Even after Caleb came into our lives I had the games. There is a picture of him lying next to me while I am holding a controller. As I think of the image the words of the family proclamation flash into my mind. "Successful marriages and families are established and maintained on principles of faith, prayer, repentance, forgiveness, respect, love, compassion, work, and wholesome recreational activities," (The Family: A Proclamation to the World, emphasis added).
Wholesome implies, "Conducive to moral or general well-being," (Random House Dictionary, 2010). Recreation is "refreshment by means of some pastime, agreeable exercise, or the like," (Random House Dictionary, 2010). Putting the two together forms the definition that I believe was implied: "Refreshment, conducive to well-being, by means of some pastime." Sadly, Caleb was getting nothing out of it and I was not being refreshed. Video games take, they don't give back.
With the ever mounting pressures of school coupled with the demands of family life the gaming finally hit a nerve I could no longer ignore. Speaking specifically to fathers, Harold B Lee said, "The most important of the Lord's work that you will ever do will be the work you do within the walls of your own home," (Strengthening the Home [pamphlet 1973], 7). I felt the import of that calling as I watched my son begin to grow and develop and then my daughter too. They were in my care. God had entrusted them to my wife and I for protection and learning. I knew then that I had to let the games go if I ever wanted to be what God needed me to be.
I took the games to a store and traded them in for cash. Though I had wanted to buy movies with it to ease the pain, the money ended up going to family needs and I never saw it again. It was a much better ending anyway because the addiction to games is just part of the problem. Entertainment as a whole is dangerous without the proper perspective.
For me video games are not an option. Like the people of Ammon I have buried my weapons of war and they will remain there. I will not take them up again. But media in general poses another problem.
"Therefore, choose only entertainment and media that uplift you. Good entertainment will help you to have good thoughts and make righteous choices." (For the Strength of Youth, 2001). Entertainment is not anymore evil in nature than is a television set or a radio. The evil creeps in from the misuse of such things, whether that is overuse or inappropriate content.
Filth is ever present in our media today. Even as good Christian people we often miss the foul ingredients that are embedded in the shows, movies and games we watch. I think of the words of Alma about his son, Corianton's, sin. He asked if Corianton knew sexual misconduct is the worst "yea, most abominable above all sins save it be the shedding of innocent blood or denying the Holy Ghost?" And then he went on, "For behold, if ye deny the Holy Ghost when it once has had place in you, and ye know that ye deny it, behold, this is a sin which is unpardonable; yea, and whosoever murdereth against the light and knowledge of God, it is not easy for him to obtain forgiveness; yea, I say unto you, my son, that it is not easy for him to obtain a forgiveness." (Alma 39:5-6).
Drawing from his words, we have the three worst sins we can commit: Denial of the Holy Ghost, Murder, and Adultery. These are prevalent in all our media today. In fact, our criteria for ratings is largely based on the last two. Denial of the Holy Ghost, while generally referring to the ultimate sin of lying in the face of God, is also a process of getting to that heinous act by ignoring the promptings of the spirit and denying God's existence.
These three sins are in almost every film out there in the world today. Practically all modern shows and cinema deny God in order to pursue another end. It can be that pleasure is the ultimate experience, that only survival of the fittest is truth or even that there is no truth and existence itself is a misappropriated belief. There are thousands of these variants playing every hour on the hour on television stations across the world. They sell us these lies at the price of time and values. This makes it absolutely critical to choose the best entertainment.
I look back at the definition we set up earlier. Entertainment must be refreshing and good to our souls (body, mind and spirit). Sometimes we need a good movie or book to provide a little relief from the world and express things of the soul. A concert or set of music can provide the same thing. Many different options are available and can be pursued if done in wisdom and in order, not in the spirit of glutting ourselves upon it.
Entertainment is not required for salvation, but our sanity may be saved at times by it. It is not tied directly to exaltation, but it isn't denied either. It requires a balance that the world sadly does not understand. We cannot let ourselves become slaves to the television shows and movies of the day.
We must dedicate our lives to following the Savior and his teachings which ask us to give our heart and soul to him, not idols of metal and glass. He wants to bless us and has great desires to uplift us, but cannot do so if we continually shut out the Holy Ghost by the misuse of media.
I love the Lord and am trying to do more to follow him. I hope and pray he will aid all of us in rising above the filth of the world and becoming the saints of God he asks us to be. I say this in his sacred name, Jesus Christ, amen.
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