parents. They are suffering under the cruelty of their parents’ harsh
words. Any instruction is lost to a wounded spirit and deepening
alienation.
(^) “A wise man’s heart guides his mouth, and his lips promote
instruction” (Proverbs 16:23).
(^) In all your interaction, your focus is to see your teenagers find
comfort and strength in knowing God.
(^) Teenagers experience frequent failure. As Christian parents, you
must become adept at taking your child to the Cross to find
forgiveness and power to live. You do your children great disservice
if you strip away all the excuses for failure and force them to see their
sin as it is, without giving them well-worn paths to the Cross. No
wonder Christian teens often have such a poor self-concept! They
have been taught to see through all their false mechanisms for dealing
with guilt, but have not been taught adequately where to go with it.
(^) Even your times of warning must have a positive thrust. You have
a good pattern in the book of Hebrews. In Hebrews 6, after giving
very straightforward warning, the writer adds these words: “Even
though we speak like this, dear friends, we are confident of better
things in your case ....” (Hebrews 6:19).
Developing an Adult Relationship
(^) A good metaphor for the parent and teenage child relationship is
the relationship adults would have with one another. There are several
elements to an adult relationship that parallel your relationship with
your teen. This does not signal the child’s moving out from under
parental oversight; rather, it marks the parent’s sensitivity to the
child’s ascent into adulthood.
(^) Think of your relationship to your child in these terms. In your
nurturing relationships with adult friends, how would you try to
pursue that friendship? What are some of the “dos” and “don’ts” of
adult relationship?