Burglary, Assault, Home Invasion!!!!! All in the middle of a Family movie night!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ku1YOrxXeQ

Check it out……or better yet don’t bother because…

Even if you make it through that, chances are your daughter will die anyway from …

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OMbvhug7CGU&feature=related

…at least that’s what I gleaned from my peripheral vision and peripheral attention last week.

So what was I doing?

Well it was actually about 2 weeks ago when I was visiting my in-laws and they had the TV on in the background all weekend. Now my sensibilities weren’t overly offended by the plethora of female sanitary product commercials, and I made it through the onslaught of ED commercials, but when I had to stand in front of the TV to keep my 4 year old from witnessing a home invasion, not just once, but three times I finally decided the TV was going off. Unfortunately I didn’t get it off before I was subjected to Merck and companies blitz of scare tactics about HPV.

Does marketing affect you? Does it?

I offer exhibit A - my father-in-law – 61 year old white male farmer.

Up until a few years ago I would have classified him as fearless. Now though, he has developed, uh, dare I call them “phobias” about someone breaking into his house, someone breaking into our house, “something bad” happening to us because the world is so dangerous, catching the bird flu, the swine flu, SARs, salmonella, or some other deadly disease.

What’s happened to him?

The fearless farmer with a 12 gauge behind the door now checks the doors three times before going to bed. If I’m out of town his advice to my my wife is, “lock the doors and don’t go outside.” He doesn’t want to eat in a restaurant because of the constant salmonella outbreaks he hears about….uh oh, wait! How’d he hear about those outbreaks anyway?

Well about 4-5 years ago he subscribed to the Dish network, or one of those satellite TV companies, and since then the TV has run pretty much 24/7 in their house. Now I only visit about once every 6-8 weeks but it’s been enough to make some observations:

Observation 1- He is the same, tough capable, healthy individual he was 5 years ago.

Observation 2 – He has developed some (as nearly as I can tell) irrational fears about things over which he really has little to no control.

Observation 3 – The only thing that has changed is what’s gone into his mind through his eyes and ears for the past few years.

The result? - The Bible calls it a ‘Spirit of Fear’, and by the way it says that God didn’t give it to you.

Do you have one?

Oh I’m sure you don’t. TV doesn’t affect you that way..... you’re smart enough to be able to filter through what’s realistic and what’s not. What’s important and significant and the rest of the gobbledygook.

So ask yourself – what do you fear? Anything? What do you worry about? Anything? What makes you nervous daily? Anything? The recession? The job market? The economy? Coming pandemics? The budget deficit? Losing your healthcare? Losing your job?

How’d you find out you were supposed to be worried about those things? I bet it wasn’t from reading the Bible was it.

Now, go read Psalm 91. – Seriously – stop reading this and go read Psalm 91 right now, it’ll only take you 4-5 minutes.

What are you more inclined to believe, those verses or the “realistic” information you get from 24-hour news channels and their companionate commercials?

If you think you can bombard yourself with the TV to no effect your kidding yourself.

If you just read Psalm 91 and felt that those were just nice verses for a different people in a different time, and didn’t see them as literal promises that you can stake your life on then you need some adjustment in your thinking.

Now there’s no substitute for reading the Bible, but when you’re not doing that why not fill your mind (your soul) with uplifting, faith-building materials instead of fear enhancing, worry-multiplying stuff.

You know what I’m gonna suggest next. Check out the link to the right. If you haven’t read it yet, order it today. If you have, buy 5 copies for your friends, it’ll build their faith and they’ll thank you for it later.

God Bless.

LM