Romans 7:19-25
Introduction
The Apostle Paul describes his wrestling match with his own depravity. Sin kept Paul from doing the good he wanted to do to please his Heavenly Father. The more he sinned, the more fear controlled his life, the fear of separation from God. Paul knew that there was nothing he could do on his own that could save him. Only his Heavenly Father, in merciful discipline, could forgive and restore Paul to a right relationship.
Thesis: Teenagers wrestle with their own depravity.
Observe the progression in a child from infancy to adolescence. From fear of slogs of slime through fear of others, then fear of others’ opinions, and fear of personal success, now comes the ultimate fear: the child’s fear of himself. A lot of life-changes herald that fear. Hormones, both growth and sexual, change the body and the thoughts. The emotions change, wildly swinging side to side on their way to adulthood.
Youth this age joke a lot about how nerdy their parents are, and how far behind the times their parents are. But beneath this veneer of joking lies fear.
Teenagers fear growing up.
A. Fear they won’t make it to adulthood.
The magnify the importance of everything. Life and death hangs in the balance with basketball games, final exams, dates, cheerleader tryouts, and arguments with mom and dad.
B. Fear the consequences of their own choices.
The desperately want to be independent, but without the consequences. So parents are a mixed blessing. They bail you out when you get into trouble, but parents also make the big decisions for you. And teenagers often resent those decisions, while at the same time they are thankful they didn’t have to make the choices themselves.
C. Fear the rapid changes in their lives.
Physical growth, sexual maturity, and acne. They fear they are weird.
D. Fears are compounded exponentially.
16 year old Anne had been going with David for a whole year (stress). They had a fight (stress), about sex (stress), and now it looks like they may break up (stress), but she isn’t sure (stress), and the situation was left unresolved (stress).
Because of this fight, she couldn’t concentrate when she was studying for her American history exam (stress, stress). So she got a D (stress). The test paper is now in her purse, and has to be signed by her parents (stress)–who expected her to be a B student (stress).
She asked her friends (stress) what to do about David. Her friends, Alice and Bridgette, gave her conflicting advice (stress).
All of this stress had made her skin oily (stress). And she now has an enormous zit (stress), right between her eyes (stress). Cheerleader tryouts are next week (stress), and she’s getting her period (stress).
E. Fear responsibility of premature adulthood.
Jobs, sibling care, too much to do, college and career worries, and information overload.
F. Fearful of everything.
Worst of all, they do not have good coping skills.
Parents fear giving up.
A rigid system controls an emergent adolescent like a picket fence controls an angry bull. The more they try, the more parents find themselves out of control and alienated. By trying to keep a lid on everything about this budding teen, they sabotage any chance of a healthy relationship. Growth is inevitable. It’s programmed into the child. And yet, parents may be tempted to sacrifice growth for rules.
A. Letting Go
- Researchers in Richardson, TX, asked youth: “What would you like parents to know about your opinion of rules and limits?” Their response was: “We would like them to understand that at our age, we need parents who let us go and at the same time watch us carefully.”
- Frank Minirth: “You cannot control what your child says, her attitude, or what he does when you’re not around. But you can control the consequences of behavior. When you try to control what you cannot control, you reinforce, in a funny way, their fears of growing up. By trying to control what you cannot control, you’re saying in effect, ‘I don’t trust you to mature; I don’t trust your control of yourself.’ Youth have to face who they are, which means they have to feel they are in control of what they do and say.”
B. Monitor surreptiously
This does not mean protecting the child from failure, consequences of wrong decision. Youth broke a garage door glasses, father made him confront owners and borrowed money from dad, bought new glasses and father and son replaced all 37 windows.
C. Allow other adult journey mates
Discipline gives guidance for growing up.
A. Definition of discipline = to teach, to give knowledge; not to control.
Carl’s grades fell and his parents hit the ceiling. No TV, no dates, no ball games, no extracurricular activities, no phone, no fun til the end of the century!
The result was an explosion that could have leveled an entire city. Fights, accusations, recriminations, screaming matches shot through the household. Then they came to me to be a referee more than a pastor.
After a lot of talking, Carl admitted he understood his parents’ concern about his grades. His parents also said they understood Carl’s feelings about the severe controls they placed on him.
I asked, “Carl, how can your parents help you bring your grades up?”
His answer: put controls on his extracurricular activities, help him budget his time, remind him of schedules–all more reasonable versions of the restrictions his parents had imposed.
The difference? Mom and Dad had been trying to control him. Now they were teaching Carl how to discipline himself. Relationships are built on discipline, not control.
B. Don’t Major on the Minors
- Majors: health & safety; teenagers’ involvement in Christian activities; and teenagers’ actions on others.
- Minors: teenagers’ room, clothing, hair, makeup, jewelry, money.
C. Discipline’s Do’s
- Set rules and consequences early.
- Be fair. Keep your word. Do what you said you’d do–no more, no less.
- Teach with discipline. Teen comes home 15 minutes after curfew. First, listen to his story. It may have been due to something beyond his control. If it was, point out how he could have avoided the situation in the first place. This teaches him how and why to take responsibility. But if it was willful disobedience, exert the full penalty.
- Learn to compromise.
- Be willing to watch and wait. You know they’re headed for trouble. You want to take control and stop them. Sometimes it is better to let them make a mistake, be held accountable for the consequence, and learn from you how not to get into that kind of situation again.
- Worship together.