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Many of you are probably familiar with the Christian movie productions of Sherwood Pictures. They\u2019ve had great success with limited budgets on films like Facing the Giants<\/em>,\u00a0Fireproof<\/em>, and\u00a0Courageous<\/em>. Each of their films covers a particular theme, like faith, marriage, or fatherhood. The other week, they released a new project entitled\u00a0War Room<\/em>, focused on prayer. It was a box office smash, vying with hot Hollywood releases like\u00a0Straight Outta<\/em> Compton.\u00a0<\/em>However, like the church\u2019s other projects, it\u2019s come under criticism for being poor quality and perhaps even presenting a distorted view of Christianity.\nThese criticisms are sometimes coming from other Christians, not just jaded mainstream reviewers.\u00a0I recently read one article by\u00a0John Mark Reynolds that was particularly unsparing. He called it \u201cGenie Jesus and the War Room Problem.\u201d<\/a>\u00a0He argues that all the Kendricks\u2019 movies have the same theological flaw: They give Christians the impression that any problem a Christian has can be solved by the appropriate amount of faith and prayer. In other words, he\u2019s accusing them of presenting a prosperity gospel.\u00a0He points out that for many people, living out the Christian\u00a0faith\u00a0will\u00a0involve unanswered prayers, suffering, and sad endings. \u00a0In\u00a0War Room<\/em>, a wife is urged to remain in a bad marriage and pray for her nasty, philandering\u00a0husband, who ultimately repents. Reynolds cites the examples of\u00a0many women like her who will pray fervently and see no change.
\nOkay, so we know happy endings aren\u2019t universal, but is it fair to accuse Sherwood\u2019s films of generally presenting a false gospel? Do they really preach a \u201cgenie Jesus\u201d? Will Christians walk away with a false idea of what faith, prayer and provision really mean? I\u00a0think a more careful\u00a0look reveals\u00a0that while Reynolds raises interesting concerns, he\u2019s being disproportionately harsh. (Full disclosure though: I haven\u2019t seen\u00a0War Room\u00a0<\/em>yet, just previous Sherwood movies.)
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\nFirst of all, I find it amusing that the Kendrick brothers are now being criticized from the left for encouraging women to stick it out in bad marriages, whereas\u00a0Fireproof<\/em> was lambasted by the far right for putting the burden on the husband. It\u2019s like no matter what they try to say about marriage, they can\u2019t win. While I may not personally agree with all the particulars of their advice, I think it\u2019s healthy that they\u2019ve struck a nerve on both sides. (Besides, a clip from\u00a0War Room<\/em>\u00a0also shows the husband getting tough talk from a Christian brother, so it\u2019s hardly letting him off the hook, though you might get that impression from some reviews.) I think Christians have developed too casual of an attitude towards divorce, and Reynolds isn\u2019t that clear in his post about whether he would limit himself to Jesus\u2019 (potential) exceptions. He seems to imply that a woman might be justified in walking out\u00a0even if the husband isn\u2019t necessarily unfaithful, just cold, nasty, verbally abusive or whatever. Now in fact, the husband in\u00a0War Room<\/em> is teetering on the edge of infidelity, but even if a wife suspects this, it\u2019s not ridiculous to suggest a waiting period where she hopes and prays for repentance.
\nNow, to address the accusation of prosperity preaching, I don\u2019t deny that people might get a dubious\u00a0impression from some of the Kendrick brothers\u2019 stories. And some\u00a0of the language that\u2019s been used to promote\u00a0War Room<\/em>\u00a0in particular might raise concerns. The film is promoting a system where Christians create \u201cchecklists\u201d of prayer requests that you then \u201ccheck off\u201d one by one as they\u2019re answered. As one of the brothers said in an interview,\u00a0\u201cIt\u2019s great to be able to check off those prayer requests and see that God is alive and well in your life.\u201d But as Reynolds pointed out, what about Christians whose prayers go unanswered? Do we tell them they\u2019re just not doing prayer right? Or worse, that God must not be \u201calive and well\u201d in their life if they\u2019re not getting \u201cresults\u201d? The brothers may want to approach these questions with more nuance.
\nTheir breakout picture\u00a0Facing the Giants\u00a0<\/em>followed this same pattern and faced similar critiques. By the end of the film, all the characters have experienced spiritual revival and subsequently had their problems resolved. The team wins the big game. Their kicker makes a\u00a0long shot\u00a0field goal after being mediocre at best for the majority of the film. The main couple is no longer infertile or financially struggling. Et cetera. However, in fairness, things get worse for all the characters before they get better, even\u00a0after<\/em> they make a renewed faith commitment. The team works hard but has to swallow another string of losses before they see improvement.\u00a0The wife gets her hopes up before getting a negative result, when she prays tearfully, \u201cI will still love you, Lord. I will still love you.\u201d But\u2026 then come the twists: Turns out the pregnancy test was switched by accident! The other team was cheating! This same day-saving plot device comes up in Courageous<\/em>, when a man is told to lie or lose his job, only to find out it was just a test and he\u2019s getting promoted. While these\u00a0characters remain humble and don\u2019t lose their faith\u00a0even when circumstances seem to be against them, the bait and switch motif is a story-telling crutch for the Kendricks.
\nHowever, it\u2019s inaccurate to say that Sherwood\u00a0characters never experience actual loss or always have a perfect ending. In\u00a0Courageous<\/em>, the protagonist loses his little girl in a car accident and spends much of the film wrestling with guilt over how he could have been more present and affectionate for her. There\u2019s no genie Jesus to bring her back. It\u2019s a permanent grief he must confront and carry. Another Courageous\u00a0<\/em>character\u00a0is exposed for corruption and faces prison time, though he shows signs of remorse. Again, not the happiest of endings, especially for his young son. I would encourage the Kendricks to explore more story-lines like these, where there is potential for redemption without perfect resolution. It\u2019s also worth noting that when the wife in\u00a0War Room<\/em> prays for her husband, part of her prayer is that his deceit would be exposed (which, in fact, it is, even if the consequences aren\u2019t as harsh as they probably would be in real life).
\nThe truth is that downer endings are rare, even in mainstream Hollywood fare. The fact that the Kendricks want their protagonists to have happy endings is hardly unique to evangelical movie-making. And especially when you\u2019re portraying things like marital conflict, it\u2019s very difficult to resolve that in a way that\u2019s neither completely happy nor depressingly sad. However, I have noted that Catholic film-makers are less afraid\u00a0to portray stories of suffering and martyrdom, which John Mark Reynolds\u00a0prefers. He would probably argue that there\u2019s a richer theology of suffering in Catholicism than in evangelicalism, as well as a longer history in which to find inspiring martyr stories. But I disagree with his claim that the Sherwood movies are inherently trivial and shallow next to such\u00a0harrowing tales of persecution. The Kendrick brothers are telling stories about ordinary people who have to make ordinary choices. Their characters don\u2019t have to be literally burned at the stake in order to grow spiritually.
\nOf course, the\u00a0film-making\u00a0may sometimes be bland, stilted, or didactic, but that\u2019s a separate criticism.\u00a0I am not saying that the Kendrick brothers are making great movies, or movies I would count among my favorites. I do not expect them to achieve the transcendent balance of grief and joy that great Christian novelists like Evelyn Waugh and and Marilynne Robinson have achieved in their work (Brideshead Revisited<\/em>,\u00a0Gilead<\/em>). And I\u00a0do wish the pickings were a little less slim for people who want something more artistically authentic. I think the Kendricks should be consulting honest film lovers who can offer constructive advice on how to improve (people like the guys at More Than One Lesson<\/a>, whose Christian podcast spent an hour and a half on an in-depth review full of specific, helpful criticisms). However, I don\u2019t want my judgment to be clouded by Christian culture snobbery, which I fear has happened to Reynolds and his ilk. I sense in his article a general distaste towards mainstream evangelicalism that\u2019s causing him to exaggerate his case and overlook aspects of these movies that actually do have merit. I\u2019m not afraid to cry \u201cHeresy!\u201d even if it involves a\u00a0sacred cow of evangelicalism, but it\u2019s not an accusation I would rush to make without clearer warning signs. In my opinion, lobbing it at Sherwood pictures is an overreaction.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Many of you are probably familiar with the Christian movie productions of Sherwood Pictures. They\u2019ve had great success with limited budgets on films like Facing the Giants,\u00a0Fireproof, and\u00a0Courageous. Each of their films covers a particular theme, like faith, marriage, or fatherhood. The other week, they released a new project entitled\u00a0War Room, focused on prayer. It […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3595,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16,37],"tags":[328],"class_list":["post-24475","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-faith-and-culture","category-movies","tag-movies"],"yoast_head":"\n