ReEngage, Inc.

As a direct result of my passion for those who have fallen prey to the sin of fornication and to those who believe that marriage is no longer relevant to God I have founded a non-profit organization entitled ReEngage, Inc. ReEngage, Inc. is an organization made up of concerned parents, educators, health professionals, clergy, and citizens who want to begin the process of repairing these broken relationships between not only fathers and their children but mothers and fathers. Our mission is to foster the reconnection of the absentee father with their children through outreach and counseling, education, and preparation.

Absentee fathers have become an American epidemic that reaches across racial, economic, and ethnic lines. We have irrefutable evidence that most of our other social problems in the black community stems from this phenomenon. Last year we set a record for births in America with 4.3 million, of those 4.3 million births 40% were to unmarried women. As we become a nation of more illegitimate births, separations, and divorces more and more of our children will face the real possibility of growing up without the financial, spiritual and emotional guidance of their fathers and this we must not allow to happen.

Let us be clear, the experiment of women raising children alone and the belief that fathers in the lives of their children is overrated has failed and failed miserably. The evidence is clear that children being raised by single mothers are not doing as well as children being raised by both parents.

Here are just a few examples of how horrific the results have been for our children.

* Children from fatherless homes are five times more likely to be poor, and ten times more likely to be extremely poor.

* Seventy percent of juveniles in reform school and long term prison inmates come from fatherless homes.

* Children from fatherless homes are twice as likely to be high school drop outs.

* Fatherless children have more emotional and behavioral problems.

* Girls from fatherless homes are three times as likely to be unwed teenage mothers. Adolescents in mother-only families are more likely to be sexually active, and daughters are more likely to become single-parent mothers.

* Boys from fatherless homes have a higher incidence of unemployment, incarceration, and noninvolvement with their own children.

* Seventy-one percent of all high school dropouts come from fatherless homes.

* Seventy-five percent of all adolescent patients in chemical abuse centers come from fatherless homes.

While these numbers appear as figures on a page they are actually people, primarily children who are suffering. We should begin to address the problems of crime, drug and alcohol abuse, educational failure, and teen pregnancy in a holistic way. For decades public policy has treated the black family as three separate entities. We have focused on the poor underprivileged children, the strong matriarchal black mothers, and the irresponsible black fathers. We must begin to reestablish and reappraise the role of fathers in the family structure. We should craft policies and strategies that treat the black family as a unit. We should direct our public policy to reinforce the institution of marriage and discontinue policies that reduces or diminishes the status of the father. Many of our policies have had the unintended consequences of rewarding behavior that is detrimental to the formation of families.

We must begin to reestablish and encourage the belief in marriage in the black community not purely for religious reasons, but for social and economic reasons as well. We cannot truly discuss the fatherless child without including a discussion on the state of marriage in the black community. As we begin to heal the relationships between the father and their children we must also begin to heal the relationship between male and female in the black community. Many women today view the role of the black male as that of surrogate parent, merely there to provide DNA for the creation of the child.

For decades we have become paralyzed by the argument of why we are in the state we are in. There are those who blame it on slavery, racism, and economics. While others say it is a moral or cultural issue. The time has come to stop focusing on the why and begin to focus on the what, as in what are we going to do about it? Regardless of whether the government or the larger society chooses to support our efforts the black community can no longer be excused for refusing to act. These are our children that are being deserted. I can’t tell you the times I have gone to meet with young black men and listened to their anger and their pain towards their fathers. They have every right to be angry you see when they were younger and needed a father to protect, support, and encourage them no one was there. Not only was there no one there but no one came and no one seemed to care.

Our mission is the following: To foster the reconnection of the black male with their children through outreach and counseling, education, and preparation.

We have the following goals:

1. Reduce the number of black children growing up in single mother households by reengaging the black male back into the family dynamics.

2. Educate black children to the consequences of having children without fathers and the benefits of marriage.

3. Work with established community and government entities to provide the needed services for these reengaged black fathers.

4. Provide counseling and support groups for emotionally damaged black fathers.

5. To prepare fathers for the reintegration process through parenting training, anger management, and ensuring their lifelong commitment in the child’s life. Our primary concern is the welfare of the child.

6. To provide mediation when possible between mothers and fathers to ensure the smooth integration of the father back into the child’s life.

7. Become a community clearinghouse for the qualified available research and programs designed to combat this epidemic.

8. Begin to utilize the steps created from the conference co-sponsored with area organizations and educators, clergy, and social service professionals.

We can no longer sit idly by while our children are being deprived and our nation is losing generation after generation of children. Black children just like all other children deserve and require a loving and caring relationship with their fathers, will you help us to make that day a reality for them.

Teenagers Are Fornicating Less

And a little child shall lead them.

Isaiah 11:6

I recently read an article stating that fewer teenagers today are engaging in sex. If this report is true, then Glory be to God. It appears that the young people are able to do what many thought was impossible, they are forgoing sex. This will come as a shock to many adults who promote the idea that teenage sex is inevitable and so we may as well not make any efforts to curb it. However, with this data many states have cut and curtailed their abstinence programs. The problem have with the studies that say abstinence doesn’t work is because they don’t take into account the 90% of other information that teenagers receive through movies, television, music, and video games. Abstinence education is just a small area in the child’s overall day. The important aspect of abstinence education is that it helps to shape attitudes not necessarily about sex, but also about marriage.

“You have to look at why sex was created,” Eric Love, the director of the East Texas Abstinence Program, which runs Virginity Rules, said one day, the sounds of Christian contemporary music humming faintly in his Longview office. “Sex was designed to bond two people together.”

To make the point, Mr. Love grabbed a tape dispenser and snapped off two fresh pieces. He slapped them to his filing cabinet and the floor; they trapped dirt, lint, a small metal bolt. “Now when it comes time for them to get married, the marriage pulls apart so easily,” he said, trying to unite the grimy strips. “Why? Because they gave the stickiness away.”[1]

While I would love to believe that all our children will grow up and save themselves for marriage, this is really not realistic. What is realistic however is that we can stress the importance of marriage to many children who have lost interest in it as an option, due to their own single parent experience. Why is stressing the importance of marriage important? Because study after study has shown that children do better regardless of economic conditions in two parent families. This should be something we want to promote as a society, for the well-being of the society. I find it interesting that we expect people who have been unable to maintain a committed relationship to develop that in our children, it’s not going to happen. Just as parents that did not complete their educations require help educating their children, so we should also help them prepare for marriage.

The institution of marriage is under an onslaught, but unlike my religious conservative brethren I don’t believe it is from gays. The current threat to marriage is and always has been heterosexuals, whether they are adulterers, pornographers, or other sexual deviants. The breakdown in the family and marriage has nothing to do with whether gays get married or not. While I find it personally offensive, my experience shows that the breakdowns in marriage are due to the partners in the marriage. I think the gay question is a smoke screen to cover the real issues which is that we are not preparing our children properly for marriage or adulthood.

For the first time, however, Virginity Rules and 700 kindred abstinence education programs are fighting serious threats to their future. Eleven state health departments rejected abstinence education this year, while legislatures in Colorado, Iowa and Washington passed laws that could kill, or at least wound, its presence in public schools.[2]

I find it hard to believe that with all the pressure our children are under to fornicate, that many find offering a counter message worthless. It’s as if we give freedom to the sex trade, but it is imposing on our freedom to offer another view. This is in part why the rest of the world finds our values so hypocritical, we allow promotion of and the selling of sex in every area of our lives, but God forbid if we show that there are other alternatives. This is crossing the boundaries of State vs. Church, we must not continue to buy into this for the sake of commerce. We are selling out our children for the sake of making money. What value are you willing to place on the lives of your children?

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[1] http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/18/education/18abstain.html

[2] Ibid

Boys Town 2007 Part 2

Hear, my children, the instruction of a father,
And give attention to know understanding;
For I give you good doctrine: Do not forsake my law.
Proverbs 4:1-2

Now that we have gotten over the shock phase, let’s look at how we would create these schools. Let me say for the record that it is my firm belief that children of all races and economic status do better with both parents in the home, most studies will attest to this fact. So I am not advocating the complete isolation of the young men from all female contact, this would be just the other side of the same coin we have now. We would replace young men who have the emotional state of women with young men that would not be able to display compassion or tenderness.

Let’s begin with how we would house the young men. I think the school housing should be done as a two parent home. The homes would have house parents that would supervise the homes and the young men when they are not in school, physical training, and or other curricular activities. Preferably the couple would be a married couple, but that would not be a necessity. A married couple would help to teach the young men in a real world scenario how a man treats a woman he loves and it is a statistical fact that children from two parent homes do better than those from single parent homes.

An increase in the numbers and proportion of children born outside of marriage and a rise in divorce rates have contributed to a three-fold increase in the proportion of children growing up in single-parent families since 1960. These changes have generated considerable public concern and controversy, particularly about the effects of these changes on the wellbeing of children. Over the past 20 years, a body of research has developed on how changes in patterns of family structure affect children.

Most researchers now agree that together these studies support the notion that, on average, children do best when raised by their two married, biological1 parents who have low-conflict relationships.[1]

I don’t think we can stress enough the importance of marriage for these young men, due to a number of economic, cultural, and selfish reasons marriage is not highly valued in our community. We should begin the process to change this phenomenon, because the statics concerning the chances of children growing up in poverty in single parent families is well documented. However, studies show that it is not just purely economics; there is something inherent in marriage that transcends to the family. It is what I call one of the mysteries of God, God has sanctified marriage and He continues to support marriage.

Also, if income was the major factor behind the negative association between single parenthood and child outcomes, one would expect children of single-parent families who are not poor to have better outcomes than children of poor single-parent families. However, a recent study in Sweden—where the safety net is stronger than in the U.S. and where the poverty rate among single mothers is very low— found problems for children of Swedish single-parent families similar to those found for children of American single-parent families.[2]

Two opposite sex staff members could fulfill the same purpose only to a lesser degree. They could demonstrate to the young men inter-gender relationship skills that a lot of our youth do not presently have. They would learn the value of respect for women and see them as more than faceless bodies gyrating on the television. Under no circumstances should it be an unmarried couple or staff members who are romantically involved, this would only reinforce behavior we hope to modify.

Within the homes, the young men should be given instruction in cleanliness, trustworthiness, and thriftiness. They should be taught in life skills and be required to take an active role in the chores of the house. They should be required not only to have scholastic studies, but also spiritual and historical studies of their ancestors. At all cost we must provide a stable and secure home for these young men, they should learn conflict resolution at an early age.

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[1] http://www.clasp.org/publications/Marriage_Brief3.pdf

[2] Ibid

Are You Worth Waiting For?

To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and

unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled.

Titus 1:15

As I was on my way to work this week, I saw a young lady wearing a tee shirt that stated, “I am worth waiting for”. I have to admit when I first read it I was shocked; it’s not every day that you find our young women wearing the message of abstinence. Unfortunately for many of our young women the uniform of the day is a little more tawdry. As the day went on and I thought about the young ladies shirt, I was reminded of the many comments from folks that abstinence is unworkable, and impractical. Those kids are going to have sex and there’s nothing anyone can do about it.

I began to think about that logic and those who are promoting it. The majority of people promoting this logic are people who themselves were unwilling or unable to remain celibate. I thought back into my training; there is a saying to find out who is behind something, follow the money. In this case, who would have something to gain from promoting this position, would it be God or Satan? If it were God then this would be in direct contradiction to His Word, which he said he would never do.[1] If Satan, then why are we promoting his agenda and doing his bidding? Am I foolish enough to think that kids or adults for that matter won’t fornicate? No, but I am not so jaded and cynical to give up on standing for something, God.

I believe that our women and our girls are worth waiting for. I believe that our children are our most precious resource and they should be protected, sometimes from themselves. Too often in our community our children are not being protected, they are being abandoned and forced to raise themselves. In many cases it is not even intentional neglect, but the byproduct of single parenthood. I believe the majority of single mothers want the best for their children, but because they are so over worked and stressed they can’t provide the attention and the care the children require. Our community is full of strong and beautiful women, who have been raising our children alone for years. I think though that it is time for our women to look at the bigger picture of what single parenthood does.

William Raspberry of the Washington Post writes

For the 2000 Census, the percentage of black families headed by married couples was 38. The only good news is that it was also 38 percent in 1990, suggesting that the trend may have stopped getting worse.

Now consider this: Fatherless families are America's single largest source of poverty. The Annie E. Casey Foundation's "Kids Count" once reported that Americans who failed to complete high school, to get married and to reach age 20 before having their first child were nearly 10 times as likely to live in poverty as those who did these three things.

But while marriage may not be a cure for poverty, it does turn out to be a fairly reliable preventative . Isn't it worthwhile to spend more time and resources helping young people to understand the economic implications of single parenthood before they become single parents? Wouldn't it make sense to rethink our relatively recent easy acceptance of out-of-wedlock parenting?[2]

The conclusion is that if our young women choose to become pregnant without the benefit of marriage they are not only condemning themselves, but also their children to a greater chance of a lifetime of poverty. I don’t think that if presented with the evidence most mothers would knowingly place their children in the vicious cycle of poverty, but many of them do it. This has given rise to generations of families that cannot escape the cycle of poverty. We will not be able to break the cycle of poverty that plagues our community without addressing the epidemic of fornication. Any remedies that do not take this into account will be like placing a band-aid on a shooting victim, it helps but it ain’t going to stop the bleeding.

This bleak prospect for single mothers prompted US public affairs columnist Jonathan Rauch to suggest that "marriage is displacing both income and race as the great class divide in the new century". Indeed, research shows that the growth of single parent families accounts for virtually all the increase in US child poverty rates between the 1970s and early 1990s. Children growing up in single parent families are four times as likely to be poor than are those from two-parent families.

Today, almost two thirds of all poor children are in single-parent homes. Growing up in single-parent families also has negative effects on the social and economic outcomes of children. In addition to their high incidence of poverty and low income, studies show that children from single-mother families are much more likely to experience psychiatric disorders, ranging from hyperactivity, conduct or emotional disorders, and schooling problems than those living both parents. While children growing up in single-parent families are not doomed, the odds are certainly stacked against them.[3]

We as concerned parents and neighbors have to come up with a way to educate our children on the negative effects of fornication. The biggest hurdle is the fact that in our community it is not just our children that are practicing fornication, but our adults as well. It is very difficult to press the argument of abstinence when the adult is laying up with people they are not married to. I think what fuels a lot of the anti-abstinence argument is the fact that we don’t want to teach our kids about abstinence if it requires us to evaluate our own lifestyles. We should be more that just hearers of the Word, we should also become doers of the Word.[4]

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[1] Matthew 24:35

[2] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/07/31/AR2005073101075_2.html

[3] http://www.nzbr.org.nz/documents/perspectives/perspectives-2004/Issue47.pdf

[4] James 1:22

Chapter 9, Part 1 How Do We Break The Cycle?

How Do We Break The Cycle?

So how do we as a people begin the process of reversing this epidemic that has caused so much destruction and devastation in our communities? Can we stop what seems to be an insurmountable problem? Do we want to stop it? We in and of ourselves can not stem the tide of this epidemic, it will only be arrested by the supernatural power of God.

“For those who live according to the flesh set their minds
on the things of the flesh, but those who live according
to the spirit, the things of the spirit.”
Romans 8:5

We who have been living after the flesh, how shall we now live in the spirit? We can not, without the power of the Spirit of God born in us through the death of our old nature or old man. It is this power of the redemptive work of Christ that frees us from the death sentence that we deserve. So what shall we do? We can begin to incorporate a few principals in our lives that can lead to change. A change that will not only benefit us, but more importantly our children. I pray that you will consider these principles with an open mind and begin to instruct others in their application. They are all spiritually based and come directly from the Word of God. I hope that they will help our people and our nation to turn back from the edge of the abyss that we seem intent on going over. If we want to live after the spirit there is work we need to be doing. Here are ten principals to developing a more spiritual way of life and hopefully a closer relationship with God.

1) Relationship with Christ

2) Prayer Life

3) Confession of Sin

4) Repent of Sin

5) The Word of God

6) Live in the Spirit

7) Change Thoughts

8) Resist Temptation

9) Fellowship with Believers

10) Marriage

I believe that if we as a people began to use these ten principals, we will not only stop this epidemic of fornication, but also the lawlessness that now permeates our communities. The time for doing nothing has passed for too long we have turned our backs pretending this was not a problem or a problem others had to fix. I once read somewhere, “How can one man lynch another man?” He cannot without the silence of other “so-called” good men. We can no longer be silent to this destruction. Our children’s very lives are at stake. Let us put aside our petty differences and come together with one voice to cry out against this tragedy.

Relationship With Christ
“But God demonstrates His own love towards us, in
that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us.”
Romans 5:8

Every time I read or say this verse my heart is overwhelmed with gratitude and conviction. When I could care less about God, when we were in the midst of our fornication, drug/alcohol abusing, adultery, lying, cheating, stealing, coveting, envying, murdering, and any of our other sinfulness, Jesus Christ died for us. This is the essence and beginning of our new relationship with the living God. We love Him because He first loved us.[1] All that we read, hear, and know about God is designed for one purpose. That purpose is to develop a relationship with God. Our purpose on this earth was and continues to be to fellowship with God. Did God need man to help the earth produce fruit? I think not, God wanted a species that He could commune with. It is no accident that we are the only species that aspires to know God. If evolution is true then show me the link between humans and the other animals. There should be some species that connects us to the rest of the animal world. As much as they try, the best they can come up with is the primates and they are a giant leap from man. Conveniently, of course there is not one, it has vanished.

Why is our relationship with God so important? The scriptures reveal that it is this relationship with God that gives us the power we need to overcome our sinful natures.[2] When Adam sinned, he not only broke his fellowship with God, but ours as well. We are born into sin and only God through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ can overcome that sin nature. We can never do it ourselves. If we could there would be no need for the ultimate sacrifice. How many times do we tell ourselves we are not going to continue in a particular sin only to find ourselves doing it again. And it seems that the harder we try to stop doing it by our own power the more we do it. The apostle Paul says, “That what I want to do I cannot do and what I do not want to do that is what I do.”[3] Our Lord understood this by His being fully human and suffering temptation. Through His own temptation He is our supporter before God, the Father. That is why He said that the Father would send a Helper with power. If God has the power to raise the dead, does He also have the power to keep us from stealing, lying, and fornicating? Of course He does. So if He has the power why do we continue to live in this sinful state?

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[1] 1 John 4:19

[2] Luke 24:49

[3] Romans 7:19

Chapter 7 Part 8

The ruler of this world is falling and he knows that his time in this world is short.[1] He is working to steal, kill, and destroy all those he can.[2] He is like a roaring lion seeking whomever he can devour.[3] My little ones do not fall for his tricks, do not allow the media to mislead you. Do not keep company with those who are chasing after the world. They will only lead you astray. The fallen of this world want to get as many as they can to join them. Once you have fallen, you are no longer important. You are only valuable to them so long as you have your purity, so long as you have something that can be taken. Once you lose it, you are now just another “hootchie”. It is exciting to have all the attention, but the attention you are receiving is not real. It is not about who you are, it is about what you have that they want and once gotten from you, you are of no more use. Do not surrender to the world, surrender instead to God.

You are the future mothers of our people. Be strong and be patient. God has a special person for you, someone who will love you and treasure you. Nevertheless, you must wait for them. In this microwave world it seems difficult to wait for anything. Why should you? Your future happiness will depend on it. The reason so many marriages are not lasting today is because many of the participants are arriving already defiled. Therefore they are defiling the perfect institution of marriage that God created. The institution of marriage is not defiled, but the modern participants are. Today not only is the institution of marriage under siege by the gay and lesbian community, but I believe a greater problem is the heterosexual fornication that is going on throughout our society. Where is the outcry of the religious right against fornication? Where are all the demonstrations and denunciations against this threat? Surely, it is a greater threat to the sanctity of marriage than gays. I would ask anyone to do a study on the number of divorces in this country compared to the level of fornication in each generation. I believe they will find a direct correlation between the rising divorce rate and the number of people who defile themselves prior to marriage. The reason our Lord taught against remarriage is because the person once having been with another has become defiled for the original marriage partner.

Also, because of the transformation that takes place during sexual relations there is a transfer of not only the sanctity of ones body, but also of ones loyalty and trust. That trust once broken is difficult if not impossible to recover. When a woman is intimate with a man, especially for the first time, she becomes very loyal and protecting of that man. She will defend him against anyone and everyone, even her family and friends. As the number of sex partners increases the loyalty factor decreases. Loyalty is a key component of marriage, without it the marriage is not stable. Marriage is a tough proposition when everything is done right in today’s society. There are so many obstacles to a marriage surviving, we need to give ourselves every chance to succeed. One of the most powerful tools we bring to a marriage is purity. Our loyalty at that time is unquestionably to our partners.

Parents teach your children purity. Do not surrender them to the world or the logic of the world. Do not let the world convince you that you can not stop them from “experimenting” or having sex. You can, it just requires your interaction and intervention. You will just have to get up off the couch and teach them and train them in the right way to go. Even if you were not pure, surely we can all understand and agree on the value of being so at the time of marriage.

“And teach them to your children and your grandchildren.”
Deuteronomy 4:9

Children are to learn from their parents. Somehow, today we have decided that this responsibility has fallen to others. Instead of teaching our children ourselves, we think they should learn from the television, or their peers, or the athletes and entertainers. We have neglected the spiritual upbringing of our children, we have "farmed out" the job to the schools, the media, anybody but us. The moral education of our children is almost non-existent today. The schools are no longer allowed to impart any values outside the “worldly” values of consumerism. The teaching of creation is all but outlawed. We have taken away the foundation of wisdom by allowing them to believe that the world came from nothing and is speeding along to nowhere. If this is what they have to look forward to it is no wonder they have no moral compass. I can understand the world promoting this view, but we have churches promoting it as well. They teach a watered down version of the origin of the world to appear logical to the world. Instead of changing the world we are allowing the world to change the Church to be more “modern”. Everything modern is not good, many people have replaced God with technology.

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[1] Revelations 12:12

[2] John 10:10

[3] 1 Peter 4:8

Chapter 7 Part 7

There are many of you who feel like you are in unbearable situations at home and you feel unloved and unwanted. For some of you those who are suppose to be protecting you are pressuring you to defile yourselves with them. And unfortunately for some your purity has been taken by these very same "protectors". Nothing could be further from the truth, you are beautiful and precious to God. Your heavenly Father knows your situation, He knows your pain. You may feel alone, but you are not. There are people who love you very much, especially God. Do not surrender to the tricks of the enemy. He will lie to you and tell you that you are worthless and nobody cares about you. There is no reason to stay pure, and besides everyone else is doing it. The world screams why should you be any different. Don’t you want to be popular and fit in? You are nothing special; if you want to belong, you need to defile yourself. This is your only worth; you are nothing more than a body to give for the pleasure of others. Well, you are special, you are one of our most important assets. The future of our people is in you.

“Do not think that I came to bring peace on earth.
I did not come to bring peace but a sword, for I
have come to set a man against his father, a
daughter against her mother, and a
daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law.”
Matthew 10:34,35

The Lord tells us that we must choose ourselves to follow Him. This means that if your family is not choosing to serve God, you serve Him anyway. If they are not going to church and obeying God, you do it anyway. Go with the neighbors or talk to a pastor, God will place people in your life for you to find Him through. Though you may only be children you are still responsible to follow God. Seek God in your lives and He will make His presence known. Many churches have youth outreach programs. Begin at home by developing a relationship with God privately. As I wrote to the young men spend fifteen minutes a day seeking God and your life will change. He will lead you through whatever situation that may appear impossible for you. With God all things are possible, nothing is impossible for Him. The Bible says that if you draw near to God He will draw near to you.[1] This world is dying every day, you do not have to die with it. Young people you have a tremendous struggle ahead of you, but with God’s help you can accomplish anything! Sometimes following God will be difficult, but the rewards are worth the effort. You will be a better person and your life will be better for it.

Marriage is God’s perfect outlet for our sexual desires. To look at the world you would not be able to tell. Our whole culture screams sex, sex, and more sex and there is hardly a dissenting voice. Many of the same people who preach abstinence are the same people who own the media outlets that promote this casual sexual atmosphere. They are hypocrites and God will judge them. It is unfortunate but for the sake of material riches you the youth of our nation have become expendable. You are bought and sold daily. On the one hand it appears that you have value, but underneath you are only a profit margin. The enemy makes it look like your opinions are important, but only in how he can corrupt you. The whole world is becoming a commercial, a slogan. The world is not some office on “Madison Avenue”. There is a God and He will give to everyone according to their choices.[2] I am not trying to frighten anyone only trying to give you the truth. There must be a change for our people and it must begin with you. Choose purity and choose life. Do not believe the lies of this world, it does matter that you remain pure. You will feel better about yourselves and the world around you. Everywhere you turn it is about sex, the world would like for you to believe that it is no big deal. It is not important if you stay pure, it is some old-fashioned thinking. Talk to your parents and grandparents the world told them the same thing years ago. But it is important, your future will be determined by your choices. You only have one chance to be with the one you love in a loving marriage with purity of body, heart, and spirit. It is no wonder so many of our marriages do not last we come into them defiled. Do not waste it away without thinking.

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[1] James 4:8

[2] Matthew 16:27

Chapter 6 Part 3

“And everyone who has this hope in Him
purifies himself, just as He is pure.”
1 John 3:3

Our spirits have become dead to sin. It no longer bothers us to be sinful. We give and are given in marriage with no concern of where or with whom our partners have been with. We change partners like we change our socks. There should be a national outcry against this sinful behavior, against this epidemic of fornication. We should send an unconditional message that our young women should stay pure. The days of harlotry must come to an end. They will only come to an end when we as a people make it a priority to end them. When we let our sons and daughters know that we want and expect purity. Not only should we stress it with them we should demonstrate it in our behavior. Mothers, you must stop allowing these men who you are not married to into your homes. At least while your children are present. You should stop allowing these men to come into your homes and rob you and your children. Your children are watching you. If they see you as a harlot, your sons will think all women are whores and your daughters will think this is acceptable behavior. That this is the type of behavior a woman has to do to attract a man. Why do you think that the majority of teenage unwed mothers come from teenage unwed mothers? There must be a national effort from all of us to turn this epidemic around.

Mothers your children depend on your guidance. What is your behavior teaching your children? They see these men who only come around when it is payday. They see these men come and go as they please. Your sons are learning this behavior; for these men are their male role models. They are being taught by the same men who are doing this behavior to you to do this to the women they will eventually meet. It is as though we are in this viscous cycle that no one wants or is willing to break. By you opening up your legs to whomever you are taking on their sins to yourself. You are sharing in their filthiness and their destruction. Remember sexual sin goes against our own bodies.[1]

“But if a widow has children or grandchildren these should learn
first of all to put their religion into practice by caring for their
own family and so repaying their parents and grandparents,
for this is pleasing to God.”
1 Timothy 5:4 (NIV)

The Bible says that a widow or single mother with children must show piety or self-control so that her children will help her to make ends meet and supply her needs. But it says the single mother who lives for pleasure is dead even while she lives.[2] So if pleasure is more important than your family God will judge you. You should consider not your own desires but the example you set for your children. We should stop looking to others to be the role models for our children no one initially has more influence over our children than we do. It is only when we fail to provide leadership that they begin to look to others for what they find lacking in us. If you run around with your butt hanging out of your clothes, this is what your children see as their example. I once heard it said that if a person approaches my car in a car that has flashing lights and gets out wearing a uniform with a badge, I am going to assume they are a police officer, because primarily the uniform that person is wearing. So if you come up to me with your butt hanging out and your breasts sticking out of your top wearing a prostitutes uniform what am I suppose think? If you do not want to be treated as a prostitute, you might want to stop wearing the uniform. In a perfect world a woman should be able to wear what she wants to with no problem, however we do not in any such place. Our world is a fallen world with fallen people. We allow not only some of our young women, but also some of our little girls to dress as women. We not only allow them to dress like grownup women, but like harlots. We give them the impression that for a woman to be attractive, she must dress like a harlot. Look at the celebrities and how they are presented by the world. You have gifted singers that have to dress like harlots to sell records and get on television. This is what is being fed to our children. Even “so called” Christians are falling into this trap of the world. In an effort to imitate the world, they dress like the world. We are supposed to imitate not the world, but Christ.[3] Our little girls are wearing makeup, getting plastic surgery, and being put in situations that invite sin. These “so called” Christians appear in all the outward appearances to be just like the world. Because of the parents desire to have material success they have placed training of their children secondary to their worldly success. What happens then is the children become lost in the attractions of the world with disastrous consequences. The parents spend so much time trying to achieve material success that the children’s spiritual development takes a back seat. The results are frequently a lack of moral conviction and this leads to sinfulness such as fornication. Fornication then opens the door to other sins. Material success despite what the “ministers of prosperity” are preaching does not equate to being in God’s will. Material success should never be our primary goal. Their are a number of successful people that do not serve God, just as there are a number of poor people who do. A good example of this is Jacob from the Bible, for ten years he appeared to be successful. He had all the trappings of success, a nice home, money, and many material possessions.

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[1] Romans 6:18

[2] 1 Timothy 5:6

[3] 1 Corinthians

Chapter 2 Part 2

How many times have we seen movie stars, athletes, and other worldly entertainers leave the wives of their youths for the newest flavor of the month? We have to understand that our children see this unhealthy behavior and incorporate it for themselves. They think that it is ok to exchange women as if they were video games. The average marriage today lasts about seven years. That is of course out of those who even bother to get married. About fifty percent of all blacks from 24 – 44 are living in cohabitation arrangements and not marriage. Is it because marriage has changed? I don’t think so. It is because we have become a disposable society. If it is not making me happy, replace it. The bible talks often about joy and rarely about happiness. Why? Because happiness is a passing emotion. If I catch the light on my way to work I am happy, if I do not I am not happy. God says have joy, not happiness. Happiness is transient, but joy is eternal. In spite of our circumstances, we can have joy, not because of them.

“…weeping may endure for a night, but joy comes in the morning.”
Psalm 30:5

God wants us to have joy in His blessings not to pervert them.


“Therefore put to death your members which are on
the earth: fornication, uncleanness, passion,
evil desires, and covetousness which is idolatry.”
Colossians 3:5

“..you shall not bow down to them nor serve them.
For I, the LORD your God am a jealous God, visiting the
iniquity of the fathers upon the children to the third and
forth generations of those who hate me.”
Exodus 20:5

The bible teaches that those who pursue idolatry (fornication) provoke God’s wrath because they are elevating something before God. God states over and over that He is a jealous God and will not tolerate anything that is placed before Him. We become preoccupied with our own selfish pleasure and ignore the long-term damage we do to ourselves. Idolatry may be strong language for some people, but we should look closely at what fornication says about those who practice it.

Today we are beginning to see the results of this epidemic of fornication. Instead of placing God’s laws and righteousness at the head of our lives, we have chosen our own selfish pleasure. This has created multiple victims from an act that is supposed to be victimless. How can this be you ask? Unfortunately, most practioners of fornication do not practice protected sex so we have an epidemic of new and more deadly strains of sexually transmitted diseases. We have an epidemic of illegitimate children. The term illegitimate is not even used anymore. We have replaced it with this new terminology of “baby’s momma” or “baby’s daddy. We treat illegitimacy as legitimacy. The bible says beware when you call evil good and good evil. I am not advocating ignoring or even punishing the fruit of these illicit relationships. I am saying love the sinner, but hate the sin. We should learn to hate sin the way God hates sin. He hated sin so much that only the sacrifice of His own Son could satisfy His disdain for sin. Today in our churches in an effort to keep or to gain members, we ignore this issue. Ministers do not speak out on it and so in keeping silent they are practicing sin by omission. Giving this lifestyle a green light. I have seen pastors having ceremonies to anoint these children. Again, we should love these innocent children, but acknowledge the wrong being done. Before forgiveness, is confession of sin. In most cases it is children having children. Everyone makes mistakes, but if I am a pastor with a congregation full of women that continue to have illegitimate children, maybe my message is not being made clear enough.