Handling Media InfluencesSample

Today's reading sets the theme for this study. Media has influenced people since the beginning, not just in the technology age. The images we see, the music we hear, and all other varieties of media change our hearts and minds which in turn, shape our attitudes and actions. This plan isn't a set of a new stricter rules or boundaries for us to follow. That would become just one more arbitrary moral code for kids to reject later in life. The goal is to reset our hearts and minds and focus them on our relationship in Christ.

Tell kids who they are. Show them what relationships are for. Challenge them to make the most of the technology and media in our lives to point others to Christ, then share God’s love, and to ultimately draw us closer to Him. The passages we'll read are about why and how, not do and don’t. When we point kids toward a growing relationship with God, He will speak to each one of them about the way they use media and expose how they may be allowing media to use them. Read the passage and discuss these questions:

What does it mean to crave the things of this world?
What sorts of things should we crave?
What ideas do you have for how our family can redirect our cravings for the things of this world toward the things of God?