Dear Christian Filmmakers: Stop Forcing the Gospel into Every Scene
Dear Christian Filmmakers: Stop Forcing the Gospel into Every Scene
Why do so many Christian movies feel preachy and out of touch? In this video essay, I confront a common mistake in Christian filmmaking: forcing the gospel into every scene instead of telling great stories. Many Christian artists believe that quoting Scripture and including overt conversions automatically makes a film godly—but that’s not how Jesus told stories.
Dear Christian Filmmakers: Stop Making Faith-Based Films:
Dear Christian Filmmakers: Stop Forcing the Gospel into Movies:
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Please check out Josh Keefe’s video on Christian film. Credit to him for the “Saving Christmas” scene: Why Christian Movies are Bad – https://youtu.be/50_3J6Go5Ng?si=MzPU73U5vqOqmt9b
Timestamps:
0:00 – STOP forcing the gospel into your art
0:33 – What do we mean by “forcing” the gospel?
4:03 – Laziness in faith-based art
6:00 – Good production, bad message?
7:44 – Why faith-based media FAILS as art
10:45 – The biblical storytelling method (100% success rate)
13:36 – The BEST way to tell stories…is through emotions.
So, who am I?
I make films & video essays/commentary from a Christian perspective. I’m an amateur filmmaker who is passionate about writing stories in the visual medium and talking about issues in the film industry and culture at large.
Reminder that some of the best fantasy stories people know of, were made by christians my fellow believers!
I am so glad to have seen this
I’m a faithless atheist, and though it is not a film (it’s a manga and anime) I think Vinland Saga embodies what you say really well
For anyone who hasn’t watched it and is open to anime, I’d recommend you give it a chance and I highly doubt you will regret it: that show changes people
No no Christian filmmakers. Please change nothing! Keep making terrible media that drives people away from your insane religion. It’s working!
This is a fantastic video. I’m not a christian myself but I did grow up in a mostly christian household and I’d say I’m more of an agnostic. I believe in God but I don’t believe in or trust or however else you wanna put it, into how any church preaches the gospel. For the most part I found my experiences to be full of fake christians and I mean that in several ways, people who think going to Church every Sunday is good enough, people who are holier-than-thou hypocrites or self righteous zealots. I am by no means saying christians must be perfect, no, we are all sinful, but I’ve never liked how they preach and that extends into their movies being 90 minute "Become a Christian today" propaganda, although the values of the christian faith, regardless of how poorly most christians tend to practice them, I think are objectively good. To that end, a more on the nose movie that I still don’t find too preachy and I very much enjoy coming back to is Fireproof. It’s a movie very heavily revolving around, yes the bible, but mostly around christian values and it is absolutely beautiful, showing that it can sometimes be very hard to follow a righteous path and sometimes seems like it’s not worth it, but in the end it helps the individual become at peace with one’s self. Another one, which I don’t think is a "Christian movie" (correct me if I’m wrong) but still reflects a lot of those virtuous values is The Ultimate Gift.
Naturally several people may like these movies and still not grow any closer to religion, but I think they can help people reflect inward and become more at peace, and regardless of whether or not that down the line leads them to God or the church, in and of itself that is a net positive.
Dear atheist filmmakers: Stop removing Christianity from every film and persecuting Christian filmmakers.
vinland saga also is really great for this
As a Christian writer working on a science-fiction war novel, I sincerely appreciate this reminder.
You will not believe me when I say this, Hacksaw Ridge craved the path for me to become an ex Muslim…
The mission has to be one of the greatest religious films
I find the Christian Rock songs of Alice Cooper quite good as it’s usually a result of the concept the album revolves around where a villainous character sees the error of his ways or a takedown of superficial morality in the various albums set in Hell. They feel like something which comes up in the natural flow of the album and aren’t off-putting to a non-Christian such as myself.
If something is important to you, then I expect it to come up here and there, not something that gets crowbarred into every conversation. Silence is such a great film because it’s a topic that Scorcese occasionally returns to, as he clearly gets inspired by a story he wants to adapt… and his own faith can be seen to inform his other films without being about that faith.
As a christian I am thankful that I saw prince of Egypt, veggie tales, and narnia before the garbage that is gods not dead, etc. Christian movies need to not shove down the message into the audiences throats and instead show them themes and ideas based off of Christianity
I’m not a believer. Still, I decided to watch a TV show of the Bible. It just tells the stories of the Bible one by one in a somewhat chronological order. While not really that spectacular to look at, the stories are what had me interested, it was immersive and very realistic at times. But when miracles happened of direct Divine intervention, it pulled me out of the story and made me loose interest, at least the ones where suddenly God just saves people by making them be unharmed by fire or stuff like that. Honestly, I was educated in a Catholic school, and every time we had some religious story told to us in a cartoon or something, some of these bad tropes mentioned in this video really pulled me away from reinforcing my faith and just made me forget it.
FOR FUCKS SAKE STOP SPREADING GOSPEL IN FUCKING TIKTOK THANK YOU
Jesus spoke in parables to reward students who truly wanted to learn his message, and punished bad students who did not care to dive deeper into the meaning, resulting in no further knowledge. Movies should be used in this exact way.
Can we all appreciate Prince of Egypt tho
Speaking as someone who was raised Christian, who probably falls somewhere in between truly Christian and something else, and who works in entertainment, YES. As a storyteller, your MAIN JOB as an artist is to ENTERTAIN your audience. You can desire to share your faith or your person views within your art, but you MUST meet your audience where they are at. And you CANNOT, in good faith, meet the audience where they’re at if you look down on them within the film. I’d argue that Christian movies should be THE MOST layered, nuanced movies, because the underlying message of Christianity is that God loves you and that you can always change yourself for the better. There should be very few true villains in Christian films. Audiences need to be able to see themselves in every character, at least by the end.
My boyfriend was traumatized by church life. Bullied, belittled, made to feel stupid and small. If someone really wanted to help someone believe in something bigger, he’d be the type of person you want to reach. In order to reach someone like that, you need to be extremely careful, and term things and phrase things in things they accept or are comfortable with. You can’t just smack them in the face with faith. It’s insulting to them. It’s frightening; some even find it cult-y. I don’t offer my spirituality to him as a disguised pill or a smack in the face, it’s just there. I am open about it and I present it in ways that he understands and try to make him feel included if he wants to be. I don’t expect him to change, I just want him to see that not every person of any spiritual presence of mind is going to hurt him or subjugate him. We have gotten along in that way quite well.
The a-religious side of things has their own religion, too. Whether they see it as religion or not. And anyone here who wants to make Christian films or exist in entertainment as a Christian, BE CAUTIOUS. The people who have taken wokeness and rainbowism as a religion- and they basically do, look at how they act- they will attempt to blacklist you if you try to work with them and reveal your faith or intentions. If you really want to help spread faith, you’re going to have to term things in terms they may recognize, you may have to speak softly (literally and metaphorically) when you want to shout. You will have to be patient, and persistent.
Approach every situation with a "What are they saying and what do they mean? And why do they mean that?" sort of mentality, or you will get no where. If you truly want to see more faith in film, you have to play the game and you can’t treat everyone like they want to memorize the Bible or they’re dumb. These people have been told over and over again that life is hopeless and that there’s no one or few people in the world who care about them. They believe that everyone, from the bottom of the system to the top, does not care about anything but themselves, and they feel hopeless. They should be the easiest audience to approach, so please do not be forceful.
Good luck to everyone.
Sadly I don’t think its ever going to get better. Christian media has been terrible for a long, long time…and there’s a reason for that.
Ironically, Christian entertainment is terrible for the same reasons woke entertainment is terrible…they have to cram "the message" down your throat so hard that any attempts at nuanced writing with any depth is cast aside. Hilarious that Christian creators can’t see this simple concept.
The first one is only realistic if she say Allah instead of Jesus or literally any other religious figurehead lol
As an atheist, please stop demonizing people you are hoping to convert. People stop engaging (or turn hostile) with a media that patronize them.
Protestants, especially today, have a huge difficulty in dealing with art. Just compare the Catholic artistic legacy with the Protestant one in history. Art necessarily deals with the sublime and grotesque side of human life, and this duality is what Christian moralism, typically Anglo-Saxon, fails to contemplate.
I’m an atheist and have always felt lectured at when watching Christian film. It’s usually just so in your face and operates under the assunption that its viewers will already agree that it is correct in its portrayal of the faith. Meanwhile for all its faults, redemption of the christ really got to me in the torture scenes. A biblically accurate recreation of crucifixion was all that was needed to emphasize its brutality. To think the Roman’s used to do that normally… makes me shiver.
I’m not Christian anymore, but I but I agree with your points. The Bible is fascinating and exceptionally interesting. World wide floods, burning bushes, prophets, wars, the Son of God, these are all fascinating concepts that can be used to create incredible stories. Christian storytelling can, and is, amazing. The problem though, is that most Overtly Christian movies are not made by people with a creative vision built around strong themes, but are made primarily to spread the faith. Their goal is to preach first, not to tell a story, so the final product suffers, because preaching leaves no room for critical thought. It blatantly explains the message as clearly as the preacher can.
One of the best Christian based stories ive seen recently is faith the unholy trilogy, while being very much slathered in Christian symbolism and even evangelical writings, it doesnt stray from the focus of the main character being a weak. Fearful and cowardly man on his journey to becoming a warrior of God to exorcize demons
I’m interested in your take of "Nefarious" as a Christian theo-psychological "horror" story. Mine? I thought it was brilliant.
If I wanted a sermon, I would have gone to church.
I’ve wanted to make almost this exact video for years, but I never felt like it fit with my channel or audience. Well, now I don’t have to, because this perfectly summarizes my thoughts. Great stuff! I’m gonna go check out the rest of your content now 🙂
I’m going to play this over and over again. Thank you very much. As a playwright who writes for church, I face this problem almost the time with my drama director…
Christian based movies are for Christians first and foremost.
The issue with Christian movies is your message is trying to villianize regular life for non-believers like me.
The lawyer in God’s Not Dead 2 has very ignorant mission to the court case. Sure there are individuals who act like that. But it does notnconmect to those who dont care about Christianity from a neutral point.
Christian movies fail becuase you all forgot what humanity is for your faith.
Edit: Good video though.
So good news. Don’t just peach the good news, but hear it. Listen to others about of other things. For you can make anything good news. But the good news does not come from just anything. It is you and your relationship with your creator. So that each day be blessed by your willing-ness to live it, and appreasiate it, having affection for those special towards goodness!
Ben Stein lecturing the class about the bad history of tariffs!!!
As a Christian myself, I really appreciate what you said here. I feel like in my family if I ever DARED to say films like “God’s Not Dead” is not good, I’ll be (metaphorically) crucified (I’m being hyperbolic), but you hit the nail on the head with how these fall flat to the story telling example set by Jesus and how Christian art can be just that … art.
It never fails to amaze me how the obvious path is ignored: History. Show Christians being morally admirable, self-sacrificing, or charitable, WITHOUT YAMMERING ABOUT HOW HOLY THEY ARE which is an option that just never occurs to the people making Christian movies. Those characters exist, but they’re in mainstream movies, largely biopics and period piece. Things like a Spanish nun lying to one of Franco’s goons or a pastor standing alongside unionizers or civil rights organizers or staying to minister in a situation of danger is someone to be imitated even if one doesn’t convert–that’s an aspirational figure of human compassion–them being Christian makes a case for devout Christianity being a personal strength not just an aesthetic or get-out-of-accusations-free card, which is how we see it being used around us.
But doing the right thing in an unsafe, personally impactful way is high stakes. Being a coward and saying you prayed on it or asked forgiveness is low stakes. Those characters doing acts of moral courage in times of extremity are not "sexy" in the sense of being brave doesn’t tell the other church people how holy you are.
These movies aren’t made to convert or even gain admiration–doing that would mean making fun, enjoyable, thought-provoking art that then made people want to know more/imitate admirable characters. They’re made to pat oneself on the back. Y’all are just one upping each other about being I’M SO JESUSY, WAY MORE THAN HIM…and then confused when people not in church don’t think watching you measure is very interesting.
"…And delivered him unto the torturers…" Excuse me. I thought the correct answer was: nobody should be tortured.
I’m glad you made this video. This is a thought I’ve been having a having a hard time articulating.
I thank you for saying everything I feel concerning "Christian" Films… I still say that in itself is a dumb title… Just make movies and like you say the Story can have Moral elements, even some scene of preaching…however do it as a FILM… Not a Sermon!!! good video…
Christians don’t have the energy to create something original because they’ve already spent it all trying to destroy the creativity of others, and the lives of creative people: their book burnings and banning, for example. How insecure are these people, that any idea that conflicts with their own private take on Christian dogma must be, not answered, but suppressed and destroyed, and its creators vilified?
I really liked "God is not dead" but the sequel is down right offensive.
I can’t stop watching your videos. They’re fantastic. I couldn’t agree more.
…Jesus, man…. lol
You have a great point about victimhood. I feel like a lot of Christians want to believe that they’re victims being shut down by anti-theists, when in reality, their beliefs are being treated fairly by atheists and other religions alike. Too many Christians have this weird persecution complex, sometimes to the point of bordering on fetishistic. Like it’s definitely not all Christians, but they’re always the loudest representation of that and contributing to that disgust toward the faith.
Preach about weak theology!
Wow congrats on being the most palatable christian youtuber i’ve ever seen
This is exactly what I’ve been trying to say! I have never been part of a religion, but I find that its good to look into different types to figure out what it tries to say andhow it tries to bring meaning into the world. Movies like this always hurt that narritive because it just doesnt add any value to what its saying. It feels more like its regurgitating whatever their faith says instead of showing what it means and showing why people value whats said.
I can never really put what i think into words well, but this is about the best i can do.
If I were a filmmaker, I’d do a movie about devout family being hassled by the community at every turn only for their passionate speeches about their faith turning their oppressors to their side. Then, at the end, it’s revealed they’re Satanists.
I despise when Hollywood portrays Christians and Christianity as ignorant fools who believe that everyone is going to hell, they love to show them as if they are oppressive
Preachy Films vs Hacksaw Ridge is CS Lewis vs JRR Tolkien
Breath of life is a christian film from nollywood, imo it did a great job in story telling, while not being overly emphatic on sermons, but on emotions and events, and shows the struggles, desires, and perspectives of life. The visuals are beautiful too
"hey Christian filmmakers, stop making Christian films"