6.25.2006

More Like Sugar Than Salt

Being cool. It's what we are all about.

Wait, I'm sorry. You are above being cool. In fact you are the salt and the light of the earth. Being cool is nonessential to you, instead seeking and serving God is your purpose and you have no need to get caught up in the ways of the world.

Then why do I feel we are very similar, if not a tad nicer, than our worldly counterparts? Why do we sit and watch hours of reality television that primarily consists of people plotting, bickering, and making meager attempts to prove Darwin's survival of the fittest law applies only to them? Shouldn't we be reading and memorizing scripture instead? Why could we readily rattle off pop culture facts much easier than the listing of the twelve apostles? Why do we associate only with people that look and act essentially like ourselves. Do not even the tax collectors do that?

Being cool. It's what we are all about.

You see, I don't think we're that much different than the world we live in. I'd like to think we are but I think many of us desire to appear tolerant, even "loving", foregoing our call to be different. We have thus made idols of things like not using curse words and abstaining from alcohol to prove that we are different. Maybe we won't even smoke, but what child with a D.A.R.E. education would?

Please excuse me. I need to go watch Gray's Anatomy.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Interesting points Blake. But I agree with you on the amount of time spent watching REality TV and other shows. Jen and I recently got our cable cut. from 60 channels to the lifeline package which includes about 13 channels (we would not even have local channels without cable in Western OK). My reading and prayer life has improved immensely.

Anonymous said...

Interesting, Blake. Good thoughts.

Anonymous said...

And a really clever title. I just noticed it. :) Write me sometime!

Anonymous said...

When Ed and I moved to Germany, we brought our American TV with us. It won't receive German TV signals. So we don't watch TV anymore--just DVDs--unless we catch a show here and there over the Internet.

No "real" TV for almost five years now. I can't describe what a blessing it has been. Now, every time I'm at someone's house and the TV is on, and I see the inane commercials and the subtle worship of pop culture, I feel very thankful that I'm not inviting those temptations into my home every time I walk into the livingroom.

Some might accuse me of sounding "holier-than-thou." But I'm not trying to. I agree with you, Blake--I think we're not as different from the world as we like to think we are. And TV is one reason we aren't.