“When is Father of Lights coming out?”

While I know this will not stop the flow, I at least wanted to explain a little about our process of putting movies together here at Wanderlust Productions, and give you a peek behind the curtain, so to speak, at what we do and how we do it. Hopefully it will help answer the question as to why you have to wait so long.

The first thing you must understand is that Wanderlust is a tiny production company consisting of four people. There is myself, Braden Heckman, Brittney Banks, and Matt Bilen. That’s it. Brittney is the studio manager, bookkeeper, personal assistant, and has a host of other jobs, not least of which is trying to keep three boys from being complete idiots all the time. So when it comes to actual production stuff, it’s three people. Matt is part time at the moment, so now you’re down to two-and-a-half people. Keep that in mind as you read on…

At this point, I am nearly finished with what is called the “rough cut”. For the past month I have been building the movie. It started off as a 2:45 hour beast, which I have since widdled down to around 2 hours. I’ll soon have it just the way I want it, and at that point it will be, in a sense, the movie you will eventually see. But really, that is just the beginning for us. Next comes the time consuming (and for my guys, the really fun) part.

Everyone here will watch the rough cut, and when we’re all happy with every single thing in there, the cut will be “locked”, meaning I’m not allowed to go in an tinker with it anymore. The shots are the shots, and my voice over is my voice over. At this point, my heavy lifting for the actual movie is over, and Braden and Matt take the reigns, while I turn my attention to planning our upcoming tour of the film and putting together the Deluxe Edition DVD.

Matt is in charge of scoring the film, and since these films are known for basically having a wall of sound from end to end, he’s got a big job ahead of him. He basically has to create 2 hours of incredible music that fits the mood and intent of each section. He’ll also need to mix all the sound so the voices are all at the same volume, the music doesn’t overtake the voices, and any background stuff is either minimized or taken out completely. Matt’s the reason the movie SOUNDS good.

Braden takes charge of color correction and any titles that show up in the film. When someone’s name pops up onscreen, he did it. We usually outsource our opening titles sequences to a good friend of our who’s basically a genius, so at this point we’ll bring him in as well to start working on that. Braden will go through the film, frame by frame, and make the colors pop and really give the whole thing a professional sheen. Braden is the reason the film LOOKS good.

At some point, we’ll also need to record our director’s commentary for the DVD, and Braden will then get started on designing the DVD cover, the DVD menu, and other web stuff we’ll need associated with the film. Once the DVD is complete, we’re just getting warmed up. Next up is to finish the Deluxe Edition, which hopefully I’ve finished with the rough cut at this point. We don’t score the extras, but this Deluxe Edition will have an extended Director’s cut of the film, so Matt will have to add some music to that as well. Braden will go back in and color correct everything, Matt will do another sound mix, titles will have to be made, the DVD created, and then that is finished.

We’ll be taking this film out “on tour” so to speak this time around, and will be hitting some major cities across the United States, so I’m going to need to show some leaders the film beforehand to get them on board in helping us take their community by storm and getting the word out. Once we’ve locked in our cities and venues, we then have to kick in the marketing side of things, which is basically trying to get a lot of people to help us make the showing around the country amazing for everyone involved. We’re also hoping to have a companion CD of original and remixed music from bands and artists like Jesus Culture, Leeland, Jeremy Riddle, Barlow Girls, Kim Walker-Smith, Marc Ford (former guitarist for the Black Crowes), Jaeson Ma, and others. So we’ll need to screen the film for them and get them writing and creating songs that have been “inspired” by the film. We’ll need to create the CD, master it, etc…

At THIS point, the first of you will finally get to see the movie, and this will be sometime in the summer. We will be selling the DVD at these events, but it will not be available for the public for another month or two after the tour. We also have distribution deals with domestic and foreign distributors that need to be set up and implemented, lots of legal work to deal with, and about a million other “little” things that we have to take care of that simply go along with running a business. Oh yes, and we need to sleep every once in a while as well.

Remember, all this is done with four (well, maybe three-and-a-half) people! As soon as the DVD is released, we do it all over again with The Greatest Fight, our next film about UFC/WWF superstar Ken Shamrock. When that’s done, we do it all again with our first cartoon, Anointed Fighters.

So there is a little peek behind our curtain. Obviously we need lots of prayer during this time, so keep covering us with it, please. We also need continued favor, as we will be showing the film in the Spring to various entities in Hollywood to see if there is anything else up God’s sleeve with this film. In the end, though, it all comes down to whether or not you guys like the movie, and whether or not it pulls you closer to the heart of the Father. We’re going to work our tails off to make sure that happens to each and everyone one of you.

Just please don’t ask us anymore why we don’t simply give these movies away…

While that may seem like a fairly straightforward “duh” statement, try to understand where I am coming from. I work in an entirely VISUAL medium, and setting out to visually capture something that is not visually there can be, how shall we say, a bit tricky. I can’t help but view this film through the skeptic’s eyes, and even at this stage I dread the inevitable accusation that everything we filmed was staged. I cannot stress enough how unbelievable some of the things you are about to see will seem. As this film will probably have the highest profile of anything we’ve ever done, I am bracing myself for the strong backlash I’m sure I will face.

But all this has gotten me thinking. Why is God invisible? Why must I serve an invisible God? At its most basic form, faith in God is intensely personal, and all evangelism is based on the notion that “you have to take my word for it”. The hope is that your faith ushers in a response from someone else to step out and call on an invisible deity, wherein He will make himself known to them in a very personal way (yet remain invisible), and the whole process hopefully repeats itself. For whatever reason, this is the way God has set the game up. But again I am left with the question: why?

If we’re all truly honest with ourselves, we often have those moments of doubt where we wonder if we’re simply devoting our lives to a figment of our imagination. I recently spoke in a church in Chicago, and at the end of my talk I told everyone that God was going to meet every single one of them right here, right now. Even as I said it, I inwardly cringed, hoping beyond hope that I was telling these people the truth; that God exists and fervently desires an emotional relationship with them. So I prayed for God to show up, for Him to break through their minds and into their hearts, and then I shut up and waited.

It was an excruciating couple of minutes. Dead silence. I didn’t even have music playing in the background to help. It was all or nothing. Either God shows up invisibly, or I’m just a big idiot. And then, as it always happens, people began to encounter Him. People began to cry. And it spread all over the room. God was meeting each person individually, yet He was remaining invisible. Even as He moved, I was asking Him why He had to make it so hard? Once someone decided to serve You, why couldn’t You throw them a bone and give them, like, a 3 second glimpse of You?

In my travels around the world, one truth about God is categorically, undeniably true. When people TRULY encounter Him, He is irresistible. His love is so magnetic, so mind altering, so overpowering in its beauty and grace, when an encounter takes place there’s no going back. But since God is love, He wants our love in return, and if He were to show Himself to our natural eyes, quite simply, we wouldn’t have a choice. Love requires a choice. A choice can only be made when options are available. If God were to fully reveal Himself, all options against Him would vanish.

Exodus 33-34 gives us a good example of what we’re talking about. Moses is on Mt. Sinai, interceding for God not to destroy Israel because they were acting like numbskulls again. When God grants his request, Moses, I’m sure in a fit of radical recklessness, asks God to show him His glory. God then tells him that he can’t see His face or He’d die (so powerful is His glory) but He’ll put Moses in a cleft on the mountain and cover it with His hand until He walks by, then Moses can gaze upon His back. It’s an extraordinary privilege that very few in history have been afforded. When Moses comes down from the mountain, He freaks everyone out because his face is shining. Even the after effects of viewing God with the naked eye is enough to scare people! Think about that: Moses was allowed to see God’s back, and it was too much for OTHERS to bear. How terrifyingly irresistible IS this God of ours?

For our love of God to be real, He must remain hidden from us. But thankfully, He shows Himself to us THROUGH us, which is incredible in its humility and simplicity. You want to see Him move? You’re going to have to pray for someone. You want to feel Him inside you? You’re going to have to suspend your disbelief long enough to allow Him access to your heart. You’ll certainly see God move in Father of Lights, but even then, you’re going to have to believe that what I’m showing you actually happened as you’re seeing it. With true love there will always be choices to believe the opposite, otherwise it can’t be the fullest extent of love.

It may not be the way I always want it to be, but as usual, His ways are not my ways. Thank God for that.

Sincerely,

Way too many people than I want to name”

I currently find myself in a strange position. As a producer of movies, I often encounter people pitching their ideas to me. As a producer of fairly hardcore Christian movies, I often encounter people pitching the kind of nonsense you see above.

While recently finishing filming on my latest movie, Father of Lights in Israel with my friend Todd White, I saw a slightly different approach than the one portrayed above. Let me paint the picture for you…

We had come to Israel with no agenda; simply to see what God would do when we turned on the cameras. We had never really lived this far out on the edge before (typically, when we go somewhere we are visiting a ministry and God-adventures just kind of happen organically), and we were relying on God to end this film series in a powerful, fitting way. Needless to say He did just that, and in spectacular fashion no less, but I want to focus on another event that happened while we were filming to illustrate that there might just be another way to go about dealing with those who disagree with us.

We had just entered the Muslim district in Old Town Jerusalem, and Todd was just talking and loving on people. He began praying for people, specifically for healing, and one after another, Muslims were being healed of all sorts of pain and problems in their bodies. He would pray for them in Jesus’ name, and I then watched as they tested their bodies and looked back at him in disbelief. The pain was all gone. But of course, that’s when it got interesting.

Without fail, these Muslim men (they were all men) remarked that all the pain was gone, but would then turn to Todd and say, “But you were praying in the name of Jesus. Jesus was just a prophet. Allah has no son.” They had just encountered someone who disagreed with a major tenet of what they believed, and, like most people, they wanted to debate. They wanted us to know they didn’t agree with what we believed.

To which Todd simply replied, “That’s cool. How is your back again?”

To a man, they were stopped dead in their tracks. They had no answer, and the debate fizzled before it even started. God had touched them—Jesus had touched them, and that was a fact they could no longer debate. Their minds wanted to, but their bodies were a testimony to something that flew in the face of what they believed. So some of them slunk away, unsure what to do next. Others grabbed nearby friends and asked Todd to pray for them. This was the kingdom of God in action. If we would have stuck with words, we would have gotten nowhere. Step into the power of God, and the world stands speechless.

When I look at these two approaches, one strikes me as inherently Christ-like, and the other as, well, a little arrogant. No one wants to be converted. Everyone wants to be loved. Too often we become a stop-gap to God’s love for others because we just can’t get out of the way—like we need to break down the walls in their heads as if that is the way to their hearts.

I’d love to start getting emails from people pitching their ideas for movies about radical acts of love and kindness and service and compassion. It is disheartening that most of what is pitched to me takes an adversarial approach to those who disagree with Christianity. Aren’t we called to love our enemies? If you truly see those who disagree with you as your enemy (which taking an adversarial approach implies), then what does Christ call you to do?

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs… (1 Cor 13:4-5)

Now remember, it’s September, so it’s getting cold outside in Wisconsin, and therefore the parks had closed off their outdoor sections. This means that what is during the summer months a field of water-filled awesomeness complete with slides, characters, and watery playgrounds is now a veritable wasteland of concrete with creepy little statues everywhere. You or I would walk past the window looking out to this barrenness and think nothing of it. The outside is closed. Nothing to see here. Continue on.

But that’s not how my three year old saw it.

I don’t know how many times we walked from our room to the water park, but every time we did, we had to walk past the window showing the closed up outdoor section of the park. And every time—I kid you not—every single time we walked past that window, River, my three year old boy, would press his face up to the glass and exclaim with extreme glee, “Cool!”

Now what does this have to do with God’s kingdom? The Lord showed me the first time I walked past that window, wondering what in the world my son thought was so cool. I didn’t see anything cool. I just saw an empty, drained water park. But the eyes of a child saw something different. He saw possibility. This thoughts were not negative like mine. He didn’t see the park for what it was, he saw it for what it could be. One look at his face told me everything I needed to know. He wished so badly he could get out there and play on all that stuff. So what if there wasn’t any water, those were still slides out there. That was still stuff to climb on.

How often do we do this? How often do I do this? We see the world the way it is—crappy, broken, dirty, frightening, dangerous—and we recoil. We head underground. We hope for its quick destruction. We pray Jesus will return soon to get us out of here. But that isn’t the kingdom perspective. That’s not how God wants us to see His world. We are to have the eyes of a child. Where others see desolation, we must see possibility.

That’s the kingdom way.

]]> http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/october-2011-musing/feed/ 2 http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/september-2011-musing/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=september-2011-musing http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/september-2011-musing/#comments Tue, 30 Aug 2011 17:15:26 +0000 Darren Wilson http://wanderlustproductions.net/?p=890 The other day my wife and I were driving in the car somewhere, the kids were screaming in the back seat, and I found myself smack in the middle of suburban America, complete with the three kids, the minivan, the suburban house…the only thing missing was the white picket fence. While contemplating this utter normalcy, my wife said something that took me a bit off guard.

“It’s amazing, isn’t it, that you’ve basically created a genre of film that never existed before.”

Have to admit, never thought about it that way before.

There are a few people who have seen my rise from complete nobody who had accomplished nothing to someone who now speaks in megachurches and has his films shown around the world, and even used in college courses! All of this has happened within three years, and while God has certainly pushed me forward fairly quickly, I have been so caught up in the process of change that it’s quite difficult for me to sit back and take it all in. But occasionally, God gives me a glimpse of what He’s done.

I was recently in Phoenix speaking at a film festival put on by my friend, Patricia King. After one of my sessions, a young man came up to me and grabbed my hand. I could tell he was about to burst, but until he spoke, I didn’t yet know the context of his emotional state. He poured out his heart to me, telling me that he had come out of the homosexual community four years ago and had felt so much pressure from the Christian community, so much judgment, and he’s had to struggle through his own healing in a fairly lonely way. But then he saw Furious Love (and this is when the tears really started to flow), and he saw what we did with that lady-boy in Thailand, how we just showed him love, and through simply watching a movie, this guy found a freedom he had never known before. He thanked me profusely, blessed me, and that was it.

Those types of things happen more and more as I meet the people who have helped make these movies the phenomenon they are, and honestly, I never tire of them. I also have absolutely no idea how to react to them. I’m a fairly introverted guy, and I like nothing more than sitting in my studio (“my little cave” as I call it) and dreaming with Jesus, partnering with the Holy Spirit, and making stuff that reveals more of the Father’s heart for this generation. I make these things for myself because I want to see God move for myself. I made Furious Love in large part because the phrase “God loves you” had lost almost all of its potency for me. That He continues to use these films in others is still the most amazing irony to me.

On September 1-7 I will be taking my final trip to film for the last movie in this trilogy, Father of Lights. I’m not quite sure how I’m going to feel saying, “that’s a wrap” on this one, because it will signify the end of an incredibly special season of my life. God called me to make films when I had no idea what I was doing. He has honed our craft and skill, brought people around me who are incredibly talented and have also bought into my vision 100%, and who want to change the world as much as I do. I had so many wild God experiences while making the first two films that I wrote a book about it. For the last 6 years of my life, these films are all I’ve known. I have never NOT been working on them. So I’m not certain what feelings I’ll have when I shut down the camera for the last time. I do know where I’ll be, though, and I find solace in the fact that I will be in one of the last locations my king stood while He was here on earth. There’s something comforting in that.

If you have been touched by these films, I truly appreciate all your kind words and thanks, but please, and I mean this in all sincerity, thank the Father. He has orchestrated all of this, and He’s shown up time and again whenever we’ve turned on the camera. If He didn’t move, these films wouldn’t exist.

Father of Lights will be the last of these types of films that I’ll probably ever do, unless God tells me otherwise. He’s already shown me our next three projects, and one of them, honestly, may just be the most controversial film in recent memory. So we have other stories to tell, other topics that Daddy wants us to explore, and my promise to you is that I will continue to make these films for myself, to move me, inform me, and teach me. The moment my focus becomes you, “the public”, is the moment we go off the tracks. In the end, we’re all family, we’re all essentially the same, so honesty is always the best course of action. If it moves me, it’s going to move you. If it teaches me, it will teach you.

That’s just the way He created us, I guess. He wants us connected with one another. Because through Him, we are truly one Body.

]]> http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/september-2011-musing/feed/ 4 http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/a-giant-prayer-request/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=a-giant-prayer-request http://wanderlustproductions.net/2011/a-giant-prayer-request/#comments Wed, 24 Aug 2011 20:37:47 +0000 Darren Wilson http://wanderlustproductions.net/?p=888 Hey everyone,

From Sept. 1-7, Braden and I will be heading to Israel with Todd White to film the last part of Father of Lights. Unlike other trips, I have no overarching agenda on this one. The Lord told me that the trilogy needs to end in Israel–”end it where it all began” were, I believe, His exact words to me, and He also made it abundantly clear that I was to bring Todd White with me for this. So we’re going to film some general things all over Israel (the Lord showed me how to end it already, so I just need to capture the stuff) but, obviously, we’re hoping for some spectacular “God stuff” to go down while we’re over there.

I don’t think I need to sell you on the importance of the ending of Father of Lights being absolutely epic. We’re currently getting a lot of interest from major players in Hollywood to possibly help us with getting this film in theaters in 2012, but of course, it’s going to have to be a lights out, amazing film with one whopper of an ending.

Now, even if nothing out of the ordinary happens in Israel, the ending is going to rock, but I’m asking God for the moon here, and I’m hoping you’ll join me in praying down the spectacle of heaven wherever we film from Sept. 2-6. Would you all join me in praying for God to move in mighty, spectacular fashion? As always, please send this on to your prayer chains, and if ever there was a prayer request you copy and forwarded, hopefully it’s this one!

Here are our specific needs for this final shoot:

1) major protection over our families back home while we’re gone
2) protection for us and our equipment. We want to be invisible to the enemy even while we’re tearing down his kingdom.
3) an “ending to end all endings”. I literally have no idea what I’d even WANT to happen, and I prefer God’s ideas over my own, so please join us in praying that He will move in such a way that has never before been captured on film, so that everyone who watches this film will know at the end the undeniable goodness, power, and majesty of the King.

Thanks everyone! We’re on the home stretch! Send this to every prayer warrior you know!

Darren Wilson

OUR PROJECTS
Furious Love Event DVDs
Our sincerest apologies for those of you who pre-ordered these at the Event back in April. We knew it was going to be tight getting these things out quickly, but we had no idea exactly how much work they would be! 11 DVDs, over 22 hours of content, and lots of things to fix already means a lot of time and energy, but when you add to that our insanely busy summer schedule of traveling to finish filming our Shamrock movie and Father of Lights, well, hopefully you can see why it’s taken us so long. But we’re working very hard to get them out so you all can enjoy the wonderful content. Right now, we’re looking at an October release, but again, I’ll keep you posted as we get closer to a firm date.

The Greatest Fight
This is our film with UFC great Ken Shamrock. We’re currently awaiting clearance to use all the UFC/WWF footage we want to use within the doc, and once we get that I can finish my rough cut and Braden and Matt can go nuts making it look and sound absolutely amazing. We like to think that we’re a company that is known for pushing the limits of Christian media, and this film is certainly going to do just that. I’m hoping for it to be finished by the end of the year, for an early 2012 release. Look for a trailer coming within the next month or so!

Anointed Fighters
Our first cartoon! We’re super close to finally getting the animation that we will then take into post-production and create music to, as well as some other fun stuff. There’s truly NOTHING like this out there right now, and if you’ve been waiting for a cool cartoon with a kingdom mindset for your kids, look no further! We’re getting stoked about revealing this one.

Father of Lights
The big one. By far our number one question these days is, “When will Father of Lights be released?” Unfortunately, we can’t pinpoint a date yet simply because we don’t yet know how it will be released. Columbia Pictures is interested in seeing if it, and there are a few other options we’ll be looking into for a theatrical release for this bad boy, but again, the bigger the release, the later in 2012 it will come out. We’re hoping to have that film finished by early 2012, and after that we’ll be showing it to the powers-that-be, and then we’ll have a clearer view of a release date. I know for sure that I’ll be taking it on the road on probably a 15 city tour where we’ll be showing it in VERY large venues, so keep an eye out for that next year. Again, we’ll work to keep you up to speed on everything that happens. We’ll also probably be asking for your help at some point!

So that’s how things are progressing. Braden and I will be heading to Israel next week for the final filming of Father of Lights, so please keep us in your prayer from Sept. 1-7. We want to end this trilogy with a bang!

More to come soon…

I am currently reading through the entire Bible, and in my handy dandy plan that came with my Bible, it has me actually reading the New Testament twice within the year. So that means that I already read this particular verse once before just a few months ago, but of course it meant little to me back then. Guess I wasn’t ready for it. How God has infused the Bible with this ability (yes, yes, I know, it’s His Spirit that is opening my eyes when they need to be opened, not the actual words on the page) is beyond me. It never ceases to amaze me how I can read something one week and just gloss over it, then read it the next week and it bursts to life. I assume this has something to do with our individual journeys and how our current experiences and circumstances intersect with this living word and cause it to apply to us here and now, whereas the first time we read it, our experience and circumstance was different, pulling our attention to something else we were reading at that moment. The thing of all this that perhaps blows my mind the most is when, say, I have not read the Bible in a few days and I miss my “assignments” for a few days, then, when I pick it back up, what I was supposed to read last Tuesday hits me right between the eyes on this particular day, in my current circumstance. It’s almost as if God kept me from reading it on Tuesday so I would read it on Friday instead, because He knew I would need it then, at that precise moment, to speak life into me. I don’t think I’m willing to say just yet that God keeps me from reading my Bible, but hopefully you see my point.

So the other day I’m sitting in my “comfy” chair in my studio (being the boss has a few perks—namely, I get a comfy chair) reading in Matthew, at the very end of the book, and I came across this little gem.

“The 11 disciples traveled to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus directed them. When they saw Him, they worshiped, but some doubted.” – Matthew 28:16-17

Now honestly, I must have read this particular verse at least a hundred times in my life, but for whatever reason, this time those last three words jumped off the page and lodged themselves in my brain. I just stared at them, and I think I even wondered if someone had snuck into my Bible and put them there, because I was certain I had never seen them there before. As I have just mentioned, it seems our circumstances in life often open the doors for the Spirit to speak to us through the living word, and this was no exception. I recently read a review of my book, Filming God, where the reviewer mentioned something to the order of, “Whether or not you believe Darren’s encounter with an angel…” For some reason that stuck with me. I wasn’t upset (I rarely get upset by people questioning me or calling me a liar or whatever—I always tell people it’s easy to be called a liar when you know you’re telling the truth) but more…surprised. You would think I wouldn’t be so naive any more! Why wouldn’t you believe me? It happened. I remember it as clearly as anything else in my life. But then again, I can’t really fault anyone for thinking I’m making it all up. I suppose if you look at what has come from this encounter, two successful films, two more on the way, an awesome production company and an even more amazing team helping me create the films of my dreams, yeah, I guess you could accuse me of making it all up to try and jump start my little media empire or something. Obviously that’s not what happened, but being a former skeptic and cynic, that’s probably how I would have viewed it in an effort to get out of having to take someone at their word and possibly change my own behavior and beliefs.

So when I read this particular verse in Matthew, I guess it resounded with me in a way because I was dealing with the concept of doubt in my own life. For the last four years, I’ve constantly had people doubt what I say. They doubt the miracles in my films because they didn’t actually SEE them with their own eyes. They doubt the stories they hear because they don’t know these people. They doubt my experiences because they think I’m trying to use them to make a few more bucks. It is just so EASY to doubt, and apparently, it always has been. I mean, look at the context of the doubt in this verse. The 11 disciples travel to Galilee, back to where it all started for them, they go to the place Jesus told them to go, then He shows up, the resurrected Christ. I mean, they see Him with their own eyes! They worship Him. Yet, immediately after this seemingly mind boggling, doubt-destroying encounter that THEY THEMSELVES HAD, they doubted. Was it real? Perhaps we ate some bad mushrooms. Was it all just a dream? Wishful thinking?

Let’s just be real. We all have doubts all the time. I know I do. Here I have become a spokesman of sorts for the supernatural and God moving on the earth today, yet I have just as many doubts as anyone. Sometimes I’ll even doubt my own experiences! As time goes by, and as voices come in from the outside accusing you of lying or saying that you didn’t really see what you think you saw, you begin to wonder if that experience you had was real or if it was all just your imagination. Luckily, God has seared that experience in my mind and heart, and I also took notes the moment after it happened, so I can always return to my own testimony.

I don’t think we are bad people if we harbor doubts sometimes. I think God fully understands our limitations and our weaknesses. If you continue reading that passage in Matthew, look at Jesus’ reaction to this doubt—doubt, might I remind you, that is coming from his closest friends and confidants. These are the disciples, for heaven’s sake!

“Then Jesus came near and said to them, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe everything I have commanded you. And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” – Matthew 28:18-20

That’s my Jesus. His dearest friends are in the midst of doubting the greatest moment in human history, doubting what their own eyes are seeing, and He doesn’t even address their doubt. He overlooks it. He comes near to them. Here I always felt bad about my doubts, thinking they would cause some kind of rift between me and God—after all, Jesus was always so big on belief and faith and having ears to hear and eyes to see. But instead, Jesus takes the offensive, and He comes near to them. He approaches them and tells them they’ve got work to do. He doesn’t address the doubt, because the doubt will be destroyed by His presence. He gives them…us…our marching orders, then reminds us that even in our doubt and our weakness, He will be with us always, forever and ever.

Presence overcomes doubt. Always. Nothing else could have changed my heart other than a real encounter with the living God. No amount of theorizing or proofs or evidence would ever be enough to break through my logical mind. Only an encounter could. Only His presence could. When doubt creeps in, here is your answer. Seek His presence. Ask for a new encounter. A fresh encounter of His love. Doubting in and of itself isn’t the worst thing you can do, that much is made clear at the end of Matthew. Living there certainly is, though, because when you live in a constant state of doubt, you keep stepping back with each step He makes towards you. Just stop, set aside your disbelief for a moment, and hear His words. Let them enter you and come alive, because that is what the word of God does. It lives.

“I am with you always, to the end of the age.”

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Then I watch them squirm.

Inside a battle rages. We are taught from a young age (either explicitly or implicitly) that art from Christians must be pragmatic–that it must be used for God’s glory or to save people. But no other storytellers are taught this. They are taught that your primary goal must be to entertain your audience.

Why do so many Christian films fall flat emotionally? It is my contention that at a certain point they cease to be emotionally honest. Emotional dishonesty occurs when the writer puts their point above their story. I don’t really believe this character would react that way, but they’ve just encountered Jesus, so, you know, they kind of have to react that way because, well (kick the dirt), Jesus…you know…saves people…

Unfortunately, if the story hasn’t been built properly, the character change will never feel honest–whether it’s a Christian story or not. Christian films, unfortunately, fall into this trap more than most films precisely because the writers come into the process wanting to use their stories for a purpose, rather than wanting to simply tell good stories. It’s as if we don’t trust ourselves. Do you really think what you believe isn’t going to come out in the stories you create? Free yourself from the shackles of purpose-driven storytelling and just entertain me.

I always get nervous when I hear Christians talking about how we have to make media that will be “tools” for salvation. I’ve made two of the most hardcore Christian films around (Finger of God and Furious Love) and both have been used quite often as tools for salvation and change, so in one sense I realize that media can in fact be used this way. But where I see the danger, and where I think a lot of our storytelling problems are coming from, is the temptation to approach a story with this explicit intent. When I made Finger of God, I honestly had no thought that it would become an international sensation and would directly lead to people’s salvation. But when it came time to put it together, my number one priority was to make this movie as entertaining as possible. I left a lot on the cutting room floor for both films that was great content for evangelism, but since it didn’t service the story, it had to go.

For my students, this is perhaps the biggest hurdle standing in their way of making things with real impact and potential with the masses. Before we can tell great stories that truly change hearts, we need to agree that changing hearts probably shouldn’t be our #1 priority. Telling a good story should. No one wants to be converted when they sit down with your story. But everyone does want to be entertained. C.S. Lewis was fond of talking about the power of good stories to get past people’s “watchful dragons”, the natural walls we put up when someone is trying to change our belief system. He understood the power of a well-told, entertaining story. In a culture that has been inundated with stories since infancy, entertainment is now the primary currency. If we want to change the world, we need to do so in an entertaining way. If not, our stories, no matter how well-intentioned they may be, will be devoured by every watchful dragon they encounter.