Running on Empty

Parents, your teen is incredibly busy.  Teens, YOU are incredibly busy!

Each day is spent moving from one thing to another, from teacher to coach to parent to bed.  While we want to encourage our teens to be active in their school and sports, it comes at the cost of God, church and youth group, which are often placed on the back burner.  Why?  There is no time for them, and quite frankly, there is no immediate feedback from God, church and youth group.  

• In school, your teens receive grades to judge how they are doing.  
• In sports, your teens can be moved to a starting role if they do well.  
• In plays, your teen an be cast in a starring role for their great acting.  
• In church and youth group…..

Well...there isn’t anything.  So we often fall into the mentality of allowing our teens to “catch up” on God later in life or worse “when they are ready”. 

And yet, the separation of church into it’s own category away from school and sports is doing a grave disservice to our teens.  If we don't understand that our relationship with God needs to weave into every area of life, then when its time to “be ready” for church they will simply close that box and never open it up again.

We will be starting a new series at youth group on November 2nd called Running on Empty.  We will talk about how teens today spend their teen years running from one program to the next, at the cost of their relationship with Jesus.  To start thinking about this and to allow your teens time to think about this, ask yourself or your teens these questions honestly:

Do you say the following Never, Sometimes or Always?:

• “There’s just not enough time to do everything.”
• “It’s just a busy season I’m in right now.”
• “Yeah, I know, but THIS is really important!”

If you find yourself answering yes more than no, you and your teen might be over programmed.  As Jesus sits with Mary and Martha in Luke 10, we see the importance of not just being busy, but being able to spend time and develop our relationship with our Creator.  Church, youth group, small groups…all these things help develop our relationship with God.

Teens and parents, think about how busy you are and if you are running on empty.  Where are the opportunities that you can refuel yourself with God’s life giving Spirit?