How should a Christian respond to Hollywood?

Alas! the notice boards outside many places of Christian worship tell a different tale. What mean these placards announcing “entertainments,” “amateur theatricals,” or “concerts”—not very sacred either—or that one giving details of “a great political demonstration”? Some fifteen or twenty years ago things had gone so far that a godly minister felt himself constrained to publish a booklet on this very thing, entitled The Devil’s Mission of Amusement, and that mission has continued unabated to the present hour.

Oh! beloved friend, why do you go on with these things? Are they sanctioned by the Word of God? Were such things adopted by our Lord Jesus Christ and the apostles, even as a means of attracting the crowds? No. Do they win the people? Are sinners saved? Do they, repentant and forgiven, go rejoicing away? No. Are believers refreshed? Do you know of any who have made spiritual progress under the influence of an entertainment? Do Christians really get helped by them? No. But possibly you do know of young Christians who have by these very things taken the first step on a sad and declining pathway.

But Satan is clever; he is subtle; and if we turn from worldly amusements, he will mix them with religion to suit us; and the deluded Christian, following his own will, and not guided by the Spirit, substitutes that which may sound pious, for that which is openly worldly, and thinks himself at last consistent. Alas, he has only made matters worse! At first sight it certainly does seem incredible that any true Christian could be found willing to listen to precious portions of His Word used or sung, even by the most talented of professional entertainers. The mixture seems too horrible that surely it is a masterpiece of Satan's skill to lead Christians to believe that their presence at such occasions is commendable. In Christendom we often see the church adopting worldly customs on account of not discerning that in the Word of God the cross of Christ has clearly separated His Church and this present evil world. The one who is following Christ could not go on with these things with a good conscience; he could not have pleasure in them. His happiness is in Christ and in Christ's people. How then can he find it in that world that crucified his Lord? Besides, he is better employed. He does not stand about idle, waiting for Satan to send him off on some errand, for surely it is true that “idlers are the devil's workmen”; but he is busy of every day that he lives, and to account to Him fully for every talent entrusted to his charge. We trust enough has been said to show that although recreative exercises are perfectly legitimate and needful for the young Christian, all distinctly uworldly amusements, clubs, and other associations are not for the one who desires to be true to Christ, and to obey the Word of God.

Thus you see, beloved friends, the importance of the very youngest of us knowing not only that our consciences are relieved, but that we are positively brought into a place where there are divine resources, and that we have a new object before us in that blessed Christ who has done all this for us. We have now one to please. Have you the sense of that in your heart, that you have one to please up there in heaven? Do you say, "I have relief in my conscience, I have my sins forgiven me?" Then I ask, what are you doing? Do you say, "God has given me everything here to enjoy, and I am enjoying myself now. I have this world, and I am to enjoy the world. I am of course, to keep myself from the grossly evil things in it. I would not go to the theatre, or to the opera, or to a ball, or a concert, or anything of that kind." But do you think that because you have obsequiously abstained from all that, and have kept away from those gross things, that you are out of the world? Oh, be not deceived. You may have abstained from those things because they offended your conscience, but you are not necessarily apart from the world, because all that is in the world that comes under either of those three heads, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world.

272 For the Christian too, amusements only lead him away to a distance from God, and destroy his communion with Him. All that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father but of the world. The world and its lust pass away, but he that does the will of God abides for ever. The prince of this world is Satan, who seduced Eve with these things, having first of all destroyed her confidence in God; and it was with these things that he tried to seduce the Lord also, although, thank God, in vain. But with little trouble he succeeds but too often to seduce the hearts of men and of Christians; and to cause the pleasures of the world to have more power upon the soul than Christ Himself, than the love of a dying Saviour.

The theatres have been unusually crowded to witness the play. Many ministers have attended, and advised their friends to attend. Some have gone so far as to urge their congregations not to miss such an opportunity. Many Christians, who had never been to a theatre before, have seen the play, witnessing it with tears, and declaring afterwards that they had heard a more powerful sermon from the stage, on a week-day, than they usually hear on a Sunday from the pulpit

I am not generally in the way of hearing theatre intelligence, nor have I gleaned one item of my news from the current newspapers. These facts have been forced upon my attention by hearing of Christians of all kinds debating whether they should go to see the play, and of those who have been earnestly recommending others to go. In all my experience, I have known nothing of its kind which has made so profound an impression upon the entire community. It strikes me as being a very clever move of the Devil to get in the thin end of the wedge of worldliness, and a proof that the Christian profession has no sense of the great gulf existing between Christ and the world. It speaks loudly of the widespread Laodiceanism of the day, and of the great and growing need for every true Christian to be separate in heart and ways from the world, as though it were but yesterday that Christ had been rejected, and the cry had rung from the frenzied lips of hot fanatics—“Away with Him! Away with Him! Crucify Him! Crucify Him!”

"F. C.," Weston-super-Mare. To find professing Christians going after shows and exhibitions of any kind is, in our judgment, a melancholy proof that their hearts have never yet found a satisfying object in Christ. If Christ be dwelling in my heart by faith, I shall not be found at shows. It will not be so much a mere question of the right or the wrong of the thing; but the fact is, it will never occur to me. The Lord Jesus said to the woman of Samaria, "Whosoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst." There is no more longing for the streams of false delight which this poor world offers, when once the heart has found its place beside the fountain of living waters. Do you think Paul ever thought about the right or the wrong of going to any public amusement? "One thing I do," he says. And this is his language, not merely as an inspired apostle, but as a devoted Christian man. It is most deplorable to think of having to reply to such a question; it proves too plainly the low tone of things amongst many who profess and call themselves Christians.

We can make no rule about entertainment. The buoyancy of youth demands a certain amount of liberty which, if kept under godly limits and controlled by godly principles, is all right. For my own part, I have no desire to visit exhibitions and other shows, not on the ground that these amusements are sinful, but simply because I am satisfied without them. Christ and His interests are enough. Besides, souls are perishing and eternity is nearing, and I have neither time nor inclination to mingle with the world in admiring its toys and sharing in its pleasures.

And in the midst of all this, what is it that occupies our attention? Is it the kingdoms of this world? or is it the kingdom of God? Is it the politics of earth, or the politics of heaven, that we go in for? Is it cinematographic representations, athletic sports, theatrical performances, or political meetings that swallow up our leisure hours, or is it the society of the people of God we seek, where His word is reverenced and read, and where prayer is wont to be made? Are we, like some who are described in this epistle, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God?

Beware! The communication media of the day form the mind and character. Immoral and violent TV, radio, movies and literature wreck morals.

In these words the Holy Spirit has uncovered for us the root of much failure and weakness amongst the children of God. The idolized thing becomes like a film over the eye, dimming its vision of the brighter things above. Here I feel very sympathetic with my younger brothers and sisters, for I am now sufficiently old to look back to youthful days when there were not nearly the number of clever things invented, calculated to fascinate and fill the mind to the exclusion of far better things. In my young days there were no motor-cars, no aeroplanes, no radio, no television, no cinemas, enticing you to spend time on them rather than on the service of the Lord and things of eternal value.