Posted on 08/18/2009 11:43:02 AM PDT by pastorbillrandles
Twilight - Giving heed to fables…
By: Pastor Bill Randles
Why “Twilight” is spiritually fatal, and what it shows us about the state of
Christian youth.
“…and they will turn their ears away from the truth and be turned aside unto fables.” (2 Timothy 4:4)
If someone would have told me 25 years ago, that one day a popular series of “vampire romance” books would be accepted and promoted by evangelical ministries, I wouldn’t have been able to believe it. That’s why I was shocked to read this article by Christian documentarian and researcher, Caryl Matrisciana and Paul Villanueva, http://carylmatrisciana.com/x2/content/view/81/1/ which documents the glowing reviews of the occult book series by evangelical publications such as: Campus Life, Focus on the Family, Christianity Today, Christian Teen, and Christian Stay at Home Moms Magazine. All gave glowing testimonials, and some even suggested that the "Twilight” series could become the basis for Bible discussions and studies!
My purpose isn’t to merely echo Caryl Matrisciana and Paul Villanueva's excellent article, exposing the occult roots of this book series. Rather, I have a burden to show you why I believe that this literature could have a completely soul deadening effect on those who are fascinated by its dark vision.
First of all, consider what the ‘vampire’ myth really is - nothing less than an obscene parody of the precious gift of God - which is eternal life through the Son of God, Jesus Christ, and by the gift of His blood, offered to God for us. To God blood is sacred, those who drink it are an utter abomination to Him, because of what blood represents. We obtain eternal life by accepting in faith our share of the offering of the blood of Jesus, termed precious by God, ”…As of a lamb without blemish and without spot” (I Peter 1:19)
In the pagan myth, ‘vampires’ are those who obtain ‘immortality’ by sucking other’s blood. The ‘immortality’ they gain, is literally a damned existence. They live in the night, they cannot endure light, they feed on the blood of innocence. Far from just a harmless thrill, Vampirism is the basis for all sorts of pagan spiritualities. Blood drinking and blood sacrifice is an everyday reality among animists all over the world.
The vampire fable is nothing less than an all out assault on the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Consider this, a young person can go to a theater on a Saturday evening and vicariously fall in love with a vampire, and his 'coven'(family), and then go to church on Sunday morning and partake of the Lord's supper. That same person on Saturday evening could conceivably root for a girl to forfeit her own mortal soul, to be the lover of a vampire, and the next morning go to church and eat the bread and drink the cup of eternal life! Can one eat at both the Lord's table and the table of demons? Did you know that this book series was 'given' to a Mormon woman in a dream, and that she was visited in a subsequent dream by the vampire figure?
“You cannot drink the cup of the Lord and the cup of demons, you cannot partake of the Lord’s table and the table of demons.” (I Cor 10:21)
Ah but Pastor it is only a movie! Lighten up! But this is more than a movie - it is a pagan myth which is a perversion of the only Gospel that can save us. The movie presents vampires as being attractive, in fact so attractive that the young lady in the story is willing to become a vampire to be with her lover. In order to be with her vampire lover, she submits to being an eternally damned soul! This movie skillfully plays on the emotions in such a way that the viewer pulls for the mortal young woman to be with her “lover”, a 110-year-old vampire in the form of an attractive and well-mannered teen.
What the popularity of this film, even among evangelical youth, says about the state of the church is that we have forgotten what we once knew very well. That is, you can’t fill your mind with all of this paganism without injuring your relationship with God. We used to know that it is very possible to “lose your soul”, to so jade ourselves by constant, undiscerning exposure to worldliness, that we render ourselves unable to pray, to hear the Word, or to live for God.
We once knew that to voluntarily expose ourselves to blasphemy and sexual sin - not to mention something as blatantly spiritual as Vampirism - was something to be shunned, avoided, that it was soul deadening, and injurious to our Christian walk.
Another thing the popularity of this movie shows us is the loss of the sense of the sacred among Christians. I believe in gospel liberty. We don’t need Christian guru’s telling us what books not to read and what movies to avoid, we have the Holy Spirit. On the other hand, Paul warned the Christians in Ephesus, to:
“Have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness but rather expose them.” (Ephesians 5:11)
Where is the sense of the sacred? The idea of the sacred is that there are some things in life that are ‘other’, they are above us, they are not to be ‘profaned’, for they are above us. For example, marriage is sacred, so is sexuality, as well as life itself. The purity of children is to be held sacred, that is why there is a special warning to any who would cause them to stumble.
The Gospel itself is sacred. I believe that “Twilight” is a direct assault on the gospel, an obscene parody of the good news of salvation, the salvation we obtain by partaking of the precious blood of Jesus, offered as a sacrifice for us. Jesus is the one who has brought “life and immortality to light” through the Gospel. I don’t believe it is possible to read or enjoy “Twilight” without spiritual defilement.
Of course we must remember, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness…for the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all sins.” (I John 1:7-9)
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Oh, the 110 year old guy? LOL!
The religious/vampire/fantasy thing doesn't bother me in the slightest. But the "romance" here is frankly sick. I'm appalled that young girls find this type of exploitation of a damaged teenager by an older, very powerful man to be romantic.
I don’t think being a fantasy myth, it is all that different from any of them, except that the central tenet of the Christian gospel, is that Jesus shed His blood for our sins, that by “eating his flesh and drinking His blood”( that is personal participation in His sacrafice for us, by faith), we recieve the gift of eternal Life.The vampire myth also promises a kind of a state of immortality, and that by drinking other people’s blood. it struck me that Vampirism is an obscene parody of the Christian gospel of blood atonement.
I think its wonderful that the family stands by the sicko, because they are all so nice, ya know?
It's not "sick" it's...destiny! (heavy sigh)
Most people miss the real point of all this. It is not that vampire stories are horrible in of themselves - it is that the modern ones now make the vampires, who were always damned satanic creatures, into sympathetic characters. The modern interpretation of the vampire myth turns evil into good. Not only is that an extremely misleading thing to do, but it really takes the power out of the stories. They used to be epic battles of good against evil, and now they’re all teen-angsty soap-opera BS.
LOL :) But you still turned out fine. And, I bet that your husband found his perfect wife.
I get what you’re saying and to a certain extent I agree concerning “finding the perfect guy” etc. I found “my” perfect guy during college. He’s not perfect and neither am I. We’ve been married almost 20 years.
In the last book, he marries the booze and they live happily ever after.
LMAO! Hey, he’s gotta take part in some of this stuff, too ;) Actually, he’s entertained by the Harry Potter books and movies. More so than Twilight...especially the movie. When we watched, he couldn’t stop cracking jokes when he wasn’t falling asleep.
I’m not saying I disagree with you, by the way, I just am very uneasy about people who have not read something that they are criticizing.
Like people who criticized the Harry Potter series by saying the books claimed
“There is no good or evil, only power”
when it was the villain who said that and the sentiment was rejected by the protagonist over and over.
That kind of out of context statement drives a stake (pardon the expression) through the heart of the argument.
The Twilight series is pure teenage girl angst. It isn’t a particularly well written book, it has many moral slippery slopes, but it is very difficult to take a serious moral stand against it without a good working knowledge of it.
Just like magic in many fantasy books, vampirism is used a storytelling tool in the series. It has it’s own rules and internal consistancies. The moral lessons are set upon the foundation of rules that the writer constructs, and while in real life vampirism is evil, it is used as a neutral construct for telling the story.
I call Bella an insipid little twit. I LOL’d while reading some of the passages in the books. My kids did too.
And the guy, lead character, may be 110 yrs old but he looks like a teen boy.
Now THAT is a powerful criticism of the series, I agree!
I just finished reading the 4th book. I let my daughter read the series against my better judgment. If I had it to do over again, I would stand my ground.
Yes, there are some teachable moments in the books. That Bella and Edward abstain from sex until marriage is a good thing. However, Bella didn’t want to wait and would have had sex with Edward if he had decided to do so. Additionally, Bella makes it clear that she really doesn’t want to get married. Edward uses marriage as a way to prevent Bella from becoming a vampire right after high school graduation. Bella caves and marries him not because she believes in the sanctity of marriage but because that is Edward’s condition to turn her into a vampire. So while there is a good lesson about abstinence, marriage is treated as a roadblock to Bella’s desire rather than as a sacred institution entered into before God.
The other thing that troubles me about this series is that Bella’s entire life revolves around Edward. It’s more than just a simple, sweet love story. Bella practically worships Edward. I think it’s a bad lesson for teenage girls to show Bella being so wrapped up in Edward and seriously self-hating at times that she believes being with Edward makes her complete. I don’t want my daughter to think that a boy or a husband will make her complete. Only a personal relationship with Christ can fill the holes in one’s life. The book leads us to believe that Bella’s clumsy, sad life was preparing her for eternal life as a vampire - that she was born to be one.
Oh and I read those books as a teen and I didn’t turn out fine.
I looked for years for the “Perfect” guy. At 30 I realized there wasn’t one. Luckily at 34 my DH decided I was okay.
_____
Was it because of those books you read that you searched for the perfect guy? If the worst you did was that, I’d have to say you turned out in the top 1 percent.
Take vampirism out of the book and you have the same, lame story with the same bad decisions and bad lessons.
Just with worse marketing.
Looks like. But he is fully an adult man. An adult man who exploits a teenager who has been caretaking her parents who entire life, who is so happy to have finally found someone who can take care of her. And wants to care for her, obsessively- to the point of stalking her. This adult man who is CERTAIN that Bella will lose her soul if she becomes a vampire, but he can't resist her. He can't stop himself. He can't help it, you see, not because he's a sicko who needs therapy but because their relationship is destiny.
Hey, if we were all reading this book and having in depth discussions of how horrible Edward is, I wouldn't have a problem with it. But the majority of people reading this book seem to think this is romantic and something to seek for.
I've discussed this book with a number of adult, female fans and not one of them disputes any of my points. They just excuse it because "it's just a book".
If people were lionizing Voldemort instead of Harry, I'd be disturbed about that too.
I agree. I am NOT disagreeing with that at all.
It is scary that so many of the modern churches think you can turn anything from the culture into a teaching thing...you can’t.
I don’t think you read my post. I said I object to the fact that this being used by some churches for teaching etc.
It shouldn’t be proclaimed by the church as a wonderful thing.
That said, I personally don’t have a problem with fantasy.
It’s a love story....that’s pretty much it. The teenyboppers like seeing the guy without his shirt on.
I made a point of reading it before my daughter did because of a concern expressed by one of the women at church. She was concerned that it might be a bit “too old” for my 11 year old, although she enjoyed it and had no problem with giving a copy to her 13yo granddaughter. I thoroughly enjoyed it, and am patiently waiting my name to come up on the waiting list at the library for the next installment!!!!
Unlike the Harry Potter series, the Twilight series has only appealed to the female youth at our church. HP appealed to all of the youth....well I should clarify that, they only appeal to the youth that actually read and at level above See Spot Run..........
It’s fiction, fairly well written, it causes them to think, and if it has them reading instead of playing video games or sitting in front of the boob tube -— I say YEAH!!!!!
I don’t see the need to dissect reading material in some attempt to twist it into something it is or isn’t.
Vampires were originally a personification of the fear of disease and infection.
I still haven’t figured how they became romantic, undead demigods. Even Dracula was pretty repulsive if you read the actual book.
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