For the Dads:
Do your teens play video games? Have they spent more than an hour in the last month gaming on the computer, X-Box, or GameBoy? Here is a resource to help you lead your household in this area with wisdom and conviction.

Yesterday, in his blog (”Video Games and the Lure of the Unreal“) and his commentary (”Video Games: The New Playgrounds of the Self“), Dr. Al Mohler takes a hard look at the contemporary videogaming scene. (I especially recommend the commentary.) I appreciate Dr. Mohler’s approach: he doesn’t suggest that Christians should not play video games. But he does appeal that we exercise wisdom and discernment, as we would in any other area.

Dr. Mohler references Christine Rosen’s essay, “Playgrounds of the Self” in The New Atlantis:

“Interestingly, Rosen begins her article by considering these games as an experiment in self-invention. Many of these new games involve deeply intensive role-playing and the creation of artificial selves. Given the vast number of hours many persons commit to playing these games, do they even know who they are anymore? Rosen notes: ‘We have created video games, the new playgrounds of the self. And while we worry, with good reason, about having our identities stolen by others, we ignore the great irony of our own mass identity theft–our own high-tech ways of inventing and reinventing the protean self, wherein the line between reality and virtual reality ultimately erodes and disappears.’ ”

The challenge with Dr. Mohler’s commentary is deciding which quotations to include here. There are so many that are worthy of consideration. The next one was most notable to me, as it reveals the tendency of video games to promote a desire to be God and to play God:

“As Christine Rosen sees it, ‘Improved hand-eye coordination is not the reason most people play video games. It is the opportunity to be someone else–someone else with limitless powers and absolute control.’ ”

But we know that there is only One who has “limitless powers and absolute control.”

“My glory I will not give to another.” Isaiah 48:11.

You’ll find a lot more insight in the article. Dads, if your teens are gaming, I recommend you make reading this article a priority.

Categories: five15 blog