Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Speaking of Confusion
A while back, the London Telegraph, carried a story about some churches using LAN parties featuring Halo 3 to attract kids to church. The reasoning:
Consider, Jesus did not take the publicans and sinners to the synagogue, rather, He went to where they were.
That the world is full of profanities is undeniable, and anybody that wishes to carry the gospel to the world will, of necessity encounter those profanities to one extent or another. That, after all, is why Jesus DID hang out with people that the church officialdom of the time found offensive.
But the church is meant to be a holy place, a place where we who believe can find something better - a place where what is holy can be seen, plainly. Halo 3 is not quite so degenerate as some of the naysayers in this thing would have us believe, but neither is it holy - it does not glorify God.
And so, I think we to respond to this by pointing out the the first word in the Great Commission is not "invite," or "attract" but rather it is "GO!" I think it is time we got going.
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Pastors and church leaders defend their use of the game saying it is an effective way of connecting with boys and young men, who are notoriously hard to reach. Once they are in the church setting, ministers can offer them Christian messages after playing the game.And the rejoinder (a bit hyperbolic perhaps, but very funny)
"If you want to connect with young teenage boys and drag them into church, free alcohol and pornographic movies would do it," James Tonkowich, president of the non-profit Institute on Religion and Democracy, told the New York Times. "My own take is you can do better than that."The problem here is one of trying to attract kids to church instead of going out a meeting kids where they are. Around here, there are plenty of places where kids go to play games on a LAN. Why wouldn't the youth pastor just show up there instead of go to all the time, energy and effort to set up a LAN to allow kids to play a game that is admittedly morally questionable.
Consider, Jesus did not take the publicans and sinners to the synagogue, rather, He went to where they were.
That the world is full of profanities is undeniable, and anybody that wishes to carry the gospel to the world will, of necessity encounter those profanities to one extent or another. That, after all, is why Jesus DID hang out with people that the church officialdom of the time found offensive.
But the church is meant to be a holy place, a place where we who believe can find something better - a place where what is holy can be seen, plainly. Halo 3 is not quite so degenerate as some of the naysayers in this thing would have us believe, but neither is it holy - it does not glorify God.
And so, I think we to respond to this by pointing out the the first word in the Great Commission is not "invite," or "attract" but rather it is "GO!" I think it is time we got going.
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