How to Talk to Your Kids About Sex

Here's how to cover the when, the what, the where, and the how.

Dana C. Edmond is the author of Do It Right! Love, Sex, and Relationships God’s Way. He has served as a pastor, teacher, youth director, and most recently president of the South Central Conference of Seventh-day Adventists in Nashville, Tennessee. He and his wife, Jill, have been married for 38 years and have two children, Courtney Michelle and R.J., and four grandchildren.

Our children will inevitably be confronted with sexual images both earlier and more often than we as parents would probably wish. Living in the United States, I had assumed that this was primarily an American problem. But in 1995 I took my family with me to Holland while I attended some meetings.

I decided that there are portions of Europe where society is even more oriented toward sex than in America. The whole time we were there, I was constantly covering the eyes of my then 9-year-old son and 12-year-old daughter.

One afternoon while walking around in Utrecht with my family, I noticed, to my horror, that there was a man who had “forgotten” to put on any clothes.

Since I was the first one in my family to spot this, uh, unusual event, I decided to try to discretely encourage my wife and children to walk in a different direction.

I almost made it, too, but just before we were out of view of this “Gentleman Godiva,” my son said (loudly) to his sister, “Courtney, look!” (Isn’t it amazing that your children always seem to see the things you don’t want them to see, but they often can’t see the things you want them to see?)

How do we give our children a healthy, Christian perspective of sex in a world where an unhealthy, un-Christian view seems to dominate?

AS A PARENT, YOU MUST HAVE A HEALTHY, CHRISTIAN PERSPECTIVE OF SEX.

You cannot give your children what you yourself do not have. Sex in its right context—involving a husband and a wife in a loving, healthy, happy relationship—is one of God’s greatest gifts to humans. If that is what you truly believe and that has been your blessed experience, then communicate that to your children.

Of course, that does not mean that your children actually want to hear that their parents have a happy, healthy sexual experience with each other. My experiences with young people (I was a youth director for 11 years) and with my own children have led me to believe that kids prefer to view their parents as nonsexual beings. Of course, the truth is that, with one very notable exception in Scripture, the only way that parents get to be parents in the first place is for them not to be nonsexual beings. The point is that there is nothing wrong with letting your children know (without going into personal details) that their parents have given sex, in its right context, their personal approval.

ALL CONVERSATIONS WITH YOUR CHILDREN ABOUT SEX HAVE TO BE AGE-APPROPRIATE.

What you say to your 4-year-old is obviously not the same as what you say to your 14-year-old. You’ll need to talk with your children about sex at three main intervals in their lives:

1. When they are toddlers, to answer their questions and to protect them against those who would seek to take advantage of them.

Obviously, when one is dealing with young children, the “sex education” should be somewhat limited. They should understand that their genital areas are not for random touching, either by others or themselves. You can also explain that babies grow inside their mothers’ tummies. Of course, young children are curious and don’t hesitate to ask lots of questions about whatever is on their minds. So to a large extent you’ll know what to tell your toddlers based on what they ask.

But remember, whatever they ask must be answered honestly, even if the honest answer is “You are not quite old enough to understand that right now” or “Mommy [or Daddy] doesn’t know how to answer that question right now.” And whether or not they ask for it, you have to tell them something about inappropriate touching so they can protect themselves from child molestation.

2. As they enter the school years, to help them understand the miracle of human reproduction and to protect them against the misinformation of their friends.

You can be pretty certain that if you don’t talk to your children about sex, one of their friends will. If that happens, instead of getting information, your child is more likely to get misinformation. The same is true if they are exposed to sexual topics or images in magazines or on the Internet. Use these early years to give them patient, truthful answers, and they will be more likely to seek your advice as they grow. Some parents start the conversation by reading their child simple books about God’s plan for families and sex.

3. When they are teenagers, to protect them from, well, themselves.

About the time they begin to discover the opposite sex and have the opportunity to do something about what they have discovered, you need to talk to your children and help them understand that while sex in its proper context is a wonderful thing, when it is taken outside that context, sex is dangerous and (with the advent of AIDS) even deadly.

I recommend that, if possible, both parents talk to their children about sex. Men and women do not look at sex in exactly the same way, and it is good to have both “perspectives.” I would further recommend that these particular talks be held separately, to make it easier on the child to ask one parent those questions they might feel uncomfortable asking the parent of the other gender.

Ultimately, a discussion with your child about Christian sexuality is just another in a series of discussions that you as a parent need to have with your child about life in general. If an open line of communication has already been established between you and your child and you talk regularly, this conversation is not likely to be difficult.

If, on the other hand, you and your child do not communicate easily, I do not think it is ever too late to start trying. Ask God to help you begin that process today.

 

Sidebar: The Sex Talk

WHAT MESSAGE SHOULD CHRISTIAN PARENTS GIVE THEIR KIDS?

If my wife and I were going through the child-rearing phase of our lives again and we were giving our children the Christian philosophy of sex, we would tell them what we told them the first time (and what we periodically remind them of now): The Christian, biblical view of sex is that there is no sex until there is a marriage between a man and a woman. In other words, relative to sex, until you say “I do,” you don’t.

Here are some texts in the Bible that shape the Christian philosophy of sex:

• Hebrews 13:4

• 1 Corinthians 6:9, 10

• 1 Corinthians 6:18-20

• 1 Corinthians 7:2

• Proverbs 6:24-33

• Proverbs 7

Dana C. Edmond is the author of Do It Right! Love, Sex, and Relationships God’s Way. He has served as a pastor, teacher, youth director, and most recently president of the South Central Conference of Seventh-day Adventists in Nashville, Tennessee. He and his wife, Jill, have been married for 38 years and have two children, Courtney Michelle and R.J., and four grandchildren.