We know how high the stakes are when it comes to raising kids in today’s digital world. In our most recent Marriage After God podcast episode I sat down with John-Michael Bout to talk about one of the toughest—but most important—topics parents face today: protecting our children from pornography and raising them for digital integrity.
John-Michael is a husband, father, and Christian leader with over a decade of experience in ministry and discipleship. He’s the founder of Digital Discipleship, a ministry focused on equipping families and churches to cultivate digital integrity and live counter-culturally in a hyper-connected world. His insight comes from years of personal struggle, gospel transformation, and walking alongside others toward freedom and wholeness. In our conversation we covered
“Technology doesn’t parent—you do.”
John-Michael didn’t hold back. “You can’t outsource discipleship to a filter,” he reminds us. “Technology can help, but it can’t replace you.” He shared tools like Canopy or Bark that can be helpful, but are not the ultimate solution. “They’re there to support your parenting—not do it for you.”
“We’re not just blocking the bad. We’re building a vision for the good.”
John-Michael made it clear: if we only focus on what not to do, we miss the opportunity to shape our kids’ hearts. He referenced Proverbs 4:23: “Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.” His focus is on helping kids love truth and beauty, not just avoid danger. “We’re forming appetites,” he said. “We want them to crave what’s good—not just fear what’s bad.”
Creating a Safe, Open Home
John-Michael described his home as a “yes space, not just a no zone.” He encourages hobbies, friendships, and honest conversations. “If my kids are struggling, I want them to run to me, not hide from me.” As Romans 12:21 says: “Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” The idea is to fill your home with good things that make evil less appealing.
One of John-Michael’s most practical pieces of advice? Don’t wait. “Start the conversation before the world does,” he said. “And keep it going.” He doesn’t rely on “The Talk.” Instead, he’s constantly checking in, making it normal to talk about sex, screens, and everything in between—always with grace, and never with shame.
“We’re not raising kids to survive—we’re raising them to fight.”
When I asked him what his ultimate goal was, John-Michael didn’t hesitate: “We’re training our kids to walk in holiness and strength in a digital world.” He referenced John 10:10—“The thief comes only to steal and kill and destroy. I came that they may have life and have it abundantly.” “This is war,” he said, “but our kids aren’t alone. God is with them. And so are we.”
Leading by Example
Before we wrapped up, John-Michael shared: “I can’t call my kids to purity if I’m not walking it.”He himself stays accountable, prays often, and stays rooted in God’s Word. If you’re a parent trying to navigate this space, let John-Michael’s wisdom encourage you: It’s not about fear. It’s about formation.
READ TRANSCRIPT
Aaron Smith (00:08.527)
Everyone welcome back to another episode of the Marriage After God podcast. I’m here with John Michael. Welcome to the show, man.
John-Michael Bout (00:14.712)
Thank you for having me Aaron. I’m excited to talk to you.
Aaron Smith (00:17.588)
Yeah, you guys just reached out to me recently because you guys are trying to spread the word about something you guys are producing right now. And I know we’ll get into that a little bit later, but why don’t you just share with our audience who you are, how long you’ve been married, what’s your family status, what’s a little bit of your story.
John-Michael Bout (00:32.078)
Yeah,
John-Michael Bout (00:33.718)
yeah, totally. So, yeah, my name is John Michael Bout. I’m a father of three boys, married to lovely wife, Jess. So I say three. Third is going to be on the way in six weeks. yeah, it’s gonna be a busy house. And yeah, I’m also the executive director of a ministry called Into the Light. Basically, we make resources for churches and families on biblical sexuality.
Aaron Smith (00:46.932)
Congrats.
John-Michael Bout (01:01.022)
Just trying to make, you know, films, episodes, series, podcasts, resources that help people think well about the dangers of pornography and also the goodness of God’s design for family and sexuality.
Aaron Smith (01:13.182)
Awesome. And how long you’ve been doing this ministry?
John-Michael Bout (01:16.536)
We’ve been doing it for almost four years now. So it’s been awesome.
Aaron Smith (01:21.814)
Amazing. Am I hearing a little bit of Canadian? Are you Canadian?
John-Michael Bout (01:25.71)
You picked it up. Yes, I when I say my last name Bout, it kind of gives it away. I’m from the Niagara Falls area.
Aaron Smith (01:27.776)
about.
Aaron Smith (01:31.605)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (01:34.54)
Yeah, my wife and I spent a little bit of time up over there. And I just actually interviewed another couple that is in the exact same area. Do you know Sophia Sam? Have you heard him?
John-Michael Bout (01:38.286)
Alright.
John-Michael Bout (01:45.326)
Last name? What’s her… Okay, Okay.
Aaron Smith (01:47.24)
Sam, his first name’s Sathya. He’s got
Aaron Smith (01:50.664)
a ministry on helping men find freedom from pornography addiction. And he’s right in the same area, Niagara Falls area of Canada. He’s Canadian too. I just interviewed him yesterday.
John-Michael Bout (02:01.358)
Okay.
John-Michael Bout (02:01.958)
Well, I’m based in Louisville, Kentucky now. So we’ve been here for the last like three and a half years because I’m also kind of part-time working on a master’s of divinity at Southern seminary. So doing a couple of things at the same time. Okay. Have you been there?
Aaron Smith (02:16.49)
Awesome, I love Louisville. Yeah,
Aaron Smith (02:19.132)
yes I have. We have family that live in Kentucky and in Ohio. yeah, we like traveling the country, seeing the states. We love having family all over the place. Well, I’d love to hear a little bit about your story. What got you into, mean, you’re director, so you like making films. I actually went to school for film, video production.
John-Michael Bout (02:24.096)
Okay. Great.
John-Michael Bout (02:32.237)
That’s awesome.
John-Michael Bout (02:36.003)
Mmm.
Aaron Smith (02:45.728)
do it at all except for the podcast, but I don’t do that anymore. But I love what you’re doing and I love that you’re creating creative and in-depth resources for Christians and families. But what got you into that? How did you find yourself into this ministry?
John-Michael Bout (02:48.536)
Okay.
John-Michael Bout (03:03.159)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (03:03.854)
So there’s kind of two parallel stories that have merged. One, kind of doing the film stuff and two, why I’m topically passionate about this issue. So I mean, I can kind of can tell them in parallel, but I grew up really solid Christian family. Parents love the Lord, you know, explain the gospel to us. And my dad and older brother are kind of both into film stuff. So it’s always been in the family a little bit to work with cameras, work with film.
Aaron Smith (03:15.937)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (03:33.79)
own
John-Michael Bout (03:33.99)
things, be in the education space. But kind of alongside this, when I was very young, eight years old, I came across pornography for the first time.
John-Michael Bout (03:47.87)
So even though I had wonderful parents who loved the Lord, were discipling us in many ways, they just frankly didn’t know they needed to talk to me that early. And so kind of from age eight, I started to get hooked and discipled by pornography, kept that hidden for a really long time until I was age 18. Kind of inside that space, I was messing around with cameras and film, photography, videography.
John-Michael Bout (04:17.314)
When I was 18, the Lord did a big thing in my life. He put some older Christian guys who were kind of a godly example of what it meant to really follow the Lord and love him and have a passion for him. Not being perfect. You know, I mean, they still clearly struggled with sin, but they were confessing sin. They were bringing that into community, into the light. And I started to spend time with them and the Lord used that to convict me of
John-Michael Bout (04:47.2)
the sin that was in my life. So basically I opened up to them for the first time. They were the first people I ever told after almost a decade of addiction to pornography. And after I did, after I kind of first opened up, that was when the Holy Spirit started to work change in me. I started to, you know, want to actually get into the Bible myself. I started to actually hate the sin and not just hate the consequences of the sin. And from there, after kind of a period of
John-Michael Bout (05:17.184)
years the Lord gave me. I started to walk in freedom from pornography and have since. But along the way, I started to help other guys, especially as I walked, continued to walk in freedom, started to help disciple other guys who were struggling and you know giving them good books, good other resources that were out there. But this thing kept happening.
John-Michael Bout (05:40.682)
I could take, you know, Finally Free by Heath Lambert or one of these other great, books. I could drive it to their house. Say, let’s read this together. And they wouldn’t read it. And that just happened enough times with really close friends that I was like, you know, maybe there’s a place for me and some others to make a film resource, to make documentaries, to make video series for the church on
Aaron Smith (05:47.979)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (06:09.132)
you know, dealing with pornography proactively and when there’s already a problem. So that was when me and a good friend of mine, Jacob Volk started Into the Light Ministries basically to do just that, to make kind of accessible resources for churches and families on this topic.
Aaron Smith (06:27.434)
That’s amazing. So how long have you been married? I think you said it, but I didn’t.
John-Michael Bout (06:31.318)
Yeah. Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (06:31.89)
For coming up on four years.
Aaron Smith (06:34.218)
my four years and how long ago was this experience where these older men came into your life and helped you find freedom and recognize that what was going on.
John-Michael Bout (06:45.1)
Yeah, that was like seven years ago now, something like that. Yeah, that’s one thing I’m immensely grateful for is I was able to, of course, I still struggle with sin. I’m not a perfect man, but I was able to put to death the pattern of struggling with pornography and lustful thoughts so I could walk into marriage.
Aaron Smith (06:48.342)
So before you met your wife.
John-Michael Bout (07:07.374)
And just be an open book like hey, I’ve got a lot of sin in my past But the Lord has done a great thing. He’s redeemed me and You know warts and all But very thankful for that
Aaron Smith (07:19.434)
Yeah, and I love that you brought up how you said your parents didn’t really know what to say or how to say it or even that they needed to say something to you about it. And you mentioned that you were exposed to it. Can you share a little bit of that story of like, how did that happen? Because I think as parents, we can be kind of naive sometimes and not realize how accessible, especially nowadays, how accessible certain things are and where they’re going to show up at. And we might think like, we…
John-Michael Bout (07:28.259)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (07:48.576)
We protect merely wow, we monitor what kind of movies they watch, we don’t give them free access to certain things, but what was that story for you? Because I know how I was exposed to it and it’s totally different now, but I think it’s easier now. But the fact that I wasn’t even trying and I’ve stumbled across it and found it and started a lifelong struggle with pornography, what was that story like for you? How did you get exposed to it so that we can maybe shine some light on the schemes of the enemy?
John-Michael Bout (08:01.99)
yeah.
John-Michael Bout (08:17.774)
Yeah, I mean, I think that’s, you’re, hitting on kind of the key things. Uh, my parents actually, when I was, I think it was 13, they actually sat down with me and had a really good intentional conversation about pornography and,
John-Michael Bout (08:33.708)
Little did they know I’d already been struggling for a long time. So I just played dumb. So this is the first thing I always tell people is like start younger because the average age of exposure is age eight. And I am a living statistic in that sense. So for me, the way I got exposed, I…
Aaron Smith (08:48.598)
Well, yeah.
John-Michael Bout (08:54.508)
Just, I love music, I love playing music, love listening to it. And so just surfing through different sites and different music, came across explicit album artwork. And then that, you know, obviously piqued my interest and curiosity.
John-Michael Bout (09:10.496)
started to pursue that more and I had pretty limited access at that point. But basically as the access grew for me, the more I saw it deeper and deeper into it. mean, that’s what pornography does. It’s designed, you get hooked not actually on the gratification itself, but on the surprise actually of the next thing. And so no one is ever satisfied with the level of depravity they’re looking at right then.
Aaron Smith (09:28.982)
That’s the pursuit of it.
Aaron Smith (09:33.644)
you
John-Michael Bout (09:40.45)
actually always feed you more and more and more. So I mean that was exactly, it was slow for me at first until I got a phone which was a little bit later but then it really got worse after that. I’m 24.
Aaron Smith (09:52.704)
How do you?
Aaron Smith (09:55.372)
So you were just saying how you were browsing the internet. I’m thinking when I was a kid there was no, there was internet but it was not like that yet. But it was very similar in the sense of like an innocent thing and then you get exposed to something and then you’re like, and you weren’t prepared emotionally, you weren’t prepared mentally, spiritually for it. And then you’re, and it’s secretive and it’s private.
John-Michael Bout (10:03.726)
Mmm.
Aaron Smith (10:25.364)
What you just said also about how the, it’s not the gratification that you get from the pornography, you know, that end result that you’re looking for. It’s that pursuit of it. And I totally agree with that. And I’ve seen that it’s exactly how God actually designed us is that the hormones that we have in the body, we try and tell our children, like the things that we feel in our body are good and they’re put there by God. It’s when they’re misplaced, when they are
Aaron Smith (10:53.878)
directed in the wrong direction and they’re fed with the wrong things is when they become misused and unhealthy. And that drive to seek more and to go deeper and to experience new, that’s supposed to be something that you are doing with your spouse, which deepens your intimacy, deepens your connection, deepens your oneness, deepens your excitement for each other. But then pornography just draws you that other way. It pulls you away. It dulls.
Aaron Smith (11:21.132)
all of those senses and requires you to have more and more. And the fact that it’s so easy, accessible, it can draw you much faster than real intimacy does, you know?
John-Michael Bout (11:31.906)
Well,
John-Michael Bout (11:34.489)
and on that, think one of the challenges of how this topic is sometimes handled is we major on the prohibitions and minor on the invitations of God inviting us into a good and beautiful design of marriage.
John-Michael Bout (11:53.23)
John-Michael Bout (11:53.71)
and sexual intimacy and side marriage. And so I think sometimes parents feel kind of weird talking about that with their kids. Like it’s like, it is private. But I think God has given us this beautiful design that we work towards. And so when we say don’t look at pornography, it’s absolutely true. You know, all these bads and the no’s. And yes, we should talk about those. But I think we, the accent is falling on the wrong side.
John-Michael Bout (12:22.478)
when that’s the major thing we talk about. And we don’t also invite them to see the good and the beautiful design that God’s given us inside of marriage. And I think that’s what the devil basically tries to do. Before you’re married, say, you know, take before the time. And after you’re married, to say what you have, you know, take what you can’t have. It’s like reaching back. And it’s essentially just taking whatever that God’s designed best for where you are right now.
Aaron Smith (12:45.216)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (12:51.586)
to give you a seat of doubt that that’s actually not what’s best for you. There’s something out there that would be more satisfying than what God’s given you. And it’s just a lot.
Aaron Smith (13:00.842)
Well, I’d imagine this is probably a part of what you guys are presenting in your resources. That when we just focus on the prohibition, which should be focused on as like, here’s the wrong use of this gift. But if we we neglect the communication of what it is as a gift, like what it truly is, like what sex is, what it’s meant for, that it’s good and that it’s powerful in the right context.
John-Michael Bout (13:20.867)
Thank
Aaron Smith (13:29.482)
does, it misses that thing, it turns sex into a sin when it’s not as long as it’s in the right context. Which is another thing that we, I don’t know if you struggled with this after you got married, but transitioning from sex is a sin to sex is a good thing was very difficult for us. Because you grow up and you’re like, no, it’s me having an addiction to pornography. Sex has a totally different definition than it should. For my wife, it’s got a definition of like, well, that’s
John-Michael Bout (13:44.962)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (13:57.42)
that’s off limits and now all of a sudden it’s good and it’s always been a bad thing and now it’s a good thing, rather than understanding what it truly is. Is that something that in your resources you guys are helping present to parents?
John-Michael Bout (14:11.852)
Yeah, I did a podcast with Jonathan Holmes who speaks in the series, Parenting and Pornography, Roadmaps to Raising Children Integrity. That’s the one that we just released or one of the ones we just released. yeah, incredible speaker on basically how do we think about sexual intimacy? And that was one of the questions I asked was, you know, how do we think well about moving from one stage into the next? And that was definitely part of my story. Like I remember
John-Michael Bout (14:42.328)
honeymoon. I just the in this was a good part of it. Just kind of rejoicing in like, wow, this is this is a good thing. And this is crazy. Like every other sexual experience for me before this. Afterwards, I’m always left actually in shame and guilt. And like this is
John-Michael Bout (15:04.162)
you you’re, you’re a bad person. Those are the kinds of things in my mind, all the different angles of condemnation. But being able to think, whoa, this is, this is a good thing that I can actually delight in now. It was like a very revelatory kind of experience for me. But the other, the flip side of it is a hard kind of switch to flip. I think for a lot of people.
John-Michael Bout (15:28.512)
especially guys with pornography, but I think girls with pornography sometimes, but also with things like abuse. I was just talking to a sister this morning actually about how many girls are first introduced to things of sexuality through either some sort of sexual abuse, seeing pornography, seeing like their dad or brother looking at pornography. You know, they’re introduced great and very
John-Michael Bout (15:56.256)
gross ways. And so it’s not really surprising that when they enter into marriage, their connotations with sex and sexuality are like icky, gross. I don’t really want to that. Exactly. Yeah. So there’s often just a lot of baggage to unpack.
Aaron Smith (16:06.356)
Yeah, disgust.
Aaron Smith (16:12.53)
No, I bet. And I feel like it’s always been an issue, of course. mean, the Bible talks a lot about sexual sin and how it needs to viewed and purity in the church. But what are you seeing? mean, you’re 24. You’re in the… What generation is that? I don’t know about Gen Z, Gen X, Gen Y. Yeah, I don’t know what they are. But anyways…
John-Michael Bout (16:36.686)
kind of got lost after.
Aaron Smith (16:40.244)
What are you seeing that’s prevalent right now in your generation when it comes to pornography, when it comes to communication and how it’s viewed? Because it seems like it’s so… From everything I see on social media, it’s so regular. It’s like normal life now.
John-Michael Bout (16:55.756)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (16:58.128)
Yeah. Well, honestly, it’s interesting because there’s the Christian community and then the secular community inside secular spaces. It’s viewed as a good thing. It’s a normal thing. If you’re not looking at pornography, that’s actually really weird. It’s probably unhealthy. but inside the kind of more conservative evangelical space, still taboo, but also very,
John-Michael Bout (17:23.726)
There is also an element of expectation. Like, you’re not surprised now. Guys my age is like, of course all my friends struggle. I think the angle of women struggling is a growing trend and there’s a ton of shame there. A book I was reading with some studies in it said that women have three times the amount of shame that guys do on average coming, kind of opening up about this topic.
John-Michael Bout (17:53.126)
and I was just thinking back to the first time telling my story and the amount of like fear and shame that was connected to that and trying to think of having three times that much fear and shame connected. but that’s, mean, I think that’s partly because the way we’ve talked about it as a church is like every man’s problem. or this is it guys are visual, girls are emotional. And like some of these broad brushstrokes can sometimes be helpful.
John-Michael Bout (18:21.9)
but a lot of the time it actually, they are not super helpful. And then we sideline, you know, sisters in Christ and tell them they’re struggling with a guy’s problem when this is just the problem of sin and the problem of being in a culture where technology is super ubiquitous and there’s a porn industry that’s actually actively pursuing children. So it’s not surprising that where we are.
Aaron Smith (18:47.072)
What do you think is driving the increase of women struggling with porn addiction in today’s society?
John-Michael Bout (18:55.255)
Mm.
John-Michael Bout (18:57.77)
Access is the obvious first one. I can think of many stories of people I know, Christians, that the boyfriend or even the husband becomes a gateway for the wife to start watching or the girlfriend, like, this is normal or hey, let’s learn from this. And then that begins an addiction on the other side. I also think…
Aaron Smith (19:00.908)
you
John-Michael Bout (19:27.71)
social media is a huge contributing factor, just the milieu of what’s popular, what gets likes, what people want to see. And so those are kind of the big factors that I can think of, but I’m sure there’s others as well.
Aaron Smith (19:30.122)
I bet. Yeah.
Aaron Smith (19:42.06)
Yeah, I am on social media periodically. I’m often on Twitter now because it’s safer, I than some of the other ones. But I’ve noticed, I mean, it used to be men were always sexualizing women, like in movies or in music videos or anything like that. But it feels like there’s an increase of female influencers, musicians, artists.
John-Michael Bout (19:58.403)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (20:11.432)
Actresses that are giving a persona of porn star, know, like highly sexualized. I’m thinking of what’s her name? I don’t even know where she’s from. I think she’s like was a Disney star. Sabrina Carpenter, think is her name. it and all anytime I’ve ever seen a clip of her, it’s it’s like pornography and I have to like quickly go past it and she’s just a singer. And when I say Jess, but like she’s super famous and I feel like there’s a
John-Michael Bout (20:27.104)
yeah.
John-Michael Bout (20:36.674)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (20:40.798)
a growing influence of influential women who are, it used to be like just Madonna or just like there’s like these onesies or one or two, you know, people that were trying to make that name for themselves, make that image. But I feel like it’s so much more prevalent nowadays is the influencers sexualizing themselves and making that like, hey, this is what men want. This is what I want to be for men.
Aaron Smith (21:09.208)
So I’ve seen that. don’t know if you’ve experienced a lot of that on your side of things. And then the other thing I’ve noticed, I saw a really sad interview of someone who had an OnlyFans. I’ve never been on OnlyFans, but I know what it is. she was saying the reason she started her OnlyFans is because she was tired of working paycheck to paycheck and she wanted to do something that would give her the freedom and life that she wanted.
Aaron Smith (21:38.932)
And so she became an only fan star, essentially a porn star, because she can make more money. And I thought I was so sad by that thinking like there’s been this push to move women from being mothers and wives and having the most amazing role of raising children and doing keeping a home and like things that are very conservative, very old school quote unquote, to moving into the workplace, to moving into careers and thinking that that’s their highest goal in life.
Aaron Smith (22:08.128)
And then realizing that it’s not fulfilling, realizing that it’s not sustaining, realizing that it’s difficult and stressful. Like all of us men know this, how hard it is to do that and do that day in and day out to support something, support a family. And then saying like, there’s these girls over here making millions of dollars showing off their bodies. I’m going to do that. I’m like, the devil is so clever to have this progress.
Aaron Smith (22:36.992)
What you guys are doing is, what’s crazy is I’ve had several interviews now on this exact topic and it’s not like I’m not looking for it. Just there’s so much necessity nowadays, especially in the church to shine a light on pornography, on sexual addiction, sexual depravity and how it’s just prevailing in the church. And so that’s what you guys are focusing on is, I mean, I’m sure anyone could watch your stuff, but you guys are focusing on equipping.
Aaron Smith (23:07.052)
Christians on how to talk about these things. Would you share a little bit about what you guys are doing in to the light ministries?
John-Michael Bout (23:14.626)
Yeah, totally.
John-Michael Bout (23:16.142)
So yeah, Into the Light of ours shared a little bit about the ministry broadly, but specifically we just, I don’t know when this will come out, but as of the recording, basically a week ago, we dropped two new series. And the first one is called Parenting and Pornography. And so kind of the goal of this series is, you know, as parents, we want to protect our kids. We want to raise them to know and love Jesus. But one of the most challenging areas of their disciples
John-Michael Bout (23:46.249)
is going to be sexuality. Whether you like it or not, that’s the world we live in.
John-Michael Bout (23:51.712)
And so I think a lot of parents, like I just was looking at an email earlier today of a woman who watched the series. She said, you know, my plan was basically to follow the put your head in the sand and hope it never comes up approach to this topic. And so basically the goal of the parenting pornography video series is to equip moms and dads to talk to their kids about sexuality and do it in age appropriate ways so that you don’t follow the put your head in the sand and hope it
John-Michael Bout (24:21.616)
doesn’t come up approach as moms and dads. And really it’s just kind of equipping you to think through what is God’s good design? know, what is this, if we don’t know what we’re talking, like what we’re gonna teach them, we can’t, we’re not gonna be able to have a good conversation. What is my responsibility as a parent? How do I think through this and not just parent towards behaviors, but parent towards the heart of our children.
John-Michael Bout (24:47.406)
Because if we’re aiming first and foremost just at behavior modification, like don’t don’t look at this. Don’t do that. Then when they leave the house, we’ve not actually equipped them to be men and women of integrity. Like we want to send children, not not children out of our house. We want to send many women out of our house who are able to get exposed. You know, they’re going to come across it. But then to say no or to know what to do, you know, to close the laptop to run to
John-Michael Bout (25:17.38)
mom and dad, or to go to an accountability partner, or to even have had the foresight to have some accountability software on their device in the first place. So really, it’s walking through some of those foundational things, and then getting really practical. What could a conversation about the dangers of pornography and the goodness of God’s design? What could that look like? You know, here’s some ways that you could approach that. All right, now what do you do if you find out they’re already struggling? Okay, how do you approach that conversation?
John-Michael Bout (25:46.936)
What are some scripts to talk about in that way? And then the last kind of two episodes, it’s a nine episode series, the last two episodes walk through, all right, maybe you’re having all these conversations, but how do you think through technology? Because this is not just a sexuality issue, this is a technology issue. how do we, yeah, and an access issue, that’s right. So how do we think through wisdom principles to put in place into our homes, and even wisdom principles to teach to our children about
Aaron Smith (26:01.217)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (26:04.812)
It’s an access issue.
John-Michael Bout (26:16.89)
device safety and accountability. So it’s kind of a quick overview of that series. But I’m really hopeful that this will equip moms and dads just to take responsibility that God’s given them.
Aaron Smith (26:29.068)
Let
Aaron Smith (26:29.428)
me ask you, you mentioned that email from that mother who said she was going to take the head in the sand approach. That’s probably most parents. Why? Why should we not take the head in the sand approach?
John-Michael Bout (26:42.017)
Mm.
John-Michael Bout (26:45.42)
mean, your child’s… If I was talking to someone directly, I would say, do you love your child? And, you know, I think the majority of parents would say, absolutely, I love my child. Then I would say, one of the greatest dangers to their soul and to their life is the dangers of pornography. Just looking statistics alone, but even thinking about how it affects marriages, how it affects spiritual health, all of these things.
Aaron Smith (26:55.189)
Yes.
John-Michael Bout (27:14.848)
If this is truly one of the greatest dangers in your child’s life and there’s an industry that’s actively targeting them, then you cannot just leave this up to someone else. And God is calling you to it. And you’ve got this, you’ve got what you need with God’s word, Christian community, the church, you truly do have what you need to deal with this issue well. But you have to, it starts by taking responsibility for that and saying, it’s not the school.
John-Michael Bout (27:45.088)
It’s not sending them somewhere else. It’s not even just putting them in front of a good book and saying, you know, read this and not talking about it again. It’s actually repeated conversations, checking in with them, walking alongside them and discipling them. And that can be hard. That is hard, but that’s the work of parenting. Parenting is not easy. Yeah. And the other thing is if you don’t…
Aaron Smith (28:07.264)
What? Yeah, it is. No, it’s not. It’s very difficult.
John-Michael Bout (28:14.21)
The world will. Your child will get a sexual discipleship from someone. And so if you’re not gonna give it to them, then the world will do it for you. And so that’s just not an option for a Christian parent to do. But that will be what will happen if you don’t take it on yourself.
Aaron Smith (28:32.054)
So it’s pretty much guaranteed that no amount of… I can keep my kids from going to the movies. I’m not going give them a device until a certain age, but you’re telling me that no matter what I do, they’re going to be exposed. They’re going to be… I mean, I’m saying this facetiously because of course they are. Like I was just explaining, like I’m looking at news on Twitter and then something shows up and I have to scroll past it quicker because the…
John-Michael Bout (28:49.164)
Yeah. Yes.
Aaron Smith (28:59.914)
social media, what they’re gonna, they wanna present to us.
John-Michael Bout (29:02.818)
Well, even if you were to, you know, box your child up in inside your house and no technology and no modern things, the problem is that doesn’t last. You’re actually just, you’re trying to keep your child a child. You’re not.
John-Michael Bout (29:19.35)
you’re not training them to be a man and a woman who’s useful in God’s kingdom, who’s ready for marriage. The series actually kind of starts with basic principles and then works its way up with kind of the final chapter, trying to walk through how do you send your kids out actually?
John-Michael Bout (29:37.324)
Because that’s really the ultimate goal of parenting in some ways is to help them know God in his ways and to equip them well to live as an adult. There’s other goals too, but I think those are two of the big ones. And so you just can’t make protection your ultimate goal. Protection’s a great kind of proximate goal, but if you make that your ultimate goal, you’re just playing whack-a-mole and you’re gonna lose, frankly.
Aaron Smith (29:54.721)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (30:02.462)
No, it sounds
Aaron Smith (30:03.012)
like we have a mandate as parents to protect. So we’re protecting spiritually, physically, emotionally, mentally. And we can only protect so much because there’s going to be things outside of our control. But to also train up, as the word says, train up a child in the way he should go, that we are making them wise and have integrity and know the truth from the lie. I think of Proverbs.
Aaron Smith (30:31.884)
And it says, my son, stay away from the, don’t go near her home, stay away from the harlot. And there’s many Proverbs that are, it’s a father speaking to a child, son, warning him of the dangers, warning him of the pitfall, of lust, of sexual sin, and avoiding the whore on the street, not even going down her street, getting near her where she can call you, hey, come here.
John-Michael Bout (30:47.854)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (30:59.4)
And so that’s what you’re saying is that is the training is not just to learn how to protect them more, but it’s to train them up in the way they should go, give them the tools they need so that when they are not around you, when they’re with a friend, when they’re, you know, at a party, when they’re at school, when they’re at wherever. And this is what’s crazy is it’s so accessible now that it could happen in a second. One thing that we try and teach our kids
Aaron Smith (31:25.93)
And I’m sure you guys probably talk about this in the sections on devices is to never look over people’s shoulders at their device. when people are always on their devices, we even tell them with ours, like they’ll come over and I don’t know what’s going to show up on my phone sometimes. And so they come over and I put my phone on and like, you’re not allowed to look over my shoulder and you have to ask permission. Can I look at your phone? Can I? And they, and they do that because they could be sitting next to someone on a bus in anywhere.
Aaron Smith (31:55.654)
anywhere in public nowadays standing next to someone and then you don’t know what they’re looking at. so that’s one thing we try and tell our children and we explain to them like they could be looking at something that’s not good for you and you don’t know that. Or they could be looking at business stuff that’s none of your business or they could be looking at you know and so that’s one of the things that we try and teach our kids.
John-Michael Bout (32:01.4)
Mm.
John-Michael Bout (32:17.294)
Totally. I mean, that’s a good tee off to the other series that we just released as well, which is kind of related to it, but it’s called TechSafe. And so I guess one of the challenges that I’ve come across and that I’ve wanted myself is just, you know, whether you’re a struggler with pornography, wanting to protect the devices that you have and you’re trying to cut off access, live out Matthew five, or your parent wanting to proactively protect your family.
Aaron Smith (32:28.192)
Ooh, I like that.
John-Michael Bout (32:47.534)
both of you have very practical questions of how do I take this iPhone or gaming console or smart TV and make it actually something safe to have in my house. And so basically we made a set of tutorials in this series called tech safe that walk through, okay, you’ve got the smart TV, you’ve got the smart home, you’ve got computer, tablet, gaming console, all these different devices in your house. Here’s how information flows into your home through those.
John-Michael Bout (33:16.942)
And there’s the different danger points, you know, associated with those for pornography or even predators or other dangerous content kind of online. And then we’ll give you some tools to filter or to monitor or even block as many of those danger points as possible. So they’re very practical, kind of walking through different device types and then making different recommendations and giving you links to, okay, here’s how to set up parental controls on an iPhone.
John-Michael Bout (33:45.35)
And we partnered with Covenant Eyes on that one to just try to make it really practical and just make a list. I’ve got these five devices. All right, I’m going to watch those five videos. I’m going to walk through those steps and try to set them up as safely as possible to go from maybe like a 10 % safe, very open to explicit content to more like an 80 or 90 % safe where it’s much more restricted and protected.
Aaron Smith (34:09.045)
Yeah.
Aaron Smith (34:12.83)
Yeah, I just keep thinking about how you were exposed to it. You were just looking up music because you love music and there’s an album cover that’s explicit, which we’ve all seen them. There’s a lot of them, explicit album covers. But I was thinking about some of my kids play Switch. We give them a couple hours a week to play the Switch. And there’s what we I don’t like them being connected to Internet because then they get down. They get uploads of like news and stuff.
John-Michael Bout (34:16.142)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (34:20.803)
Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (34:42.307)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (34:42.314)
And this
Aaron Smith (34:42.934)
is how nefarious this stuff is. On Switch, you just click the little store button and then you can just scroll through all of the games, right? But there’s adult games and they have covers that are not kid appropriate and they’re just there. so I’m always like, you can’t, when you’re playing the device, you can’t go to the store. I tell them things that they can’t click on, but it’s even worse than that. Like they just start the device up and the home screen has, you know,
Aaron Smith (35:12.054)
three or four news items that I can’t control what they are. And it’s just always amazes me how accessible all this stuff is and how easy it is to just boom. Like, what’s that click? And then like, they’re just exploring, you know? And I think about YouTube, we don’t ever let them have free access to YouTube because I’ve heard stories and I’ve seen it myself. Like an ad comes up that you have no control over or it promotes another video that you have no control over. But we always tell the kids too. Good.
John-Michael Bout (35:38.338)
Yep. Well, and Aaron,
John-Michael Bout (35:41.84)
and you’re more, it sounds like you’re way more proactive than most parents I’ve talked to because you’re actually saying YouTube, that’s a dangerous, like you’re assessing YouTube has a lot of dangerous content. There’s things I can’t control. And so I’m not going to let them go on that. This I’m going to be restricted. But even those like in some ways, basic principles are like just so many Christian parents I know don’t think about that.
Aaron Smith (36:07.358)
Yeah, they just freehand the device over and say, okay, and they just assume the kids aren’t going to be looking for anything because they might not be.
John-Michael Bout (36:14.722)
Yeah, totally.
Aaron Smith (36:16.14)
And it’s just going
Aaron Smith (36:16.78)
to, but they don’t, but it’s looking for them. Like you said, can you, I want to know, I want to dig in. said that this porn industry is directly pursuing our children. I want to, I want you to speak on that a little bit because I would imagine most of my listeners probably don’t realize that. Probably don’t think, maybe they do. Maybe some of them are very savvy and they’re like, no, this is, they’re coming from my kids. But they, would imagine they’d be like, no, that’s adult content. Only adults are looking for it.
John-Michael Bout (36:35.393)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (36:44.833)
If they get exposed because someone shows them and that it wasn’t, you know, but when you say that the porn industry is directly coming for our children, what do mean by that?
John-Michael Bout (36:54.894)
John-Michael Bout (36:57.215)
In some ways it sounds kind of like fear-mongering. They’re coming for our children. Yes, no, totally. But in some ways, I think it’s very simple. If you think about it, Dewalt makes power tools. And what do they do? They often make kids versions of their power tools that can be sold in Voice-O-Rus. Why do they do that?
Aaron Smith (37:00.616)
Well, they are, and I think we should be afraid, but go ahead.
Aaron Smith (37:16.748)
All right.
John-Michael Bout (37:19.906)
They do that because if a child gets attachment to a certain brand or thing, as they grow up, they’re way more likely to go spend money and buy DeWalt tools.
Aaron Smith (37:26.379)
early enough.
John-Michael Bout (37:32.234)
It’s marketing essentially is what it is. It’s building your market base and getting people to come back to you and buy your product. It’s really the same thing. They’re trying to hook children at very young ages because as they grow older, they’re going to be more likely to spend money and buy things. It’s money driven. so you can do that through ads. There’s even things like
John-Michael Bout (37:57.72)
This is not a specific example, but I know that if you can type in things like Elmo, and if you slightly misspell it, it takes you to a porn site. And so it’s literally just targeting like a child who can’t quite spell properly will get redirected to this site. And they’re way too young to know what to do with it. They’ve never been talked to by anyone and it’s very stimulating. So they get hooked. So that’s kind of what I mean by targeting. And of course it just drives revenue for them.
Aaron Smith (38:26.036)
Yeah, I, going back to what I was talking about with modern musicians, certain influencers that they’re much more sexualized at a younger age. Maybe they’re not a porn star, maybe they don’t show off their bodies naked, but the way they present themselves online, the way they build their audiences, the way they encourage their followers definitely pushes towards pornography and sexual sin. It’s all about lust, it’s all about
Aaron Smith (38:54.974)
showing off. all about these things that, like you said, it’s conditioning and it’s creating the desire, the craving, and it’s pushing into want to find more. But I just wanted to highlight that because I want parents to realize that this is absolutely the age of exposure is getting lower and lower. And the accessibility is infinitely more accessible today than it ever has been.
Aaron Smith (39:24.892)
More versions of it more variations of it more types of it Like I said just on social media alone you don’t have to be following anyone Like that and you will get shown by the algorithms certain things to see if it’s something that you’re interested in and it’ll suck you in and It’s one of the it’s one of my biggest fears that because I have my oldest is 12 He’s gonna be a teenager this year, which I’m terrified about but
Aaron Smith (39:54.516)
I’m fearful of like, do I introduce social media to them at some point? Do I ever? And because they are going to be introduced to it. Maybe some of my kids will be like, no, I have no interest at all. That might happen, but it’s going to be a thing. It’s going to be a real thing. And I’m like, how do I, I may not be able to stop them from being on social media, but like you were talking about, the end result is not just protecting them, it’s equipping them to know how to know what they’re
John-Michael Bout (40:05.581)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (40:22.956)
experiencing, know how to battle it, know what’s going to be coming, and then what to do when it does. We need to be stepping up in that realm as parents.
John-Michael Bout (40:33.15)
And this
Aaron Smith (40:33.176)
So, go ahead.
John-Michael Bout (40:34.801)
is where I just commend parents. Get equipped on this. That’s why we made the series. There are good books out there. But don’t just do this on your own. like, you know, think about taking care of your family. But I think this is an area where the church as a whole, we should actually try to have a united front on this.
John-Michael Bout (40:55.574)
We all agree we want to protect our children. We all agree we want to raise men and women of integrity. So let’s do this actually together and open up and talk about it. And that’s why we’ve designed this series parenting and pornography to have a discussion guide with it. Basically to try to make it usable in a small group. You could get like, let’s grab three of our couple friends to get in. We’ll watch it or, you know, let’s do it. We’ll watch two episodes as a church and then encourage people to go finish them at home. Just try to
John-Michael Bout (41:25.568)
it easy for communities to start talking, not just individual homes to start talking. So that even like if you’re sending one of your kids over to another friend’s house in the church, you know that, okay, I know they’ve thought through this well. They’ve watched through that series. They’ve probably put some safeguards on their devices. It’s probably a pretty safe house for me to send my child to.
John-Michael Bout (41:51.502)
you start to create communities of integrity, not just individual homes. And that’s kind one of our prayers for the series is that we hope that’s how the Lord will use it.
Aaron Smith (42:01.804)
I love that idea, being able to do it in community so that you know. You’re like, well, I know that we’re all on the same page. So if something happens, we’re going to talk about it and we’re all going to be on the same page. So what makes Parenting and Pornography, this series that you guys are coming up with, different from other resources about biblical sexuality and parenting?
John-Michael Bout (42:20.91)
That’s a great question. think number one, some series, and I first want to start off by saying I praise the Lord for whatever resources are out there. And I’m just thankful for that because we need different angles to come from. But I would say some tend to come more from a statistics and psychology perspective.
Aaron Smith (42:36.384)
I like that. Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (42:44.79)
And I’ve shared statistics on this podcast, and that the super valuable but like we’ve been talking about, this is a heart issue primarily, we and our children have sinful hearts that want this. And so we can do we can even be really intentional about this, we can talk about it with our children. But if we’re not aiming at their heart, they will find it, they will find a way to go get it.
John-Michael Bout (43:11.616)
And so I think that is a deep thread throughout the series that is unique from the ones that I’ve come across that we need to disciple our children towards their hearts. And kind of a second thread is you do have this. The Lord has equipped you to with all that you need and you don’t need to send them out somewhere else. You and your family inside the church with God’s word have what you need to talk about this well with them.
John-Michael Bout (43:41.27)
And so yeah, I think those are some of the ways. And then I think another way that this resource is unique is we want to make it totally free. And so if people go to our website, intothelightministries.ca, all our resources are totally free. You don’t have to pay for it at all because it’s made possible by donors. And we did that because if pornography is free and not just free, but targeted to our families,
Aaron Smith (44:02.572)
That’s amazing.
John-Michael Bout (44:09.442)
then we should make the help and the hope as freely available. And so we’re very thankful to be able to do that, but I think that’s kind of another angle that makes it a little bit unique to some other resources.
Aaron Smith (44:25.036)
That’s awesome. You guys have quite a few contributors on the resource on the parenting pornography. Albert Mueller is one of the speakers in it, right? I love him. listen to his podcast, often his daily podcast on news and world events. Yeah, the briefing. He’s awesome. Who else do you have in the series? Who else contributes to it?
John-Michael Bout (44:33.42)
Mm-hmm. That’s right.
John-Michael Bout (44:40.098)
Yep, debriefing.
John-Michael Bout (44:46.702)
Yeah, Abby Helbersen, she’s a mom of 10 kids, she’s homeschools and she’s amazing. Yeah, she’s written a couple of great books. You can check her out on Instagram too, at misformama. She’s incredible. So she kind of opens up the series with Albert Mueller and then she kind of introduces some of the other episodes. And then after that, it’s Jonathan Holmes, who’s fantastic biblical counselor.
Aaron Smith (44:53.861)
That’s amazing.
John-Michael Bout (45:12.162)
Then we’ve got Andrew Walker, who kind of talks more about God’s good design. And then we’ve got Julie Lowe, who’s again a biblical counselor talking about more the practical conversation. And then Justin Whitmull Early, who’s more on habits of the household and thinking through habits of technology in the household. So yeah, those are the speakers. Super thankful for all of them. Yeah, free.
Aaron Smith (45:33.004)
That’s great and it’s free. That’s incredible.
John-Michael Bout (45:37.1)
Of course, if people
John-Michael Bout (45:37.952)
want to support, they can on the website. We’re always making more resources, but it is 100 % free for people to use.
Aaron Smith (45:44.886)
So where
Aaron Smith (45:45.477)
can my listeners find these resources? Because I think all my listeners should go check it out. I’m gonna go check it out because I’m at that phase. I need to be talking to my kids and we have been doing things, but I can always use more resources to help me. So where can we find you at?
John-Michael Bout (45:59.51)
Yeah, IntoTheLightMinistries.ca is our website. The CA there is the Canadian coming out. And yeah, all the resources are free there, podcasts. We’ve got a documentary, a video series, and then tutorial series. You can follow us on Instagram and all the socials, IntoTheLightMinistries, and that should come up. So yeah, it’s all accessible for people to use.
Aaron Smith (46:05.024)
Yep.
Aaron Smith (46:23.232)
They praise God for what you guys are doing, John, Michael. It’s so necessary. And I just, pray that my listeners, I pray that all of our homes, we would take it seriously. The fact that the enemy wants not just us, because we need to, as men and women, be protecting ourselves and being vigilant and aware in today’s world. But we need to be ready and prepared and teaching our children to give them what they need to.
John-Michael Bout (46:48.995)
Mm.
Aaron Smith (46:51.98)
to launch into this world not just as good people, but strong people, people who fear the Lord, who love the Word of God, who are prepared with wisdom and integrity to know how to fight the schemes of the devil and to resist and to walk uprightly in purity. So thank you for what you guys are doing. Yeah.
John-Michael Bout (47:12.27)
Praise the Lord. I’m thankful
John-Michael Bout (47:14.134)
to do it.
Aaron Smith (47:14.972)
I’ll put all the links for these resources in our show notes, and just pray everyone goes and checks out IntoTheLightMinistries.ca to get these free resources, parenting and pornography masterclass to learn how to talk to our children about sexuality and the Bible and what God has for us. Thanks for being on the show, man.
John-Michael Bout (47:32.44)
Thanks for having me on.