"I only read the articles!"

Over the years I have seen what we might best term from a Christian perspective quite a few “secular” movies. Many of them I have enjoyed quite a bit; many of them have been bad from a number of different viewpoints. In just about all of them one cannot help but see something of that which we refer to as the evidence of man’s fall. Because of the Fall, that is his fall from a position of perfection in the eyes of God to one of sin or lawlessness which we find described so well in the book of Genesis man has what we have come to recognize as a fallen nature, i.e., from birth he has but one propensity and that is to do everything which is contrary to the will and purpose of God his Creator. Now that is not to say that man no longer has any interest in ‘God’ or religion, for above all living creatures on the face of this planet man is most religious; he has a multitude of gods that daily he bows down to and all with but one goal in mind: to make life in this world as comfortable for himself as he can make it. Period.

The interesting thing is that so very often men in their purported religiosity find themselves involved with or under the influence of some very religious institutions or bodies of religious adherents. Sometimes this happens because they are born into families where religion of one kind or another has been the mainstay of the family heritage. Hence small children grow up “believing” that their particular religious upbringing has been, is and probably always will be the only one worthy of any attention whatsoever. All others are total and complete fallacies and should not be considered as having any basis in truth at all.

Over the past fifty years or so religion has been featured almost to the point of stardom in quite a large number of motion pictures put out not only by Hollywood but a number of foreign countries as well. England too with its very religious heritage has seen fit in these days to incorporate alleged Christian themes or sub-themes into films with the purpose, no doubt, of bringing at least on the surface a sense of the moral which religion is supposed to typify. For many movie watchers the result of this has been quite varied depending on how religion or the church or more specifically, Christianity is depicted. One of the areas that religion is most often called upon is in the matter of someone’s death in the film. Following the death of a major or supposedly well beloved character a scene is inserted which deals with the individuals being interred, buried or whatever. There is a “clergyman” present to make some summary statements about the person being buried and then, almost perfunctorily, this man of the cloth asks God to accept this person into His kingdom based not on the man or woman’s good works, or nice character or loving nature but on the basis of Christ and the “hope of the sure and certain resurrection of the dead” as if after all just about everyone is going to “make it” anyway. Of course Hitler, Stalin and all the mass murderers won’t be there for obvious reasons. But this dear soul while certainly far from perfect in anyone’s eyes could surely not fit this category so for those listening in on this funereal soliloquy this dear departed one is pretty well a shoe in, as they say. And if he/she can make it then the rest of us have it made.

A few months ago I happened to stumble upon a rather interesting little video that initially I found, if nothing else, quite amusing for a number of reasons some of which you may chuckle at as well. It appears to be more or less professionally produced by a Christian group that even in this rather whimsical style carries across a message that in the final analysis has a fair bit of clout to it. The circumstances that portray this message do not have any Scriptural support but then I don’t believe they were meant to. What they do portray however is a message that is exactly contrary to all that the world believes in terms of a person’s entry into either Heaven or Hell. Surveys of course have been taken over the years more times than one can adequately count with the idea in mind, I suppose, to gain an understanding of what “Joe Average” believes or pretends to believe in terms of what is required of any ordinary human being to gain access into the “life hereafter”. Most folk have the idea as do the individuals (save one) in the video that one’s works or good behavior or activities in counteracting their bad deeds with supposed good ones will in the final analysis make them “good enough” to get in. None of them make it. And while one or two of them don’t appear all that surprised others are shocked and cannot possibly understand why it is that all that “good stuff” did not stand them in better stead with the powers that be.

The last man in line does finally come to that place where his “file” is open for inspection. Initially his file is looked down upon as not bearing much weight in the final determination and as he is asked to step up for his assessment the inquirer, I suppose St. Peter, is tapped on the shoulder and given a new file in the old one’s place. Well, I won’t put any more spoiler in at this juncture. Consider carefully how this brief video culminates. Perhaps you could then ask yourself what so many others have been asked, “On what basis should you be allowed in to Heaven … or not??”