The worship service to God is one thing, and the activities carried out for the edification of the church are another. Anything that takes the place of the Holy Word in a service of worship to God is a prostitution of the pulpit. The preaching of the gospel can never be replaced by Christian cinema or a theatrical piece on a biblical theme. The Bible is the living book!!! Nothing compares to the preached Word of God for reaching the heart of man. That is why I understand God’s commandment: “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature” (Mark 16:15). With these principles well established and clear in us, we can delve into this topic.
Spiritual Gifts
Everything that God has given to the saints for the edification of the church is holy and good. The Bible says: “So also you, since you earnestly desire spiritual gifts, seek to abound in them for the edification of the church” (1 Corinthians 14:12). A theatrical piece, interpreting any biblical story, by people whom God has endowed with the gift of acting, can bless the church if it is done for edification. What was written before was written for our instruction, and there are many stories, fables, and parables that the ancients used, recorded in the Holy Book, to open the eyes of those who were in darkness. I consider that if God put it in the heart of some brothers and sisters to act and to invest money to produce works and films that reveal the Truth, who am I to judge their motivations? As the Word says about judging others: “He who eats, let him not look down on him who does not eat, and he who does not eat, let him not judge him who eats; for God has received him. Who are you, that you judge another’s servant? To his own master he stands or falls; but he will stand firm, for the Lord is powerful to make him stand firm” (Romans 14:2-4).
Christian cinema is absolutely not the same as Hollywood. I think our brothers and sisters are making a great effort to improve their productions and to bring edifying themes and spiritual teachings and virtue, which are so sorely needed in this medium, overflowing with so much lewdness, violence, and moral corruption. As James said:
“… do not imitate what is evil, but what is good. He who does good is of God; but he who does evil has not seen God” (3 John 1:11).
That is clear. How many have been converted by watching films. For the Word of God never returns to Him empty, but does what He wants, and will prosper in that for which He sent it (Isa. 55:11). God did not command us to take the results into account, but to preach, to go… If Paul had despised women in evangelistic teaching, and had imposed the religious dogmas of his time and Jewish traditions, Lydia and her household would not have been converted or baptized (Acts 16:14-15). However, the apostle put the holy commission before prejudice and allowed God to save the life of that woman who would be a door of salvation for many in Thyatira (Acts 16:40). In the same way, if the Master had taken into account that it did not look right for Him to be alone with a woman, He would not have saved so many Samaritans through His conversation with that Samaritan woman at the well (John 4:9-42).
Oh, blessed Lord! Brothers and sisters, Jesus was an author whose writing, with ink of His own blood, transcended the ages and the universe. We bless God for our great Savior. I am sure that if cinema had existed in biblical times, the Son of God would have made excellent use of it, for if with TWELVE men He filled the earth with the knowledge of God, imagine what it would be with technological and digital means. We would already be in heaven, my brothers and sisters!!!! But it pleased Him to give that holy commission to us, the church, and therefore we must stop invalidating God’s initiatives with our tradition or prejudices (Mark 7:13).
Let us not go any further than this: you know that many say that this medium, through which you and I are communicating, is the antichrist, because they claim it bears the mark of the beast, 666. The argument suggests that the acronym for “world wide web” corresponds to 666 (WWW), since neither the Greek nor the Hebrew alphabet has numbers separate from letters, but the letters are also used as numbers, so each letter has a numerical value. That is how the V/WW corresponds to 6. If we start from that premise, as Christians we should not use the Internet so as not to ally ourselves with or bear the mark of the beast. But that is not true; that is a type of interpretation or emphasis that has been given to the apocalyptic passage. Are there many sex sites on the cyber network? Yes. Is man using this medium to kill, rape, steal identities, and a long list of et ceteras? Yes. But that is not strange, it does not surprise us; man is evil!!! Man without God is dead in offenses and sins, and everything he does goes toward evil. But we, the children of God, those of us who are alive in Him, are using the Internet to edify the church and to carry the message of the gospel wherever this network reaches. The same was said in the past about TV, radio, LP records, etc. Let us not make the mistake of those workers in England, in 1811 in the industrial age, who, when facing layoffs and financial crisis, blamed the machinery for their dismissals, and so, occupying the workshops, began to destroy the spinning machines. Today we know that the problem is not the instrument; the great obstacle here is our heart.
When Paul went to Athens and saw all those images and idols, he did not take a rod and destroy that place in zeal for the commandment that says “You shall not make for yourself images… nor bow down to them…” (Exodus 20), but rather, taking as an example one of them, the one inscribed “TO THE UNKNOWN GOD,” he preached the gospel to the Athenians. That is what I call a spiritual man, not a religious fanatic. Undoubtedly, all things are pure to the pure (Titus 1:15). The spiritual man judges all things in the Spirit, and evil works are manifest before his eyes.
Therefore, the truly important matter here is: Is the human being using scientific knowledge and advances to fulfill the Great Commission? You and I know very well the answer, and it is a resounding NO. Oh, sin is grave, most grave… Therefore, if we have a group of brothers and sisters whom the Holy Spirit has moved to make these films —I say it this way because nothing good comes from us, but every perfect gift comes from the Father of lights (James 1:17)— and they make reproductions of biblical accounts and inspiring stories to edify the church and so that the ungodly may not say: “Well, I watched those horror and sex movies because there was no other option,” I will not be the one to judge them or throw stones at them. Brothers and sisters, let us renounce the spirit of Michal, who does not worship God but disguises herself as “spiritual” to criticize the way others worship Him (2 Samuel 6:16), because they are not able to understand the emotions and motivations that move the children of God to praise their Lord in every possible way.
Paul earnestly pleaded with Timothy, at a moment of his farewell: “I charge you (…) to preach the word; to be urgent in season and out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all patience and doctrine” (2 Tim. 4:1,2). The apostle did not speak to him of forms, did not tell him how or with what, but he did tell him to use every resource to preach sound doctrine. Joseph in Egypt spoke like an Egyptian, dressed like an Egyptian, and answered to an Egyptian name, to such a degree that not even his brothers recognized him, not because they believed he was dead, but because he looked like an Egyptian (Genesis 42:8). Nevertheless, Joseph, although he conducted himself like an Egyptian, was not contaminated in Egypt even though his wife was a foreigner, but kept his faith and his principles. So it is with us: we are in the world, but we are not of the world, nor do we wage war according to the flesh, but we do everything in the Spirit and by the Spirit.
Finally, each one of us will give an account of himself to God (Romans 14), but the wicked, God will judge. We are Christians, and we live in the world, though we are not of the world; therefore, constantly, in every situation we face, we must ask the Lord: Tell me, how would You do it? What should my position be in this regard? And the answer is clear: Examine everything and hold fast what is good (1 Thess. 5:21). For all of the above, we extend the right hand of fellowship to those who use drama as an evangelistic option, hoping that it will be good for the necessary edification.
By Marítza Mateo-Sención
