This is the Truth Network. Oh, welcome to Truth Talk Live. Today, the question is, as we're talking about rescue the helpless, God's heart for the exploited.
And where do you see the church's role in fighting child exploitation and how has God stirred your heart along those lines? Again, this is a live show. We love your calls. We love your questions. And since we've got some folks that deal in this every single day of their lives, you have a question, gee, how can I deal with this with my kids?
866-348-7884, 866-348-7884. We have Whitney Miller with us. We have Mike Zwick with us.
In fact, we did a show on this topic earlier today for the Mike Zwick Show coming up some Saturday in the future. But Whitney, welcome to Truth Talk Live. Thanks. Glad to be here, Robby. It's always good to chat with you all.
It is. And so, you know, you have a chance to talk on this subject all the time, in which, by the way, if you've got a young child with you in the car or something, it might be this isn't a subject that they may be real comfortable with. Or you may be comfortable with having that discussion with them in the car because we will be using words that… Certainly aren't typically on Truth Network. Let's just put it out there. Yeah, yeah.
Well, it might be a little uncomfortable, you know, for… And that doesn't mean we're going all that deep or anything. But we do want to make you aware that this is the kind of thing that we feel like is critically important for parents, critically important for grandparents. Whitney, these statistics literally blow our mind, especially in North Carolina. Like, what's the age now of the average child that views pornography?
Yeah, so, wow, way to jump right in there, Robby. Yeah, no, that is the scary concern. And it's not just in North Carolina. It's across our country.
And honestly, if we took a look at it internationally, it probably wouldn't be too far off either. But we are seeing that the average age of children viewing pornography for the first time or being introduced to it for the first time is that eight, nine-year-old mark, right? And so think about that, an eight-year-old. And now we're not just talking about what we grew up with, right? Like, it's not a magazine tucked away behind a counter in plastic anymore. This is what they are viewing via their cell phones or their tablets. And unfortunately, you know, media of all sorts, not just social media, right, even YouTube, the stories we hear from parents, whoo, but even YouTube, right? They… A couple of scrolls in and they have content before them that is intended for adults before a child's eyes. And it happens so quick. And, you know, I don't know if we mentioned this in the last showing this morning, but one of the top places that children encounter it is at grandparents' houses. It hits top of the charts. And why do you think that is?
I'm looking at you guys. What do you think? The grandparents don't suspect it. The grandparents know less about technology often than even their children do, right? And so it creates quite a— I resemble that remark. Yeah. I mean, I wasn't going to say anything. No, but it's true, right?
How often—and then all it takes is our sweet little children to say, but mommy lets me. Right? That's all it takes. And grandma's like, well, if mom lets you look at the tablet for an hour, here you go, buddy.
Free ride. So you mean kids know how to play that game, huh, Whitney? Oh, very—didn't we?
I hope I do. Yeah. And so, Whitney, you were talking about it this morning that you were talking to a lady that her child was looking at what was just, I guess, a pretty well-known young person's show.
What was the name of it? Oh, yeah. No, this person was me as a mom. I had my child turn on the TV, just normal, right? Turns on TV and clicks on Disney Plus, right?
Something that we have been back and forth on before. We watch old Disney movies. We watched, gosh, we watched a 90s movie last night from Disney Plus, right? Where you think it's a safe space for your kid to log into. And unfortunately, the first thing that popped up when he clicked on Disney Plus was a show called Dying for Sex was the name of it.
And it was front and center on my Disney Plus. I'm like, what in the world? Now, here's the great part.
Not great. But the good part about it is I've been having conversations with my children for a while, right? About what is inappropriate.
What does that look like? Because remember, my role as a Christian parent is safeguarding my children, preparing them for the world and teaching them discernment, right? And so in doing that, I am preparing my children what they're up against, right? We're preparing them for war, right? We are in a war.
There's no doubt about it. And we are preparing them not just to put on the armor of God, but to fight with the armor of God. And so I think that having those conversations, as soon as that popped up, he said, Mom, there's something inappropriate on the TV. And of course, I'm like, Oh, my gosh, what's on the TV? But, you know, fortunately enough, it was there was no graphic images, but the words alone.
And so we're even we're in spaces, we think we are safeguarded or are safe for our children to be. Man, the enemy is he is a sneaky guy, right? But again, I love the fact that this is a 12 year old young man, right? Yeah, 10. Oh, he's 1010 year old young man that knows enough to say, Mom, and then feel safe to know what he's talking about, that, wow, this is what you warned me about. And so, you know, Michael, we talked about you have an eight year old, right? And it's well, I have an eight year old. And I mean, he's more interested in playing Legos. And he's more interested in playing Legos than he is with, you know, all this other stuff.
But I was talking to Whitney this morning on the show. And I said, Well, at what age should we start to talk to these kids about this? And she said, right now, and I'm thinking what, but you know, the truth is, is that the best way to really prepare somebody for something is to talk about it early. And yes, it is uncomfortable. It's going to be uncomfortable for me talking to my eight, would you even talking to the six year old or seven year old? So yes, it's going to be uncomfortable for me talking to the eight year old seven, six year old right now. But at the end of the day, would I rather feel a little uncomfortable now? Or would I rather something happened later on and not be prepared for it, and then not know what to do. And so sometimes, sometimes we take the tough part first, and we have to go through the storm to be able to get to the other side.
But it's something that I've got, I've definitely got to do and sooner than later. Yeah. So you could be sitting there like me like, Whitney, how exactly how do I enter into this conversation? Or you got a question along those lines.
That's what we're talking about today. And we would love for you to call in the 866-348-7884, 866-34-TRUTH. Again, rescue the helpless. See, the situation is, is that these children are being exploited and the days of the white van and stranger danger is not the way that children are exploited these days. And it ramps up a lot worse than eight years old and 10 years old. By the time they're 13, 14, we'll get into some of that a little bit later. But this is a great opportunity for you to enter into the conversation and think, you know, gee, what is the church's role?
What is my role? How can I get my church more involved? Which by the way, you can get Whitney to come in and speak by the way. And she is with the Invictus Project, which has an amazing run coming up in Asheboro, North Carolina this August?
August 23rd. Yes, it's our third annual rescue run. So we're excited. And you know, Invictus Project has all these law enforcement. And again, you know, putting people away and whatever.
But when you see the war that she's talking about, she couldn't be more right about it. And of course, one of the first places we can fight this war is on our knees, right? For our children. Absolutely.
And how would you like if you're going to suggest to a parent, say, Mike, how would you suggest it? Right? Prayer has got to come before that discussion. It does. Yeah. Oh, please.
Yes. Please enter into that conversation parade up for many reasons. One, because it's important that you are seeking the Lord and how to speak to your child because each child you speak to is going to come from a different situation or scenario. We may be speaking to our 15 year old, our 10 year old, and you don't know their level of exposure because they haven't come to talk to you about it, right? They don't think that mom and dad have any idea about what's going on around them. And the truth is they they are probably right. Are we going to a break, Nick? Is that why I heard?
That makes sense. I'm hearing the bump in music. So, hey, during the break is a great time to dial in. 866-348-7884. We had a few technical difficulties, but that sounds good.
I like that music. We'll be right back. 866-344-TRUTH. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com. Welcome back to Truth Talk Live. Today's topic is Rescue the Helpless, God's Heart for Child Exploitation. Like, wow. To say it's a war, I've got Whitney Miller here.
I've got Mike Zwick. It is. But one of the key elements in any war is communications, right? If the enemy wants to wipe out, you know, a battle plan, he'll go after the communications to cut those lines any way he possibly can, right? And so as we ramp this up, obviously through the Truth Network to get it out in any way we can, then you ramp it up, sharing this episode with people, sharing the podcast, all those kind of things, but also with the resources that are available. And so one of the gigantic resources we have here in North Carolina, and it is gigantic, is the Invictus Project. Invictus meaning truth. And so, Whitney, share a little bit about the Invictus Project.
Yeah. So, you know, I know this network goes well across the nation. So to share a little bit about what we are doing here in North Carolina, the Invictus Project is a nonprofit that supplements funding to the Invictus Task Force. So the Invictus Task Force is our law enforcement component, and they are combating the child exploitation and trafficking right here in North Carolina.
I say that, but even our work is we're partnered with the SBI and HSI. So that allows us a little more jurisdiction freedom. But it is a combination of four sheriff's offices, as well as Homeland Security and the State Bureau of Investigations who have come together to create a task force of 14 schools that focus solely on crimes against our children as it relates to the sexual exploitation and trafficking of minors. And so their sole focus is driven towards fighting for our children. And as the nonprofit, we get to come in and financially supplement the needs that our task force and law enforcement partners have while they actively pursue those that hunt our children. And we also get to educate our communities. And the partnership between us and law enforcement is beautiful, because what it does is it allows me as an educator to the community to go forth with information that is occurring real time, right? What is happening? What are they seeing? What are those shifts as artificial intelligence is introduced to the mix? Right? How is that impacting this fight for our children?
And why that is so invaluable is because sitting in front of parents, I don't want to hand them information from a year ago. This fight is changing quickly, right? Just as much as our cell phones update and remind us we need to turn them off and update them tonight, right? Is how quickly this fight is evolving. And it allows us to really jump in there and explain to our parents and our communities how they can best be equipped to engage in this battle for their children.
Right. And so this is an opportunity for all of you listening, right? There might be somebody out there that had this happen, right? And all of us could learn from your experience if you had the courage to call in and share that at 866-348-7884. Or you had the courage to call and ask a question. How do I approach this? How do I do this kind of, you know, what could I do to help? All those questions.
There's no question I wouldn't love to get 866-348-7884. But in this battle, right, as technology ramps up on their side, and it certainly has, you had mentioned in the show that we did with Mike, for Saturday's show, these tips that come in. Oh, yes. Cyber tips. Cyber tips. And how many cyber tips did we receive in the state of North Carolina just – Yes. So, yeah, let me share with your listeners a little bit about what a cyber tip is, because that seems – that sounds very, you know, unfamiliar probably to most unless they are on the law enforcement side of it. But what a cyber tip is, is it means that every platform, every service provider on the internet, so Snapchat, Instagram, Verizon, Spectrum, you name it, every service provider is a mandatory reporter of obscene materials, right? When it comes to child exploitation material, anything like that that comes across their platform, they are mandated reporters. Now, they report to that incident, that situation, that video, that picture, to law enforcement, and it trickles its way down to wherever the area that that particular image was, or video was, they narrow it down to that arena, right? And so when we talk about a state, the state of North Carolina in 2019 had 4,900-ish cyber tips come through the state of North Carolina. Now, I also want to share this because I think it's very important. When we're saying one cyber tip, understand that one cyber tip could house terabytes of videos and images of the worst of worst of the worst of mankind as it relates to, you know, sexual abuse of children. And there's no real nice way to say that, but these are the worst moments of a child's life that are being recorded and videoed and shared amongst individuals, right? So that's what we mean when we say a cyber tip. These are not just photos.
I hear it all the time. These are just photos. What's the big deal? I'm like, that's someone's baby behind that picture. That's someone's child behind that picture. And in their videos, not just in videos of the abuse, it's all. Yes, videos.
Yes. So in 2019, 4,900 cyber tips came through the state of North Carolina. Last year, we saw around 28,000 cyber tips come from the state of North Carolina.
28,000 cyber tips in the state of North Carolina. What happened between 2019 and 2021? Right, obviously COVID. And everyone went home, right?
Everyone was locked away in home. And we saw this huge influx begin. Matter of fact, by 2023, there had been a 550% increase in cyber tips. 550% increase.
Now we are expected to hit 33,000 cyber tips by the end of this year in the state of North Carolina, with January of this year being the largest month of cyber tips they've ever experienced or seen. Right. And you can imagine what it takes to just follow up. And each one, like you say, can contain unbelievable amounts of horror. And just, you know, it's unbelievable. But again, this is a call-in show. And I'm just saying, this is your chance to 866-348-7884. And Michael, I appreciate that God put this on your heart, right? The reason we're doing this show is because God put it on your heart.
And this is something that we need to get out on the radio. Yeah, I had a prophetic dream. And so I've started having those years ago. And a few years back, I didn't know what was going on with these prophetic dreams. But I had a dream where my son had fallen and it was terrible. And then I prayed the next day.
And then instead of getting hurt or getting killed, he just hurt his leg. And then I had a dream about somebody was yelling, inflation, inflation, inflation. And this was before all of that.
And then a few months later, terrible inflation kicks in. So I had a dream where my daughter was actually taken away. And I realized that she was being trafficked. And so the next day at church, I said, does anybody know anybody who fights child trafficking?
Nope, nope, nope. And I was just about to say, well, God, I don't know what you want me to do. And I said, contact Robbie. And he got me in touch with the Invictus Project. And this is just a, it's really a godsend. But you know, when I was thinking about this, one of the things that came to my mind is that sometimes this can feel overwhelming. Sometimes this can feel, feel very heavy, but I just opened the Bible and it's 1 Corinthians chapter one, verse nine.
It says that God is faithful by whom you were called under the fellowship of his son, Jesus Christ, our Lord. So Whitney, sometimes I'm sure this seems tough. Sometimes this seems overwhelming, but we have the victory in Jesus Christ.
And I had a friend of mine who's fighting a lot of this similar stuff in our County and she's helping the Sheriff's Department and all that stuff. But you know, she said, sometimes it feels like I'm coming against hell with a water pistol. Uh, but at the same time we are more than conquerors through Jesus Christ. And so the enemy was trying to fight us.
When we first got on this show today, we couldn't hear anything. What did you say, Whitney? Well, I mean, you know, Satan, Satan's a tricky guy, you know, he tries to step in or where he thinks he can impact it. And I love that you came back with communication is key because I'm like, that's exactly what he's trying to disrupt here. Right. Um, but yeah, we have the victory through Jesus Christ. So, and I'm sure that when you go out every day and you do this, um, if you didn't know that Jesus conquers the devil or Jesus is more powerful, it might be pretty tough for you. Oh yeah, absolutely.
Well, we got to go to a break. We know that some audiences are going to have to go watch the podcast or hear the podcast, however that works on Facebook, YouTube, or go to truthnetwork.com the rest of you and hang on to your seatbelts. We've got a lot more coming up.
Stay tuned. You're listening to the Truth Network and truthnetwork.com. Welcome back to Truth Talk Live. We would love for you to call in.
This is a live show. How about you? Have you ever witnessed or experienced something that opened your eyes to the idea of child trafficking and how did, you know, how did God meet you in that moment? Maybe you got a testimony for us of something that you witnessed or you saw or you unfortunately got like, man, next thing I knew, there I was.
866-348-7884, 866-348-7884. You know, I told you we might ramp this up a little bit, so here we go. One of the things that's just completely disturbing, and I, you know, desensitizing the eight-year-old, the nine-year-old like, oh, this stuff's out there, but by the time they are 11 or 12 years old, and you shared this statistic with me this morning, and I was like, holy mackerel, that our children are sending nude pictures of themselves.
What was that statistic you shared? Yeah, so one in four of that 11 to 14 age range are sending nude photos of themselves. And that is a hard pill to swallow when we speak to parents, right? Because our first inclination is like, oh, no, no, no, not my baby, right?
Not my sweet little innocent baby, right? But the reality of it is, is our society is grooming our children and oversexualizing them. So the sending of a nude photo is a lot less taboo than the time in which we grew up in, where somebody sending that, it would have been, oh, gosh, the names that she would have been called, I'm sure, you know, or he would have been called, right? But now it's very, I hate to say it, but it is, it is incredibly normalized amongst our teenagers across the board.
I mean, it's not, it's not an uncommon thing, you know, and Well, if it's one out of four, that's basically 25% of the kids are doing that. And it is terrifying when you think about where that can lead, which we're going to get to in a minute. But first we got Deborah is in Burlington. Deborah, you're on Truth Talk Live. Hi, Deborah.
Hello. Oh, you are sharing such valuable information and the statistics that you're giving is just mind boggling, and how this has increased so much here in the last few years. And I'm interested in, and what is the church's role and how we can get involved? Yes, Deborah, you're awesome for asking that. I'm so thankful to share that question with the with all of us really, because that is the the question of the hour is how does the church get involved in this?
And there really are multiple ways, right? There are a couple of things I would say that within the church realm, I think it is important that we're addressing the concerns of over sexualization and pornography. I think that's a really good start as a church to discuss, because the reality of it is that is a concern across the board in a large way. But also, you know, our church is that place of fellowship.
So are we creating that space where our children are feel comfortable having these conversations with their parents, right? Are we engaging in them engaging them in that way? I think that this is where the battle has to be waged is in our churches, because we understand it spiritual, you see, the rest of the world doesn't get that part.
They don't understand what spiritual warfare looks like. But we as believers, we understand what that looks like, we understand what tools we have to combat it. And I think as a church, we have to rise up to fight this evil, not just for our children, but for children that don't have anyone fighting for them as well. Darrell Bock Yeah, and I would add, Debra, that, you know, I'm a pastor, and I've certainly been a youth leader, that you can have, as a youth leader, you can have discussions with parents to say, is it okay if I go here? And as a youth leader, you need to go there.
You need to say, guys, do you know that 25% of the kids out there are sending nude pictures of themselves? Like, listen to what can happen if you do that. And, you know, talk about how valuable, right, their sexuality is, and why Satan's so desperate for it, and that intimacy, and all those things can come from the pulpit, too. And so, you know, it's just, it's a fight, but I think prayer is gigantically involved. Like, for all of the church to join in, you know, God, what is, what can we do? And what can we say? And so I'm curious about you, Debra, what do you think? Debra Taylor Well, and actually, at the church I worship at, between services, we have people that come in and pray for our church, for our leadership. Sometimes we even include things going on in the community. And we find that this is very important, not only for the church and the direction, and, you know, for the Holy Spirit to be operating within the walls of the church there, but, you know, for us to even find out.
It's a time when we share some things that we find out, just like today, what I'm finding out, and then we pray into that as well. Darrell Bock Right. Exactly.
Exactly. Debra Taylor And I think that's a great start. But just don't stop at prayer. Be actionable too, because our kids are, they desire to have someone to tell these things to and to understand what is actually going on. So Debra, you're awesome.
Thanks for starting there. Darrell Bock And Debra's a friend of mine, so thank you for calling in, Debra. But you did get involved in something like this, Debra. And you said there was a local group at Alamance County, and they wanted to get all the pastors together, all the churches together. And they said, hey, certainly everybody, every pastor is going to want to get involved in fighting child trafficking or human trafficking. But you said not everybody wanted to get involved.
Is that right? Debra Taylor Well, that's it. I shared with Michael that I personally took time to ride through Alamance County and part of Caswell County to deliver information about a session that was going to be held at one of the churches regarding the exploitation of our children. And it was a very small percentage. Now, with that said, some churches may already be doing something or have already hosted something at their own church, because I'm just not aware of that.
But it was a very small number that attended. And that's disappointing. Darrell Bock It's clearly, it's a matter of prayer. I can tell you that that is not an easy thing to do, as God knows, to get a lot of churches on the same page on any particular issue.
The interesting thing, though, is as things ramp up and the battle becomes more intense, it's interesting. When it starts to get closer to home, people start – Debra Taylor And we'll have a choice. Darrell Bock Yeah, yeah. Thank you so much, Debra. God bless you. I appreciate your call more than you know. Debra Taylor Well, God bless you all as well. And thank you for this information that you're sharing with us today.
And it's a difficult topic for a lot of people. Darrell Bock Oh, I know. I know.
Yeah, it's real close to home, and I understand. Debra Taylor Absolutely. Darrell Bock Okay. Thank you, Debra. Bye-bye. So, unfortunately, those pictures lead to what they call sexploitation, right? Debra Taylor Sextortion. Darrell Bock Sextortion. There you go. I know. So that all those words – Debra Taylor But you just came up with a new term there, so that might be something soon.
Darrell Bock Oh, there you go. Sextortion. Like, oh, my gosh. Whitney, explain that this is unbelievable, what'll happen to some young man or whatever young woman.
Debra Taylor Yeah, so I'll give you a bite-sized look at that. And so what that looks like is a little Johnny's 14 on Instagram and a 16-year-old, you know, Nancy, Sarah, whatever you want to call her, sends a message to him to be his friend on Instagram, has to follow him, follow back, all the things. And she's beautiful, right? This picture is – this profile picture is a beautiful 16-year-old girl. And remember, little Johnny's 14, 16-year-old girl, stunning, says she lives in the same state as him, maybe the same county, invites him to be his friend.
Of course, of course he's going to say yes. And so proceeds a conversation. And unfortunately, that conversation leads to her asking something as simple as, if you send me one, I'll send you one.
Right? And remember, we just discussed how these things are normalized already in our society for our children. So it's not like a moment, it's more of a, okay, Johnny's 14, she's a pretty 16-year-old girl, what's Johnny gonna do? And unfortunately, we're seeing more and more often that Johnny sends the picture. And now this lovely 16-year-old girl is not a lovely 16-year-old girl.
It is a 30-year-old male in another place. And sextortion begins where she then begins, he then begins to tell little Johnny, if you do not send me $250 via Cash App, Venmo, you name the platform, then I'm going to share these photos with everyone. Well, you may ask how in the world is that are they going to share this with everyone? They don't even know this kid. Well, they became friends on social media. So now that person has access to everyone that likes Johnny's photos, everyone that's on Johnny's friends list, all because they are now connected as friends. And this person has every willingness and desire to send this photo out and sextort them if they do not pay them. Why? They have nothing to lose.
Right? And so now little Johnny's photos have made it out. And the the harshness of it, the reality of it is our children aren't equipped to handle that type of shame and embarrassment. And unfortunately, what we have seen is an uptick in teen suicides, especially targeted towards boys.
Because of that shame, right? The people on the other side of this, these conversations that are pursuing are relentless. I mean, they are telling our children, well, you might as well end your life if you're not going to, if you're not going to do anything about it. And they're, they're pushing, right?
They're pushing, they're pushing because they're hoping to get some kind of monetary gain out of this situation. But for Johnny on the other side, this is the darkest moment of his little life. And he's not running to tell mom and dad because would you at 14? At 14 is the first thing you're going to go run and tell mom is, hey, mom, by the way, I sent a not good picture. And I need help, right?
Not not many, unfortunately. Yeah, they're saying they want this money. And even worse than that, to me, I don't know, you can't get worse than that, maybe.
But anyway, a lot of times, they send the money and they still publish. Yeah, yeah. Because what they care, there's nothing to let's destroy lives while we're, you know, we're at it. Satan is out to actually take out our Yeah, he's out to kill and destroy.
I mean, that's what it that's what it's about. And so when we say exploitation, like it, and you think, well, it's only little girls been picked up by vans, no, no, no, no, no, no, much, much, much, much, much, much, much force on this. And unfortunately, I think we keep that mindset of it's our children are going to be kidnapped and run away with and, you know, that's not how the enemy has to work anymore.
So the game is shifted, unfortunately. And because we have been disengaged parents, we're not we're not seeing it. We're not understanding that our children aren't having to be picked up on the side of the road anymore. We've handed them everything they need and the devices in the palm of their hands. We have handed the keys to our children's bedroom to the general public and said, Come on in, when we've handed them a device.
Right. And, you know, Tammy and I were noticing it the other day, we were in New Jersey, interestingly. And we just looked around in this restaurant, because, you know, we were waiting to get on a plane. And, like, there are two three month old children, obviously, I mean, these children are. And there's a tablet sitting in front of their face in order to try to keep them from crying so that they can have a warm meal, like you say, or whatever.
And so they're groomed, like, unbelievably from the time. And you wait till you hear, we're not done. No, we're not done. But we would love to hear from you. 866-348. What's your question?
What's your experience? 866-348-7884. You're listening to the Truth Network and TruthNetwork.com. Welcome back to Truth Talk Live. Today's show, wow, rescuing the helpless, God's heart for exploited children and trying to get information out there. Again, we are so blessed to have with us Mike Zwick with If Not For God and Whitney Miller with the Invictus Project, InvictusProject.org.
They've got all sorts of resources there. In fact, you can get Whitney to come speak at your church or your youth group. And she was our youth group leader at West Asheville Baptist Church back in the day.
And just an amazing, amazing gift that God has given to the body of Christ here in North Carolina and across the world now. God's given her a microphone to share some of what's going on. But during the break, we actually have Mike in Dayton, Ohio, wants to chime in. But before that, Mike was going to ask a question and Whitney said, hold that thought.
Wait till we can do this on the air. So she wanted to see his unfiltered ex-reaction to her answer. And I know the question that's coming, but go ahead, Mike. Well, here is the question.
And my heart kind of sank before I asked the question, because sometimes you don't want to hear the answer if it's the wrong answer, you know, the answer that you don't want to hear. But was this is I've heard people say, don't put any pictures of your children up on social media. Don't put any videos or anything like that.
And Whitney, what are your thoughts on it? Well, I'm going to share with you what I have done. Okay. My thoughts are it's a we have gotten accustomed to living our life out loud behind a screen. And unfortunately, we have lost a lot in that both quality of life with our family and our children sometimes too busy taking the pictures. Right. But even more concerning is the fact that, you know, technology advances quickly.
And with A.I. capabilities, all it takes is someone snagging that photo. And there is there are platforms now that they can take any photo, put that photo in there, and it declothes the individual in that photo. And so you can imagine, as we're discussing terabytes of videos and pictures, how easily it would be for someone to take those pictures and videos of our children, our sweet, innocent babies, and and do that to them.
And now they become in the hands of people that are not good intent with good intention. So my my encouragement to you on that would be, is it worth it? And also, Mike, just, you know, just telling you, since, you know, God's given you the courage to step up and talk about these kind of things. How fun.
Since you now targeted put a big old target on your back. How how wonderful. Great. Well, I'm just saying, right, that. Well, I'll take Mike's kids and let me show you what I can do, because it can.
And the next thing you know, you got something. And again, you know, it's our job. God gave it to us to protect our kids, our grandkids. And I hope you stepped up all the grandparents games, Whitney. You know, because it is it is hard to say, hey, you know, when you come to Grandma's, we're gonna have a great time, but we don't have screens.
And, you know, we don't we don't do tablets or whatever it is that that because, you know, one of the other things that you mentioned in the show we did this morning, Whitney, that was quite disturbing is you had a friend that had a special needs, a nonverbal wasn't it daughter. And she was watching something that normally is a very innocent show. It was it was a it was bluey. It's a child's cartoon. And to be honest, it's a cartoon that is fairly reasonable.
It's got good family dynamics, decent values. But unfortunately, she was watching the show on kids YouTube and and the words from the tablet, right, because she made her turn it up to make sure she could hear what was going on. She was doing all the check pluses of a parent that is giving their child, you know, time on a screen. And so everything she's hearing sounds like a normal show. But as she walks over there to her daughter, she sees that there is sexual activity between the characters in the show during a regular recording of the show. And so it had been manipulated and put on kids YouTube, Right. So here they took the AI again and said, hey, make this happen. Wouldn't this be whatever. And again, desensitizing and and entrapping, you know, just totally innocent. No doubt there's a millstone headed their way.
But, you know, let's wake up. We got Mike is in Dayton, Ohio. You got the story about your grandson, Mike. Yeah, my step. Yeah, my step grandson. And this is close to home.
It's not, you know, this is not far fetched if people are listening. I'm a grant. I'm 60 years old. And this is my step grandson. And my son calls me up and says, Dad, you wouldn't believe what happened. And I said, What happened? And then he said, Well, Kayden, which is, you know, I was really hesitant to do all this online right now.
And but I'm a little bit nervous about it. But Kayden was, it was online and he was sexting, I guess that's what you call it. And the and it was an undercover cop or a sheriff. And they were patrolling the internet and they caught Kayden sending an inappropriate photos to this cop and then the cop, the police officer, you know, came to the parents and, and said, Hey, this is what's going on. And my my son just this kind of called me up right away. And he lost it. I mean, he, he was crying about it. And I said, Michael, there's nothing you did wrong.
It's just one of those evil things that's out there, you know, and, and, well, the police officer really helped them and me as well, how to make sure that there's parent controls on all the all the devices. He came through and he showed them how to do all that. And, and, and Kayden's a great young man right now. And this was about a year ago. And, and then they're watching him like a hawk. I know it's kind of invasive, but how old was Kayden at the time of the incident? He was about 13. Yeah, yeah. And, and he was, you know, this, you know, it's just it's really hard to believe that this could happen to you, or happen to your grandkids or grand step grandkids. And that's not unusual that right, Whitney?
No. And Mike, I'm so glad that you took a minute to call in and say that because you know what, so it was really hard. Oh, I have no look, I have no doubt because there's an element of, of what the enemy wants us to receive as shame.
But really, what you did is you just woke somebody else up that's listening into this. Because it's that reminder that that the enemy is real. And he is not, he is he is not picky on who he takes down.
He just wants to take anyone that that has a lust or love for the Lord down right that that joy for the Lord. My kids and my kids are really my son and my, my daughter in law are really strict person and they really are on top of what's going on. And you know, I mean with with their lives and that's, you know, it's, you know, that's, that's just goes to show you the battle that we're in, Mike, it just, yes, it is. But I'm really since we don't have a lot of time, and you brought up an amazing topic that we haven't really talked about is controls like on media. And can you speak to that a minute? Yeah, so and it's really a two part thing.
Absolutely. There needs to be protective measures on your child's device. If your children have apps that they've downloaded that you are not familiar with, you need to get familiar with them before you allow your child to be on them.
There is a great parent resource on our website that includes ways to set parental controls. But here's what I do not want to happen is sometimes we allow that to be the protector instead of us. And remember, it is flawed, right?
It is set up by the world according to the world's terms, and we know who, who is, you know, well equipped in this world, unfortunately. And so I think that it is so important that we do not excuse engagement in you know, with our children for protective measures. So I just I say that because I see it, I see it all the time. And I'll speak on behalf of teens that I've spoken to, and they're quick to say, Hey, look, the more controlling my parents got the sneakier I got. Right.
And so that engagement piece is vital. Don't just throw the hammer down without discussing it here with your children, and letting them know, Hey, this is why we're doing this. And, and I want to have those open conversations with you. And I want you to feel comfortable coming to me because I know it's not a matter of if you see it, I know it's a matter of when when this occurs. And I'll tell you, with, you know, my own kids and situations like that.
It wasn't, it was really helpful from my perspective to say, Hey, I struggled with this. This is where I crashed and burned. And here's where I don't want you to crash and burn because I did this stuff. Right. And to admit your frailties and where you're broken and all those kind of things when you agree that that, you know, he was strong that I'm not the hero of this story.
It's Jesus. And our kids need to hear that. So often we come into a parent role where we are, we want them to see perfection in us, but they need to see that we are not perfect.
But we know who is right. And that's what gave us that righteousness, that ability to step into that place. But our kids need to see us real and unfiltered because they're viewing the rest of the world through a filter as it is. They need to know when they come home, there's real unfiltered love there. Right.
And when they know that dad crashed and burned, it's easier for them to say, Hey, I'm struggling here and not feel as judged because, you know, obviously who, and what you're talking about is shame on a level that we really like, I don't think we could even scratch the surface of the shame that's out there on this particular subject. And where it harms is, is in our intimacy, which screens tear down intimacy to begin with because it's all artificial. Yes.
Oh, you're, you are so on it right there, Robbie. I look, I've spent a lot of time on that particular topic especially. Um, and, and you're absolutely right.
It has destroyed intimacy, even between a husband and wife, how many husbands and wives lay in bed scrolling at the end of the night instead of talking to each other or, you know, I mean spending that, that intimate time with each other, it's occurring across our nation, across our, and it's not, you know what, I don't want this. It's a quick fix. It is. It's a quick fix. It's a, well, it's a quick subdue, right? Like I can, I can just.
Can we call it an idol? 100%. 100%. You know, it just is that it's, it takes the place of, of God, which then, you know, God would put you back into saying, here, I developed this for intimacy. We need intimacy. Good. Good. That's it.
I have a channel for it. Right, right, right, right, right. We're supposed to. And those things, those things saturate and ruin what, what was intended for good, right? That's what the enemy that's, if he can just give you a counterfeit version, that's what he will always do, right?
Close enough to good, but not quite good. Right. That's how Mike, I admire your courage for calling in today, thank you. Thank you. And God bless you. And Hey, Invictus project, Invictus, like just second sound Invictus project, Invictus project.com. Don't forget the, the.org. Now why don't you say com it's org. Blame it on me.
