If someone asked you what the word trivia meant, what would you say? According to the Oxford dictionary trivia is “Details, considerations or pieces of information of little importance or value.”  Whenever I think of trivia I think of game shows, pubs, and boardgames.  Yet recently I have realised that triva can be found in other areas too.

While driving my aged father-in-law home he shared his concerns of life with me.  As I listened, I realised that most of his concerns came from what he heard on the news.  The more he spoke, the more I realised that all the things he was agitated about made little or no difference to his life – he was agitated by trivia.

“Most of our daily news is inert, consisting of information that gives us something to talk about but cannot lead to any meaningful action.”

Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business

Emotion alone does not make a something meaningful or important.  Something becomes trivial to us when it does not effect our time, decisions, money, or relationships.  For example,  this week in the news I read about an IS terrorist stripped of his Australian citizenship, Trump threatening to close the Mexico border, and Chinese schools enforcing school uniforms with built in GPS.  What do I do with this information? If I do nothing with it, it becomes trivia. Yes important truths can become trivial.

The truth of the gospel must never become trivia. Make sure the that the good news of Jesus as Lord effects not only your emotions but your calendar, your budget, your relationships, and your decisions.

Denis Oliver