10 Mistakes People Make with Teenagers (plus 1 bonus)

December 12, 2014 by

Teens Sharing a SongLightning fast read meant to make you think…

10 Mistakes People Make with Teenagers (plus 1 bonus):

1. Beat themselves up over the rebellion of their teen kids and overly take the blame for it (don’t forget God dealt with something similar in Adam and Eve and now with a whole world full of people!). (Genesis 3:1-21)
2. Don’t realize (since they haven’t come to it yet) that oftentimes the teen years can be a literal “Hell” on parents (excuse my “French”).
3. Wonder why their teen has become like an alien (it’s absolutely n-o-r-m-a-l ~ normal ~ that it seems like they’re from another planet).
4. Forget that they were all these things to their parents and then some (when they were teenagers).
5. Think that because their teenager was a “saint” growing up for them that somehow it was because of their “parenting skills” (probably helped, but don’t get all self-righteous about it looking down on others or giving “advice”).
6. Are critical of the Youth Pastor and less than fully supportive overlooking that he (she) is having to deal with a room full of a hundred of them at one time!
7. Overlook how they (teens) are watching you to see if you really live what you say you believe.
8. Think they are the only ones whose kids have gone off the deep end between the ages of 12 and 20 (you are not alone).
9. Don’t realize that as they (teens) see their parents (Mom and Dad) take a stand for Jesus Christ that God will make it so they never forget it. (John 14:26)
10. Give up on that God could ever get a hold of them / wake them up to serve Jesus Christ (never give up, never give up, never give up!). (Proverbs 22:6)

BONUS Forget that admitting when you blow it, saying you’re sorry and asking for forgiveness from teens is probably one of the most important things a parent can ever do.

(Teens Sharing a Song picture file above is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic license: click here.)

You might also be interested in:

Filed Under: 10 mistakes, lightning fast read, teenagers Tagged With: , ,
About Pastor Mike

Pastor Mike is making the most of web technologies to encourage disciples. A self-proclaimed “twitterholic,” one twitter follower describes him as the “jogging, blogging, tweeting Pastor.” Visits to Pastor Mike’s blog (A Heart For God) number in the hundreds of thousands. His video blogs have been viewed over a half a million times.