I know from experience, as do most adults when honest, that growing up ain't easy. The struggles of our teens are real and of great consequence. On Friday evening the preacher, Jeremy Pierce, was very real with the audience talking about some of the major issues that we all face today. He shared statistics that were mind-blowing to many of them, and a stark reminder to us adults, presenting a much needed reality check.
During these years they are processing all the things they have been taught against all the messaging that the world would thrust upon them in their music, movies, video games, online content, and the like. Just like us as adults, each has a different individual struggle and those struggles are real and intense. Many of the decisions they make today will have impact them for many years to come and likely will set the course for the rest of their lives. The problem here is that at this point in their lives they are often ill-equipped to make such monumental decisions without significant input from others.
Our job as parents, friends, mentors, and persons of influence is to shape them and prepare them for these decisions. I will paraphrase the writer Andy Andrews by saying that our job isn't to raise great kids (despite what most people would say), but rather to raise our kids to be great adults. That is an important distinction as most would think that great kids are the goal, this would be a great intermediate goal, but it is short-sighted. We MUST prepare them for adulthood by controlling exposure to the issues of the world, not keeping them from everything, but shaping them to make good decisions, to recognize trade-offs, to understand consequences and risk-reward systems, but most importantly to put them on firm ground spiritually.
When we remove God and His ways from the context of their lives they are essentially baseless. The messaging this weekend has been built around a theme of Love Out Loud and trying to identify what that looks like. One of the most powerful demonstrations I have ever seen occurred last night when the minister, Dr. Spencer Furby, taught that scripture (the Word of God) is the script for our lives. He set up a scenario that teens face on a regular basis where a young pairing had been dating for several months and was faced with the opportunity to have some alone time together at home. In this scenario the young man was attempting to talk the young lady into "taking advantage" of this situation and moving to a new level of physical intimacy. The Good Dr. Furby then pointed to scripture as the script for this situation, to craft a response to the effect of:
"My body belongs to God,"
and
"My body belongs to my spouse"
(sorry the actual references escape me this morning)
This scenario was actually played out in front of the roughly 400 teens in attendance and I believe was a seminal moment for several. In a short debriefing with 5 of the boys from our group after returning to the hotel, it was obvious that they were duly impressed with this demonstration. When we craft the right object lessons it is possible to make an impact. This scenario could be tweaked as well to put a more adult spin on it as well, as this type of struggle is not restricted to teens.
We would all do well to get into The Word, as it is the best way to flip the script on society. Learn it, love it, live it, and you will Make Today GREAT, and set a course for smoother sailing ahead. That smoother sailing won't be without some headwinds and rough waters, but will keep you in touch with the Great Captain of our lives who is more than willing to navigate you through the storms, when you cast your cares upon Him.
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