Insight on the News
TV Evangelism—God’s Way?
If Jesus Christ were on earth today, asserted TV evangelist Jim Bakker, “he’d have to be on TV.” Why television? Because, according to Bakker, “that would be the only way he could reach the people he loves.” Like Bakker, an increasing number of fundamentalist preachers in the United States feel that television is the best medium for spreading the Word of God. Yet, a 1984 study showed that, for the most part, TV evangelists “reinforce people already committed to evangelical religion.”
Interestingly, in a letter to the editor of the magazine Ministry, one reader wrote: “You said they [television sets] are the church’s most powerful gospel seed-sowing tools, and yet God says the most essential work is house-to-house visitation—soul hunting. . . . Our Saviour loved to get away from the multitude, and then He went from house to house—soul hunting. The one-soul audience was His delight. . . . Can we not do the same?”
According to Jesus Christ, the purpose of the Christian ministry was not just to ‘spread the Word’ but to “make disciples.” (Matthew 28:19, 20) He directed his followers to go to people’s homes. (Matthew 10:7, 11-13) The apostle Paul accepted this preaching method and said regarding his ministry: “I did not hold back from telling you any of the things that were profitable nor from teaching you publicly and from house to house.” The personalized house-to-house ministry of the disciples reaped good results.—Acts 5:42; 20:20.
If Jesus laid such emphasis on this method of preaching in order to make disciples, why do many evangelists prefer TV as their medium? The Courier-Mail of Brisbane, Australia, notes that TV evangelists “make up to $120 million a year selling salvation. They appear in a blaze of electrified power and glory on 300 TV stations, and are worshipped like pop idols. . . . For all their tactics, these men who claim to manipulate even God, come down in the end to a straight business deal. Send them $10 and they will send you to heaven.”
Faithless Leadership
Jesus Christ said: “I am the resurrection and the life.” (John 11:25) Yet, “many of the Catholic theologians who staff universities and seminaries cannot bring themselves to say they believe, or at least believe literally, in the resurrection,” reports the news magazine Insight.
How can Roman Catholics who sincerely desire to follow Bible teachings have their faith strengthened by such teachers? They cannot, for the apostle Paul wrote: “If, indeed, there is no resurrection of the dead, neither has Christ been raised up. But if Christ has not been raised up, our preaching is certainly in vain, and our faith is in vain.”—1 Corinthians 15:13, 14.
Where There Is No Peace
On October 24, 1985, the United Nations General Assembly declared 1986 to be the International Year of Peace. The resolution stated that the year would be “devoted to concentrate the efforts of the United Nations and its Member States on the promotion and achievement of the ideals of peace by all possible means.” How did they hope to accomplish this? By the “continuing and positive action by States and peoples aimed at the prevention of war.”
Now that we are nearing the “Peace” year’s end, what do we find? Such noble intentions have been dwarfed dramatically by the military conflicts that continue to rage worldwide. “Guerilla insurgencies, territorial disputes, ideological and racial differences and ‘holy’ wars add up to at least 19 major conflicts, and many smaller ones,” noted The West Australian. The newspaper article pointed out that nearly one million soldiers are presently engaged in armed conflict worldwide. Clearly, for the millions who become victims of such warfare, there is no peace.
Can human leaders hope for a genuine solution through future proclamations calling for peace? No, for Jeremiah 10:23 states: “I well know, O Jehovah, that to earthling man his way does not belong. It does not belong to man who is walking even to direct his step.” (Compare Jeremiah 6:14.) Indeed, true peace will come only from God.