Back Again – with South Park?

Sorry for the brief interruption of thoughts.  This past weekend was busy with school and dates.

Last friday a man named Craig Detweiler spoke at our college chapel.  He is the co-director/leader of a program called Reel Spirituality.  Reel Spirituality is “a creative encounter between the church and Hollywood, featuring ministers and filmmakers in discovery of common ground as story tellers, image shapers, and culture makers.”  According to Detweiler, they find the “sacred” in the media.  So, he spent three days in chapel here at my school telling us about how you can find “Jesus” in our media and pop culture today.  Not all of it was terribly irking or anything, but the last chapel was particularly unnerving.

Detweiler was talking about how Jesus Christ was a revolutionary and  counter-cultural (changing and driving culture) activist.  Both of those are true in some sense of the words, but Detweiler kept going back to our current western media in order to provide backing for this “nature” of Jesus.  I will never forget his last example of finding this revolutionary Jesus in the TV show South Park.  I quote his words (I wrote them down), “You see guys, I think South Park has got it.  They understand the nature of Jesus.”

Wow.

That’s so deep.  That’s incredible.  That’s weird.  Where did he come to think that?  What the heck is he talking about?  I think he should get down off the podium now before I throw my pencil at him.

If South Park has got the nature of Jesus understood, then I’m going to hell because the nature they present Jesus in is not the nature the Word of God teaches.  If South Park’s Jesus is the same Jesus of the Bible, then I’ve been missing something for a long time.  If Jesus was only a revolutionary and a man who ran against the cultural norm, then I don’t need him.  He is as worthless as a piece of trash, just another attempt to bring peace to my mind.  Why don’t I go follow Mohammed Ghandi or Che Gueverra or some other world changer?  The reason I don’t do that is because my belief of the nature of Jesus Christ is that he is the only way through which I can receive salvation and eternal life.  Yeah, he was kinda revolutionary in how he thought and acted, but I follow Him because of his free salvation.

In closing, I want to make sure that no one gets the impression I am slamming Craig Detweiler.  His heart is Jesus Christ, but the way he expressed that at our chapel sessions was a bit foggy.  I do believe that some of the cultural issues he was addressing are in fact important, but we need to make sure we approach it with a non-compromising heart following after Jesus Christ.