The Passion of the Christ

It’s possible that you haven’t yet heard of “The Passion of The Christ”, the new movie starring James Caviezel (Frequency, The Count of Monte Cristo) and directed by Mel Gibson (Braveheart). But if you haven’t heard about it, you may have been away from the TV, radio, internet, post office, and discussion about movies or religion with friends or neighbours. To me, the movie seems to be everywhere. Friends have seen it, I’ve seen posters, promotions, news stories, and I’ve gotten form letters in the mail urging me to watch it.

Of course the movie, which depicts the story of the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus, follows a long tradition. The writers of the Gospels are storytellers – yes, accurate in what they say, but saying it in an artistic way to reach a certain audience. They followed the example of Jesus Himself, who used storytelling extensively (both stories that may have been fictional as well as true stories and even current news events). Throughout 2000 years of history, Christians have used drama and storytelling to share the Gospel with an often illiterate audience. Both believers and non-believers have used the media at their disposal to tell this story. Some have been accurate, others have toyed with the facts or completely perverted them. In the past 100 years, numerous movies have been made depicting the life of Christ, such as The King of Kings (1927), King of Kings (1961), The Greatest Story Ever Told (1965), Jesus (1979), Matthew (The Visual Bible) (1997), and The Gospel of John (2003).

I’ve had the chance to direct and act in dramas featuring the life of Christ. And I’ve seen some of the movies, and have usually wished for something better. Of course, you can never do the life of Christ justice. Maybe I’m just overly critical, although there have been good points in most of the depictions I’ve seen. After all, when you know Christ you can often be touched by the parts that ring true.

Now we have The Passion. Many Christian leaders have seen it and recommended it, including Billy Graham, the late Dr. Bill Bright (Campus Crusade), Dr James Dobson (Focus on the Family), Eric Reed (managing editor Leadership Magazine), Darrell Bock (professor at Dallas Theological Seminary), Jack Graham (president, Southern Baptist Convention), and Max Lucado (Christian author). Visit the International Bible Society to get your “The Passion” themed Bibles. Ministries are creating study and evangelistic materials, organizations such as Josh McDowell ministries, Rick Warren (The Purpose Driven Life guy), Lee Strobel (The Case for Christ guy), the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, and the Willow Creek Association. Of course I’m sure non-evangelicals will be on the bandwagon as well (Catholics probably leading the way, Gibson himself belonging to a conservative Catholic sect. The Pope has even seen it.). Websites are also popping up – check out TheLife.com, ShareTheLife.com, another site for Passion Outreach, and for something in a whole bunch of different languages try The-Passion.org. And guess what? The Jesus Film (the 1979 movie seen over 5.6 billion times) website has a special page just to promote The Passion. Yikes! I could go on and on.

Though you may find such popularity disturbing, the fact is of course that people will be seeing this movie and talking about Jesus, and we should be ready, as always, to share the truth. And I hope that Christians who see the movie will have opportunity again to meditate on the real Jesus and all He is. The story of Christ’s passion is powerful because it’s true, and it’s still changing lives because He is still changing lives.

Now you’ve read this far so that you can find out – is Jim going to watch it? Yes, I am. The movie comes out on Ash Wednesday. We’ll be sure to tell you what we think! This movie has had it’s share of controversy. Jewish organizations have been concerned that it will fuel anti-semitism. They have a reason to be concerned, of course, after the history of persecution they have had. But we as Christians should know that the world as a whole is responsible for Jesus’ crucifixion. It was a gentile that hammered the nails, and it was all our sin He carried. I doubt that an accurate telling of the story will fuel more hatred of Jews, except in those who are already racist and anti-semitic. As Gibson himself said, when asked who killed Jesus,”The big answer is, we all did. I’ll be the first in the culpability stakes here.”

It should be said that this movie is also rated R. It is meant to be realistic and so it is graphic. This has always been a catch-22 for movie makers. The reality is so brutal, so horrible, you just can’t depict it on screen if you want anyone to watch it. We’ll see how Gibson handles the details.

Anyway, enough about that! I meant to just write a brief note and talk about other news too, but I figured while I was at it I might as well be thorough! To conclude, then, here are a few more things to check out if you’re interested:

* The official The Passion website
* Reviews, trailer and graphics (slow loading page)
* Christianity Today’s The Passion page
* Campus Crusade is at the forefront of The Passion evangelism. If you’re interested to hear what they have to say, download their free flyer by right clicking on the link below and saving it. It’s a pdf file.