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Writer's pictureJoshua Marcengill

Transforming Narratives: Watching Movies With the Lord

From episode: Body Ministry with the Trinity



I love how dramatic and how visual Song of Songs is. It really pulls me in. I remember very early in my relationship with the Lord, I didn't have a TV, you know, and it was like intentional. I just didn't want to watch TV, but I had always loved movies. I just kind of grew up watching movies and I remember the Lord convincing me somehow that he wanted me to watch movies. And I was probably like watching one on my computer or something like that. I vaguely remember it, but I do remember that he wanted to watch a movie with me and I felt like that was wrong or something. So I was like, "Oh no, I'm just mindlessly kind of doing this." But because he had this desire that felt, I don't know, delightful somehow, I was intrigued a little bit. And so I began to watch this film, and I can't recall which movie it was, but it wasn't necessarily like a G-rated film or something. It definitely wasn't. But what that experience did for me was it really transformed the way I see narratives. And because when you watch a movie or anything, it could be a cartoon, it could be anything, with the Lord, then you just start to see the gospel narrative showing up everywhere. And it's like you have eyes that see and ears that hear and you're just watching him. I mean, even if it's like not a nice story, then you're still seeing him in the wants and the desires of the writer or in the characters. And it's just unmistakable. Almost every movie I've ever seen has the gospel narrative in it. There's always a hero that often dies for the cause and is somehow resurrected in some way, shape or form. And they go on to say it. And I mean, other people were saying it. I probably heard it somewhere. I can't recall. But I know it brought me to the revelation of understanding that every human heart is hungry and desires the gospel narrative, the true gospel narrative, the one where Jesus saves us and rescues us. And it's funny, but there's been several movies that were made that had like really bad endings. And, you know, I can't think of any of them off the top of my head, but, you know, just like endings where nobody wins and there's no good resulution. And those movies aren't very popular. It's just interesting to me that it's like the appetite for narrative has been kind of sacrificed in those movies. And so people aren't really all that interested because there's no gospel narrative, or at least there's not enough gospel narrative because it's still there.

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