I’m just going to say one more time that, in a society that has lost its moral way, Christian women today have to be more than a little different in our entertainment choices. Entertainment is optional. I can go to heaven without watching a single movie or attending a single play. Thus, if the language, portrayal of sex and the blasphemy in a movie or play is antithetical to the Biblical values system, Christians should choose some other form of entertainment.
I go online and read reviews of movies or plays—reviews often written by people who have no practical religious affiliation—and find that a certain play or movie is at best littered with and, at worst, saturated with language that Christians should be working to keep from their minds rather than inviting into their hearing while paying money to do just that. Secular commenters are sometimes appalled by the same show that Christians applaud on Facebook. The non-Christians are shocked by the amount of inappropriate (i.e. sinful) language, while the Christians are applauding the wonderful evening enjoyed while ingesting it!
I know all the repeated criticisms of those of us who keep saying it. “Everyone has to make the judgment calls about entertainment.” …”Who are you to be the media police?” …”Just because I am sitting there watching the real world, history, fantasy, etc., doesn’t mean that I am approving of every thing about every scene.”… I have also witnessed a generation of children grow into adults who can see little difference between the church and the world: in how we dress, behave, speak and entertain ourselves. They cannot recognize holiness (separation from the defilement of the world) and so they, in disillusionment do not see the choice to follow God as a clear and distinguishable path to be with Him. Christianity becomes, to the observant teen, a sort of hamper to staying within societal norms, rather than a full-scale rejection of sin and the father of lies and a hatred for the things that are of the world.
Evangelism is diluted by the near-absence of any call to repentance—the crux of the salvation plan. People who are invited to become a part of a church that demands no holiness, of course, see no need to change sinful practices and life-styles. Conviction and the putting away of sin—the hardest part of the salvation plan—is the part about which that the candidate for baptism has little understanding. In other words, evangelism by those who are watching, dressing and speaking just like the world is relatively empty of conviction to change upon becoming a “disciple.” It’s important to remember, though, that a “Christian” is literally a “follower of Jesus.”
So WOULD you follow him into the theater or into your living room to see, for instance, these movies that many of those who claim allegiance to him are/have been posting about seeing in the past couple of years? Is this where Jesus would lead the new Christian?
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8503618/parentalguide
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1745960/parentalguide
These are just two examples of many from which I could choose. But let me be clear. People who need the gospel see our choices. Our children, who need the gospel, see our choices. We take them to Bible class, where they are exposed, at least, to the concept of holiness. They hear the readings and learn some of the verses.
Be ye holy as a I am holy.
Come ye out from among them and be ye separate, says the Lord
Whatever is true, just, pure, lovely, of good report—if there’s anything praiseworthy or virtuous, think on these things.
Let no filthy communication proceed from your mouth.
But put on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make no provision for the flesh, to gratify its desires.
For this is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality; that each one of you know how to control his own body in holiness and honor, not in the passion of lust like the Gentiles who do not know God; that no one transgress and wrong his brother in this matter, because the Lord is an avenger in all these things, as we told you beforehand and solemnly warned you. For God has not called us for impurity, but in holiness. …
Therefore go out from their midst, and be separate from them, says the Lord, and touch no unclean thing; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to me, says the Lord Almighty.” Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, bringing holiness to completion in the fear of God.
I can hear some already: “But my Jesus ate with sinners.” Yes. He did. But your Jesus did not go to the arena of his day to be entertained by filth, to laugh at sexual humor and the taking of His own name in vain. Those who wear His name, but who try to put Jesus in an arena of being entertained and gratified by those who are mocking God, using impure and base language and applauding sinful sex, know better. They are not honest with the Scriptures. They are reaching to try and justify the gratification of their own desires for ungodly entertainment.