GlenThompson
Inactive User
The following thoughts are some of my rather recent reflections & meditations on the things I do & justify, & that, seeking not to excuse my sin intentionally or rather consciously, but so as to be Biblical & not simply a legalist.
Up front let me say it plainly that I’m confused!
I’ve been as far in my extremities to the right as I could imagine possible without being ascetic, & in turn, in seeking & discovering a good & necessary freedom, indeed one that, in principle, is far more Biblical than those naïve initial motivations I once embraced, I have leapt, again in the natural extremity of my personality, to the other side! What we rightly call the ‘pendulum swing’!
But what is the answer?
My close friend & fellow pastor Nick Clevely has coined the phrase; ‘Sinfully safe.’
What he means thereby is that we, as conservative Christians, of whatever theological persuasion, often think it Biblical to, ‘lest we err in some way or other,’ go to the ‘I don’t drink, I don’t chew (do they mean gum or tobacco?) & I don’t go with girls that do’ maxim as a ‘sturdy’ rule for life!
& so, as this fleshes itself out, they will say, ‘I don’t drink because I’m a Christian!’ I once said it was ‘Satan’s spit!’ Then there is the whole matter of TV! Which I had previously named, ‘Satan’s scorn tube’!
& so those of us who have fallen into this kind of foolish & un-Scriptural pharisaism look down, in harsh & critical judgmental questioning, on anyone who happens to drink (like Christ did) or watch TV (which itself is neutral) as, at best ‘flakey’ or at worst ‘pagan’!
I remember when I first heard that Spurgeon smoked a cigar & drank whisky. I didn’t know ‘this Spurgeon guy,’ as I called him, but I ‘knew’ my Bible! & I didn’t really care if he was so many peoples favorite read; he was a heathen to me! So due to my incorrect theology & that due to lack of proper discipleship by wise & Biblically balanced mentors, I missed out on firstly, the ministry of a giant, & secondly, & here more importantly, what true Christianity is really about!
It’s the furthest thing from ‘eating & drinking’ & what you put ‘into your mouth!’ It is about, ‘righteousness, peace & joy in the Holy Spirit!’
This ‘sinfully safe’ life style, however, has its benefits & that being, true benefits!
Firstly, it greatly simplifies things for the saint!
You won’t be caught up with the hassle of trying to know what is okay to watch on TV & what isn’t!
Or when is drinking drunkenness & when is it ‘making merry’?
Or ‘how far can you go’ in your relationship with your girlfriend before it is fornication?
One of the most extreme cases I remember priding myself on ‘discovering’ in the early days was, & I will sum it up in this, ‘what kind of costume may a girl wear, a bikini or a full costume?’ to which in some self-righteous & pseudo sincerity I would respond, ‘what are you doing swimming anyway? People are going to hell!’
For the ‘sinfully safe’ brother the answer is really very easy - Abstain from all that is in anyway questionable & you will save a lot of time! & here, as stated already, there is some real benefit! Quite simply, don’t watch TV! Don’t drink! & don’t date!
Now I’m not here saying, ‘do watch TV, do drink & do date’! Not at all!
I’m dealing with the person who, on what he will call Biblical grounds, abstains & condemns those who aren’t with him!
When I lived in this place I was ‘more holy’ than I am today! At the same time I was an, unknown to me then, Arminian.
This usually goes hand in hand!
I was, in some sense, being good so as to fit myself for acceptance with God!
I sinned ‘less’ as an Arminian than as a Calvinist!
Now what I mean is, of course, that when my knowledge of the Bible was ‘patchy’ & fragmented & much was left to the rules & regulations of my shabby exegesis & that of others whom I looked to, I didn’t do the things I now do & would even punch myself & teach others to do the same if they were struggling with, say, lust! It kind of works as well! Your attention is transferred to the swollen cheek you now have & the ‘solid’ example that you now think you are!
But as far as the Bible defines sin, I was much worse than I am today!
Self-righteousness oozed out of every pore! Harshness & a scathing tongue ripped apart many who dared to transgress the laws that I had laid down!
&, again, I taught many young people to stand for things Christ condemned in His own day!
One of our ‘pride & joy’ young converts stated after a prayer meeting to a group of bystanders, ‘You cannot watch TV & be a Christian!’
I was good at the rules, most of the time!
But this article, or rather confession of sorts, is not about this obviously wrong way of interpreting the mind of God as laid down in His Holy Word.
Here, as my heading states, I wish to un-burden my soul before you as to my new dilemma!
I’m an extremist! This is a blessing & a curse! Sometimes both at the same time! But God made me this way, albeit that my sin has perverted me in this way too! There must be hope for the extremists among us! Perhaps this is not fairly an extremist’s plight exclusively. Maybe this is true of all of us & that it is a challenge to all of you who dare venture from the ‘sinfully safe’ false religion previously explained! I would venture to say that it is more observable in those of us who are extreme but that it is, indeed, both factual of & frustrating to every true Christian throughout the world.
What I’m talking about is the curse of inclusion & its resultant confusion.
If we don’t simply abstain from everything, as a law matter, but venture into this realm of including, ‘using not abusing,’ ‘all things in moderation,’ philosophy, then we will eventually come to some fresh & new challenges that we had, perhaps, never bargained for!
Let me try to explain.
From ‘no TV’ I have opted, not as a law, but as a preference based on our unique family desires & needs, to include one.
This meaning, however, that we use ‘multi-media’ & not, as yet, actually watching TV per se!
We don’t have an aerial & that due to us not wanting TV to rob us of valuable family time, as we see it.
Each one will, as it was with us growing up, end up having their own favorite programs & so our limited time together will end up being taken hostage by lesser things!
But we do watch ‘a lot’ (relative) of DVD’s! We own a large amount too, both Christian ones & secular as well.
We watch when we want to & not otherwise! This works for us!
Or does it?
With the initial inclusion of TV in our recreational times we said such things as, ‘there are lots of other forms of recreation to also enjoy, & so ‘TV’ will not always be the form used. It should feature, perhaps once a month!’
This too had its own set of standards.
No more than a 13 rating & that not for L or S or N! We could excuse a 16 perhaps for V (Speaking of my wife & I & not our 3 & 4 year old girls).
Once this was in place & we had gone down this road for a little while, we, me especially, were becoming more & more keen for DVD’s over against the other more taxing & challenging forms of pleasure.
This became a weekly thing! The 13 became a 16 & the L became a non issue! Even a 13 for S would be justified as we thought to ourselves we are adults, hello! We are no stranger to these things! Further we began to discover our favorite types of movies (thrillers love stories etc.) all over again & so the boundaries moved further & further to include ‘part 2’ of the trilogy that had a higher age restriction than ‘part 1’ for instance.
Today I watch almost anything that I want to watch &, to be completely honest with you, derive some real benefit from almost all of it! (This is not a justification! It’s a confession & that of being a little confused – so please hear me out)
I saw ‘Schindlers List’ a few years ago & most of you will here amen the fact that it was brilliant! Antje & I wept after watching it & it moved us to pray! We wept not for the 6 million Jews that went to hell via execution, worthy of tears to say the least!
But our great grief was more personal. We thought about the Day of Judgment, & us feeling like Schindler did! He had done ‘so much’ but he truly could have done more! His broach would have saved another 1 or 2 people! His car, another 10 lives etc.
Then there is ‘The Godfather’ trilogy. This is my favorite movie. It is Ecclesiastes in modern dress! It so clearly portrays a young & somewhat decent & innocent son of a mobster who will eventually inherit his father’s position. He will then seek to ultimately legitimize all that is in his charge. This dream proves to be impossible & the deeper he gets into the supposed ‘above board’ dealings the greater the corruption evidences itself!
The series ends with him as an old man, in Sicily, alone sitting on a little chair, & he falls over & dies! “Meaningless” indeed!
This, like ‘Schindlers List’ was helpful to me!
Now I tread where I expect to walk in almost solitude.
My wife has parted form me, in the sense of what I’m about to say! (We are very much in love!) My closest friend has expressed his disapproval, in principle, & most if not all of you will agree, I think! I’m not sure I disagree myself!
I recently watched what I would call a gripping & brilliant drama about a single mom & her 12 year old daughter who experiences a tremendous demonic attack!
Now I say a drama because that’s what it is. It is a story about life! It could have had as it’s theme a sewing competition & the characters would have been no different! It was well done & truly edifying to me! I came away better & helped! Further I prayed before & sought God’s grace to not allow me to enjoy this for its horror dynamic (as I thought it would be a horror) but to watch it with a sober & sincere desire to see what I could learn from it!
The movie I refer to is ‘The Exorcist’!
Told you, you would struggle with this one!
Stay with me – remember my heading!
What I took away, honestly, was an appreciation for the fact that it was not in anyway sensationalistic, it correctly captured the total evil & utter blasphemy of the devil, it exposed the fact that he plays the Catholics (who are not a Christian option) like an instrument, it exposes the ‘modern’ liberalism that is so rife (they want to put this evidently possessed girl on Ritalin – her bed is bouncing all over the room!), & it further left me prayer full & self-analyzing as to what I would do if someone manifested a demon in my congregation!
It has been years since I’ve had any specific dealings with those possessed! Would the demons turn to me & say “Christ we know, Paul we know but who are you?”
I was moved to pray!
This movie is a great classic that, as far as my tastes & abilities to endure heavy stuff goes, would be in my top 10 without a doubt!
Now I have brought you all up to speed with what some may call my journey to the abyss! But what others will say is a typical learning curve in any sincere Christian’s life who will not simply abide in the ‘sinfully safe’ camp! & that coupled with an appreciation for & understanding of the extremists among us!
I write this so as to expose myself to you all & provoke within you a response!
I’m not propagating anything!
Nor am I saying that this is the only way to go about learning! In fact I think, if I land against my current actions, which I might, that this way of learning is not the best at all!
We should learn from the mistakes of others & avoid ‘re-inventing the wheel’ in every successive generation.
But I’m sincerely confused!
Someone has said, ‘I will not be entertained by anything Jesus died for’!
To me this is completely missing the point! It smacks of spiritual naiveté & echoes a plastic fundamentalism!
Others, for who I have far more time, have said to me that they won’t watch a movie that has sin as its entertaining aspect, like an Eddie Murphy stand up comedy show where swearing is the focus! These say that they will however watch a movie with swearing if it is realistic in that it is wrong in the movie too & yet rightly portrays a, say, New York gang & it’s struggles!
Like ‘Schindlers List’ for example or on a milder scale the new favorite, ‘Faith like potatoes’! Both contain swearing! For which I’m glad! Sorry!
The alternative would lose something that would make the movie completely unrealistic!
Now it is in running down this road with my particular extreme character & perhaps somewhat desensitized past that leads to ‘The Exorcist’!
If the title wasn’t so taboo already, & if its reputation wasn’t so severely smudged, many of you might have also enjoyed it & derived benefit from it as I did!
Now my point is this;
I could literally justify almost anything on the ground of benefit!
Take p0rnography for instance! Most if not all of you have seen some! I have seen a lot! I labored in this sin prior to my conversion & carry loads of baggage daily due to my stupid decisions of the past!
Have I looked at **** since I got saved? None of your business! Have you married men lusted after another woman in your heart? None of mine! Okay, now that we are all listening, let’s take a typical situation. Joe & Sally are married & were pure before getting married! This is only a good thing! But Joe’s dad was too super-spiritual to give his son some, just-before-marrying ‘tips’ as to how to …you know what, so as to please Sally, his prospective wife! So here we have a classic ‘wham bam thank-you mam’ scenario! He is selfish sexually & a pathetic lover! **** could help him, or so he reasons, & so he fools around ‘on line’ a little & comes away with some truly helpful ‘hints’!
Now I’m not saying this is good!
It is not good at all! It is wrong! It is sin! It is evil! It is Satanic!
But I’m trying to incriminate myself here & say that maybe ‘The Exorcist’ too is wrong!
Just because I get something truly helpful out of it, maybe doesn’t justify its viewing!
Here I’m confused!
& my confusion comes from not knowing where to draw the line! Those in the ‘sinfully safe’ group don’t have any trouble here. They simply draw it at the front. No TV!
This is a benefit!
If one, however, who is honest with Scripture comes through this dark tunnel, either via the hard lessons he himself learns, or preferably, being well taught by mentors, if such a one lands at the ‘no TV’ or ‘almost none’ preference (Piper & the like), then this one will be perhaps most greatly blessed!
My dilemma comes from the curse of inclusion & its resultant confusion!
Now my mind reasons that **** is obviously wrong for umpteen Scriptural reasons. But Paul also says that certain things, & the list encompasses a lot more than ****, shouldn’t even be named among saints! He further tells us to meditate on things that are pure! We are to redeem the time! Turn away our eyes from looking at worthless things!
But these all once meant to me utter abstinence from almost everything!
Now I’m not sure they have to!
But in my willingness to be teachable & not just stand on my first thoughts, I’ve become ensnared by the system, as it were, & watch, on average about 2 hours of DVD’s or Video’s a night!
It is somewhat controlled, according to us! It somewhat edifies, according to us! (So does ****!? I speak in a vacuum here & not that we view this, we don’t!)
We further justify ourselves on the all too typical lazy excuse (I still use it! But let’s call a spade a spade!), that we are ‘bushed’ & ‘brain-fried’ after all those hours of hard work & just need to ‘un-wind’!
Sound familiar?
The truth be told, before I ‘lapped up’ this vomit of an excuse, I was quite capable of reading a book with my wife or just chatting or grappling with the Scriptures together!
From which we derive much benefit!
Much more than we do from ‘24’, or ‘Schindlers List’, or ‘The Exorcist’! Though each of these do indeed ‘edify’! (As does ****)!
Now all of you will be saying **** is wrong (obviously), & some that ‘The Exorcist’ is also wrong. But the same will fight for the validity of watching ‘Schindlers List’! This on the ground that, although the language is as bad, it is nevertheless about a true atrocity &, so, helps us appreciate the horror of what happened!
The latter has, I’m sure, much more ‘F’ words than the former, at least that’s how I remember it, & I would offer the exact same defense for ‘The Exorcist’!
Now I’m asking sincerely here if we are really living life to the full if we are allowing ourselves to be sucked into this DVD ‘mad’, TV ‘mad’ kind of life.
My question implies that I feel it wouldn’t!
But, to tell the truth, I’m confused!
Please don’t ‘stone’ me, on the ground that I bring up here what many of us are dealing with!
Again recall my heading, & with this I close!
The curse of inclusion & its resultant confusion!
God bless you & may Christ be you portion forever!
In His love
Glen
