“Whatever is true, \u2026 noble, \u2026 right, \u2026 pure, \u2026 lovely, \u2026 admirable \u2014 think about such things.” \u2013 Philippians 4:8<\/p>\n
Whenever Tammy Campbell thinks about it, she gets physically ill . . . For almost 3 months her family, along with 60 other households, unknowingly drank and bathed in sewage water!<\/p>\n
It all began when city workers in Pineville, Louisiana, mistakenly connected a sewer line to an underground water pipe. Tammy started finding stringy white stuff in the filters for her refrigerator ice-cube maker, dishwasher, and washing machine.<\/p>\n
She later learned the white substance was TP. (Yuck.) Other unfortunate residents found that their water heaters were filled up with other \u201cunpleasant surprises.\u201d (And again I say, yuck!)<\/p>\n
City officials have offered the comforting(?) claim that though their citizens had a close encounter of the sewage kind, the chlorine in the water line should have killed most of the bacteria. (Makes you want to switch to bottled water, doesn\u2019t it?)<\/p>\n
Think about it. Those poor folks were taking baths in the dirty liquid. They were dropping sewage cubes into glasses that were then filled with not-so-nice iced tea. Yes, there were some evidences of something being rotten in Denmark (or, Pineville), but for 90 days Tammy and the gang were oblivious to the fact that they were using bad water.<\/p>\n
With that in mind, what would happen if we tested the stuff you and I have watched (TV\/videos\/movies), what we\u2019ve read (magazines\/books\/Internet), and what we\u2019ve listened to (radio\/CDs) this past week?<\/p>\n
Like ingesting bacteria, when we fill our minds with filth we\u2019re going to get sick \u2026 spiritually. In Philippians 4, Paul implored us to dwell on only \u201cpure\u201d and \u201cnoble\u201d things (v.8).<\/p>\n
You can compromise and say, \u201cWell, most of the music on this CD is okay!\u201d or, \u201cI know that movie has a few nasty parts, but the rest is good!\u201d But the bottom line is: you\u2019re allowing \u201csewage\u201d to seep into your head and heart.<\/p>\n
Instead, take this in: \u201cTo our God and Father be glory for ever and ever\u201d (Philippians 4:20). Bring Him glory by the way you use media.<\/p>\n
Don\u2019t allow the nasty stuff to make you spiritually ill. \u2013TF<\/p>\n
REFLECTION
\n \u2022 How much media \u201csewage\u201d do I expose myself to each day?
\n \u2022 What three things can I do to cut out the negative or sinful influences in my life, and focus on more edifying stuff?<\/p>\n
If it\u2019s doubtful, it\u2019s dirty.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“Whatever is true, \u2026 noble, \u2026 right, \u2026 pure, \u2026 lovely, \u2026 admirable \u2014 think about such things.” \u2013 Philippians 4:8 Whenever Tammy Campbell thinks about it, she gets physically ill . . . For almost 3 months her family, along with 60 other households, unknowingly drank and bathed in sewage water! It all began […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[732,733,734,735,736,737],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7890"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7890"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7890\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7890"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7890"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.churchedge.com\/illustrations\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7890"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}