Wow! Did I just go there? Yes, I just did. This is book is about “Biblical Sexuality” something that is pretty NON-PC to talk about. Yup. But hey, W.I.T.N.G right? What Is The Narrow Gateway? We ask the question whenever we encounter life’s different faces and phases. Even when it requires being non-PC. Wow! What a book though! Let’s dig in.
Yay or Nay?
So it’s a total Yay from me! Yes this is a must-read and must-apply guide or tool for parents to use to introduce their kids (ages 6 – 10) to ‘the good about sex’ as God intended it (the writer has tools for other age ranges as well, starting from the age of 3!). For many parents, Christians or not, discussing sex, with kids is taboo or at the very least, a cheeks-flushing, palms-sweaty affair. But this book navigates that beautifully by being a simple and plainly written tool and Bible-study guide, both for the parent and child. 
It plainly explains that in a world that is highly sexualised, where from infancy, kids are exposed to images, stories, rhetoric, that feeds them with various worldviews about sex everywhere they turn, a parent has to be intentional and proactive about engaging their children about sex, and doing so in a timely, sustainable, and edifying manner. This is the way behind the narrow gate.
The approach in the book is educational and practical in that it guides the parent to teach the child in a safe and sanitised way about the biology of the male and female body, where babies come from and what sex is, physically. With that critical foundation laid, the author goes on to deep dive in a child friendly way, into the Biblical values that underpin sex, by asking the questions “Is sex God? Is sex good? Is sex gross?” How clever?! And it works!
The author does three things that I personally love. One, he spends time on us parents, schooling us into understanding that our role is to teach and model Biblical sexuality to our kids. It is our task to show them what safe, love and intimacy looks like within marriage and why it is worth defying the world’s standards for. In addition, the author demonstrates that parents should not expect their kids buy into our censorship of what they fill their minds with (TV, music, Internet usage, type of friends they hang out with, language they use, places they go to) yet they see us living completely uncensored lives.
Two, a very key point the book brings out is the link between a kid growing up in an over-sexualised environment, and the heightened risk of sexual abuse. It also highlights the key preventative role that intentional parenting (including close relationships of trust between parent and child) and engagement on sex, especially Biblical sexual values, can play in protecting your child from sexual abuse or at the very least ongoing sexual abuse.
Three, I love the way he cleverly draws a close link between intentional parenting around sexuality and increasing the likelihood of your child developing or maintaining a healthy, balanced and biblical mindset about sex, notwithstanding the environment.
I could go on and on…but let me stop here before I re-write the book for you all! 🙂 This book is literally a script for parents to use to engage kids on sex and the aim is to help children to see that God created sex, it is good, it is not a thing of shame and it should not be used or engaged in in a manner that brings or causes shame.
Format and style
The author starts with a simple and to-the-point introduction of the concepts around parents introducing Biblical Sexuality to kids. He then delves into a 7-lesson “Study” with each lesson having clear and concise content points, an anchor Bible passage, talking points for parents, as well as questions the parent can ask the kids to engage them in the topic.
Each lesson is just a few pages long. In fact, one or two of the lessons were not even more than a page long! So its to-the-point stuff. You don’t have to be afraid of losing the kids in too much detail. Besides the content is actually interesting and engaging and you are likely to find that the kids stay glued to your side for the whole lesson, and they may even want to go through the next lesson with you right then and there!
The book ends off with a few round-off points and references to other resources that I found helpful and I have actually tapped into those as well.
Time to Read
I finished it in about 2 hours cumulatively. So its a quick read.
References to other resources
The author has a resource platform, much like ours here at The Narrow Gateway, though he focuses very much on introducing Biblical sexuality to kids of different ages and ranges, helping kids handle exposure to porn, navigate the risk of sexual abuse (including child on child abuse). The website is www.intoxicatedonlife.com/sex-ed.- www.covenanteyes.com is an internet accountability and filtering tool to encourage your accountable use of the Internet. It basically keeps track of your use of the Internet on whatever platforms you instal the tool, and it provides a periodic report to your nominated accountability partner.
Rating
I gave this book 5 stars on Amazon’s Goodreads, and I would do that again, and again, and again. Yes, it was that awesome.
Written by Toyin Oladiran (www.thenarrowgateway.com)
18 May 2017