Decision Making by Pastor Ed Young

#2 – Am I discussing with my kids (in my case, four of them)…  Am I regularly discussing with my kids the core values that are being transmitted through my family’s entertainment choices?  So I don’t just ask, “Does it meet the guidelines?” I ask, “Am I discussing it? Am I talking about it with my kids?”

“Well, Ed, what are you talking about?”  Well, let’s say for example, I hear one of my kids, which I’ve done before, listen to a certain CD.  I don’t say, “Whoa!  That’s satanic!  Take it out of the player!”  I think people think I do that.  “Let’s burn it right now!”  No! come on, man.  That was funny!  I think I might buy this CD myself, that was funny right there.  That was worth it for that joke.

But anyway, what I would do, I would go … Okay, for example, Lee Beth. “Lee Beth, let’s listen to this song by Shania Twain.  You know, ‘Whose bed have your boots been under?’” Now, Shania is a very talented girl. And the reason she is so popular is because she is talented.  It has nothing to do with her looks[Ed says this sarcastically for the audience]. You know that. But really, I said, “Lee Beth, let’s listen to this. What is the message there of the song?”  And we just talk about it.

Now Lee Beth does that, in listening to that song over and over again. “Does that highlight and underscore the values that are modeled and taught in our family.  Let’s just talk about that.”  And then she begins to see the decision making behind it and then she begins to learn how to make those decisions herself.  You see? That’s how we do it.