The Elephant in the Room
Hello,
My name is Isaiah Lasche, I’m currently a student at Lancaster Bible College studying Business Administration.
I had the pleasure of growing up as an only child in a stable, Christian, two-parent home. While I grew up in a healthy environment, this particular thing found its way into my life at a young age. This same thing now is facing serious amounts of backlash and the truth about its very existence and practices are being exposed to the public.
The Elephant in the Room here has amassed billions of dollars, up there with some of the top corporations in the U.S. and abroad, yet we never seem to hear much about it; maybe it’s by design that we don’t. I’ve watched it singlehandedly ruin families, I’ve watched it corrupt and desensitize the minds of people my age, and younger; lastly, I’ve watched it change our society as a whole, becoming a significant part of this culture.
If you’ve read up to this point, there is no doubt you know what I’m talking about, and that is porn.
Pornhub in particular, in light of the recent controversy, has found itself putting all kinds of new restrictions on its platform. This is due to the discovery of several videos of purely illegal activity.
“The new changes follow a major report in the New York Times that accused the company of hosting videos that included child abuse, revenge porn and other content that should have been removed from the site. — Independent.
How sad it is that the “adult-only” style platform, has had children brought into the picture and put their suffering on display for all to see. But it is not only the children on the screen who’ve been affected by this empire of internet pornography but the children who are behind the screen as well.
The numbers don’t lie. Your boys have a 90% chance of being exposed to porn before the age of 18, while your girls will have around a 60% chance. Let me rephrase that, 9/10 boys and 6/10 girls will be exposed to porn before they turn 18; before they fully mature. Not to mention that one out of every seven teenagers will be subject to an online sexual advance. — everaccountable.com
Not only does this affect those around the age of 18, but could even be making it’s way into the lives of much younger children, leaving them at an even higher risk for long term effects.
Source: https://everaccountable.com/blog/how-pornography-affects-teenagers-and-children/
What’s more, in a study that polled children about pornography exposure before the age of 13, half of the male children and one-third of the female children will have been exposed to pornography in some way. For the male children, almost a third will be exposed to pornography before they are 10 years old. Perhaps the most troubling part is that the majority of exposure (about two thirds of the group) is unwanted and unwarranted. — everaccountable.com
So why aren't we hearing about this so much in our churches? Why aren’t parents actively being made aware that this is an issue, and will continue to be an issue as long as we live in a world of sin.
We live in a culture that is oversaturated and bombarded with sex
Yet for some reason within many Christian circles and family’s it feels like the forbidden topic. From personal experience, the discussion of pornography was very important and hyped up to be something worse in my opinion than it actually was. What came from this was a quick “never do this” type of a lecture was fear and shame. I never felt I could talk to anyone within my family or within my church about my struggles with Pornography as a teenager. I just buried it, and hid it from everyone with the fear that I would be shunned or something. Obviously this is not true and I’m sure that if there was a different approach to this topic, I would be much more obliged to share my struggles and have someone help me work through it.
The principle is simple:
Sin thrives in darkness
For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. — John 3:20
We as the Church must recognize this, stop treating these topics as taboo, and be the primary voice to be heard.
Avoidance is not the solution
Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good. — Romans 12:21
While the church may be silent on these issues, the world SCREAMS it’s ideas about sex to us constantly. We all have minds that are created to be filled with information, so why have information about a topic come only from one source? I believe it is imperative that the church be the primary voice to the youth that is desperately trying to understand who they are in this crazy world.
And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near. — Hebrews 10:24–25
Let us begin to rethink the way we approach this issue of pornography and sex, and begin to open dialogue as fellow believers and one day, as parents to children who will likely be exposed to porn and flooded with ideas about sex that do not line up with what the Bible teaches. Let us be the light in a dark confused, and sexually charged society.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. — Colossians 3:16
God Bless.
