By James Wilson
I love to write about a resurgent entertainment industry honoring God with a veritable tsunami of films – nine this Spring 2016 – that explicitly acknowledge redemption of His people with faithfulness to His own Word. But other movies are just as honoring if we are willing to discover them as they color outside the lines. These films focus on God’s people in light we find unflattering; they are not the people of God we want to be. They are just as faithful to Word and Spirit, but seeing them as faithful requires exercise of a repentant point of view. Repentance – re-focus – is required because we don’t like seeing ourselves as repentant tax collectors like Zacceas or the penitent publican Jesus compares to an unrepentant Pharisee. We pretend we are unlike the King David who committed adultery and then had the husband murdered, or the Apostle Peter who denied his best friend three times to save his own skin. Yet these people are more rather than less like us; these outside-the-box movies take us where we would rather not go. Take Steven Spielberg’s original Jurassic Park, Robert Duvall’s The Apostle, and Brad Pitt’s Fury.
Jurassic Park is a Frankenstein’s nightmare. Like the scientist of the classic John Hammond has – he thinks – created life. Like Frankenstein he has actually created only death. Hammond pursues his delusion after the wave of destruction begins, telling the paleo-biologist that next time – when they recover control – things will be different. She declares they never had control; they are dealing with the forces of creation itself and the only reasonable way to deal is to respect – to stop aping – God. Later the mathematician patiently explains they spent such energy figuring how to make the dinosaurs they left none for asking if they should. This plot development addresses the most fundamental issue – not by inquiring after the existence of God but by acknowledging we are not He. Only then can we ask the real question, “Who is He, and what must we do now?” To know God we must first honor Him.
To call The Apostle’s Sunny Dewey a flawed human being understates. He cheats on his wife; when he discovers her cheating he kills her lover with a baseball bat. On the run he re-encounters God and repents – one of many such occasions for him. He baptizes himself in a river and appoints/christens himself Apostle EF. He has a fruitful ministry preaching on the radio and God uses him to – for example – raise the dead. He is eventually exposed, arrested, and sent to prison. He repents again and dedicates his life to leading inmates into the abundant life of Christ. Most Christians cringe at comparisons between themselves and this reprobate. Yet Jesus makes it crystal clear He is much more interested in a repentant sinner than a man who (thinks he) needs no repentance. His superstars are Abraham who gives his wife to an Egyptian king to curry favor and mates with his servant girl rather than wait for God’s promise his wife, or Saul who works full time as a vigilante before encountering the living Savior. He honors those who seek His Face and keep seeking after failure follows failure.
Fury stories an exhausted tank crew in the closing days of World War II. Given orders to defend a crossroads against a last ditch German attack they fight after their tank is disabled and their deaths certain. But the real story is about men becoming animals doing what they must to survive war, yet conscious enough of their humanity to wrestle throughout the film between their innate drive to regain it and their instinct to survive by any means necessary. Two of the tankers are Bible quoting Christians; their struggle is just as intense as the others. That struggle is most clearly seen in the Brad Pitt character. Commanding the tank he restrains his men from raping a German girl but forces his newest recruit to kill a prisoner in cold blood. He believes the Bible but has no relationship with its author. In the climax he sacrifices his life to save the tanker he earlier forced to kill. Their struggle to be human – under God – is gross and gruesome, but ultimately it bears fruit.
There is of course no substitute for knowing, serving, and worshipping the Living God. But the One who knew no sin is well acquainted with the struggle we engage in this ugly world our sin has re-shaped away from His image. He honors those who struggle honestly to seek Him. Whenever art presents the struggle honestly He is honored.
James A. Wilson is the author of Living As Ambassadors of Relationships, The Holy Spirit and the End Times, and Kingdom in Pursuit – available at local bookstores or by e-mailing him at praynorthstate@charter.net
