Composed yesterday, typed up today
Yesterday I was pondering the bulletin insert about “Narnia, The Movie” (as I’m calling it). Specifically, I was interested in the quotes from ‘church leaders’ included in the advertisement. The quote by Mark Mittelberg states, “Rarely do events happen in mainstream culture that cause people to think about deeper spiritual realities; however, the upcoming Chronicles of Narnia movie will be one of those rare moments. As Christians, we must be ready to make the most of this incredible opportunity.”
My commentary ran as follows: “I disagree strongly with Mittelberg. I’ve seen this phenomenon happen twice-First The Passion, now Narnia. As Christians, we perk up for these explicitly or implicitly Christian themed films. Ah! Here is God speaking! Ah! Here is an opportunity to interest otherwise uninterested (and perhaps unsuspecting) non-Christians in THE GOSPEL! Mittelberg seems to believe that our culture is full of people whose spiritual sensibilities and interests are numb at best, dead at worst. The solution? Invite them to a movie about Jesus! (or a lion-jesus). I consider this a misapprehension of culture leading to a misidentification of a solution, predicated upon a wrongheaded approach of the modern church. Are explicitly Christian movies rare? Sure. Does that mean our opportunities to minister through a cultural form like film is in any way limited? No. God doesn’t restrict himself to speaking only through cultural media which are explicitly gospel-related and our culture’s spiritual interests aren’t so blunted as to need an explicitlly religious film to awaken them to spiritual discussion.
I believe our opportunities to engage culture and non-Christians are much wider than we assume. God is speaking in culture. Through film, art, maybe even TV. How can we learn to tune into what he is saying…about how he is speaking to culture now, about what culture needs, about how to address those needs through service and message. I’m not talking about “claiming all things for Christ”–I don’t think culture needs to be sacrilized. Rather, I am saying that the church is not the sole purveyor of God’s word and activity. In fact, God does not limit himself from being present in and among THE SECULAR. (I think I’ve written on the dangers of a too differentiated approach to divining the sacred and secular, especially in a culture which demonstrates so much willingness to regain the spiritual and the mysterious in it’s everyday life.)
So is God going to speak through Narnia? Yes. But is that it? What about the last R-rated flick you saw? Did you stop to consider what that had to do with God (and I don’t mean that God thinks you’re bad for hearing profanity and seeing underwear-zone body parts)? Does God shy away from media containing sin, profanity, and corruption? (I tend to think God is neither naive nor squeamish, having demonstrated rather a predilection for hanging with morally shady characters whilst here on earth). So, as a church, let’s not make the mistake of thinking that our opportunities are few, or that the culture’s interest is low. Go see Narnia with your friends, churched and un, and then go see everything else on the marquee worth seeing and talk about it as well.
November 29th, 2005 at 7:47 am
I’m curious to hear your opinion on how God speaks to us. With current events, would you say God is actively speaking through them, or that current events are simply relevant to God and our Christian walk? I find the discussion of how God “works” in our daily lives fascinating. From people ascribing every which happening to the hand of God, to naming God’s motives in a certain event. You can get into a discussion of free will really quickly, but I’m curious what your thoughts are.
So to be more clear, will God actively speak through Narnia, or will Narnia simply give good discussion about what God spoke two-thousand years ago?
November 29th, 2005 at 3:45 pm
I am so tempted to try and address all those questions in a single response, but I’m not going to. Instead, I am going to cover the following issues in subsequent posts:
1. God speaking through culture (I focus on that over/above current events). A restatement of 1st century information? A revelation of what’s relevant? Or perhaps even statements of never before said information?
2. Free will-Is there? Isn’t there? Here’s the teaser…I think there’s something in between free will and determination that makes more sense, both theologically and biopsychosocially….
3. Identifying the “hand of God” or “work of God” in our daily lives. Can we? Why do we? Are there any dangers associated with our tendency to say with certainty what God is and is not doing for someone? (sorry, I’m only good at writing leading questions).
Hmm. Maybe I’ll start writing one of those right now….
November 29th, 2005 at 4:49 pm
And your fourth question can be….
4. What is biopsychosocially?
:p
November 29th, 2005 at 6:00 pm
Hmm. Sorry for the foray into psychologese. Perhaps it’s better to say “that makes fore sense, both theologically and in terms of the integrated, multi-faceted nature of people, who are composed of biology, their minds and feelings, and their social interactions.” All of those aspects come into the free will/determination discussion in my mind. Or is it my brain. Hmm.
November 30th, 2005 at 2:38 pm
i liked what you said about God not being naive nor squeamish, and hanging with morally shady characters. mainly because i like the words naive, squeamish, and shady. but it reminds me of something one of my professors said a couple years ago. He was talking about us being salt and light. About how if we want to make a difference, we’re going to have to stand out. And that means not being caught up in either extreme. We can’t go hang out with the meat and the darkness and just blend in. the meat and the darkness don’t need more meat or darkness. they need salt and light in order to bring out what is good in them. And in the same way, if we are salt and light, and we’re only immersing ourselves in more salt and light, we may never stand out with the kind of glory that God created in us. I think it’s important for us to be out there, experiencing the culture of the world, but we have to be careful that we are sifting through it, appreciating and praising what is good in culture, and standing against what is bad.
November 30th, 2005 at 3:28 pm
Yeah, I think it’d be impossible to say god is speaking in this movie or song, but not in this movie or song. God’s hands are in everything… it’s a matter of if you’re listening or aware of it.
I think churches often get caught up in the marketing of a movie or strictly the subject matter of the story. Movies like Narnia or Passion (neither which I’ve seen yet) are obvious choices as they are simple to tie into a church theme. In fact the rate at which churches were pushing “The Passion” into a pop-culture phenomenon caused me to not want to see that movie, and especially with a church (tainted) audience.
I know there are plenty of movies I’ve seen that after watching them I’ve thought of how much of a better job this movie did than the last sermon I heard… and most of these movies you’ll never hear mentioned in a sermon.
I can understand that subject matter (adult or underwear zone as you put it) will deter a church because of the children / family aspect present (except for The Passion, which was horribly violent and bloody as I’ve been told). Though, in an adult setting there’s nothing wrong with watching an adult themed movie and receiving a surprise biblical message.
Rock ON! Let’s do the movie night thing in our group!