09 July 2008

One Life

Sometimes the church uses guilt as a motivating factor. It is a very fine line between guilting people to act and educating them about a problem. What do you think of this one?

6 comments:

Katie said...

Honestly, guilt/shame/fear are tools of someone else, not the Lord. The Holy Spirit doesn't use those, I'm pretty sure. This post reminds me of a time when Lisa and I were training for a half-marathon downtown and ran by an abortion clinic with a church group picketing outside. They had horrible posters of pictures of aborted babies and when they saw my disgust they claimed that the Lord didn't want this for the babies. This made me quite angry in that the Lord is gracious and gentle while being just. I doubt that's how Jesus communicated people's sin to them while He was here. How very like the enemy to distort the Lord's truth in a way that makes us move further from how He really views us. Does that make sense? I feel like I'm talking in circles.

Jack said...

I've seen worse videos. Things that are straight up propaganda. That one isn't so bad, but Katie is right. The Holy Spirit doesn't need to guilt folks.

My whole thing is that the problem today is not a lack of information - the problem is I don't care. I can think of 10 situations off the top of my head where people are suffering inside and outside the united states. All the stats in the world aren't going to change where my passion is.

But like I said, I like the video. and I hope it gets someone else fired up to support WorldVision. ;)

Anonymous said...

The sad but true fact is Africa's population is growing faster than any other continents'. Even with this high of a mortality rate Africa will go from 7% of the worlds population in 1900 to 21% of it in 2050. This is the factor that isn't mentioned. A population strain in any country/region has negative consequences, it's just exaggerated by being highly rural and non-industrialized. If you care, you care. It's hard to guilt the apathetic so if you care and are educated you know one person will only affect it so much. On fixing the world, good is good, but done is fairly impossible.

Anonymous said...

Uh, I'm pretty sure that part of the Holy Spirit's role is to convict. So just because something rings of guilt or conviction (such as pictures of aborted babies), it doesn't necessarily mean it's from the devil. There is a judgment seat, and Jesus is in it.

That being said, one flaw I see with the use of guilt in this video is its audience. America is, statistically speaking, the most charitable nation in the world. American citizens give exponentially more out of their pockets than any other country's citizens. Thus, this guilt is misplaced, making its use inappropriate.

Jack said...

lol,

When my grandmother gives me a hard time for not visiting her and tells me I don't love her - I feel bad. Thats guilt.

When I walk past a homeless man and ache for him - I feel bad.
Thats conviction.

Perhaps it would make more sense to say this video is a "guilt trip" but like I said before, I like the video, its not propaganda.

Jesus in the judgment seat doesn't scare me since he's the one who saves, but you patting America on the back and saying "Good job, don't worry about those starving folks in Africa" scares me.

Anonymous said...

From a communicator's perspective...

Like you say, there's a fine line, but I don't think this even approaches it too closely. And important feature to consider is the music, and the music used in this is high-energy, motivating music, not slow or dark, designed to make you feel like a bad person. It ends with a positively-centered call to action. Far less manipulative than a CCF commercial any day.