “I’ll bet they’re gonna want to do the special snuggle next.”  “They’re probably gonna want to take their clothes off.”  “I wish they’d start thinking about their future husband.”  They’re learning about the ungodly context we live in and how it falls short of God’s ideal.  By addressing these concepts at a young age, they’ve learned the truth first and then the error is exposed for what it is.  This is a different outcome than in those families who try to ignore sexuality, hoping our kids won’t think about it, or paint sexuality as essentially “evil” or “disgusting”.  To keep from our kids the beautiful concept of sexuality in marriage is teaching them an untruth.  Many teens I work with can’t fathom their parents having sex—even for their own conception!  My kids already know that sex is a normal, regularly partaken of, God-ordained blessing in our marriage.  In fact for awhile one of our kids thought it’s something parents are supposed to do every day!  (That gives new meaning to the Scripture that says not to neglect your marital duty!)
• During this time of knowing the sex concept without details, sometimes kids will ask where babies come from.  At this point it should be sufficient to say simply that God sometimes gives married people babies.  If they know of an unwed mother or a live-in situation, then you can expand it by saying simply that God sometimes gives babies to people who do the “special snuggle.”  That’s as much detail as they probably need.  After all, God put the moon in place and he put Baby Jesus in Mary’s tummy.  They’re not engineers—they aren’t seeking a detailed explanation of the process!

FILLING IN THE BLANKS

• But eventually it will be the eagerly anticipated time to fill in the details about how sex actually works.  This is the moment that most parents dread, but I longed for this day with anticipation.  But at what age should this disclosure be made?  When you’ve laid the foundation of healthy marital sexuality, the concern isn’t going to be the shock of the revelation. But I think the timing depends on two things:  the environment and the child’s social maturity:  1. The Environment.  The world teaches our kids about sex all the time and since I want her to hear it from me first, I have to gauge when it’s time.  Parents must first consider what the child is being influenced by.  The timing for homeschoolers might be somewhat later than those in public school, just from the standpoint of what they might hear on the playground—although anyone with a TV or in view of billboards had better not wait too long!  2.  Social Maturity. Can she keep this a secret from others?  Does she tell her friends Santa is a myth?—then it’s probably too early for her to keep this secret.  The last thing you want is for other parents to complain to you about your child being a source of sex information!  (Although chances are your kid will explain the truth about sex better than the average parent!)
• It’s a hard balance to find, but if you’re going to err, I’d say err on telling it early so they hear it in the context of wonder and awe, rather than as distorted and disgusting.   Our oldest was seven ½ and that was the perfect age for her.  Our youngest is that age now, but not quite ready to keep a secret.  Hopefully soon!
• So what exactly do you say?  With our oldest, we made a date, telling her that it was now time to tell her the amazing details about God’s “special snuggling”, which we now recognize by its common names: “having sex” or “making love”.  There was a sense of anticipation as we sat in our living room!  I explained how amazing God made us.  And he made us two ways, male and female—in many ways the same, but in some ways different.  We reviewed what we had shared before how God made women so beautiful and the two purposes of breasts.  We talked about the opening girls have called a vagina and how God made it a place of pleasure when stroked by her husband.  We talked at length about the remarkable male sexual organs (which she was obviously less familiar with).   These organs also are places of pleasure when stroked by the wife and interestingly, when this happens the husband’s penis actually grows about twice as big and it becomes hard and sticks up, and feels even more pleasure.    Now isn’t that just amazing and interesting?  Now why do you suppose God created the man’s penis in such a way that usually it’s small and soft, but during this time it grows big and hard?  What if it was big all the time?  That would be inconvenient!  Why does it grow at all?  Hmmm, that’s a mystery isn’t it?  Do you think God knows what he’s doing?  He sure does.  Let’s stop talking about sex for a minute and let’s go back to something I taught you a while back:  how to identify connectors.  What do we call the two ends of a hose?  Or electrical plugs?  That’s right, male and female.  (I had purposefully taught her about all about how to identify “male” and “female” connectors with this day in mind.)  How do you know which end is the male?  Right it fits inside of the female end.  Good.  At that moment a light bulb came on and she finally had all the pieces fitting together.  “I think I solved the mystery!  The husband’s penis fits inside of the wife’s vagina, right?”  It was exciting to watch her experience the joy of discovering God’s truth.  We went on to explain that God created those parts like puzzle pieces, fitting together perfectly.  We then talked about the burst of pleasure that occurs during this time of closeness.  This is the most intimate human experience there is and that’s why God made it to be enjoyed by husband and wife alone.  They create a special memory together during sex that they share only with each other.  It’s their greatest physical expression of love and it’s a great gift from God.   I think it’s important to teach sex for delight before teaching sex for procreation.  After all, couples will have sex potentially 1000’s of times, and yet only get pregnant a dozen or less.  Humans have successfully accomplished God’s command to be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth!  Now sex is more often about intimacy and delighting in your spouse than it is about conceiving offspring.  But the revelation of how babies are made needs to be taught at some point shortly afterwards.  Having gotten through the tricky part, now it’s easy.

HOW ARE BABIES MADE?

• After having established sex in marriage as about intimacy, then we later taught, “Oh, and by the way, you’ll be amazed to learn that once in a while, God uses this amazing act of intimacy and love as His way of creating babies.  Then we taught her about sperm and eggs and the amazing invention of testicles and how these sacks regulate the temperature of the sperm at 3 degrees below body temperature, pulling up tight if it’s cold and loosening up if it’s hot.  Amazing!  We talked about how the same tube that handles urine somehow miraculously switches tracks and allows the sperm to shoot out into the woman during sex.  We talked about how amazing it is that the woman’s body knows how to count to 28 and it sends out an egg every time.  And how the fertilized egg burrows itself in the womb and begins giving the baby nutrients.  We explained it all in the context of wonder and discovery.  There was no shame, no embarrassment, no regrets.  Only amazement!
• The only thing that we didn’t share at that time was regarding hormone changes and the woman’s menstrual cycle.  A year later, her third grade class was doing a unit on sexuality and I kicked myself for not seeing the note until the same day—after the class was over.  I had wanted to be the first one to talk about those things.  So we talked as soon we could—the day after the class.  I had wanted to get the first word in, but in this case I had to be the second.  One of the values for me was to portray the menstrual cycle not primarily as “unpleasant” or “disgusting” (which was the effect of the school teaching) but rather as another example of God’s wonderful, perfect design for your life.  And how amazing and exciting it will be when God, in His perfect timing, chooses to transform her from a girl to a woman.  His biological timer will cause changes in her body that will enable her to be a wife and mother instead of a little girl.  Oh, how exciting that will be!  I explained how having a period was really a cleansing process which flushes out the important blood supply and nutrients that would have helped a baby grow.  And how even if the menstruation process may be unpleasant and admittedly an inconvenience, yet it’s a small price to pay for the blessings that will likely lie ahead.  God knows what’s best for you and He made you that way for a purpose.  I explained God’s wisdom and goodness in making the menstrual cycle 28 days, giving a wife 12 opportunities a year to get pregnant.  12 gives a lot of opportunities without too many.  Imagine if the cycle happened every 5 days—you’d never get a break!  Imagine if the cycle happened only 4 times a year and a couple was struggling with infertility.  There would not be many chances to conceive.  God’s ways are perfect.  So even though the benefits of the reproductive cycle won’t be needed for awhile (hopefully a long while!) yet we rejoice that God is putting the pieces in place that will make her the woman God created her to be.
• Parents with boys should have a similar conversation about “wet dreams” and how it’s a natural release of excess sperm and should not be perceived with guilt or shame.  Again, he should realize that God is putting the pieces in place to make him the man God created him to be.

A LIFESTYLE OF SEXUALITY EDUCATION

• Sexuality education continues all the time in our home, practically every time we interact with the world.  Sometimes the opportunities present themselves unexpectedly.  Sometimes we need to take initiative in interpreting the world with them.  My most recent teachable moment was to go through a Seventeen magazine with my oldest, comparing what it says about body image and sexuality to God’s ideal design for sex in marriage.  She had never seen such a magazine before, but she learned a lot about what is taught in the world’s classroom and why it’s a distortion of God’s truth.  When the day inevitably comes where one of her friends shows her Seventeen, she’ll know the context in which it’s written and hopefully will be able to share God’s truth with the friend.   I’d rather expose her to a little of the world with the right perspective at my side, than let her stumble upon things that she hasn’t been trained how to interpret later on when I’m not around.

Addendum:  So what if you’ve let your kids grow up without teaching them these truths?

Unless you have very young kids, you’re likely reading this and recognizing that you haven’t taught the whole truth about sexuality in marriage.  Can you go back?  No.  But you can start from where you are and rebuild the foundation to bring you up to speed.

1. Stop being asexual parents and start being normal humans with hormones and thus someone who can be consulted in such matters!
   1. Show your physical attraction to one another.  Start small and gradually become more open about it.
   2. Slowly, but increasingly, start to communicate the reality of sexual delight in your marriage.  Eventually you need to become the expert on this subject that they’ll consult before listening to the world’s “experts” like Lady Gaga or Miley Cyrus.
2. Begin to talk about subjects that maybe you haven’t spoken candidly about before like guys’ eye-attraction, lust, modesty, body image, fashion, hormones, body changes, pornography, masturbation, sex, etc.  Practice first on easier topics and eventually progress to the big ones.
3. Provide commentary on the world.  As you begin approaching sensual subjects you can at first be more analytical and concept-oriented.  “It makes me sad to see how that TV couple is jeopardizing their future marriage.”  As you grow more comfortable with these topics you can become more personal, “It’s a shame that that TV couple will never know the sexual blessing your mother and I enjoy because we saved ourselves for each other.”  I’ll frequently “talk” to the actors on TV and give them my advice!
4. Ask questions about sexual topics.  Again, start simple and progress as your sphere of topical discussions increases.   “Why do you think Lady Gaga dresses that way?”
5. Enter their world and discuss it.  Watch MTV for an hour with your son or daughter.  Afterwards, let them ask you questions and you ask them some.  Talk about news headlines like Bill Clinton and Monica Lewinsky, the homosexual agenda, redefining marriage, etc.  All provide many opportunities to pass on your values on sexuality.
6. Your kids have undoubtedly learned the biological facts about sex already through school programs, friends, the media or a book you may have handed them!   Yet, there is much more you as a parent can teach them about the “theology” of sex and it’s proper context.  Read through the Song of Solomon with them or do a Biblical study of sex and marriage.
7. Talk to others about their “teachable moments” with their kids.  Make sexual education a topic that we’re all more comfortable addressing.

Photo by Brad Tucker

Hey everyone,

The race is finished and I completed all 50 miles!  Praise the Lord.  And the best part is that we raised $16,586.50 (so far) by 236 people to fight sex trafficking in Nepal!  That averages $70 per person!
Click the picture to the left for a photo album with captions to describe the whole event!

MAKING A PLEDGE.

You can still go to www.tinyurl.com/marks50milerun to make a pledge to help fight sex trafficking in Nepal.

PAYING YOUR PLEDGES.
Since pledges were anonymous, no one is able to send anyone a reminder or invoice. So the fulfillment of any pledge you may have made will require your initiative.

MAKING YOUR CONTRIBUTION ELECTRONICALLY…
Once you’ve calculated your pledge total (pledge times 50 miles) you may send it electronically to
https://www.tinyhandsinternational.org/donate (under “ministry area” I suggest you select “Fight Sex Trafficking”)

MAILING YOUR PLEDGE…
Or you may mail the pledge at any time to the organization directly. Details will be on their websites. For Tiny Hands, the address is as follows:
P.O. Box 67195
Lincoln, NE 68506
(indicate that you’d like it to go toward fighting sex trafficking in Nepal).

On Tuesday, April 15th I, Mark Forstrom, will turn 50 years old and I’m planning my own surprise party!

How can I get away with planning my own surprise party?  Because the “Surprises” will be to see 1. how many miles I can run and 2. how much money we can raise to fight Sex Trafficking in Nepal!

During the whole day of my birthday, I will attempt to run the biggest race of my life:  50 miles, from Cedar Falls to Cedar Rapids on the Cedar Valley Nature Trail!

(Note: I’m the only one in the “race” and for those interested I’ll post my mile-to-mile progress on my Facebook wall as I go.)

The run will not only be a test of my vanishing youthfulness, but more importantly, it will be a way for us to raise money together for victims of sex trafficking in Nepal.

In celebration of this milestone in my life, all my family, friends, and acquaintances are encouraged to pledge any amount per mile that I run — up to 50!

After my run, shortly after 7:30 pm on the 15th, I will post on my Facebook wall and on my blog at www.markforstrom.com how many of the 50 miles I was able to run.  (Pledgers will need to know that info to calculate their pledge amount.)

Pledges will be anonymous, only the totals will be known.

Why fight Sex Trafficking in Nepal?  Each year in Nepal, an estimated 10,000-15,000 girls are trafficked across the border where they are sold into Indian brothels and forced to become prostitutes. These girls range between ages 7 and 24, with an average age of 15.

To combat this horrific injustice, I’m suggesting the money raised on April 15th be sent to Tiny Hands, International, a *Christian organization that not only rescues 100 girls a month at over a dozen border stations, but also prosecutes the perpetrators and cuts off the supply chain.  I heard about them through a speaker we had come to our youth group this fall.  Check out the amazing things Tiny Hands does in this 6 minute video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwKqBfq8M4E#t=300

IF YOU WANT TO PARTICIPATE, PLEASE ANONYMOUSLY REGISTER YOUR PLEDGE.BEFORE MY RACE
Please click here to register your pledge amount (per mile)…. www.tinyurl.com/marks50milerace

THEN AFTER MY RACE, YOU CAN PAY YOUR PLEDGE.
On the pledge registration link above, you’ll find instructions for how to send in your pledge electronically or otherwise.

AND YES, THERE IS ACTUALLY A PARTY!!
When I finish my run at 7:30 pm, the finish line will be at New Covenant Bible Church, where I will host a party for all my local friends and family.  At the party we’ll enjoy “post-race” snacks and unveil the two big surprises of the night (the number of miles I ran and the total amount of money raised to fight sex trafficking!)

Note: I would prefer friends not give me birthday gifts other than giving to the Tiny Hands cause.

Local friends who prefer not to give online may bring your pledges in cash or check (made out to “Tiny Hands International”)  to the party that night.  Or you may hand the pledge to me at any time.

*Note for my non-Christian friends: if you’re conscientiously opposed to supporting a Christian organization, please consider fighting sex trafficking in Nepal through this alternate organization:   http://abcnepal.org.np/

On Tues, April 1, 2014, I pulled another fun April Fools Day prank on the staff of my church, New Covenant Bible Church in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Luckily, this is a church of grace! I hope you enjoy the video. Thanks to Andrew Male with the video splicing!

Correction: my speeding ticket prank was actually 2 years ago, not last year as I mistakenly stated in the video.

Saturday was one of the greatest days of my life.   Thanks to everyone who participated in the youth group reunion — either by your physical attendance or by your updates, thoughts and kind words.

I was profoundly and emotionally affected by the whole experience.  I need to blog about it to help me process it all –and for those of you who weren’t there, I want to tell you how it went.

For months I personally invested a lot of time, effort, and mental energy getting ready for this reunion.  It was the right thing to do and I was going to get it done.  The preparations were all very task-oriented and I like tasks:  planning, communicating, reserving, organizing, displaying, etc.  I spent the last two nights at church, maximizing the time needed in making the final preparations.

At 7 am Saturday morning we loaded up all the memorabilia and refreshments for the “Meet & Greet”, which was held at our old church building.  (Thanks to Faith Bible for letting us use their facility.)  We set up 20 tables in their gym and displayed a year’s worth of memories on each (photos, t-shirts, trip booklets, etc).  Haley Neiderhizer, our intern, surprised Mark and I with giant photo posters of us for people to sign.  It was neat that she gave people a way to express themselves.  Gina, my admin, set up the refreshments.

At 10 am, people from the “early years” started arriving, and it was fun to see people reconnecting and reminiscing and sharing long-forgotten stories.  As the “Meet & Greet” progressed, alumni from later years arrived.  It was delightful watching these students and sponsors reconnect with each other.  My enjoyment was watching them enjoy it.  This event was planned just for them!

When the “Meet & Greet” ended at 3 pm we had a mere three hours to clean up and transport everything back to our new building for the Banquet.  We set up the memorabilia display tables once again and checked on the decorations and food (Ken Owens and his team did a fabulous job!)

Alumni started arriving just before 6 and I again enjoyed watching them enjoy their event.  During the delicious dinner, we projected the 100+ current family photos that had been submitted by alumni and we played a youth group worship CD that was recorded in 1997.   Everything was going just as I had planned.

The after-dinner program was to be simple.  We would sing worship songs from over the years–using an overhead projector for the earliest ones!  We would recognize the sponsors for their service and present a special gift to Charley Snodgrass, who has been a sponsor for 25 consecutive years.  And then Mark Eades and I would each share about 15 minutes of reflections.

When Mark E got up to speak, rather than address the alumni, he started addressing me.  I could sense that something was going on that I had not planned.  Little did I realize that the party that I had planned was about to be sabotaged!  Suddenly, he announced that a special guest from my past had arrived to join me for this celebration of mine!  Just as suddenly, my old friend Brian Carroll emerged from the side room and came up on the stage.  He had driven 20 hours from Texas just to surprise me.

But I think the greater surprise to us all was the emotional impact that occurred within me at that moment.  It wasn’t about Brian — because I’ve never gotten emotional over him before — but it was about what he represented.  Since we became friends in college, Brian has been influential in my life — helping me to grow, challenging me to godliness, calling me on my sin, modeling Christlikeness to me.  When he walked in, it reminded me of how significant relationships are.

And then I looked across the room full of people and I realized that what was true about Brian was equally true about every person in the room — and many more who couldn’t attend.  During our youth group years together each of these precious people had shaped my life and I had shaped theirs in some way — on a retreat, in a bus, on a trip, in a stairway, etc.  I realized at that moment that this reunion was not just for them, it was for me too.  It wasn’t about well-managed tasks resulting in a party, it was about celebrating life-altering relationships.  That is what had brought us together this day.  A day that I will never forget.

In 2012, our church had a panel discussion addressing questions about marriage, dating, and sexuality from a biblical perspective.  Here are my answers.

QUESTION: Is dating without marriage in mind ok? What is the purpose of dating and marriage?

Let me answer the last questions first. Marriage is the joining of a husband and wife in the most intimate of human relationships, the ideal context for childrearing, and the ideal setting to depict the love, commitment, and affection of Christ for His church.

First of all, it’s worth noting that dating is not found anywhere in the Bible, in fact the norm there is for the parents to arrange the marriages of their children – which by the way I think is a brilliant idea – although my two teenage daughters might disagree. In all of scripture, the closest thing we find to dating is in the Samson account, and we all know how miserably that turned out!

Seriously though, dating is the reality in our culture. So what is the purpose of dating?
For those seeking to find a husband or wife, dating – or courtship – provides opportunities to learn about the character, personality, and interests of the other person, which are essential things to know when selecting a spouse.

So is dating without marriage in mind ok? Depends what you mean by dating. If it means going out on occasional dates as friends, fine. But I say dating is NOT OK in at least the following five circumstances:
• If it’s Recreational Dating, using the other person for your own immediate satisfaction.
• If it involves any kind of sexual intimacy.
• If it isolates the two of you from healthy interaction with family and friends.
• If having a boyfriend or girlfriend is merely a way to gain or retain social status.
• If it strings the other person along in an undefined, nebulous, pseudo-commitment.

QUESTION: What are some practical steps for living out a Biblical view of sexuality?

The only proper context for sexual expression is within marriage. This is God’s gracious design as a way for husbands and wives to experience great intimacy and mutual delight. Those who are married should make the pursuit of intimacy – including sexual intimacy — a priority in ways that bring mutual satisfaction. This is biblical. See 1 Cor 7.

Since sexual expression has no proper place outside of marriage, this creates a problem for those who aren’t married. What do Christ-following singles do with the reality that they have raging hormones and sexual desires, but don’t have marriage as a way to express them? This is an important question.

The first step is to bring these things to God. This doesn’t just apply to sexual appetites, we must do this with any illegitimate craving, temptation, anxiety, frustration, unmet expectation, or desire that can’t be righteously fulfilled – we must surrender them to God.

The second step is to make choices that will reduce our sexual appetites. Fred Stoeker uses the illustration of our sex drive being like a Sumo wrestler. If you feed the Sumo wrestler, it will conquer you. If you starve it, you will conquer it. So what can you do to reduce your sexual frustrations?

• Stop viewing pornography. Statistically speaking, hundreds of you struggle with this – guys mostly, but also girls. It doesn’t satisfy, it leaves you empty, it takes more and more to thrill you, but you feel less and less satisfied and more and more helpless. Porn gives you a false idea that sexuality is about taking and consuming, rather than giving and serving the way God designed sex in marriage. No women could ever live up to the expectation of porn. It’s all about you, but there’s nothing real about it. Enough is enough. How about getting victory over this starting today? 1. Secret sins never go away. 2. Tell me or someone who you can make yourself accountable to. 3. Read “Closing the Window” by Tim Chester.
• By the way, women, romance novels have been called emotional pornography. Are you meeting unfulfilled desires by living in a fantasy world of literature. Are you creating expectations and desires that no real man could live up to? Think about it.
• Entertainment. Our culture is sex saturated. What kind of sexual messages are you exposing yourself to through movies, tv, music, jokes with the boys. How about changing what you expose yourself to?
• Modest dress. Both guys and girls. Dress in a way that doesn’t feed someone else’s Sumo wrestler.

QUESTION. If someone has a very detailed sexual past, how do they fully move forward in Christ’s forgiveness and grace?

Sexual sin naturally produces much embarrassment, guilt and shame. Satan, the great “Accuser of the Brethren” in Rev 12:10, would want to keep us perpetually enslaved by this guilt and shame, sidelining us from abundant living. We wrongly think God must have lost His patience, resulting in a false sense of being alienated from Him. Ironically this perceived wall between us and God puts us in a much worse condition than the sexual sin itself. When such debilitating thoughts arise, keep in mind these scriptural truths:
• If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). Do you believe this? Will you accept His cleansing?
• While we were his enemies, Christ reconciled us to Himself (Rom 5:10). He loved you as an enemy. Couldn’t He love you despite sexual weaknesses? Yes!
• If he could forgive the blatant in-your-face sins of the soldiers who were nailing Him to the cross (Luke 23:34), then couldn’t he forgive you for your sexual sins? Yes!
• Nothing can separate you from the love of God (Rom 8:38-39).
• If God can remove your sins as far away as the east is from the west (Psalm 103:12) why do you keep them near at hand?
• If you were dead in your trespasses and sins before God’s grace rescued you (Eph 2:1-10) why not divert your attention away from your deadness and trust Him to make you “alive in Christ” now?
• Are you living in the Room of Good Intentions or in the Room of Grace?