Good morning, Five Minute Families. What a week this has been! No matter which end of the political spectrum you are on, all of us are affected by the current events going on around us. Sometimes, we can live in blissful ignorance, at least for a time, but we are impacted whether we realize it or not.

One thing that impacts us daily is what is allowed to appear on the screens and devices we have all around us-in our hands, hanging on our walls, sitting on our desks, even playing in fast food restaurants. Please note that to stay family-friendly, we will be speaking a bit in code, but Five Minute Families need to make a plan and be prepared to deal with inappropriate images and explicit media, no matter the age of their children.

There are times when we are exposed, or accidentally expose someone we love, to images that we should not see outside of a covenant marriage. Just last week, we sat down to watch a movie that we thought would be ok to watch with our kids. Spoiler alert… it wasn’t. One image popped up. It was fairly benign compared to the pictures that float around in commercials these days, but it was still more than a young person needs to see outside of marriage. Because of our own desensitization, we wrongly did not immediately turn the movie off. When the second image popped up, we shut it off. I apologized to our children, but I knew to begin praying for their protection.

During the height of the Netflix controversy, which was also last week, having older kids as well, our younger ones are exposed to conversations they often do not understand, so they have heard about the young girls’ dance movie controversy. They are curious, and it doesn’t help that many of you expressed outrage AND still shared the offensive picture on your social media pages, pages that your friends may have been scrolling with their kiddos nearby, and possibly hanging over their shoulders.

One picture, one short, one movie, can stick in the mind of a child and confuse them for years. It can become the catalyst to a lifetime of addiction, or, prayerfully, it can become a catalyst to make godly choices in the future. You must have honest and open communication, so that your kids can ask questions and receive truthful and healing answers. Don’t bury your heads in the sand, Five Minute Families.

Maybe you are feeling overwhelmed with the devices and with the lowering of societal standards, and think, “but, what can we do?” Well, let’s explore five ideas that you can employ now.

1. Preview movies (or check trusted resources such as pluggedinonline.org). You can also ask friends or family, though we do recommend you are careful because we have found a lot of families today do not have the same standards.
2. Be prepared to turn off a show, or leave a movie theater if necessary. Mama and, especially, Papa, you set the stage for how your children respond to sinful stimuli. Do YOU keep watching but send them away? If so, you have primed them to think that while you say it is not ok, it really is.
3. Put internet blockers or safety modes on, depending on the ages of your children.
4. Another option is putting a reporting program on all of your devices. One such as Covenant Eyes. It can block sites, too, but it has added features for those who struggle such as a panic button and accountability partners.
5. If you yourself have a problem with inappropriate images, please seek help. If this is too close to home and you feel defensive, please check out the Fight the New Drug website or social media pages. Fight the New Drug is a movement to bring awareness and research results about the harmful effects of these images.

Contemplate these passages:

Job 31:1 tells us that Job made a covenant with his eyes to keep within biblical boundaries of behavior.

Proverbs 4:23 encourages us to “Watch over your heart with all diligence, For from it flow the springs of life.”

And, Matthew 6:22 reminds us that “The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eye is healthy, your whole body will be full of light.”

Although it seems restrictive, there is freedom in Christ and you don’t have to be held captive to addiction. Likewise, being preventative for your family, helps to enable your loved ones to live in freedom as well. God’s world is beautiful, and we get to explore it within His healthy boundaries.

May you all be full of light this week as you shine for the glory of God.

~Originally aired on WECO 95.5 fm/940 am Tues, Sept 22, 2020~