Digital Church

Challenging Students To Do More This Year: Part 2

Another session up at camp focused on how important our words are when it comes to navigating the tension between living in the world we do and living out the faith we believe in. the culture around our students is not a culture that is screaming Biblical truth at them so we need to prepare and challenge our students to live a life that is motivated by the good news of the Gospel and allows them to share their faith through how they interact with the culture and media they are bombarded with everyday. 

I posted on this at length here: Pop Culture Christians.

Their faith plays out in their lives everyday even when they do not think about it. Their faith and worlview shows up in the posts on Facebook, how they form stories for Snapchat and how they discuss the latest movie plot. What I challenged the students on last week was whether or not their faith was evident in how they interacted on social media and how they talked about the media they are immersed in. If they were going to ask their friends the question,

"What motivates me to live my life the way I do? 

how would their friends respond. Would they respond with characteristics and attributes that exemplified Christ, or the culture they are surrounded by.

I asked them to think about five words they would want to be known by and then to begin to live out those values everyday. I also gave these questions for them to discuss in their cabins.

  • What values are most important to you?
  • Why is it important to know what the Bible says in order to engage culture?
  • If you were to make a pie chart about what takes up the most of your time, what would be in the biggest slice? TV? Internet? Snapchat? Friends?
  • What worldviews are shown through the media you see
  • How do those worldviews differ from a Biblical worldview?
  • What are the 5 words that you want to be known by?
“SEE TO IT THAT NO ONE TAKES YOU CAPTIVE THROUGH HOLLOW AND DECEPTIVE PHILOSOPHY, WHICH DEPENDS ON HUMAN TRADITION AND THE BASIC PRINCIPLES OF THIS WORLD RATHER THAN ON CHRIST.”
— COLOSSIANS 2:8

Here are some other verses to take a look at:

  • PSALM 115
  • GALATIANS 5: 1-22
  • 1 PETER 1:13-15
  • EPHESIANS 4:14-16
  • PHILIPPIANS 2:12-18
  • COLOSSIANS 3:1-5

How do you talk to your students about living out their faith among the culture and worldview that is presented to them through the media?