3rd December

Not sure how it happens, but today I feel exhausted again. I guess I’ve done too much as I’ve barely sat down all day. It’s a mental exhaustion, dealing with loss is so very draining and sometimes I need space to grieve. But it’s all a balance as last weekend I really enjoyed getting out of the house and meeting people. So maybe I don’t always get my activity levels quite right, but life is far too complicated and today there were people I was really happy to see, so no way could put them off. Then this afternoon was retail therapy time which meant a little Christmas shopping and also a treat for the house again. So we already have a new TV, and Freesat HD enabling me to get rid of my old Skybox, and today we added a Blue-Ray player to our collection of toys. That means Santa now has instructions to provide an upgrade to my son’s Lord of The Rings DVD box set… a regular favourite over the past few years! But tonight, apparently, it’s Transformers 3, Nachos and Chocolate Orange Sponge Pudding… I can cope nicely, thank you very much. But I do miss my movie cuddle curling up on the settee with Jane…

But you know what, no matter how hard I try I cannot begin to imagine there will be TV in heaven. Perhaps that’s due to my personal sensitivity to the corruptive influence that so much programming has. For sure I’ve got used to violence, sex and profanity that pervade almost every movie, and yes I do enjoy watching many films. But does that make it right? I mean really right in God’s eyes... is it just me that feels uncomfortable watching say a Certificate 12 that quite conceivably would have been classified a 15 or even 18 not so many years ago? Why do movies have to take us into a world where our experience would at best be very damaging, immoral and often illegal if it were to be real life. Is it not possible to entertain in a more wholesome way without feeding upon the perverse side of human nature?

Of course I see that in the portrayal of violence it’s necessary to dramatise in some way in order to progress the plot. But what possesses any ‘normal’ person with the desire to view explicit gory details in order to engage with ever increasing shock value. Why go to the movies to be actually traumatised? Similarly with sex scenes. It may not be politically correct to say, but I see no difference between actors who are paid to perform sexually and the prostitutes that are paid for similar function. And actors are all potentially someone’s husband or wife in real life so really it’s adultery. And I’ve been quite disappointed to view Certificate U, supposedly suitable for our very youngest and yet still incorporating some mild bad language. Why is it necessary? Is it not possible to create good quality entertainment without including all this stuff?

I believe that much of what we view is not just designed to engage us emotionally, but rather to push us to greater and greater extremes. It’s addictive and seductive damaging the moral fabric of society. Even watching the news regularly we become desensitised to real life horror. How many famines, wars, floods when reported actually shock us to the core? Profanity on TV and in the movies is not just the norm but has become almost compulsory, especially in comedy. Indeed it seems that often it’s the bad language itself which is intended to be the joke rather than a clever word play. And the boundary of filmed sex scenes simply being acted out suggestively has long been broken with an anything goes approach. At least as regards violence most of what we see is just an act… or is it? But for sure boundaries are always being pushed and the whole industry seems determined to take us more and more into Godless depraved immorality. But as our country is most definitely post-Christian maybe it’s none of my business. The Lord will have the last say in due course though for sure.

What a rant, sorry. Am I a prude…? No, but maybe I should be. Am I guilty of hypocrisy…? In measure, but I don’t want to be. In many ways my life is too worldly and for sure heaven will be a very different place to live.

Romans 12:2 ‘Don’t copy the behaviour and customs of this world, but let God transform you into a new person by changing the way you think.’ (NLT)