Wilson & Durbin: Can Christian Media Be Saved?

Christian Media as a True Story of God’s World

Well, you're both pastors and not filmmakers primarily. You're not Hollywood execs or. Yet yet just yet, that's what we're getting to. I was looking at some statistics recently that The average American adult Spends five hours a day watching live television, which just an astonishing Amount of time in the first place.

I mean that's I mean you could read an entire book for that amount of time. You could do any number of things. But it struck me that that amount of time as you just said in the previous session is teaching.

It's it's catechism class for the large Swath of our culture. So I just love to toss it out to even one of you. What's what does it look like for us as Christians to begin? Invading that market.

Building a.

Christian film industry With with the gospel of Jesus in in this industry.

Let me start by saying ripping off of something Pastor Jeff said about Christian film and and unbelieving film, but what what makes Great story what makes a great great art is that it resonates with and is true to The way God governs the world.

That's so when when you when you read a great book or you watch a great movie and the great themes are echoed. There's an echo there of what God has done in the world. Secularists try to lie about the world they try to veer off from God's way of telling stories in one way and Christians try to veer off in another more edifying direction.

So God is a little bit too tasteless in some of the stories he tells Right, and so we try to clean it up a bit and we want the stories to always tie off neatly with the bow. Everything is nice and tidy.

The person gets saved at the right point in. And one of the Right, it's so one of the Nate had an interesting interaction with some of the non-believing execs as some of you because Christian film is now product or subdivision of The secular companies and this is true of book publishing.

It's also true of movies. So They picked up on one thing we're non-believing Sony execs were saying of a particular film you need a conversion scene here. So the payers were saying we know the genre we know the cliche.

We know how it goes and since we have to market it to Christians. We know that this is where they're demanding the conversion scene, right? This is where it's got to go. Well that tells you that you're telling the story by formula.

You're not telling a story in the interest of having it conform to the world God actually made so. Non-believers want to rebel against God's norms of sexuality and God's norms of authority and hierarchy and God's norms of revelation, etc.

Christians want God the basic Christian worldview only with some of the angular rough edges smoothed out and We want a tidier and nicer and more polite than the Bible sometimes is.

Sin, Judgment, and the Need for Gospel in Storytelling

Yeah, that's a it's a big one. I agree completely in When the world tells a story they often flip the script as As to the way things ought to be and so for example, and there's so many different directions we can go with this but if you have a film series like say Ocean's Eleven Ocean's Twelve and Ocean's Thirteen It's a great point to be made and in that story You've got the audience cheering on the thieves and the criminals you want them to get away with it.

Right. And wasn't that a spectacular way to rob that casino? That was amazing, right? I'm so glad they got away with all that money and all the people that got hurt, you know, they got away. Good job.

When's part two coming out, right? What are they gonna steal next and get away with. And so the world tends to flip the script and turn the evil people into the heroes and. As a case example, use this as a good example.

Television series. Not long ago.

Breaking Bad.

This is obviously not an endorsement for Breaking Bad and I won't go out and watch Breaking Bad now. But it's something interesting about Breaking Bad as a story and what caught people is that here's a story of a man named Walter White who is.

He is an overqualified chemistry Expert and he's working for a public school. He makes about $40 ,000 a year as the story goes. His wife is about 40 years old. She gets pregnant with a child and he discovers that he has lung cancer and he's dying of lung cancer.

He has no money. He has a baby on the way and his decision is to now engage in creating the blue stuff. He's now going to get into the world of creating meth and he's gonna distribute it and initially it's because I want to take care of my family and try to get rid of this cancer and then it begins to corrupt him and then you see the results of His sinful choices.

Now you see that everybody is impacted by sinful choices people start to die. His entire community in this story is literally destroyed because of this one man's simple decision to go this direction and by the end of the series the director talks about how at the end, I'm not a spoiler, spoiler, doesn't matter, does it okay?

At the very end of the series. He reaps what he sows. It doesn't end well for Walter White. All of his sinful corrupt choices in this series Actually end up catching up with him. He's not the hero of the story and it ends in his demise.

But what the director says, who's not a Christian, the director, not a Christian, says about the series. He was bringing people along to where they got to the end and he says with a finger in their face.

You're not supposed to be cheering for him. He was the bad guy and you realize he was the bad guy. He was an awful guy. Yeah, that was a terrible thing. He destroys his entire family and community, he destroyed the lives of everybody.

That's a true story.

And actually that's a good story.

Sinful choices bring on Simple consequences that corrupt himself, his family, the world and you reap what you sow. Now as dramatic a story as that is and as ugly as it is, that's still actually a consistent story of the biblical worldview.

You reap what you sow. You choose sinful choices, a sinful path and you will reap what you sow and you will destroy your life and everybody around you. What a lot of Christians don't like is at the end of that story, but where's the conversion experience?

Where's Walter White coming to Jesus, right? Where's the end where it all turns out beautiful and well? I think that it's actually okay for Christians to tell true stories about the way the world is. The way the world is according to God and so we can actually have good storytelling that resonates with image bearers of God.

That remind us of sin, remind us of justice. All those things are actually Christian things and so Christians can actually start engaging in the film industry by doing things that are good. High quality to the glory of God doing things that are true.

They don't have to be with a tight nice little bow on the end of it those sorts of things they can actually be true about God's world the way that it actually is and the way that maybe some stories you can say the way that it ought to be so true good and Holy we need to create content that actually is holy content when we depict sin.

We don't do it in a Sinful way causes the cause of sin we depict sin in a way that is actually true. And and so I think you know. That's that's a good way of at least beginning the conversation as to how Christians can get into filmmaking.

Not differing but just add on to this there are certain pathologies that we have to watch out for it's not just Christians identifying with Manufacturing meth in the wrong ways and oh isn't that romantic.

That's one thing but even if someone gets the point that he's destroying his life. It's all law and Christian storytelling. Storytelling has to get to gospel somehow there has to be gospel. Somewhere another another example of a law genre, and this is a Surprise to many Christians is horror.

Horror films is all. It's all law and generally the victims in horror films are morally compromised. So there's a great book on this called monsters from the id by Michael Jones and basically the structure of all horror films.

Is.

Girl takes off clothes monster. So there you are. And then and that was bad and. So you have the rudimentary God is not a man reads what he sells that. That's true. And what and but the pathology of law and law keeping is is something that pastors have seen in the church for a long time.

There are some people who try to get a cathartic release from the execution of the law itself vicariously, so if I Sit through the movie and everybody dies in the movie, and there was sin and judgment, and I walk out of the theater alive.

You know there's a false gospel there's some sort of some sort of release through law. But the only way that that can actually Catch is if it's Jesus on the cross. It's got to be it's got to be Jesus.

Every other substitute is going to call for a repetitive sacrifice. You're back to the pagan system of sacrifices and the Levitical system Sacrifices where you have to go see another one go do another one you get hooked on Judgment you get hooked on and need you to see it again and again again.

So you don't want people saying that at the right point of every movie. And you don't want to say that it can't ever be grim. But you do want to say that there is Gospel there's light. There's hope it's not all this way.

Heroes, Antiheroes, and the Human Longing for Justice

Yeah comment on. You mentioned a little bit, but how? More and more you see the there's no such thing as a good hero in a lot of these stories anymore. They're compromised of an anti hero. They're not they're a false Hero, I think of you know the old Superman series.

Superman was he would see the individual and save the individual. Now with CGI graphics the way they are he can plow through entire skyscrapers Destroying entire cities in this great fight at the end of the movie and not pay attention to the individual and we cheer at the end.

When Superman wins, but did he actually win, you know, he didn't zero in on Saving the individual anymore, right?

It used to be Story like the Lord of the Rings Everybody all the good guys are vulnerable to the power of the rain. There's a there's a time. There's a There's a temptation point for Gandalf or Galadriel for airborne for for all of them for me Cravers the only one who seems to Not have that experiment, but everybody is there.

So Tolkien has an awareness that heroes are not made out of stainless steel. There's there's a vulnerability there Which I think is necessary to a good a good story, but we've gone Farther than that where where the it's an anti-hero or the Heroes give away to the flaw or in the superhero movies It's not just we don't care victims anymore.

But now the battle is an internal psychological battle within the superhero Who himself is dark and no way out and and just shows that we're lost people. We so back in the 50s comic book era It was the superheroes were substitutes for Jesus false they were a false Jesus and now they're a tormented devil.

There's more than options with that, right?

That's good. Yeah, I Think it's great. Well, I just I will say on the tail end of that we went to Comic Con About a year and a half ago, which is interesting.

Yeah.

So we go to Comic Con and we decided to do some some interviews with people to ask them questions about this universe. You've got the heroes. You've got the villains. You've got justice good and evil and here's all these people I'm sure lots of Christians in the mix, but a lot of unbelievers as well and they are so Fascinated with this world of and you ask him questions.

What do you love about this genre? What do you love about this universe, you know, and you're the good guy fighting against the evil oppressor, you know. It's the person who stands for justice, right?

And so you have image bearers of God can't help loving the things that ultimately God loves justice good versus evil and even if somebody is Completely militant and opposed to God they cannot ultimately fully suppress the desire for justice.

The desire for good to conquer evil the desire for there to be a hero that comes in and rescues the oppressed. Right and that's that that longing. I think we all have deep within us for Moshiach for the Messiah.

I'm the one to come and rescue us that's there and it's unavoidable. And so I think that you know You look at these these films that have come out last couple years these these very very successful films.

You've got like Iron Man and you've got the Avengers and everyone's trying to figure out What's the next group of superheroes that we can put out in front of people because this makes a lot of money. Well, why does it make a lot of money and it's not just that it's entertaining.

It's that that those themes resonate deeply within us and I think that it's important if I mean I'm not an expert filmmaker, but the theology behind it matters. I think it's important for Christians to start engaging in long-term vision about developing a universe That resonates with image bearers of God that they fall in love with and they say I want to sit in front of that for two Hours because that's a good story.

That's a story that I want my son to love. I want my son to have heroes and to and to actually Embrace themes that glorify God and so I think it's important for us as Christians as we talk about these kinds of Universes and heroes that we ought to actually be encouraging one another and raising our kids and promoting the idea that we need to start developing stories that are Consistent with a biblical worldview that actually and stand the test of time and to highlight all these themes that are very very important that you.

Maybe heard about the time. It was a booking mix-up. It's spectacular booking mix-up and the Pope was invited to speak at a plenary session at Comic-Con. But his staff when they found out they were very very upset that the Pope said no no, it was all right.

He was used to speaking to 40 year old virgins.

That's awesome.

Media, Attention, and the Loss of Sustained Argument

The book why Johnny can't preach there was something I read it recently and there's an interesting Statistic that he he pointed out and it was in regards to broadcast television. And this was I think ten years five ten years ago that he wrote the book, but in the presidential Debates of say 40 or so years ago the average Clip that the broadcast news would would give afterwards was close to 50 seconds of a presidential candidate.

We'd have 50 seconds of airtime now. It's down to seven seconds and then we wonder why stuff is so taken out of context and that it's used to Manipulate towards an end game and an end goal. And his point in the book is this is producing this sort of fast-paced coming at you the you you watch Bambi and.

The intro is three minutes long and the next screen in the next shot the next Scene is another two minutes long. The modern cartoons are.

Right at you.

And his point is How do as pastors how do we teach people to to be able to have sustained. To follow sustained arguments to follow sustained story arcs. And and that's how do we combat that how do we teach that from the pulpit?

But also incorporate that culture in our in our people's homes as they consume media.

So I'm one of the things I would recommend if you're really interested in pursuing this is to read two books sort of a point counterpoint. Side-by-side read one then the other or maybe both at the same time.

Because there.

One would be abusing ourselves to death by Neil Postman. Who? Argues the point you just made that we used to be an expositional culture. We used to be able to track Lincoln Douglas Douglas debates for hours in length and people would stand there and follow the entire argument.

So we used to have be a linear following argument culture. And we're now we now have the attention span of Hummingbird. But there are strengths about the way it is now. There are strengths with that. And many people miss miss that the other book would be everything bad is good for you by Steven Johnson.

So everything bad is good for you argues that. So for example when you say oh back in the day. Some of you older folks might remember the dragon Top show right. And it was a half-hour length. Two cops simple crime they walk through and by the end of the half an hour they find out who did it.

Okay.

Now today crime shows have plot lines that run through a whole season. They have 30 characters. You need a graduate degree in drama just be able to keep track of. So a lot of our entertainment a lot of the current entertainment moral content side is Light years more complex and more complicated than what used to be.

Right and so I think it's this is another another not whether to which. Every human society has complexities. It's not whether you have complexities. It's where they are right and What Johnson and everything bad is good for you argues is that back in the 50s in the 60s you?

Games were simple. They were straightforward. They were straightforward. A man could have a job in a small town. Go to work in the factory come home for lunch. Every day was the same and now just driving across a major metro area.

Everything is coming out. You have to you have to multitask all the time. So our I think we've simply moved complexity from one area where we were accustomed to have it to another and we don't know that.

We would be baffled by some of the things our grandparents were able to do. But they are certainly baffled by some of the things that were able to do.

Social Media, Filters, and Avoiding Idolatry

Yeah, I can't say much To add on to that except I will say that it's it's interesting.

Mm-hmm.

I think the the problem portion of what we deal with is in terms of even the social media platforms that I think are indicative.

Of.

Part of the problem with how we think and how we respond and don't contextualize and can't sustain listening to it. Okay, like, you know gone we you know, we start with Facebook and YouTube and So everyone's using that making long notes and discussions and arguments and conversations and YouTube video.

Well YouTube when it first came out, of course. There were you know quicker videos, but YouTube actually when it first began was a platform that really engaged people so you had people that would do an hour-long video explaining why they were an atheist and Then you had people that could could tag a button that attached their video to that video so that it engaged a long Stream of debates off of a single video that someone made you can actually add yourself to the end of their Their thing so that if somebody watched this video they can watch this one and then this one and then this one.

That's how it worked initially and that's that function is essentially gone now. You can still respond to videos, but it won't necessarily be attached. So we started Facebook YouTube longer sustained discussions and that then we moved from Facebook to Twitter.

Shorten the discussion this many characters and then we went from a YouTube video sustained argumentation or plots or whatever to vines. Seven second videos on repeat, right? And so so it is interesting in terms of how our culture tends to think in terms of sustained Arguments and listening skills, so I would only say one thing in terms of what I try to do I think that in preaching it's important for a pastor to to teach his people to teach his congregation how to argue how to think and how to Be critical so I think a lot in terms of what a pastor can do is In preaching is to teach your people how to think and make sure that they're understanding how to engage in critical argumentation and thought.

Via what they hear from the pulpit that should be part of how we actually encourage that. So.

And and what are some just practicals that you would? Give to the average person in the pew what what are some of the things that the exhortations that you touched upon it a bit in the last session, but.

What are some of the what are the practicals, you know, where it is. Where do we go from here so to speak with making films producing films producing high quality.

Practical Steps for Christian Filmmakers

Content. Start with start with the things you have control over like the worship service. I don't worry about changing the entertainment industry in LA or the publishing industry in New York. Stop copying things that are detrimental in the world in your worship service.

Don't turn don't try to turn your worship service into a nightclub act or or into an entertainment Event so if you have a group of people then teach them. Set aside the time that you want. Have the elders determine what do we want to do?

What do we want to accomplish? How do we equip the Saints for works? Service here and You teach them to argue by modeling for them. You teach them to follow the line of reasoning by opening the scriptures and following the line of reasoning that the scripture lays out.

And we have time. Dedicated every word today. We all gather and and much of that time in contemporary worship is true is triggered away. We have opportunities to do something substantive and I think that we can give our people a opportunity to long for more.

You know, I why can't I? Why can't I listen to? Exposition like this on other subjects. Why why does it have to just be theology. And Sunday morning you start looking for it and it's out there and that's the other Thing is the internet provides it there.

There are more than enough sustained arguments Available you just have it might be three clicks instead of two. But you have to give them a taste for it first and I think that the Lord's service is the place where our fundamental orientation is Disciple shaped fed and set out in the world.

Yeah.

In terms of how would I start building now as a Christian filmmaker? I want to start producing stuff that glorifies God. It's we don't have any excuse any longer. We just don't have any excuse. If you have access to the internet if you have and if you if you don't you can't pay for it.

Go to Starbucks. It's free. You can find places to do free Wi-Fi, I mean if there's really legitimately no excuse you get a device that can connect to the internet. What do you want to learn? Do you need to learn about lighting and film?

Well, you got to go to film school.

No.

You don't you have YouTube and you can listen to hours and hours and hours of sustained discussion on how to light the perfect scene. You do not need a film degree. You do not need to spend thousands of dollars to pay for this Instruction.

You can get it at your fingertips. People have created this content because from their perspective say on a YouTube channel they create content with expert instruction and Advertisers pay to be on their channel.

So when you click it and there's an ad you're paying that person for the instruction. But it costs you nothing. So from their perspective, they're making money and they're giving a good service, but you're getting free instruction.

Do you need not need to know how to work a camera? Well, there's instruction for that YouTube Vimeo all these different things easy to access and you can get it all when it comes to Content producing content.

I would say you don't have to start big-time. You don't have to get the $60 ,000 red camera. You can get.

A.

Cheaper camera and produce great content. Let's use as an example to two things. I'm not not suggesting this by the way, but just in terms of how this works the Blair Witch Project. Okay, first of all horrible movie.

I saw it before I knew Jesus. So forgive me. Stop judging me. Okay Blair Witch Project. Yeah, that's gonna feel like a feel the Presbyterian Judgment came. Just kidding. So the Blair Witch Project is.

If you don't know what it was, it was it was Independent filmmaker took a very very cheap home video camera and essentially pretended to take some young teenagers into the woods and there's this Myth of these cursed woods and this witch that's there this thing cost them nothing to make it was ridiculous how low budget this thing was and it made a Fortune and it costs nothing.

So can it be done? Can you do a film that actually makes a lot of money and engages a large audience? Yes, it can be done. It could be done in a righteous way. Not an ungodly way. There's another film in the last 20 years 15 years and it was Felt about two people that get caught at sea going on a boat trip.

They end up getting left behind and the entire film is low budget camera. Following these two people adrift at sea that eventually get eaten by sharks. Okay, that was that was the that was the that was the theme of the film and low budget.

Not high-end stuff and the person made Millions and he was able to produce content seen by a lot of people very low cost. So as a Christian filmmaker television. You want to do television content? You can create content.

Be instructed learn it all low cost and you can get it out to the world. On these platforms where everybody will see it and you can be paid for doing it. You can actually get your content now done and put up on providers like Netflix and Hulu.

So now what doesn't have to happen these days for Christians is you don't have to find your way up the corporate ladder to where? Corporate executives finally say to you.

Okay.

Now we give you permission and we like what you're doing as a Christian. Now you can genuinely doing do it in an Independent way in a way that glorifies God and does a great job and you have access to the world.

Also make sure that you get an education so you know what a story is. Yeah, and you know what a story arc is and you know what a protagonist is and you know what a story is supposed to. So basically you don't want to be all dressed up with nowhere to go.

You don't want to have all the technology in the world and nothing to say. Yeah. You have to have good experience with story and that requires reading them. That requires Acquaintance with them that requires reading Successful screenplays that you know, you just need to.

You can't just.

Show up with the gear and that comes back to we have. We have the better story, you know, we have and The low-budget films have a lot of times the ones that are successful have a great story and it takes off.

Even though they didn't spend the bells and whistles to produce it. They had a story that stuck and had. Someone tell me years ago at some songwriting Conference that you listen to a lot of these Pop produce songs.

But strip all that away and if they can play that song and it can be a compelling song with just a guitar just a piano. That's the song that's going to take off. Yeah, I'm not the one with all the bells and whistles.

So so know how to write the good stories write the good songs write the good Content which comes back to the Word of God. Yeah back to teaching faithfully.

Escaping narcissist our narcissistic culture. It's not good. Just because you did. Yeah.

Right more because your mom likes. Why don't we spend a little time just if you guys have questions just on any of these Topics will all come to you with the mic and we'll have. We've got time for four or five.

Questions here.

Why do you think Certain TV shows certain movies are so popular. Why is Star Wars and Star Trek been so popular for so many decades? That you literally have people taking their grandchildren to see the next bit the next version.

What do you think their themes of their stories are that? Resonating so strong.

My my quick take on that is that they are they don't just provide a story about individuals. But they are they provide a cosmology. They provide a map of the cosmos. This is what the universe is like.

So the outer space is like an ocean planets are like islands. We are like seafaring explorers. We go from place to place. This is this is what it's like. This is what ultimate reality is and people have a deep need to understand the universe and.

The nature of the universe is sort of quietly assumed in this and depending on what it is like. You've got a certain Manichean approach to the world with the force and Darth Vader the good side of the force and the dark side of the force that there is a it's a world view and people need a world view and.

That is told in such a way that people say, you know.

I think it's scratching that itch. Yeah, I like that answer.

How Much Christians Should Watch and How to Engage Social Media Well

You both are obviously very aware of the content that's being put out on social media by our non-christian culture. There's a lot out there. Can you give some guidelines about the quantity and content of what the average christian should watch so as to be aware of, to understand, and to effectively engage non-christians?

Okay, can you clarify that in terms I heard quantity. In terms of and get so that we can properly understand them and engage them or.

How much time, how much time, some guidelines about how much time you should spend watching this and about the content of what you allow yourself to watch. To be aware of what the world is doing, what they're doing on social media.

I'll say something about Honey. First, there's a great cartoon. Honey, are you coming to bed? I can't. Someone's is wrong on the internet.

Right.

You don't want to jump into that black hole. There's no way of, you know, Honey, I finished the internet. There's always going to be somebody wrong, always going to be somebody saying something dumb. I would say one of the things I would encourage people to do is learn how to manage your filters.

There are a lot of techniques, like on Facebook, you can regulate what comes in your feed and you shouldn't regulate it with just people who agree with you because now you're living in an echo chamber.

But you can sort of predetermine how much content from different sources you're going to get and don't chase every rabbit. Don't chase every rabbit trail. I would say make sure that you have a life. If you're spending five hours a day on Facebook, unless you're feeding your family somehow, by the way, it's way too much.

It's something you should check in, engage with, use, and let the technology save you time.

One of the things that I try to look out for on my own in terms of using this, because it becomes an addiction, like digital heroin. You can become obsessed, you can get lost in it, and many young Christian men and older Christian men have found themselves in the midst of YouTube or Facebook battles and you're connected to it in a way that becomes an obsession and ultimately idolatry.

And so I like to ask myself the question in terms of what has the weight of my life? What am I sacrificing to? What am I doing and is it glorifying to God? Is what I'm doing taking over my primary responsibilities as a husband, as a father, as a minister?

And so one of the things personally that you won't see me doing online is engaging in long battles in Facebook comment boxes. What I tend to do is see people trying to eat me up online and I just watch, and it's entertaining sometimes, but I won't engage because that just becomes, and in the same respect, it becomes a less useful way of engagement when that sort of thing takes place, where there's that kind of engagement.

Trolls have an advantage.

They do, they do. There actually is a way to overcome that sort of, I think, not very effective management of social media in terms of if there's a fight happening and someone's, you're jumping in and trying to, there's a way to do it where I can just create video content that more people will see to a larger audience that takes less of my time.

I can knock it down in 10 minutes and I address the fundamental things that are most important to gather. So that's just in terms of on the side, I try to manage it in that way personally. Now, I do think it's important.

Great example. I'm just trying to think of a good example to give. We put that recent video up where Summer was with us out at the Capitol in Phoenix at the Feminist March. We do this video. It's real short, three minutes long.

It's got a lot of different feminists and secularists responding. We put it up online. It goes around the world. And what's interesting is the comments that I saw from many Christians. The comments I saw from many Christians, people were saying things like, Marcus, is there some way that you could bleep out every foul word?

Marcus, can you blur out what her shirt said? That sort of thing. And I think what that was was, to me, indicative of many, many Christians who aren't actually engaging with the thought of the world and what the world is doing, what they're saying.

And so when we actually have it presented to us on a silver platter, here's their worldview refuted. Some Christians go, ew, gross. And what did they say? And that burned my eyes. Where's the bleach? That sort of a thing.

Well, I think if we're responding in that way to a shirt a feminist is wearing, we're like, hey, you know, give me the bleach for my eyes and make sure you blur that out next time. I think it's indicative of that we're not actually engaging the world, and we're not being very effective, because if we respond that way to these very basic things that the world is doing, then we're not ultimately engaging them enough.