When Jesus becomes just another hero, do we lose the gospel?

Are you just watching episode 160, the King of Kings.

Welcome to the podcast that shares critical thinking for the Entertain Christian.

I'm Eve Franklin.

I'm Tim Martin.

And Back from the dead, maybe.

I'm Daniel J.

Lewis.

Yes.

It is so wonderful to have Daniel joining us today.

I finally found a movie that you'd watched.

Well, I finally, yeah, found one to go to the theater and watch.

But, you know, it has been so exciting seeing what you and Tim have done with the podcast over the years.

And in case anyone's wondering, like, why is Daniel saying this even?

I started this podcast years ago.

This was my second podcast to start.

And so it's been amazing to see what you've done with it and how you've built the community since then.

And for everyone who's been wondering, is Tim actually a different person?

Well, yes.

Now we're finally both in the same place at the same time.

I am Batman.

Yeah.

No, this is wonderful.

I'm so pleased to have you finally join us.

And I've been trying to get.

What would you call this for podcasting?

It's not a cameo because you're not appearing, but special guest, co star.

I don't know.

I've just been really thrilled that you were able to join us today and talk about King of Kings, because we typically in this podcast don't deal with Christian.

And I'm putting that in quotes, movies, because they usually are dealing with topics that, you know, we can't really explore from a Christian worldview because they're already in a Christian worldview.

But there were several things about this movie that I thought would be good to discuss because we've been talking about this year especially, we've been talking about a lot of movies made for children.

And this is a movie that is specifically made to tell the story of Jesus to children.

And so, Daniel, you have a child that you took to see the movie, and.

And Tim has grandchildren that he took to see the movie.

So indeed, this will be a good discussion.

So before we get too far into the discussion, I do want to just talk a little bit about the music.

That's something we always do when we talk about movies.

And I actually think Tim has more to talk about with the music than I do this time, so I'll let him lead off.

Yeah.

So the music is by a gentleman by the name of taesong Kim.

Almost the entire creative team behind the King of Kings appear to be Korean.

And the way he did the music really lends to the artistry of this particular movie because what he intentionally wove in what you would call ancient modal scales, which are intended to actually invoke a feeling of sacredness.

And you can hear it as you listen to the movie.

It's available on Spotify.

If you want to listen to the soundtrack, I highly recommend it, which is something you almost never hear from me because Eve usually pays a lot more attention to music than I do.

But you can hear elements of, you know, Jewish and Gregorian chanting in there, and you can hear where they've held long notes and long syllables out, and it all ties itself back to sacred songs.

And the way they used it really just.

It lifts up the movie to another level.

It was really wonderful.

Wow.

Well, let's play a little bit of it so that everybody can hear what you're talking sa.

All right.

Well, I will have to say, leading into my discussion of what I liked about the movie is I think we've probably talked about this before because it has come up in a few of our movie discussions that I really love a good frame story.

And a frame story is basically kind of like a story that's telling the story.

And one of the most popular ones in current pop culture is the Princess Bride, in which it's a grandfather with his son telling the story of the.

Greatest love story ever told.

Yeah.

So this movie is very similar to the way that the Princess Bride is framed because it is a father telling a son the story of Jesus.

And I just love good friends.

So this movie really played to what I love about that.

Now, the frame is not part of Dickens, so, but it kind of is historical because Charles Dickens wrote a book called the Life of Our Lord, in which he tells the story of Jesus Christ to his children.

And this was a story that he wrote just for his children.

He told it to them at Christmas time.

He said during his life, he told his family he never wanted this book to be published.

And so the frame of the story of Dickens telling this to his son Walter is kind of a fictionalization of the way Charles Dickens used the story that he wrote.

We don't know whether, you know, this whole thing about Walter misbehaving and being told to wait in the study and all that.

We don't know if that is actual truth, but we do know that he did tell the story to his children.

And so that is the frame.

And reportedly, you know, he used the story every Christmas.

The book the Life of Our Lord was published many years after his death by his family.

So that I think we'll kind of discuss that later when we're talking about themes.

I absolutely loved the picture of substitutionary atonement that is beautifully portrayed where in the movie you see Walter sinking into the water and Jesus coming down and taking his hand, pulling him into a hug, and then changing places with him and pushing him towards the surface.

Very powerful scene.

Yeah, that was so, so beautiful.

I mean, there were multiple moments when I felt like I was going to choke up watching things that just.

My little boy, who's only 8 years old, he wouldn't completely understand some of the things, but, like, some of the themes that came out like that, the visual of that and just the, you know, seeing the love that they animated on his face during that scene, too, was just so beautiful.

I think that will be the scene from the movie that will live with me for the rest of my life.

It's just like, just a beautiful picture.

And we'll talk about some of that theme later in the podcast.

But the fact that they were able to so beautifully visualize substitutionary atonement in such a beautiful way.

So, yeah, that.

That's one thing you take away from the movie, you know, that's enough, I think.

I do like the way that there's a few places in where Dickens interrupts the story to explain hard concepts to his son.

And I appreciate that because, you know, I was in an audience.

I don't have children myself, but I was in an audience, a theater full of children.

And I think it's useful, you know, when you're telling the story to go, oh, a little boy, you know, interrupts.

I don't know what that means.

And he takes the time to explain what it means.

And one of those scenes was where he talks about why Jesus had to die on the cross.

And he goes back in time and retells the story of Adam and Eve very briefly as to why they disobeyed God in the garden and they followed after the temptation of Satan.

And so I appreciated the way he interrupted the storytelling to explain hard concepts.

I don't know whether you guys were as much in awe as I was.

The Angel Studios was able to get so many big names.

Yes, we were.

Yeah.

And even a couple of them, at least, I think one of them has, at least on social networks, been rather anti Christian.

So something that's made me wonder is to be involved in a project like this.

I know sometimes people will just do whatever and not care about their associations, or it's just a paycheck.

For some people, I understand that.

But I do wonder, because we know the word of God does not return void.

I wonder what kind of seed this is planted, or maybe some watering in the hearts of some of these cast members who have lived secular lives.

And here they are telling this story and being part of this and saying some of these things or responding to some of these things that Jesus said.

I'd love to see that.

I wish I could just know, what are they thinking?

What are they feeling after being involved in this?

Yeah, well.

And I know that a lot of times, especially for voiceovers, they basically voice it themselves in a closed room, so they may not necessarily hear the context, but.

But it's still.

I mean, they're going to see the movie.

Obviously they took part in it, so hopefully the message gets through to them.

It's just amazing.

I wonder how much money they spent just on paying for some of these voices, because there's some pretty big names in here.

Yeah.

Pierce Brosnan, Mark Hamill, Uma Thurman, Ben Kingsley.

That one kind of blows me away.

I just want to say I got a kick out of the fact that Mark Hamill played yet another villain, and he does it so well.

You really did turn to the dark side after all.

Yes, he did.

Yes, he did.

All right, so my only complaint, I really love the movie, and I think that that's going to come out as we discuss through this, that how much.

I think all three of us really love this movie.

But I did have a complaint about it, and that is going to come out in one of our themes as well.

But I have a problem with the fairy tale quality of the telling of Jesus Christ and the story of Jesus Christ.

I feel that the presentation just puts it on the same level as, like, Dogman and some of the other animated movies that we've discussed, where it's just another story that the kids are hearing.

And at no point do I really feel like they tried to make the story that Charles Dickens was telling Walter feel like a story of real life.

Like it was a true account of somebody's life and not just a fairy tale like King Arthur or something.

And that's sad to me because I feel like our kids are very inundated in our culture with a lot of animated stories.

And if we don't somehow help them understand the difference between a fairy tale and a real life historical account, I don't know.

That's just my single complaint, and we're gonna talk about that later as the theme.

But it's funny that you say that, though, because I got the opposite impression.

I kind of felt like that the way that they framed the story made it obvious that Walter and Dickens, that they were kind of the more fictionalized part of the story.

But because Dickens did say multiple times in there, this really happened, or the story of King Arthur was based on this.

And so I kind of felt, yeah, there is the artistic fairy tale rendering, the animation style and such, but I kind of felt like they divided it in a way that did feel like they were saying this really happened.

Okay.

I'm sort of halfway in between, I feel like, particularly at the start when Dickens was telling Walter.

Yes, but did you know that story is based on a real person?

I feel like that was in there.

And I think there's an element, at least from my mind, of, of course it's a real story.

So I sort of wish I could go back and watch it again.

I wish I had it on DVD or something or streaming.

But now, you know, when it comes out and I buy the electronic copy of it, I'll go back and let you know.

Okay, well, you guys tell me what you thought of the movie.

Well, I will go next.

I used to not really be a fan of animated films.

I grew up with, like, Starblazers in an anime style and Hanna Barbera Thundercats, you name it.

And they just didn't have a lot of work put into them.

And then a couple years back, we reviewed into the Spider Verse.

I think it was the first of the Spider Verse movies, and it ended up winning an Oscar, a best animated feature.

And that really opened my eyes to what animated films can do that live action films can't do as easily.

They can still do a lot of it, but they can't quite do it all as well.

And I think from an artistic standpoint, King of Kings was nigh on a masterpiece.

It takes things like the lighting and the palette of each scene and it changes them subtly to reflect the events and the emotion.

Even over the course of the scene.

For example, this scene with Lazarus, when she comes and meets him on the road, you know, it's a very muted scene with what you might imagine as an overcast sky.

But by the time Lazarus is shown walking out of the tomb, it has changed.

And it's done it in such a way that it's just so subtle that you don't even recognize it until the very end.

And of course, I thought the music using the Hebrew cantillation and the monastic chanting, the music was just wonderful.

I taught a Sunday school class not that long ago on different Christian denominations.

But we also did a section on Judaism from basically the very beginning through modern day.

And I covered a section on how worship happens in a Jewish church.

So I actually recognized it, which I thought was pretty unusual for me actually.

But, but the, the way that they incorporated it all, I feel like they used the music to make everything appropriately sacred.

You know, it lifted it up.

It's like when you sing one of your old favorite old hymns instead of one of the newer.

Not Bethel, because those aren't really worship songs.

Did I say that out loud?

You did, you know, instead of one of the newer contemporary worship songs.

Yeah.

So I really was impressed with the music with this one and actually have listened to the score all the way through.

Like Eve, I very much appreciated the framing.

And at least one time my wife and I turned to each other in the theater and mentioned a parallel to the Princess Bride.

But I particularly like that my 10 year old grandson and 7 year old granddaughter, with whom we are currently in England visiting them, we got to see how the framing impacted their viewing and understanding of the movie.

And as Eve mentioned, there's a point where Walter interrupts his father saying what's that mean?

And I felt like it was very appropriate because I was literally thinking, I wonder if William is going to know what that means or if Sophia is going to know what that means.

And they pause a couple times to do that backstory, including the story of Adam and Eve and a very appropriate, if somewhat short rendition of the story of the tenth Plague and Passover.

And you know, they changed the animation style as they did it, so it put it on another level than what they were already showing.

Just thought it was a great presentation of everything it was trying to do.

I also had one complaint about it, which Eve and I were talking before we started recording and I may be a little bit off on this one, but as I was thinking about it the next day, writing out my notes because I couldn't bring my notepad into the theater.

The King of Kings, it portrays the life and love of Jesus Christ beautifully, but I really feel like there was, there wasn't really any emphasis on the reason he came, which was to save people from their sins.

Now at one point I was thinking that the word sin was never used, but I was corrected there.

But I feel like the film avoided a direct engagement with the idea, with the, the reality of sin.

And you know, it may be a necessity to maintain accessibility to a broad audience, but I feel like it sort of lessened the Impact of the gospel, the literal good news, by not ever showing Walter draw the conclusion between his need for a savior and his sin.

And I want to say that I really feel like that is a nitpicky position.

And I certainly understand if people don't agree with me because, you know, they had to, let's face it, they took four gospels and they shoved it into two hours.

They had to drop a lot and they really had to artistically represent a lot.

The story is very truncated too.

I mean, like they shoved events a lot closer together than they actually happened in some way.

But you know what, they didn't step on any toes.

They didn't, you know, approach any heresies or anything like that.

And I, I think that was really well done as far as what they included and what they didn't.

So, yeah, I loved it.

And my only complaint would be that I wish they had focused more on sin being the cause of our need for salvation.

Yeah, the need for repentance.

Yeah.

Daniel.

Yeah.

I've long been a critic of Christian productions and for this sake, and I used to work in a Christian ministry many, many years ago.

And this was something that I rocked some boats and actually almost got fired because I am such a proponent of.

If we're doing something for the Lord, it needs to be the absolute best possible.

None of this, well, God just sees my heart and he knows that I'm putting in my effort.

No, this is for the King of Kings.

So our production, our quality, everything needs to reflect that and be for the King of Kings and Lord of Lords, and be the absolute best we can make it.

And so for so long, for way too long, Christian productions and that covers all kinds of things, not just movies, but any kind of Christian thing.

Books, stories, audio dramas, such.

But for so long it seemed like they were just lagging behind the world in the production quality, the storytelling quality and all of that.

But I really liked how they did the King of Kings.

I thought the production quality was fantastic.

The acting, the voices, everything was done really well.

And I love seeing that now.

The technology is so much more accessible, so it makes it more possible to do that.

And especially Christians growing up, learning how to use these tools effectively, then becoming skilled workers in this craft.

But also what's been really neat to see is over the last few years, these conservative or even Christian movies being released in major theaters and getting the great reception that they get.

Like when I booked this for my 8 year old son and I to see, it was a last minute thing.

I'd forgotten that it was coming up and I knew I wanted to go see it.

And I started looking around and trying to find just two seats available in the theater for the next three days for opening weekend was really difficult.

But I managed to find one.

And it was only 20 minutes from at that point.

So quickly like, put on your shoes, we're leaving right now.

And for my son taking my 8 year old son to see it and seeing it through his eyes and recognizing, yeah, there are a lot of things that we could nitpick about the theology or doctrine of the movie.

And I keep in my mind they made this for kids and yet they do have some more grown up themes to it that we can pull from it.

But then seeing it through the eyes of my son and his reception of it and enjoyment of it.

I think certain things, like the way that Walter was in the story but not actually part of the story, like he was there observing it and his little cat too for the comedic relief.

I think that that helped my son better connect with the story and imagine himself being there and seeing the story as well.

And along with that, I love the little subtle things that they did where Walter was like this invisible observer to the story.

He was invisible to all the characters except for Jesus in the stories.

Yeah, there were the multiple times where Jesus looked at Walter, interacted with Walter through the story, whereas none of the other characters did.

It was like Walter didn't exist.

I loved that and I think that my son was able to connect with that in some ways too.

And there are certain little disappointments here on the creative license and such like, considering my background, I didn't like that they did the cliche thing of the forbidden fruit was an apple, ladies and gentlemen.

It was not an apple.

We don't know exactly what it was, but we know it wasn't an apple.

Because everybody knows it was a banana.

I was thinking a tomato, but theological differences there.

There were also things that I wish they had included or emphasized more.

But I do love that they included so much.

And yes, not completely in chronological order and some things mashed together quickly, but the way that they did, I thought told a complete story and told multiple aspects of the account as well.

I wish that they had emphasized more certain things about Christ's deity.

And that's something I've become more sensitive to recent years is seeing things, whether it's storybooks for kids or anything like that, but just really trying to see are they actually communicating the deity of Jesus Christ, not just what he did for us, but who he is fully God and fully man.

Are they communicating that through their stories?

And while I think that's a more grown up topic, I felt like the movie did kind of touch on that.

Certainly I loved that, the way that they showed Jesus's relationship with God the Father.

And like, when he went to be baptized, he said, this is what my father wants.

And they showed Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane and that he said, if at all possible, take this cup from me, but not my will, but yours.

And showing Jesus's obedience to the Father was beautiful.

I wish that they're in the garden.

I wish that they emphasized the response of the soldiers when Jesus said, I am, because that was a major moment.

And that's one of those Christ as deity kind of things.

But at the same time, I did like what they did with that soldier who got his ear cut off, where they show that that soldier was really struggling then with, why are we here?

Why are we doing this?

Who is this man who I came to arrest?

But then he healed me.

And you could see that pondering on his face and really struggling with that.

I thought that was really neat.

A subtle thing that they did, by the way.

Spoiler alert.

In the movie, Jesus dies, but don't worry, because he does rise again.

How did I miss that part?

I know.

Sorry to spoil it for you, the way that they handled that.

Here we are around resurrection day, time of this recording, and it's the most triumphant moment in all of human history when Jesus Christ rose from the dead and everything that that means for us and for our relationship with God.

And I did love that they show the symbolism of the curtain being torn inside the temple.

And now that the symbology of that, that's.

I think one of the most beautiful things during the death of Christ is when that happened because it means that we now have direct access to God.

We don't have to go through all of this stuff in the law anymore.

But I wish that they made the resurrection itself a more cinematic climax in the film.

It felt like that part was a bit too rushed.

Like I would have loved to see the tomb opening and all of that happening.

But instead, the way that they did it is that the characters come upon the tomb afterward.

And I know that's the way the gospel is written too, so I get that.

I just wish they emphasized that climax a bit more.

Yeah, yeah, you're speaking to the deity of Christ.

One of the things that caught my attention was the scene where Jesus drives the demons out of the man and puts them in the pigs.

And they go into the pigs.

There was a statement that Charles Dickens, the character makes where he says the demons saw Jesus's faith.

And I was like, no, they didn't see his faith.

They saw his power.

They saw him as the son of God.

So I thought that was one point in the movie where I really felt they let me down on presenting Jesus as deity.

And.

But that may have just been, you know, a misphrasing on the part of the people who wrote the script.

Because I will tell you that in our research we discovered that Charles Dickens did not believe in the infallibility of Scripture, which was rather surprising based on the way he would tell the story of Christ to his children.

But, yeah, I don't know where that turn of phrase came from, but I have to agree with you.

I wish they had put more deity in there.

I bet that his position was a very common one at the time.

It would have been, you know, the.

The end of the age of enlightenment and well into the industrial age.

So I feel like in.

Especially in his level of society, that would have been a very common position, you know, written by mankind and not understanding the.

The God breathed nature of scripture.

Real quick, I just wanted to jump back to the curtain.

I have a good friend of mine is a retired professor of theology and he has talked about something that I never knew before, and that is the thickness of the curtain in the temple.

I don't know if you guys knew this, but the cloth that the curtain was made of is said to have been between 4 and 6 inches thick.

Yeah.

So, you know, you think about your standard comforter.

Now put 10 more comforters on it and squish it all down and you get about the thickness of the veil that was torn.

And it was torn from top to bottom, which just.

There's no way it could have been done.

I just love that imagery.

And they showed it well in this movie.

Yeah, yeah.

And there were a lot of things like that that as I was watching the movie, I thought, oh, I wish they would do.

And then they did it and then they showed it.

I mean, there were certain things missing.

Like at the Cross, there wasn't the soldier who said, surely this man was the son of God.

Yeah, certain little things like that here and there.

But still, I thought their selection of what they told was very good.

And this was also a longer movie than I expected.

Typically it seems like the kids movies are only 90 minutes, but I think this was closer to two hours.

Yeah, it was just shy of two hours or you know, four and a half hours with advertisements.

Yeah, I was amazed at how many previews were in mine.

I was just like, they just kept going and going.

I'm like, when's the movie going to start?

So over here There were only two previews, but there really was an additional 30 minutes of advertisements.

It was a little frustrating because I actually had an appointment immediately after the movie that I was late for.

All right, well, we will get started on our themes.

Hopefully we can get through these all because we have a lot to talk about.

We have talked about this quite a bit in the past, the Second Commandment, and I've mentioned my concerns about the chosen in particular.

And I thought that this would be a great opportunity to really talk in depth about the Second Commandment and how we should be approaching it as Christians.

The last time that we talked about it on this podcast, Eve had pointed out to me the importance of having a visualization of Jesus and particularly in kids educational material.

And I have been thinking about that quite a bit and meditating on it and praying on it, trying to figure out where it should be taking us.

So I wanted to briefly talk briefly.

So I wanted to talk about the Second Commandment and the pros and cons of representing Christ in media, because that's what the King of Kings is all about.

It is the story of the life of Jesus, and Jesus is 80% of the screen time of this movie.

So if we were strictly prohibitive of the image of Christ, then we would never have been able to make this movie.

So let me start off by giving just a little bit of background to lay the groundwork, and I'll start with reading the Second Commandment.

Do not make an idol for yourself, whether in the shape of anything in the heavens above, or on the earth below, or in the waters under the earth.

Do not bow down in worship to them, and do not serve them.

For I, the Lord your God, am a jealous God, bringing the consequences of the Father's iniquity onto the children to the third and fourth generations of those who hate me, but showing faithful love to a thousand generations of those who love me and keep my commands.

Genesis 24:6.

Now, this commandment is interpreted in a number of different ways out there, and when you break it down, there's about four general views.

The first view is what you would call the iconoclastic view, and it's one of strict prohibition.

What it says is all images of Christ are violations of the second Commandment.

Visual depictions, regardless of how respectful they are, are seen as Inherently dangerous because they risk diminishing or misrepresenting the divine nature of Christ.

The second one is a didactic view, which is educational use.

I think this is probably based on her early comments.

Where Eve stands.

She can confirm or deny Images are acceptable for teaching, but not for worship.

Representations of Jesus are permissible if they're used to convey biblical truth and not treated with reverence or devotion.

The third is the incarnational view, which is an affirmative use.

Christ's humanity allows him to be depicted in art.

He was holy man and holy God, so using him in images is just a presentation of his holy man form.

So they say, since Jesus took on visible flesh, portraying him visually honors the incarnation and can even support reverent worship.

And the last one is the cultural view, which is a one of artistic liberty.

That specific commandment doesn't apply to modern art or media.

Visuals of Christ are considered artistic expressions and storytelling tools.

There's no spiritual issue, and they should only be judged aesthetically and not subject to theology.

I am completely in opposition to that last one.

I fall between the iconoclastic view and didactic view.

Children, particularly young children, think about things in a physical and very concrete manner.

They don't really have a way to understand the abstract.

They understand stories best when they can see and connect emotionally with the characters.

And it's challenging to know how Christ can be fully human, but we can't see Him.

We can't see him now that he's not walking the earth anymore.

And that's hard to explain.

They really do need to recognize that Christ was human, he was fully man.

And frankly, you know, they're going to imagine a Jesus in their mind whether we give them an image or not.

So if we offer them a visual that is biblically respectful and theologically sound, and for my part, ethnically accurate, though I can understand why some people don't want to do that.

Offering a visual that way helps prevent the child from generating these wild superhero or ancient king conceptions that really will lead them astray.

And, you know, the goal is to use respectful and accurate representations of Christ for educational materials, but to do everything we can, most notably in instruction, to make sure that we don't encourage the kids to worship the images of Christ, but to worship Christ himself.

God himself.

This is something that everyone will frankly have different levels of tolerance for.

And for me, it comes down to a matter of personal preference.

Romans 14:1 4 talks about how we should handle this disagreement between Christians.

It says, welcome anyone who is weak in faith, but don't argue about disputed matters.

One person believes he may eat anything, while one who is weak eats only vegetables.

One who eats must not look down on one who does not eat.

And one who does not eat must not judge one who does, because God has accepted him.

Who are you to judge another household servant before his own Lord?

He stands or falls, and he will stand because the Lord is able to make him stand.

And that's just a wonderful image.

For me, it's when Jesus died on the cross, he died for every sin I was going to commit.

And when I accepted Christ in my case, at a very young age of 6, God covered every sin I had committed up until I accepted Christ, every sin I was committing right then, and every sin I was going to commit until the day that I no longer walk the earth.

And that includes anywhere where we have disagreements.

And, you know, I may disagree that something is or is not sinful.

Christ covered those sins too.

Now, as long as without getting into salvation issues, you can always have disagreements, but there are certain things that you simply cannot believe and still be saved.

But we don't want to get into that because that's a whole nother series of podcasts.

Well, I will rebut a little bit here.

Okay, well, we'll disagree as Christians.

So when I read the second Commandment, I don't see anything in there that says that you can't picture Jesus.

It says you can't make an idol for yourself.

And I think that a lot of times when people say that this is all about picturing Jesus, I think they're losing the fact that this could be anything that we placed as an idol in our lives.

And that can be any picture of anything.

And so I think that sort of compartmentalizes a commandment that was much broader than we necessarily apply to our lives today.

I mean, picturing Jesus causes us to worship him.

Then what is picturing Captain America or Captain Marvel or any of the other superheroes that we idolize in our.

And so I think that that in some way misses the point where we're saying, oh, you can't picture Jesus because that's sinful, that's creating an idol.

What about all the other things that we picture in media and we create idols of?

I don't think that having artistic representations of Jesus in any way violates making an idol for your self commandment.

I think it's more of what we worship in our lives.

And if we are allowing and like the Catholic Church does, where they literally pray to a image of Christ hanging on a Cross that to me is an idol.

And that is concerning to me, when it's not just because it's a picture of Christ, it's because they've literally put a statue up and they're worshiping it.

Yeah.

The way the Orthodox churches use icons, Right?

Exactly.

Is that the same way?

Right, yeah.

And then a lot of times it's not even just Jesus, it's saints that they have made statues of and worship.

So if we're looking at your levels of view on this, I would probably come more under the cultural view that you are completely opposed to, because I don't see picturing Jesus as being a direct violation of the second commandment.

I think that any worship of anything that you put before God is a violation of the second commandment.

I don't think it has to be a picture.

It doesn't have to be a 3D image.

And I think that we can portray the life of Christ because He was a historical person and we do not have pictures of Him.

So any way that we portray Christ is going to be artistic license.

There's just absolutely no way we can portray him as he historically appeared because we don't know what he looked like.

And I think that that comes with any historical representation.

We know roughly what George Washington looks like.

We actually have photos of Abraham Lincoln.

But you go further back in time, all we have is artistic representations of historical figures.

So we don't know what they look like.

And I think that that comes with an understanding of whenever we portray historical figures, we know that's not what they really look like.

None of us have a view of the past other than portraits that were painted of people.

So anyway, all that to say I don't think that a picture of Christ violates the second commandment.

I think that anytime that you idolize something, whether it's a picture, a statue, or how you spend your time, is a violation of the second commandment.

Yeah, the key word there is really, I think, idolized.

And depending on which version of and translation of the scripture that you're using, that passage, Exodus 20, verse 4, is translated differently where like Christian Standard Bible translates it as don't make an idol.

And I think that makes it very clear.

It's saying don't make an idol of any of these things.

It's not in that translation.

It's not saying don't make any kind of picture or rendering artist rendering.

Other translations, though, just say carved image or graven image, which in most places I've been digging through blueletterbible dot com to try and see some of the ways that the word is translated or the phrase is translated in other places.

And in most places, it is talking about within the context.

It is talking about using things as idols or outright making idols of something.

And so I also fall on that side of that.

Certainly we should not worship it.

It's not like we should be putting a picture of Jesus.

And that's where we kneel every time we pray.

And so we're like looking at that as we pray or even sometimes like the cross.

I get that we'll have a cross in a church up near the front, and some people might come to the altar.

But I think there is the human side of Christ that comes out when he can be pictured as a human.

Now, the way that he's pictured.

Certainly there are other theological issues there, like are they drawing him Middle Eastern as he really would have been, or are they making him look out to be like a sissy, like a lot of the pictures have rendered him as, or do they make him look strong or anything like that?

But the point is a verse I was thinking of here, Galatians 5:13.

For you are called to be free, brothers and sisters only.

Don't use this freedom as an opportunity for the flesh, but serve one another through love.

What I think it comes down to is not using our freedom if we feel like we can illustrate Christ in art, not using that as a stumbling block or letting that be a stumbling block to others, but being respectful toward others who might view things differently as this.

Like whether to picture Christ or not.

That's not a core doctrine.

You're not going to be saved based on whether you believe this or not.

I understand some people might think, is this getting into idol worship, but I think that most of the Translations of Exodus 24 do make it clear that it's talking about don't make an idol.

Right.

But remember that the word that they use, pessel, is don't make a carved image of any likeness that is in heaven above or on earth beneath or in the waters under the earth.

So it is specifically forbidding the representation of anything in heaven for worship.

Now, we understand that nowadays, too, don't worship anything other than God.

But I think what drives the theology of the stricter views is total compliance, maybe even erring on the side of caution.

Well, I guess my position on that then would be then you can't watch anything video, you can't look at anything illustrated, you can't look at any statue.

It's a valid argument because if you're going to make it that strict on the portrayal of Jesus?

It's that strict on the portrayal of anything in heaven and on earth.

So you can't just apply it to one thing.

You have to apply it to everything.

And to me, that's where, you know, when you're following a strict application of something in the law, that's where I mean, you get into that, you know, that iffy thing, you know, where people then go, so you can't wear clothing made of two fabrics.

And you know, it's like when you start like overemphasizing something out of context, that's where I start to be concerned.

Because it gives kind of the wrong view to the people outside of that culture is like, well, if you're strictly following it in that one instance, why aren't you strictly following it everywhere?

It's a select application of a commandment.

And I guess that's where my concern with it is.

And I don't have a problem.

If you don't want to picture Jesus, that's fine.

It's just that I've dealt with some people that are very strict and it causes issues.

Yeah, I've mentioned before, the reason I'm not comfortable with the chosen is I worry that people, when they picture Jesus in their head, are actually picturing Jonathan Romney in his Jesus costume when they pray.

And you know, that that may not be wrong.

And if it is a sin, it's one Christ already died for.

But I think it's inappropriate.

And for me, it's just easier to err on the side of caution.

And for King of Kings, you know, it employs a stylized, sculptural 3D animation style that strikes a balance between reverence, you know, not too silly, but it makes it approachable and it prioritizes a conveyance of spiritual weight over physical accuracy while maintaining both.

And it uses iconic shapes and painterly textures that I think help the story more than you could do with a live action version of the same thing.

But what's interesting about that is sculpture, even if it's a 3D or versus a fixture, is actually the definition of an engraven image.

Very true.

One of the first things that I looked up when I started doing research was the shapes of noses in character representation.

And I ended up spending like 45 minutes down the hole of character.

Character design theory.

It was a deep, deep hole.

Yeah, well, let's not go into that deep hole.

We have other things to talk about today.

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Well, the next thing that I thought this would kind of lead into, because we were talking about the representation of Christ, is I did want to just talk a little bit more about storytelling and a child's imagination.

I actually saw the movie last night, so I haven't had as long to think about it as Daniel and Tim have.

They came to it first.

I had a hard time squeezing it into my schedule this week, but I slept on this overnight.

And one of the things that really, I started dwelling about was the fact that this movie is really a story and we're seeing it in the child's imagination.

And they kind of portray that over and over again.

Because there's, like, at the beginning of the movie, you see where Charles Dickens is.

Well, you don't see Charles Dickens.

You see Scrooge, you know, facing his mortality and, you know, in a storm and night, and he's scared of dying and all this, and then suddenly he's interrupted by a child crying, and suddenly he's Charles Dickens on a stage.

And so you kind of see this juxtaposition of imagination versus reality, even though the whole thing's animated.

And it is then, you know, continued on as Charles Dickens tells Walter the story of Christ, where, you know, you're seeing the fact that Charles Dickens and his wife are actually taking on roles in the story.

And, you know, she's holding the baby and she becomes Mary, or she's standing up on a ladder and she becomes the angel.

And there's a really strong scene in the movie where the cat goes missing and Walter's frantically looking for it.

And there's this kind of setup prior to this that Charles Dickens is obviously does not like cats, and he doesn't care much for Walter's pet and good man.

Amen.

I know Daniel agrees with that, but he.

He gives up his disdain for the cat and goes looking for the cat.

And.

And you see that he finds.

Well, actually, the cat finds him, but in the imagination of Walter, he turns around and he sees Jesus holding his cat.

And it's a powerful scene because you think of Jesus finding the lost.

It's Kind of like that, the whole shepherd vis.

But then Jesus morphs into his dad holding the cat.

And that's one of the things that was kind of powerful about the movie.

But at the same time, it was kind of a reminder to me that this is storytelling.

You know, this isn't like a scriptural passage, reading the scripture or whatever.

This is storytelling.

And the whole visual aspect of the movie is supposed to be a child's imagination.

This is like he's visualizing the story as his dad tells it to him.

And he's got a vivid imagination.

It's a beautiful way to tell the story, but it does end up with some interesting juxtapositions.

So I think that it behooves us to talk a little bit about how storytelling fits into the Bible.

And I was thinking about this because, as some of you may know, I haven't.

Don't promote it as much as I did.

Kind of create a book called Are you just watching that?

I sell on Amazon.

That kind of just steps you through some of the general ideas about how to approach your movie or your entertainment critically.

And one of the final sections in that book is all about stories and how important they are.

So I think that, you know, my initial problem with this movie was the fact that it is a story of Christ and that, you know, that can be taken out of context with, you know, understanding it as a historical account because our kids are so inundated with stories.

But yes, stories are very important.

Like you implied, storytelling plays an important role throughout all of human history and in, in particular, Christianity depended upon it a great deal.

In the early church, the original spread of Judaism, the.

The original people of Israel until about 1400 B.C.

the entire thing was all oral history.

And when you jump forward when Christ is walking the earth, you'll see a large part of his ministry was public speaking as opposed to reading from the Torah in the synagogue.

And he used stories, or what we call his parables, to excellent effect.

And then after Christ's ascension and the early churches, beginning the work of building the flock, they depended upon telling the stories of the apostles to the churches and combined with letters that were sent to the churches to tell those stories and to encourage one another from the elders of the church, it really created the backbone of Christianity.

And it wasn't until about 150 years or so after the death of the last apostle that we start to see the New Testament come together in a canonization of books.

But in reality, God tells us to use stories to explain his will and his word to our children.

In Deuteronomy 6:20, 21, he says, when your son asks you in the future, what is the meaning of the decrees, the statutes and ordinances that the Lord our God has commanded, you tell him.

We were slaves of the Pharaoh in Egypt, but the Lord brought us out of Egypt with a strong hand.

And that's like the lead in to one of the greatest stories of the Bible, you know, the Exodus.

It's where all of the nation of Israel had been enslaved in Egypt, and God brought them out and brought them to the land that he promised their forefather Abraham.

And it is just so central to the idea.

I appreciate that they used a storytelling phrase.

It's interesting that, you know, you put it in that context because in the modern context of what the word story means, a story means fiction in the modern context.

So when we say that the people of God were instructed to tell their stories from generation to generation, and then you read the Scripture, it is a historical narrative.

It's not a story by modern understanding.

So just like you were warning us in the previous, you know, theme about worshiping the image rather than a creator, we also need to be concerned that children don't put Christ into a fictional category like the hero of a story.

So in Psalm 78:1 through 7, it says, My people hear my instruction, listen to the words from my mouth.

I will declare wise sayings.

I will speak mysteries from the past, things we have heard and known that our ancestors have passed down to us.

We will not hide them from their children, but will tell a future generation the praiseworthy acts of the Lord, his might and the wondrous works he has performed.

He has established a testimony in Jacob and set up a law in Israel, which he commanded our ancestors to teach to their children so that a future generation, children yet to be born, might know they were to rise and tell their children so that they might put their confidence in God and not forget God's works, but keep his commands.

So while I believe stories are important, and I believe they are very important to scripture because like, like you have already mentioned, Jesus told stories to reveal spiritual truths and that there was a narrative that was passed down through story in ancient times, I'm just, you know, I'm a little concerned when we put Jesus on the same level as a superhero or tell a story in a way that's very common to, you know, fictional storytelling like the Princess Bride, I raised that up as, you know, the connotations of the Princess Bride in the way these two stories were Told similarly, the Princess Bride was a complete fantasy.

But if you read the book about the Princess Bride, it was presented as history.

I don't know whether you're aware of that, but the whole story of the Princess Bride, if you read the book, was, was he was condensing a historical book into a tale for his son to make it fun.

It wasn't a historical book, but he was treating it like it was a historical book.

And so there is this juxtaposition in a lot of our storytelling today in which we present story as sometimes factual, but still story.

Yeah.

As a society, we have embraced the story as an end in and of itself, when the stories are really supposed to be, you know, they're supposed to end with.

And the moral of the story is.

Yeah, and we don't do that anymore.

We.

We don't discuss, except on this podcast, the moral of the story.

These stories, they should all point to Christ.

Even the stories you tell.

Love the Passover or, you know, the eating of the forbidden apple.

You know, it all points.

It should all point to.

To Christ.

And that's where I think we as society are dropping the ball.

Yeah.

We're forgetting that the stories are supposed to help us grow and we're treating them just as entertainment.

Right, Right.

Yeah.

And that is something that disappointed me at the end of the movie, that Walter, way past his bedtime, wakes up other kids who should be also sleeping.

But he then is all excited about the story only and not about the change and not even like, hey, Jesus died, but he's alive.

It's not that celebration that he's wanting to share.

He's just wanting to share a good story.

Now, again, though, I get it.

He's a child.

They're showing this four children and demonstrating what children would feel.

But I do wish that they'd even just emphasize that more in what he was saying and celebrating and telling his brother and sister to say that, you know, I learned about Jesus, the real hero that King Arthur's story was based on.

But Jesus is alive.

I would have loved to hear him say that.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I think that that was one of the missed opportunities and part of my, I guess, personal problem with calling any account from the Bible a story except for the actual parables that Jesus told, which were actual stories.

Right.

And maybe this is just a personal hang up, but I do feel like we have to clarify ourselves.

Whenever we talk about stories, it quote unquote from the Bible that these are not stories, these are historical accounts.

And it's like you were Opening the history book of the world and talking about things that really happened, and they have real influence on the way we should be living our lives today.

And that is just a reminder to us to put a very strong emphasis on how we teach and when we're teaching from the Scripture.

So just a couple passages to cap this off.

One is Philippians 4, 8, 9.

Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any moral excellence, and if there is anything praiseworthy, dwell on these things.

Do what you have learned and received and heard from me and seen in me, and the God of peace will be with you.

So this is, you know, Paul concluding a letter to people.

You know, it's like I've told you all these things, and you need to dwell on these things and you have to learn from them.

And then, you know, as a final caution to those of us who are teaching the Word of God, James 3:1 says, not many should become teachers, my brothers, because you know that we will receive a stricter judgment.

So in our storytelling, we need to make sure that we are honoring the God of the Bible who is holding us accountable for how we teach the next generation, that we're not just presenting stories to them, that we are presenting history to them.

And I think that, you know, the King of Kings is a wonderful movie to take your kids to.

Don't let anything that we say in this podcast drive you away from the theater with your young kids.

But one of the things I want to embolden you with is that when you bring your children home from seeing the movie, don't just send them off to bed.

Talk to them about the historical Jesus and the spiritual Jesus and why this is important and why they, you know, their sin is so important.

And all of those things that were not expressed as perhaps strongly as they should have been in the movie, because it's a beginning, it's a jump off to how you can teach your children further about Christ.

Yeah, I love that.

All right, so I think this is kind of a good carry on from talking about storytelling.

One of the things that you notice right off the bat, and we've kind of already mentioned it several times, is that Little Walter is obsessed with King Arthur.

And King Arthur is a type of messianic hero.

We see that a lot.

In fact, a lot of the movies that we have reviewed in the past over the many years that we've been doing this podcast, had messianic heroes, because that is a common heroic form that is used for storytelling.

And they're all based on Christ.

Christ is not a messianic hero.

He is the Messiah.

And any story that has a messianic hero in it is based on Christ, and so it's brought out.

I don't know whether it is for sure in a historical standpoint, whether Dickens actually would ever have said that King Arthur was based on Christ.

But the legend of King Arthur is definitely a messianic hero.

Yeah, it became a more and more messianic story as it evolved, you know, over the years.

I think the earliest written record of the legend of King Arthur is 15th century, but we know that it had been orally, you know, told and.

And recounted and in pubs and whatnot for at least 100 years before that.

And we do have evidence that.

That things have been added to the story to make it more like the story of Christ because, hey, you know, steal from the best.

Yeah, yeah.

I like the scene in King of Kings where Jesus calls his disciples and you suddenly see them all start running across the table with the cat and Walter watching them and the cat batting at Judas Iscariot.

I mean, it was just really cute.

You know, the story of Jesus is presented in allegory in a number of different places.

And we could easily point to Aslan in the Narnia stories.

Oh, yeah.

And a little bit less clearly to Eragon and Tolkien's Middle Earth.

So it makes sense.

But they make a big deal in the King of Kings, or Walter does, over the magic sword.

And for the first third of the movie, he's asking, when does he get his magic sword?

Because, you know, Walter has this little wooden sword that he's pretending to be Excalibur.

And they didn't get into this part in the movie at all.

But the point of Excalibur is Excalibur was representative of the duty of a king for justice.

And as king, King Arthur should have wielded Excalibur for that purpose and never for vengeance.

And it all goes back to Romans 13, which is one of my favorite sections, particularly as an army vet.

Romans 13:3, 4 says, for rulers are not a terror to good conduct, but to bad.

Do you want to be unafraid of the one in authority?

Do what is good and you will have its approval, for it is God's servant for your good.

But if you do wrong, be afraid, because it does not carry the sword for no reason, for it is God's servant, an avenger that brings wrath on one who does wrong.

Now, this is a very touchy subject in today's society.

There have certainly been many rulers in history who clearly.

How do I put this?

They did not have God's will in mind when they took some of the truly evil actions they took.

Hitler, I don't believe, was thinking he was serving God when he was killing the Jews, although it's possible anti Semitism, particularly back in the Middle Ages, actually rose to that level.

There were entire neighborhoods of Jews who were wiped out because they were blamed for crucifying Jesus.

And, you know, Pol Pot probably never even heard of Jesus.

But the point of the matter is God is sovereign and the people who are in charge are in charge because he has a purpose for them.

And we should be following that example, the example of Scripture and the example of Jesus when it comes to the idea of this magic sword.

We have been given a magic.

And I'm using air quotes, though you.

You can't see it.

Magic sword.

And we see Jesus wield it in a couple places.

In Revelation, chapter 19:11, 16, it says, then I saw heaven opened and there was a white horse.

Its rider is called Faithful and true.

And with justice he judges and makes war.

His eyes were like a fiery flame and many crowns were on his head.

He had a name written that no one knows except himself.

He wore a robe dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God.

The armies that were in heaven followed him on white horses wearing pure white linen.

A sharp sword came from his mouth so that he might strike the nations with it.

He will rule them with an iron rod.

He will also trample the winepress of the fierce anger of God the Almighty.

And he has a name written on his robe and on his thigh.

King of kings and Lord of Lords.

And again, that's Revelation 19:1 16.

And I think that's the most poetic description that we get of Christ in the end times.

And it's a really encouraging visual for me, particularly when it says he will trample the wine press of the fierce anger of God the Almighty.

What is that song?

My eyes have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord.

That's the hymn of the Republic.

Yes, the hymn of the Republic.

The rats.

It talks about the grapes of wrath and all that.

It was a much more common image in the early to mid 20th century.

But Christ dying on the cross, he did trample the wine press of the fierce anger.

He took that punishment meant for us, his followers, his disciples, his believers, and took it upon himself.

And then, you know, there are two other places where it talks about the word of God being a sword.

Stand therefore with the truth like a belt around your waist, righteousness like armor on your chest and your feet sandaled with readiness of the gospel of peace.

In every situation, take up the shield of faith with which you can extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.

Take the helmet of salvation and the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God.

That's Ephesians 6, 14, 17, and then Hebrews 4 through 12, which is one of my personal favorites.

For the word of God is living and effective and sharper than any double edged sword.

Penetrating as far as the separation of the soul in the spirit, joints and marrow.

It is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart.

No creature is hidden from him, but all things are naked and exposed to the eyes of him to whom we must give an account.

Yeah, it's interesting that this is portrayed in the movie because there's several times throughout just kind of connect all of this back to the King of Kings.

There's several instances where Walter says, well, is he going to draw the sword?

And he uses words instead, like with the temptations of Satan and all of that is.

And, and so it's like in Charles Dickens, the character then, you know, says to Walter, his son, well, he, he used a sword.

It was the sword of the word of God.

He's speaking his sword is the words.

And I think that that connects really well with what you just read.

Did they actually, I don't remember him ever drawing the parallel between the word of God and a sword in the King of Kings.

Did he?

And I don't remember or.

Yes, he did.

It wasn't in so many words, but he was like, he didn't need a sword.

He had the word of God.

Okay.

Yeah, I just wanted to tie this into how we are to face our battles in the modern day.

You know, are we willing to take up arms in the defense of the word of God, or should we be like so many out there and profess a pacifist attitude and go willingly to a martyr's grave?

And it's something that I've struggled with both as a vet and a father.

Or, you know, you hear about your kids being bullied at school and you're like, I'll show that kid what's what.

I'm three times his size.

But you know that you really have to evaluate it for yourself and figure out what you need to do.

And the first place we go is 2nd Corinthians 10, 3:5 where it says, for although we live in the flesh, we do not wage war according to the flesh, since the weapons of our warfare are not the flesh, but are powerful through God.

For the demolition of strongholds, we demolish arguments and every proud thing that is raised up against the knowledge of God.

And we take every thought captive to obey Christ.

And that really is the battles we are called to fight are battles of the.

The heart, mind and spirit.

And you know that the movie shows us how Jesus wields that sword, like you said.

And I'm not going to read the whole thing, but in Matthew chapter four, the movie shows the temptations of Christ in the wilderness immediately after the baptism.

And each time Christ responds to the temptations of Satan with it is written.

And when Satan says, for it is written, he will give his angels orders concerning you and they will protect you.

They won't let you stub your toe against a stone.

And Jesus, he basically says, stop cherry picking.

And it is also written, do not test the Lord your God.

And that's an example of how we should be using the Word.

And you have to know it.

You have to be familiar with the word of God to be armed properly.

Yeah.

And that's where, you know, these Sunday Christians, you know, I don't need a church to be a Christian.

That's where they all fail.

We have to keep each other sharp and we have to lose ourselves in the word of God.

Yeah.

I think it's interesting that you bring that up because it's like a lot of times in the Western church, we use commentaries.

We use other people's, you know, interpretation of Scripture, and then we use that as our sword instead of the actual word of God.

And it's a reminder that we're not talking about, you know, what other people have said.

The Bible says it has to be our own personal knowledge of what the Bible says.

And it's not our interpretation of Bible.

Also, it is the actual words of God that we use.

We don't paraphrase the scripture.

We actually use the Scripture.

Yeah.

When we use Scripture, we're not supposed to use it as a club to beat people into submission.

We should be using the Word to separate the truth from the lies, the healthy flesh from the sick flesh, the corrupt flesh.

And you can't do that without God giving you wisdom.

I certainly can't.

It's.

I'm presuming that's applicable for everyone else.

Yeah.

Jesus said, do the righteous need a doctor?

No, they don't.

It's the sick that need A doctor.

And that's what the word is for, is to heal.

I love that they showed that in the King of Kings too, where he was there standing or sitting with multiple people and he said, who is it that needs the doctor?

It's the sick that needs the doctor.

And they, they showed that.

And that's, you know, that's something that is nice and easy for the kids to understand too.

You don't go to the doctor unless you're sick.

So, so don't pretend to be sick and stay home from school.

Christians are called to suffer wrong without retaliation for themselves.

And the scripture doesn't prohibit, at times, it even compels the defense of others, especially the weak and vulnerable.

Such action, when motivated by love and justice rather than vengeance or pride, can be consistent with the heart of God and examples of Christ who lay down his life for the protection of others.

But we have to remember the sword that we wield is not a weapon of violence.

It's an instrument of healing.

Yeah.

All right, well, moving right along, I do want to remind you before we deal with our final theme that you can share your feedback.

You can comment on the show notes, which will be at.

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All right.

The last thing I want to talk about and I think is the absolute, probably the biggest theme that and the best one to conclude with is behavior has consequences.

Now the setup for this is that as I mentioned earlier, Charles Dickens is doing a one man show and his family has joined him in background stage and his kids, his boys especially, are roughhousing and interrupt his show.

And so he has to come back and discipline them and get them to be quiet so he can finish his show.

And he's got an audience out there waiting, which is absolutely hilarious because Walter makes a few cameos on stage.

But there's this to and fro between him and Walter in which he gets a little irritated.

A Little upset, a little angry, and he takes it out just a little bit on Walter.

I mean, he doesn't beat him or anything, but his words are a little strong.

And he kind of breaks his son's spirit and sends him away in a very chastised way.

And one of the phrases that comes up during this back and forth between him and Walter is the behavior has consequences.

And his consequences, you know, in this case means that he's going to get punished.

And he gets his little toy sword taken away from him, he may not get it back.

And, you know, those are the consequences for his behavior.

And I was thinking about that from the standpoint of what you see between that interplay is that it's not just the son's behavior that has consequences.

The father has some consequences there as well.

And he tries to take it back.

I mean, there's this scene where you see he's very upset that he crushed his son just a little too much.

So I did want to talk just a little bit about, you know, discipline and the fact that you don't take your anger to your child.

I think I remember when I was a child and, you know, my parents always, if I think if they were really upset with the way we were behaved, they would send us to our rooms and make us sit there and wait for punishment.

But I think a lot of times that cooling off period was for the sake of the parent, you know, so they didn't come and do the discipline out of anger.

It definitely was, in my case.

You got to have that distance so that you're not immediately taking that discipline out of your own feelings of anger and upset.

And in a way that's kind of dealt with in the movie, because he doesn't deal with Walter till he comes home later.

And so he's had a chance to cool down.

So just for the scripture, for that, it's Ephesians 6:1:4.

Children, obey your parents in the Lord, for this is right.

Honor your father and mother.

This is the first commandment with a promise that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.

And then that follows that command with, fathers, do not provoke your children to anger, but bring them up in the discipline and instruction of the Lord.

And then in Colossians 3:20 through 21, and very similarly, it says, children, obey your parents in everything.

This pleases the Lord.

Fathers, do not exasperate your children so that they won't become discouraged.

So it's like every time the children are ordered to obey their Parents, it's followed up by fathers.

Don't, you know, don't take it too far.

Don't provoke them.

Don't, you know, exasperate them.

Don't discourage them.

So I think that that fits really well into that interplay between Dickens and Walter in the movie.

Anything that you guys, as fathers want to add to that real quick?

I want to jump back to where we were talking about the.

The substitutionary scene of Walter falling into the water and Christ taking his place.

I appreciate how that ties in so nicely with this theme of behavior having consequences.

And, you know, it really drives it home for Walter.

I feel that Christ figuratively drowns for Walter taking his place.

And Walter, like I said in the very beginning, I wish they had made this just a hair more clear.

Walter understood that Christ was taking Walter's punishment.

I really feel like Walter understood that Christ was taking the consequences of his action.

I felt like all the story up until.

Because that particular scene is at the very end, all the story up until was leading to epiphany that Walter has near the end of the importance of Christ's death on the cross and what it meant for him.

Yeah, well, I mean, there's that whole scene right after Christ is crucified where Walter's kind of remembering the whole story and he's putting himself into the position of each of the people that Jesus healed.

And by exchange for that, also the audience, because we're suddenly the eyes of the.

The man that's had his vision healed.

And the.

We're the ones coming out of the grave when Lazarus is resurrected.

And then we are Peter as he sinks, when he loses faith in approaching.

Christ on the water in the same vein of behavior has consequences.

I do like how the restoration is shown in this.

Yes, Charles gets angry at Walter in the beginning and the topic of consequences.

I think that some parents might wonder, wait a minute, didn't Charles just reward his son with this really exciting story when his son was supposed to experience the consequences of his misbehavior?

That aside, though, what I think it does show is the beautiful restoration of the relationship after the consequences, even down to the cat.

But still, there's the aspect of he's fixed that relationship and now gets to enjoy that fellowship and that love more tightly after the consequences.

And so it's not like a forever separation or a forever consequence, but there is ultimately a joyous restoration.

That's great.

I like that point.

Yeah.

I think that, you know, that whole concept of a father, you know, you just mentioned, he Kind of rewards him.

He actually gives his sword back to him before he tells the story, and then basically tells him a story that tells him, you shouldn't even use the sword anymore.

Lay the sword down, the sword's not important.

And he tosses the sword aside and it sticks point down into the chair.

And looks kind of like a cross.

Yeah.

Amazing.

Amazing.

You'd almost think the swords were designed that way.

So just to kind of cap this all off, the story of Jesus is told by Dickens.

It kind of demonstrates that Jesus is the sacrifice and the substitute, without, unfortunately, as Tim has already brought up, perhaps not quite dealing with the reason why he needed to be the sacrifice and the substitute.

So I am going to just read a few scriptures here to put some context on this.

So in Romans 3, 21, 26, it says, but now, apart from the law, the righteousness of God has been revealed, attested by the law and the prophets.

The righteousness of God is through faith to Jesus Christ, to all who believe, since there is no distinction, for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.

They are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus.

God presented him as the mercy sent by his blood through faith to demonstrate his righteousness, because in his restraint, God passed over the sins previously committed.

God presented him to demonstrate his righteousness at the present time so that he would be just and justify the one who has faith in Jesus.

So this is the.

The idea of substitutional atonement, that there is this fact that we have all sinned.

So perhaps that wasn't conveyed as necessarily as strong as we would perhaps, like the need for repentance.

You know, there's.

There's no sinner's prayer in the movie.

You know, Walter is just super excited about the fact that Christ is a better king than King Arthur and that King Arthur was based on him.

And maybe that was all he could understand at that age or something like that.

But there is the concept of sin that has woven through the movie.

You see, Jesus talk about the forgiving of sin when he heals the paraplegic, and the fact that they all were sinners when they challenge him with the prostitute, the woman caught in adultery, and you know, say, you know, should we be stoning her?

And he was like, well, the person who hasn't sinned throw the first stone and they all walk away.

And then he tells her, I don't condemn you either.

And then he beautifully says, go and sin no more.

Right?

And so we get this whole idea that sin is the reason that Jesus is here, it may not have been, you know, like, presented in the way we would like with an altar call.

You know, like, you know, you're a sinner and you need to repent and, you know, trust Jesus and all that.

There will be people at the front of the movie theater to pray with you.

Yes.

Yeah.

No, instead, the message at the end of the movie was pay it forward, Go pay tickets some more.

People can go see the movie.

But you know, that, that is the point though is.

And I know we've, we've talked about this before, but this really should be the springboard for the deeper discussions.

Like I mentioned before, we should finish with asking our kids what was the moral of this story, do you think?

And using it to get them thinking more about the consequences of their actions and the consequences of our actions and how Christ plays into all of that.

So I can understand the pay it forward.

It puts the onus of work on parents and grandparents or Sunday school teachers.

I think this movie would.

Would make very good Sunday school lesson for like fifth graders who are for old enough, you know, to spread it over like three weeks.

I wouldn't use it in Sunday school, but I think it would be really fun to have your entire Sunday school class come over to your house and watch it and have a talk about it afterwards.

After having been in a Bible study that used the first season of the Chosen, I kind of.

Yeah, I have a problem with using fictional representations of Christ in a church setting that just.

I'm just not there.

Yeah, I think this one, this one has the advantage of the actual presentation being almost entirely scriptural.

Chosen has a lot made up, you know, in it not presented as scripture, but definitely, you know, use.

Use it to reference to scripture, not.

As scripture in place of.

Yeah, in place of scripture.

My last scripture here that I had was from Second Corinthians, 5, 21.

He made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God.

And that's encapsulated in verse, what they showed in picture of Jesus taking the place of Walter.

And so that is, I think, the number one takeaway that you can take from this movie.

Christ became sin so that we would no longer know sin and we are free.

We have been released from the bondage of sin.

And I just strongly encourage you, if you don't know that release, then, you know, you can contact us, you can contact a local church, but we strongly encourage you to actually understand at a soul level that the fact that you were sin and Christ became that sin for you and took your place on the cross.

So I think that's a wrap, guys.

Thank you so much.

That was a very fun discussion.

I think this once I've edited it down, this is going to be a long episode.

It's the greatest story ever told.

So of course it's going to be the longest, greatest episode ever.

All right, well, thank you so much for listening to this episode.

I'm E.

Franklin.

I'm Tim Martin.

And I'm Daniel J.

Lewis.

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