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All Is Not Lost: A 2003 Cultural Retrospective

There is nothing new under the sun.
—King Solomon

Solomon, of course, wasn’t speaking against innovation or suggesting that cultures don’t change over time. He knew what we know—that as image-bearers of God, we’re called to reflect the creativity and industry of our Creator. That’s why today we travel in cars and airplanes instead of the horse-drawn chariots on which Solomon depended.

What the wise author was speaking of instead is the heart. King Solomon knew that no matter how much the outward circumstances of a culture might change—for better or worse—inward spiritual realities always remain the same. People have—and will always have—a sinful nature. God is—and will always be—perfectly holy. Redemption is found—and only found—in Jesus Christ.

As youth workers rightly cast an eye over popular culture to better understand the young people they serve, it’s vital to remain mindful of those spiritual realities that Solomon wrote about over 2,500 years ago. What was true about humanity and God in Solomon’s day is still true today.

There’s much in popular culture that’s discouraging. And there’s some that’s encouraging. What we must remind ourselves—and communicate to our teens—is that the only hope for any culture is the power of God working in the hearts of humanity. And that begins with us.

power of God working in the hearts of humanity. And that begins with us.

Tolkien

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you know that the third and final installment of the movie epic Lord of the Rings opened around the world to box office success and critical acclaim. And it might not surprise you to learn that the cast and crew seemed to care little for Tolkien’s Christian worldview.

The movie’s director, Peter Jackson, was candid even with the religious press about not sharing Tolkien’s Christian worldview, but added that he and the rest of the people involved in the project were striving for faithfulness to the books and Tolkien’s vision. “We made a commitment early in the process that we were not going to introduce themes that were not a part of the book,” Jackson said. “We worked hard not to bring our personal baggage” to the production.

Television has chosen a different tack.

400 Channels

Thirty years ago, Americans spent their nights watching television shows like The Waltons, Happy Days, and The Six Million Dollar Man—a veritable wholesome family affair. Cable had just arrived on the scene, offering the then-unheard of 35 channels. About half of the television sets in use were still black and white.

Today there’s not much familyfriendly about most of what dances across the dial. Cable and satellite systems offer as many as 400 channels, ranging from cooking networks to roundthe- clock pornography. Every television set is color, but much of what it broadcasts is decidedly off-color: violent and/or sexually explicit content loaded with coarse language.

According to the Parent’s Television Council’s Melissa Caldwell, “You get to a certain point where viewers become inured to certain kinds of content, and so, in order to elicit the same reaction, they keep pushing the envelope.”

Sexuality

One of the trends in television today is its seeming promotion of the homosexual lifestyle. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy on the Bravo channel, features five homosexual men coming to the rescue of styleimpaired heterosexual men. The show has been such a smash hit that Bravo’s sister station, NBC, broadcast several episodes.

To Steven Isaac of Focus on the Family, “television is the biggest avenue for mainstreaming and normalizing homosexuality that we have in our culture, much bigger than film, much bigger than music. Television is the thing that is driving a young generation to embrace and accept homosexuality as normal.”

But there may be a backlash against television in the works. Coupling (a racy sex-based NBC sitcom) was supposed to be the year’s hit show, but it turned into huge failure. Skin (a Fox series about a pornographer and the district attorney bent on shutting him down) was heavily promoted but was cancelled, as well.

Gambling

Network content isn’t all parents and youth workers have to worry about. In what was decidedly worrisome to many, Connecticut officials recently considered a proposal to bring gambling directly into homes via television. The Division of Special Revenue debated whether to allow a cable-access television channel to broadcast horse racing and allow viewers to place bets over the phone.

Opponents quickly lined up against the company’s proposal, calling it another example of the insidious spread of gambling. “It sends a chill down my spine,” said the Rev. Alexis Carol, program director for the Connecticut Council on Problem Gambling. “It is really creating something new, a new gambling venue and one that is more tempting and tantalizing.”

The TV gambling was voted down, but opponents worry that it could be just a matter of time.

Take Heart

Some social critics say today’s teenagers are a generation mostly raised on television—and the morality of the Abercrombie and Fitch and Victoria’s Secret advertisements they see there. But a group of Tucson high school students and their parents circulated a petition asking local retailers to carry more modest clothing. The Tucson modesty petition asked for a larger selection of modest clothing that “shows respect for the body.” A Dillard’s department store in Mesa, Ariz. asked some of the petition signers to serve as fashion consultants, and the manager promised that more modest styles are on the way.

The obviously Christian song, “I Can Only Imagine,” by the band MercyMe, crossed over to the pop charts, and in some parts of the country, hit the number one spot. MercyMe’s keyboard player, Jim Bryson, said that he thought it was a sign that the mainstream music industry is now more open to Christian artists and that Christian bands should record what they have a passion for, not what they think will sell, because, as the success of this song indicates, “You never know.”

So in a day when it doesn’t seem safe to let your kids watch the Super Bowl, there are indications that all is not lost. Parents and leaders are working to stem what they see as the tide of immorality in the media. And there are young people standing up and saying that they won’t be swayed by immoral marketing directed towards them.

Let’s encourage ourselves with these realities. And let’s encourage our young people to stand firm, remembering another of Solomon’s wise admonitions: “Remember your Creator in the days of your youth.”

Jamie Dean is the Editor of the Evangelical Press News and the associate editor of The Charlotte World newspaper. She’s been a professional writer and editor for several years, and she spent a year on the mission field before joining World Newspaper Publishing last year.