Helping Kids See that Christian Morality Is Not Bad

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In this episode, we address the question, "How do we help our kids not buy into the lie that the Bible's morality is oppressive and evil?" Elizabeth Urbanowicz discusses why God's moral standards lead to human flourishing and how parents can guide their children to embrace the goodness of biblical morality in a culture that rejects it. Tune in for practical tips on equipping your kids to understand and defend God's truth.

Transcript

Note: The following is an auto-transcript of the podcast recording.

Hello, friends. Today's podcast question says, "how do we help our kids not buy into the lie that the Bible's morality is oppressive and evil?" Really heavy question for us to think through, and I'm sure that most people watching or listening really understand where this question is coming from because that is just the view in Western culture nowadays that the Bible's morality is oppressive and it's evil. And it's easy for us, even as adults when we are in conversations with non-Christians, to sometimes feel embarrassed or ashamed of the Bible's morality. And we need to actually take a step back and ask ourselves, why is this? Because we know that the gospel, the story that is woven throughout the entirety of Scripture is something that we are not to be ashamed of. It's something that we are to be incredibly thankful for. So we need to take a step back and think through, okay, have I bought into this lie that the Bible's morality is oppressive and evil? Or have I even just bought into sympathizing with our culture and thinking, yeah, I can understand why you're thinking through this. So the first step is making sure that we ourselves have a solid understanding of why the Bible's morality is actually a good thing. And then think through how can we talk through this with our kids? So that's what we're going to cover today on the Foundation Worldview Podcast.

This is a podcast where we seek to answer your questions so that you can equip the children that God has placed in your care to carefully evaluate every idea they encounter and understand the truth of the biblical worldview. And I'm Elizabeth Urbanowicz, your host, and I'm excited to dive down deep into this question today.

Now, the first thing I think we need to ask ourselves is why would someone in our culture, or why does our culture as a whole view the Bible's morality as evil? So why would someone claim or view the Bible's morality as evil? The first thing I think is a possibility is that someone making this claim would not understand how to correctly read, interpret, and apply Scripture. I know that when I used to live just outside of Chicago, I was part of a ministry at the church that I was attending there. It was called Coffee and Conversation. Every other Saturday we'd meet up at Barnes and Noble with just a group of people from the community, and most of them were atheists or agnostic or spiritual but not religious. And we'd just have a conversation about the deeper things in life with the goal of forming relationships and helping people see the inconsistencies in their worldview. And I know that when I was part of that group, some of the individuals who I deeply cared about, and I know they cared about me that were there, they would just claim that the Bible's morality is evil. And they would take random verses from Leviticus or Deuteronomy and they just kind of shove them in our face and be like, explain this. And it's like, okay, I can explain this, but I can't give you a satisfying, thorough answer in 30 seconds. So because we know that as Christians, we don't just take random verses out of Leviticus or Deuteronomy and say, this is the law of the land, that we actually have to have a proper understanding of Scripture, that we actually have to look at, okay, this command that's given, what covenant does this represent living under? Is this a command that was given to Christians? Was it given to all people? Was it given to the Israelites at that time? And so not understanding how to correctly read, interpret, and apply Scripture could be one reason why someone would claim that the Bible's morality is evil.

A reason that I think is actually probably even more probable is that this person who is making this claim probably believes that personal autonomy is the ultimate good. That we live in a culture that just views the freedom to make any decision that we want and to have no limitations on our ability to choose as the ultimate good. And so if this is viewed as the ultimate good, personal autonomy and having zero limitations to what we can or cannot do, is the ultimate good, well, of course, any type of system or person that is going to come in and claim that there are limits, that there are certain things that we cannot do, that there are certain things that are evil, that person or that system is going to be viewed as evil because they are fighting against what this person believes is the ultimate good. So this is where I think probably most in our culture are coming from, is viewing personal autonomy as the ultimate good. So therefore, any limitation on personal autonomy is viewed as the ultimate evil.

Now, we know that this is not how life works. That freedom from all restraints is not how reality works. We know that reality based restrictions on what we can and cannot do are healthy. I mean, just some examples. The fact that we cannot jump out of a plane without a parachute, that's a good restriction because what happens if we jump out of a plane without a parachute? We die a horrific death. That kind of restriction is good. When we think about just an everyday example, not allowing our children to play in the middle of the road, telling them that they cannot play in the middle of the road, that they can play in our house, they can play in our front yard, they can play in our backyard, they can play on a playground, but they cannot play in the middle of the road. That is a healthy reality-based restriction. Because what happens if children play in the middle of the road? Well, their chances of getting run over by a car dramatically increase. That's dangerous. Okay? We also have laws like people are not allowed to hit one another. Someone may feel very angry inside, but that person is not allowed to take their hand to strike another person because that could cause physical harm to that person. And that's also going to cause emotional damage to that person as well. That we know that we live in a world where there are healthy, good reality based restrictions, that when we take off all restraints, when there is just anarchy, that what happens is many people get hurt. Is there human flourishing in societies like that? No. When we take away all reality based restraints, people suffer. People are injured, people are harmed, people are killed. So we know that in this world that there are good and healthy limitations to personal autonomy.

So if there is a God, and if this God is good, what would a good God do? Would he take away all limits to personal autonomy and say, do whatever you want to do? There are no consequences to anything. Nothing is off limits. No, that's not what a good God would do. That's not what good parents do. Good parents who love their children place limits on what those children can or cannot do, because good parents know that if they have no limits on their children, if they don't limit the amount of sugar that their children consume, their children's bodies are going to be harmed. They're going to gain an excessive amount of weight. They're not going to be able to concentrate in school. And they know that setting limits on certain types of food is good. Also limits on how late children can stay up at night. That's also a good thing. Why? Because in order to flourish, children need many hours of sleep each night. So just like good parents set limitations on their children's personal autonomy, a good God would also set limits on his creature's personal autonomy and limits that lead to human flourishing.

Now, the narrative of our culture may be that Christian morality is oppressive, that it is evil. But when we look at the limits that are placed on our behavior in Scripture, those limits actually lead to human flourishing. What would happen if every person loved God with all their heart, soul, mind, and strength, that person would actually come to the foun of living Water would be refreshed every day. Okay? That would lead to flourishing. What would happen if people actually loved their neighbor as they loved themselves? That would also lead to human flourishing. What would happen if all husbands loved their wives as Christ loved the church? That would lead to the flourishing of wives and children. What would happen if all wives submitted to the godly leadership of their husband as the head of their household? That would lead to the flourishing of the family? What would happen if children obeyed their parents as the Lord? That would lead to the flourishing of children? It would lead to the flourishing of families. What would happen if all humans reserved all sexual activity for the covenant of marriage? Well, we'd have a dramatic decrease in unplanned pregnancies. We'd have a dramatic decrease in abortion. We would have a dramatic decrease in poverty. All of these things, we would have a dramatic decrease in the amount of sexually transmitted diseases and infections. So all of these things, whenever we look at what God has commanded at the limits that he's placed, when we're commanded not to lie to one another, what would happen if humans stopped lying? If humans stopped stealing, if humans stopped coveting? All of these things are things that lead to human flourishing. Are they things that limit our personal autonomy? Yep, they are. But they're all limits that lead to human flourishing. So we need to make sure that we as adults have a solid understanding of this so that we can then have conversations with our kids about this.

And so I think it's healthy just to bring up this conversation to say, have you ever noticed how sometimes people tend to think that the Bible's rules are bad, or that if you're talking with older kids that the Bible's rules are oppressive and just ask, what do you think about that? Just to get an understanding of where our kids are at, what they're thinking, and then we can ask them some questions. Would I be a good mom or would I be a good dad if I didn't have any rules in this household? And to talk through that and then to talk about, okay, what are some of God's rules that people don't like? And if you're talking with older kids, you can talk about rules regarding sexuality, because I think in our culture, those are the main category of rules that people don't like. People pretty much like not lying and cheating and stealing. But when it comes to sexuality, that's where people don't like any rules and talk through that. Well, what would happen if everybody lived according to God's design? And talk through some of those things that I just talked about with us on the podcast. Husbands and wives would be faithful to one another. Children would not be born without having both a mom and a dad in their house. People wouldn't have to worry about contracting sexually transmitted diseases. Children would have a much greater chance of being raised in a home that was not in poverty by having two parents that are together.

And a really practical thing that we can do with our kids just to help them understand how reality-based rules lead to flourishing. What you can do is go out and buy a new game for your family. Or if you have a family favorite game, you can go ahead and play that. And so go ahead and play the game together, talk about the rules, and then talk about, okay, so how did the rules help us as we were playing this game? And talk through all the things that the rules did and then say, okay, here's what we're going to do. We're going to play this game again. There are going to be no rules. Anything goes. Now, obviously set limitations so that you make sure your children are not harming themselves or one another, but let anything go. Or if you're not comfortable with that, just tell your spouse ahead of time. Say, "Hey, here's what I want you to do. I want you to break all of the rules in this game." Or you can tell one of your children ahead of time and then play the game with either everyone or one person having no rules. And then debrief. That game is not going to last very long because if it's just one person breaking the rules, everybody else is going to cry out. That's not fair. That's not fair. And if it's everybody breaking the rules, people are going to get mad at one another really quickly and then debrief and talk about what just happened. We were actually harming one another when we were playing with no rules. Were we actually able to play the game the way it was intended to be played? No, we didn't even make it through the game. We couldn't with all of these rules being broken. And then talk about that, compare and contrast that to the first time that you played the game when you actually followed the rules and talk about how these reality based rules led to flourishing. Now, those of you who are familiar with the curriculum that we just released at Foundation Worldview, our God's Good Design curriculum, this is a curriculum for kids four on up on the goodness of God's design for gender and sexuality and marriage and family. And the first unit in that curriculum is one that I think can benefit anyone because it just goes through the concept of design, and it systematically builds out an argument for why we should care about God's design and why we should follow that design.

Now, in a recent podcast, I went through all eight of the truths that we covered in that unit. So I'm not going to go through them in detail, but I will list them here and just talk through. This is another way that we can help our kids see that God's rules are for our good. So in that first unit, the truths that we cover are design is a purposeful plan. Our bodies and minds show design. Design always comes from a designer. God is our designer. Designers understand their design best. God understands our design best knowing and following the designer's. Design is best, and we learn God's design for us in the Bible. And so just having this understanding of whenever we see something that is designed, that design points to a designer and that designer understands that thing best, and when that designer's design is followed, it leads to flourishing. It leads to what is best, so that our kids see that God's rules are for our good. They lead to flourishing and God is a good God. And when we follow his design, that is when things go best.

Now, I'm sure most of you watching and listening have already thought of this, but if you haven't, it is also important for us to talk with our kids about sin and how sin corrupts God's good design. That our kids understand that we are all born in sin, that we have inherited Adam and Eve's sin. So even if we try our hardest to follow God's good design, even if we try our hardest to follow all of the rules that God has established, we are going to fail. That we cannot follow God's law perfectly. But that is the goodness of the gospel, that God knew that in this state we could never live up to his perfect standard. And so that's why God, the Son gave of himself. He took on human flesh. He lived the perfect life that we could never live. He died in our place and three days later, he rose again to new life defeating sin and death. And now all who turn from their sin and trust in him are reconciled to God. And one day when Jesus returns, we will be made new and we will be made whole. We will be resurrected, and we will no longer have the restraints and constraints of sin upon us. So we want to make sure that as we're teaching our kids that biblical morality is a good thing. They understand that no human, no human can ever follow God's law perfectly. That is why we need Jesus.

Well, that's a wrap for this episode. But if you have a question that you would like for me to answer on a future Foundation Worldview podcast, you can submit that question by going to Foundation Worldview dot com slash podcast. As we leave our time together, my prayer for you is that no matter the situation in which you and the children God has placed in your care, find yourselves that you would trust that God is working all things together for your good. By using all things to conform you more into the image of His Son. I'll see you next time.