For God's Sake, Turn off the TV

I watch a lot of the 700 Club. I am fascinated by it and the other shows on TBN; I can only partly pretend I watch with a sense of condescending irony. In reality I am engrossed. I watch it the same way I might watch ants swarm and pull apart a beetle. Not to say, "Dude, that's messed up," but recognizing that it's real, and though foreign, more familiar than I always admit.

If it was high concept comedy, the 700 Club would be among the best shows on TV. The hair and wardrobe are perfect. The accents perfectly match the comments. Discussion quickly goes from murdered babies to Robertson's diet milkshakes. But it's real, and that's crazy.

So I watch. I watch Pat Robertson. I watch Hal Lindsey. I watch Jan Crouch. I watch Benny Hinn. I call my wife over and ask if she can believe what she's seeing. She tells me to change the channel. I watch and get angry. I watch and laugh. I watch with a sense of superiority and judgment. Can you believe he just said that? Look at her hair? How much do you want to bet she's in the hospital in a week? It's like pro wrestling to me. Man, that's arrogant and foolish.

This isn't a side show or some off the beaten path diversion. Pat Robertson is quoted as an authority on NPR without debate. The eschatology of Hal Lindsey is the culturally assumed view, even among non-Christians, with no alternative in sight. This is the public face of the church. It may be that Christians will always look wacky to outsiders- that's fine. But it's not fine to look wacky and misrepresent Christ. Hopefully, Mother Teresa, St Francis, and Martin Luther King do seem odd and distinct. But hopefully not for the same reasons that Pat Robertson does.

I want to dismiss it all as nonsense. Who watches the 700 Club anyway? Surely no one would look to Jan Crouch with her tarantula eyelashes and pink cotton candy hair for spiritual guidance. But people do. And that's a problem. I am concerned with how we look to those outside the church, but not more than how we exist as the real Body of Christ on earth.

What am I even saying? Only that Pat Robertson seems to be getting a lot of air time these days outside of his regular TBN audience. A lot of people have a "Left Behind" view of history. I suspect some people would think of Benny Hinn when you say "Christian" before they would Jesus.

Somewhere in this is a struggle.

I Miss You-Bjork
I Can See For Miles-The Who
I'll Sleep When I'm Dead-Warren Zevon
Fitter Happier-Warren Zevon
In The Summertime-Mungo Jerry