Adults, Video Games, and the Liberating Power of Limitation

I recently had the opportunity to be on a fresh new podcast, Christ and Pop Culture. This podcast is hosted by my fellow church members Rich Brooks and David Dunham. Rich (his group blog) and David (his blog) are talented, fun guys (with well-done blogs), and I would encourage you to regularly listen to their show. If you desire to know what is going on in American pop culture, and you want that knowledge filtered through a reformed lens, I can think of few better places to send you than to Christ and Pop Culture. They were very kind to have me on as we discussed my blog posts from several weeks back about youth groups using Halo 3 for evangelistic means. Download the show directly here--it's about 30 minutes long, and it's a worthwhile listen.

In the course of our conversation, we talked about adults and video games. The issue was introduced, "How much should adults play video games?" Now, while acknowledging right off the bat that video games are not necessarily sinful, and that it can be fine to play them at times, I noted that video games are fundamentally rooted in a fantasy world. They have little ties to the real world, even if they replicate real-world experiences. There is little in your average video game, furthermore, that you can transfer to the real-world in a meaningful way. Essentially, video games are pure entertainment. There is not anything wrong with pure entertainment, of course, but it is my contention that for the Christian, the person invested with the responsibility to bear the image of God, subdue the world, preach the gospel to the lost everywhere around us, and advance the kingdom of God, pure entertainment should be limited. In fact, in a society that idolizes entertainment, recreation, fun, and self-indulgence, we should provide a clearly countercultural picture of a life devoted to higher things, to important things, to causes that last for eternity.

Do not misread me. I enjoy sports and movies as much as the next guy. I am not an ascetic. However, like any man, I have alot of important things to do. I have a family to provide for, a career to build, a faith to cultivate, a church to serve. I love spending some time on TrueHooop (the best basketball blog in the world, hands down), but I get to do so very rarely, maybe once a week if I'm lucky. I love watching movies, but I watch only a few (if that many) in a given week. I love pleasure reading, but since the summer, when I read Tom Wolfe's A Man in Full, I have not even attempted to read a book for fun. Am I unique? No, there are tons of men just like me, no, doing more than me, and we realize that there is simply too much of importance to do in the real-world than to rack up high scores and defeat towering enemies in the virtual "world."

Christian men who devote large portions of time to recreation and fun would be well served by trading investment in ephemeral things, things that will not last and that are of little lasting consequence, for investment in things that truly matter. Don't waste your college years goofing off. Serve your church, work hard in your classes, provide an income for yourself. Post-college, don't follow Zach Braff and the immature men-children and waste your life away. Seek a wife, use your gifts and talents in employment for God's glory, build a church through faithful service, share the gospel with hell-bound people, and generally live for things that matter and that last. Limit your pursuit of pleasure and fun. If you're dragging your feet about children, and your wife really wants to have them, but you don't want the extra work burden and personal responsibility that comes, because you don't want to give up all those sports games and video games, it is time to limit yourself. It is time to be a man, to dig in, to work yourself hard, in order that your wife would be happy and you would become what God has in store for most of us: a father. If this sounds repressive, the Bible shows us it's not. Indeed, it is in limiting ourselves--in terms of our pleasure pursuits--that we free ourselves to do things that matter and to become the men God intends us to be. In limiting ourselves, we liberate ourselves.

Sometimes, the Only Halo Related to the Youth Is a Game...

Well, I'm being a little fascetious there. But you can excuse me, I think--it was too fun to pass up.

This is a fun discussion, and I'm thankful for everyone who's chimed in. Very stimulating stuff. Essentially, I think that all who have commented essentially agree. No one really wants to slam a church youth group for playing Halo 3, while all are quick to affirm that the primary focus of the youth group and the church itself should be to ground students' lives in the Bible. On this point, Rick, Riley, Mary and Joseph (I didn't plan that, I swear) are in basic agreement. G. F., on the other hand, just wants to break it down.

In all seriousness, I concur with this consensus. If Halo 3 were horribly violent, then I would have a problem with a youth group playing it. But it's not Doom or Duke Nukem or--shudder--Postal 2. These games all have clearly sinful elements to them. Postal 2 apes the Columbine killers, for example, in certain gameplay elements. Youth groups should have no part of that. But with a game that is violent, yes, but is not horribly so, I think we can say that we're okay with youth playing such a game under supervision. We might not all use the game in the same way as the churches profiled in the NYT story, but I myself have nothing against a little combat-by-video-game. It can actually be pretty fun, though I prefer games in which the violence is not ultrarealistic. I feel better about "nuking" a funny little robot than I do a pixelated woman.

With all that said, we still haven't gotten to the heart of the matter. So here goes. If a church has a youth group, and that youth group is not a substitute for parental spiritual care of children but a supplement to it, I'm fine with youth groups. I'm especially okay with them when they don't major on silliness and hijinks but instead attempt to bring youth together in a fun and relaxed setting to communicate the eternal truths of God's Word. I know that Covenant Life Church in Maryland, for example, trains it students theologically using Wayne Grudem's book on systematic theology. Knowing CLC, I'm sure that they show their youth a good time, but the emphasis of their times together is the Triune God and the Word through which He has spoken. That sounds like a great operation to me, and I'm guessing that the youth benefit from their association as much as they enjoy it.

The primary resource for children, though, must be their parents. We must say that, highlight it, and live by it. Most churches do none of the three. We need a recovery of the role of the parents in the lives of their children. A dad and a mom are not advisors or buddies. They are a child's authority. Dad must be a strong, spiritual leader and mom must be a godly, gracious helpmeet, to use an old word. With this in place, we are poised to reach the youth who were not raised in Christian homes. It is great to invite an unsaved friend to a youth group meeting, yes. That may well have great effects and even lead youth to Christ. But it is far more important that our teenagers invite their lost friends to two other places: our churches and our homes. In the church, the youth will hear the gospel and see its effect as people of all different ages and types worship together in the name of Jesus Christ. In our homes, they will see the calculus of the gospel displayed, as husband and wife demonstrate and speak the gospel to their children. A great youth group is helpful to the witness of the Christian church. But a gospel-saturated church is calibrated to display the gospel in a way an age-segregated youth group cannot. In addition, a loving Christian home is foundational to our evangelism, as there youth will see the relationship of Christ and the church lived out between husband and wife. In our homes, the gospel is both spoken and demonstrated. When all of these parts work together, and the church is healthy and vibrant, then it is equipped to reach youth in a way that Halo 3 and its space combat cannot touch.

Youth Groups, Halo 3, and the Evangelistic Imperative

Note: I am leaving this piece up for today (Wednesday) because of the response it has attracted. I'll continue my commentary on the issues it raises tomorrow.

The New York Times published a piece yesterday on how church youth groups are using the video game Halo 3 to attract young people, specifically young men, who are just about the hardest group to reach of them all. The article prompted an opportunity for reflection on reaching youth and the lengths to which we go to do so.

Beginning with the immediate issue, I'm not sure how I feel about churches using Halo 3 to reach youth. It is a very violent game, and we've got to acknowledge that. With that said, though, the game is not as violent as some games are. I have played previous iterations, none of which incited me to commit violence against others. Should churches use video games to reach teens? That's a tough question. It's hard to reach teens. They are at once asking big questions and devoting themselves to minor matters. There is a reason that many young men become obsessed with sports or other diversions and many young men become obsessed with the school social scene or other pastimes. This is because they do not have to deal with the heavy matters of life as do adults. Yet at the same time teens do think a good deal and will consider material that is thoughtfully and interestingly presented. Teens are tough to reach, yes, but affecting material can and will move them and lead them to think about deeper things. They'll gravitate to Halo 3, yes, but they will also ponder the higher questions of life in their bedrooms when alone and isolated from the immature and sometimes abrasive school environment.

Which leads me to propose that whether or not Halo 3 is the best way to reach teens is not the best question to ask. I would rather have parents taking responsibility for their teens' spiritual lives and not ceding such activity to their local youth group leader. When parents live out a real, vibrant, passionate Christianity that avoids both pious platitudes and youthful identification, they set themselves up to connect with their child and to allow their teen to consider the Christian faith in a sustained and thoughtful way. We have somehow worked ourselves into a situation where parents are merely responsible for ensuring their teens' survival, even as they leave all cultivation of a healthy spiritual life to an overtaxed youth minister who has only a fraction of the time and opportunity of a parent with the youngsters. This is a fundamentally flawed situation. Tomorrow, we'll look at it more, and examine the paradigm through which parents can lead their children through the tough and tumultuous teenage years.