Shoal Creek ParenTeen - The Power of Hope

There really isn't much worse than being in a state of continual hopelessness. Hopelessness that drags on drains the life, and will to keep pushing on, right out of our souls. I think since our teens are still in the earlier stages of their lives, and since they therefore haven't had as many experiences of having "pushed through" successfully into better better waters, they are more at risk of being captured by hopelessness.

However, according to this recently released study/article, having conversations with hopeless and potentially depressed teens actually CAN have a measurable effect on their ability to believe that people and circumstances CAN change and get better. For example:

Researchers started noticing back in the 1980s that many teens felt that social and personality traits were immutable — that someone who is once a loser is always a loser.

So what if we could convince kids that things can change for the better — would that help mitigate the high rates of depression? Yeager tested that out. The results of his latest study, published Monday in Clinical Psychological Science, suggests that it does.

The study divided 600 ninth-graders into two groups. Half participated in a brief intervention program designed to help them understand that people and circumstances can change. These teenagers were shown several articles, including one about brain plasticity, and another about how neither bullies nor victims of bullying are intrinsically bad.

"We didn't want to say something to teenagers that wasn't believable," Yeager says. "We just wanted to inject some doubt into that problematic world view that people couldn't change."

The students also read advice from older students reassuring them that high school gets better, and they were asked to draw from their own experience and write about how personalities can change.

Nine months later, the researchers checked up on all the students. Among those who didn't participate in the intervention, rates of depression symptoms such as feeling constantly sad and feeling unmotivated rose from 18 percent to 25 percent — about what the researchers expected, Yeager says. The group that participated in this intervention showed no increase in depressive symptoms, even if they said they were bullied.

What I take from this is that we all know how hard it can be to see beyond our current difficult circumstances. We all know hard it can be to be hopeful and willing to persevere when it feels like nothing is going our way. Because our teens haven't yet survived as many battles as we have, they tend to be prey to hopelessness, for they doubt that things really can change for the better.

Our job is to "inject" a sense of hope into their hopelessness by sharing from our own stories how we too once were hopeless (in whatever relatable circumstance we can think of), but how we DID survive, and things DID get better. Sharing our stories of making it through the tough times really CAN make a difference in the life of a teen who may be facing a seemingly hopeless situation.

It's just up to us to open up and get verbal about it!

Shoal Creek Student Family Weekly Update 9/23

Hey Buya and Crash Families, here are all the things to pay attention to for students!

1. Check out Justin Talley's "At Second Glance", a review of the message given this past Sunday in Shoal Creek's Student Ministries. Find it here.

2. Crash Students - Wear Clothes You Can Get Dirty To Small Groups tomorrow night - We're gonna spend some time trying to get the Attic ready for reopening, which means we need to rip up carpet and do some other various stuff. So please wear clothes that you aren't afraid to get dirty in.

3. Crash Sunday Morning Change-Up Coming in Sept! After just seeing what would happen with a combined 6th-12th grade service on Sundays, we've gotten enough feedback to know that the Crash students need their own space on Sundays. Sometime in September this will happen as we will move back into the Attic for a high school only, 11am service. Read more about it here.

At Second Glance - Role Models

A second look at this past week's message from Shoal Creek's Student Ministries...

This past week in Shoal Creek's student ministries we asked the question, "How should a role model help me become the person I need to become?" We tried to answer that question by suggesting that a truly transformational role model will help you become who you need to become in three ways.

1. A transformational role model will invite us into their life. Meaning, they give you access to see who they really are and what they're really all about. They don't show off their strengths only to withhold their weaknesses. By inviting you into their life, what they're really doing is earning your trust. Trust is the relational currency we exchange with someone, and by which we give someone permission to be influential in the shaping of our life. When a role model invites us into their world, and when we enter and determine whether or not their world is something that's attractive to us or not, we in return give them access into the shaping process of our world.

2. A transformational role model will challenge our weaknesses. Just like a chain, we truly are only as strong as our weakest link. We have a tendency to want to only make our strengths stronger in life, and the downfall of that is that it can lead to our weaknesses becoming even more of a fatal error in our lives. Transformational role models will not just pat us on the back and give us hi five's for jobs well done. They'll see the weak spots in our lives and not be satisfied to just ignore them, because they know our weaknesses are keeping us from the lives we can achieve. A good role model will create conflict in our lives, even if we don't want them to, because the best version of ourself is worth fighting for.

3. A transformational role model will see Jesus as their ultimate role model, and will help us understand how to make Jesus our own ultimate role model. We seek out and allow role models to make an impact in our lives mainly because we are aware of our own deficiencies and short comings. As we mature, we become increasingly aware that we are not the finished product of who we want to be. We also come into increased contact with the brokenness of the world, and this increased awareness of brokenness in ourselves and the world lines up a seemingly never ending set of problems that block our way forward. What a truly life-changing and transformational role model will do is help us understand every problem is at its root a spiritual problem. Every obstacle we face, every brokenness we come in contact with, is really spiritual in nature. There isn't a single problem you or I face that doesn't have spiritual implications in our lives. Therefore, what the role model can help us see is that since every problem is really a spiritual problem, only a spiritual answer will do. They will lead us to then see Jesus, his life and his teachings, as the ultimate answer to the problems we face. They can share with us their understanding of what a relationship with Jesus is like, and be a voice to guide us in pursuing our own relationship with Jesus.

If you're someone looking for a role model of this description, then please come by Shoal Creek! We'd love to connect you with someone who will help you understand who Jesus is for you!

Weekend Links

Here's a list of several links, post, articles I came across this past week that could bring some insight into your life--hope you enjoy!

When Joy Is Hard To Come By




"I'm not a student first."---Say what? Here's a blog post and video recommended by Haley Seba that proposes that before we see ourselves as students, we should see ourselves as Christ's.

4 Things Every World Changer Does

"Needless to say, there is a great need for social justice and activism in today's world. But what can one little person do to make a difference?"

Tweet of the Week

The cross is the place where the Judge takes the Judgement.
— Timothy Keller (@timkellernyc) September 9, 2014

Shoal Creek ParenTeen - Cell Phones...It's Ok To Say...

Cell phone rules can be a way sticky subject in families. It's hard to know what lines we are justified in drawing for our teens. We don't want to be unjust, but there are serious, sometimes life-altering, consequences that can stem from poor choices we make with our cell phones. 

Here's a real "contract" that a family used with their teenager. Maybe use this as a reference point in deciding what could work for your own family if you're having trouble coming up with a usable model.

Dan and Denise’s fourteen-year-old son has two cell phone contracts: one with his cell phone carrier and one with them. In order to clarify their family’s cell phone expectations and protocol, Dan and Denise printed the following guidelines and had their son sign them and post them in his room.

1 - It is our phone. We bought it. We pay for it. We are loaning it to you. Aren’t we great?

2 - We will always know the password.

3 - If it rings, answer it. Say hello and use good manners. Never ignore a phone call if the screen reads, “Mom” or “Dad.”

4 - Hand the phone to one of your parents before bed every night.

5 - If it falls into the toilet, smashes on the ground, or vanishes into thin air, you are responsible for the replacement costs or repairs.

6 - Put it away in public (for example, in church, in restaurants, in movie theaters, wherever you are with other people). You are not rude; do not allow your phone to change that.

7 - Do not use your phone to lie to, fool, or deceive another human being. Do not involve yourself in conversations that are hurtful to others. Be a good friend first.

8 - Do not text, email, or say anything through this device you would not say in person.

9 - No porn. Nothing you wouldn’t want your mother to see.

10 - Do not send or receive pictures of your private parts or anyone else’s private parts. Don’t laugh. Despite your intelligence, someday you might be tempted to do this. It is risky and could ruin your life.

11 - Take pictures, but don’t forget to live your experiences. Keep your eyes up. See the world happening around you. Stare out a window. Listen to the birds. Take a walk.

12 - Leave your phone home sometimes and be okay with that decision. Learn to live without it.

13 - Download music that is new or classic or different from what your peers listen to. Your generation has access to music like never before in history. Take advantage of that gift. Expand your horizons.

14 - Play a game with words or puzzles or brainteasers every now and then.

15 - You will mess up. We will take away your phone. We will sit down and talk about it. We will start over again. We will always be learning. We are on your team. We are in this together. 

(original article here)

Shoal Creek Student Family Weekly Update 9/16

Hey Buya and Crash Families, here are all the things to pay attention to for students!

1. Check out Justin Talley's "At Second Glance", a review of the message given this past Sunday in Shoal Creek's Student Ministries. Find it here.

2. Crash Sunday Morning Change-Up Coming in Sept! After just seeing what would happen with a combined 6th-12th grade service on Sundays, we've gotten enough feedback to know that the Crash students need their own space on Sundays. Sometime in September this will happen as we will move back into the Attic for a high school only, 11am service. Read more about it here.

3. Don't forget about Communion tomorrow night, from 6:30-8pm in the SC Auditorium! An amazing time of spiritual connection through reflection on God's truths.

At Second Glance - The Boundaries We Need

A second look at this past week's message from Shoal Creek's Student Ministries...

This past Sunday at Shoal Creek, we asked the question, "Why do we need boundaries?" We tried to answer it by saying that without boundaries, we will run into things that will hurt us. And I think that for the most part, as kind of a general rule, we agree with that. There are good reasons behind the planning and setting of rules and boundaries that I must observe when I get in my car and onto the highway. Mainly, that my life and the lives of others be preserved through my (and hopefully) their adherence to the boundaries MDOT sets before us.

So as a general rule, when we can connect the dots between prescribed boundaries and our safety, we find it easy to live in concordance with rules and boundaries. The problem, the rub, comes when we doubt that a certain boundary is indeed "for our own good." When aiming this conversation at the spiritual, we are really asking deep in our hearts, "Is God good? Is God for me, or against me, or at least unconcerned with me at all?"

To get right to it, this whole argument comes down to TRUST. We are either people who trust God (and therefore are more readily compliant with the boundaries He sets), or we are people who struggle to trust in a God (and are therefore less readily compliant to what He may be asking).

To grow in trust with God, we must pursue God as a community while going through the trials and doubts that we face daily. Community, being together with others seeking the same goal (in this case, the goal being to grow closer to God), is vital to personal growth. It is so extremely tantamount to real, personal connection with God that we share with other humans the humanly struggles we face. Otherwise, what we regularly fall into, and what we may be facing even now, is extreme distrust that God really does care about me and what the best for me.

I promise you, the God of the Christian Bible DOES love you and want what's best for you--even if other external or internal forces are trying to convince you otherwise! However, I will never be able to share my story with you, my understanding of God's unconditional love that exists deeper than any adversity, if I never get a chance to talk with you and know what makes it hard for you to trust God.

If we want to grow closer to God, we MUST talk about what keeps us from trusting Him. Otherwise, if we're not communally working on trusting Him, we'll turn our backs on Him whenever He suggests we follow a certain course of action, or make a certain decision, that might be counterintuitive to what we're feeling or thinking in the moment.

I think I'm seeing just how deep "self-preservation" runs in my soul. How, when push comes to shove, I want to preserve or elevate my way of life (thinking/feeling) above your way of life. Inside me resides an "I want what I want, and you better not get in the way of me getting what I want!" type of core. 

But I'm also learning that when I elevate my desires to being more important to me than anything else, I end up hurting myself and the people I care about. The only healthy way forward, I think, is to learn to live by God's will, God's design, God's desires for my life.

That means that the most important thing I can do in any day that I take breath is to work on trying to trust God more, which might mean me needing to talk with others about the obstacles that are keeping me from being able to do so.