Media: The Medium is the Message

Media: The Medium is the Message

Thoughts from listening to and reading Marshall McLuhan, who coined the phrase "The medium is the message."

Communication has:
1. A content - What is the message that is being communicated?
2. A medium- What is the means or the environment in which the message is being communicated?
3. An effect - The content and the medium work together to have an effect.

When we think about communication, we have to think about the effect, not just the content.

If I were to spray paint "Jesus Loves You" on the side of someone's car in the Walmart parking lot, we could say:
1. The content - the message is "Jesus Loves You".
2.  The medium - spray paint on a random car.
3.  The effect - Anger, resentment, outrage.

Another example:
A ten year old watches "good" television and movies for six hours a day.
1.  The content is good.
2.  The medium is television.
3.  The effect is the sum of 40 hours a week of "good" content + 40 hours a week of watching TV.  These have to be considered together.

What about how we communicate the gospel?
1.  The content: God loves you more than you can possibly imagine, but if you don't trust Jesus for salvation, you are in for a worse eternal destiny than you could ever fear.  You could die today or this week or this month or this year.  This is something that you should come to grips with immediately - your eternal destiny hangs in the balance.
2.  The medium - Large comfortable churches; relational, timid evangelism; believers who have the same values as the people of the world.
3.  The effect - Our "medium" contradicts our message and in effect says that we don't believe our message.

Combining "the medium is the message" with Woody Allen's "95% of winning is showing up":
1. If you come to my mother's funeral, ten years from now I won't remember anything you said, but I'll remember that you came.  Your coming communicated more than anything you might have said.
2.  If you send a thank you note, most of the significance of the note is that you sent it.

Sesame Street was conceived in 1966 and came on the air in 1969.  Their goal was to create a children's television show that would "master the addictive qualities of television and do something good with them",[3] such as helping young children prepare for school.  It has been said that Sesame Street didn't help kids love learning, it taught them to love television.

In conversation, your greatest message may be communicated through listening and being interested.  What I was with X I thought I was in the presence of one of the greatest people of our times.  When I was with Y, I thought he was in the presence of one of the greatest people of our time.

Jesus didn't teach linearly.  He taught in the moment, based on what was happening.  We see this at the wedding in Cana and with the woman at the well. We must learn how to teach in the context of life.   "Today we're going to Lowes."