Blown away...

Tonight we went to a Sunday school social function for our oldest son. We appreciated the invitation for families to come, as well as kids. We were celebrating the end of the year, the class in general, and our friends' move to an awesome farm that has a pool and a pond and poultry and livestock. It's a great place.

To be honest, I didn't really think much about the pool being central to the event. I assumed that it being a church event, girls would dress modestly. I took for granted that the rules would be the same as they are in summer camp... one-pieces in the water, cover-ups when walking around. Somehow, it wasn't like that at all.

What I saw was girls who my son has gone to church with since he was three, dressed in skimpy bikinis, wandering around the property. They jumped in and out of the pool. They surrounded guys in the water and chatted with guys lying next to the pool. They played with chickens, jumped off the rope swing into the pond, and even stood talking to the host dad, a pastor, all the while scantily clad in string bikinis.

I can't remember a time when I've seen that many girls in that little fabric, including our recent family vacation at the beach. At the beach, girls donned shorts or shirts for the most part when they weren't in the water or lying in the sun. Yet tonight, I was totally, completely blown away. Of the approximately 20 girls there, four had on one-pieces/tankinis that sufficiently covered their chests and behinds. Wow. Just wow.

We are at a critical point in teaching our oldest son to respect women and to stay morally pure. Yet this event thrust him in the middle of an absolute nightmare. I am so sad at the fallenness of it all.

I was scared to say anything to anyone, and then another mom broached the subject with me. Then a wife of a ministry intern approached us about us, and another pastor's wife chimed in too. We all had sons or husbands who were standing out in the middle of all that... stuff.  As a volleyball game started, we decided someone needed to tell the girls to put on shirts or cover-ups if they were going to play. Amazingly, the hostess had to find several shirts and loan them to girls because they hadn't brought anything to put on over their bikinis. By the end of the evening, there seemed to be two groups of people: the parents who were mortified at the blatant disrespect the girls were showing for males in general, and the parents who were standing there talking to other parents while their daughters pranced around in skimpy swimwear.

My husband wanted to leave early, but because we were giving other students a ride home, we felt like we couldn't go. So we stood there talking and silently praying for the boys. Before the designated time was up, the boys' parents started calling them out of the water. We just couldn't watch anymore. I'm ashamed I didn't take my son home earlier, to be honest, but I was somewhat in a state of shock at the whole situation. I am still in a state of shock.

My oldest child is a girl. I have always felt a little guilty for making her choose modest over trendy, but tonight I looked at her and said, "You know that if this had been your class and you were swimming, you would have had on a one-piece or tankini, right?"

To which she replied, "Absolutely."

Her dad said, "Now do you see why we have been so strict about what you wear?"

And she said, "I've always done it. I've not always liked it, but I've always obeyed. And tonight I realized just how bad it does look to walk around with nothing on."

We are most assuredly not perfect and don't get the whole modesty thing right 100% of the time. One of my greatest regrets in life goes back to the bad choices I made in that area during high school and college. But we have to fight to be holy; we just have to.

We had a great family discussion... very open, very frank... all of us... 17-year-old girl, 15-year-old boy, 9-year-old boy, and mom and dad. And then we had a time of prayer. I'm grateful the Lord shone light in what could have easily been a dark place. I am overwhelmingly thankful for my husband's godly leadership, calling light, light and darkness, darkness and taking time to instruct our sons in the battle they will face all their lives.

I just had no idea they would have to fight it so fiercely in the church. My prayer is that the Lord will contend for the men in my life and be a help against their adversary. My prayer is also that my daughter and I will choose light and always lay down our right to wear whatever we want in order to protect our brothers in the Lord.