For my entire ministry I enjoyed working with kids. The older I got, the harder it was for me to keep up with their world, their frame of reference, their vocabulary and the like. They take the rapid technological advances in stride. I still marvel that we can video chat with anyone in the world in real time!

I remember about twenty years ago I was talking to a teenager and made a reference to Will Rogers’ famous line, “I never met a man I didn’t like.” I was greeted by a horrified, disgusted look, followed by the question, “Was he gay?” They have as much trouble relating to me as I do to them. I have to confess that at times I find myself agreeing with the words of that song from the musical “Bye Bye Birdie.”

“Kids! I don’t know what’s wrong with these kids today. Kids! Who can understand anything they say? Kids! They are disobedient, disrespectful oafs! Noisy, crazy, sloppy, lazy loafers! And while we’re on the subject, kids! You can talk and talk till your face is blue! Kids! But they still do just what they want to do! Why can’t they be like we were? Perfect in every way! What’s the matter with kids today?” (lyrics from the song “Kids” by Lee Adams and Charles Strouse, featured in the musical “Bye Bye Birdie.”)

Yes, indeed, what is the matter with kids? If you’re looking for examples of societal collapsing, consider these: One high school cancelled its prom for the first time in history because last year’s senior class “got drunk and left bottles and cans all over the street.” Then there’s the school where pregnancy starts in junior high and has become so prevalent, students nonchalantly call it the “sophomore disease.” Speaking of sex, I just read about two sex-crazed girls who wanted a man so badly they conspired to get their own widowed father drunk so they could jump his bones. The father didn’t remember it, but he impregnated both girls. And what should we make of the kid who was so jealous of his brother, he lured him into a field, killed him in cold blood and then, after smarting off to the judge about his crime, got away with a slap on the wrist? Then there’s the ingrate son who conspired with his greedy mother to swindle his blind father and cheat his older brother out of any inheritance. Kids! What’s the problem with these kids?

Well, for starters, they’re not kids anymore. The drunks who forced the prom cancellation were from the Class of 1933 in rural Indiana. The pregnancy story is from a high school in the 1970s. The last three episodes I mentioned are all from the Bible: the girls who got their dad drunk and essentially raped him are Lot’s daughters. The murderous brother is Cain and the swindler son is Jacob. 6,000-year-old stories that lead you to conclude the next generation is going to send society to hell in a hand basket.

What’s the matter with kids today? The same thing that has always been wrong with them. This is not a new problem. It is an ongoing one. We see piercings and tattoos covering ever more body parts, wildly colored hair and outfits and we think to ourselves, “What’s wrong with these kids? There’s no hope for them.” I know I’ve had those thoughts. I had a neighbor kid who I was convinced would be in jail before he was 20, and I prayed he wouldn’t end up killing someone. In fact, he did kill someone and wound up in jail.

The fact that the concern about the next generation has always been around and the world has somehow survived up till now anyway does not mean we should ignore the problem or gloss it over. It is a real problem. It is also a problem for which there is a real solution. God’s solution.

Proverbs 22:6 Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it. 

The most crucial part of that training is to teach them about God’s grace. Yes, you use to the Law to shape and mold them and teach them proper behavior. You teach them that there are consequences for their actions. But you absolutely need to tell them that God’s grace offers mercy and forgiveness for Jesus’ sake. You tell them that He died to pay for sin so that we would not have to do so ourselves.

I’ll share more on this tomorrow.