Talking to our teenager daughters can be hard, but some conversations are critical for their faith walk. Discover tips for addressing these 7 important Christian teenage topics for discussion.
1. The Nature of God
Before your daughter can trust God with her heart, she has to understand his nature. Too many times, God is deemed a punishing God, judgmental, or distant. The true nature of God is a loving father who is free with his forgiveness and mercy. The first step in helping you daughter see this is to lead by example. Show them what it means to be a loving mother whose mercy abounds and easily forgives. Second, dedicate prayer and Bible study time with your daughter. As you read a Bible story, start a list of qualities you see in God and add to it over time. Some qualities include: loving, just, merciful, omniscient, all powerful, ever-present, intolerant of sin, and forgiving. Finally, look for God’s goodness in your every day life and talk about it with your daughter.
2. Who Your Daughter is in Christ
Teenage girls and woman often have such a hard time accepting who they are in Christ in exchange for low self-esteem. Though in reality, she (and you) are made by Christ for a purpose. Make a list together of the lies the Devil has told her about herself: I’m ugly, fat, unpopular, stupid, weird, useless. Then, make a list of God’s truth to combat those lies: you are fearfully and wonderfully made, God’s steadfast love endures forever, and God fulfills his purpose in you. Talk about these truths with your daughter, remind her of them, teach her how to remind herself when the lies creep in, and speak these truths in your everyday conversations with her.
3. Worldly Views vs. Godly Views
As your teenage daughter grows and friendships become vitally important to her, the views of those friends will also become a constant in her life. Additionally, the views of her college professors and classmates loom not too far in the future. It is vitally important that she view the world through a Godly lense and not the lense of this world. Watch the news with her and be aware of her social media usage and what she is consuming. Take opportunities to talk about your faith in relation to current and worldly events. Contrast your faith view with a worldly view to show the stark difference between the two. Furthermore, allowing your daughter opportunities to explain the difference to you will go a long way in internalizing a Godly view of the world.
4. How to Handle Scary News
Scary news surrounds us on a daily basis, and it has never been more accessible to our teens than it is now. Thus, it is important that you teach your daughter to trust in God. When scary news fills our screens and bad things happen, it is an opportunity for parents to turn the conversation to God’s plan for redemption for this fallen world. Additionally, it is important to remind them that God cares about every strand of hair on their head. Therefore, he specifically cares about their fear and safety. As Christians, we must combat this fallen world with God’s truth. He loves us, cares about our wellbeing, and even if bad things happen, he has a plan for ultimate redemption. Finally, we fight evil with good. Look for the good in every scary situation and work for good in your own communities. Make it a point to pray and read the Bible together so she knows where to run when she gets scared of the world around her.
5. Destructive Gossip
Gossip is never productive. Ever. Our daughters need to know that speaking poorly about someone behind their back not only hurts the person but also their own personal walk with God. Gossip is often excused as “venting”. “Venting” to another person is gossip in disguise. Teach your daughter that if they are speaking negatively about someone else, the conversation needs to be a solutions-based conversation with someone who has wisdom concerning the problem they are having (which is rarely a peer). Additionally, moms need to model this behavior in their every day conversations. A saying by Eleanor Roosevelt that I like to use to remind my girls (and myself) of this is-Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people.
6. Using Faith and Reason
I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that teenagers are very black and white thinkers. This can be detrimental when having to use faith and reason to explain the unexplainable, namely God and his works. Take the opportunity to explain this concept in every day life. For example, how do you explain the unclaimed water bottle left in your car? The evidence is minimal. It could have been dropped there by a big black bear for all you know. However, you did give a ride to one of their friends yesterday. While the evidence is not definitive in either scenario, our reason says it is probably the friend’s and not stolen from a bear. Relate situations like this to God and faith. While we don’t have scientific proof that God created the universe, we can use our reason and what we do know to conclude that God created us all.
7. Sex
Saving the scariest for last! There are many reasons to encourage your teen daughter to save herself for marriage both Biblically and physically; God designed sex for marriage, the risk of unplanned pregnancy, risk of disease. The point I want to reiterate though has more to do with their emotional well-being. Most teenage girls are more emotionally driven especially when it comes to relationships with the opposite sex. Sex only intensifies this emotional connection. Within a marriage, this is exactly what is supposed to happen, The danger comes when this emotional connection happens outside of marriage and the very real possibility of being emotionally connected to the wrong person (and subsequently marrying the wrong person) increases. Additionally, the emotional maturity to handle this connection or rejection is not there with teenage girls thus putting them at a higher risk of mental health issues.
Many well-meaning mothers describe their plan to help their daughters have safe pre-marital sex because “they’re going to do it anyway so I don’t want them to be unsafe or feel shame if they decide to do it.” My loving response is that we should give our daughters more credit in their ability to abstain and follow God’s path for their relationships. Create an environment in your home that if they do fall victim to premarital sex then there is no shame, just as God does not shame us when we fall victim to sin. Lead them to forgiveness and away from making the same mistakes again.
Christian teenage topics for discussion aren’t easy, that is for sure. Many times the outcome of such topics are in stark contrast to the world’s view. Nonetheless, these topics of conversation are important to ensure you set your teenage daughter up for success and nurture her faith walk.
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