Category: Current Events

The Problem With Christian Entertainment

Why do we not impact people in the entertainment industry? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Yesterday I saw a post on Facebook, and whether it was sarcastic or not, I don’t know, about why Christians shouldn’t watch The Office. Now I have never seen an episode of the show. The most I know about it is I understand a lot of memes on Facebook are from it and I know about the Owlkitty video of it. That’s it.

This led me to thinking about something else. I know we all realize it, but for the most part, Christian entertainment sucks. It’s often just boring and preachy. There are some exceptions, but it’s nothing the world wants to see. I remember when Fifty Shades of Grey came out that the same day, a counterpart movie called Old-Fashioned came out. You might have never even heard of it. There’s no way it could compete with Fifty Shades.

If there is one clear exception to this, it is the Chronicles of Narnia. Yet do you see Christianity explicitly spelled out in that? No. There’s a lot of symbolism in the books of course that points to Christ and so there is also in the rest of Lewis’s fiction, but many atheists can even enjoy reading C.S. Lewis.

Christians don’t have anything in the way of entertainment. We think you have to spell it out explicitly. It’s not fun. If we make something for the purposes of entertaining, our aim should be that the product is actually entertaining. That doesn’t negate we do it for Jesus, but people won’t want to watch Christian entertainment or play Christian video games or read Christian books for fun if they are not, well, fun.

Back in the days of the NES, I remember getting the Bible games from Wisdom Tree. They were alright games, but the only reason I got them was that they were Bible games. That’s it. They honestly hardly even worked on the NES at times. Bible video games are often some of the worst games that they are.

Many of us who are Christians don’t like it when we see a series and the politics is out there in front and everyone knows it. We think we are being preached to, and in essence, we are probably right. I know a lot of people have complained about the newest Star Trek series thinking that it’s going on. They could be right. If we don’t like it, why think unbelievers will like it?

What would be good is if we had a series come out on TV that was actually entertaining or a movie at the theater that was actually entertaining or a book or a video game or whatever it is and people wanted to play it and then find out later on that it was a Christian series. I know some of you will disagree, but on my podcast I have had John Granger on to discuss the Harry Potter series as a Christian series from a Christian viewpoint. Even if you don’t agree with that, if it is true, that is something powerful. That is having it done right.

When we think things have to be explicit, we also assume our audience is stupid. We assume that they have to state it outright or else no one will get it. That insults our audience. No one wants to be assumed to be an idiot.

I don’t know if you should watch the Office or not, but I know the reason we debate this is because we don’t have our own entertainment that’s good. You may enjoy watching Pureflix, but how many people do you know who are non-Christians who are buying it? This is not to knock them at all, but if we are wanting to reach people, it doesn’t help that goal if people aren’t interested in our method of outreach.

God gives us all things richly for our enjoyment as is said in 1 Tim. 6:17. Shouldn’t we do something for the enjoyment of our fellow neighbor? If we want to show Christianity to them in a way that is something they will want, shouldn’t we show them something they would want to have and something they can actually enjoy? This isn’t to say fun is the main goal of the Christian life, but fun is the goal of entertainment. If you sit down to watch the Office, you likely aren’t doing it to study theology or philosophy. Rightly or wrongly, you’re doing it to have fun.

We’re also meant to be creative people in the footsteps of the creator. Our creator created some very fun things for us here. I’ve seen our cat running around here playing some tonight. The animal kingdom is a testimony to the fun of the creator in many ways. Yes, nature is red in tooth and claw at times, but it’s also very fun in many other ways. Shouldn’t we be creative that way? Shouldn’t we make music and TV and movies and video games and books that unbelievers even will want to live?

Let’s do better.

Then maybe we won’t have to debate the Office because not only will we be watching our own great material, but so will everyone else.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I Affirm The Virgin Birth.)

Book Plunge: The Madness of Crowds

What do I think of Douglas Murray’s book published by Bloomsbury Continuum? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

I ordered this book on Interlibrary loan after I saw my wife’s priest recommended it, and I shortly forgot that I had. When I got it, I was thinking “I have so many books to go through already. Do I really want to go through this?” I saw an endorsement from Sam Harris on the back and seeing as I think the new atheist material is just horrible, that got me even more concerned. Do I really want to go through this? Still, I decided to open it up and give it a shot.

Within a few days, I was telling so many people they needed to go through it as well.

This is one of the most important books on our society that I have read. Murray deals with four major areas today and with some smaller areas that have a major impact. He does not write as far as I can tell from a Christian perspective and actually I gather is a homosexual from what I read. I read through though finding extreme agreement with so much that I read.

Let’s start with the first section he has on homosexuality. He talks about a movie being played in a theater in England that a gay publication protested against so much that it had to go to a new venue to play. The story in the film was about people who used to be same-sex attracted and no longer were.

Murray wrote about taking the main man behind it who helps people who want to be rid of same-sex attraction. He says that he never forces anyone and they come to him and how he said we should take him at his word. He’s not out there trying to eliminate homosexuals from society. He’s trying to help people who want to be helped. We could question his methodology, but why assume base motives of him?

He then goes on to say that gay no longer refers to just who you sleep with. Consider Peter Thiel who spoke at the RNC convention in 2016 and made a remark about the great battle of the day in comparison to past generations was what restrooms can we use? That he was truly representative of the homosexual movement was called into question. Ian McClellan made a statement about Brexit that said that if you were a homosexual, it was clear how you were to vote.

Murray also points out that this view of homosexuality only goes one way in the sense that if someone leaves a straight lifestyle to embrace a homosexual one, they are said to have found their true selves. If they go the opposite way, then they are said to be traitors to the cause living in denial. I wish something had been said about how in the first case it can often leave a family behind that doesn’t really want the dynamic to change.

The next major area to be dealt with is the question of women. This has begun with the idea of women being sexualized, and again, there are mixed messages. Consider how when Harvey Weinstein was found to have a casting couch that immediately women jumped up to complain about the treatment.

Mayim Bialik of the Big Bang Theory talked about how she makes it a point to be modest and dress conservatively, except, of course, when she doesn’t. Murray brought up about her being on Piers Morgan’s show and how he was saying there was an event to honor someone who had died and he thought too many women were using the event to show off their cleavage and he didn’t find that appropriate, Bialik, who is on the panel, gets up and turns her back to the crowd and tears her dress to expose herself to Morgan in protest.

Murray writes about how women have complained about being sexualized, all the while while often wanting to be as sexy as possible. Too often, women want men to notice them and yet at the same time not turn them into object. One aspect of this I was surprised was not mentioned were topless marches. Women who complain about objectification aren’t helping themselves by doing this.

He also says the feminist movement has often gone to an extreme of “Kill All Men” which really doesn’t mean to kill all men for some strange reason. It really means that men need to realize how they behave and bring about change. Who knew? Men are vilified for the crime of being men.

If women want a world where men are not going to notice them physically, it’s really a pipe dream. This is especially so since women buy so many items that are designed to highlight their feminine features and be noticed by men. It is human nature for men to notice beautiful women and this is a power that women have in that they can drive men absolutely mad and make them do things they wouldn’t normally do, a power they can use for good or for evil.

As for believe all women, this seems to go one way. When a woman makes a charge about how a man has behaved towards her sexually that is inappropriate, that is to be believed. What happens when it goes the other way? What if a man complains about a woman? The man is part of the patriarchy and must be dealt with!

There is an interlude after this on technology. Social media has its benefits, but it has also been a problem. Now, anything you say can be found and used against you. A tweet made years ago in innocence can ruin your career today. A person could have made a statement back in the early 2000’s that was opposed to redefining marriage, which was the majority opinion then, and be called into question for it today.

Social media means everything you say can be found for all time and there is no distinction anymore between private things and public things being said. Also, many people say things online that they wouldn’t say in person. It’s easy to do that when the person isn’t right in front of you and you are safe that way.

The next major section is race. Here again we see the same kind of scenario that we saw with women. Charges of racism and cultural appropriation can show up anywhere and someone can be turned into the bad guy immediately. Campuses have had riots over a comment that most of us would see as innocent, but was perceived as racist.

Consider the case of a school where one day a year, minority students were expected to stay off of campus by choice to show the contributions that they have made to culture. Whatever one thinks of this, it is an event done voluntarily by a group to themselves. Then one year they decided to reverse this and have a day where no white people were to show up.

The difference is that the whites were not volunteering. It was told they should do this. One professor sent out an email in response saying that this is not proper and goes against our basic freedoms. Before too long, there were riots taking place with even the president of the college being in a kind of hostage situation and the professor who sent the email was being accused of racism and had to quit his job.

As with Peter Thiel also, race has become more of a political stance than a biological one. Kanye West endorses Candace Owens and then goes and meets with Trump. At this point, it doesn’t matter what you think of any of those three people. The point is that after this, Kanye is said to not be truly black.

By contrast, what about Rachel Dolezal who was a chapter president of the NAACP and whoops, she turned out to actually be white. Her parents are both white. What are we told? If she wants to say she’s black, then she’s black. So Kanye who is truly black is not black, but Dolezal, who is truly white, is black.

The next interlude is on forgiveness with some nodding towards the Christian tradition on this. Can there be any forgiveness in our culture? Someone gets appointed to a government position and everyone scours through their past tweets and Facebook posts to find any dirt that can be found whatsoever and ruin their lives.

I have gotten annoyed thoroughly with the apology culture where everyone has to apologize for everything. Just this morning I read about a Padres player who apologized for hitting a grand slam. Apparently, he was supposed to not get one because when your team has a great lead, you shouldn’t pile on the runs. Ridiculous! This guy plays the sport well and has to apologize for it?

Besides that, it’s easier to think today that these aren’t apologies. They’re a way of saying “Please don’t ruin my life.” Unfortunately, the crowds don’t know forgiveness.

The last issue is transgenderism. One theme in the book regularly is that we make a major change in society, such as many people have done on homosexuality, and before the dust can settle and we can see how this will work out, we’re off to the next one. Murray writes about children even as young as eight being given hormone treatment to transition and they’re not required to tell their parents about it, although their parents sure need to get permission if that child needs an aspirin in school. Parents get concerned and they are told, “Get in line or your child will commit suicide!” What’s a parent to do?

Long time feminists who speak out are condemned. This includes those cases where a rapist in a prison identifies as a woman and then goes to a women’s prison and, well, I think we all know what happened. What about men who transition into women and then compete against women in sports? They do have an advantage from their past. The feminist movement must be beside themselves since they have long complained about men being seen as superior. Now, apparently, men are also superior at women’s sports.

Where will this end? It’s hard to say, but the crowd is not getting any better. More and more people are being attacked for perceived wrongs and the worst motives are assumed every time. Discussion is automatically shut down when one person is said to be on the wrong side of history or a racist or a homophobe or transphobe or sexist or whatever. Such people exist, but why assume they are everywhere? Why not have a real dialogue about our differences?

I really encourage everyone to read this book. It’s incredibly eye-opening and very easy to read and shocking to read. Our society has a lot of problems and if we don’t reverse the trend, it will only get worse.

In Christ,
Nick Peters
(And I affirm the virgin birth)

On The Rioters

What do I think about the riots going on? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

By now, everyone should know about the death of George Floyd in Minneapolis. If you don’t know about this, I can only assume you’ve been in a coma and are just now waking up and for some reason my blog is the first thing you want to read. If so, I appreciate it, but you need to just take a minute and turn on any news station and you’ll hear about this immediately. This is such big news now that I’m hardly hearing anything about Coronavirus any more.

So now some people are looking at this awful death that took place and are out there saying they’re demanding justice. Nothing says that like tearing up cities that had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with the event. Right now, I am hearing from so many people that “We need to listen to the oppressed.” Oppressed people usually don’t have the means to destroy historical landmarks and break into stores and steal items they want or break into Planet Fitness and actually start using the workout equipment.

Furthermore, if you want me to hear, I need to hear more than just that you’re offended about something. I need you to give me real data that there is a real problem and not just that you think that there is. I also need to hear a realistic solution you want to see and not only one you want to see, but a way to get there.

However, if I see you going out and rioting, then I no longer see you as the oppressed. I see you as the oppressor at that point. After all, this event happened in Minneapolis and I write this just outside of Atlanta that had NOTHING to do with what happened, and yet we have rioters gathering. I remember reading one night about the College Football Hall of Fame being looted.

I don’t even care about football a bit and yet that bothered me. I couldn’t tell you a single college football player on the field right now, but I know that in that place there is some history and it matters to a lot of people. I know about other losses that have taken place.

I know about Historic St. John’s Church in Washington D.C. being attacked and firefighters having to put out the flames. I know about the Lincoln Memorial and about the World War II Memorial being vandalized. (Strange that rioters complaining about a black man being killed have no problem vandalizing a memorial dedicated to a man who freed the slaves.) I know about the black business owner in Minneapolis who owned a sports bar that he put his life savings into and he had to start a GoFundMe.

I can already hear the pushback though.

“Nick! These are all businesses! These are landmarks! I’ll grant you it’s horrible, but it doesn’t replace human life!”

That’s true. Human life is first. So let’s talk about human life. How about this one?

This is Dave Patrick Underwood. He’s a law enforcement officer who was shot and killed during a riot in Oakland. If rioters say they care about life and justice, then what about this life? What about justice for Underwood? Right now, he’s actually the only one I know about. There could be more and I am sure if this keeps up and he is the only one now, he is the first of many.

Wanting justice is a good thing, but wanting justice by doing injustice to others is not a good thing. No one is denying a right to protest. Whether I agree with your reason for protest is irrelevant. If some Georgians wanted to gather to protest the Heartbeat Bill here in Georgia, that is their right. I would think they are 100% in the wrong, but I would defend 100% their right to protest.

In this case, yes, I think the original police officers did a great evil. Also, here in America, I think they should get justice like everyone else. They should have a trial and get to present their case and be treated accordingly based on the evidence.

It has been a long time since I watched Batman Begins, but I read about a scene in it recently where Ducard orders Bruce Wayne to kill someone. Bruce will not do it without trying the man with a trial first. Ducard tells him that his enemies will not share that sentiment. Bruce responds that that’s what will separate him from them.

Right now, I know at least one officer has been arrested. Let him have a trial and be dealt with accordingly by the law. Unfortunately, what is going on now is just more injustice and more innocents are being hurt by it.

What about racism? Racism is a great evil wherever it takes place. Race is one of the central facts about who a person is and is something sacred. Rob Bell is definitely out there these days, but one quote I remember from Love Wins is that heaven will be a hard place for a racist to be. I think he’s absolutely right with that one. (This is in no way an endorsement of his teachings. It’s just acknowledging he got something right.)

At the same time, I have not seen the hard evidence any of the police officers who did this evil were doing it because of racism. It has just been assumed. I am not saying it isn’t racism. It could be. I am saying we don’t know.

However, what concerns me more is the narrative of racism. No one is denying that racism exists in this country. It always will. As long as there are sinful human beings around, some of those sinful humans will be racists. They exist in all races and groups as well. Anyone of us can succumb to that kind of thinking. No one is immune.

However, I also do not think it is the norm. The majority of Americans today do not live with a racist mindset. While I will grant I cannot prove this, I do not have any reason to believe it. If this is right though, then we have a problem where racism is treated like the norm instead of the exception. With that, we have what is believed to be a spark of racism and the world today pours gasoline on it.

That is far more concerning honestly.

I also think the media loves the stories that look like racism. The “Hands up, don’t shoot” was never true, and yet it was paraded around as racism. As a conservative, every Republican I see running for president has been proclaimed to be a racist repeatedly. After the first few dozen times, the cry just loses its effect.

How’s it going to end? Rioting won’t end it. If anything will end it, it’s the gospel. It’s changing people through the love of Christ. It’s recognizing everyone of every race is fully made in the image of God.

I have no delusions that the riots will end because I post this, but I can hope that someone might give up or might persuade someone else to not go out and do this rioting. I can dream.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Remembering the Fallen

How are we treating Memorial Day? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Okay. I admit I need to teach this to myself a lot more. It’s really hard sometimes to think about Memorial Day. In my own family, I have to think a bit before remembering anyone who has military service and the one that comes to mind is my uncle who died a few years ago. I can’t think of anyone in my family who died in combat. It doesn’t mean they’re not there, but if they are, they are in the extended family and I’m not aware of them.

Maybe you’re in the same boat. Maybe you don’t know anyone like that in your family right off. That’s okay. There might not be. On my side, it’s not that my family isn’t patriotic. We certainly are. It’s just that for whatever reason we didn’t serve.

So for me, this is really a normal day. If I didn’t know today was Memorial Day, the only thing I would be wondering is why the mail isn’t running today. Actually, I even checked before I remembered that it’s Memorial Day.

But again, that’s just me. For a lot of people, it isn’t. My wedding anniversary is probably for you a normal day. It sure isn’t here. There are many families today out there that are missing someone. There are many chairs that are empty. They did lose loved one in various wars.

That means their were husbands that never returned to kiss or embrace or make love to their wives again. There were fathers who never returned to teach their sons how to play baseball. There were mothers who never got to go get a dress for prom with their daughter.

They won’t be gathering around a grill outside (Which I don’t do anyway, another oddity) to fix hot dogs and burgers. Their families don’t just see this as another day off of work. In reality, this day can be super depressing for them.

So really, one of the best ways to honor the day would be to honor those families. Spend time with them. Don’t try and have fun with them unless they want that. Just be there for them. Listen to them. Let them talk about the sacrifices their loved one made for us.

Over here, we have a lot to be grateful for. We live in a country that is founded on the idea of freedom. It’s not a natural in human history. There has never been a country like this before. We have changed the world with this radical idea.

Give thanks to these families. They need to know that their pain today still matters. Their loved one or loved ones are appreciated.

So to all of you who lost loved ones, I am sorry for your loss. I appreciate your sacrifice and theirs. It wasn’t in vain. Any freedom I have today is in part because someone else was willing to sacrifice theirs.

Thank you.

Happy Memorial Day everyone.

Never forget.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Mental Illness Awareness

How do we treat mental illness? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

May is mental health awareness month. Mental health too often gets a bad stigma attached to it. Why is that? I don’t know, but maybe it has something to do with the fact that every time a mass shooting takes place, you immediately hear people talking about mental illness. Conclusion then reached? Mentally ill people are the ones doing shootings.

Now of course, it could be these people are mentally ill, but maybe they’re just evil people? Could it be you don’t need a mental illness to be evil? Could it be some people could be in their right mind and still pull off horrendously evil acts?

Mental illness sometimes gets it rough on TV shows and movies also. Look at the way mental hospitals are treated. Many patients in there are what we would refer to as crazy. Now in reality, mental hospitals are sadly usually awful places to go to. However, people who go there are not necessarily crazy.

Mental illness is not the extreme cases you see.

Mental illness includes someone like myself, an aspie who has a hard time with social situations and understanding those cues and tends to take things super literalistically.

Mental illness is the person who struggles with depression and wants to decide if they should even get out of bed that day or if they do, if that is the day that they will finally just do something to end it all.

Mental illness is the person who because of a personality disorder doesn’t know who they are fully and clings to other relationships trying to establish their worth and value.

Mental illness is the elderly spouse who has to be reminded who their spouse is everyday and can’t remember their own children.

Mental illness is the person who has a hard time leaving their house because they have to check repeatedly to make sure that they turned the stove off.

Mental illness is the teenage girl who is constantly starving herself or throwing up what she ate because she is trying to get the perfect body.

Mental illness is the young man with a pair of scissors cutting his own skin to release the tension and anxiety that he is feeling.

Mental illness is the person who would like to get some groceries at the store, but is scared to step out of their own house due to an intense agoraphobia.

Mental illness comes in many forms and sadly, it’s usually treated as a stigma. If physical hospitals were run the way mental hospitals were, they would not really last long at all. We can point to many organizations that deal with problems of physical health, and that’s great, but it’s much harder to think of a corresponding number with mental health issues.

In the Christian church, it’s easy to paint a picture of medications being something a Christian shouldn’t use when struggling with mental health. Now I don’t think we should jump to medication for every problem in mental health, but it is no sin to take a medication for mental health any more than it is to take an aspirin when you have a headache. We should remove the stigma in our churches against this.

And I know some of you are surely charismatic, but please stop saying every mental disorder is caused by a demon. That helps no one. I am not saying it cannot happen, but because someone has a mental condition, it doesn’t mean that they are possessed by a demon.

There is also no shame in seeking therapy. Why is it we talk about problems and struggles we have with friends and family, but when it comes to therapy, that’s suddenly looked down on as if you are weak? My wife and I both see a therapist. We find it extremely helpful. Please do not fear going to a therapist if you need it.

May is Mental Health Awareness Month. Please be aware of the people in your life who struggle with mental health issues and be there for them in the way that can help them the most. Please also remove the stigma on mental health, especially next time you hear of a mass shooting taking place. Most people with mental health problems you meet are not going to do something like that. They’re people just trying to make it in the world, like you.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Book Plunge: Moral Combat: Why The War On Violent Video Games Is Wrong

What do I think of Patrick Markey and Christopher Ferguson’s book published by BenBella books? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Gaming has always been a pastime of mine that I have highly invested in. I have heard for years the panic about video games leading to violence. This has often been assumed and taken for granted. If you let your children play violent video games, they will be desensitized to violence and be more prone to be violent. Besides, look at all these school shooters who played violent video games. What more do you need?

People who think that way need to read this book. It is an excellent look at how these claims are blown out of the water. What is going on is often bad science. People are often tested to see if they’re more aggressive after playing a video game. Question. How do you measure aggression?

You don’t let people walk the streets with a crowbar in their hand seeing if they’ll bludgeon someone. Instead, questions are often asked like would you put hot sauce in someone’s food if they didn’t want it? You could be asked if you would be prone to hurt someone’s feelings. Some people will want to do this anyway. Some people might want to do the hot sauce thing not because they’re aggressive, but because they like to pull pranks on people.

When some games have come out, such as some in the Grand Theft Auto series, it has been speculated that there would be a rise in crime. It was even compared to the Polio scare. Well, the game under question came out and yes, crime was affected.

Crime dropped.

What about school shootings? How about someone like Adam Lanza? He’s the guy who shot up the Sandy Hook school. It was said that he was a player of video games and this without the hard evidence and people ran with it. Well, it is true. Lanza was spending significant time playing video games.

He had a reputation of spending hours at the arcade playing Dance Dance Revolution.

What’s interesting is that sometimes, these killers had a history of NOT playing violent video games. This actually could have made them more prone to violent shootings. Why? Because games are nowadays a way that people come together and bond together socially. People who are not doing that can be social outcasts and feel rejected by their peers and be more prone to shootings.

What about Columbine? Contrary to what is thought, the killers had not made a level of DOOM modeled after their high school. Also, the skills needed in a video game to shoot the enemies do not transfer to real life. My father-in-law is quite good at sharpshooting I have been told. Let’s go back to when I used to play Goldeneye. I could play that all day and still go to a shooting range with him and do horrible even if I was the best player of Goldeneye there was.

Many games nowadays also contain moral judgments. Some people will go through a game again and try to be as ruthless as possible just to see what happens, but most will actually start to think about these moral issues. Final Fantasy X can get one thinking about the relationship between religion and technology and what it requires to atone for one’s sin.

What about video game addiction? This can vary. When Breath of the Wild first came out, many of my friends were spending hours playing this. Does this constitute addiction? No. This is just guys getting a new toy and playing with it. Sadly, there are cases where intense horror has taken place, such as the daughter who starved to death while her mother played World of Warcraft.

A child could play 3-4 hours of video games a day and still function well with their peers and make good grades. If they are able to do this, that does not constitute addiction. By contrast, someone could play 1-2 hours and have their grades suffer and that could constitute addiction.

What about obesity and video games? This sounds like a no-brainer, but again, it isn’t. Take away a child’s video games and it doesn’t mean they’ll jump outside and start running and jumping. They can just as easily find something else to do. If anything, now we have games that require movement which are being good exercise. My wife once decided she really wanted to lose weight and did it with the DDR exercise plan. What’s that? It’s playing the aforementioned Dance Dance Revolution. It worked. She lost 30 pounds.

More and more games are coming out like this. It can also be better than going to a gym because with video games, you can get instantaneous rewards that motivate you, such as a high score or trophies or achievements unlocked or reaching new levels.

Now many of you know that this is an apologetics page. What does this have to do with apologetics? First, we need to be people of truth in every field. I don’t care for football at all, but that doesn’t mean I want to spread a claim that playing football makes someone more violent if it isn’t true.

Second, a work like this can show us how misinformation can spread easily. Many people who complained about certain games revealed by their words that they had never played or seen those games and were going on secondhand information. This never does our cause any good.

Third, if we attack false causes of violence, we never get at the real cause. No one doubts the nobility of the desire of people to want to reduce violence by eliminating violent video games, but if that is not the cause, then you could eliminate all such games and violence would still take place.

Fourth, paranoia should never be our friend as Christians. It’s easier to go after something else rather than saying that maybe we should do a better job of raising our children and teaching them good from evil. How about a parent instead of banning some games, maybe try something like renting through Gamefly first and, I know this is bizarre, playing it with your kid and talking about it. If you fear some of the content, go on YouTube and watch the videos of the game and discuss why or why not the child should be allowed to play it.

Also as Christians, we don’t want to unnecessarily alienate video game players. The overwhelming majority of us, including me, grew up playing games and we are not violent people at all. As someone with Aspergers, I was also pleased to hear about how games have helped people on the spectrum socialize and I can attest that that is true.

So my fellow gamers, game on. Enjoy and have fun. We all want to end unnecessary violence in our world today. Maybe now we can go and find the real culprit.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Never Forget

How is the world different so many years later? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Many times when Allie and I are going in and out of our apartment complex, we see kids waiting for the school bus or getting off the bus. I have told Allie that these kids are growing up in the digital age. All their lives there would have been iPhones and internet and wi-fi and so many other things.

Today, there are people now who are full-fledged legal adults. They are a small number now, but it will grow over time. They are people who are adults who have never known a life without 9-11.

For these people, this evil will be a part of history always, and that is a great concern. When evil becomes a part of history, we tend to miss its shaping and influence. We assume the world is as it has always been. This is normal.

Today, many skeptics complain about slavery in the Bible arguing that we can all know that slavery is wrong. It’s easy to say that after centuries of a Christian background. Go back in time and many people you meet will say the exact opposite. It’s a part of life.

It’s not knowing our history that causes us to not appreciate where we are today.

I hope that we will pass on to the next generation the lessons of history that we have come to learn. I hope we will pass on how many innocent people died in the most horrific terrorist attack on U.S. soil to date. Even now when this day comes, I wonder if some terrorist organization will try to do something again.

9-11 did something in shattering our safety. We are not invincible. We can be attacked. We all learned it. I was listening to a radio program awhile ago talking about something that was eerie in Manhattan on that day was the silence. Manhattan is usually buzzing with noise, but it wasn’t that day. Everything was shut down. Schools were even still closed the next day. People had to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge to get home.

For me, I was in Bible College in Knoxville, Tennessee. Before the chapel service began, someone came in to tell us a plane had crashed into one of the twin towers. Okay. We didn’t know much about it. I suspect a lot of us forgot about it. I was thinking it was likely some crazy freak accident by a drunk pilot.

After the service, we heard about the second plane hitting the second tower.

This was no accident.

Before long, many of us were gathered in a lobby area for students watching it on TV. I certainly remember watching when the first building came down. I remember a leader suggesting we all gather and pray.

Safety is easy to take for granted.

In reality, every good thing is easy to take for granted.

Let’s never take our safety for granted and let’s always remember our history. Evil is real. We need to learn what the world was like before great events and after. If we do not learn from history, we will keep repeating it.

And no one should want to repeat 9-11.

Never forget.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

On Marty Sampson

What happens when someone leaves Christianity? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Until the announcement came, I had never heard of Marty Sampson. I really don’t pay much attention to Contemporary Christian Music as too much of it seems shallow to me, though there are a few exceptions. I do understand I have at least one friend who really looked up to Sampson and was devastated by the news.

“Time for some real talk… I’m genuinely losing my faith.. and it doesn’t bother me… like, what bothers me now is nothing… I am so happy now, so at peace with the world.. it’s crazy / this is a soapbox moment so here I go xx how many preachers fall? Many. No one talks about it,” he said. 

“How many miracles happen. Not many. No one talks about it. Why is the Bible full of contradictions? No one talks about it. How can God be love yet send 4 billion people to a place, all coz they don’t believe? No one talks about it.

“Christians can be the most judgemental people on the planet – they can also be some of the most beautiful and loving people… but it’s not for me. I am not in any more.”

He added: “I want genuine truth. Not the ‘I just believe it’ kind of truth. Science keeps piercing the truth of every religion.”

Many of us looking at this are a bit surprised and in some ways, not surprised. When he says no one talks about these kinds of things, in a sense, he’s right. Very rarely does the church talk about these intellectual issues. Instead, most of the church services are just large group therapy sessions to help people feel better.

I have to wonder what kind of God concept he had when one leaves it behind and thinks that there is great peace then. I have a personal theory that many of the struggles we have in our life come down to bad theology. How we view God impacts every area of our lives, even if you’re an atheist.

The truth is the church does need to talk about these issues. We do no favor to our young people in the church when we simply give them emotional placebos and expect that to carry them over. Would you want your marriage to rely totally on your emotions? (Which could explain why there are so many divorces.) Why say your relationship with Christ is the most important aspect of your life and never think about it?

What do we do with our youth? We give them pizza parties, video games, and concerts. What do they get in college then? They get all of those along with sex, drugs, and drinking. Guess which side is going to win this one.

Marty Sampson has since made a post recommending a number of Christian apologists, which says he was looking for some answers. He gives no reason why they are not convincing. At this, I have to wonder if something else is going on, which I suspect it usually is.

After all, all the issues that he raises are ones that have been addressed time and time again. There are plenty of resources available to help someone who is struggling with any of them. I suspect most of these five guys Sampson lists as respectable apologists would have been glad to have worked with him through the issues.

Ultimately, we need to be doing better. You will not be strong as a Christian if you rely on your emotions because your commitment will only be as strong as your emotions are. This is the same in any area of life. It works that way with marriages, jobs, friendships, etc. Christianity requires a commitment of the will and for that, you must be able to be made sure in your mind.

Every church should have someone in there who really knows apologetics well and at least an apologetics small group. Every youth minister needs to be equipping the youth in their church in Christian apologetics. There is eternity at stake for people and we don’t need to be giving a shallow faith to those who need a deep one.

I also recommend my friend George Brahm who has similar thoughts here.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Why The Church Should Deal With Prophecy Experts

What difference does it make if Christians claim to be prophecy experts? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

Last Friday I wrote about how to be a prophecy expert, which was rather tongue in cheek in its approach. Now why do such a thing? Granted, I don’t care for dispensationalist thinking a bit, but is there something more to it? Is there some actual danger that is at work with this?

Yes there is. For one thing, when a preacher like John Hagee makes these claims, people take it seriously. Some of these claims have been so serious that people have sold their homes and such, particularly with people like Harold Camping. People then broadcast all of this everywhere and guess what the media sees as representative of Christianity?

Let me state this right upfront also. There are plenty of good dispensationalists who love Jesus and don’t at all buy into this kind of behavior and condemn it. They don’t go out making active predictions about when the rapture will take place and don’t try to find fulfillments of the Bible in the news everyday. I even had a dispensationalist come on my show to critique The Harbinger.

Now let’s get back to the media. This idea is something then that really damages our witness to the world. If we can be shown to be wrong on something that people can verify easily, such as a simple realization that the end of the world didn’t come on such and such a date, why should they take us seriously on what they can’t verify so quickly, such as the resurrection of Jesus?

If a pastor does this, the pastor needs to be held to account. John Hagee should not have the public ministry he does after his blood moons error. When we have a pastor who has an affair or something of that sort, we call him to account, and rightfully so. Shouldn’t we do the same with a pastor who shares false teaching at this level?

Note also that these people never seem to recant of their errors. Hagee has never said anything in repentance about the blood moons that I know of. I know a lady who blocked me from her channel on YouTube because she made predictions based on the solar eclipse a couple of years ago in August and I kept asking if she would repent. Nope. Never happened.

Second, prophecy experts can tend to distract us from our real mission. There are Christians with all the charts and graphs that can tell when the rapture is to take place and who the antichrist is, but they don’t have a clue on the doctrine of the atonement, or the Trinity, or the resurrection of Jesus.

This is not to say that one could never study the former, but if you know more about that than you do about the essentials, you have a problem. We have a tendency to go for this knowledge that seems more esoteric. After all, you are in the know if you know that stuff.

This gets to another concern. Many people study this so much that they try to figure out everything about who the antichrist is. They spend less time thinking about who Jesus is. Shouldn’t He be our main focus?

Finally, these ideas also have very large political ramifications. How do we treat the nation of Israel and peace treaties and such? Many people are hesitant to see any peace treaty signed because they are convinced that’s the antichrist. (As if if that was the case, we could somehow stop a prophecy from being fulfilled.) How much energy has been spent trying to make a red heifer (You know, God needs the help). What we think about prophecy could affect people all over the world we don’t know about.

I encourage Christians to really study end times ideas on their own. I say that as someone who grew up with the dispensationlist movement. Now I have found my eschatological home in orthodox Preterism. This viewpoint makes the most sense of all of the Scriptures, but if I abandoned it tomorrow, I would still have the same problem with prophecy experts.

In Christ,
Nick Peters

Book Plunge: Pokemon and Harry Potter: A Fatal Attraction

What do I think of Phil Arms’s self-published book? Let’s plunge into the Deeper Waters and find out.

I have been a gamer for as long as I can remember. My gaming life started with seeing a Colecovision when I came home one day under the TV in the living room and asking what it was. From then on, I came to enjoy games. They’ve always been there. Not just video games. Any games. Board games and card games can still be very enjoyable to me.

Now I am married and active in the ministry of Christian apologetics. It has been over three decades since I got my first Nintendo. My love of gaming hasn’t changed. I could be playing Words With Friends with some friends or going through a daily logic problem.

I also see it as a shaping influence on me. It is growing up in gaming that also shaped my desire a lot in the battle of good versus evil. Of course, this was also coupled with my Christian faith. My parents raised me up in the church and I was there every Sunday and in the evenings and when I got out of high school, the subject I knew best was the Bible so off to Bible College I went.

Today, I really see apologetics as doing in reality what is often done in fantasy. It is the battle of good versus evil. It is fighting to spread the Kingdom of God. There are real people out there who seek to destroy Christians. I debate atheists most every day.

Recently, someone sent my wife and I a video about religion and Pokemon. It is no secret that Pokemon, like many other fantasy industries, draws upon mythological themes found all over the world. This is not a problem to me. I find it fascinating. In looking at this video, I wondered if anyone might have actually written on this from a scholarly perspective. Sadly, I found nothing, but I still think it could be an interesting project for anyone interested in this. I would not be surprised if some Poketubers on YouTube have engaged in such research.

What I found on Amazon was Phil Arms’s book instead. I laughed some and before too long, I decided why not see what is said? Sadly, going through, much of what I think is confirmed. Many people who write about this write with a fear that our children don’t understand fantasy from reality. I suspect it is such writers who do not understand fantasy from reality.

Let’s say something positive upfront. We should all applaud the effort to raise our children Christian. We should also applaud the effort to monitor their entertainment choices. I have no problem with that. If a parent has forbidden something like Pokemon or Harry Potter or such from their home, the children should respect that.

Still, I wonder when these children grow up and start to think differently how many of them will wind up rebelling against this kind of thinking? It has happened in many areas and many of these areas of truth. Consider the case of sex before marriage. Many people have told young people, “If you have sex before you are married, you will feel guilty.”

Some will. Sure. Some won’t. When this happens, they will wonder what else the church has lied to them about. (Note it is not a lie, but they often perceive it as a lie. A lie is not merely an untruth but something that is told as true knowing it is false or vice-versa. It is intentional.) Inerrancy and young-earth creationism are two other beliefs like this. I have seen some people ready to throw Christianity out the window because they found one “contradiction” in the Bible they couldn’t reconcile.

Note I say that last part as a believer in Inerrancy properly understood. I believe in it so much I have been a co-author on two eBooks on the topic. Those are Defining Inerrancy and Contextualizing Inerrancy. While I do hold to Inerrancy, a contradiction in Scripture would not cause me to abandon Christianity for a moment. Jesus still rose from the dead based on the historical evidence.

I fear that Arms’s work could be doing more of the same. He also gets a paranoia in Christians that I do not believe is fruitful to good Christian discipleship. The lines are too blurred as great writers like C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien and others are not mentioned who often engaged in writing of a fantasy nature. If anything, this could lead to a further idea in an atheistic worldview reaching children.

On page 16, Arms tells us that much of the evil of Pokemon comes from “the deeply held belief system of some personalities at the very core of the Pokemon industrial complex.” Little problem. He never tells us who these people are. This is quite important as well since these are accusations of moral turpitude of the people involved. We should not make such claims unless we can name the people and specifically cite the references.

Does that mean that all people involved are perfectly angelic and devout Christians? Not at all. Yet that does not mean they are definitively involved in a satanic plot to control children. These claims need to be backed.

Pokemon was actually created by a man named Satoshi Tajiri. This is someone I have a great respect for also because he and I have something in common, namely Aspergers. The game was based largely on Tajiri’s love of bug collecting as a kid. This is something common with other original game makers. He was also mentored by Shigeru Miyamoto. You may not know who that is, but you have probably heard of some of his creations. These include Super Mario Brothers, The Legend of Zelda, and Donkey Kong.

Actually, Zelda hits home with me. Link, the main character, was one of my first heroes growing up. I remember going to the barber when I was young with a picture of Link from Zelda II and wanting a hairstyle like his. I had a wooden sword and shield for me that my Dad made for my pretend adventures. My wife today has given me two ocarinas. I found out later that Miyamoto based Zelda on his love of outdoor adventures and told people when he signed things like instruction manuals to the game, “On warm days, play outside.” Also, I have a friend who has written a book about The Legend of Zelda and Theology.

By the way, let’s state something here also. If the only way you can present the Gospel in media to people is something explicitly Christian, you don’t know how to really present the Gospel that well. It has been said that wherever you have a hero and a villain, somewhere you have the Gospel. This should not surprise us. Christianity is the cry of the heart of man. It is the truth that we all seek.

On pages 23-24, Arms mentions doing research on a number of websites. The problem is that throughout this book, he consistently does not cite the sources. He will give quotations, but he won’t tell many times where they are found. Internet searches I have done for these quotations has been fruitless and as one who has seen several made-up quotations, I remain skeptical.

On page 24, he refers to Ash as a character in the game. This is false. Ash is a character in the anime. Some could see the character Red as referring to Ash, but it could just as well refer to the main character in the original game. Those of us who play the game and understand it will have a reason to immediately discount Arms as not knowing what he’s talking about.

On page 25, Arms has a problem with the idea of becoming a Pokemon master. After all, Master is a word from the New Age movement. This would be a guilt by association and Arms seeking to find what he wants to find.

The creatures in Pokemon, referred to as Pocket Monsters, are often seen as pets. Pet owners are often referred to as masters. Slaves in the Bible are said to have masters and Jesus is said to be our Lord and Master. One can go to College and get a Master’s in a particular field of learning or play Golf and participate in the Masters’ Tournament. If you host an event, you can be referred to as a Master of Ceremonies. Why choose the negative term and not the other terms? Why read into a term something not necessarily there?

He also says Pokemon trainers gain powers in the game. This is false. Trainers acquire new Pokemon who have new abilities, but the trainers themselves do not gain powers.

On page 26, he states that an early quest is to capture a Kadabra. This is also not accurate. I shared this with my wife and we both laughed together wondering when this quest was in the game. It is also not in the anime. There is a quest in the anime to defeat Sabrina’s Kadabra, but not to find one of your own.

Arms says there is an emphasis in Pokemon on teaching children to fight, kill, poison, and use occultic and psychic powers to reach their goals. One of the first rules of understanding a work of any kind is to try to figure out the world it is set in. Is it in a world meant to be like ours? Now there are times that sometimes one could think that it’s set in our world, such as in a movie when Ash says most Vikings lived in Minnesota, referring to the football team there.

Still, do children today see the world of Pokemon like that? Doubtful. Children don’t need fantasy stories to believe in magic. We already do. Fairy tales are full of it. They lock on to what children already know. As Chesterton said, fairy tales are not here to tell children dragons exist. Children already know they do. They exist to tell us that dragons can be beaten. Lewis also referred to the spell of naturalism and that we need a stronger spell to overcome that.

One can understand the concern of people like Arms, but would they prefer fantasy with no extramaterial elements whatsoever? (See my article on why I do not accept a natural/supernatural distinction.) He could find this in much of science fiction like Star Trek. Keep in mind that many of us are mature Christians who can enjoy series like Star Trek and Star Wars (Which I don’t watch personally on either account) and still not agree with the worldview, but we like the story. There is even a series now called Star Trek Continues starring Vic Mignogna. Mignogna is a popular anime voice actor who has been at numerous anime conventions. My wife and I have met him and I have emailed him a few times.

Oh, wait. Did I forget to mention he’s a devout Christian? He has helped numerous people who have come to the conventions struggling with many issues, including suicide. I have heard of him playing the piano at these conventions and singing worship songs. You can watch videos of him online talking to kids at these conventions about Jesus. We have with us a Gospel of John CD that he gave us personally with him reading the Gospel. If you go to his website, he makes it no secret that he is a Christian.

I say this because many of us do know fantasy and Mignogna does as well. We have elements of fantasy in our literature and stories because we know the real world is fantastic. We know that there is more than the material realm that we see every day. Arms should want to affirm and celebrate this.

Arms also says part of Pokemon is saying “My will be done” instead of “Thy will be done” on page 33. Yet if this is Arms’s point, it can be pushed to absurdity. The evening I publish this, my wife and I will be joining friends to see Christmas lights. We will stop somewhere for dinner. Are we sinning when we tell someone what we want to eat? We are telling the cooks in the kitchen “My will be done” aren’t we? The problem is only if our will contradicts the moral will of God.

On p. 35, Arms quotes another pastor who says that Pokemon teaches about gaining power from crystals. Again, my wife and I were puzzled at this. We tried to think of a game of Pokemon where this happens. We could not come up with one. We suspect this is a pastor who does not know about the game and sadly, there are too many pastors writing about things they do not know about.

On p. 40, he quotes Anton Lavey (And it’s Lavey, not Levey) who was the founder of the Church of Satan, as saying the fastest way to indoctrinate young people into the occult is through fantasy role-playing games. I saw that and immediately tried to find this quotation. I had no such luck. Arms gives no reference. Let me show a problem with that. Check this picture with a quote from Lavey about Halloween.

There is a well-known Christian apologist who regularly shares this quote. Many people look at this and think this is a powerful statement. For me, as a researcher, I want to know when I see an unreferenced quote where it came from. I did some searching, but so did Jeff Harshbarger of Refuge Ministries, an ex-satanist. As expected, he never said it.

There’s also a great danger with unreferenced quotes. One runs the great risk of bearing false witness about one’s neighbor. Yes. Even though Anton Lavey was a satanist, he was still someone in the image of God and thus, our neighbor. We are not to bear false witness against him or anyone else.

Arms also has something to say about evolution which is in the games. Yet go to any biology professor and base your paper on evolution on the Pokemon games and you will fail immediately. Not only that, there are plenty of devout Christians today who hold to Inerrancy as well who either agree with evolution or have no problem with it. This isn’t just modern times. Go back to the past. Asa Gray, the Christian botanist, had no problem with it. Neither did the minister Charles Kingsley. Also, Mr. Inerrancy himself, B.B. Warfield, wasn’t concerned about evolution. You can find support from a framer of the ICBI statement like J.I. Packer as well.

For those who assert God must have created humanity fiat to be special, we have an excellent counter-example. Namely, everyone of us. Psalm 139 says that we are fearfully and wonderfully made, but we all know there is a long nine-month average process of making each of us. It is not how we are made that makes us special. It is what we are. We are bearers of the image of God.

There is an emphasis on the concerns about power on p. 46 as the game apparently tells children they have the power in their hands. Use it. Any child who thinks this applies to the real world I suspect already has some severe problems to begin with. There are also many things that can give a child a feeling of power. This is especially true for boys and not a bad thing. To this day, go through Wal-Mart during Christmas time and hand two grown men rolls of gift wrap. They will duel with them like they’re lightsabers.

On p. 50, he tells us that Mickey Mouse, Daffy Duck, Bugs Bunny, and Popeye have been replaced with more sinister characters, yet even these characters would fall under concerns like magic and violence.  Mickey Mouse, for instance, nowadays, appears in the popular Kingdom Hearts role-playing games.

But even before that, one does not have to look far to see the magic in many Disney movies like Fantasia or short scenes like The Sorcerer’s Apprentice. Don’t forget the classic fairy tales that Disney has brought to life. How many of these also have Christian ideas of ending the conflict, which Arms speaks of? Do they not often have a warrior who slays the villain?

Looney Tunes is also not without magic. One of the favorite cartoons of my Dad and I involve Bugs Bunny in a Transylvania setting where he gets in a magic duel with a vampire using those dreaded words like “Abracadabra” and “Hocus Pocus.” Popeye is the hero every time by eating spinach and then walloping the villain of Bluto.

But who are these other more sinister characters? Figures like the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, He-Man, She-Ra, Care Bears, Gummi Bears, The Smurfs, and My Little Pony. Arms at this point strikes us as one who sees satan behind everything.

Arms has much to say about the phenomena with teen witchcraft and Wicca. I share his concerns. The problem is not Pokemon. The problem I point more to a church failing to do its job and looking to something like Pokemon to blame. The church has often failed to present a compelling view of Jesus in our era and does not build a good Biblical foundation. It’s more than just reading Bible stories to children today. We need to equip them with apologetic knowledge of how they can know the Bible is reliable and that Christianity is true.

From there, he goes on to talk about Dungeons and Dragons. Later in the book, Arms says he has never played Dungeons and Dragons. This was not a shock. Many of the criticisms presented about the game have been found to be sensational and been retracted. Are there problems? Yes. There are also problems with solitaire since that can be an incredibly addictive game. How many people have redealt a hand on the computer until they finally won one game?

Arms gives the case of Sean Sellers who says he got involved in wicked practices because of D&D. Is it really the cause of D&D or is it more the cause of Sellers himself? Fortunately, in response to the Pulling Report, we have the record of Sean Sellers himself.

With the controversy over role playing games so prevalent today many well meaning people have sought to use my past as a reference for rebuking role playing. While it is true that D&D contributed to my interest and knowledge of occultism I must be fair and explain to what extent D&D contributed.

When I was playing D&D I was not a Satanist, and in fact would have probably punched any Satanist I met right in the mouth. I was interested in witchcraft and Zen however. In doing some research at the library for a D&D adventure I was leading I happened upon other books that led to my study of occultism.

After I became a Satanist I used D&D manuals for their magical symbols and character references for my initial studies. I also used my experience as a Dungeonmaster to introduce people to Satanic behavior concepts and recruit them into the occult.

I do have objections to some of the material TSR releases for their role playing games. I think their excessive use of paganism and occultism is unnecessary and can lead to idealistic problems among some players; however, to be fair to TSR and in the spirit of honesty I must concede that D&D contributed to my involvement in Satanism like an interest in electronics can contributed to building a bomb. Like the decision to build a bomb, I had already made decisions of a destructive nature before I incorporated D&D material into my coven projects, and it was Satanism not D&D that had a decisive role in my crimes.

Personally, for reasons I publish myself, I don’t think kids need to be playing D&D, but using my past as a common example of the effects of the game is either irrational or fanatical.

February 5th 1990
Sean R. Sellers

So by Sellers’s own statement, whom Arms cites as an authority, Arms is either fanatical or irrational. Perhaps he is both. Also, unlike Arms, I will give my source. It is Michael Stackpole’s response which he says Sean Sellers helped with. We also recommend Arms read Confessions of a D&D Addict.

On p. 63, Arms says that Pokemon does not have a Christian view of conflict-resolution. Instead, it is more in line with the New Age movement encouraging children to think of the collective instead of individuals. There is a great irony here because in doing so, they are much more in line with the Biblical worldview. Arms has grown up in the modern 20th century in the West and thinks everyone thinks like him.

The Bible is in a culture where individualism was unheard of. The group was to be thought of first. One does not think about what is good for them, but rather what is good for their culture and their people. Arms is invited to check any of the scholarship from the Context Group and an honor-shame perspective to see this. It’s a great irony that in this facet, countries like Japan where Pokemon comes from are closer to the Biblical culture in that respect than modern America.

Not only this, has Arms never seen the first movie? In the main battle of the clones in there, Pikachu, the mascot of Pokemon, responds to the slaps of his then evil clone by turning the cheek repeatedly. Ash, the main character, throws himself in between the two fighting forces when a powerful blast goes off being willing to sacrifice himself to end the conflict. Does Arms see these as wicked examples?

On p. 64, Arms says in Pokemon the real pathway to peace is for the world to abandon all ideologies and religions. No backing is given for this incredible statement. He then goes on to say that to accept this premise would require rejecting Biblical beliefs like the deity of Christ, the resurrection of Jesus, salvation by grace through faith, etc. The fact that there are numerous numerous Christians like myself out there who have no problem with Pokemon and love Jesus show that this is inaccurate. Note in all of this, Arms never references an episode of Pokemon or the movies or anything of that sort.

On p. 68, he returns to D&D saying the setting is the mind of the player. Why yes. The mind is the area of the imagination and D&D requires imagination. Imagination is something that sets us apart as well. We don’t see other animals creating works of fiction after all.

At this point with his obsession about violence, conflict-resolution, obsessiveness, deceptive tactics, anything to win ideas, and occultism, I want to ask Arms a question. If he is wanting to eliminate anything having to do with anything like this, let’s get to the point. Will he speak out against professional sports?

Violence? Has he never seen a football or hockey game? How many fights break out at hockey games? Many parents have got into fistfights at Little League games over calls made on their children. There are people today suffering physical damage because of football they played growing up. Some hockey players opt to have their teeth pulled out and replaced since they know playing hockey will knock them off. I have heard of someone having a part of their body cut off by the blade of an ice skate. Not only that, how many times has a professional sports team won a major event and the response has been rioting and looting in their home city?

Conflict-resolution? It is often violent. In football, grown men tackle and climb all over each other for a ball. What about boxing and wrestling?

Obsession? Do you know how many sports shows you can find on the radio? Do you know how many TV channels there are dedicated to sports? How many grown men can spend all day watching sports? How many people memorize trivia about their favorite sports?

How many sports also rely on lying and deception? Do you not have to fake out your opponent many times? Is this not deceptive? This also includes winning at any cost. How many of us have heard about athletes who take steroids to win?

And as for occultism, how many teams are named after animals? Could this be not seeking to embody the spirit of the animal? Isn’t that familiarism at that point?

I am sure I can amass many more examples from professional sports. I am also sure Arms will not denounce them. Professional sports are just different somehow.

Let’s go a step further. If we want to talk about Biblical conflict-resolution, why exclude violence? Isn’t that how the Canaanite conquest was resolved? Isn’t that how the Amalekites were to be dealt with? Isn’t this how God deals with His enemies in the book of Revelation?

Arms also says on p. 69 that for the vast majority of young people involved in D&D, the line between fantasy and reality grows fuzzy. No backing is given for this statement. I would love to see which organization out there did a search of all the young people that play and how they determined the line between fantasy and reality is blurry for them.

Arms quotes an authority familiar with the game saying, “The stuff that make me nervous is the over-identification with the characters. I’ve seen kids go into raging fits, scream for hours, and throw objects in anger when they lose a battle or when their character dies.” Arms gives no reference to this quotation. I have done a search but have not found it. I have no reason to believe this quote without a reference and a source. Does Arms expect me to believe blindly? Would it have been too much of a bother to quote the reference? Obviously, it was.

It is not a surprise to see Arms go after Harry Potter, but as usual he does not know that of which he speaks. Arms even tells us about the four books out at the time in order of release. Prisoner of Azkaban, Chamber of Secrets, and Sorcerer’s Stone. Yes. Those are only three books. Yes. The last one to come out was the first one mentioned.

Yes. There are instances in the book of good characters being killed by the evil wizards. Why? Because J.K. Rowling (Her name is spelled wrong at one point even by Arms) knows what world children live in. It is a world where real death occurs. Not everything is pretty and bright.

We wonder if Arms has ever interacted with Christian scholarship on Harry Potter. There are plenty of Christians who see the good in the series. Most notable I think is John Granger. Granger read the first book after his pediatrician gave his daughter a copy so he could explain to her why trash like this is not allowed in their home. He immediately saw them as Christian classics. More can be found here.

It is doubtful Arms will ever really research this. More likely, he sat down at his computer one day and put in a web search of something like “Pokemon, satanic” and went immediately with what he found. Similar happened for Harry Potter. Researching both sides and responding to real criticisms does not seem important to Arms who holds the view of what my ministry partner calls, “The godly man in authority.” The cause is just and necessary so one cannot be bothered with details like this. Ironically, it’s also an anything to win mindset.

On p. 95, he writes about parents complaining that their children spend all day playing Pokemon. First off, parents need to be able to control their children properly. If you have a problem with what your kids are doing, try to exert some authority. Second, how about this for an idea? Play the game with them. Many kids would love it if their parents would take an interest in their games.

On p. 99, Arms tells us about how his children talk to others about controversial subjects on the playground and get ridiculed. Arms tells them that this is what Jesus said would happen. We would be persecuted and this shows tht we are on the right track. Now let’s suppose I send this to Arms, which I think I will. He writes back and he gives a lot of criticisms. If I followed his logic, that means my thinking is on the right track since I am being persecuted.

This is bad logic on Arms’s part. To say If you follow Jesus, you will be persecuted, does not equal, if you are persecuted, then you follow Jesus. If it is raining, the sidewalk is wet. The sidewalk is wet, so it is raining. False. It could be raining. It could be a walker spilled a drink. It could be a sprinkler system came on. It could be it was raining yesterday and the sidewalk is not dry. It could be flooding is going on in the area and the sidewalk is not only wet but underwater. You get the idea.

On p. 114, he says the creators of Pokemon have now released Digimon. This is false. Pokemon and Digimon are often seen as rivals to one another. Again, this is basic research Arms could have done. He should not speak as if he is an authority when he has not done basic research.

He also says a number of websites for Pokemon are proud of their linkage with D&D and another game called MAGIC. He quite likely means Magic: The Gathering, which I have never seen referred to as MAGIC. If guilt by association works, I encourage him to ban Parker Brothers and Playskool. Both of them have the backing of Hasbro who manufactures D&D and other such games. Parker Brothers produces Monopoly and Ouija Boards both. Guilt by association does not really work.

On p. 127, Arms lists Isaiah 14 as an example about the life of satan. This is not about the devil. The figure in the account is a man. One can make a parallel if they want to, but I see it as no reason to think that is in the mind of Isaiah. This does not mean I do not hold to a real devil. I think the Bible is clear that he exists. I do not think he is talked about as often as people think he is.

In conclusion, Arms’s work is really lacking. It is the kind of fanatical paranoia that gives Christianity a bad name. We can appreciate his zeal, but we know that Scripture has a problem with zeal not in accordance with knowledge and much of Arms’s work I think will drive more people away than it will bring them to the Kingdom.

Now if you’ll excuse me, as I have said, my wife and I were gifted with a Nintendo Switch recently and she’s happily playing Let’s Go, Eevee! I think will go and join her. She loves it when her husband plays Pokemon with her after all.

In Christ,
Nick Peters