I was so pumped up today to see 26 people from our church and our youth group at See You at the Pole. AWESOME!
You are a group of people that has the ability to do some really positive things for your school and for your community.
In order for you to live up to that potential you need to be careful to not fall into the lifestyle that is usually displayed by your generation. What do I mean by that? Anyone care to guess?
Your generation is a generation in crisis.
There is a man by the name of Josh McDowell. He writes a lot of books about the teen culture. He did this survey a few years ago with 3700 teenagers who go to church.
Here are just a few of the things he found out:
2 out of every 3 teenagers lied to a parent, teacher, or other adult.
6 out of 10 lied to their friends.
1 in 3 cheated on an exam.
1 in 4 had smoked cigarettes.
1 in 5 had tried to physically hurt someone.
1 in 9 had gotten drunk.
1 in 10 had tried drugs.
Over half had tried some sort of sexual activity.
Half said they were stressed out.
Over half said they were confused.
75% said they were looking for answers.
These are Christian teenagers just like you.
It is a sad truth but many of the people in our society today have lost the ability to distinguish between what is right and what is wrong. And it is not just a problem for the teen’s generation it is a problem for all generations.
ASK – Why do you think there is a lack of moral standards in our society today?
Government
The School System
The Church
Parents
Ancestors
Hollywood
Television
Music
The point is, too many people have made a decision to embrace a worldview about what is right and what is wrong instead of embracing a Biblical view with high moral standards.
Instead, people choose to embrace and accept the counterfeits that this world has to offer. And as they embrace these counterfeits they are duped into thinking that they are getting the real deal when the fact is they are embracing the lies of Satan.
ASK – What do you think I mean by saying counterfeits? What would you consider a counterfeit?
Some music
Popularity
Drugs & Alcohol
Sports
Some other religions
Friends
Sex before marriage
Possessions
Most of the counterfeits that people are accepting today will offer us an immediate benefit and immediate satisfaction but they offer us nothing for the future. While making sound Biblical decisions we are storing up for us long-range blessings.
Would you call some of these counterfeits sinful? Anything that takes the place of God in our life is sinful isn’t it. Who should come first?
Sin is packaged for appealingly in our culture today. It carries the promise of immediate satisfaction. That is why so many people choose the counterfeits instead of the real thing, because they can have instant gratification.
Right choices on the other hand require us to postpone the immediate satisfaction for a better long-term benefit. Because it is a long-term benefit some people have a hard time choosing to do what is right.
Psalm 11:3 “When the foundations are being destroyed, what can the righteous do?”
For many years now, the foundation of our society has been torn apart and it is time for a generation to stand up and shout out for the destruction to stop and for the foundations to be rebuilt. And I believe that it is you and you and you and each of you here tonight that are going to be the ones who are going to stand up for what is right, what is true, and what is Godly.
You are the ones who are going to change our school and you are the ones who are going to change our community.
Let’s stop a moment and lets think about what is going on in the world right now.
What is happening in Israel?
What is happening in Afghanistan?
What is happening in Iraq?
What is happening in Iran?
What is happening in Korea?
What is happening in India?
What is happening in the United States?
Ask – How does it make you feel that all these bad things are happening?
The Bible says, that when you see the things that are happing in the world today begin to happen, that means that it is getting close to the time Jesus returns to the earth a 2nd time.
When Jesus left the first time He told His followers that He was going to prepare a place for them and that some day He would come back and take them to His heavenly home.
I’m not telling you this to freak you out and scare you. I am telling you this so that you would know and understand the importance of the times. It is time for Christian young people to stop screwing around with counterfeits and start getting serious about being a person who is going to follow God.
You need to take a look at your own life and decide what you are going to be.
The world thinks that your generation is a violent, callous, and unmindful generation of what is right and wrong. And through the last 30 years the many adults have complained about the youth.
25 years ago when I was a teenager, we were wild and we were rebellious and we would go off the track and we would do things wrong. But we knew where the track was and we knew what was right and what was wrong. Today there seems to be so many teenagers who don’t seem to know the difference between right and wrong and they don’t care about the differences.
Every day in the United States:
4219 teenagers come down with a STD.
500 try drugs for the first time.
1000 try alcohol.
3610 teenagers are assaulted.
2200 drop out of school.
And every day in the United States of America 6 teenagers commit suicide. Teenagers, your generation is in a crisis.
The 24 Annual Survey of High Achievers, a study of high school honor roll students says that 1 in 5 female honor students had been the victim of a sexual assault. 1 in 3 honor roll students knew that someone had brought a weapon to school. 4 out of every 5 honor roll students polled had cheated on their school work. Do those stats shock you? They should. There is something wrong in the world but it doesn’t have to be that way.
What is my point? It is so simple. What are you going to do? Are you going to be a person to make a positive difference and be a part of the solution or are you going to be a part of the problem?
There are so many bad things happening in the world today and they make the world a scary place but God promises us that if we turn to Him, He will not only help us, he will give us everything we need to live and to love and to survive.
READ Psalm 46:1-11
What do you want to do? Be a part of the problem or a part of the solution? To be a part of the solution you must first “be still and know” He is God. Once you do that, the rest is easy because then you will want to make the right choices and do the right things.
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