Theology in the Raw - How to Disciple Young Kids in Christian Sexuality, Part 2: Laurie Krieg

Episode Date: September 4, 2025

Laurie Krieg is the Director of Parent Programs & Discipleship at The Center for Faith, Sexuality, and Gender, where she also serves as a founding board member. Laurie has a master’s in evangelism and leadership from Wheaton Graduate School, and she and her husband, Matt, are the co-hosts of the Hole in My Heart Podcast, co-authors of An Impossible Marriage (IVP 2020), and together wrote the forthcoming parenting book, Raising Wise Kids in a Sexually Broken World (IVP 2026). Pre-order our brand new resource: Christian Sexuality: Raising Kids, which releases on Sept 16th! See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology and Raw. This episode is part two of my conversations with Lori Krieg, who is a host of a brand new resource that we are putting out at the Center for Faith Sexuality and Gender and Gender, which is called Christian Sexuality, Raising Kids. How do we disciple our young kids, zero to 12 in conversations around sex, sexuality, gender, faith? The gospel, navigating friends, navigating schools, and navigating screen use. all these things. I mean, to say I'm excited about this resource is an understatement. We produce lots of resources at the center. We produce resources that help pastors and leaders navigate LGBTQ, the LGBTQ conversation. We've had resources directed at teens and youth pastors and parents with LGBTQ kids and LGBTQ people wrestling with their faith and sexuality. So we've covered all these areas. The one gaping hole in our resource, our list of resources is,

is something that helps parents with younger kids in the broader sex, sexuality, and gender conversation. Again, not just same-sex stuff, but just sex and sexuality as a whole. And so, as I mentioned in the last episode, Lori is the host of this series and just did an absolute fantastic job. So if you did listen to the previous episode, I would highly recommend doing that. That's going to give you a running start into what we're even talking about. for this episode, I want to dig deeper into how to have conversations around sex with your younger

kids. Like, what does that look like? What language did you use? What should you say? Shouldn't you say? How old should they be would you have the conversation? And then we also talk about how to navigate school systems and, you know, whether you homeschool or private school or public school, like how do we disciple our kids in this conversation. So again, Lori is the director of parent programs and discipleship at the Center for Face Sexuality and Gender. And she is coming out with a book called Raising Wise Kids in a Sexually Confused World coming out in early 2026 with IVP. I'll probably have her back on the show when that book releases to talk about her book. So, yeah, please welcome back to the show.

The One and Only, Lori Creed. All right, Lori Krieg, welcome back to Theology in the Raw. In the previous episode, we talked about. Well, this resource that we have coming out called Christian sexuality raising kids, basically how to disciple your kids, ages zero to 12 in conversations around sex, sexuality, gender, so on and so forth. We gave an overview of the series. We talked about why we should be having these conversations at an early age, not wait until like our parents might have done if they had the conversation at all. It's like they, you know, they pull us aside. They're all sweaty.

I'm like 18 years old and they're trying to explain to us and everybody's all awkward You're a full beard Yeah But we need to be having conversations From day one

And we ended the last conversation Talked about why It's so important to begin early And yes there is a fear of Putting ideas under a head that they don't already have But there is also And there's an age of way to do it, obviously, but we shouldn't avoid the conversation simply because we think

we're going to destroy their innocence. Let's talk specifically about the sex talk or sex talks. First of all, what age should you begin this conversation and how would you go about it at different age stages? You can even just walk us through kind of different age stages. within this zero to 12 and help us, how should parents go about this conversation? So you have the sex talk, which I know we're supposed to have 100, one minute conversations. Got it. We're going to do that. But there is a conversation you have where kids go from not understanding the nitty-gritty of sexual intercourse to understanding it. That is an intentional conversation for which you have to prepare.

We gave y'all a script, which you are welcome to just throw out or adapt or adopt. But as a real mom who has had these real conversations recently, it was very helpful for me to script it out before I went into the room so that I am less sweaty and terrified. I think we're all going to be sweaty and scared. But you can take that and just be like, okay, here's the three pieces I really want to think about. But life stages, you know, in the zero to five range, we're saying, we're using the language of seeds, really zero to seven. Mom, how did you get a baby in your tummy? My six-year-old asked me that.

Six years old. Last week, six years old. I don't have a baby in my tummy now. But how are babies made? And it was funny because my girls were also in the room who have had. had the sex talk. And so I gave him the younger version, but listen to how it turned out. Mom, how do babies get inside mommy's tummy? He's like, I've just really been wondering that. When he was tiny, I was like, God takes a part from a dad and apart from a mom. God makes a baby out

of that. That was fine, that zero to three range. So that's very general. It's accurate. Very general. But very, very, they probably don't even have pictures in their mind. Well, maybe they do. But I mean, they're, they probably don't. Or a seed from a mom and a seed from a dad, and God puts them together and makes a baby. Usually that suffices kids, zero to three. Four to seven. So this is where my son is in this age range right now. Mom, how do babies?

I've just been wondering about that. And I was like, oh, great. We're watching TV. And I was like, you know, I tried to give them the little kid version. I was like, God takes apart from a mom and apart from a dad, and God puts them together, and he makes a baby. And he's like, what? what part of the body?

And then my daughter, the wise crack, right? Oh, they're probably dying to jump in. Right? Yeah, I can see this. They're like, oh, they like cut off part of their hand. And then the other one, like, shut up, girls. You're making this worse. So you have a normal family.

That's good to know. Yeah, I do. So then I was like, well, and I'm looking at Matt, who like has filmed this with me. I'm like, you're turn to step in. I was like, you know, there is something inside the man's penis that God has. there's a seed inside there and then there's an egg inside the mom and God puts them together and that makes a baby. Something distracted the moment that skirked me out of that moment, but do you know what

that was to me is that was a indicator that maybe if the age range to talk with our kids about intercourse is between seven and ten, some say six years old, some say five years old. That seemed a little young because you have not entered into like the, the pre-pubescent state where your mind starts preparing for puberty. So that feels a little young, five, six. But that did tell me he might be part of the group who could hear it earlier than maybe some who need it closer to 10 or even 11. Is that because he's asking more specific questions?

And that alerts you to because if he's asking specific questions, that does, right, does that demand a specific answer to those specific questions in a tasteful appropriate way? If he was asking those questions and I knew he was going in a school system where he would get answers that I know are not going to be biblical or he had the personality type where he's like, I'm going to go ask every single person I see because I'm so curious. I would be like, this is an emergency. But I know my son and I know his context. And so I know he's not going to ask every single person he sees. So that tells me, okay, he has one more. time. I also know his screen habits. He doesn't have access to go Google that. Also, he can't

spell. So that's yet. That's not a knock on him. I'm just like, he thankfully can't quite read excellently. But if you had a child who is very, like, gregarious, really smart and intuitive and wanted to, had tons of access to screens, had a cultural context at their school or on the playground or in their neighborhood where they could ask these questions and would be very asking everyone. That would be a five alarm bell inside my head to say, I need to have this conversation early and now. But that did set me something up in me, even though my son's context is not that, made me think, I think in the next year, we need to start having a more specific conversation. Okay. And how specific does that get? Can you give us, I don't know if you probably don't have

your script in front of you, but what does that proactive conversation look like? Are you being specific with the sex act? I mean, yeah, we are. But it's, one sentence. And here's what was in my head. This really helped me. So I have up into my left like 25 books on puberty. I got so many kids books and for parents' books. I got purity culture books. I got super secular ones. And so I wanted to read it all in order to really understand what is the best way to really help my own children first and then to serve you all. And what I understood, what helped me is, okay, this is a service to my children. This is not me being like, I just need them to know about sex so that they're not damaged.

It's my kids are sexual beings. They're developing into sexual, really, you know, sexual beings right now. And they're going to go through puberty, whether I like it or not. Do I want to be the one to help them or do I want them to figure it out on their own? we the parents should be the ones who want to and even if we don't want to we help and we so that helped me to be like I need to help prepare my child for puberty okay that's helpful so then I thought it's not just puberty for puberty say God why did you create puberty why do I have to have this sex talk because again I do not if you think about the last episode I don't want it to just be

horizontal I don't want to just throw tampons at them or tell them you're going to have what dream sorry, you're going to have like all the ease on this episode because, like, you know, sorry to figure it out. Like, what is the purpose? Oh, because God has created us for procreation. Oh, why has God created us for procreation? Because he just loves babies. Yeah, he does love babies.

He wants the world full of more images of himself. He wants the world filled with his love. God is a procreative God because he loves us so much and he wants the world to just be in union with each other when it's himself and he would advance his kingdom. So I'm like, okay, how do I explain this to a 6, 7, 8, 9 year old? Lord, help me. But I'll just tell you that helped my anxiety,

which non-Christian studies say that sex talks go best when parents are chill. Like, chill. So work on your anxiety. Have a plan. so it says be prepared like have a plan know what you're going to say and then kids are ever perceiving your anxiety so if you can go in thinking okay lord this is about not me just ripping off the band-aid and just trying to expose my kids to sexy sex sex sex this is me try to teach them

something about your procreative heart and your love for procreation in a covenant relationship okay lord help me to serve my kid that's the heart go in with you. peace and serving them. So when I start these conversations, hey, we're going to have a conversation that is that, hey, I would love to talk to you about something. So we're going to go. Where would you like to go and find a safe place that's safe for your kids, that's safe for you? So that might be your room. It might be there and let them pick. I don't personally recommend doing like a big weekend because you're going to have more than just this conversation and you want to be able to come back to it. Do have, do have a weekend. This is my recommendation of like,

you're becoming a woman now or you're becoming a man now. Like, go celebrate. But the sex talk, I want it to be a place where you guys can keep coming back to. And it's not like, I have to go climb Mount Olympus to talk to my dad about this. It's, I know that safe place where we talked about it the first time. We can go right back there, his room, my room, living room, base, whatever, go somewhere. And it can be mom and dad. I recommend the same gendered parent or whomever is closest if you as a parent you're a single mom or dad you don't have you know you're not the same gender as the child that you're talking to maybe you have a trusted mentor in your life who could be a part of this conversation if you don't have a trusted mentor same gendered

mentor for your kid pray for that person and so anyway but god knows your situation for those you listening he's going to provide find a safe place hey i'm going to talk to you about your body and how you're going to be growing up. And I'm going to talk to you about sex. Have you ever heard that word before? Now, you may expect your kid to just freak out. What? Sex? This is crazy. If you're not freaking out and they have not been exposed everywhere,

just going to be like, no or yes. Yeah, I have heard that. I don't really know what it is. I don't know. This one person said that word. What's that mean? I've heard sexy. What's sexy? kids are very straightforward black and white or no what is it well you are growing up into your body right now which this is another reason to talk to your kids between seven and ten girls are starting puberty and boys are starting puberty younger why nobody knows it's a star so girls are starting at around age nine but their body starts preparing a year or two before so this is

the window that's great so young I always think puberty is like 11, 12, you know, then, but it's happening. Yes. And it's not when you get your first period. Your body starts preparing a year or two before. It's not, you know, when boys' voice start changing, it's a year or two before. So boys are a little later than girls. So maybe that helps. So boys, it might be closer to 9 and 10 when you talk to them. But again, listen to your kid. But their body really moves into puberty around 11, 12, and girls around 9. But even sometimes it's, really seven. So this is the window, seven to ten-ish. You know, your body is turning. I want to talk to you about sex, but before I do that, you know, your body is turning in from a kid body into a grown-out body that is able to have sex one day and to get married if God calls you to that. But let's talk about how your body is going to change. What do you think about that? You're always pausing.

You say some sentences. What do you think about what I just said? and you're listening, you're answering questions, and then, you know, I did have at least one of my kids be like, just staring at me with big wide eyes. So, and then the other one was like, I want a diagram. I want to see everything that you're saying. Really? So yeah. Oh, yeah. So, you know, your body is changing. So when you are around, so this is me talking to my girls, your body is preparing to have sex. So have you heard that word? No, I have not heard that word. Or yes, I have heard that word. So sex is when a mom and a dad, remember how he talked about when you were a kid about how God takes apart from a mom and apart from a dad. And when they come together, it makes a baby. Yes, I have heard. I do remember that. Well, this is what happens is that a man's penis and then they're going to start getting wide-eyed. But again, this is not sexy.

If they have not been exposed to stuff, this is just biology. Which you've been establishing from day one. Right. Day one. I've been talking about penises. We've been talking about my eyes. So that word is not going to be like, oh, my God. It's like, okay.

Yeah. But they're still going to look at you like, this is interesting because we've never talked about this. And they're probably going to feel your anxiety. They're going to feel your little bit of anxiety. Even I who studied to not be anxious, was anxious. Okay. So man's penis, Prest, did you want me to say all this?

Yeah. I mean, if you're, if you're willing to talk to your eight-year-old, then I think my adult audience can handle it. Okay. Yeah, for sure. So, okay, yeah, I guess word of warning for those of you who have, like, people listening that you don't want to hear biological body parts name, then skip ahead or pause or turn to volume down. Okay, go. Yes.

And I do want, if your kids are listening, I want you to be the one to say it, not Lori. So is, you know, man, a mom and a dad, they get married. and in the safety of a promise, they take all their clothes off. You might say this, you might not say this. I didn't say it to one. I did say it to one. I did say it to another because she was like, well, where are your clothes? So you might say this, you might not.

But a man's penis goes inside. Do you remember how girls have three holes? Yep, one for tinkle, one for poop, and another one where babies come out. So it goes inside the one where the babies come out and a man's, the seed, is called semen. It goes inside a woman's tummy right inside of her uterus, and it connects to an egg in there. And together, God makes a baby. It takes the semen. It takes the egg and put together, it makes a baby.

One of my kids did say, why are you telling me this? What did you say? I said, because your body is preparing right now to have babies if God calls you to it. But even if God doesn't call you to have babies every time, so I'm skipping a part about when I talk about periods, but let me just tell you the theology that I did say. Every time you have a period, buddy, you can be reminded that God wants you to have babies, whether that's making disciples, being a mentor, or through adoption, or through your body. Every time you have a period, you can be reminded. God loves babies. He loves disciples. Isn't that a way better way to talk about your period? Because literally even sharing that with my kids and next time I have my period, you know? It's like, oh my word, God wants images of himself everywhere, not because he's just like,

everybody needs to have a quiverful. It's because he loves humans. So why are you telling me this? You know, God does want you to, God wants us to have babies. So I'm sorry, I'm mixing it up a little bit. from sex to puberty. So there is a scripted way you can go through it. But those are the elements.

Gospel narrative, talk about sex, and then talk about the body changes that they're going to go through. So you keep bringing it back to the gospel, which I think almost it de-sexualizes, but that's not the right turn. Kind of. It theologizes sex.

It brings it into a theological arena. How do you, you kind of, I guess you did touch on this in passing, but just kind of re-re-ask the question. How do you avoid giving the notion that because they have the potential to do this, that this is inevitably what they should do, have kids, get married and everything? Is it just a matter of continuing to remind them that this is, if God calls you to marriage, this is, you know, but I mean, I could see a kid maybe even connecting dots.

Like, well, if I do have this body part and it has this function, then, if I don't get married and produce kids, am I doing something wrong? Has that ever come up? I don't know. This is why you talk about the mission of God a lot, and you talk about if God calls you to marriage. Like, that's a every other day conversation at least once a week. So I, to shove the theology only in their faces, like in just the sex talk, like, oh, and by the you might also be called a singleness, and this is just like going to be a reminder to you

about how God wants you to make disciple babies and not maybe babies from your tummy. Don't slam it all in at the same second in that conversation. But if this conversation is in a context of mission of God, marriage and singleness are equally valuable, and that everyone is called to make disciples, but not everyone is called to marriage. That is going to make the sex talk go so. much better. It's kind of make you as the parent think, which that is my critique of purity culture, is it was horizontal rules, my interpretation of it, for rules for just like do good's sake. But when you put it in the gospel context, it's like, oh my word, then the rules make sense. It's like God wants it to be in a covenant because God isn't a covenant with us. God

wants us to have babies because he wants all of us to be making disciples. It's pretty incredible. Wow, that's awesome. That's so good. Oh, my gosh. How did it go with your three kids? Yeah, we kind of touched on it. Did some different reactions? I mean, looking back, do you feel like, okay, looking back, were there some things? You're like, oh, my gosh, if I had to do this a thousand times, it would definitely do this over and over and over. And were there any things that you look back and say, you know what? I don't know if I would have said that or done it this way. Are there any, do you have any kind of regrets or maybe not any great regrets, but things you would, the things you did or said that you would recommend not doing or saying? Right.

I am so grateful I had puberty in my mind and the gospel in my mind and that I worked really hard to not show them too much anxiety at all. Like I really worked on that of like, okay, Lori, this is serving them. This is serving them. You're loving them by teaching them what their bodies are going to go through and teaching them the gospel purpose. come on you can do it um so that i would repeat the one who like said why are you telling me this like maybe i should have waited like six more months it's just that's the only thing but it's at the same time it's been so helpful because god like that wasn't the only conversation we've we talked about it this week and i'm like they asked a question about wait a minute why did that

person have a baby, they weren't married, right? Do you remember what we talked about, how babies are made? Yeah, but it has to be a mom and a dad. It has to be a mom and a dad, but some people can do married things without having made the promise. God wants it to be in the context of a promise, but not everyone does that. So it's been so nice to just keep, I can keep coming back to it. And I just got to trust that God's grace, even if you do it three months early, six months, late. It's just you've got to trust that God's grace is sufficient. I almost wonder, too, if I was going to err on doing it a little too early or a little too late, I think I would probably choose a little too early. Yeah. Because of the anchoring bias. Like even if you're like,

well, maybe I should have waited six more months. You still have the anchoring bias. We talked about that in the last episode that, you know, you have laid the foundation. Somebody else hasn't laid the foundation, you know. Exactly. keep coming back to that. How do you, so, you know, both you and I, our primary work or the last decade has been in LGBTQ-related questions and theologies and pastoral responses and everything. How do those conversations, how do you handle those conversations as you're talking about sexuality in general? Like, do you start talking about same-sex relationships that at the same time you're talking about sex? Or is that like a different sidebar?

conversation? Is it kind of baked into the whole thing? So if the themes in your family are gospel, creation, fall, redemption, recreation, sin is normal because of the fall. God's going to make it all good. Another theme being your mission, another theme, marriage and singleness are equally valuable, it's going to be really a lot easier for you to talk about LGBT stuff in that context. My three-year-old, we talk about about this. Ask me, why can't mom can two girls marry each other? It wasn't that hard to respond to her in even three-year-old language because I'm like, well, yes, it's legal for girls to get married in our country. But it is not, you can say, you know, it's not marriage in God's eyes. It's a little

above a three-year-old's metaphorical language, but it's not marriage for God because God wants moms and dads to be married because they're so different from each other. And God is so different from us. So when moms and dads love each other, they show you a picture of how much God loves you, even though he's so different from us. So I'm answering her question and then I'm talking about a little deeper. So if we like drill down in the gospel marriage and singles, so we drill down under marriage. There's been like a bit of a catechism or just things that I've been teaching them about what marriage is so that they know the anomalies are sin, not because we're better than those sinners, but because it doesn't fall into God's beautiful design. Kids are very black

and white. There's good people. There's bad people, right? And there's good, there's right and wrong. There's, they don't do well with gray. I think that's even psychological or like kids are just their brains. They have to categorize. So how do you establish God's truth about marriage and sex without fostering an attitude of judgmentalism or dehumanization toward people who aren't following that, for instance, you know, yeah, especially in a lot of the same sex conversation. Every single day we're talking about broken as they see around it,

whether it's like friendships that are hard. And I work very hard in my own heart, and I do not nail this. And I'm working still on not seeing people as good and bad, but as people who have turned and repented toward Jesus and those who have not yet. So how we talk about that in kid language is language of brokenness. brokenness is very common conversation in our home. So one of my kids does something wrong and hey, buddy, got to say sorry for that. It's not right. I'm sorry to whomever. And then they may spiral

and shame. I see it. They start to spiral. Oh, I'm the worst kid. I hate myself. Or they might say I hate myself. I'm a worse kid. Hey, you don't have to do that. Jesus loves you. He forgives you. It's gone. It's on the cross. We all love you. We all struggle with stuff. I'm not kidding. We go around the horn in the creek house like once a week. We like regularly name all our struggles. So you just did this thing. You struggle with anger and, you know, anger isn't itself bad, but, you know, sinning in your anger. Yep, we're all here for you. We love you. We're going to work with you on that. Okay, what do you struggle with Ellis? He names it. There's no shame. It's just everybody goes, what's dad's struggle with? They like can name our sins right away. Like anxiety about money. Mom worries about, you

know, her job can be her performance or life or anxiety, also anxiety. Usually it's like fear and, you know, but we're not like, yeah, that's what makes you a terrible person. It's like, yep, we all struggle with things and we all need Jesus. every day. So that person, so they're like, yeah, that person's a bad person and I'm a good person. Like that person is struggling with sin and instead of taking it to Jesus and asking him to help them like we all need to do, we all just remind each other of where we need Jesus, they're going with this struggle.

And then all of a sudden that just deflates the like fun stone throwing that even little kids like to do. and I like to do in my flesh so then when we see someone who is in a same-sex relationship or is living out their gender or their sexuality or having babies outside

of covenant of marriage there's so much more grace there's truth like hey I got to go to Jesus with my stuff so could you there's invitation to grace but it's less black and white you've already painted a picture

of like there's a common struggle we all participate in. Yes. So that when they see somebody else that's also struggling, they're not othered, right? They're actually the opposite. They're identified as participating in a struggle that we all have in different ways. That's good. Yes. That's really good.

It makes it a lot easier. How have you navigated the school situation? You know, both of us, we travel a lot and speak around the country. and it's not just right-wing media that is, you know, talking about how radically progressive our educational system is and people are, kids are being fed stuff at kindergarten and all this stuff. It's like, I go, I talk to a lot of parents from the country and it is, it's not in every case. I don't even know the percentage, but the stories they tell me what their kids are being taught.

I'm like, wow, all right. So I guess Fox News isn't always wrong. Like I don't, you know. You nailed it. Not a huge fan, but like, yeah, there are, you know, and maybe it's over-emphasized in some right-wing media for political purposes and stuff. But there is some pretty alarming things being done and taught in some public schools. Have you experienced that as well? And how do you navigate that?

Our kids have been, we're in public school, my youngest or my oldest K through fourth. And then we pulled them all out mid-year, fourth grade of my oldest. So about five years. It was not because of LGBTQ concerns. I know a lot of people wonder that. But it is, I went to public school my whole life. And it helped. I mean, like, it wasn't great, but it was basically morally, at least neutral, if not sometimes, almost Christian.

Like, it wasn't, you know, there was like the bad kids. And then sometimes my siblings were the bad kids. And so it's like, you know, what is, it's like it was not, it was not what it is today. And I think that's a helpful sentence. It is different today from what I can tell. For those formative years in our public schools context, it was not what I'm hearing, some of these horror stories that you're saying. But there is a spiritual, philosophical something that can in some public school context, really create we're talking about foundations be a foundation of of self of everybody's good of

if we all just got along it's fine it's there's just a foundation that is not as close to the gospel and it was making it very hard at home to teach my kids when you're getting eight hours of different foundation than at home. And even beyond a foundation, sometimes it can be not just being taught a different foundation, but being

indoctrinated pretty aggressively and made to feel shame and scared to even say what they actually believe for fear of repercussion. In fact, I was at a church up in Canada and they said

their kids will get will fail exams. This is true. I mean, this is, I'm just repeating what they told me. If they don't answer yes to certain very progressive,

like, questions and give an answer that is not even close to being a Christian worldview, they will fail the exams. And they said they even, so their kids are like, do I lie so I can get a decent grade and get into the college I want? Or do I say what I believe?

Which isn't, it's what probably the majority. aren't in the world blaze, you know, Christian or not Christian? I mean, and get a bad grade. And now I can't get college scholarships. And I mean, that's, that's, that's tough. It's really tough. Or at younger age, I've heard, you know, similar Canadian context,

um, taking kids out third, fourth grade, asking them, what gender are you? Without parents on purpose, excluding parents. one-on-one with little kids. So the assumption is you're not the gender you were born. Asking every kid, that's pretty intense. So that would fall into indoctrination. So I think the question's like, what do we do? We talk about this metaphor in the film project is in the 1980s,

scientists did this like perfect ecosystem trial. In Arizona, there was perfect air and trees and wildlife, and they put it in a bubble. And a lot of the trees started falling over, even though they had perfect soil, perfect sun, perfect water. They sort of falling over from their own weight. And what scientists realized they forgot is that trees need wind in order to grow strong roots. So that term, he coined it, the term is anti-fragile. The kids are intrinsically anti-fragile. They're like our muscles.

They're like our immune systems. They're like trees. We need to bump up against things in order to grow strong. So for parents listening, for caregivers, pastors, kids need good soil. They also need the right amount of wind to grow strong. So we as parents need to discern, are my kids? kids getting the right amount of soil. So if my kid was in that Canadian context, I'd be like, oh, my word, everything we can do.

Every day they go to school and it's a hurricane. So what can we pour into them at every other minute? Let's process it. Let's talk about what is godly in this situation. And in order to help our kids stand strong. So on the other end, there are Christian more conservative context where it's tons of soil and these trees are getting fat and rich soil but they're not getting enough wind and exposure and i cannot tell you my husband is a licensed mental health therapist who

specializes in sexual addiction how many homeschool kids are in his office with intense sexual addiction because they were not exposed to a proper amount of wind in order to grow deep root. So the answer is not everybody's shelter inside a bubble, nor is it, let's put them into a hurricane. This kid takes discernment. So you really have to just navigate who your kid is. Yes. Are they getting enough soil? Are they getting the right amount of wind? And that can happen as a homeschooler. Obviously, you're going to run the risk typically of not enough wind. Public school, you might run the risk of too much win. I'm going to say something that might be provocative.

I don't know. That's the Algin-Raw. If you put them in a Christian private school, in my anecdotal experience, you might be getting the wrong kind of nutrient-rich soil. Too much nitrogen, not enough nitrogen. I don't know if that's true or not. I heard nitrogen is important.

You know, but I, you know, we've, I'm not going to name any names. But yeah, there's certain Christian private schools where I'm like, they're going to be getting all kinds of like, I would say, political idolatry and a brand of hyper-conservative evangelicalism that equates like, you know, certain Christian views with the gospel and all these things. It's like, gosh, that's going to take its own kind of undoing. And I don't see that as like, well, at least that's safe. And I'm like, is that safe that my kid is going to be taught things that either they're, going to believe and I'm going to have to undo or they're going to reject and be all confused.

Like, wait a minute. Is this Christianity? Maybe I don't want to be a Christian if I have to vote a certain way to be a Christian, you know. And so even the quote unquote safe private, and again, I know some really good Christian private schools. I think in Grand Rapids, you guys have, I think, some ones. Yeah, some great ones. Yeah. So, yeah. So I, is it too simplistic to say. This is what I've often said. It sounds like it's kind of what you're saying. I mean, Whatever choice you make, the parent, parents, or single parent, if you're a single parent, has the primary responsibility to disciple your kids. Like you can't, what in the video series, was it John, or no, as John Tyson said,

but you can't outsource the discipleship of your kids. Hopefully the schooling can come alongside, whether it's blowing wind or helping with the Soil, either way, the primary responsibility rests on the parents. And you can't, like you said, if you're homeschooling and we homeschooled all of our kids, the majority of the time, not all the time, but most of the time. And that, I just can't stress enough. If your goal in homeschooling is to shelter your kids, that is going to, well, it's going to possibly put kids in your husband's office, you know, like, again,

And it's like just don't make, protect them from all the wind. It's like, well, that, that, if you're homeschooling, I would say, then you need to find environments where they're going to experience wind for the sake of strengthening their discipleship, you know. And that's when I think, so our kids are in a private school context now is, I, people warn me of this. They said, don't get lazy. like that is the temptation is you're like oh praise god i'm so tired somebody else could do this for someone else i relate but i am i am hyper aware and that's the blessing of doing this job as like we're pioneers in this space in this time right now um is i'm like okay lord help me to process what they're hearing now at school and uh help us to be the primary

mary soil fillers and then make sure that they're getting good wind it's we can't really ever rest or take a break from parenting so good parenting it's not for the faint-hearted um laurie thanks so much for being on theology draw a couple times in a row uh again the series is raise christian sexuality raising kids give us you've got the floor um speak to anybody listening that's considering that you know that needs to go through this series. What's your encouragement challenge for them to check it out? Not please, I hate, you know, not the seller product, whatever, but to provide, we're trying to provide the church with the resource we find is really needed. So take it, take it away.

Speak to my audience about this resource. If you have young people in your life, yes, 12 and under, but around that is age, and you're looking at them and your heart beats a little faster because you're a bit concerned for them. When you look at them and you look at this world and then you look inside yourself and you're like, oh my word, how can I contextualize this world in a gospel way? I don't know what sentences to say. I don't know how to talk to them. This product is for you.

We really, I, between this project and the book that I wrote that's coming out later, I cited so many sources. We, our team, did the hard, dirty work for you because you as a mom, as a dad, as a caregiver, as a pastor, you don't have time to read 9,000 puberty books like I did. So you do not need to just take what I say, digest it, and repeat it. If you want to, you can. But definitely consider it if you're looking at your kids

and you're looking at this world. saying, Lord Jesus, help me. We really try to make this product for you to help you cast a gospel vision for your kids. It's at CenterforFaith.com. The links in the show notes that comes out September 16th, but I would recommend, yeah, sign it up early just so you don't forget.

Lori, thanks again for being on the podcast. Really appreciate you. It's best. Appreciate you. This show is part of the Converge podcast network. Are you looking for news with a faith-based perspective? Then tune in to the pourover today. The podcast that delivers the world's biggest news stories through a lens of

faith every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. On the pour over today, you'll hear the same news and headlines as a major outlets, but interpreted in the context of God's sovereignty. I absolutely love that. You can stay grounded in the midst of chaos with faith forward, engaging summaries that connect current events with eternal perspective. Just search the pour over, okay? Spelled P-O-U-R, like the coffee, on your favorite podcast platform or find the direct link in our show notes.