“Dystopian Existential Thoughts” – Their Sources and the Way to Peace – Purity 1671
Purity 1671 05/30/2025 Purity 1671 Audio Podcast
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Good morning,
Today’s photo of a family standing on an unknown seashore as a hazy sun begins to set comes to us from an unknown FB friend who shared this scene on social media back on July 14th, 2024. If this seaside memory is yours let us know and we will photo-credit you on the blog after the fact.
Well, it’s Friday, thank God!, and as the sun sets on another work week, I am reminded of how vitally important it is that we have a Christian worldview as the context in how we live our lives because without it even the most stunning sunset will be powerless to deliver us from hope stealing contemplations of impermanence, futility, and death.
Generally the busyness of our lives keeps us from pondering the big questions of life and death and finding meaning in what often can seem to be the absurdities in this world but in our mass media culture of fear, the daily news casts are filled with reports of the bad things happening all across the world which not only paints a dim picture of the state of the world for today but they also paint a bleak picture for the future. Reports of wars, rumors of wars, anticipated environmental catastrophes, and natural disasters can fill us with fears that the “end is near” and the entertainment industry runs with these fears creating and movies and television series featuring the horrific, apocalyptic, and post-apocalyptic nightmares and speculations.
Recently, I made the foolish choice to sit down to binge watch a short post-apocalyptic series that focused on a global catastrophe and the dramas of society who were doing their best to survive from mutant zombie-like creatures and the evil deeds of their fellow man. The series was dystopian and hopeless as one could be and despite the supposed “goodness” of some of the characters’ intentions, themes of selfishness, “live and let die” immoralities, and the desire for revenge corrupted any hope that the “good guys” would win. The more the drama and carnage unfolded you realized that there were no” good guys” and nobody was going to really survive. So, I regretted giving my time and attention to such soul corrupting fare. I tried to watched it through the lens of the gospel, taking note of what the characters were doing wrong and hoping that that common grace would somehow shine through, but even my trying to put things in a Christian context didn’t keep me clean of the show’s negative effects.
Yesterday, as I was going about my day, I caught myself having “dystopian existential” thoughts pondering the fate of the people that I passed on the streets – thinking that they seemed to be consumed with the things of this world and how tragic our lives would be if this is all there was in life – how hopeless life would be if it were just us alone in the universe, left with nothing but our wits, skills, and abilities to find our happiness, meaning, our purpose. Without the knowledge of God and the gospel of Jesus Christ, the secular version of life is “work hard, take what you want, try to create your own happiness, try to avoid suffering, and die anyway. With thoughts of how futile life could seem, I realized that this mental narrative was either a product of the enemy or from my exposure to the dystopian horror series that I had unwisely exposed myself to.
The word of God tells us in Philippians 4:8-9:
8 …. Fix your thoughts on what is true, and honorable, and right, and pure, and lovely, and admirable. Think about things that are excellent and worthy of praise. 9 Keep putting into practice all you learned and received from me (The Apostle Paul)—everything you heard from me and saw me doing. Then the God of peace will be with you.
Paul’s advice is to fix our thoughts on what is true, honorable, right, pure, lovely, and admirable – not quasi-scientific post-apocalyptic nightmares – and to follow His example of discipled Christian living, with the ultimate fruit of peace resulting.
So, if you grow weary of ministry or living the Christian life, or just plain tired and want to relax from the work and troubles of this world, be wise and discerning in your selection of what you put before your eyes. Because even though the show or movie will end when the screen fades to black and the credits role, the seeds that secular entertainment can plant can lead us into temptation, fear, or dread.
Once I realized that my negative train of though was the product of the show I watched I was able to redirect my thoughts and let go of my feelings of anxiety and dread by remembering who I am in Christ and the fact that there is a God who loves me and is directing all things for the good of those who love Him and are called according to His purposes and that life is full of hope and meaning when we fully and continually trust Him.
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For those who want more evidence for Christianity than my simple encouragements provide, I offer apologist, Frank Turek’s website, https://crossexamined.org/.
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Today’s Bible verse comes to us from “The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling” By John G. Kruis.
(While Bible verses on various topics of Counseling can be found with a quick Google search, we encourage you to purchase this resource to support the late author’s work. (The Quick Scripture Reference for Counseling By John G. Kruis on Amazon )
This morning’s meditation verses come from the section on Mixed Marriages.
Nehemiah 13:23–27 (NASB) In those days I also saw that the Jews had married women from Ashdod, Ammon and Moab. As for their children, half spoke in the language of Ashdod, and none of them was able to speak the language of Judah, but the language of his own people. So I contended with them and cursed them and struck some of them and pulled out their hair, and made them swear by God, “You shall not give your daughters to their sons, nor take of their daughters for your sons or for yourselves. Did not Solomon king of Israel sin regarding these things? Yet among the many nations there was no king like him, and he was loved by his God, and God made him king over all Israel; nevertheless the foreign women caused even him to sin. Do we then hear about you that you have committed all this great evil by acting unfaithfully against our God by marrying foreign women?”
Today’s verses fall under the seventh point of our counseling reference guide resource section on Mixed Marriages.
7. Men of Judah intermarried and were led into deep sin. God was angry with them.
Today’s Bible verses speak of one man’s zeal for doing the right thing according to God, drawing from the truth of scripture and the mistakes of the past to emphatically encourage others to repent.
Seeing Israelite descendants being completely ignorant of their ancestor’s native tongue and customs caused Nehemiah to see the evil that mixing with non-believers had caused leading him to contend, curse, beat, and pull the hair out of some to drive them to see the error of their ways – and using the Biblical example of Solomon to drive home the point that his contemporaries had gone astray. God’s righteous wrath flowed through Nehemiah to impress upon the offenders the far-reaching effects and weight of their sin.
Corrupting ourselves with alternative views of faith and religion is never worth the “education” that it supposedly brings. We don’t need to learn about and associate with error to be more “diverse”. We should instead obey God’s word and not be led into all types of sin through friendships or marriages with non-believers.
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As always, I invite all to go to mt4christ.com where I always share insights from prominent Christian theologians and counselors to assist my brothers and sisters in Christ with their walk.
Today we continue sharing from “Day by Day Along the Way” By Jay E. Adams.
As always, I share this information for educational purposes and encourage you all to purchase Adams’ books for your own private study and to support the late author’s work. This resource is available online for less than $20 at many sites.
Day 170
In that same hour He exulted by the Holy Spirit … – Luke 10:21
Jesus also rejoiced! As He thought about the cross, and all that it would make possible for simple people like the seventy and His disciples, He rejoiced that the Father had revealed all these wonders to “babes.” At least, that is what they would seem to the world which sneers at the unsophisticated and unworldly. But, actually, it is the “wise and intelligent,” trusting in their own knowledge, whose eyes are covered. It has pleased the Father to blind them in their self-righteousness. Jesus, and His salvation, is revealed only to those that God wills (v. 22). It is not by human wisdom or insight that people come to know Him as Savior; it is by revelation. Let us remember that, and make much of the revealed words of God in the Bible. Reason cannot bring men savingly to Christ. Only reasoning from the Bible can do that. The Bible is truly God’s Words written; they are as much His words as if you could hear them spoken audibly. So, along with your Lord, rejoice that in His Word you are assured of your place in the Lamb’s book of life![1]
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[1] Jay E. Adams, Day by Day along the Way (Cordova, TN: Institute for Nouthetic Studies, 2020), 178.
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