I was reading a book recently that told the true story of a woman named Lara. Born in Kazakhstan in the middle of last century and living most of her life in Ukraine, her life was filled with things we can’t even imagine. Lack of food, lack of clothing, lack of shelter, and, perhaps most importantly, lack of love. And, yet, in her heart, she always knew there was a God and He so lovingly led her to Himself.
Today I’d like to write about something specific that happened to her and delve a bit into the spiritual lesson that can be learned from it.
A few years after she got married, she and her husband found a small, dirty house that was said to be haunted. This made it cheap enough for them to afford and they bravely moved forward. They lived in that house for a long, long time, through the births of many children and then through the untimely death of her husband. Through all this time, Lara just didn’t feel well. She spent weeks in the hospital, trying to recuperate, only to come back home and eventually end up back in the hospital to recuperate again. It was a mysterious illness with seemingly no cause.
Until one day…
She and her son-in-law were in the attic working on something that needed fixing when they came across something they had never realized: There was mercury stored in the attic.
They started putting the pieces together and realized that she was suffering from severe mercury poisoning and that her husband’s death may have also been from that.
The house was condemned (and no home insurance!) and the whole family was taken immediately to the hospital. (If you want to read the rest of this story, I’ll put the link for the book at the bottom of this post. Definitely worth reading!)
But I want to reflect a bit on that mercury poisoning. The family was being slowly poisoned and did not even know it. It was affecting their health and yet they were in complete ignorance as to why they weren’t feeling well.
In light of this, my mind was led to the subject of entertainment. I have been thinking a great deal about its role in the lives of Christians. Time after time, I am flummoxed at the choices of those who say they love Christ. Time after time, I find myself puzzled at my own choices, specifically back in the day, as someone who claimed to love Christ.
Meanwhile, my appetite for the Word was not great. And my attitude towards prayer was apathetic. My passion for worldly movies and ungodly music and spiritually unhealthy fiction far outweighed my desire for scripture or anything holy.
I am so grateful to God for His continual conviction to my heart in this area, as one by one, He began to show me the poison I had been filling my heart with. It was a slow and arduous process and it continues to this day. But, oh so slowly, I’ve been ridding my life of the mercury that poisons my soul and so greatly affects my spiritual health.
But none of it could have begun without one specific choice: I chose to surrender my entertainment to my Lord.
Oh, that was so very hard. And I had to do it over and over again. And, in fact, I continue to do it to this day. Only recently, I was watching a series someone recommended to me. I was enjoying it and yet there was this niggling that wouldn’t go away. The series was filled with lies about God. Lies that specifically went against scripture. The Holy Spirit just kept working on my heart until I finally surrendered. It saddens me that it took me too long to get to the place of surrender.
I am not sure we can even get to a place of conviction until we take the first step and say, “Lord, I surrender my entertainment to you. I ask you to show me the truth about what I am watching, what I am listening to, and what I am reading. I ask you to take away my taste for anything that is displeasing to you.”
It isn’t instant, but I promise you that as you start removing the mercury from your spiritual life, you will be surprised at how much more spiritually healthy you feel. It’s quite amazing, really.
I think many of us are spiritually poisoned and we don’t even realize it. We grow lazy and watch movies and shows that are filled with the things God hates. Or we get caught up in a book series filled with sorcery and magic. Or we just turn on the radio to any old channel. We dismiss the idea that these things affect us in any way.
Satan knows this. He knows that Christians think entertainment is simply just that: entertainment. What he also knows is that most entertainment has some level of mercury hidden within that is specifically designed to deaden our consciences and to make us apathetic towards the things of God.
Oh, how important that we consider the consequences of our entertainment choices. I am a living, breathing example of what happens when you surrender this to the Lord.
I still find myself utterly amazed at how the Lord took away my desire for ungodly music. It’s like my own personal little miracle. I know I have mentioned this before but I am going to do so again for any new readers.
I LOVED—and by that I basically mean “was addicted to”—rock music. Of both the secular and Christian varieties. The harder the better. Eventually I became convicted that secular was definitely displeasing to the Lord. That wasn’t too painful. But, oh, the Christian music that was patterned after the world was a tough one.
Finally, I threw my hands in the air and said, “Lord, I can’t do this. I need your help. If you want me to stop listening to this, can you take away my taste for it?”
And HE DID!
It wasn’t instant and it wasn’t easy but HE DID. Today, I just don’t even desire the ungodly music I had been so addicted to for so many years.
And as I have, very intentionally, begun removing the mercurial entertainment from my life I have found that, little by little, God has reawakened my hardened conscience and given me a hunger for the Word that I never had before.
And so I heartily encourage you to also turn your entertainment over to the Lord. Trust me, I know it’s hard. And I know it’s unpleasant to even consider. But I also know how incredibly rewarding it is. And I definitely know you won’t regret it!
*Lara’s Hunger, written by Harold Troyer. You can find it here.