Play Station

The commons area hummed and murmured with activity. A larger, quiet woman spoke to a younger man with large, gauged ears and a squeaky voice, probably brought on by a cold, about her English assignments. Sitting right beside them were two men with gray hair, one of them having a head-full of it, the other talking to him about the Bible. In the corner, an elderly woman whom I recognized from my math class was selling pizzas for 5 dollars, an offer I took up in a moment.
My fingers tapped the keys on my computer. The image on the screen changed from a facebook page to IGN.com, the website of the International Gaming Network, and on the homepage is a CG photo of a young, slender woman in shorts and a vest with short hair, with the title “Final Fantasy XIII” is here. I look at my page history, and the last few days have the IGN logo splattered all over it.
At the moment that I am about to click on the link to watch the intro video just one more time, I hear the fast drums and heavy chug-chug of guitars from my pocket, and my brother's angry face on the display. I answer.
“Hello?”
“Hey, Matt, how's it goin?”
“Good man, you?”
“Goooood. So heeeey I'm sitting here staring at about 13 PS3's on the shelf...”
“Where?”
“Best Buy.”
“What the heck, seriously?”
“Yeah. So... you want me to get one?”
I sit there for a millisecond or two. Opposing thoughts ran through my brain. One said Dude, you just got back $2500 on your tax return! Get 'er done! Another said You know if you just get it you'll play it all the time and get sucked in. Remember when you threw away all your PS2 games in ministry school? The last, and finally the one that took over, said Man, you made a promise to your brother that you'd go in on one with him, and I know it'll be really fun. Just do it.
“Yeah, man, let's do it. I just got my tax return back and we definitely need to get a PS3.”
“All right, sounds good. I'll see you when you get home.”
I hung up. Sighing, I bent over and ran my hands through through the one-inch-long extrusions of protein that shot up from my scalp, finally gripping the back of my skull as my elbows touched my knees. Looking for answers up at the ceiling, I pack up my bags and head off to work.
The next few hours of janitorial were spent tormented by thoughts. I'd come so far! I was seeing people get healed miraculously in front of my eyes, I was having encounters with God in heavenly places, I was hearing Him for myself and others with pin-point accuracy. I've come so far, I thought, and now I'm going straight back to something I was freed from. I felt like the dog in Proverbs, “As a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly.” It was just a PS3, though, it wasn't like I was going back to doing drugs or anything. But I had high hopes for my life, and I didn't want something as stupid as this to drag me down. I vacuumed the rug, sucking up all the garbage into my backpack.
As I pondered this, my thoughts turned to God. Up until now I just assumed I knew what He wanted for me, and what He wanted to do. I didn't try to contrive an answer like I had so many times, I just waited and listened. I gave it up to God and started sweeping Victory Academy.
Then a random thought came into my head. I hadn't even considered this, it just snuck into the stronghold of my mind and checkmated its king.
Matt, said the thought, I'm allowing you to have this PS3 because you've been through the trials of life and I can now trust you with it.
I stood dead still, staring intently into space. A tear began to well up in my eye. God trusts me. I'm worthy of trust. For so long the church has taught the doctrine of “Sinners in the Hand of Angry God.” They mean well, for without God we truly are nothing. But I believe that what we're missing is a revelation of what Jesus' blood actually does. It doesn't just make us go to heaven when we die – the blood of Jesus changes us, from the inside out. His death put our own sinful nature to death, and His resurrection raises us anew from the dead, not just theoretically, but as a spiritual reality.
At one time in my life, I wasn't strong enough or trustworthy enough to have a PlayStation 3. Now that old man has been buried in baptism, so that I may walk in newness of life. He's turned my life into His Play-Station, and the joy I get to experience is beyond words.