Fun Friday: Christian Guide to Entertainment

Before I continue any further concerning entertainment topics like anime, films, or video games, I want to first address the elephant in the room about Christians enjoying entertainment. This is somewhat of a contentious discussion in the Christian community and, as a result, I want to develop the biblical framework— a Christian guide you’d might say— for enjoying entertainment. This is important for understanding how Christians should interact with entertainment as a whole and to prayerfully discern how to enjoy life using the Scriptures as our framework. Before I do though I want to address the opposers of entertainment.

Jokes aside, I want to address the real concerns that Christians have with entertainment and acknowledge the valid critiques against it. There are some Christians that are heavily against electronic forms of entertainment such as TV/movies, video games, anime, etc. so much so, that many of them have gotten rid of TV sets altogether. The reasons for this typically fall into 3 categories.

1. Society (Satan) influences people to sin through entertainment
2. Entertainment is being used to brainwash/disciple people, especially children
3. Entertainment is a huge waste of time and can be spent more productively

Many people might name this differently, but essentially, all of the concerns typically fall under these three categories. Let’s consider each one.
Society (Satan) influences people to sin through entertainment. Christians who oppose entertainment have a valid point here. With the advancement of technology, humanity has gotten access to a lot more sin namely lust. It’s a pretty well known fact that pornography has run rampant throughout America and even in the church. One look at the TV or social media and you’ll quickly see the constant temptations present behind the screen. Not to mention that society loves to use the media to preach their false gospel of ‘self’ which pushes for LGBTQ propaganda and abortion. As a result, in order to put safeguards in place, many Christians have gotten rid of their TV and video games while some churches even require that their members do not watch entertainment.



Response: First, I want to be clear, if that is you, I hear you and if you believe that that is what is best for you and your family, I 100% support it. I always say, in this article and many others, that we must submit ourselves to the Holy Spirit and His Scriptures as we use wisdom and discernment when we interact with all forms of entertainment. Whether that is sticking to watching certain shows or playing certain games, or just not doing any entertainment at all, I always push for Scripture-based discernment first and foremost.
However, I want us to avoid the common mistake of attacking the mediums rather than the means of sin. What I mean is that we believe that with the rise of technology that human beings have become more sinful but that isn’t the case. It would be way too long to quote it all here, but take a quick read of Leviticus 18. God had to describe a multitude of sexual sins for the Israelites to not do such as adultery, homosexuality, incest, and even beastiality, not because they weren’t doing them and God was being careful, but because they were doing them and God had to tell them to stop! Leviticus 18:1-5 (CSB) says, “The Lord spoke to Moses: ‘Speak to the Israelites and tell them: I am the Lord your God. Do not follow the practices of the land of Egypt, where you used to live, or follow the practices of the land of Canaan, where I am bringing you. You must not follow their customs. You are to practice my ordinances and you are to keep my statutes by following them; I am the Lord your God. Keep my statutes and ordinances; a person will live if he does them. I am the Lord.’”
Romans 1:29-32 reminds us, “They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, arrogant, proud, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, senseless, untrustworthy, unloving, and unmerciful. Although they know God’s just sentence—that those who practice such things deserve to die—they not only do them, but even applaud others who practice them.” My point is that the medium may have changed but the sinful heart of humanity hasn’t. Since the beginning of time, human beings have been ‘inventors of evil’ and don’t need to be taught how to sin. If you think that people are more sinful because they have technology, then I think you’re giving our ancestors WAY too much credit because we see, from the beginning of the Bible, that human beings are horrendously sinful.
Does society use technology to enforce sin? Absolutely! But I just want you to have a biblical view of sin and not think that the problem is because the sin is coming through a screen. Do you know what the number one genre for books is? Romance, and not the innocent Cinderella type either, more like the 50 Shades of Gray type. The difference between a screen and a book can never change a lustful, angry, sinful and evil heart. Only the Gospel of Jesus Christ is able to turn dead men alive again and unless the Gospel is the true source of our repentance, righteousness, and sanctification, we will never be any less sinful because we don’t watch TV or play video games. 
Entertainment is being used to brainwash/disciple people, especially children. Again, I 100% understand this statement! It is unfortunately true that many Christian parents, due to ease and comfort, have resorted to the TV, tablets, video games, and phones to be the primary disciple-makers of their children. Then when they get older, they wonder why their children fall so quickly into the world because they’ve been brainwashed by it. Multiple researchers such as Barna Research and Lifeway Research estimate that about 65% to 75% of children that grew up in church have left Christianity by the time they’re an adult. In some cases, I’ve even heard higher! Unfortunately, with the invention of smartphones and social media, children now have access to all types of ideologies, heresies, religions, and so-called experts who teach them about the way of life through sinful means. This doesn’t include the amount of insane things that are placed inside of TV, films, video games, and anime. Especially with games like Grand Theft Auto or kids watching incredibly inappropriate shows such as Game of Thrones (yes, I’ve really heard of this), it’s no wonder that parents are on guard against the screen.
Not to mention the very real addiction side of the problem. Kids are so impressionable that they can easily become addicted to screens which can have long term effects in the future such as lack of exercise, intimacy, focus, etc when they get older. There are so many issues concerning brainwashing and sinful discipling that occur when a person, especially a child, has long term exposure to entertainment.
     


Response: As a parent myself, this is also a real concern of mine and I can understand why, for the sake of children, that parents are willing to get rid of all screens in the house altogether. However, once again, I don’t think it’s the medium that is bad but the means, in this case, content. In fact, there are 3 things that come into play with children and entertainment/screen interactions: character, content, and context. ‘Character’ might seem odd but let me explain. Proverbs 22:6 (ESV) says, “Train up a child in the way he should go; even when he is old he will not depart from it.” People oftentimes limit this to spiritual disciplines but the verse doesn’t limit this because this verse is talking about training up a child in all things, and this can include entertainment and screen interaction.
Let’s be honest, unless we choose to live out in the wilderness and never have contact with civilization, it’s almost guaranteed that our children will be in contact with screens. (You’re looking at a screen reading this article!) Eventually, our children will interact with phones, TV’s, video games, etc, and it’s wise to train up a child in how they can interact with these things while keeping their Christian character strong and intact. 
Personally, I grew up in both households (by the same parents), where the first half of my life was very minimal screen interaction (we did have a Sega Genesis) and the second half of my childhood was a ton of screen time as a young believer. My Christian parents were wise in developing godly character in me with my interaction with screens, primarily video games. To put this in perspective during those years, I was a devout Christian (still am by the grace of God), regularly studied my Bible, prayed, played basketball and football, played outside with my friends, played keyboard every week at church, worked part time at the school store, and I graduated high school with a 4.3 GPA— all while being a very heavy gamer on Xbox and anime nerd. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m not trying to say this to brag because I was just as much of a messed up teen with my own struggles with sinful lusts, emotions, and actions, and I was BY NO MEANS a ‘perfect kid’, but I just want to put this in perspective for some Christian parents who think that playing video games, watching anime, or TV is automatically destructive. In fact, it was because my parents trained me up to have godly character as a child, that I’m able to carry a greater quality of devotion to the Lord, focus on family and ministry, while still being a gamer. 
My point with ‘character’ is that whether you decide to give your child a tablet at young age, wait until their teens, or just not give them any screens until their 18, it’s imperative that, as Christian parents, we teach them how to maintain their godly character, priorities, and responsibilities, when they eventually interact with entertainment or any screen.
This leads to the second part about content. Yes, I was (still am) a gamer and I liked to watch anime growing up, but my parents were sure to check the contents of what I was watching. Now, before I continue, I’ve stated in other articles how Paul quoted the pagan philosophers Aratus, Menander, and Epimendes in Acts 17:28, 1 Corinthians 15:33, and Titus 1:12 respectively, not because he was supporting their views but because all truth belongs to God and that we can learn genuine Biblical truths even from pagan sources. This doesn’t mean that my parents let me watch anything and everything in hopes that I would learn something biblical but my content was curated to help build godly character.
For example, I watched Christian-based films such as The Lord of The Rings, Chronicles of Narnia, and even VeggieTales, and the anime’s/cartoons that I watched (unfortunately, I am a big Spongebob fan so that doesn’t count) were shows that expressed godly virtue. A prime example of this is Avatar: The Last Airbender. If you’ve never watched this show, it is WAY more than just a little kids show. It has a 9.3/10 on IMDB making it the 7th highest rated show of ALL TIME and it has powerful themes, lessons, and character development throughout the series asking profound life questions like, ‘what does it mean to be a leader’, ‘can I be forgiven’, ‘can I be redeemed’, ‘how do I endure suffering’, ‘how do I deal with conflict especially with those I love’, ‘how do I learn from people different than me’, (from a woman’s perspective) ‘if I’m not the standard of beauty, can I still be a feminine woman’, ‘if I don’t have the same power as other people, can I still be a strong man and my family’s protector,’ ‘how do I learn the virtues of justice, humility, wisdom, self-control, or even faith, hope, and love?’ Or my two personal favorites: ‘what does it mean to be a good man’ and ‘am I willing to make the ultimate sacrifice for the greater good?’ These are not surface level questions, and trust me, this show does not give you surface level answers. In fact, you would be hard pressed to watch this show and NOT see biblical themes all throughout the show. The craziest part about it is that this is a KID’S SHOW and it does a superb job at tackling these issues. 
Don’t get me wrong, even as a child, I did live as a Christ follower as any believing child would do; however, being able to see and experience godly virtues through the lens of Avatar: The Last Airbender was incredibly beneficial, not just to my life but to many other lives because it was a character-building show. There’s a reason why people love other films like Pursuit of Happiness, Matrix, Finding Nemo, Up, Lion King, Prince of Egypt, Forrest Gump, Shawshank Redemption, Spirited Away, Saving Private Ryan, and many more because these films speak so deeply to the human condition that we can connect to them and even grow in our Christian perspective on life because of the quality of virtuous content in these films.
 
Lastly, context is something that can be very impactful for kids interacting with screens. From personal experience, most of my friends and mentors from church lived in different neighborhoods across the city, and my first ‘discipleship group’ was actually through playing Call of Duty and Halo (to be fair, my family is military and I grew up in a military town so I’m used to being in that environment. I mean I even had a neighbor who was a Navy Seal lol). During these times, my friends and mentors would, yes, play together, but also we would be praying together, talking through Scripture, expressing our struggles, and asking questions that we had about Christianity all while we were getting headshots on a video game. I’ve even developed discipleship relationships as an adult using this same medium of video games. Furthermore, it’s much different if a kid is just watching a show by themselves versus that same kid watching a show with their parents and being taught valuable lessons through it. I remember watching movies and TV shows within the context of my family and they would teach me valuable lessons (character) through the content we were watching.
Again, I am NOT saying that you have to put screens in front of your kids. However, I am saying that, being a product of that environment and knowing other people personally that have been raised through that environment, when it’s done right with Christian character, content, and context in view, this can be a very useful tool and weapon against the influence of this sinful society. 
Entertainment is a huge waste of time and can be spent more productively. Again, this is a valid point. It’s incredibly easy for people (famously men) to come home from work and sit in front of a TV lifelessly for 6 hours and then go to bed while ignoring their priestly duties as a husband and father. Furthermore, it’s common for young people to have their priorities all mixed up as they are spending hours upon hours on video games, Netflix, or Hulu as they are distracting and wasting their lives away. It’s sad that even Christians are willing to spend 5 hours a day watching Netflix or playing Fortnite, yet they can’t even spend 5 minutes reading the Bible or praying to the Lord.

Response: This is a valid concern as both a Christian and a pastor myself, I wholeheartedly agree. However, I want to also express what the Bible says multiple times in places like Ecclesiastes 8:15 (CSB), “So I commended enjoyment because there is nothing better for a person under the sun than to eat, drink, and enjoy himself, for this will accompany him in his labor during the days of his life that God gives him under the sun.” In other places where similar statements are repeated, the verses say ‘it is a gift from God.’ Yes, we should be fervent in prayer, reading our Bibles, fasting, evangelism, holiness, disciple-making, ministry, marriage, parenting, work/career, etc. On the flip side, that doesn’t mean that we aren’t allowed to enjoy life in the Lord. We are allowed to have fun, relax, laugh, and enjoy ourselves as long as it is in a glorifying way to the Lord and in our walk with Him. If someone has a deep, intimate walk with the Lord, is active in his marriage, family, church, and community, and decides after a long day of hard work and time spent with the family, at an appropriate time, they choose to relax by playing a video game— biblically, I don’t see anything wrong with that. Their priorities are in order, and if he’s playing video games or watching a TV show/movie to relax and recharge and not to escape life’s responsibilities, then I wouldn’t say it’s a waste of time but it’s a proper use of time. There is a time and place for everything under the sun, including entertainment and the difference between it being a waste and being useful is how it’s utilized properly.

Three Warnings for people on both sides of the discussion.

1. Avoid Legalism

This is mainly for Christians who oppose general technology mediums for entertainment. Don’t fall into legalism that avoiding entertainment or not watching TV somehow makes you more holy. This is an unfortunate trap for many churches. Pastors and leaders believe that if they can force their members to not drink alcohol, watch TV/movies, or play video games, that somehow, the removal of these things will make them more holy. Philippians 2:12-13 (CSB) says, “Therefore, my dear friends, just as you have always obeyed, so now, not only in my presence but even more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling. For it is God who is working in you both to will and to work according to his good purpose.”
This verse shows us 3 things: we must work hard during the sanctification process to live holy, we must work out our own salvation, and it is God who is working in us. This means that ultimately God is the one that is making us holy in the first place. Also, there is an emphasis on us working out our own salvation. Now Paul obviously isn’t saying that the Christian walk is a ‘Jesus and me’ journey because that would be a blatant contradiction of Scripture; we do need the Christian community found in the church. However, what Paul is saying is that there is a very personal aspect to the sanctifying work of salvation. People struggle with different sins and have different proclivities to sin. Some Christians may not have a problem with sexual lust but they struggle heavily with alcoholism, or others struggle with pride and anger. My point is that we shouldn’t fall into legalism in the area of entertainment because we believe that if we (or our children) don’t engage in entertainment, we are somehow more holy or our children are ‘closer to being saved.’ At the end of the day, the source of our holiness comes from God Himself, and just because something may work for one person/family doesn’t mean it works for all families. Just like the personal examples I used earlier about video games and films, I am not suggesting that everyone should be doing that as a family, nor do I expect most people to do so. My goal for bringing up those examples was to show that some people/families have positive experiences with entertainment mediums such as TV/movies, anime, and video games and that we shouldn’t be so legalistic and closed minded when discussing the topic.

2. Avoid Antinomianism

On the flip side, this does not mean that Christians should be antinomian (anti-law) so much so, that we have no self-control or guardrails for holiness. Some people take Christian liberty past its limits and do things that are downright foolish. Sure you can watch TV, but should you really be watching Game of Thrones (especially, without VidAngel?) Yeah, you can watch anime, but should you really be watching anime that is littered full of sexual fanservice? Can your kids play video games sometimes? Sure, but should a 12 year old really be playing Grand Theft Auto or should you be playing the game for 6 hours a day? Is enjoying life a gift from God? Of course! But that is not God’s primary goal nor will for us in this life. 1 Peter 1:16 doesn’t say, ‘Be happy, for God is happy.’ It says ‘Be holy, for God is holy.’ Happiness (enjoying life) can be a product of holiness but it’s not the main thing. Therefore, we should be wise and holy with our choices of entertainment and make sure that we’re doing it in such a way that honors God in your heart and before other people.

3. Avoid Pride

At its core, ultimately we need to avoid pride. We don’t need to be pridefully legalistic in which we believe that we are better parents, more holy, or earn extra grace points with God because we don’t have a screen in our house. On the flip side, we don’t need to be pridefully antinomian to the point that we believe we can watch or play anything and everything that comes across our screens without being negatively affected by it. Satan is a real adversary who is willing to use every method and means possible to cause us to fall and stumble; therefore, with this in mind, we have to practice wisdom, holiness, and self-control with entertainment and not be consumed by it but to enjoy it properly.
Now that we’ve explained some of the concerns and proper guardrails concerning entertainment (rather exhaustively, I might add), let's discuss some simple guidelines for Christians who do decide to interact with any form of entertainment. In fact, I already named them: character, content, and context. I’ll go over these briefly.

Character. Your holiness and walk with God must be both first and central to your life. What I mean is that all forms of entertainment, including the things we’ll be talking about in Fun Friday articles, must be both secondary and supplementary to your walk with Jesus Christ. This will fuel everything from what you watch/do, when you do it, and even how long you do it. Your godly character will fuel your content and your context for entertainment. For example, I do love anime but because of my belief in Christ and His work of holiness in me, I am careful about the type of anime I watch so that I don’t set myself up to fall in temptation. I also make sure to watch it in the context with my wife as a date night so that it’s both enjoyable and beneficial for us in that we are spending quality time together and I’m not just aimlessly wasting time. I can’t express this enough but your walk with the Lord must come first. When your spouse, family, friends, or church community think of you, would they primarily think of you as a devout Christ follower or a heavy gamer?
Content. Use biblical wisdom and discernment that you developed from your character-building walk with God to determine what you watch and play. Some of you might be fine with playing certain games or watching certain shows while others are not. The basis for either group of people shouldn’t be ‘keeping up with the Jones’ but about staying in line with the Lord. Ask yourself questions like, ‘is this film God-honoring,’ ‘does this game have godly themes in it’ (Judges was a brutal book in the Bible but it still had Christian themes in it; it is still Scripture after all!) I’m not saying that you can’t watch or play anything with violence in it because even the Bible is very violent, but with character (holiness) in view, we should be very wise with the content that entertains us.
Context. You can be a godly man who loves the Lord, playing a perfectly fine video game, but do it at the wrong time, like on a date night with your spouse. There's nothing wrong with watching a good show but should you be doing that while it’s time to play with your kids? Or this can even mean the context of your individual situation. For example, I sometimes play video games on date night only because my wife is also a big gamer and we’ll play together. Or maybe you’re watching an uplifting movie with your kids and explaining Gospel truths from the film. My point is that the context in which you entertain yourself is all the difference in your activities being wasteful and harmful or encouraging and restful. Though this one is last, it’s still very important, so make sure that if you are going to participate in entertainment, ‘read the room!’

I hope that this encourages you!