Are You Not Entertained?
One of my favorite film scenes in the movie Gladiator was when Maximus, having slaughtered the whole lot of opposing gladiators, notices the lack of applause at his quick delivery. Once he chucks his sword at the uppity-ups in the crowd, he screams, “Are you not entertained? Are you not entertained?” Then, of course, people start to applaud.
Such a Roman gladiatorial match crowd is a fine example of what pastors (particularly youth pastors) are struggling with today. Who could compete with a gladiatorial match? Carnage. Suspense. They even attempted to make history come to life by reenacting ancient battles where the actors really fight and really die–at the expense of no one important, mind you. Imagine an ancient church hosting gladiatorial matches to attract Romans–where the gladiators were only maimed, not killed.
When I read authors like Neil Postman (Amusing Ourselves to Death) or Allan Bloom (The Closing of the American Mind), I’m tempted to lose heart because, it’s not just the church that is being ruined by this addiction to entertainment. And then, I come face to face with it when a parent tells me her child is bored with our student ministry programs. I wasn’t at all offended, since I’ve seen kids get bored with the coverage of the Iraq War, the Gulf Oil Spill, and even with the never-ending SAW saga. They get bored with anything that doesn’t take things a step further. And what I’ve realized with my own children is that, the more you try and whet their appetite for entertainment–even if only temporarily to capture their attention for a good reason–they want more. More games. More jokes. More fun activities. Then many parents treat it like a trade-off. For every four Wednesday nights my kids give you, you should give them at least one fun activity a month. Hopefully, we see the problem here. For even the parent, both fellowship with the Body of Christ and study of God’s Word are a drudgery.
So, I ask you, what is the answer?
Some argue for compromise. We should understand this ADD generation and just deal with it. Or some may argue that children today are visual learners, which means they learn only through eye candy. We start them out on the electric babysitter (TV, ex. Sesame Street) and it’s all downhill from there. I mean, what do you expect us to do? Deprogram them and start over? Some would say this compromise is similar to translating the Bible into an indigenous language. Those poor people who no longer spoke Latin were forced to listen to Latin masses up until Vatican II! And until people like John Wycliffe or Martin Luther, no one dared translate the Vulgate so that common people could understand. Is that what we’re doing? Withholding entertainment to maintain power? Quite the contrary. It seems as though, if we mastered entertaining our students, we could have them eating out of our hands. But is this the way? Many student pastors wouldn’t admit it, but this is what they’re trying to do. By baiting kids with sensual candy every week, they’re perpetuating a serious problem.
Instead, do we withdraw? Do we strip the walls of rock band posters, refuse to play video games with our students, go back to hymnals, and save my jokes for the annual youth party? Again, no. We are where we are. There’s no denying it. Our kids are pumped full of so much information but they have neither knowledge nor wisdom. Adults treat students like miniature versions of their failed, miserable selves, and they cannot train them to be true men and women. Kids can make straight A’s and hit home runs but they’ve never considered if there’s anything in the world worth losing their lives over. They don’t think about this because no one’s making them. I don’t think the answer is to cold turkey strip them of any cultural details they find familiar: TV’s, computers, rock instruments, lights, etc. But I do think it would be beneficial to teach every student what it means to renounce these things. Someday, we may not have a choice. Thirty years from now, we may lose all these basic technological “necessities.”
Is this not the problem Christ pointed out to the rich young man: Go, sell your possessions, and come, follow me. Then you will have treasures in heaven. Later, Christ commented that it was hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. The same is true of a culture that thinks it cannot survive without the technological trappings, without entertaining speakers, without the best music in town. Students who have “lost interest” in either Christ or the gospel have done so simply because the Holy Spirit never truly brought them to life. Or at least, they’ve been so inundated that they’re deaf to the truth. Many “bored” students out there are this way because they’d rather save their lives than lose them for Christ.
I have been “complimented” by a lady telling me she heard a student say he thought I was cool. I don’t say that to boast; it offends me. The reason it offends me is because that kid never comes to our services or shows any signs that he’s walking with the Lord. So what if he thinks I, or anyone else, is cool! The question I must ask at the end of the day is not, “Did I entertain them?” Rather, the question is, “Are they learning to give up their lives for Christ’s sake?” At the end of a retreat, my main concern cannot be, “Did you like the music, the speakers?” Rather, “Have you heard anything from the Lord?” At the end of my life, the question isn’t, “Did they like me? Did they get my jokes?” The question is, “Have I been faithful to my Lord and to the gospel?” The question is not, “Did I attract spectators?” The question is, “Did I make disciples?”
Beyond Despair 