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When you live a holy life and allow the Spirit to lead you, He grows you incrementally in Christlikeness. That means you're more pure today than yesterday. You seek holiness more today than you sought sin last week. It means your eyes will desire to see the noble things and not the base things.
I strive to maintain a strict filter of what goes into my mind. I don't watch movies often, I don't like secular books, I put in a strict limit on my web searches, and I watch only a few television shows. Satan has done a great job of saturating the media with profanity, blasphemy, nudity, homosexuality, and every other thing you can imagine that God hates.
Never was that more apparent to me than today. I am not saying I am SO holy. I have a long way to go. But I am only remarking on the benchmark that was put under my nose today and I was struck by the force of it. In looking at The Weather Channel's pictures of the looming storms that are due to arrive in NY any moment, I was wowed by satan's presence there:
If you enlarge the picture it gets even more dramatically obvious. Sex, money, nudity, sex with ghosts and more sex.
I'm not naive. I know that there are a plethora of posters and advertisements out there that are doing a good job promoting satan's works of darkness. What I am remarking on is that this is the first time in years that I saw any photo of Times Square with its blatant demonic trade, and it sucker-punched me in the stomach. The instant I saw it, it was like a physical blow. THAT is sanctification, and THAT is the boast: I'm boasting on the Holy Spirit's work which today showed me a benchmark of the progress He has wrought in me, Jesus's new creature.
I had looked up the photo from a link on The Weather Channel, but now I see it in quite a different dimension. Rather than seeing it simply as a snapshot of an oncoming weather system, it seems to me for all the world to be God's looming judgment over sin.
I strive to maintain a strict filter of what goes into my mind. I don't watch movies often, I don't like secular books, I put in a strict limit on my web searches, and I watch only a few television shows. Satan has done a great job of saturating the media with profanity, blasphemy, nudity, homosexuality, and every other thing you can imagine that God hates.
Never was that more apparent to me than today. I am not saying I am SO holy. I have a long way to go. But I am only remarking on the benchmark that was put under my nose today and I was struck by the force of it. In looking at The Weather Channel's pictures of the looming storms that are due to arrive in NY any moment, I was wowed by satan's presence there:
I'm not naive. I know that there are a plethora of posters and advertisements out there that are doing a good job promoting satan's works of darkness. What I am remarking on is that this is the first time in years that I saw any photo of Times Square with its blatant demonic trade, and it sucker-punched me in the stomach. The instant I saw it, it was like a physical blow. THAT is sanctification, and THAT is the boast: I'm boasting on the Holy Spirit's work which today showed me a benchmark of the progress He has wrought in me, Jesus's new creature.
I had looked up the photo from a link on The Weather Channel, but now I see it in quite a different dimension. Rather than seeing it simply as a snapshot of an oncoming weather system, it seems to me for all the world to be God's looming judgment over sin.
For your information. Since I couldn't find a contact info. I thought you might want to know that google chrome was trying to filter your website because of malware. My shortcut to your blog was missing under favorites, I went under my history to find it. clicked on it, and got a message that your site contains malware. Since I have been checking your website for years, I was not worried and clicked proceed. God Bless You
ReplyDeleteHi Bill,
DeleteThank you for the blessing :) My email used to be on the right hand menu but I see it is gone now. I'll fix that. I had been using Chrome but over the last months I've had increasing problems with it, flash crashes and slow-downs, hang ups and all that. So I deleted Chrome and switched to Firefox (that's probably when the email disappeared.) I was really wondering about chrome and the issues that started cropping up. I had uninstalled and re-installed twice, and also upgraded several times etc. My Norton Power Eraser and Norton Virus Scan showed up nothing.
I wonder if the assertion of malware has anything to do with Chrome problems...or if it is just the usual malignancy against conservative sites. Hmmm
Thank you for letting me know! I will check it out!! Bless you as well.
I can understand where you are coming from :) it's amazing how sin sensitive we become once we follow the will of God and trust Jesus to be our Lord daily! I have recently decided to stop watching tv all together and let me tell you the thought scared me just like the times I was prompted by the Holy Spitit to foresake other sinful habits. It's been only a week but I'm staying strong and in the Word. Thank you this article Ms. Prata may God bless you even more so as He already has.
ReplyDeleteGood for you for giving up TV, if that is your decision! I know a lot of Christians (online) who have made that decision and have not regretted it. A friend I have in real life did get rid of cable and joined Netflix, where they can choose instant tv or movies that are G-rated and have no commercials.
DeleteIt is a terrible struggle for families with children. I cannot imagine their stresses and pressures in this media and gameboy saturated world. I'll pray for your to have strength to continue in your decision
Thank you sister in Christ :) It's a bit challenging because there's a large tv in my bedroom and my wife doesn't want to stop watching tv. I've read some people have to have the tv on all the time bc it emits a certain frequency that people find calming. As for Netflix I have that as well but I feel like it will feed my need to watch tv, the only media I do consume is through YouTube and thats what little selection of Christian cartoons they currently have. I'm ranting I know lol but it's good to know there are others out there like myself.
ReplyDeleteI can imagine the difficulty of trying to give up the habit. I read a book in 1998 that was published in 1978, even before the time when cable television was widely available, that hit me hard. It is called "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television" by Jerry Mander (yes, his real name)."http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Arguments_for_the_Elimination_of_Television
DeleteIn it, Mander proposes
1. While television may seem useful, interesting, and worthwhile, at the same time it further boxes people into a physical and mental condition appropriate for the emergence of autocratic control.
2.It is inevitable that the present powers-that-be (or controllers) use and expand using television so that no other controllers are permitted.
3. Television affects individual human bodies and minds in a manner which fit the purposes of the people who control the medium.
4.Television has no democratic potential. The technology itself places absolute limits on what may pass through it. The medium, in effect, chooses its own content from a very narrow field of possibilities. The effect is to drastically confine all human understanding within a rigid channel.
What binds the four arguments together is that they deal with aspects of television that are not reformable.
And that was BEFORE cable, iTunes, YouTube, Twitter, satellite broadcasting and all manner of instant broadcasting. If we take the premise that in the last 34 years things have not improved, but only declined, because sin degrades the entire universe, then we know and understand that TV is less redeemable than ever.
I was especially struck by #3. And it was your comment about the fact that some people find the tv calming due to a frequency. I know some people believe that, and there IS a frequency, but it actually the opposite of calming. The chapter where Mander discusses what constant television watching does to us BIOLOGICALLY was frightening. The tests and studies have proved that it induces a hypnotic state, dilates our eyes, changes our brainwaves, and more. It literally, biologically, pollutes the brain and causes a physiological change in our body. (I'm going on 20+ years' memory here).
I'm not globally indicting TV and I don't judge anyone who watches. I watch myself, probably more than I should. But knowing how it's controlled by satan, who wishes to present his ideas through it and not the pure ones that TV had the potential to produce, I do try to strictly monitor my intake.
The 1990 Hollywood movie "Avalon" shows how the tv is largely to blame for the breakup of the nuclear family, tracking a Polish immigrant family thru their immigration in the early 20th century thru modern times. The movie clearly shows the hearth is now the tv, but far from facilitating family communication, by definition Tv squelches it, all the while substituting common memories and dreams for some advertiser's version of crass greed and individual envy. The storyline is taken from the director Barry Levinson's own personal history.
Anyway, that is my thought on the calming frequency and tv in general. I applaud your desire to work on giving it up. You've inspired me to renew my own efforts!
Wow such interesting insights! I had no idea that tv has a biological effect on our beings..thank you for your encouragement and input Elizabeth :) I will be praying for you to stay strong and vigilant!
Delete"You will keep him in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on You" Isaiah 26:3
Everything is so blatant yet we are so blind. I have a long way to go but I feel the more I build/ get closer to God the more my sight of things sinful improves. Coming into God is almost like getting laser eye surgery. At first I had terrible vision; it was blurry. Then I got even closer and use glasses; I could see much better. Now I can see a lot of things without my "glasses"; its getting better and better. I say all of that (lol) to say that so many choose not to see because they do not choose God. Sin is in your face everywhere you turn, if you would only choose to see.
ReplyDeleteGrace there is a commerical right now for Liquid Plummer Double impact that reeks of sexual innuendo. I was shocked that cleaners are now even sexualized. What a time we are living in.
As always, thank you for helping me see better using God's word.
Blessings,
Marrell