As an IV staff I am guilty of thinking that I am the expert on how Christians should present themselves to culture and interact with culture, and so when something seems somewhat cheesy, I am quick to jump on it and run it down. Sometimes I go overboard. Maybe this is one of those times, but this site, Godtube, just makes me squirm. I know that the intentions behind this site are most likely from a desire for Christians to have safe, "clean" options as alternative to "wordly" things that are admittedly tricky to navigate.
But to me this seems like yet another attempt to remove ourselves from the world, making ourselves insulated and isolated from those who might think differently than us or have conflicting values. It's all the same stuff as regular YouTube, only it's sanitized, Christianized, and mostly irrelevant to people who don't know Jesus. It makes me sad that tons of Christians out there are going to celebrate this site as a positive witness for Jesus on the internet, not realizing that for the most part non-Christians won't darken the virtual door of Godtube, unless it is to mock or shake their heads. Why do we as Christians continue to struggle with relevance, lacking creativity and drive to engage the world with excellence on the world's turf and terms? It's not easy, and it's certainly simpler to spoof and parody in Christian-ese and know that it will be accepted and liked by people who speak the same language. Sigh. Maybe I'm being too hard on this instance.
But to me this seems like yet another attempt to remove ourselves from the world, making ourselves insulated and isolated from those who might think differently than us or have conflicting values. It's all the same stuff as regular YouTube, only it's sanitized, Christianized, and mostly irrelevant to people who don't know Jesus. It makes me sad that tons of Christians out there are going to celebrate this site as a positive witness for Jesus on the internet, not realizing that for the most part non-Christians won't darken the virtual door of Godtube, unless it is to mock or shake their heads. Why do we as Christians continue to struggle with relevance, lacking creativity and drive to engage the world with excellence on the world's turf and terms? It's not easy, and it's certainly simpler to spoof and parody in Christian-ese and know that it will be accepted and liked by people who speak the same language. Sigh. Maybe I'm being too hard on this instance.
No comments:
Post a Comment