Legacy Youth Ministry Resources

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Manson's Hero

To me, Satan ultimately represents rebellion. Lucifer was the angel that was kicked out of heaven because he wanted to be God. To me, what greater character to identify with? (Shock-rocker Marilyn Manson, from interview with Anthony DeCurtis)

A Hard Heart Breeds a Cold Heart

Don't keep rejecting God. Watch over your heart and your choices. They affect the kind of person you become. Shock rocker Marilyn Manson kept rejecting God, even when he knew he should accept Christ, while he was in Christian School. Instead, he kept hardening his heart. The description of the development of hardened hearts in Romans 1:18-20 parallels Manson's life as described in his autobiography. Each time he came to a fork in the road, he seemed to choose the dark path. When confronted with alcohol and drugs, he took them. When he had the opportunity to have sex, he went for it. When he saw the potential of power through black magic, he was positively intrigued. When his parents fought fell short of perfection, he grew bitter towards them. Eventually, his heart seemed to be almost devoid of compassion. Although his parents were not perfect, like his dad telling him repeatedly that he wouldn't amount to anything and threatening to kick him out of the house, they also showed signs of love. His dad took him to hear his favorite band. His parents took money they had saved for a weekend getaway and instead bought him a set of professional racing skates for over $400.00. He admits that his mom spoiled him. But he was ungrateful, suspected that his mom had been cheating on his dad, and abused her. Marilyn Manson admits that he "hit her, spit on her and tried to choke her. She never retaliated. She just cried, and I never felt sorry for her." (Italics mine) When the family decided to move, he "was bitter and angry -- not just at my parents, but at the world." His life became a series of one dark, selfish decision after another. Extremely conceited, other people are looked upon as dumb, beneath him. He stole, ingested drugs, and used people. Watch your heart and your decisions. You can either forgive and make compassionate choices, taking you down one road of life, or hold onto unforgiveness and bitterness, becoming a totally selfish person. His motivation to become a performer? "?I wanted to be the loudest, most persistent alarm clock I could be, because there didn't seem like any other way to snap society out of its Christianity- and media-induced coma." He took his stage name from sex symbol Marilyn Monroe and convicted murder instigator Charles Manson. Marilyn Manson identified with him and saw him as a "gifted philosopher, more powerful intellectually than those who condemned him." Shortly later he admitted, "By now, I had begun to feel removed from the everyday world of morality. Guilt had become more a fear of getting caught than any sense of right or wrong." With no God and no sense of right and wrong, even murder can be justified. In Manson's own words, "My respect for human life had long since dulled." He witnessed a head-on collision and was approached by a woman who was severely injured and distraught. She walked up to him and said, "Please, somebody hold me." Again, in his own words, "I could see the humanity and desperation well up in her brown eyes. She just wanted some kind of physical, nurturing contact as she died. But I kept walking. I wasn't part of it and didn't want to be part of it." He hated a girl named Nancy, and decided to try to kill her. Here's how he justified his attitude: "With Nancy, while I didn't think it was right to take a human life, I didn't think it was right to deny myself the chance of causing someone to die either, especially someone whose existence meant so little to the world and to herself." (p. 111) A couple of police cars drove by and scared him before he could carry out the murder. Shortly thereafter, Manson reflected that he had only "one weak spot still left in my cold black heart: pity, a word that over the course of the arduous year to come would be excised from my vocabulary." After considering letting a fellow band member die in his own vomit, Manson said, "I was becoming the cold, emotionally crippled monster I always wanted to be, and I wasn't so sure I liked it. But it was too late." (p. 126) (Written by Steve Miller, Copyright April 25, 2002. Source: Marilyn Manson in his autobiography, The Long Hard Road Out of Hell, Regan Books, 1998, pp. 20, 26, 46-48, 64, 80, 87, 96, 111, 112-114, 118, 125, 194, 197, 198)

Youth as The Age of Temptation

?Youth is the age of temptation and the greatest temptation of all is to do what the rest of the gang are doing, right or wrong. Too often it is wrong, for wisdom comes only with maturity, and the road to the maturity of self-understanding and self-discipline is long and hard and there are those who never reach the end of that road.? Pearl S. Buck

Guard Well Thy Thoughts

?Guard well thy thoughts; our thoughts are heard in heaven.? Owen D. Young

Others' Faults and Headlights

?The faults of others are like headlights of an approaching automobile ? they only seem more glaring than your own.? Chewelah [Wash.] Independent

?No Fishing Allowed?

Maybe because the sea is never far from a Hollander?s mind, I liked to think that that?s where forgiven sins were thrown. ?When we confess our sins,? I said, ?God casts them into the deepest ocean, gone forever. And even though I cannot find a Scripture for it, I believed God then places a sign out there that says, NO FISHING ALLOWED.? (Corrie ten Boom, Tramp for the Lord, p53)

Temptation Bangs on Your Door

Opportunity may knock once, but temptation bangs on your door for years.

As Soon As It's Light

I'm a light eater. As soon as it's light, I start to eat. -Art Donovan

Cars Going the Wrong Way

Most of us have a hard time seeing our own faults. We choose to believe that everyone who accuses us of wrong has the wrong perception. We're like the senior citizen who was driving down the freeway when his car phone rang. Answering, he heard his wife's voice urgently warning him, "Herman, I just heard on the news that there's a car going the wrong way on I-75. Please be careful!" "Hell," said Herman, "It's not just one car... It's HUNDREDS of them!"

Youth as The Age of Temptation

?Youth is the age of temptation and the greatest temptation of all is to do what the rest of the gang are doing, right or wrong. Too often it is wrong, for wisdom comes only with maturity, and the road to the maturity of self-understanding and self-discipline is long and hard and there are those who never reach the end of that road.? Pearl S. Buck

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