No Wonder Your Teen Likes Rock & Roll

By: Nathan D. Jones

My wife currently baby-sits a couple of children.  Though sometimes it has been challenging trying to control them; we have been able to develop a friendship with the unsaved parents, and both of the children’s mothers have visited our church.

Recently one morning the young 4 year old girl that my wife watches came in with a “Hannah Montana” plastic guitar.  This guitar is a full package deal. It sings Hannah Montana songs while the child strums the nylon strings.  There are head phones and even a microphone attached, so the child can sing along and hear himself croon away.  Is this merely a harmless toy?  I don’t think so.

Being a musically conservative, independent Baptist family, and desiring to shun the world’s wicked music, we admittedly had never really heard any Hannah Montana songs.  We allowed the girl to “play” the guitar for about twenty minutes, which turned out to be about 19 and a-half minutes too long.  The first 30 seconds were just an informative learning experience, the latter, just annoyance and aggravation.  My 3 year old daughter, who looks up to this older girl, was bouncing along to the songs and enjoying the “music” that the little plastic guitar spewed forth.  I could see that if we let Hannah Montana sing in our house all day, my daughter would be her newest fan.  Thus the guitar suddenly went missing.

It is not my desire to write an article on music, but merely to put forth some thoughts about the worldly indoctrination that frequently occurs at an early age. This indoctrination happens not only in the area of toys, but DVDs, books, and video games.  I am sure this musical toy comes in a brightly covered package.  It is a popular, attractive item and often parents want their children to “have more then we had,” so they endeavour to beg, borrow, or steal to get their children the latest in youth entertainment and pop culture.  I believe this happens not only in unsaved families, who really don’t know any better, but in saved families as well.  They certainly don’t want their children to be the “un-cool” ones in the neighbourhood and they do all they can to make their children popular.

The danger in this mentality is that little by little the once staunch disdain and contempt of those worldly items slowly erodes or even replaces the Biblical foundation that was being laid there.  Instead of teaching children that God abhors worldliness and compromise, and desires that we listen to music which glorifies Him, we let a little sin in the camp and thus neutralize the teachings of Scripture we’ve attempted to instil.  Without even realizing it, parents can set their children’s spiritual growth back years, simply by allowing a double standard in the home.  At Sunday school and church services they are taught that worldly music is wrong, but the toys, DVDs, books, and TV that exalt a sinful lifestyle and music, are allowed to invade the home.

The young minds of children are so mouldable and impressionable.  They do not have the maturity to discern the error and thus fed a continuous diet of confusion, slowly begin to lean toward the world and eventually mirror it.

One day a parent comes home from work unexpectedly and their pre-teen is “rocking” away in his room listening to music that has “never been allowed in our home.”  The Christian parent then thinks, “What happened?”  Why did they all of a sudden being to listen and like those sinful sounds?” I would put forth to you that it wasn’t “all of a sudden,” but that they have slowly and methodically been allowed down the slippery slope simply because the parent permitted music like Hannah Montana’s into the home.  Oh Hannah is not yet an outwardly immoral girl; she seems harmless and fun to the kids, but her music and lifestyle once accepted in the home, makes the transition to and adoption of more evil things, palatable.  Sure your kids may have been partially influenced by schoolmates or friends around the block, but they’ve never grasped the seriousness of the downgrade because the instruction was not serious enough at home.  No wonder your teen now likes rock-n-roll.

Parent, are you surprised at the bad attitude your child or teen displays?  Having trouble getting your child to obey the simplest rules set in place for their good?  Re-examine the influences that are weighing upon them.  Is the television programming that your child views or the music that they listen to chock-full of bad attitudes, disrespect for authority and clear admonitions to “live life the way YOU want to”?  You might find some answers to your behaviour problems there.

God has placed us as parents to be the rulers of the home.  It is up to us to instil in our children the Word of God, so they will live a holy, God-honouring life.    As God said of Abraham in Genesis 18:19,

For I know him, that he will command his children and his household after him, and they shall keep the way of the LORD, to do justice and judgment; that the LORD may bring upon Abraham that which he hath spoken of him.

God help us as parents, and especially fathers, to command our children, and “bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord.” (Ephesians 6:4b)  God has made the Christian home to be the bastion of truth for training our children.  With so many things fighting to control them in this depraved world, let us beware of a little leaven that will eventually corrupt or destroy the family unit.  In this perverse generation the Christian home needs to shine out as a beacon for the lost to see.