I watched God Is Not Dead this morning and I liked it more than I expected. The writing was not Academy award winning material, but it had a few interesting characters that you cared what was going to happen to them. With that said I have three major beefs with the film. First, the primary argument for Gods existence and who He is should lead with the Resurrection and the evidence for it and what that means. This is never touched on favoring arguments from the scientific evidence regarding the origins of the universe, man, and moral absolutes instead. Though I think these arguments are important and sound I do not think they trump the Resurrection. This should have been touched on in the film. Second, the primary protagonist in the film has a confrontation with the primary antagonist about belief in the existence of God. The question is asked what happened to him in reference to the antagonist At this point it is disclosed that as a 12 year old boy he lost his mom in spite of his prayers to save her. The actor actually delivered the lines well and it was quite affecting. You actually saw the heartbreak in his face over losing his mom at such a difficult age and the loss of youthful innocence that resulted. The protagonist can only muster a sometimes the answer is no response. Though intellectually this is true at that moment and time the hurting individual was not needing a lecture or rebuttal, but empathy, compassion, and an acknowledgement of his legitimate pain, frustration, and anger. He needed to see the love of Christ through the Christian and the hope that can be found even through such a tragedy. I do not question that Christians can be insensitive like this at times, but it should not be held up as the appropriate response. There was never a recognition about how this was the wrong approach and I think that is a big error in the film. Finally, this film was a bit hostile to those that do not have faith in Christ. There was a clear good guy and bad guy vibe that seemed overdone at times but also not very helpful to showing the love of Christ to those that do not know Him. We need to remember our battles only feel like they are against flesh and blood, but they are not. We are blessed to know Christ, but none of it is of our doing. No matter how hostile anyone acts toward us due to the faith we have we are to show them the love of Christ. Most atheists and agnostics simply believe we believe something that is not true, but are not consciously hostile. Such individuals are often open to a frank discussion of ideas and the evidence. Furthermore they are watching us to see how our actions align with our beliefs to see if we really believe this stuff. The fact that a Christian movie does not go to greater lengths to present atheists and agnostics in a more nuanced way, in my opinion, undermines the message of the movie. So though I thought the movie was OK it is difficult to recommend it because of my concern this film serves more to polarize than to reach out. Given that it seems to primarily be trying to win the argument without winning the heart. Those are just my initial thoughts and Id be interested to know what others think about the movie.
Posted on: Fri, 29 Aug 2014 11:38:30 +0000
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