Welcome to the Rooted Parent Top Ten, a curated list of resources from across the web that we believe will be helpful to parents raising teenagers. Here you’ll find articles, podcasts, and videos to support you in gospel- centered discipleship and interpreting youth culture. While most are gospel focused, others are included because they include a message of common grace. (The opinions presented in these articles do not necessarily reflect the position of Rooted.) At the end, you’ll find Rooted resources compiled from the last month’s new offerings. We hope this resource is helpful!
Gospel- Centered Parenting
Gaming Alone: Helping the Generation of Young Men Captivated and Isolated by Video Games by Sarak Eckhoof Zylstra, TGC. This important piece is available both as an article to read and a podcast to listen to. Either way, if you have a son, you’ll want to read Zylstra’s deep dive into boys and video games to discover a biblical way of thinking about this developing phenomenon.
Practical Advice for Christian Parents of a Child Identifying as Transgender by Denny Burk. “I wrote this letter on the basis of some shared assumptions between me and the pastor: (1) the Bible is God’s word; (2) the Gospel is the power of God unto salvation; (3) a transgender identity represents an ungodly ideology that is incompatible with following Christ; and (4) the parents share these commitments.”
Faith Without Risk Isn’t Faith by Mike McGarry, youthpastortheologian.com. “Are we as youth pastors and as parents willing to see our teenagers walk in faith if it means God shows up through trials and suffering in their lives?”
Digging Into Doubt by Mac Harris, Hope Community Church Podcast. Using Gideon’s struggles to trust God as proof of God’s kind patience with our doubt, this podcast addresses how parents can be honest with teenagers about their personal faith struggles, opening the door for kids to ask hard questions without shame or condemnation.
Give Your Kids Better Heroes by Ann Swindell, TGC. “But apart from Scripture, I’ve found nothing as valuable for consistent, meaningful reflections on how to respond to life’s challenges than reading about the lives of these saints.”
Mini-Theology of Fatherhood in Ephesians 6 by Davis Wetherell, TGC. “Paul calls on a dad to maintain embodied, purposeful involvement in the lives of his children, for the glory of God.”
Youth Culture
Teenage brains may be aging faster due to stress from the pandemic, study finds by Adrianna Rodriguez, USA Today. “It’s unclear how these structural changes in the brain will impact teens and what it means for their future, experts say, but it serves as quantitative evidence supporting higher rates of mental health disorders among teens since pandemic.”
‘Luddite” teens don’t want your likes by Alex Vadukuhl, NYT. “For the first time, she experienced life in the city as a teenager without an iPhone. She borrowed novels from the library and read them alone in the park. She started admiring graffiti when she rode the subway, then fell in with some teens who taught her how to spray-paint in a freight train yard in Queens. And she began waking up without an alarm clock at 7 a.m., no longer falling asleep to the glow of her phone at midnight.”
TikTok pushes harmful content to teens every 39 seconds, new report claims by Yi-Jin Yu, abc.news. “Imran Ahmed, CEO of the Center for Countering Digital Hate, called the results ‘every parent’s nightmare.’”
On Rooted
Prayers for a Teenager Struggling with Discouragement by Connie Nelson
To the Parent Who Was Weary Before the New Year Started by Rooted
When I Can’t See God at Work in My Child by Anna Meade Harris
Prayers for a Teenager Who Has Been the Victim of Racism by Logan Murphy
