This Message Brought To You By the Letter ‘C’!
Like many children growing up in the past forty years, Sesame Street is lodged in my mind as a mythical place where creativity and friendliness flow freely. While I used to love it for its songs, animations and puppets, it wasn’t until later that I realized how wonderful a picture of community it presented.
Sesame Street is a place where everyone belonged, regardless of skin color, their physical size (Big Bird anyone?), or their age: everyone has something to share with everyone else.
The Gospel Coalition posted a thoroughly excellent reflection on what the Church could learn from Sesame Street’s contextualized message.
Here’s an excerpt from the article, but you really should jump over and read the entire thing:
As the New York Times puts it, this was a “messianic show,” with a “mission” to remake the way children envisioned the world.
Yes, Big Bird and Bert and Ernie and Grover and Oscar the Grouch and their human co-stars would teach you about letters and numbers and safety tips. But, more than that, they would show you, by the characters they featured and the plotlines they put forward, a new way of seeing things on issues ranging from racial equality to obesity prevention to the global fight against AIDS.
I know that some immediately will conclude that I’m saying simply that churches should contextualize in their teaching and mission.
Yes, Sesame Street did contextualize. The writers and producers picked up on familiar themes such as advertising commercials (”This broadcast is brought to you by the letter ‘C.’”). They built their segments around a typical child’s attention span. They featured songs that were easy-to-sing and memorable (pop quiz: can you hum the tune of Ernie’s “Rubber Ducky” song? Of course you can).
And, yes, of course, churches should contextualize the gospel, addressing people in a language that can be heard and understood. But contextualization itself is not enough. Some of the most self-consciously contextualized churches are faddish and hyper-consumerist. They’re more like the mass-marketed latter years of Sesame Street, and less like the early, innovative, culture-shaping times. And we’ve got all the “Tickle Me Elmo” kinds of Christian ministries we can stand.
Sesame Street was effective because the program didn’t just contextualize to the present; it contextualized to the future.
Do you have any favorite Sesame Street memories? What do you think about the notion that the Church should adopt this idea of contextualizing for the future?
Editor’s note: You can relive some classic Seasame Street moments on Hulu, including one of my favorites.
