Avoiding Darkness While Surrounded By Darkness
AW is very passionate about anime and loves the concept of it, but there are plenty of things about anime we do not like or condone. The way women and men are sexualized and degraded is a huge concern to us. True Christians that watch anime should never be okay with seeing hentai (porn) or perverted sex appeal for either gender (boy, girl). True Christians should never be okay with the profanity, the brutal gore, fighting and violence that some animes promote. Now why should true Christians avoid these things? The answer is simple. Yahweh is not in it and Yahweh strongly warned his holy children to avoid the “appearances of evil” and to be holy, as He is.
So how does AW get away with looking at it if Yahweh told us not to even be around it? As a professional doctor who must sometimes see the patient nude, they are trained and supposed to see the sickness—not the body part itself. Doctors are indeed a gift from Yahweh, the Bible says they are, but Yahweh also knows doctors and nurses may see patients naked. Yahweh knows workers who care for the mentally disabled will see their residents naked or must bathe the resident. In either situation, a doctor is supposed to see sickness and treat the sickness, regardless of where it is on the human body. Mentally handicapped people cannot always care for themselves, so someone has to do it for them. They are supposed to see such people as unable to perform and should never look at their resident sexually, but as a professional who is doing their job to aid someone else.
Likewise, here at AW we understand that we are to go into the world and make disciples as a Christians and we also understand that we are to reach the lost. Sometimes, you must go to where the sinner is. The sinner will not always willing stroll into a church or your house. You have to get up and go to them. Making Christian anime is AW’s way of reaching the lost. No one at AW is watching porn or participating in rituals, watching sex scenes when we select animes to watch. We find animes that are reasonable and void of those themes as much as possible. If we start a anime and those themes suddenly pop up, rest assured our team leaves and finds another source to observe.
The lost like anime, yet the church has done nothing to meet the lost who are into anime. This is our ministry, we are professionals and know what to do and how to safeguard our hearts. The motive is not the same as someone sitting down to enjoy the anime. The motive is to observe, pull reasonable content then leave and never return to it. Christ went to the sinners, sat with them, ate with them and was accused of being a friend of tax collectors, drunks, gluttons and sinners. Yet, He did not sin. He did not approve of the sin. He also was setting an example for others to follow. Although avoiding the “appearance of evil” is ideal and should be done at all times, some ministries people have will have or even be called into will have evil present all around them.
Yahweh is not a hypocrite. We live down here on a corrupted planet with free will. Due to sin, devils and Princes surround us and by their free will, they tempt us and create evil for us to listen to and see. Devils hate true Christians and will always try to find ways to shove evil onto their path, no matter what the form.
One would think school would be a safe place to be. No, not at all. Public and sadly, Christian institutions will have students already sexually active, pregnant and depending on their situation, considering abortion (murder), stealing from teachers or classmates, have fighting among students, shootings, bomb threats, profanity, use of drugs, rape that is between students or rape between teacher and student and other evil wicked acts take place on school grounds. Usually during school events, the bathroom, locker rooms, etc. Guess what? College is no different. Can’t forget the work world. When a young person enters the work force, they will be exposed to all sorts of things, yet they are expected to “ignore it” and “overlook it” and do their jobs.
AW is aware of the settings we are in and very aware that not everything can be controlled. What staff can control is what they let into their house, their minds and their life in general. If a child goes to a school (public or Christian), the child cannot prevent the evil that is present or around them. What the child can do is choose to not use bad language, choose to not have sex, choose to not lie, choose to not do drugs, choose to be a better person and an example of light to the sinner in a dark atmosphere. That the child can control. Everything else, they should let alone and pray for the lost.
AW prayed about what to do concerning fantasy and anime and Yahweh revealed it is motive and purpose that makes anime good or evil. He literally said He didn’t hate anime, he hates what people do with it and dislikes that his own children watch it (the bad ones) and think nothing of it. So, with this in mind, we avoid the appearances of evil in our personal lives, but when on the clock, we put on our spiritual armor, anoint ourselves and enter the battel field in hope to bring back someone from the darkness and to the light.
We sometimes sit around evil, but never engage with it or condone it. We observe, take notes and when finished, we leave and go off to make something better. Something holy. Something that will make sinners think about what it is they’re doing with their lives, Christ and what they intend to do about Christ once they decide devils and sin isn’t for them anymore.
Blog post written by AW
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