Why Truth, Christian Thinking is Key for Media Wisdom
By Movieguide® Contributor
Christian scholar Dr. Jeremiah Johnston recently spoke with Kirk Cameron about Christian thinking and seeking the truth.
“The Gospel’s so easy to forget,” Johnston said on Cameron’s podcast “Takeaways.” “It’s so easy to get lax and complacent and get our focus off truth.”
He explained that he has become “an addict of the truth” over the years as he continues to seek answers about his faith.
“The most dangerous place a Christian can be is when you stop seeking truth,” Johnston said. “Every truth we find in the world can and will be reconciled with our faith…the deeper you go with God, the deeper He’ll walk with you.”
Cameron then asked Johnston how to become a better Christian thinker.
“The first thing you need to realize is we need to recover the great intellectual tradition of our faith,” he said.
Johnston explained that Christianity “survived the first three centuries” because they were spreading their faith and talking about the benefits of Christianity.
“So, what does that look like for you?” he asked. “Can you first answer your own tough questions that you face? That’s step number one to being a Christian thinker.”
The second job of a Christian thinker?
“To make sure that our faith connects up well with the questions culture is asking about our faith,” Johnston said, adding that Cameron’s podcast is an excellent example of showing ways Christianity relates to everyday life.
Christian thinking is key when it comes to engaging with media and entertainment.
Johnston’s emphasis on seeking truth goes hand-in-hand with the importance of teaching children a Christian worldview that they can come back to when engaging with different media.
“Today it’s become abundantly clear that we are living in a culture war of ideas. The Bible warns us, ‘See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the elemental spiritual forces of this world rather than on Christ’ (Col. 2:8),” Movieguide® previously reported.
Movieguide® added that parents must protect their children from non-Christian worldviews prevalent in media.
“Whether consciously or unconsciously, consistently or inconsistently, everyone is influenced by a worldview – their set of presuppositions and assumptions (which may be true, partially true or false),” Movieguide® explained. “Our worldview consists of those sets of beliefs and presuppositions that we hold about basic realities of our world. Our worldview determines our values, influences how we think and therefore guides how we live.”
“Every movie and television program you and your child watches has a dominant worldview that informs the themes, values, messages and lessons in that movie or TV program. Sometimes, the presentation of that worldview is mixed, inarticulate or confusing. Whether or not that is the case, however, it’s vital for you and your child to comprehend and understand the movie or program’s worldview so that you can measure it against the Christian worldview and what the Bible teaches and evaluate the movie or TV program,” they emphasized.
Johnston also discussed apologetics, a religious discipline that sees Christians actively defend their faith. It’s a topic that he talks about often.
“The doorway for evangelism today and sharing our faith goes through apologetics from now on,” Johnston said, via The Baptist Press. “The world today as we see it reflected around us is post-Christian, secularized, even hostile to the Christian worldview. This is our Jerusalem. This is our mission field. We have to be able to explain the Gospel through the doorway of apologetics … and we have to spread that with clarity. I can’t imagine sharing the Gospel now without marrying it with apologetics.
He also took part in an apologetics conference in 2022, where he pointed out that many ways of thinking end up “rebranding” over the years.
“The cool thing about truth is the truth never has to be rebranded,” Johnston said.
Watch Johnston and Cameron’s full conversation here.
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