It is one of those realities in life that we associate certain events or attitudes with certain people or places. Rebellion is one of those things. We can go either way with it. We run into teenagers, so we think we will undoubtedly find a bunch of rebels. Or we hear about rebellion and assume teens are involved.
But what we need is a reminder that rebellion is not a teen thing; it is a human thing–core teaching number one.
When Judi and I were asked to right on this topic, we were really encouraged to bring the gospel and its hope into a discussion that can become pretty intense. Between our own experience and the hope the Word of God brings, gospel hope was not hard to find in the midst of rebellion. But it can be hard to hold onto when your own teen seems to be at war with you.
So we went back to the garden of Eden where the first rebellion began in order to better understand the kind of rebellion that shows up in teens. And what did we find? We realized that the other rebels in our home were the adults, as in the parents, as in us. How well had we dealt with our own hearts before we began to deal with the sin and independence of our kids?
I can critique Adam and Eve for their desire for things God said no to, but can I critique my own desire for things off limits? Not as easily. But then on the other hand, can I quickly tear my teen apart for his or her immature desires, while still not dealing with all of my own that are readily apparent to them? Ah, not so much.
The other core teaching of this book is an explanation of the different kinds of rebellion or foolishness. We take this material directly from Poverbs where the fool is described. We believe you will be helped much by this explanation in order to better respond to your teen. (Check out the article on rebellion here. It lays these concepts out in brief for you.)
For more information, you can find the book on Amazon here.