Mark preached to us from Mark 8:22-9:13 yesterday about “The Divine Necessity.” The cross is a divine necessity:

1. The Father requires it: it is the divine plan for the salvation of sinners
2. The Son desires it: Jesus plans to go to the cross to give his life for sinners and redefines the expectations of even those closest to him, like Peter.
3. The disciple (you and me) acquire it. We are each called to take up our own cross and follow the Savior. John Stott explains what this means:

“Self-denial is not denying to ourselves luxuries such as chocolates, cakes, cigarettes and cocktails (though it may include this); it is actually denying or disowning ourselves, renouncing our supposed right to go our own way.” Stott, The Cross of Christ, 279.

Some discussion questions for parents and teens:

• Where is one place in your life where you are struggling to deny/disown/renounce yourself?
• How does Christ’s finished work at the cross position you to make progress? In other words, how does justification help you in sanctification?

Categories: Thursday Thoughts For Parents, five15 blog
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Parents,

Sunday was our second installment of Green Thumb in Parenting. Our topic was discerning the fruit of conversion in our teens and assessing their preparedness for baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Since these topics are sort of like dominoes—the trigger for the Lord’s Supper is baptism, the trigger for baptism is conversion—we spent all our time talking about discerning the fruit of conversion in our kids. Dennis Gunderson explains why it is important to look for more than a mere profession or a simple prayer:

“So it is foolish to conclude that a child is saved merely because he makes the bare acknowledgment that these things are true. Be wise enough, parent, not to assure your child of his eternal safety on such shallow grounds! Love your child enough not to mislead him in ways you would not mislead an adult professing the same things.” Dennis Gundersen, Your Child’s Profession of Faith, 27.

We pointed to five things to look for, five ingredients that—taken together—will give you a better sense of whether your teen is converted:

1. Evidence of trusting and following Christ (does he love Jesus?)
2. Ability to communicate the content of the gospel (does she understand these truths, not just regurgitate them?)
3. Evidence of godly sorry for sin, followed by repentance (remember 2 Corinthians 7:10-11)
4. Ability to examine one’s self and the condition of the soul (does she think she is a Christian?)
5. Faith that has been tested (perhaps through rejecting the world or enduring trial)

Although we didn’t discuss it in the class, I offered these suggestions for thinking about teens and their preparedness for baptism (and thus, the Lord’s Supper):

1. Make the decision with order (baptism before Lord’s Supper)
2. Make the decision with time (slowly)
3. Make the decision with your teen (does he want to be baptized?)
4. Make the decision with others (involve community: pastors and other parents?)

A leader in the ancient church named Tertullian urged Christians to take seriously the import of baptism, and not rush to it:

“If any understand the weighty importance of baptism they will fear its reception more than its delay.”

Remember that we do not have class on Mothers Day. Our third and final class will be Sunday, May 20. We will be talking about discipleship, how to develop a simple plan for imparting essential truth about Scripture, doctrine, and godliness to our teens. As before, we will devote a good chunk of time to Q&A with my panel of experienced parents. If you have questions that you would like them to answer, leave a comment or email me this week. Thanks!

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Parents,

Thanks to all of you who came to the Shepherding Your Child’s Heart seminar on Saturday morning and/or the Green Thumb in Parenting class on Sunday morning! I so respect your love for your kids and your humility in getting help outside yourselves.

In the Green Thumb in Parenting class, we talked about how the metaphor of gardening or farming is useful when we think about parenting. We began this three part series by talking about two introductory steps:

1. Tilling the Soil of Our Children’s Heart: Cultivating Relationship

Here, the point is that God intends to use the relationship teens have with their parents to foster spirital growth in the life of your teen. J.C. Ryle explains:

And all this is one of God’s merciful arrangements. He gives your children a mind that will receive impressions like moist clay. He gives them a disposition at the starting point of life to believe what you tell them, and to take for granted what you advise them, and to trust your word rather than a stranger’s. He gives you, in short, a golden opportunity of doing them good. J.C. Ryle, The Duties of Parents, 7.

We looked at Tedd Tripp’s Authority—Influence Continuum, and how important it is for parents to endeavor to influence teens with godly example and with patient instruction. Practically, this effort is well-served by regular, intentional meetings with your teen. A weekly time with your kid is a good idea, although you have to choose what will work best for your family. These times work best if they are not primarily corrective, and there is plenty of flexibility to address whatever your son or daughter wants to talk about. Two questions that are good to ask every time: “Do you have any questions or observations for me as a dad (or mom)?” and “Is there anything you need to tell me about?”

2. Spreading the Seed of the Gospel: Having Gospel-Centered Conversations

Our teens need the gospel even after salvation. They need to be taught details about God, sin, cross, and faith & repentance. Jerry Bridges explains why this is important:

“Part of the problem is our tendency to give an unbeliever just enough of the gospel to get him or her to pray a prayer to receive Christ. Then we immediately put the gospel on the shelf, so to speak, and go on to the duties of discipleship. As a result, Christians are not instructed in the gospel. And because they do not fully understand the riches and glory of the gospel, they cannot preach it to themselves, or live by it in their daily lives.” Jerry Bridges, The Disciplines of Grace, 46.

Here are five suggestions for making gospel-centered conversations a regular part of your home life:

1. Look for opportunities. Seize them.
2. Walk in personal humility.
3. Orient your kids toward God and His Word.
4. Give affection and encouragement as much as possible.
5. Trust God.

Here’s where I need your help. Session 2 is on Sunday morning (by the way, we’ll be moving to Room 102). We will take the first 15-20 minutes of class to discuss any questions that arose from session 1. Of course you can just show up and ask any question you want, but you’ll get more helpful, more thorough, and more intelligent answers if my panel of experienced parents has a chance to think about it some first. So if you have a question you would like to get answered, leave a comment or email me. These questions will get first priority on Sunday morning.

See you Sunday morning!

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Parents,

The annual spring thaw is a good time to review with your kids the importance of purity and modesty. As the weather heats up, so does the temptation. Spring fashions are annually less modest than the previous year, and our culture is agressively putting forward immodesty and impurity as desirous.

For your sons in particular (and perhaps for your daughter), you should be aware that our dear friends at Covenant Life Church have created a Purity Resources page, compiling into one place many sermons and articles on the topic. I particularly recommend Josh’s 11/03 message on Media, and the recent Purity series. Don’t miss Josh’s You and the Flesh cartoons.

For your daughters, Sovereign Grace Ministries is making CJ’s message, “The Soul of Modesty” available for free until April 6. This message is described like this: “With humility and wisdom, C.J. brings the gospel to bear on this potentially sensitive topic, addressing externals only after addressing the heart.” I recommend reviewing this message at least annually with your daughter, perhaps before any shopping trip. Our culture has so completely jettisoned any semblance of modesty that as parents, we need to constantly fight the tide with biblical truth.

To download this message as an MP3 file, “visit the Sovereign Grace Store and add the message to your shopping cart. During the checkout process, enter the promotional code FREEDOWNLOAD to bypass credit-card payment. (Note: At the Order Preview page, please verify that you are being charged $0.00 for this message before you click on “Place Order.”) After the checkout process completes, you will see instructions for downloading the MP3 file. This code is good for this item only and expires April 6.”

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PARENTS,

I hope the concert Sunday night has prompted renewed discussion about music in your home: it’s place, it’s relative importance, what it looks like to exercise discernment in lyrics and style, and so forth.

This couldn’t be more timely: Bob Kauflin was just interviewed on the New Attitude website. It is outstanding. You’ll notice right away that Bob’s interview is saturated with Scripture. Many young people assume that Scripture doesn’t have much to say about the music they listen to; Bob helps us see that isn’t the case. Consider taking several family dinners in a row to review the verses together and talk about how they influence your musical priorities.

Bob explains why it is so important to keep Scripture central as we think about music:

These Scriptures guide me in how much I listen to music in general, how much I listen to a particular artist or style in particular, how much time I spend looking for new music, etc. Music is a gift from God meant to create fresh affections for God and direct my attention to him. I understand that I’m free to put music in its proper place and enjoy it as a gift from my Creator rather than an idol.

I’m also careful about why I listen to music. Music can exert a powerful influence on our emotions, but I shouldn’t be looking to it as the ultimate object of my emotions. If I expect music to lift my spirits, calm me, make me happy, etc., I might be expecting it to do what the Gospel is supposed to do.

Read the entire interview here, or gain more insight from Bob Kauflin.

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Parents,

Ever wonder what effect the iPod, video games, text messaging, and computer time is having on your son or daughter’s soul? Dr. Al Mohler can help you figure out. A week ago, Dr. Mohler posted on “Media Snacking,” explaining the implications of attention deficit in the digital age:

Several factors have been blamed for the shortened attention spans. Many blame television for the problem, noting that the pace of television programming and the structure of eight-minute segments between commercials trains the mind to expect shorter attention demands.

But, if television shortened the national attention span starting decades ago, the Internet and its massive media expansion seems to be producing an even shorter attention span.

All this may be great for the marketers, but it spells further challenge for educators, parents, and preachers. How will people be able to listen to a serious biblical sermon if their minds are set to pay attention only for a few minutes — or even less?

Parents, how are you combating this tendency towards the brief and trivial in favor of the sustained and substantive? Do your kids read? Do they engage in extended, thoughtful conversation? Biblical truth doesn’t translate easily into bite-size segments. Let’s train our kids to love learning and to be content with the absence of images (reading). This is especially important since the truth of the gospel can’t be communicated visually: it takes words (and lots of them) to clearly and precisely communicate the blazing holiness of God, the radical depravity of sin, and God’s reconciling initiative towards sinful humanity in and through Jesus Christ.

A proposed reading list? I recommend starting with the Bible. Are you kids familiar with the basic storyline? The various genres? Individual books? If you need help with this, check out Mark Dever’s books; Promises Made: The Message of the Old Testament and Promises Kept: The Message of the New Testament. If I can help you develop a reading list beyond the Bible, I would love to.

Categories: Thursday Thoughts For Parents, five15 blog
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Parents, I suspect most of you don’t read the New Attitude blog unless you have a graduating (or graduated) senior is who is considering going to the conference. But you should know that Eric Simmons recently posted two excellent commentaries about correction. Given the amount of correction that tends to go on in the homes of teenagers, I want to encourage you to read these posts and apply them towards kids. Here is a sample:

If you see something you think you should share with a friend that is corrective, start by asking your own heart some questions. You may not be objective in this especially when something has been done against you personally.

These are some questions I have found helpful:

1. Am I sharing my thought with them because I am personally offended or personally irritated?
2. Am I sharing my thought with them out of self-righteous judgment? This is especially applicable to issues of preference and issues of conscience.
3. Am I sharing my thought out of impatience because I am tired of the way it affects me or others?
4. Am I coming with conclusions or questions? (Read Chapter 10 of Charity and its Fruits by Jonathan Edwards if you want to read more about this.)

Here are links to Part 1 and Part 2.

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Parents, we all know that music is a huge deal to this generation of young people. That’s not anything new: for decades, the generational gap has been shown through changes in musical tastes and preferences.

What is new is the amazingly rapid changes in music technology that have enabled a generation of music-lovers to possess a world of music at their fingertips through the internet. Musical formats have changed before: LPs yielded to cassette tapes which yielded to CDs. But the digital revolution is radically changing the rules, making music far cheaper and more portable than ever before.

The ease of copying digital music raises important ethical considerations for the Christian. I so appreciate that Bob Kauflin shares on his blog some Random Thoughts on MP3 Downloads and Copies. He cites a Barna report stating that “only 1 in 10 teenagers think music piracy is morally wrong.” However, as Christians, we’ve been called to a higher standard than simply crying, “Everyone else is doing it!”:

Romans 13:1, Deut. 5:19, and Eph. 4:28 come to mind. While file sharing, copying CD’s for friends, and downloading music illegally is easy and attractive, it’s still wrong, despite our rationalizations…

Parents, is this a conversation you’ve had with your kids? Do you know where your teen is getting his music? What does she think about sharing and copying music? Does his iPod contain illegally obtained music? Do you have a conviction about this? If not, why not? Please read Bob’s comments and talk to your kids about their music.

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Is Our Worship Fun? Is Our Fun Worship?

Parents,
I wouldn’t be surprised if you told me that your kid sometimes complains of being bored at church. “Why can’t it be more fun?”, they might ask. Now you can come prepared to answer the question, Should worship be fun?

Last Friday, Bob Kauflin answered this question by posing a couple other questions of his own: Can our worship be fun? And: Should our fun be worship? He explains:

The fun this world offers is unsatisfying, deceptive, and temporary. Let’s not idolize or fall for it. As Christians, we can enjoy fun activities without believing they’re the root of our joy. The fun, joy, pleasure, and celebration we experience when we worship God is greater than the world will ever know, because the root is knowing we are completely forgiven through the substitutionary sacrifice of Jesus Christ. Our joy is in God himself. We’d be fools to look for it anywhere else.

Read the whole thing here.

Categories: Thursday Thoughts For Parents, five15 blog
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Parents,

We’ve just wrapped up our series of Sunday messages on caregroups. I am sure these messages have helped you become a more effective caregroup member. I think the these messages translate to family life pretty easily: our church is a community that is seeking to please God, so are our families. The statements and ideas we were introduced to over the last four weeks can be easily adapted to family life. Here are some of the main ideas of the last couple messages, modified to apply to family life:

• 1/7, Mark, Gospel-Centered Families. Substitutionary atonement is the heart of the gospel. We must never assume the gospel or relax our grip on the gospel. Families are application factories; every family needs to have a functioning gospel. Come to family dinner ready to share a gospel-related Scripture.
• 1/14, CJ, Application. Grace-motivated obedience is what counts. Families are a strategic means of applying the truth. We need to help each other connect “one bit of Scripture to one bit of life.” Patience is critical in this: we need to remember how far we’ve come and how long it’s taken us. A two word summary of the Christian life: “gospel applied”.
• 1/21, Kenneth, Fellowship. Walking in the light is not sinless fellowship, but it is transformational fellowship. Walking in the light means not waiting for others to come to me wiht observations. We must be humble in this: proud people minimize or defend their sin, and never change. Humble people are suspicious of themselves and ask family members for help. Families cultivate fellowship by creating a culture of love.
  
• 1/28, Mark, Relationships. You were made for relationships… for the purpose of mutual edification.  Family relationships grow through asking good questions.  Are we better at reciting lines from movies than talking about God from Scripture?  Relationships are guaranteed to be messy.  If the gospel is functioning in your family, grace wins!

Parents, please consider reviewing these messages as a family.  At a minimum, please make good use of the questions that were handed out!  They are valuable!

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