UncommonTEEN: The Podcast for Christian Teen Girls

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Today's Ask Me Anything question comes from Ellie. she says, "Sometimes I do feel uncommon as a believer, but your positive words help me get through tough situations. My parents are strong Christian believers who are both teachers. They are very knowledgeable about the world we are living in as teens. Through this, they are opposed to the idea of social media and the possible negative effects. I have recently moved school and feel like the odd one out that doesn’t have a social account. I understand that my parents want what’s best for me,  but I just want to feel included in some way. 

 

I’m sure a lot of teen girls have this same question, one because I know several teen girls who don’t have social media. I also know several other girls who have created social media accounts without their parent’s knowledge. Please don't do this! What this does, is it breaks down your relationship with your parents, because all relationships thrive off of trust. If there is no trust, there is no relationship. Parents have their boundaries because they have your best interest in mind. 

You also said, “Sometimes I do feel uncommon as a believer.” Being uncommon isn’t a bad thing, it’s actually a pretty great thing! God needs you to be uncommon! If you were like everyone around you, nobody would ever see Jesus in you. What does it mean to be uncommon? It means not common, rare, above the ordinary, exceptional, and remarkable! Acts 4:13 is the verse that is the verse God gave me for UncommonTEEN. It says, “Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and perceived that they were unlearned and untrained in the schools (they were common men with no educational advantages), they marveled; and they recognized that they had been with Jesus.” What made them uncommon was their relationship with Jesus, but just like with the disciples, the crowd looked at them and noticed that there was something different about them. That opened the door for them to share the Gospel with them, resulting in people getting saved. 

When you are uncommon, people look at you and ask, “why are you so nice? Why are you full of peace when everyone else is going crazy? Why are you happy all the time?” That, just like with the disciples opens the door for you to share Jesus with them. It’s okay to be different. It’s okay not to have social media even if everyone else does. They may make fun of you but embrace that you are different and be confident in who you are in Christ. 

Check out this week's episode to learn more about what you can do when your parents oppose social media, but you feel like the odd one out. 

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

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On this week’s AMA episode, we answer, "

Hi Jamie, lately I've been feeling like I'm disappointing everyone around me in my life. My parents with not being athletic enough (even though I work out), my entire family went to college for athletics, and I only play one sport and I'm only ok at that. I'm also not popular at school and not really that talkative. I feel like I'm also disappointing God by not being a good enough Christian. I really try to ignore the lies the enemy has been telling me continuously but honestly, I can't stop thinking about how I'm talentless and not good at anything. I also have anxiety, and it really hurts me when I start to believe this. How can I make these feelings and thoughts stop?

First of all, I want you to know that you are not alone in this. I have heard from several teen girls lately who have been telling me similar things. It hurts my heart that this is a struggle that you’re having, because you were made so beautifully by God.


You are enough…because God sees you as enough! He loves you. You are worthy….you are valuable, because God sees you as valuable. 

Jeremiah 1:5 tells us that before we were even formed in the womb, God knew us. 


He knew every little detail about us…He intentionally thought out everything that makes up who you are, and He was pleased with it. 


I know it’s hard, because everyone in your family is really athletic, but God created you just the way you are on purpose. He doesn’t want you to gain your identity from that. He wants you to gain your identity from Him. Now, I’m not saying quit working out or playing sports. Do your best, but then be satisfied because you did the best that you can do. If your parents are truly disappointed in you because you aren’t athletic, I encourage you to pray for them that they see you through the eyes of how God created you…that they see your true identity through Christ. 

You were not placed on this earth an accident. God deliberately thought about every detail about you before the world was even formed! When you truly understand how much God loves you, you understand that you have so much value! That you are not a disappointment to God. That you have so much purpose! That you are God’s joy! You are a beautiful daughter of the most high King! 

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
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UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com

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When I think back to the life of King David as a young boy, I see someone whose circumstances weren’t the best. I see someone whose dad didn’t really even consider him as a son. He was forgotten about, made fun of by his brothers and other people. I see someone who could have been so insecure about who he was, because of the way he was treated by the people who were closest to him…his family. 

 
David’s own dad didn’t see anything special about David that he would even consider David his son. 

With how David’s dad treated him, we wouldn’t blame him if he was insecure about who he was. I’m sure his brothers were constantly making fun of him, as well, because when he was out with the sheep, he would often sit back and write poetry and play his harp. They didn’t see their brother as someone who could be king. They saw him as a nobody. 

But do you know something amazing about David? In spite of his circumstances, he wasn’t insecure. He was confident in who God created him to be. 


And so can you!

One thing I love about David is that he owned who he was. He didn’t ask himself, “God why did you create me to write poetry? Mighty warriors aren’t supposed to write poetry. God why did you create me to play music. Mighty warriors aren’t supposed to play music on the harp. I guess I’m a nobody.” 


No, he took those things that he was good at and He used them to glorify God. He used them in spite of what others thought about him. David owned who it is God created him to be. He owned his identity. He knew that he was a shepherd for the Lord. He knew that he was a poet for the Lord. He knew that he was a musician for the Lord. And he knew that is was a warrior and an anointed king for the Lord. 

And because he knew and owned who God created him to be, God was able to use David in a mighty way and the same is true for you! 

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
Website: UncommonTEEN.com
Instagram: @uncommon.teen
UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com

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On this week's Ask Me Anything, episode, we are answering the question, "Could you talk about fear of the future on the UncommonTEEN Podcast? I'm really scared of everything going on in the world. I know I should give all my problems to God, but I'm still so scared and don't know what to do. I feel like God isn't listening to me and isn't helping at all.


On thing I have learned about fear is that it is meant to paralyze us. It's meant to make use doubt God, doubt ourselves and doubt others. It's meant to consume uses that the enemy can stop us in our tracks. 


Fear is something that I dealt with from a young age. On one hand, I lived my life in fear and on the other hand I was addicted to it--drawn to it. 


I didn't give my life to the Lord until I was 17, but even so, I was still addicted to fear. I couldn't wait for the next horror movie to come out. I remember the last horror movie I ever saw. I was in college and a bunch of my friends from the Christian organization on campus and I went to go watch it. There was one girl in our group who wasn't used to watching horror movies and it scared her pretty badly. While we were on our way back to our dorm rooms, one of the guys in our group went ahead of us and pulled a prank on that girl...something to do with the movie, scaring her more. She just laughed it off and so did we...not thinking any more about it. 


The next day, I was talking to a guy (who is now my husband), telling him about what happened the night before, thinking it was funny and he looked at me and said something I will never forget. He said, "Why would you intentionally invite fear into your life when God so clearly says in His Word not to fear?" Ouch! 


You may be thinking, "I'm not intentionally inviting fear into my life, it just happens. I can't help it, but see it when I look around me." And you're right. We live in a fallen world and just looking out there it's crazy! However, we aren't the first generation to face pretty crazy things. It's happened to every generation up to this point. 


The question we need to ask is: why are some people not affected by the craziness going on around us...meaning they aren't in fear...while others fall prey to it? 


The answer, it's what we focus on. If we focus on our circumstances more than we focus on God, we will step into fear. However, if we focus on our God more than we focus on our circumstances, it will produce peace. 


Think about the Israelite army when they were up against the Philistines. The Israelites were hiding in terror. They were focused on the big problem in front of them...Goliath. However, when David saw Goliath, he wasn't afraid at all. He was focused on how big His God was and knew that together they could take down Goliath! The same is true for you!

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
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Instagram: @uncommon.teen
UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com

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AMA: Hannah-Does Evolution Fit with the Bible?

On this week’s AMA episode, Hannah says, “Recently I’ve been thinking about evolution. When I was talking to my friends about Jesus and God one of them asked me “so you don’t believe in evolution?” That question has stuck with me as currently we’re learning about evolution in science and we’re about to do a test on it. But I guess my question is this: is evolution real? And how does evolution fit into what we know happened in Genesis with the creation of humans?”

I love this question, because as Christians, this is something that is extremely important to know. We can actually help lead others to Jesus when we know the answers ourselves.

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

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In part one of this series, we talked about how to keep ourselves from losing positions so that we don’t find ourselves in a low place asking ourselves, “How did I get here?”

As a teen, I found myself in these places so often. I didn’t give my life to Jesus until I was 17 and I had a lot of learning, a lot of shame, a lot of guilt, a lot of regret that I couldn’t let go of…most of those because of choices I made that got me to that place where I was asking myself, “how did I get here?”

When I was a teenager, I didn’t have the best track record for choosing guys. Now, granted, I wasn’t a Christian until I was 17, but goodness…I could have taught you all what not to do! Well, I kind of do with my podcast episodes, by sharing my stories with you.  

I want you to realize that if you are feeling this way, you are not alone. I know there are many girls who are listening to this walking through something similar, but there is hope. You can become free! 

Freedom starts with forgiveness. Forgiving yourself and forgiving those who have hurt you. When we hold onto unforgiveness, it hurts us. 

1. Forgiveness is the choice to let go of the desire to hurt those that hurt you…including yourself.  
2. Forgiveness is not weakness. It gives you the power to take your life back from the person who hurt you.
3.  When you choose to forgive, that’s when you find freedom.
4. Forgiveness is not a gift to the offender. It’s a gift to you. When you have unforgiveness, you hold onto your past. You are stuck and not able to step toward your God-given destiny. 
5. Forgiveness doesn’t start with their apology. Sometimes they will never apologize. Sometimes they will never be sorry. When you hold onto unforgiveness, that person is still controlling you.
6. Forgiveness is a choice made by faith. Choices lead…and feelings will follow. If you wait for a feeling, you’ll never forgive. 

True freedom comes from the Word.

John 8:31-32 tells us Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”


In order to really know the Word of God and step into the freedom He has for us, we have to know the Word. Not just know it in our heads but know it in our hearts. We do that by renewing our minds to God’s Word. 


Romans 12:2 says in the NLT version, Don’t copy the behavior and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think. Then you will learn to know God’s will for you, which is good and pleasing and perfect.


The battle of shame, guilt and regret is a battle in our mind. The Bible helps us renew our minds and when that happens, our thoughts line up with God’s

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

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I have heard so many stories from several of you ladies who were innocently scrolling on social media when a message popped up in your chat. 


This super cute guy was messaging you either asking you if you'd like to be his friend or complementing you about how beautiful you are. It seemed innocent enough until you found yourself in the place asking yourself the question, "How did I get here?"

Recently, Investigators (who are all former law enforcement officers) with an anti-trafficking organization called Hope for Justice, did an experiment where they created a fake Instagram account with a teen girl’s photo. In just 48 hours, there were messages from several people…three appearing to be older males who were excited to be talking to a girl under the age of 18. According to their website, hopeforjustice.org, these conversations escalated quickly to asking her (this fake Instagram account) for her age, where she lived, for her to send them photos and videos of herself, telling them that they will take care of them. When Hope for Justice responded that she (this fake Instagram account) lived at home with her mother, these guys wanted to meet with this “girl” in person. Two of these Three guys were identified by the police and law enforcement officers took over from there. 

One of the biggest tactics online predators are using is blackmail. I have heard this directly from several different people. 


There is a girl that is local to me. She was homeschooled and an all-around great girl. She was scrolling through social media one day and got a message from this guy who she thought was cute. 


This girl is a Christian, but she never really felt accepted in her youth ministry…she especially was never noticed by any guys, so when this guy noticed her online and she saw he was cute. She started talking to him. She was cautious, because she had heard the stories. 


They chatted every day at a specific time when nobody was home, and it became their thing. She got to know him and really felt a connection to him and then he asked her for an inappropriate photo. She was shocked, but sent a photo anyway, because she didn’t want to say no and not talk to this guy again. 


That one photo turned into blackmail. He began to tell her that she needed to send him more photos and videos or he was going to send her parents the first photo that she sent. He told her that he knew where she lived and recited her home address to her. By the way, it is not hard for people to get your home address if they know what they are doing online. She didn’t know how he got her home address, but she felt stuck. It wasn’t until one day that the FBI came knocking at her door telling her parents that their daughter was a victim of online sexual exploitation. 

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
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UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com

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Anxiety…I remember being in this place…my heart began beating fast. It felt like there was a 1,000 pound elephant on my chest and I couldn’t breathe. I remember one time, and this was just earlier this year, I was in a crowd where I knew about 95% of the people there. In this crowd, we were asked to find someone and go talk to them. Not a big deal right? Wrong! I started to feel anxiety come on me, I started to listen to all of those negative thoughts going through my head like “who would want to talk to you?” “what would you even say?” “you’re going to be alone.” And I began to panic. I excused myself from the crowd, went into the restroom fighting tears and asked God for help. 

As a teen, I remember lying awake at night, thinking about (or really I should say worrying about) anything and everything. It would literally take me hours to fall asleep, because I couldn’t shut off my brain. It always felt like something was about to happen, danger was going to hit, but I didn’t know where or when or how. 

I was so bad, that if a friend didn’t call or show up when she was supposed to, I would automatically think the worst…and I didn’t know how to stop it! I even remember one time, interviewing for a job. I had my hands on my lap under the table and because of the anxiety I felt, I didn’t even realize I was doing this at the time, but I was scratching my hands with my fingernails. When I got up to leave, I’m thankful the person didn’t want to shake my hand, because my hands were starting to bleed from all the scratching.

Maybe you can relate. Maybe you have been right where I was. I recently read an article about the state of mental health in teens from in the United States and I wish I could say that what I read surprised me, but it didn’t. The article stated that anxiety, depression and hopelessness among teens in the United States is getting worse, not better. 

If you are anything like I was, I tried everything and anything to get over anxiety, but nothing seemed to work. I thought that the only way things would change is if my circumstances would change, but that didn’t help either. It felt like a losing battle. But one thing I learned was that anxiety doesn’t just go away because our circumstances change. 

Anxiety goes away when we learn how to conquer it once and for all!!

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
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Instagram: @uncommon.teen
UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com

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Recently, one of you wrote in letting me know you got water baptized! Woohoo!! I’m so excited for you! Then, some questions came up about water baptism, so I thought this would be a great time to talk about it! 

 
This was an area of my life where I was so confused. To a lot of churches, water baptism has become a ritual…something that they do, but the people who are getting baptized have no idea why. That was the story of my life. The first time I was baptized was when I was 8 years old. My grandma belonged to a church that I went to with her on occasion. At this church, which was not a Christian church, everyone at the age of 8 was to go through indoctrination classes and get baptized at the end of the classes. I will be completely honest, I had no idea what they were teaching me and any time I asked questions, I got in trouble…so, I just went along with what they were saying and at 8 years old, I was baptized. I didn’t know why I was getting baptized; I just knew that I was supposed to according to the people at this church. I wasn’t even a Christian at the time! 

Fast forward to my senior year of high school and I come to know Jesus as my Lord and Savior. I guess I didn’t tell my friends this, because with the denomination that we were going to, they believed that you had to be baptized in order to be saved. Well, I was baptized when I was 8, so that counts, right? Well, in college, I was a part of a Christian organization. I was actually a leader in this organization on campus and I kept hearing over and over again that in order to get saved I was supposed to be baptized. I began to question my salvation, because even though I was baptized when I was 8, that was before I made Jesus my Lord and Savior. I began to ask the director of the Christian organization about whether or not he thought I should be baptized, and his response was to kick me off of the leadership team, because I wasn’t “saved!” Yikes! 

Shortly after all of this, I met my husband, we got married, moved to TN and started going to the church that we go to today. This was the first time that baptism was actually taught to me in a way that made sense! I learned that you didn’t need to get baptized in order to get saved, but it is very important, because it is the first commandment Jesus gave us. We’ll talk more about this in a bit. Shortly after going to our then new church, we got involved in youth ministry. The more I learned about baptism, the more I knew I should get baptized again, but my pride was holding me back. I began to think, well, if I get baptized now, people will think I wasn’t saved before. I can’t do that. That was purely pride talking! It wasn’t until I was on one of our mission trips to Jamaica that I decided that I was going to get baptized, and I was going to declare to the world what Jesus did on the inside of me, so in the

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

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We’ve heard it before, maybe many times…God loves you! For many of us, we grew up singing the song, “Jesus loves me!” and we were so excited…which we should be! I mean praise God for His love. But Just because we’ve heard it, just because we’ve sang the song a million times, doesn’t mean that we really know it. It doesn’t mean that we really understand it. And it doesn’t mean that we actually believe that God loves us. 

I didn’t grow up in a Christian home. My dad was physically, mentally, and verbally abusive. I did go to Vacation Bible School in the summertime, and I heard all about God’s love, but for me, there was a disconnect. I couldn’t understand what love was, because I never actually saw love. I was never actually told by either of my parents that they loved me. I didn’t receive hugs. I didn’t feel loved at all. I didn’t feel accepted. I often felt like I was a mistake, that I was here by accident. 

You might be listening to this feeling the same way. On the outside, you pretend to have it all together, but on the inside you’re falling apart. Maybe your story isn’t as crazy as mine or maybe your story is crazier. No matter where you feel like you’re at, you’ve been asking yourself, what’s the point of being here?

Or maybe you aren’t, which I pray is the case, but I can almost guarantee someone you’re close to is feeling this way. 

God loves you so much more than you even realize. This is not the Sunday-school Jesus loves you kind of love…this love is so real. It’s a love that’s not based on condition. If you mess up, He isn’t going to love you any less than He already loves you. He loves you…period! 

Ladies, we have had challenges recently with the UncommonTEEN App and had to close it down. Don't worry, a new app is coming soon!!

If you still want to ask your Ask Me Anything Questions or if you need prayer, head on over to UncommonTEEN.com.

For the Ask Me Anything Questions, click on the RED BUTTON at the top of the screen. These questions may used on a future episode of the UncommonTEEN Podcast!

For any prayer requests or more personal questions, click on the YELLOW CHAT TAB at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. These will not be used on the podcast unless you say you would like it to be used.

Connect with Us!
Website: UncommonTEEN.com
Instagram: @uncommon.teen
UncommonTEEN Live Conference: UncommonTEENlive.com