May 14, 2026 Show with Jonathan Blair and Joshua Enck on “A Great Awakening: Why This Film Was Made, & Why George Whitefield Was Chosen As Its Primary Focus”

Live from historic downtown Carlisle, Pennsylvania, home of founding father James Wilson, 19th century hymn writer

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Jim Thorpe. It's Iron Sharpens Iron. This is a radio platform in which pastors,

Christian scholars, and theologians address the burning issues facing the church and the world today.

Proverbs, chapter 27, verse 17, tells us iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.

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It is our hope that this goal will be accomplished over the next two hours, and we hope to hear from you, the listener, with your own questions.

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Cumberland County, Pennsylvania, and the rest of humanity living on the planet Earth. We're listening via live streaming at ironsharpensironradio .com.

This is Chris Arnzen, your host of Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, wishing you all a happy Thursday on the 14th day of May, 2026.

I'm absolutely thrilled to have an actor with us today for the very first time, who is starring in a movie that is truly my favorite

Christian movie that I've ever seen. Perhaps many of you have already heard my review of this movie, along with my co -host

Kurt M. Smith, who is a George Whitefield biographer and pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Renlap, Alabama, where we were expressing how much we loved this film and how we were urgently telling all listening to go see this movie and to bring not only family, friends, and loved ones, but their church members and perhaps even especially the lost to see this movie.

But I am so thrilled to have with us Jonathan Blair, the actor who portrayed the 18th century preacher

George Whitefield in the film A Great Awakening, and it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Jonathan Blair.

Thank you, Chris. Thank you, guys. It's good to be here. Yes, it's somewhat surreal because I think that I'm interviewing

George Whitefield here after the magnificent performance that Jonathan gave in the film.

And we do have joining us again to co -host this program the aforementioned

Kurt M. Smith, who is pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church of Renlap, Alabama, and also the author of the aforementioned biography of George Whitefield, Thundering the

Word, The Awakening Ministry of George Whitefield. Welcome back to the program, Pastor Kurt.

Thank you, Chris. Good to be back. And I'm especially thrilled to be part of this program, to be actually part of this interview with Jonathan Blair.

Great to meet you, Jonathan. Good to meet you, too. And I do want to let our listeners know that joining us for the second hour of the program will be

Joshua Enk, who is director of the film A Great Awakening.

So I'm looking forward to that interview as well after the first hour. But before I even begin our conversation,

I want to whet the appetite of our listeners by playing the trailer for this wonderful movie,

A Great Awakening. Rise, O Satan!

Awaken! Benjamin Franklin, your brother said he could use your help at his print shop.

You have my blessing. Can it do good things, Pa? Great things! From the gardens to the valley.

George Whitefield, you will be an extraordinary preacher. Remember the source of your power.

You don't believe the stories from London are true? I am doubting Whitefield's claim that he can be heard and understood by so many.

Without evidence, I won't believe it. Then let's proclaim freedom to the captives! Whom the sun sets free is free indeed!

Have you ever heard a voice like that? The last. You haven't. Benjamin Franklin.

Reverend Whitefield. Partnering with me would guarantee the maximum benefit to your cause. Match made in heaven.

Or just a deal made in a print shop. General George Washington. Today, we stand in an even darker valley.

All of this country must be our chieftain, sir. This constitution cannot fail. We cannot let the sun set on this nation.

We're lighting a powder keg, my friend. If you follow him, you are led by love.

Why can't I give road to you? I choose evidence over faith. Stop trying to change me.

You have promoted the greatest awakening these colonies have ever seen. What?

Stop. You are the lightning bolt,

George. I am just the lightning rod. And who is the saucepan?

Welcome to see your gift of salvation. One tiny candle illuminates a thousand.

Arise, O sleeper! Awaken! Hallelujah.

What a powerful trailer that is. We have a tradition here,

Jonathan. Whenever we have a first -time guest on the program, we like them to give a summary of their salvation testimony that would include any kind of religious atmosphere in which they may have been raised and the kinds of providential circumstances our sovereign

Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to himself and saved them. I would love to hear a summary of your story.

Absolutely. I grew up in a Christian home. Both my parents were believers all of my life.

And my dad was a pastor for many years. And so I grew up steeped in the

Bible. And honestly, the reality of God, he was always real to me.

He was always there to me. I don't really remember a time where I didn't just trust that I had a heavenly father and that I could lean on him.

But I think I sort of took it for granted. You know, it was just sort of like the sun in the sky.

It's just always there. And you don't really think about it from day to day. Perhaps until you don't see it anymore or you think you can't see it anymore.

And I think when I was a teenager, is when I really sort of woke up to the reality of the personal nature of God, that he is always there, but there's also a choice to be made to enter into ongoing relationship with him.

And somewhere it wasn't as dramatic as Whitfield's, but somewhere gradually,

Jesus himself and the manifold layers of his person became more and more real to me.

And I didn't really arrive anywhere. I'm still on that continuum of going deeper and deeper in discovering more and more about his heart for me and for everyone.

So I don't really feel like there was a before and after. I feel like there's just been a continuum, a spectrum of going deeper and deeper into life with the

Lord. Yeah. And I've always sort of been a storyteller and I've always known that somehow those would be intertwined.

I didn't know how, but I always knew that I wanted to illustrate who

God was to me through the stories that I was telling. And I think that was a big attraction to me as a teenager into the person of Jesus himself, was himself being a storyteller.

And that mode of communicating in a way that was dramatic and surprising just really drew me in.

It's like he knew what he was doing. Hallelujah. And when in your life did you realize that acting was to be your vocation?

I think I started it when I was 11 and I got the bug. I got bit by the bug and I just knew that that's what

I wanted to do. I knew all my life that I wanted to be creative and I wanted to tell stories somehow.

I thought, when I was younger, I thought maybe that was a writer, primarily books or things like that.

But the older I got into theater, the more, and then into filmmaking later on,

I was 17 or 18 the first time I got into filmmaking. And I realized that the art of filmmaking sort of incorporates all of the art forms.

There's writing, there's the literature of writing the script, but there's performance, there's music, there's the visual composition.

It's so much like photography or painting even. So filmmaking to me just kind of felt like every art form that you could touch in the telling of one singular story.

And just the the portability, I suppose, of a film.

It can go anywhere. It can be seen anywhere. It can reach. There's no ceiling to the audience that a film could have.

I think somewhere around 17 or 18, I knew I was going to be a filmmaker and I absolutely did not know how.

But I actually wrote in my journal the year I auditioned for Sight &

Sound, actually back in 2017, I wrote down a prayer saying, Lord, I don't know how this is going to happen.

I've made a couple of films, independent films by now, but I really don't see how this is going to be sustainable. Lord, I just want to tell your story.

So equip me somehow. And two months later, I auditioned for Sight & Sound and came here.

So it's just amazing. I reflect on that entry in my journal from time to time when

I start to get used to the blessings that he's given me and I start to take them for granted.

I look back at when I was praying desperately to be where I am now. And I understand that when you first heard about this role of George Whitfield being available, that you didn't even know who

George Whitfield was or perhaps you had heard the name but only had a vague idea of who he was. How did you, first of all, get presented with the opportunity to portray

Whitfield? Yeah, that's a great question. So Joshua Enk, the lead writer and the director of A Great Awakening.

Our friendship goes back to that year in 2017 when I auditioned for the theater. He was also writing and directing

Sight & Sound's premier production of Jesus in which I auditioned and then got cast in the role of Jesus.

So that was the beginning of our actor -director relationship. And that was a stage production, correct? Yes, that was a stage production here at Sight &

Sound in Lancaster, Pennsylvania. So I got to portray Jesus and through that relationship, you know, our friendship grew and we both shared a passion for film and we made one other film together prior to that,

Sight & Sound's first feature film I Heard the Bells which came out in 2022. That was our first foray into filmmaking and I got to sort of talk a lot of shop on the story, on the script for that with Josh.

And so he invited me first to contribute to the script as a story consultant on this new concept for a film he was talking about,

A Great Awakening. And in the course of that, talking about this man, George Whitfield, he was describing who this guy was and then all of a sudden he said,

Have you ever heard of George Whitfield? And I said, I've heard the name. That's about all I know of him. And so he went on to describe this man that 80 % of the colonists had heard with their own ears and this first unifying force in the colonies and sowing the seeds of the anthems of the revolution.

And I was like, Oh my gosh, why have I never heard of this guy before? Oh, by the way, he was friends with Benjamin Franklin. At the end of this conversation,

I was like, Josh, this sounds fantastic. Like, I don't know how you, we, I don't know how we're going to capture all this and somewhere in there he said,

By the way, will you audition for George Whitfield? And I was like, Wow. Talk about a tall order.

That was that first conversation was when Josh first explained to me. So it kind of all came at once, like drinking out of a firehouse.

The concept for the story, who this man was, would you enter into it in these sort of multifaceted disciplines, which was exactly three years ago now.

It was spring of 23 when he first talked to me about this. Praise God. Before I turn over the baton to my co -host

Kurt, I just thought I'd let you know something that I brought up in the previous program that Kurt Smith and I did reviewing the movie and promoting it.

I was taken aback watching the movie that John Paul Sneed, the actor portraying

Benjamin Franklin, looks almost identical to a dear friend of mine who is now in heaven,

Nigel Stone. Nigel Stone, a Brit. He was a British immigrant to the

United States who was a member of the same church where I was saved. And this was back in the 80s.

And Nigel introduced me to George Whitfield my church.

Wow. My church was a church that embraced and adhered to the theology of George Whitfield, Calvinism.

And in my initial stages of my Christian journey, I was very skeptical about this theology

I was hearing about. And Nigel said to me in his deep British voice, I heard you having difficulty understanding the doctrines of sovereign grace.

Read this. And he handed me George Whitfield's letter to John Wesley on election, which is a reprint from Chapel Library.

And that's where I discovered and fell in love with George Whitfield and his theology. But I know that you're chomping at the bit

Pastor Kirk to ask a question. That's incredible. So Jonathan, I had seen an interview with you back in April.

It was on Good Friday. And it was with a local news station I guess there in Pennsylvania.

And in the interview, I think the question was posed to you as far as how you prepared the role to portray

Whitfield. And if I remember correctly, you, one of the things you said you did is that you had you had read

Whitfield's journals. Is that right? Yes. Okay. So, so in thinking about that and thinking about our talk today, for you as a as a

Christian, you know, reading those journals, what kind of personal, spiritual impact did that have on you?

You know, not just in preparing to portray Whitfield in this movie, but, you know, but, but what what was your personal takeaway spiritually speaking with everything you were reading in Whitfield's journals?

Yeah, what a great question. I think the the most immediate takeaway I remember I recall at the time was

I don't remember the exact scenario, but it may have happened more than once where he was reflecting on just the the inability or his perceived lack of ability to deliver on any given day where he'd feel, you know, sick or hoarse and he still has to get up into the pulpit and preach and just sort of surrendering that to God and feeling the

Lord meet him where he's at and him being able to deliver and I found myself feeling like Whitfield was a mentor to me in real time going, okay, that's exactly what

I need to step up into the pulpit and literally do the same thing to a crowd of extras.

I was just so struck that that became my prayer every day when I'd get up to do another sermon

I wouldn't know how I would sustain eight, nine, ten takes in a row and still give it everything

I have and I just felt the Lord continuously like remind me like, I'll carry you like I carried him and I just remember the

Lord just speaking that over me and me holding onto that and going, okay, thanks, you did it.

You did it in the first sermon and the second sermon and will you do it again? I just found myself continuously, oh, will you do it this time?

And I'd get to the end of every day of shooting and you know, by God's grace

I never lost my voice and I never went hoarse and by the end of it, you know, the Lord, I just felt him saying like,

I told you and I credit that to the across time mentorship of George Whitfield and just surrendering his abilities and for me that was the most powerful takeaway that I will take into whatever project

I do whether that's writing or directing or acting it's, yes, there's a responsibility to hone our crafts and our abilities that we've been given but at the end of the day it's not really about those if they're surrendered and if we're surrendered the

Lord is still going to work regardless of how good we think we're doing. Right, right.

Yeah, well, you know, two things in response to that. One, I can definitely testify personally that the

Lord did bless you in the portrayals of you preaching whether it was in the

Kingswood district of Bristol or it was in Philadelphia um, I mean those those scenes in the movie and you know and you're you're preaching you know

Whitfield sermons I mean definitely moved me uh to tears um quite literally um you know because one, you know first because I'm a

Christian and obviously I totally totally understood you know what you were preaching from that standpoint of course the other reason is just as a historian and certainly as a biographer as a biographer of George Whitfield I, you know

I thought that you guys portrayed both you know both with the coal miners there um in Bristol and and and and with that scene you know in in Philadelphia it gave a great great sense of what of what it must have been like you know for uh you know for them to have heard that kind of voice which

God did give Whitfield a very very powerful voice but you know as as as you were you know relating to what he wrote in his journals and Whitfield knew this himself that apart from the power of the

Holy Spirit clothing clothing him and taking the gospel to the hearers it didn't matter what kind of oratorical natural oratorical powers he had exactly his words would have would have fallen to the ground were it not for the

Holy Spirit anointing him in the way that he did in such a phenomenal way yes so so so that's that's great

I mean that you you know that was a big takeaway for you even in this portrayal you know in acting in this movie as Whitfield that yeah like you said in real time you know you were you were depending on the

Lord just as much yeah you know for that so so you know I thank the

Lord for that and and and it you know like I just said it definitely it's something delivered so so I just give

God thanks for that yeah me too now as an actor Jonathan had you ever thundered out your voice like that before portraying

Whitfield um yes the closest which is what where I think

Josh got the idea to ask me was when I portrayed Jesus on stage um there were a few instances that were sort of similar in tone um we portrayed the scene where Jesus storms you know

Jesus cleanses the temple and as the whip is chasing out the money changers um that was a pretty

Whitfield -esque moment in that stage production um where Jesus is sort of thundering at everyone and um there was other moments as well in that um that I think were pretty comparable to this portrayal but nothing again you know you're on stage and you do it once and you're done and the show keeps going but nothing to the extent of of Whitfield on set so that was my biggest concern going into the film was just sustainability and how we would really do that and I didn't really seem feasible to be able to deliver the passion but also um over and over again you know and um that's where I feel like the

Lord really met us in that did you ever lose your voice where you had to no really no wow wow yep and was there anything about Whitfield that uh you uh were totally shocked by that uh has an indelible impact upon you uh before you even answer

I could say that one of the things that I really appreciated about the movie is that it was honest enough to reveal some of the warts and blemishes of Whitfield especially during that argument he was having

Benjamin Franklin and and what a classic example of a an unbeliever having an argument with a believer and the unbeliever throwing in the face of the believer things that he intends to embarrass him with but the fact that Whitfield did use slave labor with an orphanage to construct an orphanage in Georgia I believe and perhaps where I'm going with that is in this cancel culture and in the woke environment we are not supposed to have heroes that had anything seriously wrong with them and of course it's only specific things that our heroes can't have that are more involving things of race and so on but isn't this how we can an example of how we can still uphold a hero knowing that this is the only way it in the we can do it in the way that we can do it in the way can pedestal, because he was constantly taking himself off the pedestal.

And I just thought that was important. We knew that, you know, in this climate, you know, that that would be a lot of what a lot of people would first bring up was, so what about this issue?

What about his slavery? What about, you know, all these things? And there's no real clean answers to those things.

I think it's just a fascinating contradiction in the man, you know, which we sort of put in the mouth of Franklin saying the irony of proclaiming liberty while utilizing slaves.

And so that's something that we weren't really trying to apologize for and explain away.

It was just something we had to present as a fact. But at the same time, because of his the truth that he's proclaiming is not invalidated because of his flaws.

If he were proclaiming that two plus two equals four, well, that would still be true despite his personal failings.

And the same goes with the truth of the gospel. And that's what we were trying to emphasize is that don't base your faith on anyone that isn't

Christ. Essentially, there's only one foundation worthy of your faith, and that's what he's done.

And that was such a wonderful comeback that Whitfield had to Franklin in that dialogue.

But please, Kurt. Yeah, well, yeah, I was just going to say, I mean, that that was that was one of my one of my favorite scenes in the whole movie was that interchange between Whitfield and Franklin.

And, you know, and and even in that interchange, as well as in, you know, the scenes of the sermons preached, the gospel was so well presented, but also so well defended in that moment, you know, where, you know, you would, you know,

Whitfield had said to Franklin, you know, something along the lines. And hopefully you can remember this.

And how do you portray this that you don't follow a flawed life? Something along something along those lines, you know?

Yes. In other words, it's not me. It's Christ. Exactly. You know, and and and, you know, that.

That is most definitely along the lines of what Whitfield himself would have said,

I mean, because that's what he was always communicating anyway. Yeah. You know, with with Whitfield, the popularity that swarmed around him was so fast.

I mean, it just it happened overnight, as it were. And when you read his private correspondence, even in those earliest years of his ministry and, you know, in his early to mid 20s, and he is he is writing to many, to many people saying that the greatest trial of his life was the popularity, the fame.

He yeah, he he despised it. Yeah. I mean, he wanted to he wanted to retire at age 25.

Wow. Because because of the pressure of the fame and the popularity. Because he did not want he did not want people following him.

Right. He wanted people following Christ, which is why in my biography,

I compare him to John the Baptist. Yes. You know, where for John the

Baptist said of the Lord Jesus, he must increase, I must decrease. Well, Whitfield said virtually the same thing.

And I think in the movie, y 'all did a great job of of really portraying that spirit in Whitfield.

So I really commend you for that. Thank you so much. And there were scenes where I heard you say in a previous interview where the words that were coming out of the character of Whitfield in the movie were actually from your own mind and heart that you included them in the movie.

If you could tell us about that. Yeah, well, there there was the balancing act was we wanted to incorporate a lot of Whitfield's actual words, but make them, you know, feel organic and not like we copy and pasted from, you know, the pages of history and it doesn't feel right.

And so there was a good mixture of us as the writers and Whitfield himself.

But an example, first example I can think of is the Philadelphia Sermon. The segment, you know, where he's listing, he's comparing and contrasting the impact of all these pagan philosophers,

Seneca, Cicero, all of those guys, have all of them combined at any sort of comparable lasting effect as the words given by the one they call

Jesus of Nazareth. That's all pretty much verbatim Whitfield. And then sort of sprinkled there on at the end, because you're not only trying to convey a sermon, but you're trying to spin up the rhythm of compelling rhetoric as well.

There is sort of a growing, the need for a growing to a crescendo as he's like, naturally sort of engaging in building the audience to this climax.

And he proclaims, oh, does not your dead heart quicken to life at the thought that you were fashioned for such purpose and have yet a part to play in the unfolding kingdom of God?

That was just a line that I feel like the Lord gave me as I was sitting there with the sermon. And that's how

I feel. That's my passion coming out through Whitfield in that moment.

And so I feel like the Lord really sort of yoked me with Whitfield in the crafting of some of these sermons, in getting to some of those points.

Because that sermon as a whole, we sort of approached it, each sermon, with sort of an emotional foundation that we wanted to accomplish.

The church, the English church was obviously sort of a righteous anger, this fury of the

Lord coming out in these representatives who weren't being responsible with the truth they were entrusted with.

And obviously, the coal mining sequence is sort of this sorrow, this sorrowful pleading to fellow sinners to come into the light.

And Philadelphia, to me, was sort of, fundamentally, it was more joyful.

Yeah, he had been doing it for a while at this point, so he had a little bit of his rhythms down a little bit more by the time he gets to Philadelphia.

And I thought that it would be cool to portray the Lord providentially speaking about the reasonableness of faith through Whitfield to a crowd that features

Benjamin Franklin. Although Whitfield doesn't know that, that's what he feels compelled to preach on is the logicalness or the reasonableness of faith.

And that is what sort of catches Franklin's attention, is that, oh, no one's really talked about that before.

I don't know about all the rest, but here's a guy who thinks. You know? So, anyways, yeah, each sermon was sort of a blend of each of us.

And I have to admit that although this doesn't happen with any frequency,

I did begin to shed tears in the coal mine scene and was really trying to fight them back and didn't want anybody to ask me to turn in my man card.

But I couldn't help but react that way. And I think when you love the

Lord and you love the gospel and you realize what the gospel is, the only hope for wretched sinners to have eternal life, if you're not moved by a powerful representing of that, there's something wrong with you.

I just have to go to a very quick commercial break, and we're going to be right back with Jonathan Blair and my co -host,

Kurt Smith. So, please do not go away. We'll be right back after these messages.

Brian 9 Hello, this is Brian 9, president of Hearts for the Lost Ministry. Our sole mission is to serve the local church and work directly with and alongside pastors and elders with their efforts to equip, excite, and educate their flock in biblical evangelism.

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Our services are always 100 percent free. If you're looking to equip and mobilize your church for faithful gospel witness, please partner with us.

Hearts for the Lost Ministry, serving the church, proclaiming the gospel. Contact us today at heartsforthelost .com.

That's heartsforthelost .com. Now, have a heart and go share your faith. Simon O'Mahony I'm Simon O'Mahony, pastor of Trinity Reformed Baptist Church in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

Originally from Cork, Ireland, the Lord and his sovereign providence has called me to shepherd this new and growing congregation here in Cumberland County.

At TRBC, we joyfully uphold the Second London Baptist Confession. We embrace congregational church government, and we are committed to preaching the full counsel of God's word for the edification of believers, the salvation of the lost, and the glory of our triune

God. We are also devoted to living out the one another commands of scripture, loving, encouraging, and serving each other as the body of Christ.

In our worship, we sing psalms and the great hymns of the faith, and we gather around the Lord's table every

Sunday. We would love for you to visit and worship with us. You can find our details at trbccarlisle .org.

That's trbccarlisle .org. God willing, we'll see you soon.

James White of Alpha Omega Ministries and the Dividing Line webcast here. Although God has brought me all over the globe for many years to teach, preach, and debate at numerous venues, some of my very fondest memories are from those precious times of fellowship with Pastor Rich Jensen and the brethren at Hope Reform Baptist Church, now located at their new beautiful facilities in Corham, Long Island, New York.

I've had the privilege of opening God's word from their pulpit on many occasions, have led youth retreats for them, and have always been thrilled to see their members filling many seats at my

New York debates. I do not hesitate to highly recommend Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island to anyone who wants to be accurately taught, discipled, and edified by the holy scriptures, and to be surrounded by truly loving and caring brothers and sisters in Christ.

For more information on Hope Reform Baptist Church, go to hopereformedli .net.

That's hopereformedli .net, or call 631 -696 -5711.

That's 631 -696 -5711. Tell the folks at Hope Reform Baptist Church of Corham, Long Island that you heard about them from James White on Iron Sharpens Iron Radio.

Welcome back. We have on the program today, if you just tuned us in, the lead actor portraying the life of 18th century preacher and evangelist

George Whitefield. His name is Jonathan Blair, and we also have co -hosting the program a

George Whitefield biographer, my friend, Pastor Kurt M. Smith. We are talking about Jonathan's role in this film, the importance of the film, and specifically

George Whitefield, who is being portrayed by Jonathan, and the powerful message of peace between God and man, only through Jesus Christ.

I was just curious if you've gotten any negative feedback yet. I'm thinking because of one particular scene that's hilarious.

When you are in an Anglican church as a guest speaker, and one of the older clerics there, and I'm paraphrasing because I didn't write it down, but he says something to the effect of,

I'm not happy to see you here. Mr. Whitefield, and you respond, or George Whitefield responds, and neither is

Satan or something like that, or neither is the devil. Perhaps you could recite it more accurately than I just did.

Yes, he says, the Anglican clergyman says, I'm very disappointed to see you here,

Mr. Whitefield, and George Whitefield replies, so is the devil. I was just wondering when

I saw that, I wonder if he's going to get any heat, or if the production company,

Sight & Sound, is going to get any heat from Anglicans because of that. Not that I'm aware of, but the year is still young.

I can say that hearing back from a wide spectrum of representatives of different theological positions, every single person so far that I know of that has seen this film is blown away.

They are urging with great fervency to everybody they know to see this film.

Pastor Curt M. Smith, I know that while we still have Jonathan Blair for the first hour, you're definitely going to want to ask more questions since you've immersed so much of your life in Whitefield's writings and so on, so please ask a question.

Well, I do want to begin just by echoing what Chris just said,

Jonathan, that everyone that I personally know who has seen the movie, it's the same sentiments.

I mean, we all love it. I mean, it was very, very impressive. I mean, just from the standpoint of just the movie making, great production, great musical score, great acting, an ingenious script in the way that it was written.

So all of that, hats off. I mean, that was great, but you know, but obviously the most, the most impressive thing, you know, for me personally is that I was like, well, finally, here's a

Christian made movie that I can take an unbeliever to go see and know confidently they're going to hear the gospel.

And so I am so thankful you know, for that brother.

And, and very, you know, and just, and again, very thankful for in your, in your portrayals of Whitefield's preaching, the gospel is just so clear and the call to come to Christ is there, there, there's no doubt, no confusion whatsoever in the plainness of that call.

And so I do believe that Whitefield himself would have been pleased with that. But in, so outside of his journals, just going back to your preparation, was there anything else that you read?

I mean, well, obviously you must've read Yes. Okay. Yep. So, so in reading his sermons, what, what was it that personally struck you about, you know, the way, the way that he preached?

I mean, obviously, you know, you couldn't hear his voice, but just, but just in, in how his sermons content was, how his sermons were delivered.

I mean, what, what was it that impressed you the most? That's a great question.

I think just the freshness of the, the insight and the language in particular, the, and, and I, I remember them in pieces now, but I remember the one that we included at the top of the coal mine sequence where he says, fly, fly my brothers, fly to the throne of mercy, fly into the bleeding

God and beg him, beg him to break your heart. And I was just like, man, you don't hear this kind of language anymore.

Where has that gone? It just grips you. It reaches, for me, it reached through, he,

Whitefield, the spirit, every, you know, all of the above reached through the book and just gripped me. And I was like, oh my gosh, we have to put that in there.

That's just exactly what you feel in that moment. And yeah, that, that's one that will always stay with me.

In addition to his sermons, I also read The Life of God and the Soul of Man. Oh, good.

By Henry Schugle. Yeah. Henry Schugle, that, that book, you know, apparently was his conversion point.

The reading that given to him by, I believe it was one of the Wesley brothers. Yeah. Charles, Charles Wesley.

Yeah. Yeah. So I ordered that, you know, and I read that back and forward and backwards and forwards and became intimately familiar with that.

And that, you know, obviously had an impact on me too, just how succinctly it's put. And that's a whole other, that led me down another rabbit trail.

I, you know, reading about Henry Schugle and how young he was and writing this letter to a friend and how that sort of reanimated the concept of faith in Whitfield's life.

And so I, in addition to reading what he produced, Whitfield, I tried to read things that I was aware that he might've read like that, kind of get a context.

And even though it wasn't directly related, I tried to just get a general feel for what was in the atmosphere of the era.

Like I read Edwards, Jonathan Edwards, who I was more familiar with prior to this project.

So I went to him immediately as a contemporary and read heaven is a world of love.

Jonathan Edwards. Yes. Good stuff like that. And then sort of on a gut instinct,

I went forward in time and read people that had been impacted by Whitfield. So I read also someone

I was more familiar with prior was Spurgeon credited

Whitfield as being sort of the Spurgeon to him. Yeah, that's right. Yeah.

So I just re -immersed myself in Spurgeon and kind of soaked that up because it's the same spirit, you know, moving across all of them.

So I kind of did like, and, you know, and then I went prior back in time and read people that would have influenced the people that were influencing

Whitfield. So I'm forgetting his name, Richard Baxter, I believe. Right.

Yeah. Reformed pastor. He wrote that classic work. Yeah. We borrowed his quote,

I must preach a dying man to dying men. So that we, Whitfield says that, but that was one of his influences.

So a little Easter egg in there for people doing these deep dives. But yeah, I just kind of went on a journey just to really,

I mean, what a treasure hunt it was, you know, it wasn't just beneficial to the project.

It's beneficial to me and my walk. And so now I have this whole plethora of, of these writings.

But I wanted to ask you too, I'm so curious, what, what led you to Whitfield? How did you become a biographer of him in particular?

Well, thank you. Good question. So it was on a cold

January Sunday evening in 1989. I, I was,

I was attending a worship service at, strange enough, it was, it was at a church of God church, church of God denomination.

Yeah. And the, the man that was preaching, he was actually my, he was actually my first mentor in ministry.

And he was, he was, he was very well -versed in 18th century church history.

He was more of a follower of the Westleys, but he, you know, but he greatly, greatly admired

Whitfield. And he was preaching a sermon from 2

Samuel chapter 12 and Psalm 51 on the subject of revival and repentance.

And in part of this sermon, he went into the story of the evangelical awakening in great

Britain during the 18th century. And rather than focusing on John and Charles Wesley, he put all his focus on George Whitfield.

And that was the very, very first time I'd ever heard the name of George Whitfield.

And, and he just started telling all of these different stories of Whitfield's ministry.

And I was so blown away by what I was hearing. And so, so that was the initial seed that was planted for me and, okay,

I need to read more about this man. I need to find out more about him.

And, and so that's what, yeah, that's what started my journey. And, and it would end up being a 30 -year journey of, of reading, of research, everything, everything that had been written by biographers on Whitfield, old and new, good and bad, you know.

And, and then of course, you know, just the biggest thing were the primary sources, his journals, his letters, you know, his sermons.

And so, so I had always, I will say always, over time,

I eventually wanted to compose a biography on Whitfield that, that I wanted to read.

That's how, that's how I approached it. And so, so, so this is the biography that I wanted to read on George Whitfield.

And, and eventually in God's wonderful mercy and kindness,

I, I, I, I started out with that several years ago.

And, and it took me three years, three years to write it.

But it was actually during the year of COVID in 2020, where during the whole period of shelter in place here in Alabama, we all had to shelter in place for three months.

And so, you know, so that certainly took me out of pastoring that period.

It was, it was just, it was God's wonderful timing of where I spent those three months, eight hours a day finishing.

And I did finish, I finished the biography and sent it to a publisher who had already published another one of my

Christian biographies a couple of years earlier. And, and, and it didn't dawn on me until after I finished it, that it was the 250th anniversary of Whitfield's death.

Wow. How about that? 1770. Yeah. You know, and so, so yeah, so, so amazingly, the

Lord just worked it out to where, as I said earlier, the book was able to be published. Yeah. The week of September 30th, 1777, 2020.

So, but anyway, but yeah, yeah. Whitfield is just, he is, he is definitely my biggest hero of the

Christian faith. Yeah. For sure. And, and I guess the thing that, the thing that strikes me the most, which

I, I devote an entire chapter in the biography on this, the one grace that stood, that has always stood out to me about Whitfield is his humility.

Yes. Because to be as popular as he was. Yeah. To have that much fame, to where even his contemporaries were calling him the wonder of the age.

Right. Right. Okay. And it did not go to his head. Yeah.

It's amazing. You know, he was just so full of self -abasement and, and just walked with such humility.

And even as I point out in my, in my biography, what's, what's so amazing is that he was walking in that humility in his early twenties.

Right. Okay. You know, that's, that had to be a work of grace.

Amen. Now, can you repeat? Thank you for asking that.

Yeah. Jonathan, can you, uh, following that thread of his humility, can you repeat the line when

Whitfield is ascending up the steps to the balcony in Philadelphia to preach about his, uh, decreasing and Christ increasing?

If you could say it exactly the way Whitfield said it in the movie. Yeah. Uh, he says it a couple of times, but he says,

Lord, tear down the name of Whitfield, if it means your name remains. And to me, that sort of summarized that humility.

He brings it there at Philadelphia, and then he says it again to Franklin. He says, then tear down the name of Whitfield, if it means the name of Christ remains.

Don't base your faith on my flawed life. Don't base it on the cold religion of your father. Base it on what Christ has done on a cross of wood.

And that was sort of the, the North star for me, for his character. Amen. By the way,

I'm certain that if he's not listening live, he'll be listening to the recording eventually.

But, uh, my former pastor, Mike Gaydosh, who, uh, launched back in the nineties,

Calvary Press Publishing, and then later Solid Ground Christian Books. I think that he was the first one to take

Heaven, A World of Love, as an excerpt out of Charity and Its Fruits by Jonathan Edwards and publish it as a single booklet, uh, on its own.

So he'll be thrilled to hear that, that you were so impacted by that, uh, sermon in print.

Yep. Wow. That's awesome. Well, I want to make sure that, uh, before your hour runs out, because I know that you couldn't stay with us for the whole two hours, uh, that you give our listeners, uh, more reasons why they should see

A Great Awakening. I say this, uh, it's gonna, it might sound weird ordinarily from someone who's in the movie, but, uh,

I've seen the impact now enough to just objectively say it's more than a movie, it's an experience.

Um, you're going to want to see this because you're going to experience something. And, um, that's not of my ability or anybody involved's ability solely.

It's, it's something that the Lord is doing through this, I believe. And I believe that we've captured some moves of the

Holy Spirit on film in a way that we can't engineer, um, that the Lord has deemed, uh, to move in this way and in this time.

And so I would just encourage people to experience that, to come and see. Amen. And I was thrilled to hear, uh, that, uh,

I heard this from Bridget Sheriff over there at Sight & Sound. Yeah. I was thrilled to hear that churches, uh, can get, get group license, group viewing licenses to play

A Great Awakening in their own churches. Yes. And I wanted to make sure that I quickly plug that, and I will repeat it,

God willing, toward the end of the program and out from now. But if you go to sight -sound .tv

forward slash group dash viewing dash licenses, you can find out how your church, uh, can, uh, have a viewing of, uh,

A Great Awakening. And I think it would be ideal if you were to have

Curt M. Smith speak at your church after the film is over. The great biographer,

Curt M. Smith, who's in the, on the program today. Uh, but, uh,

I will repeat that later on. And I am actually going to encourage some churches that I, uh, whose pastors

I know to do that very thing, who have a large enough building to accommodate, uh, the best kind of a viewing experience as possible.

And, uh, before you leave, I just also want you to, uh, have you leave our audience with what you most want etched in the hearts and minds of our listeners and, uh, about your own faith in Christ and so on.

Yeah. I think the bottom line is that, um, for anybody searching for truth or wondering if there is such a thing as a truth, an objective truth,

I would encourage you to believe and trust that it is out there and that it can be known and that his name is

Jesus Christ. Hallelujah. Well, uh, Jonathan, it has been such a joy.

And in fact, I'll just, uh, because we do have about, uh, three minutes left, uh, for Jonathan Blair's segment.

Curt, I'd like you to make sure that you ask another question while you have the opportunity. Another question.

Um, well, um, I guess,

I guess one, uh, I guess one other question you, you had mentioned, uh, that you had known about Jonathan Edwards before you had really heard about George Whitfield.

Yeah. Um, so what, what has been a big takeaway for you with Edwards, obviously a contemporary

Whitfield, what, you know, besides the sermon, you mentioned that Edwards preach, what, um, what's been the biggest things impacted you through Edwards writings?

It's been a while since I've immersed myself as deeply, um, in Edwards, but I think, um, you know, in my head, you know,

Whitfield and not in just in my head, but in history, I think they're known Whitfield as the eminent evangelist, preeminent evangelist of the age.

And, but Edwards was the preeminent theologian and just the Einstein of theology and, uh, just the way his mind worked.

And the fact that someone so brilliant, I feel like latched on to the aspect of love of God being love.

And, and the fact that a mind so calculating and so almost scientific and mathematical went that way to me almost speaks and testifies to the truth and reality of God's overwhelming love, if that makes sense.

That someone with, um, that sort of a mind could still sense that. Um, and I've done nowhere near the amount of research on Edwards.

So that's just my impression, but, um, no, my, I, I first heard of him and Spurgeon and all these guys from my dad, um, who, uh, was a preacher for many years.

So yeah, he exposed me to, uh, all those guys. Yeah. But I still read. Well, I'm going to,

I'm going to bring up to, uh, Joshua Enk later an idea that I have that I hope he takes me up on is to do a sequel, uh, to A Great Awakening that actually has to go back in time a little bit, uh, to demonstrate the loving yet tense rivalry that existed between George Whitfield and John Wesley over the theological differences.

I think, yeah, no kidding. And in spite of that intense, uh, rivalry that sometimes got very heated,

George Whitfield nonetheless requested that John Wesley preach at his funeral.

And he eventually did, uh, anything I'm missing there, Kurt being the biographer.

Well, what, what, what Whitfield specifically requested not directly to John Wesley, but to a mutual friend of theirs that when

Whitfield left for America, um, 1769. And of course he wouldn't return to England because he would pass away the next year.

But he did specifically request to this, this brother to tell John Wesley that when you hear, when you hear of my passing, that the memorial service that would be held for Whitfield in England, that John Wesley would be the one to officiate and preach that memorial service, which

November of 1770, John Wesley did that very thing. And, and, uh, and you can, you can still read that entire sermon that, that eulogy.

Yeah. And it is, it is really beautiful. Uh, don't need to worry. We actually record, we filmed that.

And, uh, that was in the film was John Wesley's eulogy of Whitney. Really? Oh my goodness. It ended up on the cutting room floor for time.

Oh, no. At least it has a deleted scene. Yeah. Yes. Well, well,

Jonathan, I don't want to be greedy and steal your time away from you, but thank you so much for being such a blessing to me and my cohost and to my audience.

And I'll be praying and asking my audience to pray for you, that the Lord would continue to use you mightily in the cinema.

Thank you. Thank you guys so much. Well, God bless. God bless you too. And folks don't go away.

We're going to be joined by the director of A Great Awakening, Joshua Enk.

And, uh, we will be right back after these messages from our sponsors. So please don't go anywhere.

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Welcome back, as promised, we have for the second half of the program, Joshua Enk, who is the

President, Chief Creative Officer, and Chief Storyteller at Sight &

Sound. He also happens to be the director of the film, the magnificent film that we have been discussing,

A Great Awakening, the film about the life and legacy of 18th century evangelist

George Whitfield, as seen through the eyes of Founding Father Benjamin Franklin.

And it's my honor and privilege to welcome you for the very first time ever to Iron Sharpens Iron Radio, Joshua Enk.

Chris, it's great to be here, I appreciate the invitation, and I'm excited to dig in and have

Iron Sharpen Iron. Amen. Well, as I did with Jonathan Blair being a first -time guest as well, and as I always do with first -time guests, we always have our first -time guests give a summary of their salvation story, which should include any kind of religious atmosphere in which they were raised, and the kinds of providential circumstances our

Sovereign Lord raised up in their lives that drew them to Himself and saved them. And we would love to hear the summary of your story, brother.

Yeah, well, thank you so much. And all those who are listening, thank you for listening. You know,

I was born and raised in a small foundry town in Pennsylvania.

I like to say my childhood was like a Bruce Springsteen song. I played football,

I ran around on my bicycle and the railroad tracks, and I had a really strong moral upbringing.

Mom and dad loved each other. I had two older brothers, but we were not necessarily a

Christ -following household. We were a God -fearing household, but we would have been the family that would have shown up to church on Christmas and Easter.

But I always knew that there was something supernatural and something bigger than myself out there, and so I actually would pray as a child.

I would take long walks, and very imaginative, and I like to think a lot, and I would take my dog for long walks, and I would pray.

But I didn't necessarily know who exactly and what I was praying for. But my mom and dad created an atmosphere and an environment that was very safe, and I remember there being moments throughout my childhood where my mom would be moved, and my dad would say every night, good night,

God bless you, I love you. And so there was a reverency to a supernatural God, but Jesus Christ wasn't necessarily a person.

And when that changed after high school, I was 19 years old and started dating a girl, and she started taking me to church, and just to appease her parents,

I started going. And all of these questions that I had started being answered.

And I remember we were at a Christian concert, and I was just really moved, just deeply moved by the lyrics and what now

I would say the anointing that was in the room. And there was an invitation at the end, and I stood up.

I was the only one that stood up. And when they had an altar call for to accept

Christ into your heart, and I never looked back. And so I look back, though, on the way that the

Lord and His providence was working on my heart all through my life, and just teed me up for that encounter with Him that night when

I was 19 years old. And I accepted Jesus into my heart, and it was incredible, honestly.

I felt love that I never felt before just overflowed out of me, and I was devouring my

Bible that my mom actually bought me a year before on Christmas, believe it or not.

And then the rest kind of, you know, was His history. I mean, honestly, like I just grew like a weed.

And I will say sight and sound became a part of my life at that age as well.

And before I knew it, I was working in a ministry, and I never thought in a million years I'd be working in a ministry.

But 31 years later, I'm still there. By the way, I want to introduce you to my co -host, since you haven't met or spoken with him yet.

His name is Kurt M. Smith. He is the pastor of Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Remlap, Alabama, and he is also a

George Whitfield biographer. Wow. And he is—well, why don't you,

Kurt, tell my second guest, our second guest, a little bit about your book on George Whitfield.

Yeah, sure. By the way, good to meet you, Joshua. Likewise, Kurt. Yeah, so the book that I wrote on Whitfield is called

Thundering the Word, and the subtitle is The Awakening Ministry of George Whitfield.

It covers very specifically the most dramatic years of Whitfield's 34 years of gospel ministry, which would be from his conversion in 1735 all the way up to 1742.

But anyway, covering that part, I also have three big lessons, which three big chapters devoted to what's the legacy that he leaves us, and then the three are, number one, first and foremost, the grace of humility, because that's what

I was expressing to Jonathan Blair earlier, that the biggest thing that stands out to me besides the very definitive, evident power of God that worked through him and his preaching on both sides of the

Atlantic, it was the enormous grace of humility in his life, because to have that kind of fame and it not go to your head, that was purely a work of God's grace in his heart, in his life.

So there's a whole chapter devoted to that. The next chapter is, of course, preach the gospel, and yes, his gospel preaching, which

I give six definitive characteristics of what his gospel preaching was like.

That's a huge legacy. And the last chapter is what I've entitled the already and the not yet, and that's where my biography is definitely not hagiography, because I do deal very honestly with what would be the two most glaring flaws in his life.

One would be what, by and large, was really a failed marriage to his wife,

Elizabeth James. And I go so far as to say they never should have gotten married.

And then, of course, the other matter was him, which you guys addressed in your movie, him being a slave owner, and just dealing very honestly with that, but also, too, dealing with it in a way that, as Christians, we ought to deal with that because, you know, he was a sinner saved by grace like the rest of us, and so we should deal with these things in a very graceful way and not fall into the error, you know, just that arrogance of presentism where we think we're better than, you know,

Whitfield or other men, you know, like that. How long ago did you write the book?

So the book came out in 2020, and it came out, actually, the 250th anniversary of George Whitfield's death.

Oh, wow. Wow. I'll have to check. That's fascinating. Thank you for all the work that you poured into it, you know, to keep the

Synergy of the Ages alive, you know? I mean, just because they're deceased doesn't mean that their prayers are dead, doesn't mean that their work is dead.

It just means that it, you know, continues forth, and that's what we want to do with Sight and Sound Films is tell the stories of figures from history that changed the world because Christ first changed them.

That's our calling for Sight and Sound Films. And I praise God for the fact that you started off there as a stagehand.

I believe when you were 19, is that right? I heard somewhere. And you worked your way up to president and chief storyteller.

One thing that I like to repeat from when

Kurt and I, on a separate program, we did a review of A Great Awakening.

We were both so head over heels in love with this film that we wanted to promote it.

And Kurt did a phenomenal job providing all the details on Whitfield's life and so on.

But one of the things I have to say is it is astounding that for a second film for Sight and Sound that this movie is truly the best

Christian film I've ever seen. There's nothing cheesy about it. There is nothing corny about it.

There's nothing saccharine sweet about it. Everything about it from the sets to the acting to the actors that you chose to be a part of this, to the script, to the soundtrack.

And Kurt will echo that, as he has done already. We have been just blown away.

And one thing that I'll tell you that I told Jonathan before we went on the air earlier is that it is quite amazing to me that the actor who portrayed

Benjamin Franklin, John Paul Sneed, I couldn't get out of my head while I was watching this because he looks exactly like a dear friend of mine who's now in heaven,

Nigel Stone, a British brother who immigrated to the United States, and he was a of the church where I was saved.

And he is the one that introduced me to George Whitefield. When I arrived at my church in the early stages of my faith walk there,

I discovered that my church strongly adhered to George Whitefield's theology, also known as Calvinism.

And I was having a big problem with that. And Nigel Stone approached me with his deep

British accent and said, I understand you're having difficulty embracing the doctrine of election.

Read this. And he gave me George Whitefield's letter to John Wesley on election, and I've never been the same.

Wow, that is fascinating. It's amazing how the Lord, you know, weaved that tapestry together in your life.

And I really do appreciate your affirmation of the film. We worked extremely hard on it for three years.

I thought that we were going to make a movie on a different George. So it was the

Lord that placed that, you know, we had Liberty, right, but we had the Georges wrong.

Yes, George Washington was originally supposed to be the focus. Yeah, and you know, our first film did well.

Again, we're, you know, compared to Hollywood, small budget, you know, an independent film. But as far as Christian films goes, like, the way

I look at it is I'm a Christian who makes films. And when

I was growing up, I feasted on all the big films of the late 70s, 80s, and 90s, and, you know, they were incredible films of adventure and cinematography and storytelling at its best.

And so when I got saved and started working in sight and sound theaters, and I saw the way that Glenn Eshelman, the founder, was portraying theater so differently on stage, it started to plant seeds in my mind that, well, you know, that's how if we ever do make movies someday, there's a way that we can do it that's like the third way.

You know, it's not the way of the world. It's also not the way that maybe Christian filmmaking kind of has become in some parts of that side of things.

But like, what's the Holy Spirit guiding and directing and speaking to us? What story do you want us to tell,

Lord? Let you author the script. How can we have this come under your authority so that we're in sync with your will for this film, you know, versus like chasing fads, or a formula for success, and those kinds of things.

And so that's, this is really, honestly, this film is just bathed and saturated in prayer and doing the best we can with the resources that we have to move people's hearts toward him through this powerful story.

That's really the, that's really the foundation of why we're doing this. And Kurt, I want to make sure that you have plenty of time to ask questions since you are the biographer of Whitfield here.

So please ask away. Don't make it hard, Kurt. I'll make them too hard. Well, I guess my first question,

Joshua, since, you know, since originally your, your first original thought about a movie was on George Washington.

So what was it? And when was it that caught your attention on George Whitfield?

I mean, what, you know, how did, how did you get, you know, in that direction away from, from Washington?

Yeah. So, you know, we were sight and sound theaters has been around for 50 years, more than primarily stage productions.

So film is new. And, and this film, A Great Awakening was our sophomore film. And so, you know, we didn't have a ton of pressure on how quickly we can make a movie.

It was like, let's just do it right. You know, quality over quantity with our films.

And so not a lot of pressure to find the story, but what happened was I was pursuing this, this film on George Washington and the revolutionary era.

And I was getting super excited about it. Knowing that we're coming up on our 250th anniversary as a nation,

I'm a bicentennial baby. I was born in 1976. And the word liberty was always a strong word in my life.

You know, before Christ, and then especially after Christ in my life. And I was getting really excited about this colonial era,

George Washington film. And I was working on the outline and the script for months. And I continually hit roadblocks where I just, there's too much, there was, there were, first of all, there's so much story to tell.

And I really wanted to unpack the man, George Washington. And I still might someday actually still might be a film that we do, but there just wasn't that thing that made me feel like it was a sight and sound film.

Like we want these messages to really matter, not just tell an adventure story or a really cool biopic.

And I just wasn't finding that thing, you know, and you know, when you find it and my wife, she was picking up on this frustration, this writer's block.

And we went and saw, we went to a conference one time and on the way home, she said, hun, she said,

I booked an Airbnb for you at Valley Forge. And she said, why don't you go away for a couple of days and seek the

Lord on this George Washington story. And that's really, that's out of character for her.

And so I did, I took me and my dog and this 18th century little cottage in Valley Forge, which is not far from my home.

And, uh, and I really sought the Lord for three days and two nights and, um, I had wifi.

And so I was doing some research and I just seek seeking the Lord. And on day two, the

Lord truly spoke to my spirit and I was praying, said, Joshua, you have liberty, right? You have your

George's wrong. And I was really praying through this.

And I remembered my writing partner, Jeff Bender, he and I have written many stage shows together.

And, uh, and I remember him talking about George Whitfield. It's his favorite person in American history, outside of Bible characters.

And so I started to Google George Whitfield and actually what I was doing was

I was Googling pastors and spiritual influencers on the revolution. That's really what

I started to kind of like sink my teeth into, you know, who impacted these great men like we know of George Washington and so forth.

And this George Whitfield character came to my mind and I started to research it and I just literally almost fell off my chair.

Here's a guy theatrically trained, which I'm familiar with being in theater for 30 years that used his voice, used his instrument to impact hundreds of thousands, millions, ultimately of people, 80 % of the colonists that just hear about him, but heard him literally.

And then I realized the impact he had on these colonies at this incredibly transformational time called the great awakening.

And he was nearly best friends with Benjamin Franklin when those things all connected at that little cottage at Valley Forge.

I don't know what my dog saw, but I was doing a happy dance or on my face, praising the

Lord, because I just knew I found the thing. I found the story. And it was an original thought, you know, and so I just couldn't write the script fast enough.

I got back, talked to Jeff Bender. I said, Jeff, I think we're gonna do a film on your favorite person. And he started to cry and got to work.

Praise God. It was such, it was such the better choice not to take anything away from George Washington, but we know that with the 250th anniversary of America, that we're gonna be bombarded with George Washington films or TV specials and so on.

This really stands out because I don't know of any other George Whitefield film. And also not to take away from George Washington, but there is debate over the authenticity of his

Christian faith. There are people that I know and love and highly esteem who are on both sides of that.

Some believe that he was genuinely a strong Christian, like Peter Lilbeck was promoting that concept in his massive biography of George Washington.

And I know of others that have reason for doubt, even though he was a great man used of God.

So I'm just thrilled that you chose Whitefield myself. Yeah. Something else interesting that happened that you might find pretty cool is my daughter's attending classes over in Oxford in England for English literature.

And I was over visiting that school with her a couple of years ago, actually before this event that I just shared with you about the

Valley Forge story. And her and I were walking through the chapels of some of the colleges at Oxford.

And we got into the Pembroke College Chapel and are looking around and I was seeing some

Whitefield imagery. And again, this is before the idea of the movie came along. And I called

Jeff Bender from the chapel and it was early in the morning back in Pennsylvania. But he picked up the phone and I said,

Jeff, I'm standing in your hero's chapel at Pembroke College. I said, would you pray? And I put him on speakerphone and my daughter recorded the prayer.

And it was for another great awakening in this nation. It was that the mission and the prayers and the sermons of Whitefield will be heard again.

Little did we know a year later, I'd be sitting in this cottage at Valley Forge. And now here we are nearly, you know, it's in its seventh week in the box office.

Nearly 700 ,000 people have already seen the film. It has its streaming.

We have a significant distributor who picked it up for international distribution.

And the testimonies that we're getting are overwhelmingly positive. Just life changes happening.

It's incredible. But like I said to Jonathan Blair earlier, obviously, for me, the most totally impressive thing about the whole movie is the absolute clarity of the gospel of Jesus Christ being proclaimed.

I mean, you know, it's the first Christian film that I have ever seen that gives the gospel in such plainness, you know, and like I said, with such clarity.

So much so that when my family and I, when we saw the film, we were coming to the theater and I told my sons,

I said, finally, there's a Christian film that I will take an unbeliever to see.

Wow. Amen. So, you know, so I mean, my hat's off to you guys. I mean, that's, you know, besides everything else that was done to make the movie, which is all top notch, you know, but to have the gospel so clear.

And then, of course, Jonathan portraying the role of Whitefield very convincingly and especially in the scenes of where he's preaching, you know, that was just so well done.

And so I just I commend you and commend everybody that worked on that film.

Very thankful to the Lord. Well, Kurt, that is high praise coming from you.

I mean, you studied this man and knew him before I had the idea of him.

And so coming from you, thank you on behalf of the team here. Thank you. We're blessed to hear that it has passed the experts' tests out there.

And you know, what's interesting is 95 percent of the film is based on fact, like the sermons that Whitefield preached.

And we had to nuance them a little bit, but they're his words. Yes, you're right. When I heard and then that was the other thing that struck me.

Forgive me for interrupting you, but I do have to say this in praise of that part of the film.

I told my wife and sons, I said. He is he is preaching

Whitefield sermons. Amen. Those are Whitefield's words, you know.

So so anyway, I'm sorry for interrupting you. But yeah, I just have to confirm that with you, brother.

Thank you. Yeah. Kurt had brought that up in our review episode before we had

Jonathan and you on. He had brought up that those are directly from Whitefield's sermons.

Yeah. And I credit John Blair for that work because he's a talented writer in his own right.

And in fact, he's writing our third film that we're working on right now. And, you know, I gave him the sermons.

I said, here's what I need them to say. Here's pick find a Whitefield sermon that that puts that points the story in this direction.

And, you know, we'll nuance it for timing's sake. You know, we can't use the entire thing. But he went and did that that that heavy lifting in that work.

And I'm telling you, when he put those headphones in pre -production, when he put those headphones on and he'd listened to those sermons and memorized those lines when he got on set and he started to preach from the balcony or from the coal lined scaffold, you know, not scaffold, but the the the pulpit that he built.

Right. And then he started to preach. We had a move of God happen.

On the set, we had a cast in the coal that we captured. We were not making a movie at that point in time.

We were being ministered to. And there were tears and there were people having life changing experiences.

And he did it all in one take. He had everything memorized. Wow. Well, yes, that's why.

I mean, that's not saying that film actors won't do this, but theater league theater trained actors, they they get it into their

DNA and their their physicality and their words. They they work on it. They match it because they have to do it live before an audience.

Yeah, that's what he tapped into. And so, oh, my goodness, it was I wish I could rewind and replay and re -experience those shots because I walked up to him afterward, especially the coal field.

And I said, John, you have any idea what you just did? Like you said, actually, I don't. He said,

I'm lightheaded. Well, I'll speak. You wiped up.

I told Jonathan in the first hour that I was going to challenge you to do a sequel of A Great Awakening where you would have to go back a little bit in time and highlight the not only the strong bond of love, but the intense, fiery theological rivalry between Whitfield and Wesley.

Yeah, that was something that went on through the remainder of their lives and until Whitfield went home to be with the

Lord. And as I was mentioning before, even though that the disagreements and disputes were fiery and heated,

George Whitfield did ask a friend in England to make sure that Wesley preached his funeral service in England before he went to the

United States. Yeah, what a story. Yeah, we call it cutting your darlings because you can't fit everything into a movie.

And there were a lot of a lot of darlings that we cut. And we actually filmed the funeral scene with Wesley preaching at the funeral of Whitfield, but we just didn't make the film for time reasons.

Yeah, Jonathan had mentioned that. And I had a little tear trickling down my face. I had lots of tears cutting those things that I wish the world could see.

But, you know, the story is king and we had to protect the integrity of the storyline and not fall off on too many bunny trails.

Yes. And I loved the soundtrack. I think it is great that you remain true to the period where even

Protestants at that time were singing strictly acapella. There was no musical instrumentation in the movie.

And tell us a little bit about the creation of that hymn, because I did see a video where the composer of that hymn was interviewed.

Yeah, so Chad Marriott is our British friend and member of the team.

He was born and raised in England, a worship leader, and he married an American missionary girl and moved back here to Lancaster, Pennsylvania.

And he is just a prodigy. He feels it. He knows it.

He has these incredible musical sensibilities where he infuses classic with modern.

And he's all about having you feel something. And so he worked, he did I Heard the

Bells, which is our first film. And I hired him immediately to sight and sound full time and said,

I need you to be a part of our team. And he became our in -house composer. And so for Great Awakening, you know, we had time to develop what we wanted that soundtrack to be like.

And I'm a movie soundtrack junkie. I listened to some of the greatest soundtracks that were created, you know, repeatedly as inspiration.

And he and I have very similar tastes. And he saw in the script that there needed to be a hymn sung by the folks at Market Street, Philadelphia, November 1739.

And without me giving him a mission, he took it upon himself and started to play around with this.

And so I went up to his office one time and on the whiteboard were these lyrics for a hymn called Awaken Us Today.

And I read them and they were profound. And I said, Chad, where'd these come from? What is this?

He's like, well, I won't do the British accent, even though I'm very tempted to. But he's like, oh, yeah, you know,

I wrote that. And so I'm like, OK, well, can I hear it? He started to play it on the keyboard and sing it.

And people started coming into his office. And they're like, what is that? And Chad's like,

I wrote that. That's the hymn for the film. And I looked at him and I said, you just captured the essence of our film with a few lyrics.

And that that is the beginning of it. It's an original hymn that our British friend wrote on behalf of this

American story. And, you know, there's just something special about the way that that all unfolded and the backstory of his life, you know, living in England and having that in common with George Whitefield and coming over here and creating something that moved us.

You know, they're very similar. And so the rest is history. But when we recorded that in Nashville with the orchestra at Ocean Way, you know,

I don't think I've ever experienced that. But when you go in the room where the musicians are and they all play together, all the strings, all the woodwinds, the brass, the floor literally, literally vibrates.

And so when you're there and we did this, when they started playing that Awaken Us Today in that Ocean Way, which is a converted church and do a recording studio in Nashville, the anointing was just, boom.

Like, this is a new hymn that sounds old and it's a classic.

And I think it's an anthem for our church today. And we've had people request it repeatedly for their events and their church services.

So praise God. And we are going to our final break. It's going to be a brief one.

Don't go away. We're going to be right back with Joshua Enk and Kurt Smith after these messages from our sponsors.

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That's royaldiadem .com. And we are now back with Joshua Enk, who is the president of Sight &

Sound, and he is also the director of the movie we have been raving about,

A Great Awakening, the film about the life and legacy of 18th century

Revival preacher George Whitfield, as seen through the eyes of Founding Father Benjamin Franklin.

And Pastor Kurt Smith, I'd like you to ask another question while we still have time to have

Joshua with us. So Joshua, I had asked this question to Jonathan earlier.

For you yourself personally, did you read any books either about Whitfield or did you read

Whitfield's journals like Jonathan did? Any resources that you personally engaged in like that?

Uh, for me, it was just a lot of Google searches, you know, and you have to be careful with that, you know, because not everything will be true.

Um, but, uh, we go to the source material as much as we can. We had two historians on the project, um, and, uh,

I'm not sure, I can't speak for them as far as what they may have researched and read, uh, but they brought a wealth of information to us, especially that, that time period where America was at, uh, as far as colonies, you know, are concerned.

Um, but, uh, you know, when you go to, when, when the diaries exist of these people, uh, and it's their own words, um, that's the source material that, you know, sort of creators dream of.

And, uh, and, and not only did, and you know this, but not only did George Whitefield, um, journal well, but, and Franklin publicized that he published that and, and they became, you know, uh, accessible to the public, uh, to Whitfield's chagrin.

Uh, at times there was a little bump in the road along the way. I know that, but Franklin, a lot of money.

And, uh, when Whitefield was supportive of it because it furthered the gospel, he thought that if people would read his testimonies, that it would deepen their faith and their strength.

And so, um, you know, that, that actually became a major vehicle for us for the story, uh, the, uh, discovery of those, uh, published journals and diary entries, uh, by Ben Franklin's grandson.

And, and that is a fact of a fictional vehicle that we used. Um, we did, we do know that, uh,

Ben Franklin, uh, his grandson, Lightning Rod Jr., uh, had a brand new print shop built for him in front of, uh, his grandpa's house and that the paint was still drying during the start of the constitutional convention.

And, uh, you know, so when I discovered that fact, I thought, well, my goodness, uh, you know, what a, what a terrific, you know, surrogate for the audience, you know, audience member to have a grandchild ask questions about, uh, an old preacher friend that he had named

George Whitefield. And so, um, you know, what I like to do is

I like to find facts and have that inform the story, um, and build it on that solid foundation, uh, rather than just, you know, create a fictional account of a factual occurrence, uh, completely.

So lots of source material, lots of Google searches to the historians on the project.

It was wonderful to work with a team like that. I was, I was shocked to hear that, uh, the printing press in Ben Franklin's print shop was not just an, uh, unworking replica, a prop of some kind.

It was actually a rebuilt working printing press taken from the design of the printing presses of that era.

Yeah. If you want to, what people don't realize is like sight and sound has been around for 50 years and we've been bringing the

Bible to life on stage in a massive way. We have almost 900 employees here. Uh, we have two theaters, one in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, one in Branson, Missouri, and we have literally carpenters, engineers, artists, designers, costume, uh, seamstresses, wig masters.

Uh, we train our animals here. So when we started to make movies, we had all these resources, you know, and they weren't all just standing by because we're doing stage productions as well, but we were able to tap into a team that with a wealth of, of experience in the entertainment side of things.

And so when we, uh, laid out this story of a great awakening and, uh, a press had to be built, well, that's like giving candy to a child.

You know, they did their, they discovered the original blueprints of the

Franklin press followed them to a tee. Well, no, here's another little

Easter egg for you guys. When you watch the movie again, if you do, um, the, uh, typesets at the end of the film that Benny, that, uh,

Ben Franklin's son, Benny was putting together on the print press. Those are, that's the actual speech of Ben Franklin, uh, in the correct typeset with the correct typeset sizes here in Lancaster.

We have a, we call him printer Bob, uh, paper Bob and printer Ken. These are two experts in their fields.

And so, uh, printer Ken, uh, does typesets and, and teaches people to do that.

And he took two weeks and crafted the entire Franklin speech as it would have been exactly.

And created that force, brought it over. It's like, you know, eggs on a tray, you know, it was very delicate.

Um, and he was with us for the day of the shoot. And so when, when we put, when, uh,

Benny, uh, puts that speech on that print press, that's the actual speech. So just a little

Easter egg. Nobody will ever know it. Even if you freeze frame it and zoom in, you can't see it, but for us, that's, uh, that's a really fun fact.

Well, so something else along those lines that impressed me when I saw the movie is that in the, in the scenes where you've got

Whitfield building his little portable pulpit, I was really impressed with the fact that the pulpit that, you know, that he ended up building is an exact replica of the pulpit that he did carry with him, which

I I'm assuming it's still there in New York city at the, um, at the

Bible track society. Uh, I believe, I believe they're the ones that, that have the original portable pulpit, if I'm not mistaken.

I think it's in Oklahoma now. Okay. All right. In Oklahoma now. So, but yeah, so I was, as far as historical accuracy,

I was thrilled to see that like, okay, this, this is very, very impressive.

I mean, you got the pulpit, you know, very accurate. I mean, this is what it looked like everything.

Well, I'll tell you, I'm just, I'm just enjoying this moment so much, Kurt, because we were hoping for people like you to watch this film and, and, and, and bring out those, uh, those, those things that are, that are facts, you know?

Um, so thank you for that. I have a quick story about that pulpit. Uh, we built it and we put it in our storage warehouse off property.

And, uh, we had some third -party contractors working on the film, building props and painting and things like that.

And they had some combustible items that they left behind over the weekend and they started a fire. And, uh, it was a very, it was, uh, it could have been absolutely devastating.

Um, we have security footage of how this started. It just was combustible, you know, spontaneous combustion and these, uh, paint lacquer thinners and stuff like that.

And the fire was caught in time, but it stopped at the foot of this pulpit.

Wow. And that pulpit is made out of lightweight wood. I mean, there's nothing fireproof about it and the steel around it was starting to blacken, but that pulpit did not start a fire.

If it would have, it would have caught the rest of the sets and it could have been disastrous. So, you know, the

Lord works in mysterious ways. Yeah, indeed. Yes. And you were saying earlier that compared to the massive budgets of Hollywood, that this is a rather low budget film, but you would never know that watching it.

It's not like a science fiction film that would require some kind of multimillion dollar special effects, but it doesn't look like a cheesy cheap, low budget movie at all.

Um, it's just mind blowing how wonderful this film is in every way.

Yeah. Thank you for, for acknowledging that we always, we do punch above our weight belt, our, our, uh, our weight.

Um, we really, uh, are able to maximize our resources. We're very, um, resourceful, you know, people as far as a, uh, entertainment company goes and, uh, you know, we pick our battles.

Um, you know, we use the right camera and lens to make it feel like a Hollywood film. And, um, we, we put money there.

Uh, we put money in the crowd size, you know, for the market street scheme. We wanted people to feel that.

Um, and then, you know, just, uh, when you look across, you know, the, uh, the scope of a film, you know, you're able to, to quickly find which scenes need the scope and which ones don't like the story won't suffer if the scope was a little less here, but don't cheapen it there, but you can't do it all across the board with our budget size.

So, um, yeah, I think like we do on stage, I think that in most cases, uh, the production value is tripled of what we actually spent.

That's the, that's the read that we get from people in the industry, uh, that our films look three times more expensive than they actually are.

So, wow. Well, I want to make sure before the, we run out of time, I want to repeat the information that Bridget Sheriff of sight and sound gave me for churches that want to, uh, purchase group viewing licenses to, to play this, uh, film in their own church buildings.

Uh, the website is site -sound .tv forward slash group -viewing -licenses.

That's site -sound .tv forward slash group -viewing -licenses.

And if you could, Joshua, uh, just, uh, final finalize the program with what you most want etched in the hearts and our listeners today.

Well, again, Chris, uh, thank you, Kurt. Thank you so much for joining us. It's just an absolute honor to team up with brothers in the

Lord, uh, aligned with, uh, our purpose and plan to move people's hearts, uh, whether it's, uh, on radio on the screen or in the pages of a book, uh, we're all in this together.

Um, my heart is that, uh, you know, people would, um, not just watch this film, not just look at this film, uh, but that they would experience this film, uh, that they would allow the

Lord to open up their eyes, their ears to what, what the Lord might be saying to them as they watch the film.

There's a lot of challenging moments in the film. We didn't cut any corners with regards to the gospel message and how clear it is that was, uh, intentional.

Um, and, uh, and also, you know, in this era of canceling everybody because of some flaws and sins in their life, uh, made this film, um, you know, show the fact that God works all things together for good, uh, that he uses these flawed vessels, all of us, um, for his glory.

And, uh, I'll end with this, uh, my favorite line from the film, uh, when Whitefield is challenged by Ben Franklin, uh, around the area of, uh,

Whitefield's shortcomings with slavery. And Whitefield says, do not base your faith upon my flawed life.

Do not base your faith upon the cold religion of your father. Base it upon what he has done on that cross of wood.

Amen. And folks, I also want to remind you of the publisher's website for Thundering the

Word, The Awakening Ministry of George Whitefield by my co -host Pert M.

Smith. You can go to freegracepress .com, freegracepress .com.

My former pastor at Solid Ground Christian Books, uh, he also carries it at solid -ground -books .com,

solid -ground -books .com. And, of course, the website for Providence Reformed Baptist Church in Remlap, Alabama is prbc1689 .org.

I want to thank all of you for being on the program, and I want to thank everybody who listened. I want you all always to remember for the rest of your lives that Jesus Christ is a far greater