# What to think of impact of "Jesus" film's impact on world since it violates 2 comand?



## shackleton (Aug 27, 2008)

I have been hearing a lot lately about the impact the "Jesus" film is having on nations by way of evangelism so I wondered what the thoughts on this were on the PB since it is believed that movies about Jesus violate the 2nd commandment? 

(I was going to post a link but it has a picture of Jesus from the film and I knew that would offend some people).


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## Herald (Aug 27, 2008)

What Josh said. God is not hindered because of the errors of men.


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## Mushroom (Aug 27, 2008)

2Ti 2:20 But in a great house there are not only vessels of gold and of silver, but also of wood and of earth; and some to honour, and some to dishonour.


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## Presbyterian Deacon (Aug 27, 2008)

If God could use a talking jack ass in Balaam's day, He can use a film produced by them in our day.  The glory goes to God for it's impact, not to the breakers of the commandment.


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## JBaldwin (Aug 27, 2008)

I agree with others. I saw it years ago when it first came out when I was on the mission field. While I found the images of our Lord to be offensive, I walked away marveling at how the scripture ministered to me.


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## shackleton (Aug 27, 2008)

I am not offended, per se, by images of Christ but I have noticed that in movies and even audio bibles Jesus is portrayed differently. He takes on a particular personality based on what the people selling the product want to project. Example, the Word of Promise Bible, NKJV, completely dramatized (OVER dramatized), it has James Caviezel playing Jesus and it is a very mellow, almost sleepy Jesus who never exhibits any emotion. The worst movie, not counting Jesus Christ Superstar, is one that follows the gospel of Luke. It is really good except for how Jesus is portrayed, he is real giggly and dingy even when he is giving it to the Pharisees. 

The best ones I have seen are The Gospel of John and a cartoon called the Miracle Maker. Not that anyone cares or will ever go see these.


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## Pergamum (Aug 27, 2008)

Doesn't the PCA allow for images of Jesus in teaching but not in worship? I have known PCA churches to use the Jesus film.



For Mslms, they will often not accept it if you give them the Scriptures. But they are very receptive to audio or video presentations of the Gospel. There does seem to be legitimate fruit from these efforts of audio (music, reading the stories of Scripture in the vernacular...which I mass-produced last year and saw some results) and even video (the Jesus film in local vernaculars).


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## Athaleyah (Aug 27, 2008)

Pergamum said:


> Doesn't the PCA allow for images of Jesus in teaching but not in worship? I have known PCA churches to use the Jesus film.



I am unaware of images being allowed in teaching. I checked the Book of Church Order and all I found on images was the following:

*47-1.* Since the Holy Scriptures are the only infallible rule of faith and
practice, the principles of public worship must be derived from the Bible, and
from no other source.
The Scriptures forbid the worshipping of God by images, or in any
other way not appointed in His Word, and requires the receiving, observing,
and keeping pure and entire all such religious worship and ordinances as God
hath appointed in His Word (WSC 51, 50).

I am unaware of how one would be able to look an at image of Christ without thoughts of worship running through your head (thus breaking the second commandment). So if the church makes allowance for the use of images of Chirst, I think they are in error. I very much hope this is not the case. Perhaps someone more experienced than I am can shed some light.


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## NaphtaliPress (Aug 27, 2008)

It's an exception to the PCA Standards which I believe has to be registered with the Presbytery by TEs that take it. 



Pergamum said:


> Doesn't the PCA allow for images of Jesus in teaching but not in worship? I have known PCA churches to use the Jesus film.
> 
> 
> 
> For Mslms, they will often not accept it if you give them the Scriptures. But they are very receptive to audio or video presentations of the Gospel. There does seem to be legitimate fruit from these efforts of audio (music, reading the stories of Scripture in the vernacular...which I mass-produced last year and saw some results) and even video (the Jesus film in local vernaculars).


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## PastorSBC (Aug 27, 2008)

Presbyterian Deacon said:


> If God could use a talking jack ass in Balaam's day . . .



Amen. I have to remind myself often of this. If God could use that, then clearly He can use me.


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## ww (Aug 27, 2008)

I would agree with the others that just as some preach the Gospel and yet mean something else by it, God's Word does not return void. So if the film in any way includes God's Word people still will come to Christ in spite of its violation of the 2nd Commandment. It's just proof that God uses various means to bring Christ to the Nations even if those means are tainted with doctrinal error. Plenty of us were saved in Arminian Churches and many folks were saved under the preaching of Billy Graham just to name a few examples where Gospel preached reaps harvest.


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## Tim (Aug 28, 2008)

What bothers me is that because the Lord _can_ use the film for his purposes (He uses _all_ things for His glory), people think that this validates the method. No doubt people have been saved after watching the Jesus film or Passion of the Christ. But if you state that images of Christ are a violation of scripture, people will say, "how can you say that? Don't you know that so and so was saved as a result?" 

Unbiblical pragmatism.


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## ColdSilverMoon (Aug 28, 2008)

Pergamum said:


> Doesn't the PCA allow for images of Jesus in teaching but not in worship? I have known PCA churches to use the Jesus film.



Yes, the PCA does make an exception for teaching. At my previous church, Briarwood Presbyterian, they actually purchased an entire week's worth of _Passion of the Christ_ tickets at a local cinema so they could bring people to see it for free. Not saying I agree with that, but I believe it's within the rules of the denomination. The same church has paintings of Jesus over the altar in the prayer room. I love the church, but I thought that was a bit over the line...


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## DeoOpt (Aug 28, 2008)

As I was growing up I was allways moved by movies-ie- The Robe, Ben-Hur and some others, but it was the movie THe Ten Commandments that had me thinking and led me to leave the RCC.


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## NaphtaliPress (Aug 28, 2008)

I guess I don't have much patience with that kind of idolatry. And right there where anyone wanting to use the room has no choice but to see it?

Altar?



ColdSilverMoon said:


> Pergamum said:
> 
> 
> > Doesn't the PCA allow for images of Jesus in teaching but not in worship? I have known PCA churches to use the Jesus film.
> ...


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## Pergamum (Aug 28, 2008)

Is a teaching picture of Jesus REALLY idolatry? Putting pics of Jesus in a prayer room seems to be, but a pictorial representation of the acts of Jesus does not seem to be. There is a world of difference between pics of Jesus in church as objects to focus on in prayer and a graphic representation of the life of Christ.


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## Pergamum (Aug 28, 2008)

Josh: Again, some PCA churches allow pics of Jesus in teaching. This seems less offensive than hanging his picture in front of a place where people pray. The 2nd Commandment means not to make any object to worship. Some PCA churches state that using pics of Christ for teaching is not a worship use but a teaching use.


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## Pergamum (Aug 28, 2008)

If I grant your point that both are wrong, I think you still need to admit that one is less of an offense than the other.


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## VirginiaHuguenot (Aug 28, 2008)

Heidelberg Catechism:



> Question 97. Are images then not at all to be made?
> 
> Answer: God neither can, nor may be represented by any means: (a) but as to creatures; though they may be represented, yet God forbids to make, or have any resemblance of them, either in order to worship them or to serve God by them. (b)
> 
> ...


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## shackleton (Aug 28, 2008)

My wife and I frequent Branson, MO, which is sort of the poor man's Nashville, anyway, they have an ongoing show called "The Promise" which is the story of the passion of the Christ. It plays several times a day. A case can be made that movies can have some sort of evangelistic benefit but this show is simply Christ crucified simply for entertainment. Besides the violation of the 2nd command it proves that most people just don't get why Christ died. They think of it as something that makes them emotional. It makes them cry and feel good.


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## Rev. Todd Ruddell (Aug 28, 2008)

I was asked to leave a Church because of my objections to the film, which were tantamount to "A Bible in the hands of an unbeliever, and a preacher to explain its contents, far surpasses any second commandment violation depicting a person of the Godhead". Portions of the film were shown (unexpectedly) to a class I attended at that Church. I was appalled at the license taken with the Scriptures, especially when the supporters and promoters of the film were so adamant about its "accuracy" to the Gospel account. The trouble with any such depiction or dramatization is the extra-scriptural details that *must* be added to such a production (not even to mention the direct violation of the second commandment by depicting a person of the Godhead). The modern Church has lost the sensitivity to what inspiration means to the point that a film which takes great license in embellishing the Scriptures is still called "true to the narrative". It has been 15-16 years, but I remember one scene very distinctly--The actor portraying Peter enters the tomb of the risen Christ, grabs the graveclothes and presses them to his face, and then weeps. I remember thinking, "where is that in the Gospel record?"


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## Contra_Mundum (Aug 28, 2008)

If pictures of Jesus are a sin (and I believe they are),

then it is only reasonable to conclude that for every one person "positively" impacted by a single instance, many more (both saved and lost) are not merely unaffected, but must be grievously affected.

From a WCF point of view, blessing the fact of the "Jesus Film" is akin to blessing God for polygamy in societies where the only alternative to plural marriages for women is slavery or prostitution. Sure, no doubt there are many women who are given stable, productive lives under such conditions. But then, there are the many who aren't. And there are the hidden, destabilizing effects on the society as a whole.

I think the parallel is apt. Many are quick to point to the alleged benefits of pictures of Jesus. But scripture also warns us not to be wiser than God, and to stick with his "foolish" program. There is a way that seem right to a man...


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## Pergamum (Aug 29, 2008)

Contra_Mundum said:


> If pictures of Jesus are a sin (and I believe they are),
> 
> then it is only reasonable to conclude that for every one person "positively" impacted by a single instance, many more (both saved and lost) are not merely unaffected, but must be grievously affected.
> 
> ...



What should be done then? Should churches that use such things be censured, as well as pastors that allow it. And what of folks like RC Sproul that seem to make a distinction between images used in worship and visual portrayels of the NT for teaching? What of church-goers who watch these movies. Even Ben Hur shows the robe of Jesus right? If an elder visits a church goer and that church goer has such a movie, should he be under church discipline?


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## shackleton (Aug 29, 2008)

Since we are talking about violations of the second command I will mention something else that bugged me. My wife and I recently went to St. Louis we visited the PCA seminary, Covenant, the St. Louis Basilica and the Lutheran Seminary, Concordia. They have a new sanctuary and at the front they have a cross and on the cross was a Jesus of sorts. This is what bugged me. It was not the typical dead Jesus you see on crosses in older Catholic and Lutheran churches it was _art_! It was a kind of a wormy, squiggly looking thing. Since they felt the need to make the event, and person who saved them into a work of art it proves that they just do not get it. It sort of resembles that, make Christ into what ever makes you feel good kind of thing. I think the fact that they get what Jesus did and who he was so wrong bugs me more than the fact that it is an image of God. 

However, after going to the Basilica I do have a greater appreciation for why the reformers were so dead set against images of Christ. Statues and pictures of Jesus and Mary were everywhere. There were even a few people praying to them . 

side note: we rounded off our trip of visiting churches and seminaries by visiting the Budweiser plant.


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## TimV (Aug 29, 2008)

The PCA can allow whatever exceptions the individual Presbytery can get away with, and sometimes Elder candidates haven't got a clue as to the contents of the BCO or WCF, so the subject never comes up in any event. So I wouldn't use the argument that some PCA churches allow something as a justification of orthodoxy.

I understand the whole issue of teaching vs. worship is rooted in stained glass windows, and would be glad to be informed further by anyone. The idea was that European peasants couldn't read, so Gospel stories were portrayed in glass for their benefit. So the roots of the matter were in that sort of pragmatism we call "ends justifying the means".

When our church bragged about the amount of time the Jesus Film was shown by people we supported, I always kept silent because it seemed to me that there were bigger fish to fry, and you're supposed to pick the battles that you can win. Getting and training Elders who are really Elders would lead to the gradual demise of much that isn't right in Reformed denominations. But that can't be done until those ultimately responsible for good leadership start to care about good leadership.


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## Contra_Mundum (Aug 29, 2008)

Pergamum said:


> Contra_Mundum said:
> 
> 
> > If pictures of Jesus are a sin (and I believe they are),
> ...



ˇOˇ (shrug) Its a problem. If we were living 100 years ago, we wouldn't even be having this discussion. Hardly a person to the left of the Anglicans and Lutherans were divided on this question so much as a hair's breadth, whether a baptist or a presbyterian.


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## R Harris (Aug 29, 2008)

Contra_Mundum said:


> If pictures of Jesus are a sin (and I believe they are),
> 
> then it is only reasonable to conclude that for every one person "positively" impacted by a single instance, many more (both saved and lost) are not merely unaffected, but must be grievously affected.
> 
> ...



Excellent points. Romans 3:8 is a GREAT verse for showing that God does NOT approve of the position "the end justifies the means." Yet how often do we see evangelicals doing this very thing with regard to evangelistic "techniques" and "methods." It is perverse to claim to be "helping" or "pleasing" God by evangelizing but breaking several of His commandments in the process of doing so.


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