This Week in Faith 10-31-19

Beware of Friendship Idealism

Friendship is one of the issues that comes up over and over again as I talk to my kids and our students. There is so much about friendship that is hard to navigate. The Biblical idea of friendship does not come naturally to us. And yet we often idealize the way we want friends to treat us at the expense of focus on the type of friend the gospel makes possible for us to be. So much of what I try to express to my kids, and our students, about this is covered in this article. Friendship can be a source of joy for our kids but also a source of heartache so we want to walk with them as they experience these ups and downs so we can help them learn, not just assume they’ll figure it out on their own. Depending on their age, maybe read this article with them, see what they notice, and how this compares to the definition of friendship they have built up in their minds.

Click here to read the article by Christine Hoover.

What Jesus Says About Sexuality in a #MeToo Age

We live in the midst of a culture saturated by sexuality. Much of it reveals the brokenness of our world around these issues. We can see the pain that can be caused and the lines that can be blurred. As we help our kids develop a Biblical framework for sexuality, we want them to see the goodness of what God has created and the ways he gives us to experience it, but also to see that the Proverb is true, “There is a way that seems right to a man, and this way leads to death.”

The discussion in this article around lust is a helpful one for our kids to grow to understand. The idea that we take every thought captive because even in our lustful thoughts about others, we damage the image of God in them.

Click here to read the article by Sam Alberry.

The New Testament Teaches Us Not to Second-Guess Surprising Conversions

Here is another article in response to all of the talk about the conversion of Kanye West. This article looks less at Kanye specifically and more at the responses we see in the book of Acts to surprising and celebrity conversions.

Click here to read the article by Patrick Schreiner.

VIDEO: Halloween: Trick or Treat

No matter what your family’s stance on Halloween is, this video is a creative way to help engage them in a discussion around it, and the hope that we find in Jesus, who is the light that shines into the darkness of the world around us.

Click here to watch the video with Glen Scrivener.

This Week in Faith 10-25-19

Kanye West, Justin Bieber, and What to Make of Celebrity Conversions

Today, Kanye West released a new album that is full of songs that reflect the newfound faith in Jesus that he recently began talking about. How should we respond to this? How should we help our kids process it?

The truth is it’s hard for us to know exactly how to respond when we hear the news of a celebrity’s belief in Jesus. Like the article says, we either hold them up as an example too quickly, assuming their celebrity status gives them faith maturity. Or, we become cynical quickly, doubting their genuineness and trying to figure out what the catch is. Either way, it’s important for us to know how to think about these moments because it’s important for us to help our kids process them. We want our kids’ faith to be rooted in something that is lasting, Jesus himself, and not just in the fact that someone their friends think is cool says they have similar beliefs. 

It’s natural for kids to want to find role models for their faith in the celebrity arena- athletes, musicians, movie stars. It can help them believe that their faith is relevant to their lives. But there’s a tendency in American Christianity to have an unhealthy relationship with celebrities who claim faith in Jesus because people believe their faith is finally justified since popular and successful people have accepted it. This is a thoughtful article that helps us find the middle ground for a healthy response to these reports.

Click here to read the article by Trevin Wax.

Raising Children In the Word: 3 Things to Remember, 5 Things to Do

The author here is quick to point out that there are no silver bullets for parenting. So he’s sure this article doesn’t provide one. But the article does give us some basic things to be remind of and some important things to consider as we walk through parenting. My favorite one is the last one- Enjoy It! It we really believe that “the chief end of man is to glorify God and ENJOY him forever” our kids should be able to see the daily joy we find in following Jesus and should see a smile on our face as we talk about the good things he has done for us.

Click here to read the article by Carl Laferton.

Some Social Media Suggestions

If you ask my kids, they would probably tell you that I hate technology and social media but that’s not really the case. I think there are some great uses for it and some ways in which God can redeem these platforms to produce really good things in our lives, and in the lives of those around us. But I do talk to my kids a lot about the dangers of it because I know that, if unchecked, these things can form unhealthy habits in our lives that cause us to do things we would never do, had we thought through all the repercussions of our choices. I’m aware of plenty of mistakes that I’ve made over the years, too. Here are two articles that help us think through how to use these things wisely. Hopefully, they will help you think well about how you scroll and what you post.

Who Says Social Media Can’t Make You Wise?

Click here to read the article by Jen Wilkin.

Two Things to Remember Before You Share About Your Kids Online

Click here to read the article by Jason Thacker.

PODCAST: Ginger Hubbard: Biblical Wisdom For Taming Your Child’s Tongue

The way our kids talk, and the way they talk to each other, feels like the most regular thing we deal with in our house. And to be honest, it’s one of the places I struggle the most myself as well. This is a great interview that covers a number of helpful things including the importance of addressing our kids words instead of just hoping they’ll grow out of it and some practical ideas for getting to the heart of our kids’ complaining, whining, and mean words instead of continuing to be frustrated because just telling them to stop isn’t working. We have had Ginger Hubbard’s Wise Words For Moms on our refrigerator for many years of parenting as an extremely helpful chart of what the Bible says to help us address our kids’ most common struggles. Much of this interview stems from a new book she has written.

Click here to listen to the interview by Chap Bettis.

This Week in Faith 10-17-19

Fall Festival THIS Sunday!- I hope you are planning to join us this Sunday from 5-7PM at the church for our biggest event of the year. We are really excited and can’t wait to see you there. And there’s still time to invite a friend or neighbor and their family. Stop right now and take a minute to pray about who you might ask and bring with you to this great event so they can enjoy a great afternoon with their family while they get to know our church family, as well.

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How to Pray When You’re Fighting With Your Spouse

One of the best gifts we can give our kids is a strong marriage. But, like parenting, marriage isn’t easy. It is the joining of two sinful people into one home where their sinfulness is often turned towards each other. The gospel reminds us that we are both more sinful than we thought and at the same time, more loved than we could imagine. And it’s this undeserved mercy and grace form God that gives us the ability to offer undeserved mercy and grace to our spouse, especially in the midst of the most painful and challenging moments. Paul Tripp uses the Lord’s Prayer to help teach us to pray for our marriages. I want to be more dependent on prayer in my marriage and my hope is that this will help.

Click here to read the article by Paul David Tripp.

Surprisingly Useful Advice on Friendship

As my kids get older, friendship seems to be the root of their biggest joys and greatest heartaches. It is really hard to find the balance of wanting to help your kids learn how to navigate the challenges of relationships but not just stepping in to rescue them when they are going through painful seasons. I want my kids to be good friends, have good friends, and be quick to welcome new people as friends. But I also know their ability to do all of that begins with deepening their friendship with God. This article is a good reminder for us about what’s most important for thriving friendships. It might be a good place to start with your next conversation with your child in the midst of their friendship crisis.

Click here to read the article by Laura Denny.

Teens Find Circumventing Apple’s Parental Controls Is Child’s Play

Helping our kids use technology to the glory of God includes making the most of practical safeguards available to us and leading our kids to Jesus so he trains their hearts to want to honor him. This article is a reminder that the best security measures we can take can’t prevent our kids’ sinful hearts from finding what their heart wants most. Now, this doesn’t mean that we don’t make wise parenting decisions about technology with our kids and use everything available to us to help. But it also means that we don’t settle for just that. We pray for them. We talk to them. We point them to the gospel so they understand the sweetness of obedience and the forgiveness of the cross that motivates them to repent when they’ve messed up. This article isn’t to discourage you but to remind you that there are no substitutes for active engagement with our kids.

Click here to rad the article by Reed Albergotti.

Why Teens Must Read the Bible For Themselves

This is something that we want to begin building in our kids from an early age. The goal of reading the Bible with our kids is to get them to the point where they can read the Bible without us. Kids owning their faith is fueled by them being able to practice the means of grace on their own. It’s what we are trying to help them do in student ministry and hopefully this two and half minute video will help encourage you to focus on the same in your house.

Click here to watch the video with Lindsey Carlson.

This Week in Faith 10-11-19

Great Questions Lead to Great Conversations

If there is one thing I would love to have more of it’s great conversations with my kids. So I am always on the lookout for good questions that could lead to great conversations with my kids. I want to encourage them and hear what’s going on in their lives, but often my conversations with them devolve into me talking [and probably talking too much about what they’ve done wrong]. This is a short article with a couple of questions to think about, some of which could be a really good place to start for the few minutes we have in the car with our kids, or sitting across the table from them in a restaurant, or even in those last minutes before they head off to bed.

Click here to read the article by Rick Warren.

Why Don’t We Invite Input?

There are two articles here, an original and a response to the original, on a really good topic. As parents, why don’t we ask for more input from older parents that have successfully raised kids into adulthood? The articles talk about the tendency of parents to seek out the wisdom and practice of younger parents online who have a large following of their blog, than older parents in their church who have actually raised kids and done a good job. We also don’t ask because we’re afraid to admit that we don’t know and need help. It’s an insightful conversation so I’d encourage you to read the top article first and then the second one. The principle that the second article talks about also applies to our faith in general and the way our kids go about finding the answers they are looking for these days. But that’s probably a bigger conversation for another post.

Our hope is that Faith will be a place where younger parents are eager to ask and listen to the wisdom of older parents in our church and older parents are ready to offer wisdom with grace to younger parents. We want to do a good job of this so I’d love to hear any thoughts you have on how we can do a better job of fostering this in our church.

Click here to read  Why Don’t We Invite Input by Chap Bettis.

Click here to read Two Habits of Successful Parents by Tim Challies.

When Your Child Looks at Porn

“It is more realistic to plan how you will respond when exposure to porn occurs than to try to prevent porn from slipping through the inevitable cracks in whatever protection system you devise.”

Because this is the case, this article has some helpful ideas for how to approach this with our kids when the day comes. There is a way that we can go about discipling and confronting our kids on these issues that can make it more about making them feel more guilty for what they’ve done or us feeling less guilty for it happening on our watch that we forget to offer the gospel to our kids and rest in it ourselves.

I have some great resources in my office as well, if you would like to check them out or talk about the issue of pornography more.

Click here to read the article by David White.

How We Helped Our Kids Transition to “Big” Church

Even though this may happen at different stages for all of our kids but it is the goal. Our job as parents is to train and equip our kids to know and worship god for themselves. So helping them learn how to worship and get the most of being with their church family on Sunday morning is vital. In the article, she offers a number of ideas for how to help your young kids transition to participating in a full worship service. While we offer children’s church to help in that process, you know your kids best and know when it will be best to do this with them. You don’t have to agree with everything she says here but I think a lot of the principles behind what she talks about are important: starting to prepare on Saturday for Sunday morning, setting clear expectations for your kids and talking about them ahead of time, and things like that. I would also encourage you, like the articles above suggest, that you talk to older parents who have successfully brought their kids through that stage to get advice and encouragement from them.

Click here to read the article by Nicole Lino.

This Week in Faith 10-3-19

Parenting According to the Needs of Your Family

The older our kids get, the more we are learning how different they are. And these differences mean we are having to learn how to parent each of our kids a little differently. The challenge for me is that my kids often need me to respond in ways that do not come naturally. And in lots of situations, the outcome is very different from what I would have chosen. She says in the article, “Sometimes what we fear is settling for less is really God’s better plan. We need to be willing to let go of our plan and trust God to provide what is best.” Learning to trust God in my parenting regularly looks like letting go of my own expectations and parenting out of my weaknesses instead of my strengths. But that’s not really a bad thing for me or my kids if it means that Jesus is more in the center of our home than I am.

Click here to read the article by Julie Lowe.

The New Indie Film That Might Make You Worship

The Peanut Butter Falcon is one of my favorite movies of the year. I have told lots of people about it and I took Emily with me when I saw it a second time because I wanted her to see it too.  I’m just glad someone wrote an article about it so I could mention it here too :) The story, the characters, the music, and the cinematography all work together to give you a good feeling while your watching and as you leave, even as it deals with some tough issues. One of the main characters has Down Syndrome and is played by Zack Gottsagen who has Down Syndrome. He does a great job. But it also shows the power of finding someone who really believes in you. This is a great review on the theme of family in the movie, the beauty of the movie, and how we need more movies like it. The Peanut Butter Falcon is currently playing at University 16.

Click here to read the article by Brett McCracken.

5 Ways to Ensure Our lives Aren’t Strangled By Screens

It’s always good to be reminded about the good and the dangers of our technology. I feel like I swing back and forth all the time between “technology is evil :)” and not being able to put my phone down, but struggle to find that healthy balance. Usually it’s not because I don’t know the facts about all of this but because I need constant reminders of what’s true and good to help form better habits. I want this for my kids as well. Here are some good reminders that can help us form good habits so we can help our kids do the same.

Click here to read the article by Kevin DeYoung.

PODCAST: Ask Alice: A Conversation with Dr. Stacey Gilbert on Teenagers Struggling with Anxiety and Depression

So many of our kids are struggling with anxiety and depression. It can be hard to know how to respond. It can also be a challenge to figure out how the gospel hope we offer our kids fits together with things like counseling, medication, and other help that is available. I hope this helps.

Click here to listen to this Rooted Podcast Episode.