Caught in Friendly Fire(Not Forgotten - Lesson 2 of 4)
Objective:
Students will learn the qualities of a good friend and seek to be this kind of friend to others.
Key Thought:
Friends are the ones who pick you up when life lets you down.
Note to Parents/Guardians:
This lesson is about the role good friends play in our lives. There have been many great quotes about friends. Someone once said, “Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future.” Euripides wrote in his play “Phoenix” (of which only fragments survive) that, “Every man is like the company he keeps.” Paul the Apostle said in 1 Corinthians 15:33, “Do not be deceived: Evil company corrupts good habits.”
Unless you have been involved with your teenager’s friendships from the very beginning (and then it is still tough), these relationships might feel like a dark hole for you. They have inside jokes, special activities, and long hours spent enjoying each other’s company…just like you used to. It is tough not to feel threatened by these “newcomers” who seem to hold your teen’s heart and motivation so tightly.
The following is a quote full of research that stresses how important your spiritual walk with your teen is to his or her faith development. It also focuses heavily on how important it is that you steer your adolescent toward strong spiritual peers.
“Who or what, then, influences adolescents’ religious participation? A review of current literature suggests parents, peers, and significant adults, among other factors such as congregation and school, as the major influencers of adolescent religiosity. Many studiesreported parents to be the strongest influence on adolescents’ church attendance and/or spiritual development. (e.g., 3 Hoge & Petrillo, 1978; Benson & Eklin, 1990; King, Furrow, & Roth, 2002; Regnerus, Smith, & Smith, 2004; and Smith & Denton, 2005)
Gunnoe and Moore (2002), however, found peers’ church attendance during high school as the best predictor, next to ethnicity, of adolescent religiosity subsequent to high school (ages
17-22) and suggested that even if parental religiosity may be the primary predictor of religiosity of adolescents in high school as other studies have found, peer religiosity may be the better predictor of religiosity of adolescents subsequent to high school.
Similarly, Black (2008) found peer influence (i.e., church attendance of friends and spiritual depth of friends) and other adults’ influence to be the stronger predictors of young adults’ (ages 18-30) continued church attendance beyond high school years and suggested that peers and older adults other than parents take on an increased significance once the adolescents leave home.”
Source: Karen Choi on the website of the Association of Youth Ministry Educators.
Discussion Questions:
Following are the questions the students discussed during their small group time:
1.Which of the qualities of a good friend do you think you display best?
2.Which of the qualities of a good friend do you think you need to work on?
3.Which quality of God as a friend is most comforting to you and why?