How and what a person thinks will eventually determine
how he lives. I learned a little saying years ago that has prov-
en to be quite true: “Sow a thought, reap an act. Sow an act,
reap a habit. Sow a habit, reap a character. Sow a character,
reap a destiny!”
In the forward of my book, Kingdom Education, Josh
McDowell wrote: “The ideal way to help our kids not only
reject the postmodern worldview but also embrace deepened
Christian convictions is to align church, home, and school
into a unified whole that arms our children with the truth and
protects them from distortions.”
This is where we need to give major attention. Parents,
pastors, church leaders, and Christian educators must renew
their minds and be equipped with a biblical worldview if
they are going to have the ability to change the way their
children think and act. We must renew our minds before we
can teach others to do so. What worldview will we pass down
to the next generation?
INFLUENCE TEENS RECEIVE FROM
CHURCH, HOME, MEDIA, AND
SCHOOL
I was scheduled to speak in a session
for the youth leader track at a
one-week training for church leaders
on an important topic: why teenagers
think the way they do. I said to the
attendees, “I realize a lot of leaders in
the Church want to know why teens are
thinking the way they do. Before I can
address this topic properly, I need you
to share with me some important infor-
mation. Would you please tell me how
the average teen in your church thinks.”
Many hands went up as different leaders told me their teens
displayed these characteristics:
other churches challenge his estimate. After they got him to
rule out pizza parties, game nights, etc., the group settled
on between two to four hours of biblical instruction each
week at church. A short time ago, I heard a children’s pastor
share a study that shows the average child attends church for
approximately 1.4 hours per month. For the sake of this arti-
cle, we will stay with the answer of two to four hours these
church leaders gave.
Question 2: How many hours of biblical instruction does
the average teen in your church receive at home each week?
This question led to an interesting discussion. They
were adamant the teens at their churches were not getting
any biblical instruction in their homes. I then asked how
many people in the room had children or teens living at
home with them. The vast majority of them did. So I asked
them if it was true their own children were not receiving
any biblical instruction in their homes. After some more
discussion, the group hesitantly responded that teens in
their churches might be receiving
between one to two hours of bibli-
cal instruction each week at home.
They may be busy taking their chil-
dren to school, ball games, shopping,
dance or music lessons, and a host of
other activities, but not much biblical
training seemed to be going on in the
homes of these churches.
“How and what a
person thinks will
eventually determine
how he lives.”
• Disrespectful to authority
• Materialistic
• Expected immediate gratification
• Conformers to culture
• Selfish
• Possessed a victim mentality
• No accountability
• Sense of entitlement
I then asked these church leaders several more questions:
Question 1: How many hours of biblical instruction does
the average teen receive at your church each week?
The youth pastors started giving me a wide range of
hours. One youth pastor told the group his students received
between eight and ten hours of instruction every week at his
church. It was interesting to watch other youth pastors from
Question 3: How many hours of
influence does the average teen in
your church receive from the media
each week?
There was an immediate reaction
to this question. Everyone agreed the
average teen receives between five to
six hours of influence from the media each day. When asked
how many days per week this is taking place, they were
unanimous in their answer: at least six days every week.
That totaled up to 30-36 hours of influence from the media
each week.
Question 4: How many hours of instruction does the
average teen in your church receive from school each week?
The participants explained how all of their students went
to school, and the average school day was six hours in length.
Since school meets five days each week during the school
year, it meant their teens were receiving approximately 30
hours of instruction each week at school.
I then asked the participants to elaborate more on their
answers to questions three and four. I wanted to hear what
type of influence their teens were receiving from the media
and school. Specifically, I asked how much of this influence
was secular and how much of it was Christian. Notice that I
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