mattbraunlin
Member
Something in the Air
I recall many years ago my parents were watching a movie, the name of which escapes me, portraying the life of Christ. Having no interest in faith at that point I didn't pay it much attention, but I do recall that it contained a scene depicting the death of Jesus' earthly father, Joseph.I distinctly remember my mother remarking with mild indignity, 'That's not in the Bible.'
My mother's criticism was typical of the attitude of most of the Christian community for many, many years when it came to dramatizations of Biblical events: everything had to be lifted directly from the Bible, and any artistic licence was deeply frowned upon.
There is nothing wrong with this view. To the contrary, it is a good and strong demonstration of one's desire to defend the integrity of the Gospel. Even the secular world liked to play this card in attacking us, with South Park criticizing the artistic license taken by Mel Gibson in making The Passion of the Christ.
But today things are different. The historic series The Chosen has captured the imaginations of millions (including my dear mother), lauded by critics and audiences as one of the most inspired and powerful Biblical dramas of all time. And creator/director Dallas Jenkins has openly acknowledged that 95 percent of its content is not from Scripture.
The show has its critics in the Christian community, of course. This was inevitable. But the fact of the matter is that a series presenting such an overwhelmingly dynamic depiction of Christ's life would not likely have made it past the opening pitch even twenty years ago. It would have been too controversial. So what changed?
A helluva lot, that's what. Racism and covid and secularism and scientism and perversion and yadda yadda yadda, you've heard it all before. To put it delicately, the Church is on the backfoot.
But not all of the change has been bad, you know. God has been quietly at work in amazing ways.
The unprecedented technological advancements of the last ten years have made life as a Christian one of remarkable productivity and effectiveness. We communicate with our brothers and sisters around the world in seconds. We carry thousands of Bible studies and dozens of Bible translations in our pockets. We can hear sermons and Christian music at will from all over North America. We donate to charities and ministries with the push of a button. We strengthen and educate each other in the thousands with blogs and forums. We spy on the secular world with online news and social media. The list goes on and on.
Christ's body has been forced underground. But that has never stopped us before.
To sum up this unprecedented situation, I would simply say this:
The Church has grown up.
With massive persecution and tragedy on one hand, and lethally powerful spiritual weapons on the other, the Church has reached a spiritual coming of age. We few but faithful carry a new brand of wisdom, and are better informed about everything than any generation before us in history. And as such God is able to teach us in ways he never could before. Show us things which no generation before us could have handled.
It is an incredibly exciting time to be a Christ-follower.
The Chosen is but the spearhead of an approaching army of artists and soldiers and pathfinders like nothing the world has ever seen. A great and fearless host of men and women, walking like Enoch in intimate closeness with the Lord.
We are not living in a post-Christian society. We are on the perimeter, but are anything but extinct. The resistance has been hard at work, and the traps are set. God's greatest triumphs always occur when his enemies are already toasting their victory, and this is going to happen again. The combined hoards of tyrants and puppets and demagogues of the western world will cower in humiliation when their lies encounter the razor-sharp cutlass of the Truth, shining as never before through the incomparable power of the 21st century Church
