Richard’s Remarks
A Little Challenge
I have some very fond childhood memories of the Lone Star Church of Christ located in rural, Southwest Missouri. I can still “see” the building, auditorium and Bible classrooms. I can still “hear” the sounds and “smell” the smells. Regularly, after Sunday morning services, my family (grandma, grandpa, mom, dad, brother and myself) would gather at the home of Ocie and Ruth Long (my great-uncle and great-aunt). After feasting upon some wonderful “down-home cookin,” the adults would make their way to the living room for some visiting, an occasional nap and now-and-then some singing. My brother and I would usually venture outside and find something to do – often times involving a football. If my grandpa and uncle ventured outside, we would then follow them around as they explored the farm. Usually, we would end up in my uncle’s workshop where he repaired chain saws and lawn mowers and where he did his wood working. To this day there is a hand-made log cabin sitting on my office shelf that Ocie made and gave to me. What a treasure!
My brother and I, in our childhood, didn’t understand or appreciate how the adults could simply sit in the living room and “just visit.” (And, it usually didn’t take long for the scriptures to become the topic of conversation.) In other words, we couldn’t understand how they could make it through the entire afternoon without turning on the tv. Oh, Ocie and Ruth had a tv – a small set that sat over in the corner of the living room tucked out of the way. It certainly was not the focal point of the room, nor was it the focal point of those gathered in the room. Oh, how things are different today!
In our home, as in so many, the living-room furniture is arranged according to the location of the tv. It is the focal point. In my aunt and uncle’s house, the furniture all faced toward the center of the room. When you sat down you were looking, not at the tv, but at another person. In their living room, nobody “automatically turned on the television” as so many do today when entering the room, myself included. Thinking about my good memories of those days reminds me of what should be the focal point in my home – family instead of the television.
In the sermon last Sunday morning, I made reference to the dangers of becoming desensitized to sin. Isn’t the television a large part of such a dangerous process? I wonder, what kind of vision (the manner in which one sees or conceives something) do we get from television? Perhaps we don’t realize how “dependant” we are on tv. So, here’s the challenge. To see how dependant you might be on television, try to go a whole day without turning it on (ok, except for the news &/or weather). Do something else – carry on a conversation with your spouse, go and visit somebody, read your Bible, play a game with your kids/grandkids, exercise, do something outside, pray, etc. Doing such might just improve our vision.