Scott Mayer

iShare 2014: Light

Seminar: Eye-witness the Light

Pacific Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists

Eye-witness the Light- Part 1

Before I start this, many of you have probably seen this clip from some of our other videos.

But I want to play it to you because it will play in context what exactly is being said out there.

What is Hollywood putting out there that they know this thing is having a profound effect upon society and they're almost gloating and laughing in people's face.

So this, it was really after seeing this video which was played during a Super Bowl that spun this whole project here that took us 3 years to actually travel around the United States and capture.

But here's the commercial that was played.

So what was amazing to me is this commercial was played during the Super Bowl.

And when I saw it, I was blown away at 1 of the most watched moments.

This wasn't put on in the middle of the night when no 1 would see it.

It was put on when everybody is watching television saying, listen, this is an evil plot to destroy the world.

Here we're giving you television, movies, whenever you want them, however you want them, as much as you want them, for free.

So this was the question that we really wanted to answer.

Is there really some physical damage that's happening inside of our brains from watching television.

And in order to do that I want to just kind of set the stage here.

1 of the greatest evidences and powers of Christianity that can be presented to the world as a well-ordered, well-disciplined family.

This will recommend the truth as nothing else can for it is a living witness of the practical power upon the heart.

Do you know that Ellen White here is stating, saying, listen, if you want to be the greatest representation of the gospel, it is in a well-ordered family.

Now, question, what do we call family time in America?

So it's interesting to me that there's a correlation here with a well-ordered family will represent truth like nothing else and what do we spend our time as families doing together?

I want to go over the roles in the family because I just want to start to build up in your mind how television and movies are starting to tinker with this model that God has set up.

So, if the family represents truth, Let's talk about the father as a priest, right?

The lawmaker and the priest of all the members in the family centers around the father He is the lawmaker illustrating in his own manly bearing the sterner virtues energy integrity honest patience courage diligence practical Usefulness The father is in 1 sense the priest of the household laying upon the altar of God the morning and evening sacrifices.

So the father's role is to be this priest.

The queen of the home, which is the mother, the king upon his throne has no higher work than his mother.

Now, this is a very interesting statement.

Right here, the mother is the queen of her household.

She has in her power the molding of her children's characters, that they may be fitted for a higher immortal life.

An angel could not ask for a higher mission, for in doing this work she is doing the service of God.

Let her realize the high character of her task, and it will inspire her with courage.

Let her realize the worth of her work and put on the whole armor of God as she may resist the temptation to conform to the world's standard.

Here, her work is for a time and an eternity." You know what's interesting as I've studied out this role of the male and the female coming together and having a child, a baby.

What is amazing to me is the imprint is from the father.

The imprint, the characteristics, those things that are passed down from generation to generation to generation are imprinted from the father figure.

That's why Jesus spent so much time with his mother learning about the gospel.

Now of course we know that the children's job is to obey the parents in the Lord.

For this is right, honor your mother and your father, which is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with you and you live long in the land.

I found this interesting in Adventist home.

If the marriage vows have been promised to be as 1, the wife covenanting her love and to obey her husband and the husband promising to love and cherish his wife, and if the law of God is obeyed, the demon of strife will be kept out of the family.

You know, to expand upon this, it says that if a family has a well-ordered family that is adhering to the commandments and laws of God, that it is impenetrable by the devil.

Impenetrable, he cannot come into your home.

But you know what I find is really interesting in the day and age that we live in?

A window by which the devil has access to come in and educate us, taint and twist our views and characters.

How does Hollywood produce the image of the father?

If you notice some of the most common iconic father figures coming out of either cartoons, popular TV shows, movies.

Do you see how they're always portraying the father to kind of be this just moron and how he's just kind of this funny goofy guy?

Here's what she says in Adventist Home, Maturity of experience is called for.

A father must not be as a child moved merely by impulse.

He is bound to his family by sacred and holy ties.

So the father figure really should be a role that is not a jokester like this, like a moron.

They're taking this idea of what God is set up to be and twisting the model.

In fact, we have today a lot of shows that are reshaping what we view as the modern family.

These shows, you know, if I'm going to get to in the third presentation here, we're going to open up the topic of homosexuality in television and movies.

And it is a very difficult subject to talk about, very hard, but I want to show you the trend of where they're going with all this information.

Now, the new normal, this is what the modern family is looking like here in the current state.

All should guard the senses, lest Satan gain victory over them, For they are the avenues to the soul.

You will have to become a faithful sentinel over your eyes, ears, and all of your senses if you would control your mind and prevent vain and corrupt thoughts from sustaining your soul.

The Power of grace alone can accomplish this most desirable work.

Satan and his angels are busy creating a paralyzed condition of the senses so that cautions, warnings, reproofs shall not be heard, or if they're heard, they shall not take effect upon the heart and reform the life.

My brethren, God calls upon you and his followers to walk in the light.

Sin is among us, and it is not seen to be exceedingly sinful.

The senses of many are benumbed by the indulgence of appetite and the familiarity with sin.

We need to advance nearer to heaven." Ladies, brothers and sisters, this is really the heart of the matter.

You see, I want to ask a question, an honest question.

How many of you have seen a Batman or a Superman movie?

I want you to hold your hand up and I want you to look around the room.

This is a sobering question, brothers and sisters.

I want you to ask yourself, why would I walk into a room and sit down and want to hear a story about a dark night?

All of us who produce or come to church, we're even passing out literature.

And I've gone around the world and spoken this in the most conservative churches where everybody looked like they walked off of an Ellen White set.

It does not matter how conservative you think you are, everybody is watching some of the same things.

So my goal here today is not to necessarily break your confidence in the media, so to say.

My goal is to increase your confidence in the media.

I hope to prove to you today that the media is 1 of the most powerful tools to shape a mind.

And let me tell you, if I believe that it was all evil and that we should have nothing to do with it, I would not be creating media productions for a living.

So I hope that you don't hear, come out of my mouth, it's all evil, throw it all away, break it all, but I'll tell you I notice a common trend in our churches and that is it does not matter how much you are in your Bible, there is a disconnect with the information that we're allowing into our minds.

And that's my goal here over the next 3 presentations to prove to you.

So I want to just show you this American time use.

This is a chart that just kind of shows what people are doing in the day.

Now this is obviously not Seventh-day Adventists, so this is the world, so keep that in mind when you're looking at this.

Here's how much time is spent out of the day.

Here's how much time is spent in leisure sports.

And then there's a tiny little sliver right here in religious activities right here.

It's very easy to sit down and watch a two-hour movie.

ASI 2013: It's Time... To Be About Our Father's Business

ASI 2013 Seminar: It's Time

How Mainstream Media Destroys Families

As everybody's filtering in, I just wanted to kind of give you a little bit of a precursor here to what it is that you're about to see, because obviously the title is kind of a bit of a shock, but I want to explain a little bit about it.

How many of you, and I just want to know so I can understand how much I need to actually really explain, have ever seen any videos or any of the information that our ministry has ever presented before.

Wow, praise God, a lot of you in this room.

So that helps me a lot because now I don't got to go into a huge explanation of things in the past.

And I want to kind of tell you a little bit about this project because it's a project that we've been working on for 3 years now.

In fact, when we first started our ministry, we started with the intention of creating a DVD that really fully delve into and explained what happens inside your brain when you watch television or movies and did not come from a Christian perspective.

And the reason that we did that was because an argument that we got from non-Christian believers or non-Adventists a lot was, yes, I see what you're saying, but I don't believe it because you have a Christian perspective, you have a belief in God.

So what we did is we've spent the last 3 years traveling around the whole United States, talking to some of the top neurologists, UCLA, Seattle's Children's Hospital, and getting a perspective from people who have no invested interest in God whatsoever but are telling you exactly what this thing is doing to our minds.

So those are some of the things that we're going to show today And there are a few clips in here for those that are a bit weary of heart.

But the reason that I want to show you those clips is because we speak at a lot of colleges, a lot of universities, a lot of youth rallies.

I just came from last week at a youth rally, and when we would ask who here in this room is watching this movie or this movie or this movie, 90% of our Adventist children are watching these movies.

So, this is a new production that we just released.

We actually just finished it just before we came here to ASI.

We'll have them available at our booth, and we have limited copies, so please come and visit us.

Before we get started, let's bow our heads for a word of prayer.

Dear gracious Heavenly Father, thank you so much for this opportunity to come together, to unplug from the world, to set our eyes on eternal things.

Lord, may you open our eyes, open our hearts to the messages that you want us to hear.

May this message be from your throne on high.

And may everyone in this room and those individuals that have no understanding why they walked into this room, Lord, May there be something that is said that just raptures their hearts to want to have a closer relationship with you.

So the title, When I was asked to give this presentation, they wanted me to talk about mainstream media and what kind of an effect this has on families.

And it was kind of an interesting idea because I had sort of looked into it, but not really.

So I want to, I want to read a couple Spirit of Prophecy quotes to put this in perspective for you.

And this 1, If you read the description of this particular talk, this is what I actually had written on there.

The greatest evidence of the power of Christianity can be presented to the world is a well-ordered, well-disciplined family.

This will recommend the truth as nothing else can, for it is a living witness of the practical power upon the heart." The family unit is an amazing tool that God is using to teach the world these various different truths.

The father, what is the role of the father in the family?

All the members of the family center around the father.

He is the lawmaker, illustrating his own manly bearing, the sterner values, energy, integrity, honesty, patience, courage, diligence, practical usefulness.

The father is in 1 sense the priest of the household laying upon the altar of God in the morning and evening sacrifice.

And if you continue to read on, a lot of these quotes are coming from Adventist home.

If you haven't read this book in a while, I suggest read it.

There is some amazing information here in the light of the television and things.

You'll see things pop out that are amazing.

And just after this quote right here, she talks about the father being the priest of the household, needing to pray for the sins that your children have committed.

I had never really thought of that before.

That's interesting that the mini model that God has given to us is even just a microcosm of this great model of Christ being our father and God being our father.

So if the family centers around the father, don't get ahead of yourself, men.

The king upon his throne has no higher work than that of his mother.

The mother has almost a more important role.

The mother is the queen of the household.

She has in her power the molding of her children's characters that they may be fitted for a higher immortal life.

An angel could not ask for a higher mission for in doing this work she is doing the service of God.

Let her only realize her high character of her task and it shall inspire her with courage.

Let her realize the worth of her work and put on the whole armor of God that she may be able to resist temptation and to conform to the world's standards.

The role of the mother to teach the children and instill in them the characteristics that are setting you up for an eternity.

The children, Proverbs 6.20 says that the children's, what are they supposed to do in this role of the family?

My son, keep thy father's commandments and forsake not the law of the mother.

Bind them continually upon thy heart and tie them about your neck.

So the children, the way that God set this up is that the mother and the father teach the children, the children learn from them and take on these characteristics and the cycle continues and thus that's what describes God's character to the world.

I found this that was pretty interesting to me.

In the marriage vows, they have promised to be as 1.

The wife covenanting to love and obey her husband and The husband promising to love and cherish his wife.

If the law of God is obeyed, the demon of strife will be kept out of the family and no separation of interest will take place, no alienation of affection will be permitted.

What this is telling me that is in the family unit, if we are sold out to God, sold out to Christ, teaching our children in the model that God has set up, do you know that she goes on to say it's almost impenetrable by Satan to enter into our families.

But you know what every single 1 of us has as a family member inside of our families?

A window, a portal, something that allows the thoughts and things of the world to be channeled into our lives.

So this is why I believe it is very important to understand what proper use of media is.

I believe that it's a beautiful tool and can be used for God.

I'm not against all media, but there is a proper use of it and a way that It can be used so it's not hypnotic and not putting people into altered states like a lot of the mainstream media.

So that's why in the title of this, it was mainstream media is what destroys family.

You know, in television, they're flipping the model that God has set up.

Ellen White talks about the father must not be as a child or moved merely by impulse.

He is bound by his family's sacred, holy ties.

Here you see constantly, over and over and over again, from television shows, from movies, how do they always portray the father?

That she's so caring about the material things of this world, not about the character, not about what's inside.

They're taking the model of what God is setting up and flipping it upside down.

And So, by taking this apart, they're ultimately dividing and conquering against our families.

The Modern Family, this is a CBS television show that has come out recently.

I'm not gonna go into a big explanation of this, But here you have marriages that have been broken apart and pulled together.

Here's 2 gay guys that are entered into a marriage relationship.

And it's basically this real dysfunctional look at families together, but they're putting this out to the public as this is what the modern family should look like.

And if you just take a step back and analyze how does mainstream Hollywood portray a family And then look at what either Spirit of Prophecy or the Bible says about it, you start to see a stark contrast between the 2.

I want to show you this because I think this is pretty interesting.

The United States Labor Board did a study on what people are spending their time with.

Okay, so this is the average person, the average American that has a job and what are they doing with their time.

Notice here, people sleep 8.91 hours out of the day.

I thought that was kind of high, but this is what they're finding out.

GYC 2010: No Turning Back

By Beholding: The Mind-Shaping Influences of Media and Entertainment

Brandon Mascareñas

Thom Mayer

Generation. Youth. Christ. (GYC)

Magic Kingdom

This message was presented at the GYC 2010 No Turning Back Conference in Baltimore, Maryland.

For other resources like this, visit us online at GYCweb.org.

Dear Gracious Heavenly Father, I praise your name.

Thank you so much for the GYC conference and each and every person that has come out here.

Lord, may they see a greater picture of who you are.

And Lord, may you speak your words through me.

May they not see anything that I have to say, Lord, but only what you want them to know.

So Lord, be with the technology, be with this presentation, and may it be impactful.

So Magic Kingdom, we were asked a lot to talk on cartoons actually for the last couple of years.

And I always kind of said, oh, you know, cartoons, come on, they're not that bad, right?

And when I finally sat down and I started looking into this phenomenon, I was actually shocked at how deep and how much they even attack spiritual truth or the Bible or Christ, even in the most simplistic cartoons.

So, before I get started, I'd like you guys to think about 1 thing.

I want to talk to you from Hebrews 11, the faith chapter.

All of the people in the Bible that exuded amazing faith in the Bible, such as Noah, it goes through in Hebrews 12, or Hebrews 11, And it starts out by giving you clear examples of what true faith was.

You build this thing for a hundred years or more, not ever knowing what's going to happen.

If you think of Abraham and Isaac, imagine the faith that Abraham had to have to bring his son up there on that mountain knowing that this was the child that God gave him to continue on his lineage.

I also want to bring your mind to Christ, when He was in the garden of Gethsemane.

Christ was on the ground, pleading with God, begging with God, God, I don't want to go through with this.

Every single thing in my life, everything that has come up to this moment, I cannot see past this point.

I don't want to go through with this, is what Christ was saying.

And in fact, in Matthew 26, 38-39, it says, that He was exceedingly sorrowful in His soul even unto death.

How many of you have been sorrowful all the way to the point that you want to die?

But like it says, O Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me, for not as I will, but your will.

You know what this tells me about faith in the Bible?

There's 2 kinds of faith, or there's 2 kinds of roads that you can take, rather.

You can have complete faith, or you can have complete feelings, And they're on opposite ends of the spectrum.

If we were to react in the end times off of our feelings...

We may be in for a rough ride in the time of trouble.

Back to Menu

Presenter

Scott Mayer

All Recordings

Eye-witness the Light- Part 1

43m

How Mainstream Media Destroys Families

1h 17m

Magic Kingdom

1h 2m

Artificial Atmosphere

1h

Sex, Lies and Videotapes

49m

The Home Hypnotist

1h 4m

The Culture Creation Industry

1h 18m

American Idol

1h 7m

Prodigal Son in Paradise

32m

Battlefield Hollywood Q & A

42m

False System of Worship

1h

Sound Doctrine