Garbage In, Garbage Out

Read Philippians 4:1-23

4. Always be full of joy in the Lord. I say it again—rejoice!
5. Let everyone see that you are considerate in all you do. Remember, the Lord is coming soon.
6. Don’t worry about anything; instead, pray about everything. Tell God what you need, and thank him for all he has done.
7. Then you will experience God’s peace, which exceeds anything we can understand. His peace will guard your hearts and minds as you live in Christ Jesus.
8. And now, dear brothers and sisters, one final thing. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise.
9. Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you. Philippians 4:4-9

In a celebrated Florida murder trial, an adolescent claimed television addiction as his defense for the crime. “The tube made him do it,” his attorney argued.

Despite this argument, media programming never “makes” anyone do anything. What we put in our minds, however, does influence our actions. With this in mind, the apostle Paul advises believers in this last chapter of Philippians to meditate on truth and other pure thoughts. This includes our TV shows, movies, videos, and music. What are you doing to keep the garbage out?

It seems nearly impossible today to think good and pure thoughts when we are constantly bombarded with immoral images, stories, and suggestions. Little entertainment today is free from profanity, “adult sexual themes,” or violence. In addition, many books, magazines, and newspapers focus on the those “big three,” in one way or another.

Many people defend violent, obscene, and sexually explicit media on the grounds that they do no harm. They say that watching violent television doesn’t make people violent. But they miss the point. The evil lies in thinking untrue, bad, wrong, impure, ugly, coarse, and contemptible thoughts. Whether or not we become monsters, we all think monstrous thoughts. Even if all the negative thoughts never corrupt our behavior directly, our minds can still become filled with violent, evil images, and that is an evil in itself.

The situation is not hopeless, however. If you commit yourself to God and follow Paul’s advice here, you can find media entertainment that is clean and even glorifying to God.