49 Sermon Illustrations on Consumerism

Brochure on stewardship with interesting fold-out on our Consumer Culture.

1. Commodification - everything has its price.

2. Insatiablity - enough is never enough.

3. Adoration of the unpossessed - we focus on what we don't have.

4. Winner Takes All - superachievers get most stuff, others get less.

5. Hecticity - we end up with a frenetic life.

6. Instant Gratification - we want pleasure NOW.

7. Debt - something owned is something owed.

8. Deprivation - we feel something important is being withheld from us.

9. Self-Absorption - our self-interests are more important than others'.

10. Devalued Vocation - our income is more important than spiritual calling.

11. Environment Abuse - our technology is dramatically changing God's earth.

12. Escalation of Needs - when consumer needs are met, new needs arise.

Biblical passages are given which counteract this consumer mentality.

To attract churchgoers today, you've got to please the consumers. That means high-tech entertainment. Day care. Self-help groups. No pleas for money. No Bible thumping. Happy customers from California to Maryland are eating up "fast-food religion" this Easter. Pastor Bill Hybel's answer for getting 30- and 40-year-olds into the tent: Marketing. Ask consumers what they want, then let them (as they say at Burger King) have it their way. (USA Weekend: Article re: "New Time" religion)

When William Booth first set eyes on the city of London in 1849, he exclaimed, "What a city to save!" He would devote his entire life to that burden. At one time he broke down, crying out, "Oh God, what can I say? Souls! Souls! Souls! My heart hungers for souls!" With hundreds of "Christian" organizations in operation today, where is the parallel to a sickly William Booth planting his Salvation Army in 58 COUNTRIES while preaching the Gospel in over 34 LANGUAGES?

Where is the modern equivalent to the STAYING POWER of the preachers of yesteryear? Of all ministerial graduates of Yale from 1702-1775, 79 percent served one parish their entire life.

How many missionaries have you heard of like William Carey who taught himself six languages and stayed on the field for forty-two years WITHOUT A FURLOUGH to translate the Scriptures into 44 languages and dialects?

Do you know of a prayer warrior like George Mueller who without a single stewardship program, "Jesus First" pin, Giant Print Bible or 800-toll free number prayed in $7.5 million dollars to feed 2,000 orphans daily, not to mention distributing 111 million Gospel tracts and 300,000 Bibles while supporting 163 missionaries as well? He also read the Bible through over 200 times and went on a nineteen-year, 200,000-mile evangelistic circuit AFTER he was SEVENTY years old.

Would you prefer to discuss the subject of Holy Spirit power? In Charles Finney's day, sea captains testified that conviction broke out among passengers as their ships neared ports where revival was in progress.

When did you last see figures like 50,000 souls out of a total New England population of 300,000 coming to Christ during the Great Awakening of 1740-1770?

Over 10,000 residents of White Clay Creek, Pennsylvania, listened in profound silence to a Whitefield sermon for one and one-half hours THROUGH STEADY RAIN, and in December no less.

Crowds in excess of 6,000 began assembling at 6:00 AM for the first of FOUR daily preaching services by Evangelist Sam Jones - DURING THE FOUR CONSECUTIVE WEEKS of his Nashville campaign. (There were over 10,000 additions to the area churches with the city's entire population numbering only 50,000.)

How would today's cream puff, Rolex watch-wearing "reverends" compare with the caliber of their rugged predecessors as epitomized by the following excerpt from an anonymous Baptist circuit rider's correspondence in 1803:

Every day I travel I have to swim through creeks or swamps, and I am wet from head to feet, and some days from morning to night I am dripping with water... I have rheumatism in all my joints... What I have suffered in body and mind my pen is not able to communicate to you. But this I can say: While my body is wet with water and chilled with cold my soul is filled with heavenly fire, and I can say with St. Paul: "But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy".

During the eighteen years that Torquemada held the Roman Catholic "Holy Office" of Chief Inquisitor, TEN THOUSAND TWO HUNDRED AND TWENTY PERSONS were burned alive, and NINETY-SEVEN THOUSAND THREE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-TWO punished with loss of property, or imprisonment. Canon Llorente, who was the Secretary to the Inquisition in Madrid from 1790-92 and had access to the archives of all the tribunals, estimated that in Spain alone the number of condemned exceeded 3 million, with about 300,000 burned at the stake... Pope Martin V commanded the King of Poland to "burn, massacre... exterminate the Hussites." The Roman Catholic Church has never officially admitted that these practices were evil, nor apologised to the world or to any of the victims or their descendants. (Dave Hunt)

A historian writes of the Anabaptists: Some were racked and drawn asunder; others were burnt to ashes and dust; some were roasted on pillars or torn with red-hot pincers... Others were hanged on trees, beheaded with sword, or thrown into the water... Some starved or rotted in darksome prisons... Some who were deemed too young for execution were whipped with rods, and many lay for years in dungeons... Numbers had holes burnt into their cheeks... The rest were hunted from one country and place to another. Like owls and ravens, which durst not fly by day, they were often compelled to hide and live in rocks and clefts, in wild forests, or in caves and pits.

In 1833, Charles Darwin visited the South Sea island of Tierra del Fuego in search of his elusive "missing link." Upon observing the island's benighted inhabitants, Darwin concluded that he had indeed happened upon a lower stratum of humanity that would indeed support his theory of evolution. Confident in his discovery, he wrote: "The Fuegians are in a more miserable state of barbarism than I ever expected to have seen any human being. The expression of their faces is inconceivably wild, and their tones and gesticulations are far less intelligible than those of domestic animals."

However, after thirty-six years of gloating, Darwin made the mistake of returning to his "island of darkness." To his amazement, he found an entirely different community consisting of churches, schools, homes and every semblance of tranquillity. The mystery was soon unravelled; MISSIONARY JOHN G. PATON HAD INVADED THE HELLHOLE WITH THE WORD OF GOD. Darwin was willing to give credit where credit was due: "I certainly should have predicted that not all the missionaries in the world could have done what has been done." The naturalist was so dumbfounded by what he witnessed that he made a generous contribution to the London Missionary Society. He also renounced his own theory later in life.

As thrilling as this story appears, it is really quite the norm for nineteenth-century missionary activity. For instance, on the South Pacific island of Aneityum (New Hebrides) can be found the famous inscription to Dr John Geddie which reads: "When he landed here in 1848 there were no Christians. When he left there in 1872 there were no heathen."

Then there is that unbelievable account of revival which occurred on Pitcairn Island. Note with wonder what a single King James Bible can accomplish:

The true story of the MUTINY ON THE BOUNTY has often been retold. One part that deserves retelling was the transformation wrought by one book. Nine mutineers with six native men and twelve native (Tahitian) women put ashore on Pitcairn Island in 1790. One sailor soon began distilling alcohol, and the little colony was plunged into debauchery and vice. [used 10/31/99]

Ten years later, only one white man survived, surrounded by native women and half-breed children. In an old chest from the BOUNTY, this sailor found a Bible. He began to read it and then to teach it to the others. The result was that his own life and ultimately the lives of all those in the colony was changed. Discovered in 1808 by the USS TOPAS, Pitcairn had become a prosperous community with no jail, no whisky, no crime, and no laziness.

(Above notes were largely gathered from "Final Authority", by William P. Grady.)

The Steven Spielberg film “Minority Report,” gives its viewers, among other unnerving visions of the future, a glimpse of futuristic advertising. Billboards peer into the retinas of passersby, tailoring their images and sales pitches to fit the individual's interests and shopping patterns.

Such a scene is certainly fit for science fiction, but I wonder if in reality, we are all that far off. A recent news item reported one major city's experiment with “mind-reading” billboards, which boldly charge forward into the future of advertising. These proposed “smart billboards” are equipped with sensors that read radio frequencies from passing vehicles. Images are then molded to fit the desires of the majority based on listener interests and profiles. Or consider an equally inventive but slightly more absurd advertising trial currently being implemented in Europe. For an hourly salary, companies are renting “space” on the foreheads of university students to advertise their products!

Is there any doubt that marketing strategists want our complete attention? Even more so, perhaps they want us to let them do the thinking. Communicated very loudly is the message that all we have to do is “feel” and act on our inner desires, natural impulses, and driving hungers, while money masquerades as king, and marketers bank on the honored position the appetite holds in our consumer-driven society. And the promise is equally clear: If you act on these natural appetites, happiness is attainable.

But what is perhaps the most ridiculous factor in this incredibly influential marketing machinery is that the majority of us know that it's not true! We know that the promises don't pan out. That money can't by happiness, that we can't take anything with us, and that even if you could satisfy people's material and physical wants, you will not succeed in making them happy.

Jesus Christ spoke of the emptiness of the materialistic worldview and the uselessness of storing treasures on earth with piercing and timeless accuracy. (Matthew 6:19) And He spoke of the kingdom of heaven as a merchant searching for fine pearls, willing to sell everything for the pearl of great price. (Matthew 13:45-46) Christ reminds us that creation is good, but it can only be fully understood and appreciated when our eyes are truly fixed on the Creator. His words countered the Gnostics who held the material world as inherently evil, and his words continue to expose the empty promises marketed with mind-boggling persistence today.

Six hundred years ago, Julian of Norwich wrote of the emptiness of a heart that seeks happiness out of order. She observed pointedly: “The reason why we have no ease of heart or soul [is because] we are seeking our rest in trivial things which cannot satisfy... We shall never cease wanting and longing until we possess Him in fullness and joy... The more clearly the soul sees the Blessed Face by grace and love, the more it longs to see it in its fullness.”

You see, the unrelenting thirst of our souls need not be met with empty promises, or even pessimism like Arthur Schopenhauer, the famous German philosopher who reasoned, “Man is never happy, but spends his whole life striving after something he thinks will make him so.” [1] The thirst of humanity, recognized King David, is the soul's continuous panting for its Maker. (Psalm 42:1) And it was Jesus who “stood and said in a loud voice: 'If any one is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.'“ (John 7:37)

Dear friend, may you delight in the One who first saw all things and called them good. For He is the deepest desire of our hearts, and in Him, we see all good things most clearly.

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1. Armand Nicholi, The Question of God (Free Press: New York, 2002), p. 98.

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Copyright © 2003 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #5138]

Scene I: Ancient Rome. Two strangers meet on a dusty road. Miles pass in polite conversation. Slowly and cautiously, oblique references to religious ideas slip in. Both sense a spiritual kinship but are wary of mentioning it. After all, Christianity is a crime punishable by death.

The sun is high and hot, so they stop to rest. The discussion moves from the latest war news to the price of bread to problems of the Roman Senate. The younger man pushes his walking stick through the dust as he talks, tracing a gently curved line.

The older man glances at the mark, then into the eyes of his new acquaintance and quickly around to see if anyone else is watching. With his own staff he draws a mirror image of the first mark, connecting the lines at one end but intersecting at the other. The two lines together form a crude drawing of a fish, a word used as an acronym in the underground sect's ancient Greek language for "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior."

"He is risen!" exclaims the older man. "He is risen indeed!" comes the reply.

In excited whispers they arrange to meet the next evening. One will show the other the secret passages to the Christians' hiding place in the catacombs.

Scene II: Modern Rome. Two American tourists meet while waiting to clear customs. One wears a $50 golf shirt with a fish logo. The other sports a sky-blue baseball cap emblazoned on the crown in scarlet with the acronym, WWJD?

"Cool shirt," says one. "Great hat," says the other. They shake hands, exchange names and agree to meet the next day for cappuccino, "after we tour the catacombs."

What a difference two millennia make.

The cost attached to that original Christian icon was certain and severe. Display the secret fish symbol in the wrong place or at the wrong time and it could cost you your life.

In the 21st century, the cost for the individual Christian is much cheaper, and can even be paid with a credit card.

Multiplied by millions of consumers who now openly adorn themselves with the symbols of their faith, however, today's price tag for Christian imagery has reached proportions unimaginable to early disciples. Clothing, jewelry, bumper stickers and related merchandise bearing religious messages generate an estimated $3 billion a year.

But the spiritual value of those purchases is debatable, even among fellow believers.

Many say "Christian wear" is an effective witnessing tool. Others use derisive terms like "Jesus junk" and say it does more harm than good, especially if the actions of Christians don't match the message on their shirts.

Some things haven't changed over the centuries. Now, as then, Christian symbols remain a means of identifying "friendlies" in a dominant culture that is hostile to religious "fanatics."

But what was once a furtive code for a persecuted religious minority is now a mainstream fashion statement. Christians can wear their faith not only on their sleeves but also on their heads, around their necks, in their ears and on their backs. They can write with it, drink from it and listen to it.

The companies that sell such items uniformly say they create witnessing opportunities. "The average shirt is read 10,000 times!" touts Spiritual Wear on its Web site, www.spiritualwear.com. "You're just a click away from ordering some of the best Christian apparel available. Make a statement of faith with what you wear!"

"Proclaiming the Good News one tee at a time!" announces Kerusso Activewear. "With the right message and emphasis, a T-shirt can definitely help bring someone to Christ."

Living Epistles Apparel, whose Christian gear includes everything from clothes to mouse pads, describes itself as "a witnessing company dedicated to helping Christians creatively share the truth of the gospel and to create witnessing opportunities for Christians...." (www.livingepistles.com)

The Internet is just the latest angle on Christian marketing, but the products have been available for years through Christian bookstores. In fact the exhibit hall at the annual Christian Booksellers Association is crammed with as many "accessories" as books and Bibles, which now account for only 40 percent of sales at the average Christian bookstore.

Do these products deliver what they promise? Are they effective for evangelism?

Opinions cover the spectrum. But most people interviewed for this story say such items probably do a better job of identifying and encouraging Christians than attracting non-believers to the claims of Christ.

"I have a couple (Christian T-shirts) that were gifts that I wear, but I don't think of them as anything but shirts," said Andrea Valenzuela, a 22-year-old Ecuadorian who works for Nyack College in New York. "I hope someone will read the Bible verse and ask about it. But I would rather have my walk and my life -- my works, my everyday living -- speak louder than some easy-to-pull-on T-shirt."

Even the minister who instigated the "What Would Jesus Do?" explosion looks forward to the time the profitable sheen wears off her concept.

Slightly over a decade ago, Reformed Church minister Janie Tinkleberg came up with the WWJD bracelets for her youth group. She didn't copyright the idea, so anyone is free to produce WWJD items. As a result, the emblem has become almost as pervasive in pop culture as the Nike logo. But she doubts the fad is advancing the gospel.

"I think it has diluted the message," she told the Knight-Ridder News Service. "I want the fad to fade so [the concept] will wind up where it belongs -- back with people wearing them who know what these little bracelets really mean."

Kelli Creswell, 24, a native of Charleston, S.C., seconds that motion. "I think sometimes it's all overdone," she said. "Like the WWJD bracelets, the idea is great, but after a while the meaning is lost, because it becomes more about fashion than witnessing."

An unscientific Internet survey conducted by the Christian magazine FaithWorks about the value of Christian gear received 40 responses. Overwhelmingly respondents said the top two reasons people wear Christian icons are to "witness" and "because it is fashionable."

Most, however, were skeptical of the witnessing impact. More than 70 percent said Christian gear motivates non-Christians to consider faith "sometimes" or "rarely." Fewer than 25 percent felt it was highly effective.

All of respondents knew what WWJD stands for.

Ironically, William Benoit, one of several college professors interviewed for this article, admitted he didn't know what the letters mean. But he otherwise concurred with the survey results.

"I suspect bumper stickers and bracelets have the most effect on two groups: the people who wear or display them, as a manner of self-expression, and those for whom it is a 'hot button' topic, either agreeing or disagreeing fervently," said Benoit, who teaches rhetoric, persuasive speaking, argument and advocacy at the University of Missouri-Columbia. "I doubt that the people in the middle are much influenced."

Tom Collinear, a communications professor at Northwestern University in Evanston, Ill., said the growing popularity of Christian gear could "signal a search for meaning at a time when the headlines are about things like Columbine, on the one hand, and dot.com/marry-a-millionaire/instant wealth on the other."

Two professors at Baylor University represent the range of opinions among many evangelical scholars -- from benign approval to passionate endorsement.

Greg Garrett, who teaches religion and literature at the Baptist-affiliated school in Waco, Texas, said he doesn't care for such icons personally. But he knows, "Many people see it as providing a genuine opportunity to spread their faith."

"Good for them," Garrett said, "especially if they can do it without alienating the people they want to reach."

Betty Talbert, meanwhile, who teaches spiritual formation, is overwhelmingly supportive. "Since the time of (Roman Emperor) Constantine, it has been difficult for Christians to maintain their religious identity while being accepted as a part of the culture," she said.

"Wearing a religious symbol -- a cross, a fish or a WWJD bracelet -- is a way some of us testify to ourselves and to others that our commitment to Christ is about everyday living and not just Sunday worship," she continued.

"Personally I like religious bumper stickers," Talbert said. "The first time I put one on my car I did so with fear and trembling. I was a university professor who had just encountered Christ in a deep conversion experience. I knew that people might laugh at me, but I felt it was important to place a symbol of my new allegiance on my car."

Talbert said how a person feels about such public displays of Christian messages is more an issue of personal taste than theology. "I think it is very important not to judge those who do or do not display their religious commitments in their dress," she said. "One thing we know that Jesus would never do is treat a person with condescension."

Guy Mattox, a retired pastor from King George, Va., said Christian T-shirts gain the most value when they are baptized with the sweat of hard work. "If someone is wearing a shirt that says he is a follower of Jesus while he is replacing gutters or reshingling a roof or rebuilding a porch, then they are worthy of the name they are claiming," he said.

Nearly 40 years ago, Mattox presented his gas credit card for payment to a service station attendant who was in the process of exhibiting an impressive demand of profanity. When the man saw "the Reverend" in front of the name on Mattox's card, he apologized profusely.

Mattox went home, cut up all his credit cards and had them reissued without his clerical title. His reasoning? Christianity isn't viable if it can be detected only by a title on a card. "If there is not something about my life and my attitude that says I belong to Christ, then I don't deserve the honor (just) because I graduated from a theological seminary," he said.

Les Switzer, a seminary graduate and professor of journalism at the University of Houston, meanwhile, suspects there may be more behind the Christian gear craze than meets the eye.

The Protestant Reformation ended for many Christians the use of icons in worship and the sale of "indulgences," a method of paying cash as penance for sins. Switzer said he finds a parallel in today's Christian paraphernalia.

"Could I suggest that, in some convoluted way, this is an Americanized, sanitized form of indulgence?" he said. Spending money to "obtain an icon" in the form of a shirt or bumper sticker, he said, may help some Christians "deal with their sins, absolve them of guilt or at least to make them feel more comfortable?"

"It's kind of like a talisman," he said. "And of course most of us can't get along without one, whether it's in the form of a trinket, a cross or even a Bible."

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Craig Bird and his wife, Melissa, are child-care workers at a maternity home in Asheville, N.C. (c_mbird@hotmail.com)

"You'd be surprised how many ways there are to help," the full-page magazine ad assures us.

If I asked you to guess whose ad it was, you might answer the Red Cross or some charitable organization. But listen to a few of the items on the list of ways to help: spatulas, coffee beans, and shampoo. Are we supposed to donate these disparate items? No, we're supposed to buy them.

Welcome to patriotism in the post-duty age.

Spatulas, shampoo, and coffee beans are things you can buy with the Discover Card, the product featured in the ad. And Discover isn't the only one proclaiming that the way to show your love for America is by shopping.

General Motors announced that "in this time of terrible adversity," Americans should "stand together" and "keep America rolling." How? By buying a new GM car or truck.

Not to be outdone, Ford has its own ad campaign that says "in light of these challenging times, we at Ford want to do our part to help move America forward." Therefore, all red-blooded Americans should visit their Ford dealer.

If you think that this pitch is so self-serving that no one could fall for it, think again. Shopping has, as the Atlanta Journal & Constitution put it, been transformed from a "frivolous pastime" into a "patriotic duty."

One woman told the Journal that she wanted a "big TV," but had put off the purchase. Then came the events of September 11 and she said she "figured it was the least I could do."

Sixty years ago during World War II, patriotism demanded something different. Americans planted "victory gardens." They recycled rubber, iron, and other raw materials to support the war effort. Consumer goods, even those we would consider staples like milk, meat, and coffee, were rationed.

There was a clear connection between patriotism and sacrifice. A profession of love of country implied the willingness to fulfill one's duty by doing without.

Well, that has all changed in the "post-duty" age. Now, of course, buying things helps the economy, and that's what behind the ads, but they make the appeal that they'll gratify us. The therapeutic worldview permeates our culture and has weakened our sense of obligation. The measure of an ideal is how it makes people feel, not in what it causes them to do. As a result, lofty notions like patriotism and duty, have been transformed into self-serving sentiments.

We see the same thing in religion and the church. Americans increasingly prefer to be described as "spiritual," rather than "religious." There is a telling difference here: the word "religion" comes from the Latin word religiari, for "binding," and that's the last thing we want our faith to do to us.

This "self-ism" and aversion to duty is what makes it possible to see buying a big-screen television as a virtuous, patriotic act -- "the least I could do," as the woman said.

As the president said, a strong economy is an important part of our national security. But a society that calls buying a car an act of patriotism has forgotten the meaning of the word. It's forgotten those men for whom patriotism and duty meant parachuting into battle, not dropping into the mall.

For further reading:

Moskowitz, Eva. In Therapy We Trust: America's Obsession with Self-Fulfillment. Johns Hopkins UP, 2001.

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Copyright © 2001 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. 'BreakPoint with Chuck Colson' is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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Was shopping for school with your teenage daughter a challenge this year? If it was, you're not alone. The skimpy clothing popular among young girls has led some public schools to move to uniforms. Not a bad idea.

What's behind the push to dress provocatively? One fact that clues us in, observes Alissa Quart in her new book BRANDED: THE BUYING AND SELLING OF TEENAGERS, is that “youth is nothing less than a metaphor for change.” That is, kids are trying to establish their identities.

Marketers cash in on this search for self by selling “image” to youth — and increasingly, that image is sexual. We've seen this in Abercrombie and Fitch's thong underwear for 7-year-olds, as well as the company's depictions of bare-chested young males with provocative expressions in its advertising. And now Playboy sells clothing for teenagers.

But it's not just the sexual image that many of these companies push on teens; the idea that they can acquire an identity through brands is the real threat to impressionable youth. Quart quotes Rabbi Jeffrey Salkin, who decries the increase in materialism in BAR and BAT MITZVAHS: “Conspicuous consumption with these events teaches the children that spending and having [are] more important than being.” For many young people today, spending and having are synonymous WITH being. And having brand names, in their minds, is what makes them become “cool.”

“Cool is essential in establishing a brand identity,” notes Ken Myers of MARS HILL AUDIO, “especially with teenagers, whose purchases tend to be more desperately linked with the establishment of an identity than are those of adults.”

“The term BRAND,” says Quart, “suggests both the ubiquity of logos in today's teen dreams and the extreme way these brands define teen identities.” It's true — it's hard to turn your head in public without seeing brand names on posters, billboards, or the sides of buses. And this affects young people profoundly.

“One thing that's so compelling and strange about the uptick in marketing to kids,” says Quart, “is how much these practices have taken advantage of organic things that already exist in childhood and adolescence: the desire to communicate [opinions] ... the sense of lack of identity, changing bodies and burgeoning sexuality, a desire to emulate adult culture.”

Manufacturers and advertisers are participating in the phenomenon of “kids getting older younger.” And in the process, imagination has been lost. Kids used to play with stuffed animals and other toys; now they take fashion cues from Britney Spears and play brand-name-laden video games. “The kind of imaginary world kids make up with their toys,” said Myers, “is a zone in which they're really defining themselves.” Now, they're being defined by marketers.

“As Lionel Trilling wrote thirty years ago, authenticity is an even more 'strenuous moral experience' than sincerity. [Brand-name products] aim to harness teens' desire for an ideal ... world and give them a branded one instead,” writes Quart. Our job, of course, is to teach our kids and grandkids to find their identity in themselves as God made them, rather than being swayed by brands and commercialized images — because in allowing themselves to be “branded,” they not only lose money, they lose their true identity.

FOR FURTHER READING AND INFORMATION:

• Alissa Quart, Branded: The Buying and Selling of Teenagers (Perseus, 2003).

• The “Marketing and Consumerism“ page of the Media Awareness Network includes links to resources for parents to teach children and teens about marketing and advertising.

• The May/June 2003 Mars Hill Audio Journal includes an interview with Alissa Quart.

• Sally Beatty, “Too Cool for School,” Wall Street Journal, 15 August 2003.

• “Sexist '60s Symbol Hot With Teen Girls,” Netscape Network.

• Laura Sessions Stepp, “Playboy's Bunny Hops into Teens' Closets,” Washington Post, 17 June 2003, C01.

• Deborah Roffman, “Way Too Much Fantasy with That Dream House,” Washington Post, 22 December 2002, B01.

• Bethany Patchin, “The Eye of the Beholder,” Boundless, 2 August 2000.

• BreakPoint Commentary No. 020916, “Multiplying like Rabbits: Fashion's Assault on Our Children.” (Archived commentary; free registration required.)

• BreakPoint Commentary No. 020617, “From Diapers to Thongs: Abercrombie and 'Outrageous Times'.” (Archived commentary; free registration required.)

• BreakPoint commentary no.010315, “Mooks and Midriffs: Bypassing Parental Authority.” (Archived commentary; free registration required.)

• Michael and Diane Medved, Saving Childhood: Protecting Our Children from the National Assault on Innocence (HarperCollins, 1999).

• Wendy Shalit, A Return to Modesty (Scribner, 2000).

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Copyright (c) 2003 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

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If you took your teenage daughter to the movies this summer, what did you see? Laura Sessions Stepp, who frequently writes on trends among adolescent girls, saw something that bothered her. But it's not what you might think.

In a thought-provoking article in the WASHINGTON POST, Stepp writes, “If you're a young Hollywood heroine today, you lip-sync your way to rock stardom overnight ... win passage of a bill by giving [cosmetic] makeovers to members of Congress or solve murders by posing as a stripper cop. ... You entertain, but you don't inspire, at least the way movies used to.” For these young women, she says, “Power lies largely in how you look and what you buy. ... Perfection through consumption, that's the (young) American Way.”

Many of us are concerned — and rightly so — about teen culture's promotion of sexuality and violence. But I think Stepp has put her finger on a problem just as important: the encouragement of selfishness among our youth.

Movies like the CHARLIE'S ANGELS franchise, LEGALLY BLONDE 2, THE LIZZIE MCGUIRE MOVIE, and other popular summer fare may pretend to teach about independence and maturity. But the truth is that real “character development” is out; consumerism and feel-good messages are in. Or as Stepp puts it, “Life revolves around these young women.” For the most part, instead of stories about girls who grow up facing real challenges and learning how to help others, we get fictional girls whose main concern is ME, MYSELF, AND I. And that pervasive message is not doing real girls any good.

There's more than one factor at work here. For one thing, at a time when many adults act more irresponsible than teenagers, or want to stay juvenile, our definition of MATURITY has changed. For another, feminist leaders have long been putting pressure on both our educational system and our popular culture to try to make up for a supposed lack in girls' self-esteem (which is actually based on distorted data).

But the biggest factor may be that teenagers today have more spending money than ever before and have proven themselves vulnerable to marketing campaigns, which means that those campaigns grow more and more aggressive. And it's good marketing strategy to present the consumer with an image of herself the way she'd like to be: glamorous, independent of parental and moral restraints, easily able to overcome all obstacles. It's not good marketing strategy to suggest that she still has a lot to learn about the world, that there's life beyond adolescence, and that developing strong character is more important than instant gratification.

I'm not saying that every movie has to be serious; everybody needs a little comic relief now and then. I'm just saying that when frivolity and egotism become trendy among such an impressionable age group, we need to pay attention. Christian parents in particular have a duty to inoculate their children against these kinds of trends, for in our worldview, there is more to life than self-interest. We believe in the value of good character, humility, and self-sacrifice for the good of others. Let's make sure we're communicating what we believe to our kids and grandkids.

FOR FURTHER READING AND INFORMATION:

• Laura Sessions Stepp, “Hollywood's Material Girls,” Washington Post, 3 August 2003.

• David Sterritt, “Who's the adult in this picture?“ Christian Science Monitor, 22 August 2003.

• Stephen Hunter, “Girls Gone Wild,” Washington Post, 29 August 2003. (Archived commentary; costs $2.95 to retrieve.)

• David Edelstein, “Girls Gone Wild,” Slate, 20 August 2003.

• Two alternatives to the typical girl movies are Whale Rider and Rabbit-Proof Fence.

• Kay Hymowitz, “The Weaker Sex?“ City Journal, 27 February 2002.

• Christina Hoff Sommers, “Politics Dressed Up as Science,” Atlantic Monthly, May 2000.

• “The Merchants of Cool,” Frontline, PBS, 2001.

• Gina Dalfonzo, “Complicating the Issue: Women and Worldview in the Movies,” BreakPoint Online, 30 June 2003.

• Kim I. Robbins, “Lethally Blonde,” BreakPoint Online, 18 July 2003.

• Kim I. Robbins, “The 20th Century Art Form,” BreakPoint Online, 10 September 2003.

• Charles Colson, Answers to Your Kids' Questions (Tyndale, 2000).

• Brian Godawa, Hollywood Worldviews (InterVarsity, 2002).

• Colleen Carroll, The New Faithful (Loyola, 2002).

__________

Copyright (c) 2003 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

*

Many years ago a major American company had trouble keeping employees working in their assembly plant in Panama. The laborers lived in a generally agrarian, barter economy, but the company paid them in cash. Since the average employee had more cash after a week's work than he had ever seen, he would periodically quit working, satisfied with what he had made.

What was the solution? Company executives gave all their employees a Sears catalogue. No one quit then, because they all wanted the previously undreamed-of things they saw in that book.

Retailers depend on their holiday sales for much of their business but church groups have been fighting for years to play down the retail aspects of Christmas and play up the religious significance of the holiday. “Keep Christ In Christmas” is the slogan many of them use. Commentator John Boykin shares their frustration, but not their solution to the problem:

________

Every year, I boycott the local store that trots out its Christmas doodads first. It starts earlier every year – this year it was October 4th. As a Christian, I believe Jesus was God’s way of walking the earth; if that’s anywhere close to true, he’s really the wrong person to trivialize. So I object to having him prostituted by marketers. Hence the boycott.

I’m not fighting the commercialization of Christmas. That fight was lost ages ago. What I’m after is more radical – disentangling Jesus entirely from this blight on his good name. I’m out to change the bumper sticker from “Keep Christ In Christmas” to “Free Christ From Christmas.”

A heresy? Well, compare Christmas with Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. On his birthday, no one ever pays any attention to his birth. Instead, it’s “I have a dream...” and his impact on society. We mark Dr. King’s birth by focusing on what he said and did as an adult. Christmas, by contrast, has no time for what the adult Jesus said and did. Christmas keeps him safely shut up as a baby in the manger where he can’t make his usual noise about people repenting and living a godly life.

So does his birth matter at all? Well, it matters to his followers today as one way of backing up his claim to be the Son of God. But that’s not the way Jesus himself backed up his claim. He pointed not to his birth, but to his resurrection. So I’ll trade a month of Christmases for one meaningful Easter.

When Jesus denounced hypocrisy, he wasn’t talking about saying one thing and doing something else. He was talking about using God, and the things of God, as a means to some other end, like, oh, say, making a buck. This is why he drove the moneychangers out of the temple. We do him no honor by carting him out once a year to stand him on his head.

I’m not proposing that we cancel Christmas. I know the economy would collapse without it. Fine! Keep the gift giving and the Jingle Bells. Let’s just subtract the remaining Jesus-element from it and move that over into Easter. Call December 25 Solstice, call it Retail Day, call it Holiday #9. I don’t care. Just leave Christ out of it. He was not born to be the patron saint of Fourth Quarter Earnings.

________

John Boykin is the author of the book Cursed Is the Peacemaker. He lives in Belmont, California

Have you ever purchased a book or attended a costly seminar on how to stop spending money? Problems tend to multiply themselves, don't they?

With wry insight, author Mercer Schuchardt observes how we work our way into odd circles of behavior. He writes, “When you finally realize you hate the city, you move to the suburbs — far from work, shopping, and friends — and so you have to drive everywhere. Then you have to jog through your suburb to lose all the weight you gained sitting in your car and office. By having engines on your lawnmowers, saws, and any other work-replacing tools, you condemn yourself to purchasing exercise machines to give yourself a 'workout.’ You take your cell phone on dates, stop in the middle...to answer it, take your laptop on vacation, and become so bored, numb, and despairing in the process that you spend your free time watching someone else's more interesting though completely imaginary life on TV.”(1)

We are confronted daily with a paradox that is easily overlooked. In one sense we are encouraged to acquire as much as possible and as soon as possible to reel in the “good life.” Yet, the glut of goods and soft-living create consequences we don't like. So we find more pricey remedies for the very things that we were encouraged to purchase in the first place!

It's easy to get into frantic cycles of purchase upon purchase to bring a sense of stability to life, but the repercussions of such a method are often empty and exhausting. Perhaps the growing interest in simplicity, in downsizing, and in various forms of spirituality is a growing sign of the inadequacy of hyper-consumption to meet our deepest hungers.

Let me also add that much of what we buy depends on what we value, and this gets at the worldview that lies under our decisions. As Jesus observed long before cell phones and credit cards, “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also” (Matthew 6:21).

Moreover, the philosophy of life to which we hold will also shape the expectations we attach to the goods we purchase. Where our heart is dictates the hope we have in our treasures. We should ask ourselves: What do our habits of consumption reveal about us? And if we see problems with what lies beneath, can it really be that another string of purchases will be the solution?

Consider taking root in something deeper, something lasting, something that takes commitment yet is free of charge. Jim Elliot who gave his life to bring good news to a secluded people said it well: “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.”

________

1. Mercer Schuchardt, “Default Culture,” RE:GENERATION QUARTERLY (FALL 1999, ISSUE 5.3), 34.

________

Copyright © 2005 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

*

I was on hold the other day trying to schedule an appointment for a hair cut. As I waited for the receptionist, I half-listened to the obligatory recordings. The announcer asked me to consider scheduling a make-over with my upcoming appointment and to make sure I leave with the products that will keep up my new look. (Apparently, when you have a captive audience of customers “muzak” is hardly strategic.) But I was then caught off guard by a question: “What do the local communities of Chad, Africa, mean to you?” The answer he offered was as immediate as my inability to think of one: “Chad is a leading producer of organic acacia gum, the vital ingredient in a new line of products exclusively produced for and available at our salon.”

In a culture dominated by consumption, the commodification of everything around us is becoming more and more of an unconscious worldview. Thus, when we think of Chad, we can think of our favorite shampoo and its connection with our hair salon. The land where it came from, the conditions of its production, and the community or laborers who produce it are realities disassociated with the commodity. Like soap and luggage, the nation of Chad can become just one of the many commodities within our consumer mindset.

As I put down the phone, I couldn't help but wonder about Amos's description of those who are “at ease in Zion.” How at ease do you have to be to begin to see the world in commodities? At the time of Amos's words, Israel was at one of its most opulent junctures. They had expanded their territory in more than one direction. Their winter palaces were adorned with ivory and their feasts were lacking nothing. They could be heard singing songs to the sound of the harp and seen anointing themselves with the finest of oils. It was in such affluence that the shepherd Amos proclaimed, “Woe to those who are at ease in Zion, and to those who feel secure on the mountain of Samaria” (Amos 6:1).

Amos's omen is far from isolated in Scripture. While Amos compares the drunken women of Israel to the fat cows of Bashan, Micah describes the rich as men full of violence, and Jeremiah cites those with wealth and power as those who grow fat and sleek. In the book of Revelation, the church that God is about to spit out of his mouth is the one who has “acquired wealth and needs nothing” — the one not realizing that they are “wretched, pitiful, poor, blind and naked” (Rev. 3:17).

As G. K. Chesterton once noted, “[I]t is impossible to have any sort of debate over whether or not Jesus believed that rich people were in big trouble — there is too much evidence on the subject and it is overwhelming.” The pervasiveness of this evidence makes for a rough entry into the ongoing debate about the morality of affluence among North American Christians. Like Chesterton, I am at times uncomfortably aware at whom the words of Christ were aimed: I am the rich Christian to whom Jesus speaks bluntly.

I am also among the crowd he takes the time and care to caution. Among his many words about money, Jesus warned, “Watch out! Be on your guard against all kinds of greed; a man's life does not consist in the abundance of his possessions” (Luke 12:15).

How then shall we live in a world of affluence? How are we to fight the all-pervading atmosphere of consumerism and the attitude of commodification around us? There is good reason for unrelenting words against greed that turns communities into commodities and souls into consumers. There is a reason Christ has called the poor in spirit blessed, for those who cling to the Father know it is Him alone they can eternally hold. We were not made to be at ease in Zion; we were made in the image of God.

We serve a God who never sleeps or slumbers in part because those who are hurting never sleep or slumber. It is He who calls us to follow and to deny ourselves, to consider in our hearts the treasures that block our vision of the Cross, as well as our vision of our neighbor. There are none seen as commodities in the eyes of the Creator; there are but children with the eyes of their Father.

________

Copyright © 2005 Ravi Zacharias International Ministries (RZIM). Reprinted with permission. "A Slice of Infinity" is a radio ministry of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries.

*

“We're people for whom recycling is no longer enough,” says John Perry, founder of the Compact, about 50 people in the San Francisco, Calif., area, who have pledged to buy no new products for a full year, not counting food, health and safety items, and underwear. “We had a little crisis when Matt and Sarah had to replace their shower curtain liner and we said no,” he said. “But we put the word out and someone found one for them.” Whew! Everything the members will buy for the year will come from thrift shops, yard sales, and swaps. Perry says fighting consumerism is hard, since he loves to shop.

________

San Francisco Chronicle

*

The New York Times reports that some millionaires in Silicon Valley just can’t make ends meet, and are gripped by a sense of economic insecurity. Most Americans would surely find this perplexing, but a million dollars only goes so far.

As the paper explains:

By almost any definition -- except his own and perhaps those of his neighbors here in Silicon Valley -- Hal Steger has made it.

Mr. Steger, 51, a self-described geek, has banked more than $2 million. The $1.3 million house he and his wife own on a bluff overlooking the Pacific Ocean is paid off. The couple’s net worth of roughly $3.5 million places them in the top 2 percent of families in the United States.

Yet each day Mr. Steger continues to toil in what a colleague calls “the Silicon Valley salt mines,” working as a marketing executive for a technology start-up company, still striving for his big strike. Most mornings, he can be found at his desk by 7. He typically works 12 hours a day and logs an extra 10 hours over the weekend.

“I know people looking in from the outside will ask why someone like me keeps working so hard,” Mr. Steger says. “But a few million doesn’t go as far as it used to. Maybe in the ‘70s, a few million bucks meant ‘Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous,’ or Richie Rich living in a big house with a butler. But not anymore.”

Reporter Gary Rivlin described “working-class millionaires” who are members of the “digital elite.” They do not think of themselves as wealthy, even as they are fully aware of their financial standing in comparison to most Americans. It’s that other comparison that bothers them. As Rivlin explains, “But many such accomplished and ambitious members of the digital elite still do not think of themselves as particularly fortunate, in part because they are surrounded by people with more wealth -- often a lot more.”

There can be no doubt about that. There are now millionaires in almost every community, and the wealthiest now count their fortunes in the billions, not millions, of dollars.

Those given to comparisons of personal wealth can always find someone with a larger fortune. This is especially true where the wealthy congregate together in communities like those in California’s Silicon Valley. When the comparison game starts, it never ends. Rivlin cited one man worth approximately $10 million who saw that sum as relatively paltry: “You’re nobody here at $10 million.”

The enticements and pressures of a consumer society also play a part. One man told Rivlin that “the pressures to spend more are everywhere.” As Rivlin explained, “Children want the latest fashions their peers are wearing and the most popular high-ticket toys. Furniture does not seem up to snuff once you move into a multimillion-dollar home. Spouses talk, and now that resort in Mexico the family enjoyed so much last winter is not good enough when looking ahead to next year. Summer camp, a full-time housekeeper, vintage wines, country clubs: the cost of living bloats.”

Another Silicon Valley millionaire admitted the reality: “Here, the top 1 percent chases the top one-tenth of 1 percent, and the top one-tenth of 1 percent chases the top one-one-hundredth of 1 percent.... You try not to get caught up in it, but it’s hard not to.”

That must be an honest admission, and one does not have to be a millionaire to get caught up in the comparison game. If honest, most of us would probably admit to the temptation to follow John D. Rockefeller’s adage that all we need is “a little bit more.”

This report certainly brings these words of Jesus to mind:

Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and

rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, but lay up for

yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust

destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where

your treasure is, there your heart will be also. [Matt. 6:19-21]

In February 2009 the Obama family was still searching for a church home. Except for the special invitations and the presidential-scale press coverage, the Obamas’ church search puts them in a situation a lot of American believers are well-acquainted with. One in seven adults changes churches each year, and another one in six attends a handful of churches on a rotating basis, according to the Barna Group, a marketing research firm that serves churches. Church shopping isn’t a matter of merely changing congregations: A survey by the Pew Forum on Religious and Public Life last year indicated that 44 percent of American adults have left their first religious affiliation for another. “Constant movement characterizes the American religious marketplace,” a survey summary said.

Even if the American mania for shopping extends to our spiritual lives, church shopping still doesn’t get much respect. But while it may be frequently derided as an example of rampant spiritual consumerism, shopping around can be one of the good things about the way religion is practiced in America.

Part of the discomfort with church shopping has to do with the way growing churches attempt to attract spiritual shoppers. That simple marquee in front of a church with the cheerfully homely motto (“Prevent truth decay: Brush up on your Bible”) doesn’t suffice to recruit worshippers. Web sites stream audio and video of sermons and music to let prospective members shop from home, and consultants help congregations market themselves to the “unchurched” and the merely unsatisfied by deploying focus groups, surveys, product giveaways (free church-branded Frisbees, anyone?), and other tactics borrowed from the commercial realm. The WALL STREET JOURNAL reported recently on churches employing mystery worshippers, “a new breed of church consultant,” who covertly attend services and evaluate them (Were the bathrooms clean? Was the vibe friendly?) as if they were first-timers looking for a new church.

Marrying the sacred to the secular inevitably provokes criticism. In FIRST THINGS, Anthony Sacramone called church shopping “potentially spiritually corrupting” and warned against the “ecclesiological chaos” of the religious marketplace. The practice is particularly troublesome for the more established churches that find themselves in competition with growth-minded, nondenominational congregations. Pope Benedict XVI, speaking at a World Youth Day Mass in 2005, noted “a new explosion of religion” but warned that “if it’s pushed too far, religion becomes almost a consumer product. People choose what they like and some are even able to make a profit from it.” His concern is understandable: About 10 percent of American adults describe themselves as ex-Catholics — a figure that, if ex-Catholicism were its own religion, would make it one of the nation’s largest religious groups — and they are a huge target market for growing churches.

Church shopping, marketing, and the not-so-sanctified practices that go with them make easy targets for criticism. But competition among churches for worshippers has always been fierce in the United States, to the benefit of American religion and individual churchgoers. The prohibition against establishing an official state religion helped give us the shoppers’ paradise that is our religious marketplace. Disestablishment (Massachusetts was the last state to cut ties to its official church, in 1833) meant that preachers had to learn to get along without support from the state. It made the ability to recruit and keep a flock — and get them to give generously — crucial to a church’s survival. In 1992, Roger Finke and Rodney Stark argued in THE CHURCHING OF AMERICA, 1776-1990 that this produced a ministry modeled on capitalism, with pastors acting as the church’s sales force.

Salesmanship sometimes degenerates into telling people what they want to hear and, in the case of religion, into a faith that never comes down too hard on the faithful. But competition among churches should be considered a good thing, at least if you are a fan of religiosity. The sheer number and variety of churches that sprang up in the American free market in religion ended up increasing the consumption of religion. In 1776, Stark and Finke write, fewer than one in five Americans belonged to a local church. Today, the figure is more like 67 percent.

American faith comes in lots of flavors, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that today’s church shoppers are buying into a superficial, strip-mall faith. When the Barna Group studied what believers look for in a new church, doctrine and belief ranked at the top of the list of the most important factors, while more mundane or aesthetic concerns (music, parking, comfortable seating) were less important. And the free market in faith has been good for America’s religious life. All that hopping across denominational lines likely helped produce a less rigid, better informed, more ecumenical religious culture.

Knowing that churchgoers have so many options should keep pastors and preachers on their toes. In that sense, church shopping transfers a bit of power from the pulpit to the pews. And keeping a check on the power of church leaders is never a bad idea.

So, the president shouldn’t feel any need to rush into committing to a new church. When you have so many options, it pays to shop around.

Have you heard about the 100 Thing Challenge? It’s a grass-roots movement in which otherwise normal folks are pledging to whittle down their possessions to a mere 100 items. It was started by on-line entrepreneur, Dave Bruno, who believes in this simple truth: “Stuff starts to overwhelm you.” His complete insights on the topic will soon be published in a book.

Application:

We could all benefit by learning to live with less. It seems that the more things we possess, the more our things possess us. But long before a guy named Dave realized the dangers of materialism, there was a guy named Paul who came up with his own list. A much shorter list. Paul whittled the necessities of life down to just two things! In a letter to his understudy, Timothy, the Apostle Paul wrote, “So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content” (1 Timothy 6:8, KJV). This is not to suggest that we should all seek to reduce our lives to these two basic things. Rather, the point was that we should learn to be content, regardless of the number of our possessions. As Paul would say elsewhere, “I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound ...” (Philippians 4:12). Although there’s nothing wrong with possessing things, it’s learning to be content with less that frees us to focus on doing more for the Kingdom of God.

________

Source: online @ 100 Thing Challenge by Guy Named Dave: http://guynameddave.com.

Mr. Bruno’s personal list of possessions (note there are two Bibles). Some of the objects, like socks, are actually groups:

ESV Bible

NRSV Bible with Prayer Book

Library (estimate about 300 books)

Journal

Pencil

Pen

Guitar (including, case, capo, picks)

Wedding ring

Wallet

Sunglasses

Watch

Razor

Toothbrush

Backpack (for work)

Garment bag

Suitcase

MacBook Pro

iPhone

iPad

Microphone

Headphones

Chair

Foot rest

Side table

File cabinet

Car

Skateboard

Backpack

Tent

Sleeping bag

Sleeping pad

Trekking Poles

Cook set

Stove

Headlamp

Water bladder

Surfboard

Wetsuit

Wetsuit jacket

Gaiters

Wool Hat

Hat

Mittens

Mitten liners

Fleece jacket

Down jacket

Rain jacket

Rain pants

Soft shell pants

Short sleeve wicking shirt

Capeline 1 long sleeve shirt

Capeline 3 long sleeve shirt

Capeline 2 pants

Suit jacket

Suit pants

Dress pants

Dress shirt

Tie

Brown belt

Brown belt

Casual pants

Casual pants

Long sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Long sleeve shirt/jacket

Jeans

Jeans

Jeans

Shorts

Running shorts

Board shorts

Sweatshirt

Wool sweater

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

PJ pants

Socks (8)

Underwear (10)

Undershirts (6)

Brown shoes

Brown shoes

Trail runners

Hiking Boots

Sandals

This Easter, Pastor Bil Cornelius of the Bay Area Fellowship, the largest church in Corpus Christi, Texas, really wanted good attendance at their Easter services. So the church sponsored what they called “The Ultimate Giveaway.” They prepared 15,000 gift bags, each with about $300 worth of goods and gift certificates inside.

But wait! There’s more! They also gave away flat-screen TVs, skateboards, electric guitars, bicycles, furniture and 15 cars. The church had to cut an opening in the chapel wall so the cars could be pulled in on Easter morning.

Can you imagine going to church and telling the pastor, “I’ll take what’s behind door number 2!” In all, they gave out about $4.5 million in the gift bags and around $2 million more in other loot.

They did put a spiritual spin on it. Pastor Cornelius told his congregation, “Imagine how great heaven is going to be if you feel that excited about a car!”

It got a lot of publicity, of course. TWENTY-THREE THOUSAND people showed up. Our Easter attendance was a little on the light side this year. Maybe we should start working on the giveaway idea.….

*

[This illustration was original numbered HolwickID #31872 but was inadvertantly dropped from the database]

The Christmas shopping season seems to come earlier and earlier every year. This year, lots of merchants started Black Friday on Thursday, which as you know, was Thanksgiving Day.

Now I’m not one to begrudge anyone an opportunity to make a living — especially in these tough economic times — but the commercialism of Christmas is obviously out of control.

And a new survey of Americans finds that 45 percent would rather skip Christmas this year, saying they don’t have enough money to celebrate the holiday!

Well before you hit the stress button, here are a few thoughts.

It’s instructive to remember that Christmas wasn’t always even that significant a religious festival. In the Middle Ages, Epiphany was celebrated more widely. Following the Protestant Reformation, the Puritans took a dim view of Christmas, labeling it a mere Catholic invention with the “trappings of popery.” Their counterparts in colonial Boston actually outlawed the celebration of Christmas from 1659 to 1681 — talk about “Bah, humbug!”

Christmas didn’t really start to become a big deal in America until the 1820s, with several short stories written by Washington Irving, and, of course, “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” the poem by Clement Clarke Moore. Christmas carols came back into fashion in the 1830s; Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol in 1843; and the first commercial Christmas card was produced that same year. And by 1850, a character in a book by Harriet Beecher Stowe, The First Christmas in New England, actually complained that the true meaning of Christmas was lost in a shopping spree.

The more things change, the more they stay the same!

So, amid all the commercialism and very real financial stress, how do Christians focus on the mystery of the Godhead veiled in human flesh, revealed to us first in a dirty stable in Bethlehem?

Let me make a few suggestions. First, why not make a conscious decision to downsize your Christmas celebration this year? You heard me right. Since it’s likely that you don’t want to go along with all the preplanned discontentment of the marketers anyway — don’t. Talk about this with your loved ones, of course. Most of us are conditioned to see expensive gifts and decorating as required expressions for the holidays. But they’re really not.

Now I’m not saying you should end all gift-giving — but why not give one or two well-chosen gifts to a loved one rather than six or seven?

And since Advent highlights God’s ultimate gift to us in Jesus Christ, why not express this truth with your loved ones and neighbors during these economically difficult days? As a family, why not take some of the money you are saving and contribute it to a Christian organization such as Samaritan’s Purse or World Relief? Of course there’s also Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree.

It’s up to you, but don’t stop with the giving of money. Give yourself, too. Find someone in your neighborhood who is struggling, and reach out with practical help and gospel hope. Maybe this person is a widow who needs a leaky pipe repaired, an international student who has never experienced an American Christmas, or a single mom who needs a babysitter. This is doable, but it requires fresh thinking.

We’ve made Christmas harder than it needs to be. Let’s take the drudgery, debt, and sense of obligation out of it, and put in real celebration and service.

There’s no need to opt out of Christmas if we keep Christ in.

________

Copyright (c) 2012 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

There’s nothing like visiting another culture to get a new perspective on your own.

That’s what Patty and I discovered a few years ago when we went to Japan. There we visited the Perfect Liberty Church, a Buddhist sect that was at the time the fastest growing church in the world.

And no wonder. The church taught that peace and joy are found merely by exercising our individuality. It could be golf, sex, or bird-watching — anything was okay so long as you were expressing your inner self.

As I read through the church’s literature, I found myself nudging Patty and saying, “What nonsense. Imagine: They’re saying you can do whatever you want as long as it makes you happy. And they call that a church?”

Later, back in the States, Patty and I were surfing through the TV channels one night when a Christian program caught our eye. The set was gaudy, the furniture overstuffed, and the hosts were offering a saccharine vision of the abundant life.

You can have perfect joy and prosperity, they crooned. God doesn’t want anyone to suffer or be deprived. He just wants us to be happy.

Suddenly it struck us: The message of this Christian TV program was no different from what we had witnessed in Japan. It was Christianized Buddhism.

It seems that everywhere — from Tennessee to Tokyo — religion is being permeated by a consumerist mentality.

A few years ago Newsweek magazine heralded the resurgence of religion among Baby Boomers. But it isn’t anything like the old-time religion. The goal in this revival, Newsweek said, is not salvation but support; not holiness but self-help. People don’t convert; they pick and choose — as if religion were just another commodity on the market. They flit from church to church in search of what makes them feel good.

In this consumerist environment, pastors feel pressure to act like businessmen, out to attract more customers. In the process they often unconsciously repackage the church’s message: A little rationalizing here, a little rounding off there — and soon the church is transformed from a worshiping community into a comforting haven from life’s pressures. What J. I. Packer, the great theologian, calls “hot-tub religion.”

Well, the church has got to pull the plug on the hot tub. When Jesus talked about the Church, He wasn’t talking about buildings or programs. He was talking about a new community — called out to give the world a foretaste of the coming Kingdom.

The Church’s task is not to make people happy but to make them holy. Its gift to the world is not therapy but truth.

As I argue in my book The Body, Christians need to recover the biblical view of the church. If we don’t recover the biblical view of the Church, we’ll lose our distinctive calling to a feel-good consumerism. And we’ll have nothing better to offer the world than a Christianized form of Buddhism.

[Originally broadcast in 1995]

________

Resources

My Final Word: Holding Tight to the Issues that Matter Most

Chuck Colson, Anne Morse | Zondervan | August 2015

Being the Body

Chuck Colson, Ellen Vaughn | Zondervan | July 2004

Hot Tub Religion: Christian Living in a Materialistic World

J. I. Packer | Tyndale House | October 1993

________

Copyright (c) 2015 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

We sometimes come to God, not because we love Him best, but because we love our possessions best; we ask Christ to "save Western civilization", without asking ourselves whether it is entirely a civilization that Christ could want to save. We pray, too often, not to do God's will, but to enlist God's assistance in maintaining our "continually increasing consumption". And yet, though Christ promised that God would feed us, he never promised that God would stuff us to bursting.

... Joy Davidman, Smoke on the Mountain

The Christmas shopping season seems to come earlier and earlier every year. This year, lots of merchants started Black Friday on Thursday, which as you know, was Thanksgiving Day.

Now I’m not one to begrudge anyone an opportunity to make a living — especially in these tough economic times — but the commercialism of Christmas is obviously out of control.

And a new survey of Americans finds that 45 percent would rather skip Christmas this year, saying they don’t have enough money to celebrate the holiday!

Well before you hit the stress button, here are a few thoughts.

It’s instructive to remember that Christmas wasn’t always even that significant a religious festival. In the Middle Ages, Epiphany was celebrated more widely. Following the Protestant Reformation, the Puritans took a dim view of Christmas, labeling it a mere Catholic invention with the “trappings of popery.” Their counterparts in colonial Boston actually outlawed the celebration of Christmas from 1659 to 1681 — talk about “Bah, humbug!”

Christmas didn’t really start to become a big deal in America until the 1820s, with several short stories written by Washington Irving, and, of course, “A Visit from St. Nicholas,” the poem by Clement Clarke Moore. Christmas carols came back into fashion in the 1830s; Charles Dickens wrote A Christmas Carol in 1843; and the first commercial Christmas card was produced that same year. And by 1850, a character in a book by Harriet Beecher Stowe, The First Christmas in New England, actually complained that the true meaning of Christmas was lost in a shopping spree.

The more things change, the more they stay the same!

So, amid all the commercialism and very real financial stress, how do Christians focus on the mystery of the Godhead veiled in human flesh, revealed to us first in a dirty stable in Bethlehem?

Let me make a few suggestions. First, why not make a conscious decision to downsize your Christmas celebration this year? You heard me right. Since it’s likely that you don’t want to go along with all the preplanned discontentment of the marketers anyway — don’t. Talk about this with your loved ones, of course. Most of us are conditioned to see expensive gifts and decorating as required expressions for the holidays. But they’re really not.

Now I’m not saying you should end all gift-giving — but why not give one or two well-chosen gifts to a loved one rather than six or seven?

And since Advent highlights God’s ultimate gift to us in Jesus Christ, why not express this truth with your loved ones and neighbors during these economically difficult days? As a family, why not take some of the money you are saving and contribute it to a Christian organization such as Samaritan’s Purse or World Relief? Of course there’s also Prison Fellowship’s Angel Tree.

It’s up to you, but don’t stop with the giving of money. Give yourself, too. Find someone in your neighborhood who is struggling, and reach out with practical help and gospel hope. Maybe this person is a widow who needs a leaky pipe repaired, an international student who has never experienced an American Christmas, or a single mom who needs a babysitter. This is doable, but it requires fresh thinking.

We’ve made Christmas harder than it needs to be. Let’s take the drudgery, debt, and sense of obligation out of it, and put in real celebration and service.

There’s no need to opt out of Christmas if we keep Christ in.

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Copyright (c) 2012 Prison Fellowship Ministries. Reprinted with permission. "BreakPoint with Chuck Colson" is a radio ministry of Prison Fellowship Ministries.

Sometime between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur, the typical rabbi slips one or more not-so-subtle messages into the High Holy Day services.

Perhaps the rabbi will remind the throng that the doors are open year round or note that it's usually easier to find spaces in pews. Everyone laughs, because they've heard this before. But once the 10-day holy season has ended, as it did Wednesday, many of the worshippers vanish -- until next year.

The problem is that so many Jews center their faith on a few rites and seasons in synagogues and temples, said Ron Wolfson, director of the Whizin Institute for Jewish Family Life, in Los Angeles. Instead, more need to embrace rituals and symbols that they can use week after week in their homes.

“What we are dealing with here is a supermarket mentality,” he said. “People say, 'If I want exercise, I can go to the health club. If I want to buy something, I can go to the mall.’ ... Then it's natural to say, 'If I want some religion, then I know where to go -- I can go to the synagogue.'”

Obviously, Jews are not the only people who recite this American credo. Catholic priests face this issue every Christmas Eve at midnight mass.

Preachers everywhere struggle to smile at vaguely familiar faces on Easter. However, Jews face a dizzying list of bleak statistics and puzzles of their own -- especially those linked to intermarriage between Jews and non-Jews and their “assimilation” into the fragmented patterns of urban life.

Wolfson is convinced the key breakdown occurred at home. As more families shed Jewish traditions, the emphasis shifted to Jewish groups and spiritual “professionals.” The result, beginning in the 1950s, was an explosion of growth in big institutions. Millions began to commute to Jewish life.

“Pessimists will say that if things keep going the way they're going, Jewish life will all but disappear,” he said. “Optimists will say that we'll struggle along somehow.... But here's the big question: What are we going to do?”

This question is especially relevant following Rosh Hashanah, when Jews begin a new year, and Yom Kippur, when they face the reality of sin and pledge to renew their faith. Yet millions soon find themselves back at home, facing a familiar maze of careers, pocket calendars and school events, amid the drone of mass media.

Truth is, said Wolfson, many have “no clue how to be Jewish parents.” He suggests they start by learning a weekly rite -- the blessing of their children before each Shabbat, or Sabbath.

The simple blessing for daughters includes familiar biblical names: “May God make you like Sarah, Rebecca, Rachel and Leah.” But there is a poignant, and very contemporary, message in the blessing for sons: “May God make you like Ephraim and Menasseh.” These boys were raised as nobles in Egypt after their father, Joseph, overcame slavery to become a counselor to the Pharaoh. Yet Ephraim and Menassah were given a special blessing by Jacob, their grandfather.

“It's natural to ask, `Who are these guys?',” said Wolfson. “The key is that they had a Jewish father, who married an Egyptian, and they grew up under tremendous pressure to assimilate into another culture -- yet they kept their Jewish identity,” said Wolfson. “When you say that to Jewish parents, it rings all kinds of bells. This is precisely the challenge so many face today.”

This rite may be embarrassing for some parents. Others may question their right to lay hands on their children's heads and to recite holy words. After all, the prayers end with a “priestly” benediction: “May the Lord bless you and watch over you. May the Lord cause His face to shine upon you ...”

But these words must be spoken many times -- in the home -- if children are going to have strong “Jewish memories,” said Wolfson. “Parents must realize that they can get back on a Jewish road map,” he said. “You can resume your Jewish journey and take your children with you. But that road has to go through the home.”

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Terry Mattingly teaches communications at Milligan College in Tennessee. He writes this weekly column for the Scripps Howard News Service.

Retailers depend on their holiday sales for much of their business but church groups have been fighting for years to play down the retail aspects of Christmas and play up the religious significance of the holiday. “Keep Christ In Christmas” is the slogan many of them use. Commentator John Boykin shares their frustration, but not their solution to the problem:

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Every year, I boycott the local store that trots out its Christmas doodads first. It starts earlier every year – this year it was October 4th. As a Christian, I believe Jesus was God’s way of walking the earth; if that’s anywhere close to true, he’s really the wrong person to trivialize. So I object to having him prostituted by marketers. Hence the boycott.

I’m not fighting the commercialization of Christmas. That fight was lost ages ago. What I’m after is more radical – disentangling Jesus entirely from this blight on his good name. I’m out to change the bumper sticker from “Keep Christ In Christmas” to “Free Christ From Christmas.”

A heresy? Well, compare Christmas with Martin Luther King Jr.’s birthday. On his birthday, no one ever pays any attention to his birth. Instead, it’s “I have a dream...” and his impact on society. We mark Dr. King’s birth by focusing on what he said and did as an adult. Christmas, by contrast, has no time for what the adult Jesus said and did. Christmas keeps him safely shut up as a baby in the manger where he can’t make his usual noise about people repenting and living a godly life.

So does his birth matter at all? Well, it matters to his followers today as one way of backing up his claim to be the Son of God. But that’s not the way Jesus himself backed up his claim. He pointed not to his birth, but to his resurrection. So I’ll trade a month of Christmases for one meaningful Easter.

When Jesus denounced hypocrisy, he wasn’t talking about saying one thing and doing something else. He was talking about using God, and the things of God, as a means to some other end, like, oh, say, making a buck. This is why he drove the moneychangers out of the temple. We do him no honor by carting him out once a year to stand him on his head.

I’m not proposing that we cancel Christmas. I know the economy would collapse without it. Fine! Keep the gift giving and the Jingle Bells. Let’s just subtract the remaining Jesus-element from it and move that over into Easter. Call December 25 Solstice, call it Retail Day, call it Holiday #9. I don’t care. Just leave Christ out of it. He was not born to be the patron saint of Fourth Quarter Earnings.

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John Boykin is the author of the book Cursed Is the Peacemaker. He lives in Belmont, California

Have you heard about the 100 Thing Challenge? It’s a grass-roots movement in which otherwise normal folks are pledging to whittle down their possessions to a mere 100 items. It was started by on-line entrepreneur, Dave Bruno, who believes in this simple truth: “Stuff starts to overwhelm you.” His complete insights on the topic will soon be published in a book.

Application:

We could all benefit by learning to live with less. It seems that the more things we possess, the more our things possess us. But long before a guy named Dave realized the dangers of materialism, there was a guy named Paul who came up with his own list. A much shorter list. Paul whittled the necessities of life down to just two things! In a letter to his understudy, Timothy, the Apostle Paul wrote, “So if we have enough food and clothing, let us be content” (1 Timothy 6:8, KJV). This is not to suggest that we should all seek to reduce our lives to these two basic things. Rather, the point was that we should learn to be content, regardless of the number of our possessions. As Paul would say elsewhere, “I know both how to be abased, and I know how to abound ...” (Philippians 4:12). Although there’s nothing wrong with possessing things, it’s learning to be content with less that frees us to focus on doing more for the Kingdom of God.

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Source: online @ 100 Thing Challenge by Guy Named Dave: http://guynameddave.com.

Mr. Bruno’s personal list of possessions (note there are two Bibles). Some of the objects, like socks, are actually groups:

ESV Bible

NRSV Bible with Prayer Book

Library (estimate about 300 books)

Journal

Pencil

Pen

Guitar (including, case, capo, picks)

Wedding ring

Wallet

Sunglasses

Watch

Razor

Toothbrush

Backpack (for work)

Garment bag

Suitcase

MacBook Pro

iPhone

iPad

Microphone

Headphones

Chair

Foot rest

Side table

File cabinet

Car

Skateboard

Backpack

Tent

Sleeping bag

Sleeping pad

Trekking Poles

Cook set

Stove

Headlamp

Water bladder

Surfboard

Wetsuit

Wetsuit jacket

Gaiters

Wool Hat

Hat

Mittens

Mitten liners

Fleece jacket

Down jacket

Rain jacket

Rain pants

Soft shell pants

Short sleeve wicking shirt

Capeline 1 long sleeve shirt

Capeline 3 long sleeve shirt

Capeline 2 pants

Suit jacket

Suit pants

Dress pants

Dress shirt

Tie

Brown belt

Brown belt

Casual pants

Casual pants

Long sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Short sleeve button-down shirt

Long sleeve shirt/jacket

Jeans

Jeans

Jeans

Shorts

Running shorts

Board shorts

Sweatshirt

Wool sweater

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

T-shirt

PJ pants

Socks (8)

Underwear (10)

Undershirts (6)

Brown shoes

Brown shoes

Trail runners

Hiking Boots

Sandals

Pastor Bil Cornelius of the Bay Area Fellowship, the largest church in Corpus Christi, Texas, really wanted good attendance at Easter services in 2010. The church plans to give away 15,000 gift bags, each with about $300 worth of goods and gift certificates inside. But wait! That’s not all! There will also be flat-screen TVs, skateboards, electric guitars, bicycles, furniture and 15 cars. In all, about $4.5 million worth in the gift bags and around $2 million more in other swag. The church had to cut an opening in the chapel wall so the cars can be pulled in Easter morning. “Imagine how great heaven is going to be if you feel that excited about a car,” Cornelius says.

The church billed the event as “The Ultimate Giveaway.” Twenty-three thousand people showed up.

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Corpus Christi Caller-Times

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #11182]

Pastor Bil Cornelius of the Bay Area Fellowship, the largest church in Corpus Christi, Texas, really wanted good attendance at Easter services in 2010. The church plans to give away 15,000 gift bags, each with about $300 worth of goods and gift certificates inside. But wait! That’s not all! There will also be flat-screen TVs, skateboards, electric guitars, bicycles, furniture and 15 cars. In all, about $4.5 million worth in the gift bags and around $2 million more in other swag. The church had to cut an opening in the chapel wall so the cars can be pulled in Easter morning. “Imagine how great heaven is going to be if you feel that excited about a car,” Cornelius says.

The church billed the event as “The Ultimate Giveaway.” Twenty-three thousand people showed up.

________

Corpus Christi Caller-Times

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[Original illustration at this number was a duplicate of HolwickID #11182]