Brother I've heard it often that men are visual. I hadn't even stopped to really think about that until I married. I've told before of being at the local pool with my husband and a beautiful woman with a perfect body walked into the water. Every straight man's head turned in her direction. I looked at my husband who was looking at me and I nodded toward the beautiful woman and stated the obvious " she's really beautiful". He looked at me and simply said "but I love you". As much as that touched my heart, I started to think more about how men had to deal with temptation daily. I had always been modest in the way I dressed because I was in ministry for so long. But I wondered what our brothers were dealing with each day or even in church. I don't know if men are open to discussing that here. But I believe a lot of young boys were exposed at a very young age to porn. There were a lot of books hidden in plain sight. And now, at the touch of a button it's everywhere. You don't even need to go so far as to view porn. I mean, temptation is everywhere. There is a commercial running right now for a woman's product that I personally think is vulgar. Some may know which one I mean. But I look at my two young teen nephews and think "there is no way to shelter them from this".
I try to have an open line with my nephews, 13 and 16, a very vulnerable time in their lives. I told them two things, I would never lie to them and I would be there whenever they called. Hubby and I have both said this. And so that seemed to open some conversations. Their parents are both Christians, but my sister has really raised them alone. So I asked if her husband had talked to them about sex, and she said he found it too embarrassing. This really upset me. So one evening I found myself walking with my eldest nephew alone and he told me that only two girls in his class claimed to be straight. He told me that he liked one of the two girls but didn't want his parents to know. So we had a long talk and I told him about sex in an age appropriate way. And I told him it was so very easy to fall and make a mistake. His half sister has a child out of wedlock. I used her as an example. That is where I told him I would never lie to him and any questions he had he could bring to me or my hubby. My hubby has gone out of his way over the years to have a bond with the boys and they adore him, so that makes me feel better.
Then I had a conversation with my younger nephew. He has a cousin that is spoiled rotten and watches whatever movies he wants, does what he wants and gets what he wants. He's a huge influence on my nephew who is the youngest. So one night on the back porch we began to talk and he said his friends were talking about porn. He said " I don't really know what that is". So I told him that it was something that was adult and something he didn't need to know about. I said " when your friends talk about that you tell them it's an adult subject and it's not something you need to see or talk about". Again I brought up his half sister as I did to his brother and warned him how easy it was, even as a Christian to fall into sin. Now they aren't my children so I felt limited as to what I could say. I did tell my sister parts of what we talked about and that I was going to be truthful if they asked me questions. I know that my parents hid from me that fact that they had sex before marriage. I was an adult before my mother told me, and I felt very betrayed by that.
Anyhow, not to take away from the OP but men I would appreciate your conversations about temptation, how to avoid it, how to avoid porn which is very difficult this day in age. And any advice I could give to my two young nephews who I adore and don't want to see them fall into temptation. I sat them on my lap as babies when I had a moment alone with them and I would pray over them. They come from a Christian but very unstable home. Anything you would add to my advice to them, I would appreciate it.
