Category: Television

Television

Living UNbiblically: 4 Reasons CBS’s “Living Biblically” ISN’T (And Why Christians Should Watch it Anyway)

Michelle Lesley

Have you ever had to stand by helplessly and watch as a friend – or maybe even your child – headed down the wrong path, seemingly oblivious to the right path that’s just inches away? You stand behind him, cheering him on, hoping and praying he’ll go the right direction, only to watch him make wrong turn after wrong turn.

That’s what it’s like being a biblical Christian watching CBS’s new sitcom, Living Biblically, currently airing Monday nights at 8:30 Central time.

Meet my new friend, Chip, the main character of the show. His best friend has recently died, and as a result, Chip becomes somewhat out of control – depressed, drinking, and not working. In the midst of this crisis, Chip’s wife Leslie arrives home one day, announces that she’s pregnant, and that Chip needs to snap out of it and get his life back on track. Chip decides that the way to become a good father is to start living “100% by the Bible”, carrying out every single command and obeying every law. He’s a lapsed Catholic, so he goes to a priest and asks for help walking through this gargantuan task. Father Gene laughs at him. Preposterous! Nobody can possibly live in 100% compliance with the Bible! But in spite of his doubts, Father Gene and his rabbi friend team up to serve as Chip’s “God Squad”- his spiritual advisors on this journey of living completely by the Bible.

Oh, Chip. Chip, Chip, Chip… I’m rooting for you, my friend, but you’re going the wrong direction.

I had high hopes for Living Biblically. Well, “high hopes” kind of like the hopes I have of winning the Publishers’ Clearinghouse Sweepstakes. It’s never happened before, but somebody’s gotta win. Maybe this time it’ll be me.

I want Chip to win. I want the viewers of Living Biblically to win. But, as of the first four episodes I’ve watched, it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

Because Chip isn’t living biblically. In fact, he’s living most unbiblically.

The structure of the show is to take a different biblical command or two each week and have Chip attempt to walk it out in his life. Some of the commands addressed so far have been: love thy neighbor, thou shalt not worship false idols, don’t use foul language, and thou shalt not steal. Worthy and good commands, all. So what’s the problem?

1.
Going against the grain

Being a moral person is good for society. It can even be beneficial to the person who is acting morally and to those  closest to him. But the title of this show is not Living Morally, it’s Living Biblically. And therein lies the rub. It is impossible to live biblically by simply extracting external behavioral commands from the Bible and attempting to implement them in your life completely divorced from the main theme of Scripture. And what is that main theme of Scripture?

You can’t live biblically. That’s why you need a Savior.

The Old Testament is a case study of an entire nation who –  even though they were chosen by God, even though they saw Him perform mighty miracles, even though He promised prosperity for obedience and calamity for disobedience – could not manage to consistently live by the commands He gave them. God graciously shows us through Israel’s example just how wretched and depraved we really are. We cannot pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps of good behavior. The Bible tells us…

We have all become like one who is unclean, and all our righteous deeds are like a polluted garment. We all fade like a leaf, and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away.
Isaiah 64:6

For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse; for it is written, “Cursed be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the Book of the Law, and do them.” Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.”
Galatians 3:10-11

as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; no one understands; no one seeks for God…For by works of the law no human being will be justified in His sight, since through the law comes knowledge of sin.
Romans 3:10,20

yet we know that a person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ, so we also have believed in Christ Jesus, in order to be justified by faith in Christ and not by works of the law, because by works of the law no one will be justified.
Galatians 2:16

Those who are in the flesh cannot please God.
Romans 8:8

But when the goodness and loving kindness of God our Savior appeared, he saved us, not because of works done by us in righteousness, but according to his own mercy, by the washing of regeneration and renewal of the Holy Spirit, whom he poured out on us richly through Jesus Christ our Savior, so that being justified by his grace we might become heirs according to the hope of eternal life.
Titus 3:4-7

Over and over again, this is the message of the Bible: You need to be in right standing with God. It’s impossible to achieve that by your own law keeping and good behavior because attempting to keep the law and behave well in order to garner favor with God is sin in and of itself. Why? Because you’re attempting to circumvent God’s way of making you righteous – repentance of sin and faith in Christ’s substitutionary atoning sacrifice on the cross – and instead demand that He accept your way of making yourself righteous – law keeping and good behavior.

I’m sorry, Chip, but you just can’t be living biblically if you’re living completely against the grain of Scripture.

2. 
For all the wrong reasons

Why does Chip want to live biblically? Because he wants to become a good father to his child. I’d like to pause a moment and commend the creator of Living Biblically for making being a good dad one of the centerpieces of this show. In a day where television often portrays fathers as dispensable or bumbling fools, and in a real world in which fathers are far too often absent or failing, this is a much-needed, courageous, and admirable message to send. I applaud Living Biblically for boldly stating that fathers are both good and necessary, and that men need to strive to be stellar fathers and set a moral example for their children.

That being said, obeying God’s commands in order to become a good father, is, once again, not living biblically.

When I was in college, my degree program required a course in experimental psychology. If you’re not familiar with experimental psychology, it involves rats. Lots of rats. Rats running mazes. Rats pushing levers. Rats learning to modify their behavior in any way that will earn them a pellet of food.

Sadly, this is the rat race Chip, and so many Christians who go to “churches” that only preach self-help sermons full of life tips, are running. “Just modify your behavior to X and you’ll get Y.” In Chip’s case, X equals obeying biblical commands, and Y equals his desired goal of being a good father. But that’s not what the Bible tells us to do, nor how the Bible characterizes obedience. The Bible says:

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation.
The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.
2 Corinthians 5:17

…we have the mind of Christ.
1 Corinthians 2:16b

If you love me, you will keep my commandments.
John 14:15

Obedience to God is not a quid pro quo in which your motivation for obeying is to get your own desired outcome. That’s what the Prosperity Gospel teaches, and God does not consider that obedience to His commands. Only Christians can truly obey God’s commands, because only Christians have been transformed by God into new creatures with the same mindset as Christ: to obey God simply out of love for Him and gratitude for all He has done for us. Those are the only circumstances under which striving to obey God’s commands is living biblically.

3. 
The heart of the matter

“Just go to church and be good. That’s enough,” Father Gene counsels Chip early on. Later, when discussing substituting what I’d call “Christian cuss words” for the real thing, Chip says, “It sounds unsatisfying.” Father Gene advises him, “It’s incredibly unsatisfying, but you’ll be doing the right thing.” Very bad advice, I might add, from someone who – claiming to shepherd the flock of God – should know better. It’s not “good enough” or “the right thing”, because, without Christ, Chip can’t be good and can’t do the right thing.

Chip, God can see right past your attempts at “being good” and zeroes in on your heart. He knows your thoughts: your lusts, your hate, your selfishness, your greed, your pride, and every other evil, sinful intent that crosses your mind. You might fool people with your external conformity to Scripture. You might even fool yourself. But you’ll never fool God. Your outward behavior isn’t enough for Him. He wants your heart.

For the Lord sees not as man sees:
man looks on the outward appearance, but the Lord looks on the heart.
1 Samuel 16:7b

Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and the plate, but inside they are full of greed and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee! First clean the inside of the cup and the plate, that the outside also may be clean. “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs, which outwardly appear beautiful, but within are full of dead people’s bones and all uncleanness. So you also outwardly appear righteous to others, but within you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.
Matthew 23:25-28

For you will not delight in sacrifice, or I would give it; you will not be pleased with a burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.
Psalm 51:16-17

If you want to live biblically, Christ has to clean the inside of your cup first by giving you the gift of repentance and faith in Him.

4.
Twisted Scripture

The Bible says:

Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved,
a worker who has no need to be ashamed, rightly handling the Word of Truth.
2 Timothy 2:15

Living Biblically’s “workers” (i.e. writers and script consultants) who are handling the Word of Truth for this show have every reason to be ashamed, because mishandled and misappropriated Scripture abounds at every turn.

In episode 2, False Idols (hint to the writers- there’s no such thing as a “true idol”, so you can just call it an “idol” rather than a “false idol”), Chip comes to the conclusion that his phone is an idol, so he smashes it and lives life phoneless (at least for that episode). Why does Chip think his phone is an idol? Because it’s taking up too much of his time and attention. That’s not the biblical definition of idolatry. An idol is something that you lavish love and devotion on in the place of God. The command in Exodus 20:3 is “You shall have no other gods before Me.” Chip didn’t smash his phone because he’s grieved that he has sinned against a holy God by loving his phone more than he loves Christ (because he doesn’t know Christ). He smashed it in order to fulfill a biblical law so that he’ll become a better father.

In episode 4, Thou Shalt Not Steal, Chip realizes he has, on several occasions in the past, brought office supplies home from work for personal use, and that this violates the eighth Commandment. (I’d like to commend the makers of Living Biblically here for demonstrating that “Thou shalt not steal” isn’t just about armed bank robbery, as some seem to think; it’s about pens and paper clips, too.) Father Gene comes to the rescue once again with…out of context Scripture.

“Ezekiel 33:15,” Chip quotes (actually, it’s Ezekiel 33:15a and 16a, but OK) “…if a wicked man restores a pledge and pays back what he has taken by robbery…none of the sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him.” (Another round of kudos to the writers here: Chip seems to be quoting from a decent modern translation – not The Message or some other adulteration of Scripture, not the KJV, as though no reliable modern English translations exist. As nearly as I can tell, he’s using the NASB, though there might be another translation with identical wording.)

“Bye bye sins!” Chip chortles as he begins bagging up reams of copy paper and other assorted office supplies to return to his workplace. As if glibly restoring the items to the supply closet will wipe out this offense against God. The problems here?

First of all, though there’s much to glean from the book of Ezekiel, Chip is reading somebody else’s mail. Ezekiel was written to Old Testament Israel, not as instructions for New Testament Christians (or lost people either, as Chip is). Zacchaeus would have been a much better role model for Chip in this particular instance. Next, Chip has ripped verses 15 and 16 out of their immediate context. Verse 15 starts in the middle of a sentence, for goodness sakes:

14 Again, though I say to the wicked, ‘You shall surely die,’ yet if he turns from his sin and does what is just and right, 15 if the wicked restores the pledge, gives back what he has taken by robbery, and walks in the statutes of life, not doing injustice, he shall surely live; he shall not die. 16 None of the sins that he has committed shall be remembered against him. He has done what is just and right; he shall surely live. Ezekiel 33: 14-16

This passage is not saying that simply returning stolen items will zero out your sin debt. Ezekiel 33 is a beautiful passage about true, from the heart, repentance that leads to walking through life in obedience to God. Indeed, the entire book of Ezekiel is God calling Israel to grieve and mourn over her sin (mainly of idolatry and forsaking the worship of God) and to return to Him. God isn’t calling Israel to rote obedience to random commands in order to actualize her own personal goals, but to the love and worship of God. If Chip truly wanted to live biblically, we would have seen him on his face in prayer, heartbroken over his sin, imploring God to forgive him.

 

There’s a lot that’s unbiblical about Living Biblically, but if you’re a Christian, I’d still recommend you consider watching it. As homework. Watch it as an apologetics and hermeneutics assignment. Get your Bible out. Which scenes and ideas match up with Scripture, and which don’t? Why or why not? Watch it to get a better grip on the world’s mindset about God, sin, and the Bible to help you in your approach to sharing the gospel. Maybe the show will even uncover some unbiblical ideas you’ve been holding on to.

In the final analysis, I applaud the creators and producers of Living Biblically for attempting something fresh and creative. It was a nice try, but Chip isn’t living biblically. To borrow from contemporary Christian phraseology, he’s living “moralistic therapeutic me-ism”.

Because unless you repent of your sin and throw yourself upon the mercy and grace of Christ to save you, you’ll never be living biblically.

Have you been watching Living Biblically?
Which scenes or ideas from the show have you found biblically problematic OR faithful to Scripture?

Bible, Entertainment, Movies, Television

Six Thoughts on History’s “The Bible” ~ Part 3 ~ REDUX

Michelle Lesley

thWith the movie Son of God releasing in theaters tomorrow, February 28, for the past two Thursdays I’ve been rerunning a three part series I wrote on last year’s History Channel miniseries, The Bible. This is the final installment. Son of God is Roma Downey’s and Mark Burnett’s movie about Jesus that is drawn from The Bible’s scenes pertaining to His life and ministry, as well as deleted scenes that did not make it into the miniseries.

Also see: Should Christians Boycott ‘Son of God’? Three Things to Consider


Six Thoughts on History’s “The Bible” ~ Part 3

This is the third of a three part series on The History Channel’s The Bible miniseries*. You can find Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

5. The faulty theology of “The Bible’s” theological advisors is influencing and slanting the way God’s word is being presented.

Rick Warren’s twisting of Scripture to fit his “Purpose Driven” overview of God’s nature and character, Joel Osteen’s self esteem boosting and positive thinking, T.D. Jakes’ prosperity gospel and modalism (an unbiblical doctrine of the Trinity), and Roma Downey’s New Age spiritual psychology degree have crept into The Bible’s stories and subtly shifted the Scriptures’ real focus on sinful man’s need of God’s redemption to a “follow the leader and together we’ll change the world” paradigm.

Go back to the beginning of the series and watch it again, counting the number of times the word “leader” is used. Every major Old Testament character has been cast as a “leader,” and Israel’s prosperity or demise is portrayed as contingent on whether the leader was good or bad and whether or not Israel followed his leadership. This is not the message of God’s word. When Israel was obedient to God, she flourished. When she rebelled and chose idolatry, she crashed and burned. Kings, judges, and prophets had influence on the people, but it was Israel’s obedience to God Himself that was the hinge on which the nation swung.

0bc90ac98e8e3d20a24be1f335b5966aIt was especially disturbing to hear prophets such as Jeremiah and Daniel being cast as “leaders.” The prophet’s job was not to lead the people. The prophet’s job was to speak the words of God to the people and exhort them to submit to Him, just as pastors are supposed to do today. Leaders say, “Follow me.” Prophets say, “Follow God.”

Further, nowhere in God’s word does it say that Jesus came to “change the world,” or “change people’s lives,” nor does the Bible teach that Christians are to do these things. Jesus came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10), to serve, and give His life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45). Christians are exhorted, not to the lofty goal of “changing the world,” but to the abasing role of denying ourselves, taking up our crosses daily (Luke 9:23), being persecuted (2 Tim. 3:12), and making disciples (Matt 28:19-20).

Jesus did change the world, and He does change our lives, but this was a side effect of His life, death, and resurrection, not His goal. He was here to carry out God’s plan of redemption. The movie’s “change the world” mentality puts the focus on us. Scripture puts the focus on God’s sovereign redemptive purposes.

6. The glory has departed from “The Bible.”

From the beautiful picture of Jesus’ sacrificial death for us in the story of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, to the overwhelming mercy and forgiveness of God after David’s sin with Bathsheba, to the awe-inspiring, God given faith in Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego’s refusal to bow to an idol, the glory of God, which fairly drips from the Scriptures, is achingly absent from The Bible. To be fair, I don’t think any movie could ever completely capture the same revelation of God’s magnificence that a Christian experiences when he sits down and interacts with the Bible as the Holy Spirit moves in and among the living and active words. But there are movies that have come much closer than this one has. The Scriptures are not just a collection of stories meant to inspire us to emulate their heroes. Rather, they reveal to us who God is; a different facet of His glorious nature and character in each story we read.

As I conclude these six observations about History’s The Bible, it is my hope and prayer that the overall effect of the series having been telecast will be a positive one for the Kingdom. For those of us who belong to Christ, may we use it as a springboard to share the gospel with the lost and encourage discernment and study of God’s word for our brothers and sisters in Christ and for ourselves.

*Just a note for future readers: This article was written during the week between episodes 3 and 4 of the miniseries. Episode 3 wrapped up the Old Testament and introduced the New Testament, covering Jesus’ birth through the calling of Peter. As I write, I have not seen episode 4 or 5.

Bible, Entertainment, Movies, Television

Six Thoughts on History’s “The Bible” ~ Part 2 ~ REDUX

Michelle Lesley

With the movie Son of God releasing in theaters on February 28, for the next three Thursdays I’ll be rerunning a three part series I wrote on last year’s History Channel miniseries, The Bible. Son of God is Roma Downey’s and Mark Burnett’s movie about Jesus that is drawn from The Bible’s scenes pertaining to His life and ministry, as well as deleted scenes that did not make it into the miniseries.

Also see: Should Christians Boycott ‘Son of God’? Three Things to Consider

Six Thoughts on History’s “The Bible” ~ Part 2

This is the second of a three part series on The History Channel’s The Bible miniseries*. You can find Part 1 here and Part 3 here.

4. Does it really matter if “The Bible” is factually inaccurate and skips a lot of important stuff? It’s artistic license after all! 

Yes, it matters. And it matters on a lot of levels.

First, I’ve noticed a lot of details that this movie has gotten wrong when it would have been just as easy/inexpensive/practical to get it right. A few small examples:

0bc90ac98e8e3d20a24be1f335b5966aIn Scripture, when the Philistines wanted to bribe Delilah to betray Samson, they went to her (Judges 16:5). In the movie, the Philistines summoned Delilah to come to them.

In Scripture, Daniel was cast into a pit or cave with lions, and a stone was rolled over the opening (Daniel 6:17). In the movie, Daniel was put into a dungeon with lions and a door was closed and locked behind him.

In Scripture, it is clear that Sodom and Gomorrah were destroyed primarily for the sin of homosexuality (Jude 7). In the movie, homosexuality in Sodom and Gomorrah is not even hinted at.

Now, if the movie makers can’t even get these simple details correct, can they be trusted to get the much more complex details of Jesus’ life, teachings, and propitiatory death and resurrection correct? As I said before, a lot of people won’t pick up their Bibles or have a Christian share the gospel with them after seeing the movie. What about them and the real Jesus they need for salvation?

Second, the Bible isn’t just an anthology of short stories which are unrelated to one another. The Bible is one unified story—the story of God’s redemption of sinful man in the person of Jesus Christ. Every story, every incident, every jot and tittle of the Old Testament shows man’s need for redemption and points to the Redeemer to come: Christ. The gospels tell the story of Christ’s redemptive mission. Acts through Revelation point us back to the first coming of Christ and ahead to His second coming. When you omit or mangle any of the links in that chain, the story of redemption –the entire point of the Bible—breaks down, gets tarnished, gets lost in the shuffle. Why is that important? Because the Bible shows us our need of redemption from our sin. Our eternity depends on it.

Finally, and most importantly, God’s word is high and holy, and it must be treated as such rather than playing fast and loose with it. He has preserved it through thousands of years and at the cost of many lives. God takes His word seriously, and so should we.

Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.
Matthew 24:35

I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book.
Revelation 22:18-19

…To be continued…

*Just a note for future readers: This article was written during the week between episodes 3 and 4 of the miniseries. Episode 3 wrapped up the Old Testament and introduced the New Testament, covering Jesus’ birth through the calling of Peter. As I write, I have not seen episode 4 or 5.

Bible, Entertainment, Television

Redux Dynasty: In Stereotype

Michelle Lesley

collage

 

I’ve tried to stay out of this whole Duck Dynasty thing. Really, I have. As a fan of the show and a fan of Louisiana’s economy (which has been bolstered by the show), I guess I felt like it would be something akin to a conflict of interest to write anything about it. Plus, anything I could have written was already being written by plenty of other, better writers. I’m not a bandwagon kind of gal. Why rehash and regurgitate? It’s boring.

But, today I read Trevin Wax’s excellent blog post: Duck Dynasty Debrief, and he said something that got me thinking (he’s really good at that). So much so, that, late to the party or not, I had to write about it.

“The popularity of Duck Dynasty is a double-edged sword for evangelicals. The show reinforces the stereotype that devout Christians are a bunch of backwards rednecks. “

True, that stereotype is out there. It’s even been laid on me a number of times by non-Christians.

And guess what? I’m OK with that.

Why?

Because if anyone is at “fault” for the stereotype of Christians as uneducated, rough around the edges rednecks, it’s Jesus. He started the whole thing by picking people like Peter, Andrew, James, and John as His disciples. Fishermen. Uneducated. Not sophisticated. As Trevin rightly said in his article, we shouldn’t make Phil Robertson Christianity’s spokesman simply because he’s a celebrity. But the disciples? Those guys ARE our spokesmen despite their blue collar status and the fact that they put their feet in their mouths occasionally. And I’ll bet they had beards, too.

Jesus is also responsible for saying how difficult it is for a rich (which, in His day, went hand in hand with “educated” and “sophisticated”) man to enter the kingdom of God (Matthew 19:24), for thanking God “that you have hidden these things from the wise and understanding and revealed them to little children;” (Matthew 11:25), and, through Paul, “But God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong; God chose what is low and despised in the world, even things that are not, to bring to nothing things that are,” (1 Corinthians 1:27-28).

So, maybe it’s not so much a stereotype as it is, well, true. We’re the ones who have become pridefully elitist. If rednecks were good enough for Jesus, that’s good enough for me. Grab the camo, quit looking down your nose, and embrace your inner redneck, brothers and sisters. It’s in our blood.

Bible, Entertainment, Movies, Television

Six Thoughts on History’s “The Bible” ~ Part 3

Michelle Lesley

This is the third of a three part series on The History Channel’s The Bible miniseries*. You can find Part 1 here and Part 2 here.

5. The faulty theology of “The Bible’s” theological advisors is influencing and slanting the way God’s word is being presented.

Rick Warren’s twisting of Scripture to fit his “Purpose Driven” overview of God’s nature and character, Joel Osteen’s self esteem boosting and positive thinking, T.D. Jakes’ prosperity gospel and modalism (an unbiblical doctrine of the Trinity), and Roma Downey’s New Age spiritual psychology degree have crept into The Bible’s stories and subtly shifted the Scriptures’ real focus on sinful man’s need of God’s redemption to a “follow the leader and together we’ll change the world” paradigm.

Go back to the beginning of the series and watch it again, counting the number of times the word “leader” is used. Every major Old Testament character has been cast as a “leader,” and Israel’s prosperity or demise is portrayed as contingent on whether the leader was good or bad and whether or not Israel followed his leadership. This is not the message of God’s word. When Israel was obedient to God, she flourished. When she rebelled and chose idolatry, she crashed and burned. Kings, judges, and prophets had influence on the people, but it was Israel’s obedience to God Himself that was the hinge on which the nation swung.

0bc90ac98e8e3d20a24be1f335b5966aIt was especially disturbing to hear prophets such as Jeremiah and Daniel being cast as “leaders.” The prophet’s job was not to lead the people. The prophet’s job was to speak the words of God to the people and exhort them to submit to Him, just as pastors are supposed to do today. Leaders say, “Follow me.” Prophets say, “Follow God.”

Further, nowhere in God’s word does it say that Jesus came to “change the world,” or “change people’s lives,” nor does the Bible teach that Christians are to do these things. Jesus came to seek and to save the lost (Luke 19:10), to serve, and give His life as a ransom for many (Mark 10:45). Christians are exhorted, not to the lofty goal of “changing the world,” but to the abasing role of denying ourselves, taking up our crosses daily (Luke 9:23), being persecuted (2 Tim. 3:12), and making disciples (Matt 28:19-20).

Jesus did change the world, and He does change our lives, but this was a side effect of His life, death, and resurrection, not His goal. He was here to carry out God’s plan of redemption. The movie’s “change the world” mentality puts the focus on us. Scripture puts the focus on God’s sovereign redemptive purposes.

 

6. The glory has departed from “The Bible.”

From the beautiful picture of Jesus’ sacrificial death for us in the story of Abraham’s sacrifice of Isaac, to the overwhelming mercy and forgiveness of God after David’s sin with Bathsheba, to the awe-inspiring, God given faith in Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego’s refusal to bow to an idol, the glory of God, which fairly drips from the Scriptures, is achingly absent from The Bible. To be fair, I don’t think any movie could ever completely capture the same revelation of God’s magnificence that a Christian experiences when he sits down and interacts with the Bible as the Holy Spirit moves in and among the living and active words. But there are movies that have come much closer than this one has. The Scriptures are not just a collection of stories meant to inspire us to emulate their heroes. Rather, they reveal to us who God is; a different facet of His glorious nature and character in each story we read.

 

As I conclude these six observations about History’s The Bible, it is my hope and prayer that the overall effect of the series having been telecast will be a positive one for the Kingdom. For those of us who belong to Christ, may we use it as a springboard to share the gospel with the lost and encourage discernment and study of God’s word for our brothers and sisters in Christ and for ourselves.

 

*Just a note for future readers: This article was written during the week between episodes 3 and 4 of the miniseries. Episode 3 wrapped up the Old Testament and introduced the New Testament, covering Jesus’ birth through the calling of Peter. As I write, I have not seen episode 4 or 5.