Helping Christian Parents Parent their Teenagers
Parents of teens are almost the most stressed-out individuals on the planet. The parent/child relationship is strained to the breaking point and resembles a battle zone more than a reflection of Christ’s love.
But it doesn’t have to be this way.
While a youth pastor or Sunday School teacher can have a pivotal relationship with a teen, the parent/child relationship is by far the most influential relationship in every kid’s life. If things aren’t right at home you’ll have a hard time trying to disciple a kid in your youth group.
Offer the books I suggest below to the parents. Believe me, they’ll appreciate it. Nothing endears a youth leader to a parent more than someone who is willing to help them with their biggest challenge.
These parenting books were lifesavers for my family -the methods really work.
Parenting with Love & Logic: Teaching Children Responsibility
By Foster Cline, M.D. & Jim Fay / NavPress
When they reach their teens, many kids seem to have no clue about making wise decisions – so they make bad ones. How can you raise mature, responsible kids? Foster Cline and Jim Fay show you how to parent “with love and logic.” Once you learn to establish effective controls without resorting to anger and threats, your kids will learn to deal with the real world by solving their own problems. And you’ll build a rewarding relationship built on love, trust and fun.
Sometimes the best way to help the teens is to help their parents.
Frequently the biggest obstacle for teens in their decision to follow Christ is the distorted view of God they have as a result of poor role modeling from parents. Everyone wonders why most kids abandon the church once they graduate from college. They are not fleeing the church, they are fleeing their parents. Many kids have been abandoned by a parent, usually their dad, through divorce. These kids find it hard to accept a God who, in their minds, has been portrayed by their dads. Sometimes you’ll only be able to reach a kid by fostering some real parenting changes at home.
Parenting Teens With Love and Logic
Parenting with love and logic is a great resource for this. This is the most purchased item thru this website. Parents are desperate. There is also a teen version. This system works. It worked on both my kids. They turned out great. Click on the books below to order. These techniques will also be effective in your youth group or Sunday school class.
Parenting Teens with Love and Logic: Preparing Adolescents for Responsible Adulthood
By Foster Cline & Jim Fay / NavPress
When kids hit their teen years, parenting takes on a whole new dimension. As they struggle toward independence and autonomy, some dicey issues emerge. And the real world you want them to be ready for can make you shudder – kids today face life-and-death decisions long before they’re on their own.
So what do you do? Hover over them so they won’t get hurt? Drill them so they’ll do the right thing? According to Jim Fay and Foster Cline, hovering and drilling won’t prepare teens for the real world. Because they learn responsibility like they learn everything else: through practice.
As a parent, you face no greater challenge – and no greater opportunity – than to guide your children through their teen years toward productive, happy, and responsible adulthood. Parenting Teens with Love and Logic will help you meet that challenge and rejoice in that opportunity.
Click on logo to visit Love & Logic blog.
Angry teenagers are hard to reach.
The protective walls they’ve thrown up are hard to breach. I can’t blame them for being angry. In many cases their parents have divorced, ruining the family with self-centerdness. Churches have let them down and no one seems to be paying any attention. Learning to deal with and diffuse a kids anger is key to reaching them. This book is a great resource to increase your understanding of the problem.
Helping Your Angry Teen: How to Reduce Anger and Build Connection Using Mindfulness and Positive Psychology
Are you at your wits’ end dealing with an angry teen? This important guide offers frustrated parents powerful mindfulness tips to navigate heated moments of interaction with their child, as well as skills based in positive psychology to foster compassion, caring, and lasting connection.
Does your teen get angry easily or act out? You aren’t alone. Parenting a teen is hard enough, but parenting an angry teen is especially difficult. You might feel unable to keep your own cool during disagreements, or even worry that your relationship with your teen is doomed. So, how can you make sure you stay grounded when the drama rises and reestablish a sense of connection?
Written by a psychologist and teen expert, this book offers techniques based in mindfulness, compassion, and positive psychology to help you face the challenges that parenting an angry teen presents. You’ll discover the clinical and psychological underlying conditions that can contribute to teen anger, skills for improving communication, and mindfulness tips for staying calm yourself. In addition, you’ll learn skills for reestablishing a compassionate and connected relationship.
If you’re ready to take control of your own reactions and start reconnecting with your angry teen, this book will help guide the way.
Dealing with Divorce:
I have had groups where almost every kid came from a broken home. The underlying anger, hurt. and mistrust colored every reaction they had to what I did. Understanding the effects of divorce on teens is a crucial skill for today’s youth leader. Helping teens deal with divorce might be something you need to spend time doing before you can move on. The book below, by Youth Specialties, may help. There is also a participants guide.
Dealing with Divorce Leader’s Guide: Finding Direction When Your Parents Split Up
“Sadly, Christian teens are not immune to the effects of divorce. Even among Christian families, the divorce rate is more than 50 percent. The emotions and issues that are brought up after divorce can leave teens feeling lost and confused about their family and their faith.
In this six-week study, you can help students deal with the thoughts and feelings they’re experiencing after a divorce—whether it happened recently or when they were younger. With engaging stories and thought-provoking questions, students will explore issues of anger, guilt, forgiveness, family, and more through a biblical lens, offering them hope and healing.
This leader’s guide will give you the tools to help you lead students through this study—whether you have experienced divorce in your lifetime or not. You’ll find that when you give students the opportunity to open up and examine the feelings involved with divorce, much-needed healing can begin in their lives.”
Curfews:
The results of a recent survey showed that 85% of teens outside after 10:00 PM on a week night would be in the company of others who were drinking and/or doing drugs. In contrast, only 29% of teens outside at 8:00 PM would be in the company of others drinking or doing drugs.
In addition, studies have shown that teens need more sleep than they’re getting. On a school night, for junior high age kids, I suggest a 9:00 PM curfew and 10:00 PM bedtime.
Youth Group Leaders: I strongly suggest that any week night activity you plan ends before 9:00 PM.
Partnering with Parents in Youth Ministry: The Practical Guide to Today’s Family-Based Youth Ministry
By Jim Burns & Mike DeVries / Bethany House
The most powerful force in a young person’s life is his or her family. The importance of this is pointed out in the writing of the Torah in Deuteronomy 6:4-9, where believers are mandated to pass their family legacies to the next generations.
The newest trend in youth ministry today is a very healthy move toward family-based ministry, a mind-set that helps the church act as a support system, while placing discipleship and training back into the hands of family. Partnering with Parents in Youth Ministry will help youth workers understand their unique role in helping families succeed and will give an overview strategy of family-based youth ministry, as well as practical ideas on implementing this awesome ministry in your church.
Devotions:
Parents: Make sure your kids see you pursuing your faith. Have a fixed quiet devotional time for yourself every day. Let them see you pray. Share openly your frailties and how God is growing your faith. Have a family devotional time like reading a passage from your family Bible after dinner each evening. Supply them with devotional material that is appropriate for their age group and encourage (don’t insist or demand) them to have they’re own quiet time. Here is a suggestion for a family devotional.
Dt 6:6 “These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts.
Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home
and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up.”
Life: A Teen Devotional
By Melody Carlson / Revell
Ever wonder what Jesus might say to you if you met him on the street? Chances are his message to you wouldn’t be all that different from what it was two thousand years ago, even though you live in a totally different world. You can discover what he said–and what it means for you–by reading his words preserved in the Bible.
Life offers you 90 short devotions that help you encounter Jesus’ words for yourself. Popular author Melody Carlson unpacks the message that Jesus wanted his followers to understand. Then she shows you how it applies to your life during the highs and lows of school, family life, relationships, and more.
Our goal as parents
is to handle the day to day realities we face with our kids in a way that maintains our intimate relationships and displays the character we want them to develop into as adults.
Our goal as youth leaders
is to foster this environment in our kids lives as best as we are able. We must also be a character witness of the awesome benefits of an intimate relationship with God.
