Editorial: "Within a yard of Hell"

C. T. Studd (1860-1931) was an English missionary to China, India, and Africa. He is quoted with:

Some want to live within the sound of church or chapel bell;
I want to run a rescue shop within a yard of hell.

That sounds Wesleyan.

There are many directions Studd’s quote can lead you, but permit us just one.

Would Wesley be on TV? was a question that got asked in a meeting not too long ago. The question didn’t get an answer.

We’ve been talking at great lengths lately about taking our faith “to the street.” That’s good talk; it’s better action. And it’s even better action when we really understand the full meaning of “street.”

There is an important concept of “street” that always gets ignored. Whether we like the idea or not, television is considered "communication Main Street." That’s still true, even with the web and all kinds of electronic trinkets.

Unfortunately, the Christian church has a bit of egg on it’s face when it comes to broadcasting, television in particular.

II Timothy 4:3 says, “For the time is coming when people will not put up with sound doctrine, but having itching ears, they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own desires, and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander away to myths.”

If you want a demonstration of that verse, watch and listen to much of what is purported to be Christian programming and see for yourself.

Be careful, however. It’s one thing to be upset with shallow, "consumerist" doctrine that sells well, it’s quite another thing to accept some of the responsibility.

Let’s fact it, Wesleyan doctrine is generally absent from communication Main Street and Wesley’s people called Methodists share part of the responsibility.

Somehow, and with some isolated exceptions, religious communities that see through the Wesleyan lens have relinquished the airwaves to “itching ears” doctrine. The subversion and misrepresentation of the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a blemish, not only on the hucksters, but on ourselves as well.

“We’ve a story to tell to the nations,” as the song goes, but we don’t seem to want to get the story dirty or something.

So let’s be presumptuous enough to say that, indeed, Wesley would be preaching on television, just as surely as he preached in a pasture to be chased by a bull.