Ensign: The Ban Is Our Choice

All ye inhabitants of the world, and dwellers on the earth, see ye, when he lifteth up an ensign on the mountains; and when he bloweth a trumpet, hear ye. Isaiah 18:3


AN ENSIGN ON THE MOUNTAINS                    30 September 2016


Yes, I read banned books. Yes, I believe in banning books.


That sounds contradictory, but let me explain. The last week of September designated by the American Library Association (ALA) as Banned Book Week is a time that especially calls attention to books that due to their language, the situations they depict, or the characters themselves are something that parents and community leaders feel their kids shouldn't be reading and/or have access to. In bookstores and libraries you've likely seen displays where books are covered with plain brown wrappers elaborating on the reason they were banned somewhere sometime, especially within the last few years. Last year alone the ALA cited 275 challenges nationwide.


"The people in this book, this play, this TV serial are not meant to represent any actual painters, cartographers, mechanics anywhere. The bigger your market, ... the less you handle controversy, remember that! All the minor minor minorities with their navels to be kept clean. Authors, full of evil thoughts, lock up your typewriters. They did."


Granted out of more than 300,000+ books published in this country annually -- with apologies to my readers outside the United States; the only country that publishes more as of 2013 is China -- that's not a lot (you do the math). But banning a book often defeats the purpose and encourages anybody who wants to ask and is willing to devote the time to read it to ask WHY this story or that interpretation or these characters were important enough or deemed dangerous enough to keep out of the light of day or away from an impressionable young mind such as yours. Or mine.


"So! A book is a loaded gun in the house next door. Burn it. Take the shot out of the weapon. Breach man's mind. Who knows who might be the target of the well-read man? Me? I won't stomach them for a minute."    


There's two instances in Scripture I can think of where a book or books are actually being burned, so it's not as though censorship is hardly new with us. In the thirty-sixth chapter of Jeremiah we read of Jehudi, an official of King Jehoiakim of Judah who read prophecies of the prophet Jeremiah written down by Baruch his scribe (who for self-preservative reasons weren't there to read it to the king themselves) regarding the end of Judah for turning from the LORD and serving other gods.


"Colored people don't like Little Black Sambo. Burn it. White people don't feel good about Uncle Tom's Cabin. Burn it. Someone's written a book on tobacco and cancer of the lungs? The cigarette people are weeping? Burn the book."

Jehudi would read three or four leaves (KJV "leaves", the only instance a leaf of a book is referred to in Scripture) of a scroll -- the way books existed in the early 6th century BC, they were unrolled not bound -- and then the king would use his penknife to cut those leaves away and burn them. Jehudi would read, Jehoiakim would cut away, the leaves would burn. Not a word from the king.


"Let him forget there is ever such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than people worry over it."


Jump with me a little under six centuries ahead to the New Testament where in the nineteenth chapter of Acts we see Paul in Ephesus on his second missionary journey and those who had practiced magic (KJV "which used curious arts") burned their magic books where everyone could see. If you read the whole story, you find that the demon ("evil spirit") leaping into seven would-be exorcists had quite a deal to do with it. Magic was NOT going to turn back God -- its use was stepping outside God's will anyway, and isn't that what our adversary the devil wants? -- and still doesn't.


I've been using quotes from Ray Bradbury's novel Fahrenheit 451 within my message to make my point as well, that ultimately to ban a book (ironically, this book about book burning has received many bans) is ultimately to take a choice away from you. And even God won't do that. Yes, He's God but you and I have to choose whether to follow Him or not, whether to serve Him or not. We may not burn books in the public square, but we choose to cut off certain thoughts and ideas from us.


Does that mean we refuse to respect people who believe differently from us? Of course not. It means that we have to be willing to say we are not going to be shamed into believing or reading something no matter how much popular public opinion favors it. But the ban that's our choice can only ultimately go as far as ourselves. We can speak to others, but we can't make up their minds for them.


Nor should we want to,

David

P.S. I write this weekly devotional to keep in touch with you, and I hope it's encouraging too. If I'm not or you want me to get lost, just let me know -- thank you!

Thank You, Lord, for Who You Are. Thank You that we can always come to You in praise and prayer and thank You for supplying all our needs according to Your riches in glory by Christ Jesus.


Let us pray for the peace of Jerusalem on both sides of the fence, there and around the world. And we thank You, Lord, for all of us You have placed in leadership and service both here and abroad, as well as for the opportunities we have with the promise of new life in You!

And may we all seek and have a blessed week. Amen.