October 3, 2019

I am grateful to have grown up without television. My first experience was probably during seventh grade on a black-and-white TV with a fuzzy picture and a lot of “snow.” It was not in our home, so the experience was brief. My memories of any significant amount of television are after Carol and I were married and we purchased a small Philco unit for just over $100.00 (I did a spell-check on “Philco,” and my computer does not even recognize the word!).

In contrast, when I read statistics of how many hours a child typically watches TV today, I am worried. Add to that cell phones. Look around in a restaurant and the kids are glued to the parent’s – or their own – device. They do not need to be involved in any conversation – just entertained by that connection to the world.

I wonder how families handle watching the news on TV when there are so many stories and photos of crime, people doing mean things to other people, advertisements that even adults should not be watching, and language that is disgusting. Should young families just avoid the exposure or try to use it as an opportunity to educate children about the realities of life?

I would not promote shielding children from everything negative. They need to learn how to live in this broken world without being ruined by it. But they need protection from overexposure to a culture that is far from Biblical.

A kid needs to get to be a kid while that is an option. We must find ways to let this develop without being overprotective. We follow this principle with young plants. I want to find ways to help this work with young families, too.

Pastor Bill Ehmann