Marriage and Mass Media

As promised, today I will give you a sneak peek at my new presentation for women entitled, “Separate But Equal: Building A One Flesh Marriage.” I gave the presentation for the first time this week at our Defending the Faith conference in Tennessee.

How can we bring our marriages back as much as possible to God’s original design for marriage? How can our marriages be redeemed? By knowing what the Bible says and standing on its authority when it comes to marriage. I think one of the reasons this is so difficult is due to the amount of mass media that we are exposed to.

Mary Kassian, in her book Girls Gone Wise in a World Gone Wild [1] (which I highly recommend) states, “According to research studies, the US Census Bureau estimates that in 2010, the average woman will expose herself to 3,596 hours of mass media .” [p. 36.] That’s equivalent to watching TV, listening to the radio, reading the newspaper, etc. 24/7 for five months in one year! The problem is that the messages we hear in the media are contrary to God’s Word on the issue of marriage (and many other issues as well). Is this really what God would have us spending so much of our time on? No! Philippians 4:8 states:

Finally, brethren, whatever things are true, whatever things are noble, whatever things are just, whatever things are pure, whatever things are lovely, whatever things are of good report, if there is any virtue and if there is anything praiseworthy- meditate on these things.

Many times as Christians, we think we’re immune to bad messages on TV, radio, etc., but we’re not. Otherwise, God would not have included Philippians 4:8 in the Bible! People in mass media aren’t doing anything different then what Satan did with Eve in the Garden of Eden, “Did God really say…?” (Genesis 3:1). Mary Kassian writes:

Eve fell into the trap of thinking that she had the right to judge the merits of the forbidden fruit for herself, rather than simply take God at His word. From her perspective, the fruit looked attractive (“a delight to the eyes”), harmless (“good for food”), and incredibly promising (“desired to make one wise”). So she took a bite. How many times has the Evil One used the same ploy? How many times have women fallen into the trap of viewing sin as attractive, harmless, and even promising? How many times have you? [p. 17–18.]

Men are often accused of not stopping to ask for directions when they are lost. But I wonder: how many times as women have we been “lost” when it comes to our marriages, yet we don’t stop to read and understand the directions written to us in God’s Word? Let’s redeem our marriages by building them on the authority of God’s Word.

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[1] Mary Kassian, Girls Gone Wise in a World Gone Wild (Chicago: Moody Publishers, 2010).