How to glorify God with entertainment: Part 3 - Do whatever makes you holy

A few years ago I was at a Christian conference at Katoomba with a few thousand other Christians. It was the morning of the second day and we had all just heard a challenging talk about sexual purity. I left the large hall at the end of the session convicted of the need to take purity more seriously. With the fog clearing away, we descended the steep hill back down to the car park with our hands in our pockets to shield them from the cool mountain air. As we neared the bottom of the hill, I could hear some music being played. The song was “Get lucky” by Daft Punk and this chorus was repeating itself over and over again:

“She's up all night to the sun
I'm up all night to get some
She's up all night for good fun
I'm up all night to get lucky”

I reached the bottom of the hill and discovered the source of the music. There was a portable hi fi sitting on a chair with a number of Christian parking volunteers crowding around it singing the lyrics together.

I was shocked. I couldn’t believe that right after a talk on sexual purity, every single delegate was returning to their cars, only to hear a song that celebrated having a one night stand. So, attempting to be as gentle as possible, I thanked them for serving us and told them that I didn’t think the song was appropriate, especially considering we had just heard a talk on sexual purity.

A few of them responded by saying that they were just discussing themselves whether the music was appropriate and were happy to turn it off. However, some of the other parking volunteers actually booed at me as we drove away a few minutes later.

We all face the struggles and temptations of living in a world that doesn’t know Christ. The Christian life is much like an ice burg, one tenth of it is spent at Church or with other Christians and nine tenths is spent in the world where, much like salt water, the world attempts to erode our Christian character. The result is that we can end up with a culture amongst Christians that perpetuates an undiscerning, care-free, “do whatever makes you happy” version of Christianity that is averse to holiness and hostile to the challenge of God’s word on our lives that forgets the warning of Hebrews 9:24 which says that “without holiness no one will see the Lord.” So I propose a different approach: do whatever makes you holy!

Some people think the solution is to just remove yourself from the world. The Manichaean’s thought this way.[1] They believed that the material world was evil and therefore Christians should avoid all contact with it.[2] However, Jesus has sent us on a mission to the world and has prayed, not that we would be removed from the world, but that we would resist the influence of the evil one (John 17:14-18). Therefore, instead of withdrawing from contact with the world, we must strive to resist its influence. W.C. Fields once said, “a dead fish can float downstream, but it takes a live one to swim upstream.” It is progress in our Christian Character, particularly our holiness, that enables us to swim against the currents of the world as this will ”keep you from being ineffective and unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Pet. 2:3-10). If you stand still whilst riding a bike you fall off, similarly we need to keep making progress in our holiness in this life that we might resist the influence of the world and bear fruit for God.

In justification for watching, reading or listening to entertainment that heavily celebrates and normalizes sin I have heard many people argue something along the lines of the following: “I need to be watching/reading/ listening to what my friends are into so that I can relate to them in order that I might be able to talk about Jesus with them.” Such was the nature of Mr. Talkative in Pilgrim’s progress who prided himself on being adaptable to any kind of company and any kind of talk.[3] At one level we should all be seeking to “make the most over every opportunity” (Col. 4:5 cf. Eph. 5:16) to talk about Christ through discerning as to what worldview entertainment is reflecting and how these worldviews speak positively or negatively about the truths of the gospel that we might “take every thought captive to obey Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5).[4] The problem can be that we fall into the trap of consequentialism/ utilitarianism where the end justifies the means. So long as it enables me to relate better with people, whether or not I am being obedient to God is irrelevant. This view misunderstands the place of the law in the Christians life and fails to understand the nature of true biblical witness. And the irony is that such people are often the ones are the least likely to actually proclaim the gospel to their friends as they have allowed their desire to be accepted to trump their desire to proclaim the gospel.

Luther famously describes the Christian as “a perfectly free lord of all, subject to none [and as] a perfectly dutiful servant of all, subject to all.”[5] This reflects what Paul says in 1 Corinthians 9 where he describes his willingness to sacrifice his rights, to become a slave to all, for the sake of removing any unnecessary barriers to the gospel that he might win many for Christ (1 Cor. 9:4-15, 21). Whilst many people refer to this passage as giving license for adopting worldly practices in our efforts to win a hearing for the gospel, Paul never did this in such a way as to compromise his conscience or the law of God for he always conducted himself as one “under the law of Christ” (1 Cor. 9:12). Through faith in Christ he has saved us from the law as a means of salvation (Rom. 7:1-6; 10:4; Gal. 3:23-26) freeing us to obey the moral law of God from the heart (Jer. 31:34; Ezek. 36:25-27) enabling us to say with the Psalmist “Oh, how I love your law! I meditate on it all day long” (Psa. 119:97). This is how we express our love and thankfulness to God for his saving grace in Christ.[6] As John tells us ‘this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments’ (1 Jn 5:3; cf. 2:3-5; 3:21-24; and Jesus words, Jn 14:15, 21; 15:10), and his commandments tell us how to love our neighbor.[7]

It is Christian obedience to a conscience informed by God’s word and delighting in God’s law that will preserve our holiness and the effectiveness of our witness in this world. Like Israel we are “a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for God’s own possession, so that [we] may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called [us] out of darkness into his marvelous light.” (1 Pet. 2:9 cf. Ex. 19:5-6)[8] We have been saved from our sin so that we might proclaim the gospel and show to the world what it looks like be set apart to live under the rule of God that his Holy Character might be displayed through us to the world which suppresses the truth about God (1 Pet. 1:16, Rom. 1:18). Why do you think non-Christians are so insistent that we join in with them in what they watch, read or listen to, and malign us when we don’t? It is because all people have a conscience, which they suppress, that accuses them when they transgress the law of God which has been written on their hearts (Rom. 2:14-15), reminding them that they deserve death (Rom. 1:32). This is why it’s so damaging when we act hypocritically.[9] If we live just like the world in what we watch, read or listen to, our lifestyle will never confront the sinner’s conscience with their deliberate rejection of God and his law. It is to the Christian that is living differently to the world, maintaining a “good conscience” (1 Tim. 1:19), that the Apostle Peter anticipates that the non-Christian, confronted by our distinctiveness, will both malign us (1 Pet. 4:4) and ask for a reason for the hope that we have (1 Pet. 3:15-16). For this reason, the Christian life should be like a window rather than a mirror. Our life should provide an opportunity for people to look at us and see the glorious character of God, rather than a reflection of their own God-rejecting worldliness. They may well through rocks at the window becuase it reminds them of their own perilous sentence before God (Rom. 1:32 cf. 1 Pet. 4:5), but it is through our holiness that God works to save, as it commends the gospel.God may well use our holiness to save them as it commennds the gospel. J.C. Ryle expressed the importance of such holiness well when he wrote:

 “I believe that far more is done for Christ’s kingdom by the holy living of believers than we are at all aware of. There is a reality about such living which makes men feel, and obliges them to think. It carries a weight and influence with it which nothing else can give. It makes religion beautiful and draws men to consider it, like a lighthouse seen afar off….your life is an argument that none can escape…..I believe there is far more harm done by unholy and inconsiderate Christians that we are aware of. Such men are among Satan’s best allies. They pull down by their lives that ministers build with their lips. The cause the chariot wheels of the Gospel to drive heavily. They supply the children of this world with a never ending excuse for remaining as they are – “I cannot see the use of so much religion” … I fear that Christ’s name is too often blasphemed because of the lives of Christians. Let us take heed lest the blood of souls should be required at our hands. From murder of souls by inconsistency and loose walking, good Lord, deliver us! Oh, for the sake of others, if for no other reason, let us strive to be holy!”[10]

Hypocrisy is one of the greatest threats, not only to our holiness but also to the credibility of our witness. The term witness comes from the greek word μαρτυρέω from which we get the word martyr. It means to confirm or testify to the truthfulness of something.[11] The very word witness implies a context of opposition, for your only call a witness when there is a disagreement. As Christians we are to witness to the truth of the gospel (Jn. 5:33, 15:27, 18:37; Acts 26:5). However, just as Jesus testimony was rejected throughout his life, culminating in his crucifixion, we also, shall be persecuted as we witness (cf. Jn. 8:13, 15:18). And it is under the pressure of persecution that many give way to hypocrisy. According to BDAG the greek and hebrew lexicon, a hypocrite (Gk. ὑποκριτής, hypokrites) in the Greco-Roman world, describes an actor in a play.[12] Biblically speaking, it involves somebody who is hiding or contradicting their professed convictions through how they live. And such people Jesus rebukes most heavily of all people (cf. Matt. 6:3, 5, 16; Isa. 29:13).

I often feel the pressure to succumb to hypocrisy when I play online video games. There is the constant temptation to not get frustrated and verbally abuse people who are camping on the other side of the map firing mortars for the whole game. There is also the temptation toward hypocrisy in how I respond when Christ’s name is being profaned. I try and make it as obvious as possible that I am a Christian by playing with the name Jesusizmyhomeboy (most people laugh when I tell them this). While this sometimes leads to positive conversations about Jesus, more often it leads to verbal slander. The temptation is to either not speak up for Christ, or retort with a hasty comment that is void of the grace that has been shown to me in Christ. On the odd occasion when I have failed to respond graciously I have found that several others join in out of hatred for Christ and any opportunity I might have had to speak the gospel into the situation is undermined as my conduct has left me open to the charge of hypocrisy. As God gives me strength to be self-controlled and gracious in my speech, it is then that I find that I have had engagement and people willing to listen to the gospel. It is hard and requires a lot of patience but I have found that God is faithful.  It is only by God’s grace that we might remain holy in our witness so we need to keep praying for one another that we might have “a clear conscience, desiring to act honourably in all things.” (Heb. 13:18)

One way to take holiness seriously is to keep one another accountable. After becoming a Christian I was in a discipling relationship with an older Christian. He noticed that I was professing the need for repentance and yet I still had posters of half-naked women all over my bedroom wall, and a massive pile of zoo magazines stacked up in my living room. I remember one day, he came over and asked me whether I took the need to be holy seriously. I said that I did. So he proceeded to rip all of my posters off the wall, and got me to throw all of my zoo magazines into the bin. In exhorting me not to tolerate even a hint of sexual immorality (Eph. 5:3) he helped me learn what it looks like to “put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.” (Eph. 4:24) We all need friends like that.

Another way to take holiness seriously is to make holiness a habit. The Apostle Paul teaches us that as we increase in knowledge and discernment we will be able to “approve what is excellent” (Phil. 1:9-10). J.C. Ryle says that “Holiness is the habit of being of one mind with God, according as we find his mind described in Scripture. It is the habit of agreeing in God’s judgement – hating what he hates – loving what he loves – and measuring everything in this world by the standard of his word.”[13] Holiness in entertainment requires reinforcement by frequent repetition. The late Jerry Bridges exhorts us “to never let an exception occurs.” He goes on to explain that:

“When we allow exceptions we are reinforcing old habits, or else failing to reinforce the new one. At this point we must watch the ‘just this once’ type of thinking, which is a subtle, dangerous trap. Because we are unwilling to apply the price of saying not to our desires, we tell ourselves we will indulge only more, and tomorrow will be different. Deep inside we know that tomorrow it will be even more difficult to say no, but we don’t dwell on this fact… We may feel that a particular habit ‘isn’t too bad,’ but continually giving in to that habit weakens our wills against the onslaughts of temptation from other directions.”[14]

We will only begin to make holiness a habit when we acknowledge the fact that our habits, not matter how minor they might seem, have consequences. As J.C. Ryle once said, "every fresh act of sin lessens fear and remorse, hardens our hearts, blunts the edge of our conscience and increases our evil inclination." As the famous saying goes:

                “sow a thought and reap an act;
                 sow an act and reap a habit;
                 sow a habit and reap a character;
                 sow a character and reap a destiny.” 

These days we have more control over what we listen to, read or watch and so it’s much easier to get into good habits. In days gone past you would turn on the radio or the television with uncertainty about exactly what song would be played or what themes would pop up in the show you were watching. These days, through music platforms like Pandora and Spotify and online streaming through apps like Netflix we get to choose the songs and movies we want to listen to/ watch and when. This means we have much more time to make wise choices about what we will listen to or watch. One awesome program I use for helping me making wise choices with what I watch is through a website called IMBD in which we can search for any movie or show and find out exactly what kind of themes will be present in great detail through the parental guide feature. If you are a husband like me, then you have a spiritual responsibility as the leader of your family to take the extra step to help guard your heart and the hearts of your wife and kids. We don't get it right every time, but we have no excuse to be lazy in discernment in this area!

As we live amidst a moral revolution, it is my opinion, of all the ways in which Christians can stand out as holy, entertainment is the easiest. And not only does holiness equip us for our witness to the world, but it is preparing us for heaven as Kevin DeYoung says “If ungodliness is your delight here on earth, what will please you in heaven where all is clean and pure. You will not be happy there if you are not holy here. Or as Spurgeon put it, ‘Sooner could a fish live upon a tree than the wicked in Paradise’”[15] In my next blogpost we will explore the importance of self-examination in promoting holiness and safeguarding a good conscience.

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[1] Originating from Mani, a Christian heretic born in 216 AD.

[2] J. I. Packer, Seeing God in the Dark: Unraveling the Mysteries of Holy Living (Peabody, Massachusetts: Hendrickson Pub, 2013), 351.

[3] John Bunyan, The Pilgrim’s Progress (ed. Rosalie De Rosset; New Edition edition.; Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2007), IX.

[4] Movies, like the recent release about the Resurrection of Jesus – Risen – can be amazing opportunities for gospel conversations. I went and watched a movie at a cinema two years ago, and after the movie a Christian man got up an analyzed gospel elements that could be found in the movie. He made some very insightful comments. He talks about the fallen nature of mankind and that no matter where we go, no matter how much we progress we always take our sin with us, and our sin will inevitably produce destructive results amidst our relationships. Sin and the death that results will always follow us because it resides in our heart. He then described the main actor and how he represents the hero (Jesus) we all long for who will put an end to inequality and injustice through the sacrifice of himself – taking the punishment for our sin in our place.

[5] Martin Luther and John Dillenberger, Martin Luther : Selections From His Writings (Garden City, N.Y.: Anchor, 1958), 53.

[6] In the Catechism in Cranmer’s Prayer Book (1549) he describes the duty of a Christian as: “My duty towards God, is to believe in him, to fear him, and to love him… To worship him, to give him thanks, to put my whole trust in him, to call upon him, to honour his holy name and his Word, and to serve him truly all the days of my life.”

[7] Packer, Seeing God in the Dark, 322. Here Packer says that “love and law are mutually entailed, as Paul shows in Romans 13:8-10. The sixth, seventh, eighth, and tenth commandments prohibit particular actions and attitudes (murder, adultery, theft, covetous jealousy), and Paul quotes them to make the double point that when we keep these commandments we love our neighbor as ourselves, and when we love our neighbor as ourselves we keep these commandments. The point is confirmed by John’s striking reasoning in 1 John 5:2: ‘By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments.’ Neighbor love fulfils the law.”

[8] David G. Peterson and I. Howard Marshall, Engaging with God: A Biblical Theology of Worship (Downers Grove, Ill: IVP Academic, 2002). David provides a helpful summary of the intended purpose of Israel in relationship to the other nations: “A common factor in the three terms describing Israel’s vocation here ‘my treasured possession’, ‘a kingdom of priests’, ‘a holy nation’) is the note of separation from the nations in order to be uniquely at God’s disposal. The Israelites were drawn into a special or sanctified relationship with God from amongst the nations. They were chosen to demonstrate what it meant to live under the direct rule of God, which is actually ‘the biblical aim for the whole world’. As such, they were to be the means by which God’s original promise to Abraham of bringing blessing to all the nations would be enacted(cf. Gn. 12:1-3). As a priestly kingdom, they were to serve the Lord exclusively and thus be people through whom his character and will might be displayed to the world. ‘Just as a priest is separated from an ancient society in order to serve it and serves it by his distinctiveness, so Israel serves her world by maintaining her distance and her difference from it.’” (p. 28)

[9] The idea that this is expressing is essentially what happens when your functional theology fails to match your professed theological convictions. It is a cognitive dissonance – a pietistic inconsistency. 

[10] J. C. Ryle, Holiness: Its Nature, Hindrances, Difficulties and Roots (Hendrickson Publishers, Inc., 2003), 42-43.

[11] Walter Bauer and Danker, Frederick, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Third Edition.; University of Chicago Press, 2001), 618.

[12] Walter Bauer and Danker, Frederick, A Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament and Other Early Christian Literature (Third Edition.; University of Chicago Press, 2001), 1038. See also: David L. Turner, Matthew (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 2008), p 611.

[13] Ryle, Holiness: Its Nature, Hindrances, Difficulties and Roots, 35.

[14] Jerry Bridges, The Pursuit of Holiness: Run in Such a Way as to Get the Prize 1 Corinthians 9:24 (New edition.; Colorado Springs, CO: NavPress, 2006), 100. In The mortification of sin Owen likewise argues that ‘Without a sincere and diligent effort in every area of obedience, there will be no successful mortification of any one besetting sin.’

[15] Kevin DeYoung, The Hole in Our Holiness (Paperback Edition): Filling the Gap between Gospel Passion and the Pursuit of Godliness (Wheaton, Ill.: Crossway, 2014), 15. In his book called Holiness, J.C. Ryle illustrates the absurdity of living as if heaven were not of its very essence holy: “I appeal solemnly to everyone who reads these pages, how shall be ever be at home and happy in heaven, if we die unholy? Death works not change. The grave makes no alteration each will rise against with the same character in which he breathed his last. Where will our place be if we are strangers to holiness now? Suppose for a moment that you are allowed to enter heaven without holiness. What would you do? What possible enjoyment could you feel there? To which of all the saints would you join yourself, and by whose side would you sit down? Their pleasures are not your pleasures, their tastes are not your tastes, their character is not your character. How could you possibly be happy, if you had not been holy on earth? Now perhaps you love the company of the light and the careless, the oddly minded and the covetous, the reveler and the pleasure seeker, the ungodly and the profane. There will be on one such in heaven. Now perhaps you think the saints of God too strict and particular and serious. You rather avoid them. You have no delight in their society. There will be no other company in heaven.” (p 44)