During my teen years I began to spread my wings.
Teens today haven't changed that much.
Well my wings were being spread, I ended up flying into some trouble.
(I know it's hard to believe:)
The teens I am raising are too, spreading their wings and swooping around trying to figure out who they are and where they fit in this world. In the middle of it all, they have to found trouble and I am sure they may find it again. One thing that we have going for us is that, the Almighty, can see in the places us parents can't.
My teen tip for today is to cover them in prayer. They are on a battle field daily.
I had a dear friend share with me something that her teen had done and she is terribly heartbroken over. As she shared with me it reminded me of a prayer I had not prayed in awhile.
Lord, I pray if they are being drawn to trouble or are in trouble, that they would get CAUGHT!
My kids use to complain, "Don't pray for that. It's not very nice or fair."
I would just laugh, and say, "Well, if you are walking upright, then you don't have a thing to worry about."
As, I listened to my friend and felt ache with her over this matter, I said, "At least it has come to light. Now we can deal with it." If it would have stayed hidden, then we would have went on with life as if everything was just swell. Now that it is out we can begin dealing with the consequences from it. Better to do that under the care of loving parents. They are still in training. When they are little and do something wrong we just deal with it, but it seems, as teens, we think more about what we must have done wrong in our previous parenting, as if we are all finished. Here is some news, just because they get/got into trouble, it doesn't mean were terrible parents, its just more opportunity to train them. If we get to caught up on what we have or haven't done then we may miss out on the bigger picture. These are the times where we get the opportunity to talk about mercy and grace that we have been given in Christ. These are the times when the consequences are a bit bigger then when they were small, but not quite what they will be as adults. They may not need us as they use to when they were small, but they still do need us. They need our coaching and guidance. We forget sometimes that this is still our job, because they are beginning to act like grown-ups and look like them to. We are still the parents and our jobs aren't finished yet.
Prayer, what a gift. Cover your teens in it!
Praying they'll get caught,
Connie
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