James Curtis

So I was having a little walk today and I noticed how incredibly gorgeous it was. Everything was perfect. The trees were coming back to life with leaves and budding flowers. I couldn’t help but say “Praise God for spring.” Winter is such a desolate time. It’s never really enjoyable…to me at least. It’s a time where everything seems to be dulled down. School goes by slower because I have nothing to look forward to after it than a cold walk to my car. Outside it just looks depressing as the trees mimic their dead-like behavior. The beautiful green grass turns to nasty mud-stained snow. Everything just seems horrible.

Then spring comes along and it’s like we’re a child again. Many of us watch in awe as the trees regain their life. “I forgot how green the grass could be!” I’ve caught myself exclaiming. Isn’t it amazing that we have a God who will give us the horrible weather so we might appreciate the better weather just a little bit more?

My point to this whole blog is this-We all have our times of winter (understandably, it may be a different season for you.) but we MUST realize that hope is just around the corner with gorgeous new weather just waiting. We’ll see everything come back to life, and our eyes will be opened.

But there’s another problem. We’re creatures of the here-and-now. Its winter now means that you’re not acknowledging that spring is on the way. In the same way, we do this with our problems. We get in a horrible mood and forget that spring is just around the corner. I’ll admit, I’m incredibly guilty of sulking. I get ridiculous when I’m in a bad mood. But what I have to realize is that my eyes will be re-opened. I will see the world like never before. I’ll exclaim how amazing it is that the grass is so green. I’ll make sure to open the blinds so that the sun can pour in. I’ll go for walks and notice all of the beauty the world has to offer… but at that point-in-time, I stare at the mud-stained snow. I keep my blinds closed for fear of the ugliness of the dead-like trees pouring in, and I’ll exclaim how much life just isn’t that great.

Spring is around the corner…and it’ll blow you away.

I’ve come to realize the incredible impact that the mass media has on people’s lives. Advertisements are showing us that sex sells…porn is proving this to be true. Television shows are showing us that it’s okay to just be, in the words of Alex and Brett Harris (authors of “Do Hard Things.”), an “Average Teen.” Walk through any public school (as well as most private schools) and you’ll find that sex drugs and alcohol prove to be a very prominent part of almost any student’s life.

In a lot of the same ways, music seems to play a huge role as well. I’ve been known to fight to the bitter end that music has no effect on a person’s life. This has mainly been due to the fact that people try to shove this “Rap causes killing” crap down our throats almost constantly. Maybe we should start posing a better question. My, personal, theory isn’t that all music causes you to do horrible things, it’s this; although I feel as though bad music doesn’t necessarily make you do bad things, it’s very much so true that good music helps you to do marvelous things.

Hear me out on this. If we were to totally re-route our music choices to only those things honoring God, would we become better people? Absolutely not, that’s not the case at all. The point is this, mass media plays an incredible role in our lives. For teens especially, music is the leader in front of the incredible train of that which is mass media. If all you’re doing is listening to “I wanna hump dat booty, I wanna get dat booty, I wanna feel yo booty,” then guess what? you’re probably not going to feel as convicted when you look lustfully at women. Now think about this, if we were to re-rout our music choices, if only for a month-long trial, so we heard stuff like “There will be times where you may not find a reason to stand and sing, but let this remind you time after time, you’re a child of the king,” we may not feel as great about doing such things as looking lustfully at others.

The simple fact of the matter stands at this: Music, whether you’d like it to be or not, is an incredible influence on that which is you. Every question leads to two choices-Honor God (Ya know, that guy who gave His SON so that you may be saved), or feed the ego which is you. As cheesy as this may sound, God calls us to imitate Christ, and every now and then, the question really is as simple as “What would Jesus do?”

Don’t get me wrong, I don’t believe you’re going to hell for listening to that hit song “Hump dat booty.” The simple fact is, Jesus died on account of He knew all of us were going to make choices such as that, but God calls us to more. He calls us to give up little things for Him every day. Why not start with a huge influence on what you are?