The Church Leads the World...And They Both Fall Into a Ditch...

Most of the time you hear from Christian culture warriors that we need to work on taking back Hollywood (was it ever ours?).  We need to be in music and movies and all sorts of media to be a positive force in American culture.  The surprising thing, though, is that the church is everywhere in Hollywood.

Both Hollywood and Bel Air have some of the most faithful churches in all of the greater Los Angeles area.  First Presbyterian in Hollywood has been historically faithful (until very recently) and Bel Air Presbyterian is also a bastion of conservatism within the PCUSA.  Both of these churches are huge--having thousands of members and clearly millions of dollars in tithe money.  Bel Air Presbyterian alone has at least 4 different services between Saturday night and Sundays to accommodate all the worshippers.

We often hear about the popularity of bizarre cults among the Hollywood elite, like Scientology or Kabbalism, but many of the most popular stars in music and the movies come straight from the church.  Jessica and Ashlee Simpson's father was a long-time pastor in a Southern Baptist church before he pushed his daughters into show business.  Lindsey Lohan's father is one of the leaders of Teen Challenge, a Christian drug and alcohol rehabilitation ministry.  And the biggest bomb, Britney Spears, is from a Baptist family in Louisiana.  She regularly attends Bel Air Presbyterian and her mother was recently offered a contract with the Christian publishing company, Thomas Nelson, to write a book on parenting!

Do we really need to treat Hollywood like a foreign land, full of pagans?  Will that help us "take it over?"  The land is ours.  God gave it to us and He is there.  The only Christian work in Hollywood that would be blessed is one clothed in humility and repentance, starting in the churches that we already have, the pastors we already have, and the members we already have.