In general, I am the type of person who has a pretty optimistic personality. I root for the underdog, shoot for the stars, believe anything is possible. Nothing really gets me down, or so I thought. today I was milling around on one of my favorite Youth Ministry websites when I came across an arcticle about the 2009 MTV Movie awards. Now, this is where my natural tendency toward optimism turned into defeat and frustration. Give this a read.
"MTV is bringing out the big guns this year. Andy Samberg, one of Gen Y's favorite personas from Saturday Night Live, will be hosting the event. Samberg is the guy who brought us those wonderful toe-tappin' tunes like "D--k in a Box" and "J--z in My Pants," (which was one of the top music videos on iTunes when it was released), and the most recent digital short featuring Justin Timberlake which has the chorus, "We should f*** each other's mother".........
What's in store for this year? Who knows? The only prediction I am willing to make is that the show will draw in several million teenage viewers. So, if you want to know what teenagers are watching these days and who they're listening to, say a prayer, and turn on MTV this Sunday night. "
Did you hear yourself read that last paragraph? It said that millions of teens are going to watch. My deepest fear and what I believe to be reality is that what our teens are watching is a visual, verbal, and physical message of what adults in today's society expect of our teens as they enter into adulthood. It's the "gospel" of the today's world, the standard by which to live. This stuff kills me. It makes me feel as though my efforts to reach a generation in the name of Jesus are simply specks of nothingness compared the powerful message of the MTV promoting, foul language engaging, sexually explicit showing bunch of adults who do not realize what they are teaching the youth of today, and the adults of tomorrow. I mean, one of the categories for the MTV Movie Awards is "best WTF Moment", (WTF standing for What the F***). Give me a break.
Many people would read my article and say to me, "Neal, this stuff isn't any different than they are hearing on the playground at school or in the locker room". To that, I would have to agree. But last time I checked MTV is run by adults, not kids in a locker room. But that too would be incorrect, for it looks as though adults will simply bend today's moral standard to mirror the 'locker room' conversations of today's youth. What an unfortunate situation we are in.
So as I take steps to teach today's youth about love and purity, honesty and integrity, self control and morality, it looks like there are others who choose to teach otherwise. What a shove backward. Let's hope that each teen watching on Sunday also has someone in their life taking steps to teach them about living for Jesus.
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