When your kids are little, like toddler little, parent stress means dirty diapers, screaming tantrums, and middle-of-the-night sickness. It’s hard – but resolving those problems are more stressful than difficult.
As kids get bigger, though, it’s not just their basic needs that we’re meeting: we’re preparing them to be responsible, faithful adults, and that’s both stressful and difficult, especially when it comes to having the Talk. Then those ongoing Talks that keep lines of communication open and share not just facts, but the deeper issues behind them. That’s why Hal and Melanie Young’s new book Love, Honor, and Virtue: Gaining or Regaining a Biblical Attitude Toward Sexuality from Great Waters Press is so important
My son is now eleven, which is why I wanted to read this one. We’re preparing for the coming years, when we know we’ll need to talk openly about subjects we might rather not. My husband read this one with me, and so I’ll be sharing both of our perspectives.
Personally, we won’t be giving this to our son when he’s twelve. Based on his maturity level, both physically and emotionally, we can’t imagine him being ready for this in only a year; however, maybe yours is. That’s totally a call for each parent to make, and I’d recommend reading this book before handing it over, for several reasons.
One is that it really is a deep, open, and honest look at the physical side of love and relationships – and sexuality, with all that entails. The first two chapters are really an anatomy and biology lesson; the birds and bees, if you will. I would think that you would want to talk that through with him before giving him this sort of book, which goes all the way from puberty to breastfeeding. It’s a logical place for this book to start, given that each reader then has a common foundation point; but I personally would have preferred for it to read a bit more like a textbook. Some of the comments felt a bit skewed to me; it’s the difference between “should” and “do” or “will.” I can see how they might really need more space than there was room for in this book, but it just felt off.
Besides that small detail, I would definitely recommend this book for young men who are ready to do what it takes to flee from temptation. My husband found this to be an important distinction: this book isn’t for men who aren’t really invested in this topic. While I found the writing to be smooth, logical, and backed up with scripture, my husband noticed something else. He found that the authors often mentioned wrong things in order to point out just how wrong they are, or how right the other choice is. This made total sense to me as written; but after considering his point, I think he’s saying this: That if the reader isn’t totally invested in being virtuous, then it would be easy to take those other remarks and use them as a way to seek out salacious material.
As the authors point out, our culture makes it far too easy to find, shall we say, ‘inappropriate’ images. If our young men want to see them, they won’t need to look very hard. Still, if they haven’t been exposed or come across them, then you could find out in this book – in a most vague, general sense, of course. For example, on page 31, when talking about how accessibility to pornography has changed over the past generation or two, they say: “Now the industry has moved online, and it is literally no further away than a couple of clicks or a mistyped URL. In the last generation, a boy had to work hard to find p**nography. Now, that boy’s grown up, and he and his son have to work even harder to keep p**nography away. It’s pushed its way into the margins and sidebars of legitimate websites, so the bait is displayed right next to the news, sports, or hobby information.”
So … yes, it says where to find the bad stuff, but that doesn’t bother me. I’ve been telling our kids that for years: that sometimes bad pictures will pop up on the computer screen (or in a commercial, or the beach, or Wal-mart, honestly – who hasn’t seen people in PJs there?) and that if it happens, to look away and close the window – immediately. The danger isn’t in our kids knowing where to find this stuff – it’s about what they’ll do with that knowledge.
I think that’s the authors’ intention: to help young men make good choices with that type of knowledge. I do think it’s important to consider, though: are you, the parent, wanting your son to be pure, or does he honestly want that for himself? Love, Honor, and Virtue could be a great resource either way, but it provides solid strategies for redirection when dating, connecting with the opposite sex, and moments alone. It will be most useful to a young man who is old enough to understand what God is calling him to do and how he has physically built him to be.
Love, Honor, and Virtue is an easy, quick read, full of stories, scripture references, and real strategies. It reads in a chatty way, almost like you’re talking with a friend, and takes an uncomfortable topic and makes it more relatable. I appreciated the stance on dating, courtship, and preparation for marriage the most (perhaps since I’m not a man 😉 ) and the way that the authors were both Biblical and practical.
If you know a young man who sincerely wants to pursue virtue and wants specific strategies about how and why to do so, Love, Honor, and Virtue: Gaining or Regaining a Biblical Attitude Toward Sexuality from Great Waters Press is a great resource.
