There is a big difference between what I can’t watch and what I won’t watch. Let me define my terms for you. My last blog post was about things I can’t watch, meaning scenes that make me squirm for whatever reason. Things I won’t watch is focused on what I feel is damaging to me spiritually. When I hear about movies or TV shows that my Christian friends are watching I’m always surprised by the wide range of what is deemed acceptable to put into our minds & hearts. Here is how I decided what to view.
1) Does it have naked people/sex in it? I assume I don’t have to explain why we aren’t supposed to watch this. E-mail me if you are unclear on this point.
2) Does it have a lot of demonic imagery? An example would be the Keanu Reeve movie “Constantine” in which he is a supernatural detective whose “investigation takes (him) through the world of demons and angels that exists just beneath the landscape of contemporary Los Angeles.” (ref: IMDB) I have seen parts of this movie & its visual representation of the spiritual realm is probably more accurate than any of us really want to dwell on.
As a Christian who knows for a fact there is a war going on that we cannot see with our earthly eyes, why do I want to look at it for entertainment? It is real and to seek out those images for mere shock value dulls us to that reality.
3) Does it glorify violence or have excessive gore, etc.? One thing that a lot of people don’t seem to think about when they watch movies (or the evening news on occasion) is the fact that once you have seen something, there is no way to un-see it. A personal example of this, which I won’t describe in detail, is a scene from “Silence of the Lamb” which I saw while flipping channels. I did not ask for or want to see that image but there it was in all its horribleness. Life is full of ugliness and, just like #2 above, what does it say about us that we are “entertained” by those types of movies?
4) Does evil win or is the plot so muddy that you can’t tell if evil or good wins? Look, Good wins. Period. Evil never wins. It may look like it wins for a moment, but in the perspective of eternity, evil and the Prince of Darkness lose. Why waste time & money on something that glorifies Satan, making him seem more powerful than Almighty God?
Let me mention a couple of items as I close this out. The older I get the more acutely I realize that time is short. Not just for me on this earth, but for all of us. We are only allotted so many days. How we spend them really is important. If I’m looking for entertainment, I want to have the experience leave something of value in me. Yes, laughing definitely is of value! I don’t want it to leave me polluted.
Also, this is my list. Mine. Not yours. Mine. I’m not trying to be a legalistic Super-Nanny and bop you over the head. If you think I am, well, maybe that’s God trying to start a dialogue with you. I’d suggest pulling up a chair and finding out what He wants to talk about. It will be better than any movie, I guarantee!
