Social Media is awesome. It’s brought us some of the best inventions in modern times. Like the selfie, or even better, the selfie stick. Maybe you’re a fan of the hashtag or the GIF or weekly holidays like Throwback Thursday.

All of those were all made popular by one social network or another. And, maybe one of the best things these apps have given us is the filter. Filters are amazing. They basically change the way you see something in a picture. A quick swipe and you can instantly make your photo look brighter, dimmer, older, or newer. You can change the shape of your eyes, change the color of your hair, or even swap faces with another human being! You know what we called that in the old days? Magic. Now, it’s just normal. You take a pic and you automatically start swiping to the left or right to find filters that will make the scene better or funnier or more interesting. But in the process of posting our lives online, other things can get filtered too. Maybe even things that shouldn’t—like how we see ourselves, our words, and other people.

​When we can’t see a situation clearly, it’s easy to forget how powerful our posts and pics really are. Even though the Bible doesn’t say much about which Instagram filter to use or whether screenshotting Snapchat is actually a sin, it does offer a lot of advice that’s really helpful as we navigate our social lives online. As we explore what an ancient book can teach us about modern social life, we may just find God’s plan for us isn’t to use social media less, but instead enjoy it more as we learn to apply the right kinds of filters to what we do and say online.

by Dr. Kara Powell

Often parents feel like kids are tethered to their phones, constantly glancing or full-on staring into a screen. It’s unnerving. But before we judge kids or insist they “put that thing down,” we need to understand what motivates them to check social media so frequently. At the Fuller Youth Institute, we’re fans of the adage, “There’s a belief behind every behavior.” By identifying our kids’ motivations, we can empathize before we seek solutions. Without this empathy, our conversations about boundaries, rules, and good decisions get lost in translation.

Teenagers often seem hypersocial to adults because they are in a stage of life when they begin to form their own identities. The question, “Who am I?” plays like background music on a continuous loop throughout adolescence. Teenagers largely work on the answer to this question through relationships. And with lots of experimentation.
So why do teenagers constantly check social media? Why do they care so much about the likes, shares, and posts from their friends? We’ve found it helpful to think about social media as today’s version of the school lunchroom.

School cafeterias have always been a kind of petri dish within which young people experiment—a social laboratory. To parents and educators, the noon break is about eating lunch. But for teens it can be the defining moment of the entire day. Every lunch is a kid’s opportunity to try out an identity, observe, tweak the formula a bit, and get ready to test out a new version of themselves tomorrow.

Parents often underappreciate how a quick scroll through social media can be a lot like scanning the lunchroom.
Young people have very sophisticated ways of conveying social cues with digital media that we may struggle to see. Many of these cues are non-verbal, the equivalent of a thousand words in one image. That’s why phenomena like emoji and photo sharing catch on like wildfire (and keep evolving). It’s also why monitoring all the likes, shares, votes, and views is so important for our kids. And the irony of the lunchroom analogy is that often today’s teenagers are also using social media in their actual lunchrooms, navigating all these layers at once.

It turns out teenagers’ drive to connect today is motivated by the same social drive that helped us to form our identities decades ago, with new technologies layered in. And just like you used to talk to your friends on a home phone—probably one attached to a wall, maybe with a long curly cord—the basic need to connect remains.
In other words, our kids are a lot like us after all. The more we understand that reality, the more we can help our kids discover their identity through relationships—whether or not those bonds are forged digitally. They’re just navigating the journey in the only world they’ve ever known, and it’s a digitally-connected one.

Adapted with permission from the book, Right Click: Parenting Your Teenager in a Digital Media World, by Kara Powell, Art Bamford, and Brad M. Griffin.
 
To connect to a wider community of parents, check out www.parentcue.org.

As parents, it’s tempting to wonder if our role in social media is on the sideline, but there’s no reason to sit this one out. This week, try downloading the same social media apps that your kids use and get an account. The goal is to get to know the app and the specific vocabulary (tweet, swipe, DM, filter) that your kid is using.

Of course, as with everything, there are a few ground rules that can make your experience more pleasant.
1. Let your kid know you’re getting an account and ask for their help.
2. Decide as a parent whether you will participate, post, send messages, or simply observe. Remember, the goal
is not to embarrass your kid, but to better understand their world.
3. Just like being at a new job or in a new community, some things won’t make sense. Try not to get frustrated, but be patient as you get to know the unique culture of this social network and how things work.

This Week: The Apostles' Creed- Article One
​Background Info: (Taken from Colaborate Leader Guide)

Though we don’t know the names of everyone who contributed to the creation of the Apostles’ Creed and
we can’t really pinpoint one specific date on which it was written, there’s no question of its purpose: to
lay out a clear set of statements about what it means to be a Christian. The three articles of the Apostles’
Creed are specifically intended to define the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit in ways that leave no doubts
about the nature of the God we follow.

For the writers of the Apostles’ Creed, the second article was probably the easiest of the three to
compose—Jesus’ physical presence on earth left less guesswork. But in some ways, it’s the hardest to get
our heads around. That’s because it explicitly points to us.
​
Of the three creeds embraced by most of the Christian church, only the Apostles’ Creed uses “I”
statements. This Creed declares our faith in Jesus as Lord and Son of God. In his explanation of this
article, Martin Luther states that these titles point to Jesus as Redeemer, to our need for redemption--
this article isn’tjust about Jesus, it’s about our need for Jesus. Our sin is more than the bad things we do
or the good things we don’t do; our sin relates to our overall human condition. Even if we tried, we could
never totally remove sin from our lives. Recognizing our sin is not a form of weakness, but an opportunity
to confess all that Christ has done for each of us. Christ’s life, death, and resurrection hold meaning not
only for what they tell us about him but for what they mean to us. They are signs of God’s great love. This
article is our reminder that sin and death do not have the final word and that even in our worst moments,
we are not defined by our failings. We are defined by our faith in a Redeemer who was willing to go to
death and come back for each of us.

If this passage were the only information you had about Jesus, what assumptions would you make about him?

What does it tell you about Jesus' death that he was hanging next to criminals? What do the criminals think about Jesus?

God, we thank you for your son Jesus Christ. We pray that his life will be relevant in our lives in how we see the world around us. Amen.

This Week: The Apostles' Creed- Article One
​Background Info: (Taken from Colaborate Leader Guide)

Let’s go back to Nicaea, 325 CE. Emperor Constantine has summoned Christian leaders from across the
Roman Empire to reach consensus on basic doctrine. Christians were fighting—to the point of violence--
about the divine nature of Jesus and the calendar scheme for Easter, and Constantine wanted them to
settle the debate. This became known as the First Ecumenical Council. The creeds we have now, including
the Apostles’ Creed, come from a combination of documents resulting from the First Ecumenical Council
as well as the Second Ecumenical Council at Constantinople in 381 CE.

Martin Luther was a big fan of the Apostles’ Creed. So big, in fact, that he devoted a whole chunk of
his Small Catechism to helping families unpack the meaning of these very old statements of faith. The
First Article (section) of the Apostles’ Creed deals with God the Father and Creator. In both the Creed
itself and in Luther’s explanation of this article, we see a clear statement of who God is and what God
does. When we wonder which God we serve, Luther wants us to be clear: Our God made everything and
continues to make everything. Our God is in an ongoing relationship with creation. Luther writes, “God
has given me and still preserves my body and soul: eyes, ears, and all limbs and faculties. . . shoes and
clothing, food and drink, house and farm, spouse and children, livestock, and all property—along with all
the necessities and nourishment for this body and life.”
​
This lesson focuses on what the First Article of the Apostles’ Creed says, but it also gets into what those
words are telling us. What does it mean when we say “I believe”? Can we keep asking questions? How do
we live together in Christian community if we disagree?

In verse 3, the psalm writer looks at the night sky and is overcome by God's majesty. When have you experienced something overwhelming in nature?

What does it mean to be "a little lower than God" (verse 5)?

God Almighty, thank you for all you have created. Help us to believe and trust in your goodness. May we be aware of your presence in our lives wherever we are. Amen.

THIS WEEK: Daily Prayers
Background Info: (Taken from Colaborate Leader Guide)
Prayer is a beautifully messy part of the life of faith. Praying as a group, we might get tripped up by the language and patters of words "not our own." Praying alone, we might fall into prayer for what we think we need rather than what God longs to give us. So we pray as a community--learning the language of faith and being continually invited into ways to speak our deepest longings to God. Each moment of prayer is a little sabbath within our ordinary routine, a moment for rest and reconnection with God.

As Lutherans, we are offered the gift of Martin Luther's daily prayers. Five hundred years after he wrote them, we sometimes miss that these prayers were revolutionary for the church of Luther's day. In his time, the prayers of priests, monks and nuns were considered somehow "holier" than the prayers of "common folk." Luther rejected this idea, focusing his prayer guides not on monastic settings but on ordinary life. Prayer is for everyone, so his prayers were oriented around things everyone does: waking, eating, and sleeping. This was a huge turnaround.

Luther's daily prayers reflect and rely on the Lord's Prayer. In both, we do the following:

• Give thanks and praise to God.
• Confess our need for God, the source of all we need
• Ask for forgiveness
• Ask for our daily needs
• Ask for protection from evil
• Offer ourselves for God's work

Luther's prayers invite us into the practice and patter of prayer, giving us a form and a language to continue our own prayer lives in a multitude of ways.

1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)
​16 Rejoice always, 17 pray without ceasing, 18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

What would it look like to pray without ceasing? Is that what Paul meant?
When would it be hard to rejoice?

God, helps us to be reminded to give thanks in our prayers. Help us to come to you in prayer in both the good times and the hard times. Amen.

THIS WEEK: The Lord's Prayer
Background Info: (Taken from Colaborate Leader Guide)
Prayer can sometimes feel more like an obligation than a privilege. Like stretching before a workout or eating five veggies a day, we know prayer is essential, but a lot of us avoid it anyway. Our reasons vary--we're afraid we might look stupid doing it, or we don't know what to say. We're not sure it dos anything or we just forget to do it. So while prayer seems like it should be the easiest of the spiritual practices--it's just talking after all--we get stuck. And we're in good company: Even Jesus' disciples asked, "Lord, teach us to pray" (Luke 11:1).

Jesus taught his disciples that prayer is not about the words themselves, but about the relationship between us and God, and how we are affected by that relationship. That's why the prayer that we've come to know as the "Lord's Prayer" is so focused on turning us away from ourselves and back to God. We pray to remember that God's name is holy, that God's kingdom is what's best for the world, and that God's will is vastly better than our own. We also ask for what we need (daily necessities, forgiveness, guidance, protection) rather than what we think we want (revenge, independence, praise).

The Lord's Prayer is not a part of our collective memory because the words themselves have power. Rather, this prayer is a communal way of joining our thoughts and hopes--even the unspoken ones--to God's will for us, our neighbors, and the world.

Share a high from the past week.
Share a low from the past week.
Parents/Guardians be sure to share as well!

Can you recite The Lord's Prayer? Talk about why you are able to do this. If you are not able, talk about where you have seen this prayer or heard this prayer throughout your life.

Why do you pray?
What's helpful about having one common prayer that Christian churches all over the world and throughout history use?
Does the Lord's Prayer still make sense today?

Pray the Lord's Prayer together.

End your time together with the following blessing, marking the cross of Christ on your forehead as a reminder of your baptism. Parents/Guardians be sure to have your child mark your forehead as well!

(Name), you are a Child of God! ​