I've been questioning if the games i'm playing are ok for my faith

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ribread777
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I'm not sure if I'll get answers here, but I'm honestly trying everywhere I can to find a means to receive help for this situation. So, earlier in the year I felt a painful strain of guilt and questioning of my possessions, I ultimately got through it, threw some things away, and put other things in a closet that I wasn't sure what feelings to determine towards them. I also struggled with video games and how obsessed I had become with them, and God in the end gave me the answer that it's ok to indulge in such things as long as they are not of evil and that I always keep Him first and to restrain myself. And it worked out great, I felt renewed and happy, but recently, the strain of guilt hit me hard again. I think the enemy tries to take these matters I start to doubt and fills me with this really poisonous doubt so that I feel horrible, ashamed, and not worthy of God's love. This time it was in regards to the video games I play. Since Christmas, I've been playing Overwatch and I haven't had any red flags in the entirety of playing it so far, except for Tracer's sexuality (but the game doesn't force it on you, so I just tend to avoid it and not really play as her) and some of the skins (mainly the Halloween ones). My favorite characters for sure are Genji and Hanzo, I really like their story and how they both grew as characters. However, in reading Revelation recently it was sparked in my mind the subject of dragons, and whether liking anything with them is evil and satanic. I recently had also bought a Hanzo and Genji figure...as well as a bomber jacket with their ult phrases on it. But in this horrible sense of guilt that perhaps I was liking something evil, I put said things in the closet of uncertainty. This guilt is making me sick to my stomach, and I can't decide if I should continue playing or not. On one half I'm thinking "It's not real, I know not to obsess about it, it's just for fun and to pass the time, I don't believe everything in it and I know that." but on the other hand, I think "It's just a game and if it has the chance of having something bad, then just stop playing and uninstall it. Not a big deal." but...In these really stressful times...this game has been a really good means of getting me to relax. It's not that I depend on it or anything, but it just has made me happy you know? God in the end is all that matters, so I never want to indulge in something that's evil or sinful. Due to this guilt about dragon-related things I also put Dragon Quest and the new Trials of Mana game I just received (but I don't really mind ditching those, because the saving to a goddess statue system really really bothered me anyway). But it just makes me wonder if liking anything dragon-related is a terrible thing. I've tried to find answers everywhere...and for the most part most Christian sites have said it's ok, just to be careful. But I really need help, I don't know what to do and decide.
I hope someone will be able to help because this dilemma has been very hard on my mental health on top of all the other crazy things going on right now.
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ccgr
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Welcome and glad you found us!

We all have different convictions, I don't likes games with occult or sexuality forced on you and will stop playing them

If you're feeling guilty it's probably best to step away and try something else you're more comfortable with
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Do you have OCD? Just asking, because I have that and it definitely can interfere with your conscience-- put it into "overdrive", so to speak. That said, you also have to make sure you don't go too far down the dark path, either. Don't be afraid to ask for advice from your pastor or other people IRL that you trust.

I'm glad you're taking steps to make sure you don't get into anything too bad, but in most contexts I would think dragons are OK. Dragons have been used in Revelation to represent evil, to be certain, but lots of other things have represented evil in the Bible as well that are not intrinsically evil-- lions, for example. A popular theory is that dragons are actually the old name for dinosaurs before they all died out after the Flood (and they may not have completely died out until the last couple of hundred years). If using magic isn't specifically occult/Satanic, I think that's okay particularly if it's in a fantasy setting and the creators aren't trying to pretend it's real-- I personally don't have any issues with the Dragon Quest series, at least the games I've played in it. I do tend to stay away from games with LGBT characters in them if they're forced on you, though.

Another issue if you're worried about being too "obsessed" with something is just to put a hard time limit on your video gaming-- keep a clock in the room with you. For example, under normal circumstances (unless I know I'm just about to beat a game) I set a time limit of 90 minutes a day when I'm playing my PS4. Once that limit's up, I get to the next save point and quit for the day.

One thing it took me a while to understand is that God knows your heart. Do you lack even a remote desire to worship the goddess at the save point? Do you know it's fiction, the game presents it as fiction, and that it's a pixelated statue? In situations like those I don't have an issue, but again, your mileage may vary.
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Last updated March 13th
ribread777
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I don't have OCD, but I am very very sensitive on an emotional level. I tend to have very low self-confidence as well as get very very easily paranoid (just leaving a window open at night floods my mind with all sorts of worst-case scenarios), it's why I can't watch or interact with anything of the horror genre. Because of this when I feel like I'm doing something even mildly wrong, especially in my journey with God, I get so physically ill that I'm incapable of functioning normally. In thinking on this for a few days and praying to God for an answer, I determined that dragons are indeed fine as long as they aren't used for an evil purpose, but the problem with Overwatch was actually the demon/demon-inspired skins. Even though they're optional...I just know that eventually I would randomly pull one from a loot box and feel really awful, If it didn't have that, I think I would've been just fine with it. I actually had a spiritual lesson about video games a few months ago in which I learned how to properly play video games without being obsessive, and to be careful while playing them. But your advice for maintaining game time is definitely what God taught me as well so I appreciate that (:
I'm really sad about it, but I decided to quit Overwatch, it's very upsetting that if they just didn't have this one thing it would've been a game I would be very comfortable with and would've continued having a great time in. But I'm afraid it's just too uncomfortable for me, so I tucked away all the items I had in relation to it in a closet, and deleted it from my Switch. I don't know what I'll do with those items, but I'm satisfied with just letting it go and putting it in God's hands right now. Maybe when I grow older in my spiritual journey I'll know what to do and how to feel. I wasn't really obsessed with the game, but it was a really good way to get me to chill out and I really liked most of the characters, so I'm pretty sad about it. But I'll just focus on games that don't have things like that instead. As for Dragon Quest/Trials of Mana and the goddess statues, I very much lacked any desire to worship them, I just get very immersive when I play games sometimes I think? So having that in there knocks me back mentally and fills me with discomfort. I'm not really sure how to describe it, I'm just too sensitive for my own good haha, I'm an overthinker.

Thank you for your reply, it means a lot (:
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No I understand, I totally get your frustration with some video games. There's several video games I'd love to play if it wasn't just for one or two things. That said, thankfully there's a TON of games out there, including plenty that really have no big moral objections whatsoever, so there's still plenty to play.
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Last updated March 13th
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