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Source: https://www.sermonindex.net/speakers/daniel-shutt/atmosphere-in-the-home/
I'm going to ask you to read, first of all, in the Book of Proverbs, Chapter 4. I must tell you how delighted, again, I am to be here with you. It has been my exercise to come to this conference, not to be a preacher, but to be a listener.
And I must say I have thoroughly enjoyed the ministry of my brethren, and I have to tell you there's a checklist of things that Mr. Schutt needs to be working on as a result of what we've heard today.
Mr. Higgins has been speaking about the atmosphere in the assembly. I want to speak at the end of this meeting about the atmosphere in your home. And I hope that you will pray, even as I am speaking, that God will give help to do that in a wise way.
Proverbs, Chapter 4, and verse number 4. Get wisdom, get understanding, forget it not, neither decline from the words of my mouth. Forsake her not, that is forsake wisdom not, and she shall preserve thee.
Love wisdom, and she shall keep thee. Verse 7 is a verse that all of us ought to memorize. Wisdom is the principal thing. Therefore, get wisdom, and with all thy getting, get understanding. Exalt her, and she shall promote thee.
She shall bring thee honor when thou dost embrace her. I like this next verse. She shall give to thine head an ornament of grace, a crown of glory shall she deliver to thee. Now, I know you'll have trouble finding this after Brother Higgins' message, but 1 Thessalonians, Chapter 5.
1 Thessalonians, Chapter 5, I, on the other hand, will read one verse, verse number 21. 1 Thessalonians 5, and verse 21, prove all things, hold fast that which is good. And if there are those of you who struggle with Shakespearean English, I will reduce it to 21st century language.
Paul just says this, test everything, keep what is valuable. May God bless his work. A thousand years ago in England, there was a king. I know that in our history classrooms where feminist history and postmodern history are being taught, it's unlikely that many of you have ever heard the name of King Ethelred.
Ever hear of him? I would just say this, moms, please, whatever you do, don't name your kids Ethelred. It'll be a great disservice to them, but King Ethelred was a famous, to historians at least, king.
And the reason he was famous was this, it was not his wisdom, it was not his courage, it was not his insight or his foresight, actually, he was basically Captain Oblivious. Should I tell you what his nickname was?
For a thousand years, this man is known to us as Ethelred the Unready. You know why? You see, just off his coastline was a warlike nation called Denmark. I know that's hard for you to believe today. The Danes, I don't think, are famous for much of anything nowadays, if you're Danish, forgive that, but in those days, it was a fierce and warlike country.
And they posed an immediate danger to their neighbor in the west, that is, England. What did Ethelred do? Well, nothing, that's why he's got the name, Ethelred the Unready. So that when the Danes appeared on his shore, England was surrendered to their power, its wealth was pillaged, and England remained a vassal of the Danes and the Scandinavian countries for centuries to come, Ethelred the Unready.
I'm afraid that today there are currents that are sweeping through our world for which many of us have been almost totally unready. My grandfather, Schott, was born in 1882. He had the great and amazing privilege of going from the day when the horse and carriage were the standard to seeing men actually walk on the moon.
And for many years, I thought that likely my grandfather had lived through the greatest single changes that had ever come to human history, but I was wrong. Because actually, the information age that has come upon us has actually brought more change to our homes and to our culture and to our spiritual lives than anything that any of us 25 years ago could have imagined.
So I have a very pointed message at the end of the meeting because I believe that this affects our hearts and I believe that this affects our homes. And Brother Sandy, if you'll allow me to tack this on what goes on in our hearts and in our homes, always affects what goes on in the house of God.
And there are all sort of cosmetic bandages that we can put on the assembly, but unless our hearts are right and unless our homes are right, God's assembly will never really be for the glory of God. So I'm going to talk for a little while at the end of the meeting about Christianity in the information age.
And I'm going to begin in a rather odd place because I want to talk not about information but I want to talk about technology for a second. And I want to point out that many people are asking the wrong question.
Because many of my Christian friends are saying, you know, Brother Dan, what about technology? Is technology good or bad? Well, excuse my uncharacteristic bluntness, but folks, that's the wrong question.
Technology is a neutral thing. I'm not going to criticize what brethren in the past have done, but I will say that in the history of assembly teaching, I think there has been too much of an emphasis on the thing, not on the moral or spiritual values that are associated with it.
Before I was born, there were preachers who ranted about the newspaper as the devil's dishrag. How's that working out? And then there were people who were much more happy to have holes in their dashboard than have that demonic radio in their cars.
I'm not making fun of those preachers. I think they were doing what they thought they needed to do at that time. For generations, television has been excoriated. But interestingly enough, as I travel around the country, at least 75 or 80 percent of the homes that I go into have a television.
And by the way, if you have a laptop computer, you have one, whether you're willing to admit it or not. And so the real issue here is, are we just going to hammer away at your BlackBerry and at your iPod and your iPhone and your GPS?
That's technology. And by the way, God has actually, in his providence, given many of those things to us to ease the burden of ordinary life. I'm so glad that my doctor has the ability to actually look at my heart and see if it's working correctly instead of putting leeches on me.
Thank God for technology. I am grateful for the blessings that a kind God has bestowed upon society. Don't you speak against it, because you actually will be found often to be speaking against God. But I actually want to do, as I think all good preachers do, to oppose vice and to promote virtue.
And to not talk about the things themselves, but talk about the uses to which they're put. And not so much to talk about the medium, but talk about the message that is flooding into our hearts and flooding into our homes.
I think most of you know that my last child married last week and moved out of home, so I don't have young children in my home anymore. But I hope with all the help that God can give me that I never lose sensitivity to the fact it's a tough job raising children in a wicked and perverted world.
And I want to give some ministry today that will strengthen moms and dads. And I probably am going to tick some people off, so you might as well just get ready for it, because I'm going to make some plain statements.
I like what Mr. Higgins said, God has not called us here to make us happy, He's called us here to be holy. And there are some things that you and I need to think about in terms of living holy lives for God in this information age.
I think it's always good to say positive things before you set off the dynamite. So I'm going to tell you that there are wonderful possibilities in this information age. Any of you brothers or sisters here who study your Bible that are not appreciative of the resources that have become available to us, even as we study our Bibles.
If I want to know more about Ephesus as I'm reading through the New Testament, it's just a Google click away to discover a wealth of information that can help me in my Bible study. And whether it's in my work or whether it's in my study, I am grateful to God for the resources that this information age have placed in my hands.
I'm grateful for the effect that it has had on relationships. Just hear me out on this. I think that the internet is a dangerous place to form relationships. Because if you don't know this already, let me just tell you that not everybody on the internet is who they appear to be.
And there are a lot of 40-year-old perverts hiding in chat rooms. And they are a danger to your children. And moms and dads, if you're not aware of that, get aware of it. But I would say this, that I believe that in the Christian community, in the circle of assemblies that we enjoy, it has been a great blessing and a value in maintaining relationships.
I was wiping away a tear, Sandy, as you were telling about your daughter getting saved. I remember when that happened. And I, too, have experienced that, the wonder of discovering that there are believers all around the world.
Many of you know that I haven't been in Iowa for a few months. There's a reason for that. Because in January, my son-in-law was very seriously damaged in an accident, and I've been home most of the time.
And I will never, ever forget that in the four hours that it took me to drive from the meetings in Toronto back to my home in Detroit, there was something that comforted me. I was already being, and him, not me, blanketed in a worldwide outpouring of prayer as people prayed that Will wouldn't lose his foot, you know, and that God would preserve he and Betsy.
Do you think I'm grateful for that? Absolutely. And so we are so thankful for the contact with missionaries and distant family and remote friends and immediate prayer in time of crisis. Listen, this has some powerful potential among the people of God.
I believe that the information age is actually creating an opportunity to reach out with the gospel. The global span of technology is an opportunity to share Christ. And while I recognize that the message that we present must be distinguished from the false gospels that are found on every other web page, I do thank God for young men and young women who are using their computer skills to share the gospel of Jesus Christ to people that will never be in the confines of a gospel hall.
But I need to speak not just about the possibilities of the information age, but I need to talk about the problems of the information age. And I intend to do that very clearly so that no one will be mistaken as to what I have to say.
You see, we have been promised that technology and the information age are going to bring us a utopia. We have been promised that Eden is going to flow over the earth, peace and tranquility and prosperity.
I know, I know. Some people just don't read the newspaper, but here's the deal. We have been promised Eden, and we've been delivered Sodom. And if you think that's too rough, you've been sleeping. I want to tell you that this information age that we live in is a dangerous, soul-corroding, testimony-destroying, family-defiling, assembly-ruining problem.
Unless there are men and women who will stand up and face the problem squarely and fairly with the Word of God in their hand and on their knees pleading that God will preserve us, it has the capability to bring us down to ruin.
I want to speak about five things very quickly. Dinner is not going to be at 4 .20, it's going to be at 4 .25, so just so you know where I'm going. But I want to speak about five T's, and I'm not a great alliterator, but this just unites the things I want to talk about.
I want to talk about the theological issue of what is being spread worldwide on the Internet. I want to talk about the time issue, and how the information age has compromised our ability to find time to spend with God.
I want to talk about the truth issue, because I'm going to tell you that information and truth are often mutually exclusive. Information does not equal truth. I want to talk about the temptation issue, and I'm going to ask you to listen very carefully to what I have to say on that point.
And last of all, I'm going to talk about the TMI issue, and if all of you over 35 don't know what that's about, it's the disclosure of too much information to a world that has no business knowing that much about you.
And I'm going to close with an argument for Christian dignity, that reserves yourself for close, warm, personal relationships, not the endless spewing of every detail of your life into cyberspace. Let me talk first of all about the theological issue.
The New York Times recently had an article, and the whole point of the article could be summarized in basically two sentences. It was this, that for the last 500 years since the invention of movable type and Johann Gutenberg and the printing press in Mainz, Germany, we have been, till now, people of the book.
But now, this article trumpeted, we have become people of the screen. What was once concrete, what was once proofread, what was once thought about and considered and calculated and printed and reviewed, is now just the fluttering pixels of unreality.
People of the screen. Over against that, I want to tell you that God has revealed himself in words. I want to remind you that John's Gospel chapter 1 does not say, in the beginning was the picture, and the picture was with God, and the picture was God.
And I'm not trying to be a smart aleck, but the basic unit of revelation is not a picture, it is a word. That word has ultimately been displayed in the capital W word, the living word, the Lord Jesus Christ himself.
But regrettably, the issues of reading and real wisdom have been replaced with idle surfing and surface knowledge. And I want to plead with my young friends here, you be counter-cultural. You go against the grain.
Learn to read. Learn to think. Learn to meditate. Learn to spend time with God. I'm going to read part of a blog that I found a few weeks ago by a man named David Gunderson. I wish I could read the whole blog to you, I'm only going to read one paragraph.
But David Gunderson compares the internet and the information age with water skiing, as opposed to being a scuba diver. And he says our modern internet age is like people who are water skiing, it just takes a minimum of equipment.
You skim along on the surface, and you have a little fun, and then it's over. He contrasted that with the discipline of scuba diving, careful training, careful discipline, a slow, quiet appreciation of the depths of what God has created.
I'm going to read a paragraph that he wrote about our knowledge of God. I want everybody to listen to this. I don't normally read other people's stuff in my messages, but I'm going to do it today. This is what he said.
We subtly learn to treat the Father's revelation of himself in Jesus Christ as simply another bare fact that deserves doctrinal memorization and educational regurgitation instead of a lifetime of dedicated thought and increasing astonishment.
Paul prayed that the Ephesian believers may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
He went on to say this confronts headlong my fleshly desires for microwavable nuggets of knowledge that demand no effort and offer no nutrition. Listen to this. You cannot plumb the depths of Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God, through Wikipedia, Cliff Notes, or even Bible Gateway.
Remembering the alliterated outline from the sermon is good, but this is only the beginning of a lifetime of wonder. I really appreciate what that man wrote. I have read this about a hundred times and I intend to keep reading it.
Because in a shallow world where God is reduced to things like the shack, can I just kick that one more time? God the Father is not an overweight black female, sorry. That's the sort of things you get while surfing.
That's not the sort of things you get when you dig deep into the Word of God. Brothers and sisters, a theology that is based outside this book is no theology at all. Secondly, let me talk about the issue of time, and I've got an issue of time, and I've got real problems, but I'm concerned about the stewardship of our time.
You know, blackberries are commonly referred to in the business world as crackberries, and there's a reason for it. Because there are people who can't even sleep without their crackberry on beside them.
Just while I was driving out here, I heard Albert Moeller preaching on the radio. He was saying that the average teen sends 2 ,272 text messages a year, a month, a month, a month. Listen, moms and dads, if you let your kids take their cell phones to bed with them, you don't have a kid problem, you have a parent problem.
We need to get this sort of thing under control. I want to tell you that this myth of multitasking, it's rubbish. It's actually switch-tasking, it's just doing a lot of things poorly all at once. And I'm afraid that today we are not controlling the information age, it is often controlling us.
We violate what Paul said in 1 Corinthians 6, I will not be brought under the power of any. And what is really sacrificed is silence, and meditation, and time alone with God. You will not hear the still small voice over the earbuds of your iPod.
I am a busy man. Don't think that preachers just have time to burn. I get up at 6 o 'clock in the morning, I go to bed at 1 or 2 in the morning. That's the only way I have time to read the amount of books and things that I need to take care of, and to do the kind of work that I feel is obligatory for the kingdom of God.
I know what it is to be busy. But I have learned, perhaps very imperfectly, that the thing that Dan needs is quiet time with God. Turn off the technology. Turn down the volume. Get away from the tsunami wave of half-truth and outright lies that fill our world.
Get alone with Him. Get to know Christ. And use your time as a blessed stewardship for the kingdom of God. I want to talk to you just for a minute about the issue of truth. Because information does not equal truth.
You know, much of what is found on the internet is just a pooling of ignorance. That's my name for Wikipedia. You might as well write that down. But this idea of the democratization of data, this data smog where there really is no absolute authority, everything is merely propaganda, there is my truth and your truth, and actually it's very difficult to discern what is real and what is not.
To discover if there is anything there that is truly unchanging, that is worthy of anchoring your soul to. Maybe there are some older believers and you don't understand my passion in speaking about this.
But I am looking into the faces of young believers who are the future of God's assembly. Brothers and sisters, if your soul has nothing more than a collection of half-true snippets gleaned from the internet, your Christian life will be ruined.
You need to dig deep into the Word of God. Anchor your soul and your life and your home and your family and the assembly in truth. That's why the writer to the Proverbs said, Get wisdom, get divine truth incorporated in every area of my life.
That's what the Lord Jesus said. John chapter 18 verse number 37, For this purpose was I born and for this purpose I have come into the world, to bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth listens to my voice.
That's what we need, brothers and sisters. Lives that are based on truth, not just information. Let me say something about temptation. This is an area that I am very passionate about because I believe that there are Christians that are failing at this very moment over the temptations of the internet.
There is the problem of covetousness that is being driven by advertising. That's not just the internet, that's the cultural world in general. Can I say something to young people? This is personal. Do not think that a credit card will bring you happiness.
I have to talk to people almost every day whose lives are ruined at this point because in a world of easy credit they have accumulated debts that they cannot now pay. Learn that cash and carry, the virtues of the Great Depression, are actually virtues that stand Christians in good stead.
Don't be slaves to the bank. You be slaves to Jesus Christ, but not to high interest rates. There is the temptation to impurity. Maybe I'm just going to talk to the young men for a minute here, but I want all of you to listen in.
It is sin to look at sin. Everybody get that? Let me do it again. It is sin to look at sin. You don't have to do what the people on the screen are doing to be sinning. The very fact that you look... I'm not talking about the glance that happens accidentally when there are impure billboards or accidental things that come up on the computer.
I am talking about the gaze that enjoys what it sees. It is sin to look at sin. And I am just going to say that pornography is not only addictive, it is progressive. And God's assemblies where holiness is a priority will deal with discipline over people who give their lives to that sort of uncleanness.
By the way, I'm going to say something that I've started saying. I'm going to say this to the kids first of all. Would you pray for your parents? Because you know, this isn't just a sin for young people, this is a sin for middle-aged people too.
Do you ever think to pray for your parents that God would keep them from sinning? Now I'm really going to shock you. Would you pray for preachers and for leaders in God's assembly? You know something?
Men like Mr. McCandless and Mr. Dennison and Mr. Higgins and Mr. Schutt, there's no guarantee that we're going to finish the spiritual life well. To me the most frightening verse perhaps in all of the Bible are the words of the Apostle Paul that when I have preached to others, I myself might be a castaway.
And for those of us who travel and stay in other people's homes, would you pray for the preachers and pray for the elders in your assembly that God would keep them from falling into sin? There is the difficulty of gambling and sports betting.
There is the problem of stealing intellectual property, downloading music that you have not paid for. There is the temptation to cheat on tests and to practice plagiarism. There is the danger of gossip and spreading lies.
And the problem is we become so used to it that we hardly even recognize its danger. Moms and dads, can I say something very clearly? No child who lives in your home should have access to the internet in a private place.
Everybody got that? I want to tell you that computer screens need to be out in the public where everybody can see them. That will not stop people who are determined to sin. But as wise parents, we are obligated before God to do all that is in our power to keep the filth of a perishing world from pouring into our home and into the minds of our children.
You make it hard to sin. What does the Bible say, Romans chapter 13? Make no provision for the flesh to fulfill the lust thereof. I have a friend who came to me recently and he said, Mr. Schutt, I cannot get rid of my computer.
He needs to because he has a terrible problem. I said, why can't you get rid of it? He said, it's essential. I turned him to the words of the Lord Jesus. If thine eye offend thee, pluck it out. Is there anything more essential than your eye?
If your hand offend thee, cut it off. Anything more essential than your hands? Brothers and sisters, holiness may require radical surgery in our lives. But are we just going to be self-indulged and happy?
Or are we going to be holy and bring glory to the man who died for us? I absolutely have to quit. The problem of theology, the problem of time, the problem of truth, the problem of temptation. Let me just say something just for a minute about too much information.
I recently read a statistic that absolutely shocked me and forgive me for doing this. I'm almost scared to say this. But one in five teenagers confessed to having sent nude pictures of themselves or others over their cell phone in the last year.
I'm not going to say any more about that because it's just impure to even talk about it. But people are revealing more and more of themselves. And a sense of godly dignity is being lost. You know, everything that you put on the internet is forever.
Did you know that? If you believe the idea that after 30 days information that you type into a screen is erased, you really aren't even smart enough to have a computer. Because everything on the computer is, at least in earthly terms, forever.
Do you know that most large corporations actually go on to Facebook to see who you hang around with? And what your behavior is like? And hiring decisions right now in the United States of America are based on information that people never thought that anyone else would see.
And I'm thinking about the future of men and women in God's assembly. And I am reminded that I am so glad that I grew up in a generation where some of the stupidity that I engaged in when I was a teenager was not preserved for posterity.
And thankfully there are some older Christians around here that have had the grace to keep their mouths shut and not remind me of it. But in this modern internet age, would you maintain your dignity? The private details of your life are only for those who are nearest to you.
You may not be cool, but today I want you to be Christ-like. I want you to have that grace that marked him. He moved through a defiled and defiling world, and yet he was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners.
May God grant today, I don't know if this message has been a help to you or not. I'm not totally happy with everything I've said today, but I hope that the Lord will just stir our hearts to think together about the real issues that are in our homes.
And for my dear young friends here, do not engage in things that will compromise your future usefulness for God. And let me encourage moms and dads to so order your home for the preservation of yourself and of your children.
With a view to the assembly, that the atmosphere in that home might be Christ-like, not compromised by a wicked world run by the God of this world. Let's pray.