A few months ago I announced to the family I was going to do an experiment.
"We are going to cancel the satellite TV subscriptions", I said.
I have to admit, part of it was economical because the cost was around $80 a month. So I phoned the dish company and told them we are taking a hiatus from TV. The withdrawls were heavy at first. The Yankees were in a winning season, I love the Military Channel, and all those cheesy movies were on. We were missing all the talking heads on Fox, the presidential debates were heating up and now the NFL season is on! We were missing all those re-runs of Law and Order too. So you see what we were giving up?
When friends came over the other night for fellowship, I had to apologize because their team was playing in the American League playoffs and guess what? I could not get the game on TV. So with a laptop and MLB.com we were able to catch the score and see my friends team lose. Sorry Josh.
The addiction was heavy at first. Then the sway of that medium began to fade. It was like a breath of fresh air to us as a family again. We actually sat in the living room and talked for a while.
We played games and read books. We play 20 questions and talk about our dreams. And my daughter plays the piano for us. We sing and actually interact. We have the internet. We write blogs and stories. My wife and I started a part time home based business that netted us a nice paycheck the first couple of months. We study and research important topics of our day. We spend time on each other rather than staring at the tube then going to bed bleary eyed. Oh, I must admit we do check out a movie now and then. The library has a bunch of old TV series we like. We just have to be careful of the content and theme of the show.
Years ago when we were a young family we did not have TV. We would rent a video back then. It used to be we had to have our parent's permission to watch TV. Now kids plop in front of the big screen high definition and watch till their hearts content. If that wasn't enough some put the tube in the kids bedroom. There they watch TV or play video games until 2 or 3 in the morning. Is it any wonder Johnny can't spell or perform well in school? Read this article on TV and kids.
Well, I am not down on TV here. I like it. A lot. Maybe too much. It can be good if you are alone and shut in. It can be OK with reasonable guidelines. But how many families have guidelines for TV today? What about all those channels one has to surf through before he can settle on a show? How about the MTV crowd or VH1 or Comedy Central? All these shows mock and ridicule everything a Christian stands for right and decency. What if your child "accidently" sees an R-rated movie and watches all the dirt and filth the world has to offer? I am bothered when I hear a 9 year old say their favorite movie is Gladiator. Gladiator? Not Cinderella or Anne of Green Gables but Gladiator. I am speechless.
I do not think it is a sin to own a TV. Even if you have a big screen high definition set. It is a sin if you cannot control your family with one or you cannot control yourself. The results of my experiment indicate we do better without it.
2 comments:
good article bro. randy...
we had a great night with you and your family when we set the laptop up!!...i wouldn't have traded the fellowship with you for a championship with the indians!!!
josh
Amen!! We have done without tv (cable programming) for a long time now. I'm thinking something like 10 years now. I have three children (21, 19 and 17). My husband likes the history channel, ESPN (baseball and football) and other learning channels. It was hard to do away with the cable at first like you said only because that is the only thing we knew to occupy our time. But it was keeping me from us from spending time in the Bible as much and we spent little time talking together. The tv was always on something. Then we had the problem of drifting to programs that were not honoring to God. So since it was more of a downfall and hinderance to me than it was to my husband he agreed to do away with the cable. He has often preached how it helped our family in so many ways. He will not say that tv is wrong or sinful...only what comes through it and how much it consumes our lives. We do watch dvds but we can choose what ones we feel are okay. We don't allow any profanity or sexual content at all. In fact...we don't even get PG movies for the most part because they are full of sin and filth. So we tend to stay with rated G...but even some of those have things that insinuate things and put thoughts in our heads or are just plain not appropriate.
Thank you for this post and this testimony. I can agree with you 100%!!!
We do watch baseball and football on tv though. We do have our rabbit ears that allow us to see most of them. That is just something we enjoy to watch. But as you know....that doesn't come on very often to where we can do that so it doesn't consume our lives. It is just enjoyment for this family of sports lovers.
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