Teen Tuesday: Are your teens accountable?

Written by:

Jonathan Wells

I want to start off by asking some sincere questions.

Do you want your teen to leave your house at midnight totally unsupervised with no concerns as to their whereabouts? Do you want your teen to meet up with the opposite gender all alone without your knowledge or supervision? Do you want your teen to attend a rock concert? Do you want your teen to freely access immoral and ungodly information from unknown sources? Do you want the world to guide, direct, teach, and indoctrinate your teen?

Any caring, loving, and godly parent would say, "NO!" to every one of these questions.

Yet, a trend is starting to happen in our Christian homes. Teenagers are doing some, if not all of these things listed above. Yes, they are doing it under the very noses of their parents. "How can this be?" you ask. It's very simple. Parents are giving their teens a handheld device. Yes, a phone or a tablet.

With this device, your teen can leave your house after hours and spend time with anyone they want to in the world. With this device, your teen can meet up with the opposite gender and you would never know. With this device, your teen can attend rock concerts by listening to that ungodly music for free. With this device, your teen can freely access any and all information on the world-wide web. With this device, your teen is influenced heavily by the world.

It's a sad, sad day we live in. Parents are blindly giving these things over to their teens and just expecting them to be mature Christians and not make any wrong decisions. But even the most mature Christians can make mistakes and fall. The Bible says, "For a just man falleth seven times, and riseth up again..." (Prov. 24:16) Good people can & will fall. Our goal should be to help people NOT to fall. "The spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak." (Matt. 26:41) How do we help them to not fall? Put safeguards in place.

I don't even trust myself with these handheld devices. So, I have my wife put heavy restrictions in place to keep all my devices monitored. Why? Because I don't trust my flesh. Even Paul said, "...I die daily." David had to make a "covenant" with his eyes. Daniel had to "Purpose in his heart." Anyone who says, "I trust my teen to not mess up" is not wise.

Therefore, I beg of you parents; help your teen by putting restrictions on their devices.

There are many safeguards you can put in place. There is a company with an app called "ParentKit." You can install this on iOS and Android devices. It costs money but it's worth every penny.

There is also a company for monitoring computers called, "Covenant Eyes." Again, this costs money but it is worth it!

I beg of you parents, please love your teen enough to know what they're doing on their devices.

And if you are a teen reading this, please, get with your parents and start being accountable to them.

Just some thoughts from my heart.