As most of you know, these LiveDifferent Challenges are simply one way, each week, that we can challenge our culture’s way of thinking, acting, or engaging with the world around us, in hopefully creative ways so that we might better reflect the glory of God. This week, God has me contemplating amusement.
So I wouldn’t say I love all the things I inherited from my parents (let’s just say Jeff has smaller ankles than me), but one thing I am so thankful to get from them is my love of learning. I praise God that my parents somehow rooted in me an insatiable desire to learn and to grow, to avoid stagnation, and to keep moving forward. Just the other day I was telling someone about my unsual childhood as a homeschool kid: “playing outside” was really an undercover way for my mom to teach us about plants, road trips were filled with analogy and spelling games and a hundred questions from the backseat. Science fairs, bugs kept in jars, playroom carpet that had a chess board on it, cooking experiments…my mom was an absolute miracle worker for teaching children the wonder and awe of learning. She turned walking to the mailbox into a field trip! Her secret? She refused to simply amuse us. Instead of taking the easy road of sticking us in front of Sesame Street (and there’s nothing wrong with that sometimes!), she bypassed amusement and entertainment and taught us to think. And I think because of that, I truly love to learn and move and grow more than be amused. Thank you, Mom and Dad!
One of the ways I see this play out in adulthood is that I absolutely never watch TV. It’s not that I discipline myself to not watch TV, I just don’t even like it. It strikes me as mindless amusement at its worse. Now don’t get me wrong…amusement has its place. I enjoy movies every so often, I love love love to read, and I could ride Space Mountain a dozen times if there was no line. Movies are not evil. Books are not evil. Disneyland is not evil (although some would argue with me on that which is fine–I’m happy to lose the argument). But I would suggest that amusement is very dangerous. I suggest that Entertainment and Amusement, in excess, deadens our thirst and hunger for God and retards our spiritual learning and growth.
Let me explain my reasoning: The word “amuse” has several nuanced meanings in history (this comes from the 1828 dictionary): 1) to divert the attention of so as to deceive. 2) to occupy the attention of. 3) To entertain the mind agreeably; to occupy or detain attention with agreeable objects.
Basically, to amuse means to divert away from something of greater importance. It is essentially a playfully light distraction which keeps our mind from being engaged in weightier thoughts or activities. In a time where we need every faculty sharply attuned to the spiritual world around, amusement diverts the attention so as to deceive and keep us what truly matters.
Here is AW Tozer’s thoughts on The Great God Entertainment:
A German philosopher many years ago said something to the effect that the more a man has in his own heart the less he will require from the outside; excessive need for support from without is proof of the bankruptcy of the inner man. If this is true then the present inordinate attachment to every form of entertainment is evidence that the inner life of modern man is in serious decline.
…He has become a parasite on the world, drawing his life from his environment, unable to live a day apart from the stimulation which society affords him …
[However] No one with common human feeling will object to the simple pleasures of life, nor to such harmless forms of entertainment as may help relax the nerves and refresh the mind exhausted by toil. Such things if used with discretion may be a blessing along the way. …
[But] The abuse of a harmless thing is the essence of sin. The growth of the amusement phase of human life to such fantastic proportions is a portent, a threat to the souls of modern men. …
For centuries the church stood solidly against every form of worldly entertainment, recognizing it for what it was — a device for wasting time, a refuge from the disturbing voice of conscience, a scheme to divert attetion from moral accountability. But of late….we have the astonishing spectable of millions of dollars being poured into the unholy job of providing earthly entertainment for the so-called sons of heaven. Religious entertainment is in many places rapidly crowding out the serious things of God. Many churchs these days have become little more than poor theaters where fifth-rate “producers” peddle their shoddy wares with the full approval of evangelical leaders who can even quote a holy text in defense of their delinquency. And hardly a man dares raise a voice against it.”
I know this is harsh! (That’s why I let Tozer say it instead of me…he’s dead so he can say harsh things.) But don’t you sense there is some truth to it? We desperately try to entertain our toddlers so they won’t get bored, then we try to entertain our kids with TV so we can have a break and not have to engage with them too much, then we entertain students in school so that they’ll stay and won’t drop out, then surprise–we’ve bred adults who are hopelessly addicted to the sedating effect of entertainment. I agree with Tozer that there is certainly some value in entertainment that harmlessly allows us to relax, ease tension, and rest. Holy Relaxation is what John Hwang used to call it, or Rest with Accountability. But I do wonder how much this gnawing emptiness in our souls is being artificially satisfied with amusement, dulling our aching hunger for the Real Thing–Christ Himself. It’s like responding to your hunger pangs by drinking a diet soda.
To connect back to how we began, it seems to me that this frenzied addiction to entertainment prevents us from ever really learning and growing. We numb our senses so that we no longer see the beauty and wonder of the simple and beautiful creation around us. We glut our desire for romance and sex with movies, TV and romance novels so that we no longer are satisfied with the simple and beautifully imperfect romance of husband and wife. We divert our attention from the pain and challenge of Truth, by amusing ourselves with light and playful trifles. And sadly, we do this in the church of all places.
So, to conclude, please understand that I am not saying all amusement is evil. God has spoken powerful things to me through movies and novels (see our last LiveDifferent Challenge). There is a time and a place. But just as alcohol can be used in moderation to cheer the heart but can be deadly when abused, so amusement and entertainment should be handled with caution. Our goal is satisfaction not sedation. The world offers entertainment to sedate us from the beautiful pain of life. Christ offers the satisfaction of living fully awake, fully engaged, learning and growing every moment, seeing Him in all of life,. actively involved in letting Him mold us and shape us. So the challenge this week is to sit down and evaluate where exactly your life is filled with entertainment and amusement, then just for this week, cut it out. Cut out the amusement just for a week, to let yourself full engage with the truth, beauty, and pain of life. Instead of entertainment, choose a hike, a nap, an hour picking flowers or taking a walk around the block. Read the Word. Ask God to touch those painful spots that you usually douse with entertainment. Ask God to give you a childlike wonder and love of learning, a desire to grow, to discover, to live full engaged with your senses heightened, not deadened. Ask God for satisfaction, not sedation. Then ask Him to wholly entertain and amuse your heart with the pleasure and joy of Himself.