The Essential Church: An Interview With John MacArthur

The church says to every authoritarian government there is a power and authority higher than you

Our calling is not first to comply with your laws We must obey

God rather than men Welcome to the program ladies and gentlemen, my name is

Justin Peters I hope that this finds you and your family doing well today. I want to thank you so much for joining me for this podcast

Today I had the privilege of interviewing John MacArthur pastor of Grace Community Church about the film the essential church the essential church film details the struggles that Grace Community Church had with the

Restrictions coming from the local and state government dealing with the let's call it Charlie vector 19

Season, I understand that there's some censorship going on on YouTube so I'll try to speak in code as much as possible, but Charlie vector 19 and and the restrictions that Local state and governments not only with Grace Community Church, but in many places around the country as well in Canada the film also interviews

James Coates and Tim Stevens two Canadian pastors who faced not only the threat of persecution

But they were actually arrested for simply opening their churches up in obedience to Hebrews 10 25 but in defiance

Against the restrictions that were coming down from the Canadian government. And so this is a very well done

Film start to finish. I was very very impressed with it. I went into it with high expectations though Those expectations were exceeded

Let me say that this this film is not about Grace Community Church or John MacArthur for that matter

I know a lot of the critics say oh this is this is just something to make Grace Community Church look good and put

John MacArthur up on a pedestal and Evangelical celebrity and all this the only people who could say that are those who have not actually seen it.

So Please do go see it because one of the things that really impressed me

About the film is how transparent it was with the internal struggle amongst the elder board at Grace Community Church with how to respond to the

Charlie Vector 19 season and the restrictions that were coming down from the

California government They were not a unified elder board in the early stages of this

Now keep in mind that Grace Community Church has 40 elders, so it's it's a lot easier to get

Unanimity if you have only a few elders in a smaller church, but when you've got 40 different men that's a that's a heavier lift to get unanimity amongst that many and They weren't unified and it's it's a very transparent view into their own struggles with how to balance

Acts chapter 5 we must obey God rather than man and Romans chapter 13 as well where Paul instructs us to be in subjection to the governing authority so what is the right balance there and and I'll say that I myself in the early stages of CV 19

I struggled with that too. And and I initially did not have a right view of it

I kind of thought well Romans 13 is pretty clear. There's no real You know caveats there but by God's grace came to a much better understanding biblical understanding of of How we are to truly look at?

Romans 13 and Acts chapter 5 and all that and the film goes into this and it's just a it's a powerful testimony of the

Lord's work not only the life of Grace Community Church, but Tim Stevens James Coates and those faithful churches and let me also say many other churches out there

I know that you know, we're not in the headlines, but nonetheless they did the right thing as well

And so it's um, this is not a film that makes much of one particular church or one particular man it's a film that makes much of Christ and I think you will see that I do encourage you to go see it

The second part of this interview I interview Shannon Halliday He is the writer director of the essential church film and I will put the time stamps

Down below in the description so you can navigate this interview a little bit more quickly and jump around as you wish

So ask him some more questions and shed further light on this The film is just so well done

The writing the storyline and even special effects, I wasn't expecting special effects, but it's just absolutely

Superb, so please do go see it all the pertinent links down below in the description

Where you can get more information where you can find? theaters near you that are showing it you can put in your zip code and Advertise this this film on your social media accounts

Instagram Twitter Facebook all that kind of fun stuff Advertise it get it out there.

The more the word is out there more people go to see it The more theaters will open up and show it and so I think by God's grace

This will be a tremendous resource a tremendous Encouragement and even a really good powerful lesson in church history

There's just a lot in this film so I can't say enough good things about it So all the timestamps all the links to everything that you need down below in the description

Okay, dear ones without any further delay. Here's my interview with John MacArthur Well, John brother.

Thank you so very much for coming on to my program. It's an honor to have you on my YouTube channel, so thank you so much.

How are you today? Well, I'm doing fine, and I'm honored to have a conversation with you.

You're you're a dear friend So thank you for the privilege Absolutely. Absolutely. My pleasure

Well, John, I want to talk to you about the film It was a special privilege of mine just a few nights ago this past Thursday night

To sit in a movie theater with you there's a lot of things that I never thought that I would do in my life flying on the space shuttle would be one of Those and in sitting in a movie theater with you watching a film

Together is another one But it was a special time John tell us a little bit about the film

How did this come about and and what was the motivation behind it? Well, we went through the pandemic as everybody knows

Kind of in the in the public eye because we we said no, we're not going to we're not going to comply we're not going to follow the lockdowns we're not going to follow the masks and the distancing and the whatever else they onerous things they put on us because we're the church and our head is the

Lord Jesus Christ and not Gavin Newsom and not the Health Department of LA and all those powers so that's how the story began and It went on for a couple of years and the end of it was so amazing and remarkable

Because we won our case after suing the government.

We we won the case and the the result of the winning of the case was that the government had to pay three and a half million dollars in all the legal fees and They had to give us a permanent injunction against any time in the future

That no government authority or office can come against Grace Community Church You ask well, why would they give you that if they wanted to shut you down?

They were fining you and threatening prison and threatening to take away your property Why would they all of a sudden flip pay all the fees and give you that?

permanent protection and the answer was because toward the end we said we want a trial and we want to bring the health officials and the county supervisors in for legal deposition and That's perjury if you lie, and we're going to ask them the truth about kovat

And when we declared that we wanted a trial and we're going to ask them the questions about kovat 24 hours later.

They paid all the fees and gave us the permanent injunction. The one thing they feared most

Was the truth Yeah, right. Oh, that's the story and It just felt in my own heart like this was so unusual a situation

You know to come up against the government and and you know in the end the Lord vindicated us that I wanted to document the story

It's not about me. It's not about Grace Church It's much bigger than that And I didn't want to wait five years down the road for somebody to write about this and spin it a different way.

I Wanted a documentary that says this is exactly what happened and this is how you have to understand it

And so that so that people would be encouraged in the future When this stuff comes back again, because I don't think they're done trying to deal with Christianity and this culture that is so debased and wicked so I was hopeful number one that it would put some courage in the church for the future to see what

God did when we were faithful and Secondly, I actually want to make some people feel guilty

For shutting down the church and missing the opportunity to see the hand of God I Was actually going to ask you about that because I saw your clip someone posted it and it

I Wanted to produce something that would show how the Lord blesses those who are faithful for the purpose of The future

I Wanted some pastors and leaders To see this

Yeah, so can you flesh that out a little bit more for us when you say you won't you hope that it makes some pastors

Feel guilty. What's your heart behind that? Well, if you just shut your church down What are you saying you're saying in in a sense

Christ is not the head of the church We've been told to shut this thing down and you say well there was a there was a there was an illness

What do you want me to do? Well, we could say we want you to do what they did in the Middle Ages What they did when the black death and the bubonic plague came along They don't shut the churches down if there ever there's a time to open church wide.

It's then I mean This isn't just we we want to sing our songs This is people in hospitals dying and no one can visit them

You know, no one can visit them. We had conversations with people who said my brother's dying Can you go visit him and help give him the gospel or my my mother's dying or my my parents are older They're at home.

They have they have not committed themselves to Christ. Can you visit them? I couldn't get into hospitals to minister to dying people in our church congregation

One particular wife On her deathbed. I finally broke through the thing to get to her with my wife

Patricia So this is the time for the church to step up So that's where you have to start once you realize that This is not

This is not the black death like in the Middle Ages. It should have been a much easier

You know response to say hey, we're just going to be the church When you and then when you realize they were lying to you about the the

Danger, this was way way overstated as to the mortality rate Yes churches should have run fast to open up This is a this is about the conviction of what the church is in the world.

Just a footnote to that The LAPD Police in Los Angeles started coming back to our church even before the congregation did

What what does that signify well two things happened one they were being mercilessly brutalized in the

BLM riots and all the defunding the police and They started coming to Grace Church in in groups and their families

This was nothing they feared this was something they desperately needed and wanted and we had time and time again conversations with the leadership of the police department

So, you know, I was aware that they they knew that this was not what?

People were told it was and the the other thing that happened was we

Realized that if we are unfaithful in a sort of a minor test like this

We wouldn't be ready for the big one You know Somebody said to me. Well, this is like a one on a one to ten scale

But why don't you wait for the big one and my response was look if something comes against the church

We resist We don't choose this battle because it's a three or a four or a five on a one to ten

If you assault the Church of Christ We fight back. I mean we defend the church at every level and so This is the message.

We want to convey in the documentary be strong be faithful and God will vindicate himself

As he always does with his faithful people right Because once the government realizes it can take some freedoms away.

I mean, it's it's a slippery slope it may be you know a little here a little there initially, but The government the pattern is always to take more and more freedom and encroach further and further upon the church.

So it It may be illustrate that let me illustrate that for you They came to us and they said we refuse to do anything.

We refuse to any of the demands Because this is a First Amendment situation

We're not we're not we have freedom but by the Constitution so they said would you at least do masks?

No, would you at least social distance? No, would you have one entrance?

No, would you separate people in the auditorium? No, would you have this number and no more? No, we kept saying no

Necessarily because I kept saying no because if I ever said yes If I ever said yes, yeah, we'll do masks because you told us we have just given up our

First Amendment protection We we've let the the camel's nose in the tent. Yes, and in a lawsuit

The first place that they would have gone in a courtroom would have been well

They did this when we told them to do it so this isn't as strong a conviction as they're laying claim to and I think

Christians are going to have to understand this I mean, this is the future. This is the future this this

This culture is so wicked so base so corrupt.

So godless so hating hateful of the Bible They we're going to be the problem

All the way into the future and they're gonna have to silence us somewhere.

They're gonna try to do that so this was a sort of a maybe a minor test for what what is coming and Our hope is that the documentary is going to strengthen people to take a stand and and see the hand of the

Lord indeed indeed John, of course, obviously Grace Community Church and other churches

Like it that also opened up in defiance of the government restrictions and lockdowns a you face criticism from that end

You know, you're killing people you don't care about, you know elderly and all that kind of stuff

You're not loving your neighbor but interestingly, there's been some criticism from kind of the other side of the theological and ecclesiological isle if you will saying that Grace Community Church should have never shut down not even not even for a week

What one of the things that struck me about the film was the transparency

That was there in regards to how the elder board there

Worked its way through these issues because it was not a unified Elder board initially as to whether or not

Grace Community Church should open up. So two things Can you walk us through that a little bit that process within your own elder board that struggle and also what would you say to those?

Who criticize you from the other side saying well, you should never have shut down in the first place at all

Well, yeah and the the reason we shut down in the first place For the brief period that we did was because we were told

That people are going to die in the millions It was it was the same as if they said there's a hurricane coming, you know

Send your people to the basement or something Yeah, we didn't know and then the terminology people will remember was 15 days to slow the spread, you know, this is temporary

Okay, so they were They got us hooked on that It's just going to be a couple of weeks and then they kept drawing it out and drawing it out

It was I think it was a sensible thing to say We don't want to harm people and we had a couple of medical doctors on our elder board who said look what we hear is that they're going to overrun the hospitals and There's going to be such a mass of people who are ill with this kovat

That the hospitals aren't going to be able to absorb them and that would be a disaster So let's wait and see what really unfolds

And it was about two or three weeks after that that I knew that that was not the case The evidence was coming in it was coming to me just by my own observation and also from some people in the medical world who were telling me the truth and As soon as we knew that We said

We've got a we've got a meat But we also realized that we had all these terrified people in our congregation

Who had been purposely frightened of this thing? and so rather than send a mandate out and say you must come back to church and Just override their natural fears.

I just began to say to people That I had met personally with or talked to on the phone come to church

Just come to church. And so there would be 50 -100 500 and after a few weeks a thousand two thousand three thousand

They came back on their own. Yes, and that's the only way that I felt we could do that and not you know and not just sort of dominate people in a in a fearful setting and What happened was when they begin to hear from their friends that they were together

They were healthy the the LA Health Department had to put on their website There was no kovat outbreak at Grace Community Church.

I mean, that's a massive Problem for them, you know, they said you can't be together because everybody's gonna get sick.

We had hundreds and then Thousands and we didn't have a break an outbreak at all.

So I think it was just I Didn't want to force people. I wanted them to respond in a way that was on their own volition

That's how you have to respond to any Pandemic in any situation any reality about the difficulty of life and the dangers are just walking out of your house so they began to come back and they began to realize this wasn't what it was threatened to be and The church began to fill up and fill up and in the process

The elders are talking about when do we do this officially and it came to a point where we had a church full of people

But we hadn't officially declared we were open And I loved that. I mean that that was what

I wanted I didn't want the top -down saying you got to come to church. I Wanted the people to say we're gonna be at church.

Yeah, and the elders finally caught up to the people Right, right.

Well, I thought was really a fascinating insight when it showed you know like Mike Riccardi had a significant part in talking about how he came to a right understanding of Romans 13 and and by reading some sermons or writings from Martin Lloyd -Jones

How long did that process take for you as an elder board and to come to a unanimous decision

Well, I took a few months. I think it was March when the lockdowns hit and it was

July So April May June of this process is going on and we don't you know as elders, we're not really meeting

We're trying to zoom call and that doesn't work. Well, we're not meeting as elders on Sunday, which we normally do

We're not meeting at our normal elders meeting zoom meeting Occasionally, so trying to get everybody together and and make the case was was challenging

Yeah, so it was it was July when we said we're open but by then the church was filled with people

They had come back on their own because that fear began to diminish Yeah, and Mike Mike was wrestling.

Mike Riccardi was wrestling with the issue of Romans 13 The powers that be are ordained of God.

And so we submit to the government and What Lloyd -Jones had pointed out in his commentary on Romans and what

I've always had strong convictions about Was that we obey the government when the government functions in the territory given to it by God You don't want the government coming in and telling you how to parent your children

Although they would like to do that and they're working hard to do it Now they would like to isolate your children from you as parents yeah, but you you fight that you don't want the government running your church and So Mike was wrestling with the

Romans 13 thing and through the reading of Lloyd -Jones And I thought

Mike was it was wonderful the way he was honest about saying, you know I had to change my thinking

I had to see things a different way And so that was part of the process with the elders.

It wasn't that they were It wasn't that they were you know, sort of stonewalling us.

It was that helped me understand this He had a medical doctor who was saying You know help me understand this if this is going to be what they say it is and you have a theologian like Mike saying okay, help me with Romans 13 and that process went on for a couple of months and Everybody was satisfied at one point and we all just said this is it we're opening up unanimously.

Yeah Yeah, I really appreciated that part of the film I thought it was very very well done because I struggled with it too in those early weeks of Romans 13

How do you how do you handle this? So I think a lot of us did Um, one of the things that I really appreciated another one about the film

John was the Striking parallels between what Grace Community Church and James Codes and Tim Stevens and other pastors all over the place faced as far as Persecution and threats from the government and what the

Scottish Covenanters faced back in the late 1600s can you talk to us a little bit about the importance of Church in history and the emphasis of church history in this film.

Yeah through the years, of course I'm a lover of church history. So I dipped back into church history all the time through the preaching of Scripture and I always want to connect people with with history because you know what the one of the dangers in the church today is

That people think the church is some cultural phenomenon invented for the moment for now

There's a disdain for tradition. There's a disdain for history, you know, you see an ad for a church

It says we don't have an organ, you know, we don't sing old hymns This is not your grandma's church and this idea that it has to become some kind of contemporary event

That looks like it was invented last week So I'm always trying to connect the church with its magnificent history in the hand of God through that history

So I referred to the years to the Covenanters and the similar situation was the

King of England was demanding control over the Church of Scotland and and essentially said look you use this prayer book that that I authorize or You're gonna you're gonna be in trouble and it went to extremes in that period of 1600s to the point of Martyrdom.

In fact, there's a part of the film where you see the grass market the little martyrdom

Memorial there where they burned and hanged Christians because they refused the

King's edict Yes, so that was a time in church history and there are many other times there are even

Christians now They're losing their lives in India Pakistan because they're bold for Christ, right but that part of history was a reminder that the church is the is always going to be the target of the enemy and we may we may be

Inconvenienced we may have to take a stand and there might be a price to pay

But we haven't we haven't been hanged yet. We haven't been burned at the stake so Those noble believers of that time and you think about those two

Margaret's that we depict in the film an 18 year old girl Allows herself to be drowned and have her throat slit

Because she will not bow to the King of England, but only to her her Lord Jesus I want people to understand what real nobility looks like This is this is a feminized era even even the church is feminized

Much of the time it doesn't have them the manliness the fortitude Christians don't act like men as as Paul says in 1st

Corinthians, so I think that helped The viewer of the film understand that this is a very tiny little piece of church history

But there's a bigger picture. This is not rare. This is not new. This is not different This is what we should expect in our country.

We've had a reprieve from that for a few hundred years But but I I think that's over and I think every way they can there they're coming for us and we wanted the film to help strengthen

Christians by seeing the hand of God in this and Trusting it in the future

Amen, amen. Well, I believe it will certainly do that I had high expectations coming into the film, but those expectations were far exceeded

It was just so so well done start to finish. So well done. The gospel was in there and John I want to ask you a question

I don't think anybody has asked you before but there's a clip in the film an audio clip from a sermon you preach back,

I believe in 1975 and I Want to play that clip now for people to hear and so and then

I want to ask you a couple of questions on the other side of it, so let's listen to this short clip from Sermon that John preached back in 1975.

I might have forgive a Christian brother who offends me yet Because there may be times when you will go to court

But the issue would be this that wherever the Word of God or the work of God is at stake

I have the right to claim my legal privileges if for example Some ordinance came along and tried to close down Grace Community Church would we say?

Oh, it's alright. We forgive you We'll all go home and just forget the work of God Not on your life We'd be down there with every sort of legal thing you can imagine trying to prove that we had the right to exist

It's a matter of protecting the privileges that God has given us for the proclamation of his words We need you come to the decision that you were okay with suing the government

How far back do you want to go? Okay, so John with that clip two questions

One when all this began to unfold in 2020 Did you remember that sermon and those words in that sermon?

Did you remember that? Did that come to your mind and number two? that that clip from you in 1975 is by far the most

Prophetic statement that I have ever heard it far exceeds any prophetic prowess from any modern charismatic prophet that I've ever heard

You put them in the put them in the shade prophetically speaking given the

Eerie prophetic nature of what you said almost 50 years ago. Has it made you at all rethink your theology on cessationism?

No No, and honestly Justin I didn't remember having said that I mean, that's a long time back 1975

I didn't remember that I said that but I do know my convictions and I I do know that that if they come after the church

I'm gonna take a stand it the thing that struck me when the guys I don't know how they found that They found that clip and they brought it and played it for me.

I Was amazed and on the one hand that they could find it But secondly,

I was not amazed that I said that because I've always believed that Yeah, but if they come against the church the church uses every possible thing it can

Legitimately to protect itself. We don't shoot people. We don't start a war.

We don't start a Revolution, we don't protest. We don't march. We don't burn things down but we will claim the powers that we have and the rights that we have and That's exactly what the

Apostle Paul did when they threatened his life and he said I'm a citizen of Rome I demand to go before Caesar He basically

Banked on a citizen's right to protect him from those who would take his life

So I just at the time said, you know, we're gonna be the church no matter what comes I didn't

I didn't know exactly What it would be obviously But yeah, it is nice to be a cessationist and still get something right in the future

Indeed. Well, there's more prophetic accuracy in that than anything. I've ever heard from the modern prophets

So, uh, that's off to you Well, um John one final question another amazing part of this whole story is that the judge that was

Adjudicating I don't know if that's correct legal term there but presiding over this court case that y 'all were involved with is a homosexual man

Married quote -unquote to use that term married to another man now Clearly not someone who would be

Sympathetic to your calls and and yet he ruled in your favor And it made me think of Daniel chapter 1

God granting Daniel and his friends favor in the sight of the commander of the officials, you know Ashpen has and Talk to us a little bit about this just the sovereignty of God in that in particular.

I Don't have any power over that judge Right, none of us has any power over that judge, but but God God has power over everyone.

The heart of the king is in the hand of God. So this points up the fact just in that you do what is right and Then you wait to see the providence and power of God unfold that the thing about the judge that That was you know

Embedded in him was he was a constitutionalist So he just kept saying you people can't bring these charges against this church

Until you climb the mountain of the First Amendment That that was so important because he was a constitutionalist

And just a footnote to that When they came to me, they said would you at least do some things just do something to comply?

Would you do masks and I said no, would you do distancing? No, would you do?

Quarantining people. No, would you keep them? Numbers limited in the worst. I said no to everything

That the first time I said, yes, if I just said, okay, we'll do masks The camel's nose is in the tent.

Yeah, and when you come to a trial they're gonna say this church says that they're under the power of God and they

They have to meet because this is what God has ordained and they follow only his leadership But they but they used masks when we told them to you just conceded your case

That's that's where the prosecution is going to land with both feet so yeah, we wanted to We wanted to do the right thing and look

I'm I'm old enough to have seen the providence of God a Thousand times over and over and over and this is the way

I want to live my life do it is right proclaim the truth and leave the consequences to the

Lord and We as you know because you're you're a part of the the army of men who believe and who hold those convictions that way

You you have a generation coming up like Tim Stevens and James Coates and even yourself

They have those same convictions and those two guys ended up in prison Or for what they did in Canada I didn't end up in prison but in the end all of us were vindicated and all the churches that we are pastoring had a kind of an explosion of spiritual response and people pouring in so I Never calculate how can

I? Influence a judge. How can I use some kind of carnal weapon?

I Just want to do what is right preach what is right and see what God's hand will unfold

Amazing amazing testimony to the sovereignty of God certainly is well,

John Thank you so very much for your time. You've been so generous and any any final words and and what can people do to Promote this film and get it in more theaters

I understand the number of theaters is increasing but we want to see that number go up and up What what can we do to promote this?

Well, there's the website the essential church movie dot -com

Go to that, you know link it up with your friends and spread it around There's a listing there of the theaters and hundreds more are joining all through today even

So the number of places where you're going to be able to see it are expanding and this is an amazing thing to me

Because I mean this is a film with the gospel I mean, yes great gospel is unfolded in this and yet, you know

Cinemark and AMC and regal theaters. They've all taken on this film

Amazing amazing that God has allowed this to happen So, yeah, I I think go see the film take friends you can order tickets on the essential church movie

Dot -com website it lists the theaters and times and all of that and and spread the word

All right. All right Well, John, I speak not only for myself, but for millions others.

We are so very grateful for you for your leadership for your faithful testimony and The influence of Grace Community Church is a model that you have set before us.

Thank you so very much and Look, I want to say thank you for you and your ministry.

You are a unique and blessed servant of the Lord and I'm thankful to the

Lord that he brought you into my life and and made us good friends. Thank you Same here.

Thank you so much John Okay, dear ones.

Well, this is part two of my interview First of course with John MacArthur and now it's my privilege to interview

Shannon holiday And he is the writer director of the essential church film.

So Shannon brother. Thank you so much for joining us How are you? I'm doing great.

Thanks for having me on. I appreciate it Absolutely. Absolutely. This is our second time to do an interview.

The first one was a few months ago. So it's been a while and So I was there with you the other night this past Thursday night in Screening of the film and I tell you saying and I told this

John that I went in with high expectations, but those Expectations were exceeded and I mean that it was just so well done everything from the the writing the progression of the story the

The gospel is in the film, which I was very very grateful of and and even the special effects

I wasn't expecting special effects in this film But the the way that was done was just so so superb.

So, um, yeah What's your feedback been thus far from folks who have seen it? Yeah, it's been overwhelming to be honest with you

You know when you do something like this, especially when you don't really have a marketing budget, which we don't we don't have

Advertising money to like put that out there and do what sound of freedom is doing like every time I pick up my phone

It's down to freedoms in my feed. We don't have the money to do that. That takes a lot of money so you're relying on word -of -mouth and I'm actually seeing that happen and it's it's kind of crazy.

Honestly, I'll hear I'll be on Facebook or or Instagram or Twitter especially

Facebook I was just going through the thread last night and seeing the responses because we showed this movie

Well to close to 200 churches around the world Screened it at the same time.

We were screening it which is really fascinating feeling that God in his mercy and kindness had me to be a part of something.

That was the global church was taking a part in in that moment and it was really

Amazing the the community in that moment globally I just loved it and couldn't believe that I had the blessings from our

King to be a part of that I'm so thankful for that but The word of mouth is picking up and people are just on their own saying you got to see this movie saying things that you

Just said, you know, I didn't think it was gonna be as good as it was. It's actually really good This is actually a movie and it's good and and and you want to your eyes are glued to the screen and you're watching it

And the story progresses and everything you dream of as a filmmaker to try to accomplish, you know

I'm sure there's gonna be folks out there that can pick it apart at some point points, you know Maybe don't like it but for the most part

You know people are really talking about it and the reviews have been great and word -of -mouth is spreading and I'm seeing that happen in Social media and it's it's awesome

Good good. Excellent. Well, I'm so glad to hear that Yeah, it was just so well done

And I was telling John it right at the end of the filming the other night I never dreamed I would be in a movie theater with John MacArthur is kind of surreal

But anyway, I said I said, you know, John I I really have a kind of an inherent distrust and dislike for the the

Christian filmmaking genre in general when I think of like some of the ones that have made it out known to the big screen, you know those kind of movies and because the

I mean they're Not only are they not real well done. But the main thing is that theology is just so bad

Theology is so bad in most of these films, but not so with you know, you've got some notable exceptions

You've got American gospel those films The cessationist film that's coming up Lord willing here shortly, but also this one.

And so I think those three films are Truly Christian films that I can

Recommend to anyone without any reservation at all Let me ask you

I want to ask you Shannon a couple of questions that I Think John is just honestly too humble to answer and I didn't want to put him on the spot

So I would like to hear from you. How did this film come about and Was this something that John proposed to you?

Did he come up and say hey, let's make a film How did this what's the genesis of the essential church?

Yeah, you know I think There were two things happening at the same time because as I hear pastor

John talk about it There's things that I'm learning as well that this was on his mind And there was even a moment during the lockdowns and We were open and he told

Everybody why aren't we filming this? We need to start filming this. We need to be filming the tents We need to be filming

Sundays. We need to be filming what's going on. We need it Make sure that this is recorded because we're gonna use this for something.

I'm sure but we need this and So right away people started filming and I was able to use some of that b -roll as well

So it was definitely on his mind and I think it's something he deep down wanted.

So would then win somebody else Me and Jacob Hoffman who's the producer present this idea to him and I put together a pitch and we talk about the story

He's then I think we're already on the same page. I think that's why it was greenlit the way it was and and you know what after he greenlit it he he had to exercise a certain degree of faith because you know,

I don't know if he really knew me super well or what I what I could do or not do and he just trusted and you could just see the man trusting the providence of God and He didn't micromanage me at all.

I what I pitched to him. He said that sounds good go do that and then You know, he didn't see anything

I did until you know, what we finally had the final cut and I said here it is What do you think? So I think it was happening on a couple levels he was already thinking about it and then we were thinking about it and then it converged and And then it happened.

Yeah. Wow and you know one of the one of the things I took away from this is it contrary to what

I See from the usual critics of John MacArthur and Grace Community Church This was not this was not a rah -rah film for Grace Community Church.

This was not something that you know Tried to put John up on a pedestal or anything like that.

Can you can you speak to that aspect of the film? Yeah Right off the bat.

I wanted to Make sure that that was clear because I think most people

Even maybe people some people at Grace Church. I've been there a while. I understand how it works

I know what an elder ruled church is And we have 40 elders and it's not

John just making whatever decisions. He wants to make sure I mean, of course, he's our senior pastor and he's been there a long time and he's earned our

Our ear he's earned our trust in that degree. So he has a lot of influence but look

You know the the elder board disagreed with him when he wanted to open up right away

Yeah, and he did not run roughshod over them. He did not throw his chest around You know, that's not how he rolls

And he knows that you know, God's sovereign over this he recognizes that right away and then he's going to say, okay

Well, this is gonna be a process and let's see what the Lord does and And that's how we function at Grace Church.

That's how our elders function. We have a principle of unanimity They they have to be unanimous and sometimes they're not which means they have to work through that Biblically and convince one another and that's part of this film and I wanted to be a part of the film so that those who?

Think that John MacArthur is this I? don't know I sometimes I think they think of the church as a temple or a pyramid rather and At the top is

John MacArthur then the rest of the elders then us and that's not what it is right so It's Christ at the top and we have qualified elders who are submitting to the

Word of God and if they don't then They're not gonna be there The other elders blasted to move on.

So we have qualified elders and we have 40 of them. That's a lot We have seven to ten thousand people at our church on a

Sunday. So There there's lots of shepherding that goes on in our church And that's a massive amount of Union.

That's a massive amount of people to become unanimous and it was not an easy process you know, I'll hear on Twitter occasionally like Certain churches be like well, we never shut down and the you know in the government

I'm like, but you have like ten people in your church. I don't think anybody knew that you were even open We're a little bit different in our size and we have a target on us.

So And you had like two elders to convince and we have 40 so it's it's a little different context and you have to understand

God's sovereignty in that and go with it and Stay true to the Bible and see what the Lord does and that's what our church did.

Yeah I'm so glad you brought that up because that is not to be missed I've heard the same criticism you have from people and I even brought this up with John in the interview people from more of our side of the theological aisle and ecclesiological aisle who agree with the

Agree with the church's opening up and defiance of the government, but they still say well

Grace Community Church can't toot its horn and this because you know They did shut down and and our church never never did and you know

There's criticism from our side of the of the aisle if you will to Grace Community Church too, but you're exactly right.

It's And it's not to demean at all Small churches out there and because there's many of them that are good faithful churches, but You guys have a huge Target on your back.

Yeah. Yeah, you know and It's this didn't make the film, but there's

The part that did make the film is John talks about the hurricane And you say you shouldn't shut down at all and he says it was like a hurricane if a hurricane was coming into,

Florida Well, and it's gonna hit Sunday and everybody's gonna die. You're gonna head out of the state

You know, so it's similar to that he also gave another example I chose the hurricane to make that put that in the film

But another example that came close second that almost made the film was he said, you know if I was on the train tracks with a bunch of friends and Somebody came up to me and said a trains coming and he's playing on the train tracks a trains gonna come any minute now

You need to get off the tracks Well, he's gonna get off the tracks and he's gonna tell those people to get off the tracks and if the train doesn't come

Well, he still did the right thing. He got off the tracks because yeah, and then when he sees that the trains not coming It's like, okay.

Well, it's this isn't what they said. It was this isn't what that guy said It was the trains not coming. So we need to understand that and move accordingly from there

So I think he did the right thing initially to for those first two weeks to heed the warning. We weren't giving

Ownership of the church to anybody but we were heeding a warning that was given to us And they were unanimous in that the problem was and this is why the film is interesting in my opinion

Especially the part of Grace Church The problem was is now that they were unanimous to close or to yeah to heed the warning

To be unanimous to get open back up. Well, that's another cup of tea. That was a lot harder you know now they're in it they're in this boat of Disunity and they have to find a way to become unanimous

And I just think the tension in the conflict that conflict of that is very interesting and I think that most people aren't expecting that to be in the film and it actually is and I Think they'll find it very interesting.

Yeah, I mean that absolutely The film is so transparent Contrary to what a lot of people would think and have said

Coming from people who haven't seen the film Oh Grace Community Church is just lifting itself up and you know making it

Look like, you know this perfect church that never does anything wrong. No, it's it was very the film is is amazingly transparent

With the struggles that the elders were having as they were coming to grips with you know, what do we do here?

How do we how do we interpret Romans 13? What do we do with that? And it was it was very transparent and I was

I was very appreciative and encouraged by that That's fantastic.

Yeah, that was our goal and I'm glad people are recognizing that I hope they're blessed by it.

Yeah, indeed indeed Well, Shannon were the film is going up against some pretty big movies right now

Barbie and Oppenheimer so Where how do you how do you kind of break out of that?

the fog of these big films that are out which by the way No Christian should go to see

Oppenheimer from what I've read in the film, but at any rate I digress But how do you as a filmmaker?

How do you how do you get your? Voice heard above the cacophony of all the other stuff that's getting all the attention and headlines

Yeah, that's that's an interesting That's an interesting conundrum. I don't know what's gonna happen.

I mean, that's why I'm doing shows like this right now I'm just going on every social media Podcast that will take me on and I'm talking about the film because we don't have the budget to advertise like I was saying

Yeah, so, you know word of mouth is key and this is how we get word of mouth going But I think that if it's if it does get out to folks

They're gonna be interested if they're gonna know if they learn about this film in their community I think they're gonna be interested in it

And I don't think there's anything that's like it that's out right now, and I don't think there's anything That has come out that's similar to it

As far concerning the church's point of view on it's unique Nothing that I've seen that documentaries on the lockdown

Tell this part of the story. Um, they tend to move only in the data area and it tends to be very scientific

And we do have that as part of our documentary for sure because you can't ignore the data and there was some scientific blunders that were or lies that were given to us by Our authorities but and we addressed that but the film isn't about Kovat or lockdowns.

It's about the church and I think the biggest compliment that I've gotten from people That just watched the film like on that Sunday night that you were there for that premiere at grace

They said to me what you did was actually timeless 20 years from now people can watch this film and benefit from it and That is the best compliment

I've gotten so I think if people can hear about this and they go to the theaters They won't be disappointed

But if it doesn't do well in the theaters Look God's gonna use this film has he chooses to use it and I think that's that's good that somebody's

Recognizing that it could be used 20 years from now and I hope that it is So the theaters aren't the end -all and be -all of trying to beat

Barbie Heimer or Barbon Heimer, whatever they're saying it is, right I'm not trying to beat

Barbon Heimer. I don't know if we're gonna do that. But um, but in the long run I think this this is gonna be available on blu -ray and DVD and I think people are gonna benefit from this and I think 20 years from now

Hopefully, you know people will still watch this and be blessed by it. Yeah. Good deal.

Good deal. I have no doubt I I agree. I think this will be timeless It'll serve as a as a model and an encouragement because this isn't it's not like this is gonna be the last

Attempt by the government to incur upon the rights of the church. This is not the last time we'll see this

It's gonna come around again. And this this film will be a good example for for us is when that time comes not if but when

Yeah, that's right. And that's one of the reasons we made it obviously. Yes indeed

So Shannon a couple of practical questions, um What can people do say they go to the website which is again

Essential church movie calm essential church movie calm and right on the front page

There's a button that says purchase tickets You click on that and and it's gonna take you to a list of theaters throughout the u .s

And I think you can put in your zip code at the top and see what's close to you And we're adding theaters every day.

So you got to keep checking back if it's not Close if there's not a theater close to you Then maybe there will be soon and you just got to keep checking back

It might be that you have to travel 20 to 30 minutes to get to a theater. That's near you Yeah, and you know,

I think I know of some people that are willing to do that They're taking their small group or their Bible study and they're making a night of it and So it could be a really fun night for certain church community groups to do that Yeah, absolutely.

Absolutely So if you checked on the website say five days ago and there was nothing near you

Check again because that might that may have changed right? Absolutely, for example,

I remember just a few days ago people were saying there's nothing in Phoenix. It's too far away It's only in Tucson, but now we have five theaters in Phoenix.

Hey, so they went from zero to five So they got a big choice of theaters and could be right in their neighborhood and that's happening all the time

So if they go to a central church movie calm and click on purchase tickets, they'll be able to figure that all out

Okay Fantastic, and it's just one night right July 28th. Well, it's not just one night

Actually, that's just the night that it opens. We don't know how long the run will be Okay, I don't think we're not guaranteed like two weekends

But it's definitely going to be available that weekend for a few days And if it does well, then they will expand it and keep it for another weekend

So it's just a matter of what the numbers are And so that could be really neat because if it snowballs and it really starts to grow and take momentum

It's just more opportunities to get the word out to people because they'll hear about they'll be like, what's that about?

I want to go check that out. Oh, that's interesting I will I have a Point of view on that conflict and I want to see what these people are saying and that's what we want and then we can preach the gospel to them we can tell them what the church is and That's our goal.

Yeah. All right. Fantastic So I think you started with 170 theaters.

What's that number up to now as of as of this recording on? How many theaters do we have now, you know

Arlie? Yeah yesterday we had 250 so we probably have more than that now, but it keeps growing every day

Keeps trying to get that number up to at least 800. We'll see if we can Okay, great.

And what if someone goes to the website and say the day it opens there's still No theater near them.

Is there anything they can do like can can people call their theater and say hey, please show this film

Yeah, in fact that's happened a few times where people have taken the initiative on their own They wanted to see this film so bad and they said hey my whole church wants to see this film

Why don't you guys carry it and the theater said well We're just not and they kept bugging them and then they when we came around our distributor said hey

Do you want to carry this film they had enough? Phone calls that they said. Yeah, actually we do we'll take it.

We'll see how it does So if they call their theater now, there's nothing in their area and they start bugging them

That actually has had effect multiple times and we've been able to get that theater to carry it Okay, good deal.

All right Well Shannon, thank you so much I wanted to extend my personal appreciation

Kathy's appreciation she saw the film too and It's a there's times. It's a tearjerker.

I mean, it's a very moving very well done film. So thank you to you Thank you to the entire team there at grace productions.

We really appreciate the work that y 'all have done Yeah, thank you for for having me on and yeah, we do have a great team here the

Lord brought together a lot of creative people to collaborate and make this thing and And they've done an excellent job and worked long hours.

And yeah, but it's not a film is not made just by me There's a it's me and an army of people.

So We're blessed to have them. Yes, absolutely Absolutely.

Okay. All right, dear ones. Well, thank you very much for joining me I hope that this has been an encouragement to you and all of the all of the pertinent information the links and everything down below there

In the description movie website and all that stuff and how you can promote it. Please do promote it on your

Facebook Twitter Instagram whatever Promote it the more the word gets out the more theaters will pick this up all for the glory of God Okay until our next time together

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ the love of God and the fellowship of his Holy Spirit be with you all

In God's sovereignty we won our lawsuit against the county and state governments in light of this monumental victory

We've been working on a documentary The essential church traces the history of government assaults on the church

Both ancient and modern as we face this opposition today This film will strengthen and encourage us to stand courageously as the body of Christ And now we want your support not only to support this wonderful documentary