The NXR Podcast - THEOLOGY APPLIED - 3 Reasons Why “The Chosen” Does More Harm Than Good ｜ with Pastor Gabriel Hughes

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00:00:40.780 Hi, this is Pastor Joel Weber with Right Response Ministries, and you're listening to another

00:00:44.700 episode of Theology Applied. In this particular episode, I was privileged to have as a special

00:00:50.140 guest, Gabriel Hughes. He is an associate pastor at First Baptist Church in Lindale, Texas, serving

00:00:56.980 underneath the senior pastor there, who is Tom Buck. He also hosts a podcast called

00:01:03.240 When We Understand the Text. Now, in this particular episode of Theology Applied,

00:01:08.760 I had Gabriel Hughes come on the show to talk about The Chosen series. This is a TV series

00:01:14.820 that has grown in immense popularity, yet Gabriel and myself, we want to provide a stark warning to

00:01:22.440 the people of God. We ultimately believe that the chosen TV series does more harm than it does

00:01:29.200 good. We list three primary reasons why Christians should avoid watching this TV series, why we 0.95

00:01:36.180 believe it does not honor God, and why it actually does detrimental harm to our theology and our

00:01:43.480 faith. If you're interested in this conversation, you're in the right place. Tune in now.

00:01:48.280 applying God's word to every aspect of life.

00:01:52.080 This is Theology Applied.

00:01:58.500 All right, here we are again with another episode of Theology Applied.

00:02:02.540 I am your host, Pastor Joel Webin with Right Response Ministries.

00:02:06.380 As I've already mentioned, our guest for today is Pastor Gabriel Hughes.

00:02:11.080 He's the associate pastor serving underneath senior pastor Tom Buck

00:02:15.180 at First Baptist Church in Lindale, Texas,

00:02:17.680 and he's also the host of a popular podcast called When We Understand the Text.

00:02:23.980 Did I get that right, Gabriel?

00:02:25.540 Sounds good to me. Thank you, Joel.

00:02:27.560 Yeah, so thanks for coming on the show.

00:02:29.540 You've been in the podcast world for a while,

00:02:32.020 but I've noticed you on Twitter posting from time to time some negative press

00:02:37.440 with a wonderful biblical TV show called The Chosen.

00:02:42.900 So I wanted to get your scoop.

00:02:45.920 What do you think about The Chosen series?

00:02:47.920 We were holding off on this.

00:02:49.340 I was going to get to you a little bit sooner, but you're like, well, let me go ahead and finish it because I guess they have a few seasons now.

00:02:55.020 Full disclosure, I have not watched The Chosen.

00:02:57.700 I've heard much about it from many people, people who love it, people who hate it.

00:03:01.880 I have my opinions, and I do have some serious concerns, but I wanted to get a chosen expert whose favorite TV show is The Chosen, Gabriel Hughes, watching it religiously.

00:03:13.620 So what are some of your big takeaways?

00:03:15.920 Well, it's kind of funny that, you know, for us pastors, we've got accountability software that we use to know what each of us are looking at on our laptops.

00:03:24.740 You know, it's how as brothers, we keep each other accountable.

00:03:27.900 And I was concerned that with as many chosen links as were popping up in my browser history, I was going to get confronted by my fellow elders.

00:03:35.400 They're like, Gabe, we're a little concerned by how much of the chosen you've been watching lately.

00:03:40.080 So, yeah, the show is, of course, based on the story of Jesus and his disciples out of the gospel. 0.96

00:03:46.340 I would say it's even a retelling of those stories.

00:03:48.860 I don't think that they really make a very concerted effort to be faithful to the text or even the narrative that you read in the four gospels.

00:03:59.160 They will say that they do. They'll claim that they have experts that come in and they have their Bible consultants and all this kind of stuff.

00:04:05.440 But based on what I see in the show, just about every measure of dialogue that you see that could be lifted straight from the Gospels, they will change or manipulate in some way in order to fit the narrative or the story that they are telling.

00:04:19.380 So it's really a retelling of Jesus and his disciples based on what we might have in the Gospels, but I would by no means call it exact.

00:04:28.920 This is a show that is created by Dallas Jenkins. He's the son of Jerry B. Jenkins.

00:04:35.440 the name you probably recognize from the Left Behind series, that bestselling series of books

00:04:41.500 that I think almost every one of those books in that series was on the New York Times bestseller

00:04:48.000 list. Dallas is a filmmaker, and he's made some other Christian films that just simply didn't do

00:04:53.380 very well. But this one, which was entirely crowdfunded, has been an immense success. In fact,

00:04:59.520 it is the most successful crowdfunded TV show ever made. And that's kind of its claim to fame,

00:05:07.280 its success, though they've only finished three seasons. I think they're working on seven or eight

00:05:13.620 total. So we're not even halfway there yet. But what we've been able to see so far has not been

00:05:20.260 as faithful as they claim to try to be. Okay. And I've heard that there's Mormon influence,

00:05:28.200 Roman Catholic influence. Can you talk about a little bit of that? Or is everybody who's

00:05:32.960 involved, such as Jenkins, I don't know his theological disposition, but is everybody who's

00:05:38.880 involved within the realm of evangelicalism, or do we have a hodgepodge of some cults coming in?

00:05:46.000 Yeah, it's very much a hodgepodge. That's a good word for it. A lot of syncretism, a lot of,

00:05:51.360 well, I guess ecumenical would be the better way to say it rather than syncretism.

00:05:55.320 Like Jonathan Rumi, for example, who plays the role of Jesus in the show is a Catholic mystic, very Catholic, in fact, and very mystic as well.

00:06:03.900 There are various interviews that I've seen with him where he he says some things, honestly, that are very much in the realm of like the new apostolic reformation.

00:06:13.100 For example, one of the stories that has been going around about him lately is with regards to the role that he just played in the movie Jesus Revolution, in which he plays Lonnie Frisbee, the hippie from back in the 60s and 70s of that movement that led to the Calvary Chapel movement and stuff like that.

00:06:34.540 So he plays Lonnie Frisbee.

00:06:36.620 I thought you were going to say that it led to the AIDS movement.

00:06:39.960 Well, there was that, too.

00:06:41.480 Yeah, unfortunately.

00:06:42.160 So I, you know, I can talk about that. I'm going to play host and interview you and ask you a lot of questions. But in terms of the, you know, the revolution, Jesus revolution movie, I, you know, I, so I started out as a vineyard church planter and I grew up in the vineyard, you know, John Wimber came out of, you know, the Chuck Smith, Calvary Chapel, hippies, Bible kind of thing.

00:07:01.440 And, you know, and basically the main difference was in regards to, you know, practical application of the signed gifts and things like that.

00:07:09.580 And moved along the way, you know, eventually became 1689, Reformed Baptist, Covenantal, Cessationist, you know, the whole nine yards.

00:07:16.200 But that was, you know, quite a journey.

00:07:18.960 But I originally planted as a vineyard pastor and, you know, lost a significant portion of my church when we, you know, we switched theological positions.

00:07:26.480 One of the big ones, less continuationism, cessationism, didn't really lose a lot of people there.

00:07:32.200 People weren't really offended by that.

00:07:33.740 The big switch was the Vineyard's egalitarian.

00:07:36.440 And so switching to, you know, complementarianism, and now I don't even really like that word because of some of the ways that I feel like it's been hijacked.

00:07:43.140 So I just stick to patriarchy.

00:07:45.320 But that was a big switch.

00:07:46.480 But all that being said, with Lonnie Fresbee, when you look into, you know, his lifestyle, you look into his doctrine, his theology.

00:07:53.520 I mean, he really was a catalyst for, you know, Calvary Chapel taking over Southern California by by storm at that time.

00:08:02.140 But he. Yeah, I mean, he was kind of like he was kind of the dirty little secret of Calvary Chapel.

00:08:07.540 I think Chuck Smith even declined to speak at his funeral.

00:08:10.920 I can't remember if that's if that's accurate.

00:08:13.580 I don't know if you know anything about that. I think that he did.

00:08:15.740 I think Chuck Smith did speak at his funeral.

00:08:17.400 And then there's been some efforts as well on Greg Laurie's part and others to try to whitewash Lonnie Frisbee, though he had a reputation for being what, you know, of course, it was his secret life.

00:08:28.220 As you mentioned, he was a homosexual and died of AIDS.

00:08:31.840 There are people like Greg Laurie have tried to say, well, he had a deathbed repentance. 1.00

00:08:37.920 And perhaps that's true.

00:08:39.560 Maybe he did have a genuine conversion, recognized his sin and the wickedness that he was in and repented of that and put his faith in Christ.

00:08:47.980 We could certainly hope that that happened. 0.92

00:08:49.940 But what's certainly true about his life is that he was a hypocrite throughout that entire movement and claimed holiness and even was a self-avowed prophet, but was living a homosexual lifestyle on the side. 0.97

00:09:03.640 So very unholy practices that were going on in that whole Calvary Chapel and Vineyard movement at that time. 0.97

00:09:11.100 Right. So the guy who plays Jesus was the same guy who was, you know, Lonnie Frisbee in that movie.

00:09:18.600 That's how we got there. But going back now to The Chosen and the Catholic mystic who plays Jesus.

00:09:24.060 You want to talk a little bit more about that?

00:09:25.680 Yeah, so what I was mentioning is that he, in an interview for that film, for the Jesus Revolution Movement, or yeah, Jesus Revolution Movie, said that he, in preparation for that role, went to Lonnie Frisbee's grave, and his grave is at what used to be the old Crystal Cathedral, the whole, you know, Hour of Power thing.

00:09:49.300 Is that Robert Schuller?

00:09:51.260 Schuller.

00:09:52.060 Yep.

00:09:52.280 Yeah.

00:09:52.840 Yeah. So he went to his grave. It's a Catholic. It's actually a Catholic church now. Yeah. It used to be the Crystal Cathedral. But anyway, went to his grave and sat at his grave and had a conversation with Frisbee. And he said he prayed the rosary with him and asked Frisbee, hey, if you can give me some kind of a sign that I'm supposed to do this role and play you in this movie, then give me a sign.

00:10:16.680 And he said, like, the doors of the church opened up and this chord played.

00:10:20.800 It was such a movie-esque, like, sort of a moment.

00:10:24.460 And that's how he knew I'm supposed to play Lonnie Frisbee.

00:10:28.020 So, like I said, the whole, even some new apostolic stuff kind of plays into Lonnie Frisbee or Lonnie Frisbee, Jonathan Rumi's theology.

00:10:38.060 So though he claims to be Catholic, you can see kind of some influences there with like the grave sucking and stuff like that that we've known from Bethel Church and their influence.

00:10:48.180 Right. Yeah. You almost wish with retelling of Bible stories, you know, if it's going to be done, I just I wish it would just be I almost wish it would just be divorced from. 0.92

00:11:01.140 We're going to try to get Christians because then you get guys who aren't actually Christians, but are pseudo Christians. 0.94

00:11:06.840 Like, just give me some professional actors and make sure that, you know, the director and script writer that, you know, that those guys are Christians and, you know, and whatever. 0.91

00:11:17.140 Now, I do have problems.

00:11:18.340 I'm curious to get your take on this.

00:11:20.020 I, you know, with the retelling of Bible stories, I don't appreciate retelling of gospel stories where Jesus is a character in the story.

00:11:29.280 So for myself, you know, my position on the second commandment, I, I just, I don't think that Jesus, you know, I appreciate, you know, Dr. Sproul, like, you know, we have my kids love, you know, his children's books.

00:11:43.560 And, you know, and he was very careful in each of these books to, to never show Jesus, he never depicts, you know, allows the illustration to actually have a picture of Jesus.

00:11:53.860 And I personally appreciate that. I understand that Jesus is the God-man. He's taken on flesh. He is forever the God-man. And so he's still in the flesh at the right hand of the Father. So it's different than the first or the third member of the Trinity in that regard.

00:12:09.600 but i would kind of lean towards knowing god and j.i packer and some of the things that he says in

00:12:15.540 terms of images and one of those things is that you you can't depict jesus because even even if

00:12:22.820 we had you know even if the disciples had technology and cameras they took a picture of

00:12:26.700 jesus it wouldn't be jesus because he's unique from the rest of humanity in the sense that he

00:12:31.360 is the god man and you cannot physically capture on film or camera or in a painting or depiction

00:12:38.860 or any of these things, the deity of Christ.

00:12:41.540 And so what you're doing is you're severing the humanity of Christ

00:12:43.980 from the deity of Christ, and so you're showing, in a sense, half of Jesus.

00:12:48.800 And so anyways, I'm curious, what do you think about just the whole idea?

00:12:52.880 Let's say it was done perfectly, it's according to the Scripture,

00:12:56.340 they're not taking any creative license with the script

00:12:58.780 and those kinds of things, and everybody's, you know,

00:13:01.420 a solid, reformed, evangelical Christian who's playing all the parts.

00:13:06.380 How would you feel about Jesus on screen?

00:13:10.100 Yeah, so when I did my blog, which covered season one, I went episode by episode through

00:13:15.440 the entire first season.

00:13:16.720 I said something very similar to that.

00:13:18.600 I said, this is really a fool's errand to try to accurately capture the Christ.

00:13:24.500 How can you possibly do that? 0.95

00:13:25.860 You're talking about the most perfect man who ever lived.

00:13:29.400 Yes, he is the God man, but he was also in his humanity, perfect.

00:13:33.540 the only perfect man who has ever walked this earth, what does that look like in terms of

00:13:38.880 nuance, in terms of inflection in his voice? All of that is going to be left up to interpretation.

00:13:45.040 In those lines where they do actually try to quote something Jesus actually said from the

00:13:51.280 Gospels, I'm left hearing the line going, I don't know that it would have been said like that.

00:13:56.940 Now, as a preacher, and you as well, you know, when we stand in the pulpit and we quote Jesus'

00:14:02.500 words from the Gospels, what we're focusing on and what we're leading our people through

00:14:08.980 is understanding the message, the meaning of the text.

00:14:12.460 What did Jesus mean when he said this?

00:14:14.880 I think it's important that we have certain inflections and we think about those things

00:14:19.580 and we try to be as faithful to even the deliverance of those words as we possibly can be.

00:14:26.140 But we're not reciting a script when we preach.

00:14:29.500 we're trying to convey the message of God in his word. So this is not rehearsing movie lines. It's

00:14:35.640 not the same thing preaching as when a person is trying to actually depict Jesus. And so as I said

00:14:41.880 in my blog, it's a fool's errand to try to think that you can actually represent who Jesus was.

00:14:48.220 What would that perfection have even been like? What would it have been like to be in his presence?

00:14:53.600 It's something that we can only imagine, but we can never truly know, even in the information that is given to us in the scriptures.

00:15:03.620 And so in that sense, of course, when I'm looking at Lonnie, I still keep calling him Lonnie Frisbee.

00:15:09.820 When I keep looking at Jonathan Rumi's depiction of Christ, of course, I don't like it because they are doing a very happy-go-lucky, hippie Jesus sort of an interpretation.

00:15:19.840 But at the same time, you know, what you're what you're looking at in terms of nuance and different suggestions and things like that, you're watching a sinful man. 0.98

00:15:27.400 And something that I can't get out of my mind is he's also a Catholic man. 0.71

00:15:30.940 So he's not a believer anyway, with even some paganism that's mixed in with his with the other aspects of his Roman Catholicism.

00:15:39.380 And this is the man who is trying to he's giving us a version of Jesus from his Catholic mystic beliefs.

00:15:48.400 And by all accounts, it's blasphemy.

00:15:51.300 What he's doing when he gives the words of Jesus and gives this depiction is both in vain,

00:15:58.480 so it is a violation of the second commandment.

00:16:01.020 Whatever your view of the second commandment would be, whether you hold that Reformed view or otherwise,

00:16:05.240 I don't know how you can argue that it's not taking the Lord's name in vain. 0.89

00:16:09.920 And of course, a blasphemy in their misrepresentation of Christ as well.

00:16:14.880 Yeah, that's really interesting.

00:16:16.880 So you would say that it's, in a sense, it's more than just a second commandment violation, but it's the third commandment as well, that it's taking the Lord's name in vain.

00:16:24.540 Yes, I would agree with that also. 0.87

00:16:26.300 Yeah, right.

00:16:26.680 Because with second commandment, we're talking about the image.

00:16:29.180 What is the image that's being conveyed?

00:16:30.700 And with third commandment, the misuse of the Lord's name.

00:16:33.740 And this, of course, is, you know, when you talk about you shall not take the name of the Lord, your God, in vain, this is not to probe into the hearts of the people who create this show necessarily.

00:16:45.880 It's just to judge by their words.

00:16:47.940 It's just to judge by what we're seeing there on the screen,

00:16:50.180 but they're not being faithful to scripture.

00:16:52.880 So can you honestly say that you are honoring God with this work that you're

00:16:57.080 doing, or is this all being done in vain?

00:17:01.140 Right. Yeah.

00:17:02.280 Images are like black holes for worship that you certainly don't want to have

00:17:06.960 images in the sanctuary for Lord's day gathered worship.

00:17:09.780 But even outside, I found myself still trying to remove certain pictures from my head that I saw as a child or as a young man depictions of Jesus.

00:17:24.400 Because when I close my eyes and I'm praying in private practices of piety or praying with the saints on the Lord's Day or worshiping through song, addressing one another with hymns and psalms and spiritual songs, and I'm thinking about the Lord.

00:17:39.260 It's hard for me to not think in terms of physical images.

00:17:44.020 And what I'm imagining is that, you know, that image that I've previously seen in my

00:17:49.200 past, you know, some coloring book about Jesus or Jesus storybook Bible or, you know, whatever

00:17:55.600 it might be.

00:17:56.820 But the reality is it's the reason why it's wrong to depict Jesus is because it's not

00:18:02.240 Jesus.

00:18:03.080 That's not Jesus.

00:18:04.560 So I don't want to think about something that's not Jesus when I'm worshiping Jesus.

00:18:09.240 I don't, you know, I don't want that image to, to, to, to take even a portion of my adoration and my worship and my devotion. I don't want to direct my worship towards something that's not Jesus.

00:18:23.940 And so, yeah, images are powerful in that sense that they, you know, they they direct our, you know, our our thoughts, our focus, our adoration, even images outside of the Lord's day find their way into our minds mentally on the Lord's day.

00:18:41.820 And they become kind of this magnet that just sucks worship away from the God who is worshiping him in spirit and in truth and to a God who's not a false God.

00:18:56.440 And so it's, you know, I think that's part of the hang up that Christians struggle with is like, well, what's wrong with depicting Jesus?

00:19:02.360 Because it's not Jesus.

00:19:04.660 That's what's, you know, there is no depiction of Jesus that's actually Jesus.

00:19:09.120 They all fail. Whether it's a Roman, so that's, you know, whether you got R.C. Sproul to play Jesus, you know, or whether it's, you know, this, you know, Catholic mystic, you know, and whether it's, you know, verbatim, word for word from the Bible, for the script, or whether it's taking creative liberty, no matter how you slice it, that's not Jesus. 0.54

00:19:32.440 But that is going to be now a mental focal point. When I'm closing my eyes and praying to the Lord Jesus, I'm not going to be able to help but think in terms of this is Christ, and it's not.

00:19:49.640 You know, at the end of the Sermon on the Mount, it said that when Jesus had finished these words, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, for he was teaching them as one having authority and not as their scribes.

00:20:03.280 And the way that this roomy Jesus delivers his lines in the chosen is not anything like that.

00:20:10.980 Like, I'm not captivated by his speech in any way, shape, or form.

00:20:14.940 There might be some people that can say, well, I am.

00:20:17.180 I certainly love the way that he represents Jesus.

00:20:19.640 And I still think that you're letting your own biases dictate whether or not he's being faithful to what we've been told in the scriptures about Christ.

00:20:28.820 He does not speak with authority in the show.

00:20:31.040 And in fact, the lines themselves have been dumbed down so that they don't carry any kind of authority.

00:20:39.920 Now, there's a certain sense in which I appreciate that because I don't want you guys to think that you're actually speaking with the authority of Christ because you're not.

00:20:49.640 The way that you're manipulating text and changing the story and some things like that.

00:20:54.820 But even like I said, even when they are faithful to the actual words that Jesus said, like in the Sermon on the Mount or something like that, the way that he delivers those words, they're trying to create a Jesus that is palatable to the most number of people.

00:21:08.300 Because like you said earlier, you know, all the different faiths that are involved in this, you have Protestants, evangelicals, you've got Catholics, it's Mormon distributed through angel studios, and they even use the Mormon settings where they film everything like this.

00:21:23.120 There's the showrunner, I think, is Mormon or something to that degree.

00:21:27.200 So you have all these different people that seem to all be in agreement on this Christ that is being portrayed. 0.96

00:21:32.660 So they're not going to accurately represent a Christ that speaks with authority, that offends.

00:21:39.500 They're trying to create a Jesus that's going to appeal to the most number of people.

00:21:44.360 Right. Yeah, you're right.

00:21:45.600 That's a good way to put it, that if you have such a large tent that's not just ecumenical in the sense of including other Protestants of different secondary doctrinal persuasions, but you're actually going outside of Protestant evangelicalism and including Mormons and Catholics and mystics and all the rest, but they're all agreeing to publish this episode, publish this season.

00:22:11.340 then there is kind of, you can, you could assume at that point that, um, that they've brought it

00:22:16.940 down to the lowest common denominator and, and not just again, not just a lowest common denominator

00:22:22.480 within Protestantism, but, but within, um, that's a lowest common denominator that includes false

00:22:29.760 teaching and, and cults and false religions. And so, um, yeah, if everybody's giving their stamp

00:22:35.200 of approval, you know, uh, cut, let's move on. We got it. That was good. The Catholic thinks that

00:22:40.260 was good. The Mormon thinks that was good. And there's your sign. So what, what are some of the 1.00

00:22:45.700 scenes in, in the show that, um, that, that you had the most problems with the ones that,

00:22:51.440 cause I, I can guess, you know, just, I would, I would think, you know, John chapter eight,

00:22:55.960 you know, the woman caught in adultery. I feel like, you know, they probably had a field day

00:22:59.980 with that one. Have they gotten to the transfiguration yet? Thinking of second,

00:23:03.900 you know, second commandment violations, that one's going to be real tough.

00:23:07.700 Sure. There are certain things that I'm not sure if they've gotten to yet or not. Well,

00:23:12.260 full disclosure, I haven't seen the third season, so I've only watched seasons one and two.

00:23:16.760 I was watching it all on YouTube or on Amazon, and they haven't released the third season outside

00:23:21.700 of their app, and I don't want to download the app. So I've not seen any of the third season

00:23:27.040 episodes. I don't think that they have gotten to the transfiguration. There are some things

00:23:32.040 that have happened in the background that they haven't filmed. And I think that a lot of that

00:23:36.740 has been, uh, you know, it's been mostly related to, they probably just didn't have the budget to

00:23:41.260 do it. You know, for example, the scene where the, uh, where you had the miraculous catch when

00:23:47.040 Peter bowed before Jesus and said, turn your eyes away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man. You

00:23:52.620 know, when, when Peter was first called to follow Christ, that scene honestly was pretty good. They

00:23:57.540 filmed that pretty well as far as like, you know, lowering the nets into the water. And then it

00:24:01.980 fills with fish and they're trying to pull that into the boat. I think that was around episode

00:24:05.700 four or something like that. And up until that scene, the show was pretty boring. There was

00:24:11.820 nothing interesting going on, but I think they captured that one pretty well. Nonetheless,

00:24:17.300 heading up to that scene is amusing because the disciples are coming in after a long night of

00:24:22.900 fishing and they haven't caught anything and they're coming up on the shore and Jesus is there

00:24:27.320 on the shore teaching a crowd of people well the crowd of course when we have it when we read about

00:24:32.940 it in scripture it's huge it's so big that jesus can't address them all he has to get in the

00:24:37.600 disciples boat push away from the shore a little bit so that he can address everyone in the show

00:24:42.280 it's like 60 people so it's it's odd it's awkward and this was in the very early stages of the show

00:24:49.520 in which they probably couldn't come up with that many extras or that many costumes for all the

00:24:54.520 extras to wear. So that's why the crowd is so small, but it's still like even forgiving them

00:24:59.920 for that. It's still just an awkwardly put together scene and doesn't really seem to work.

00:25:05.120 So there's stuff like that where you're watching it and you're going, I know in scripture,

00:25:09.180 this was portrayed way differently. But then there's other things that just are not even

00:25:13.460 faithful to the message. The very first two scenes I ever saw were not in an episode of the show.

00:25:19.580 it was the clips that they post on YouTube. And I can't remember in which order I saw these,

00:25:25.040 but it was the story of Jesus and Nicodemus in John 3, and then the story of Jesus and the woman

00:25:30.100 at the well in John 4. And I remember them just coming up in front of me in a YouTube search one

00:25:35.000 time. I wasn't even looking for chosen clips. I had a few people that had told me, I don't know

00:25:39.260 if you've watched The Chosen before. And in fact, the feedback that I got was positive. People are

00:25:44.320 going, you know, they actually do a really good job with the show. I was skeptical. But then when

00:25:48.820 I was looking for other things on YouTube, these two clips came up. So I went ahead and watched

00:25:52.800 them both with the interaction between Jesus and Nicodemus. And then of course the woman at Sychar

00:25:57.960 and, and, and it is not only, not only is there a lot of dialogue added to it because of course

00:26:05.920 they're trying to fit the narrative of the story that they're telling in the chosen, but even the

00:26:10.920 lines as you read them in scripture are moved around. So you think you're hearing the exchange

00:26:17.920 as you know it, between Jesus and Nicodemus in John 3, but when you actually go to the text and

00:26:22.960 read it, you realize, oh, Jesus actually said this before Nicodemus answered this way, and that

00:26:29.260 changes the whole conversation. There is a particular reason why John arranged that dialogue

00:26:37.860 the way that he did. We have to believe that the exchange between Jesus and Nicodemus was longer

00:26:43.100 than the, the, the three back and forth that we, you know, if you read the whole conversation in

00:26:48.280 John three, it takes you a minute and a half, if that, and they're stretching it out to 10 minutes.

00:26:53.240 So of, of course the conversation was going to be longer, but John still writes that conversation

00:26:59.340 in just such a way to convey the message. And when the creators of the, of the show move lines

00:27:05.540 around and add dialogue, they change the message and they don't even, they're not even trying to

00:27:10.480 be faithful to what the intention was behind that conversation and where it sits in the gospel of

00:27:17.060 john so that was the first thing that i ever saw those two conversations were the first ones i saw

00:27:22.380 from the chosen and really every other problem that i've identified in the show you could have

00:27:28.520 come back to those for those two scenes and and really dissected the entire show from just those

00:27:35.180 two conversations. Yeah. So what are some of the other problems? What are your biggest concerns?

00:27:43.460 If you were pastorally talking to somebody in your church and trying to persuade them

00:27:48.620 against watching The Chosen, what would be the biggest things that you warn them with?

00:27:54.240 Well, really, the gospel is not there. This is not going to be a show that is going to lead

00:27:59.180 people to Christ. Now, I've heard stories. I've talked about this on my podcast. I've heard

00:28:03.860 stories from people who've emailed me and have said, like, we started watching The Chosen and

00:28:09.520 then my wife went and grabbed the Bible and started reading the Bible. And we love the Bible

00:28:13.940 and we quit watching The Chosen and started reading the Bible. That's great. I love to hear

00:28:18.500 that. That's exactly what you would hope would happen. But that's the Holy Spirit working

00:28:23.340 against the show. That's not with the show to bring somebody to the knowledge of the Word of God.

00:28:28.200 that's working contrary to what it is that they're doing with the narrative that they're

00:28:34.220 creating in this program. They're not trying to be faithful to the Bible. No matter how hard they

00:28:39.220 try to say that they are, they're not. You just have to go to the text, listen to their lines,

00:28:43.580 compare it with what scripture says, and you can see that what they're doing is something

00:28:47.400 different. They're more faithful to their own narrative than they are faithful to what scripture

00:28:52.900 says. So it's going to lead to a lot of confusion. First of all, the gospel isn't there. Secondly,

00:28:57.200 it's going to lead to confusion. I think one of the things you just mentioned a little bit ago,

00:29:00.980 Joel, is that when you're watching this and you're seeing this version of Jesus, it's going to be

00:29:06.920 really hard to get that out of your head when you're reading the gospel accounts. How are you

00:29:11.840 seeing anything other than what you're used to Jonathan Rumi doing when he's portraying Jesus

00:29:16.740 in The Chosen? Now, I have a little more ability to switch that off. That doesn't even cross my mind

00:29:22.020 when I'm reading the Gospels, and I'm about to jump into a teaching of Matthew in my podcast,

00:29:27.380 so I'm not concerned about that as much. But with a person who is not in the Word,

00:29:32.940 who is not making this a regular part of their diet to read Scripture and understand it and

00:29:37.860 glean from it the exhortations that we need to live by, when a person is getting their

00:29:46.960 understanding of Christ and even the understanding of these words from the chosen, then it's going

00:29:51.740 to lead to a lot of confusion as to what the Bible actually says. I've known people who are

00:29:57.060 very faithful Bible readers who study their Bibles daily, who were watching The Chosen and they

00:30:03.640 thought it was pretty good. But when they read my review of either the first season or they read my

00:30:08.860 breakdown of the exchange between Jesus and Nicodemus, they wrote to me and said, I didn't

00:30:14.320 even see some of those things that you said. And once you pointed it out, then it made a lot of

00:30:18.640 sense. And I didn't realize how much of my own mind was trying to fill in the blanks. I've referred

00:30:23.520 to this before as Mad Lib theology. If you've ever played Mad Libs, where it says write a noun here

00:30:29.120 and write a verb here, or an adjective here, and then you create this funny story you all kind of

00:30:34.260 laugh about. Well, in Mad Lib theology, it's when somebody tells a story, but they're not really

00:30:39.800 telling it accurately, but you know it accurately. And so it's like in your mind, you're filling in

00:30:45.020 the blanks. And so you think what you're hearing is an accurate telling of either the text or the

00:30:50.020 narrative. But really what's happening is your own mind is filling in the blanks that they're

00:30:54.700 leaving. And so you think you're hearing something faithful, but it's not. I think a lot of that is

00:30:58.720 going on with The Chosen, even among faithful Christians who love the Bible and understand 0.88

00:31:03.800 the Gospels, that they'll see this story and they think what they're seeing is an accurate 0.63

00:31:07.660 depiction. But so much of the story has been changed. It's going to lead to a lot of confusion,

00:31:13.700 especially if you're really not careful. So those would be the top two things that I would say the

00:31:19.140 gospel isn't there and that it's going to lead to a lot of confusion. Now, given that, of course,

00:31:25.100 John 3.16 is quoted in the show. So somebody is going to object and say, well, the gospel is there

00:31:30.480 because the gospel is in John 3.16. But with all the words that are around it, that message has

00:31:36.000 been diminished significantly right before Jesus says, for God so loved the world that he gave his

00:31:42.040 only son, he says, I did not come to the world to deliver it from the Romans. And then Nicodemus

00:31:51.000 says, then what did you come to deliver us from? And Jesus said, from spiritual death.

00:31:55.780 And I'm like, what does that mean? What in the world are you talking about? Somebody could think

00:32:01.520 that depression is spiritual death, or they could think the job promotion that I didn't get is

00:32:06.640 spiritual death. And so then when you hear John 3, 16, then, then you're going, you know, God came

00:32:13.120 to save me from spiritual death that they're, you know, of course in their mind, they're filling in

00:32:18.080 the blank with what they think spiritual death is. So it's, you can say the gospel's there,

00:32:23.660 but it is not accurately presented. This is not going to lead to anybody's salvation,

00:32:28.940 except that the Holy Spirit would work against those things that are being depicted and said

00:32:33.900 in the show. Right. And with that, I, I like what you said earlier about how certain individuals,

00:32:38.640 you know, they were watching the show and you've heard that, you know, their testimony,

00:32:42.080 I've watched the show, Gabriel. And then, you know, we ended up, we, you know, just reading

00:32:46.340 the Bible and then we stopped watching the show and we're just, because we love the Bible and we

00:32:50.280 came to salvation and to play the devil's advocate. I could imagine somebody saying, well,

00:32:55.660 but isn't the show good, at least in that regard, as a, as an appetizer to the scripture,

00:33:01.480 That maybe the show itself isn't biblical, but that it would provoke in people a desire and a hunger for the scripture.

00:33:09.980 Maybe it doesn't for everybody, but even if it did it for a few people, or just even 10% of all these people who are watching, they move on from the show to the Bible.

00:33:18.280 Whether they stop the show or finish the show, they end up finding the Bible, and in the Bible, they find Christ and salvation.

00:33:24.940 And I think for me, what I would think is, you know, I remember when I first became Reformed in my soteriology, my understanding of salvation, one of the things that was really difficult for me and one of the things that I'm commonly having to do in pastoral ministry as others come into Reformed theology is help them basically go back in time with a new understanding to re-understand their personal testimony.

00:33:53.080 Because I've noticed one of the biggest hangups for people, including myself back in the day, you know, 15 years ago or whatever it was, was this theology can't be right because that's not what God did with me.

00:34:07.600 And then you rework and you begin to understand, well, wait a second.

00:34:11.460 It's like, well, this can't be right because I chose God.

00:34:13.520 And it's like, well, okay, but okay, you did choose God.

00:34:17.200 All we're saying is that regeneration precedes faith.

00:34:19.900 And yes, you did make a conscious, willing choice to submit to Christ and his lordship, to trust in him alone as your substitute for salvation.

00:34:31.040 But what we're saying is that God did something first, that God, by the power and work of the Holy Spirit, removed your heart of stone, replaced it with a heart of flesh, that faith is a gift.

00:34:41.120 So even that choice made available to you was a gift of God, not something that was conjured up by you.

00:34:47.100 the, and, and, and then I'm able to, you know, go back and say, okay, I don't have to give myself

00:34:52.060 a lobotomy. I don't have to, um, pretend like something didn't happen. No, this thing really

00:34:57.640 did happen, but I, I misunderstood at the time what was actually going on. And I now have these

00:35:03.220 pieces. I don't have to choose between my, my experience and my theology. Um, I can actually,

00:35:09.340 um, I can actually, uh, use my theology that that's infallible, that comes from the word of

00:35:14.420 God, the word of God is infallible. And I can, um, and I can then just simply put on that lens

00:35:19.780 and, and view my testimony in light of that. And, and actually have, I don't have to get rid of my

00:35:25.860 testimony, but I can actually have a better understanding of it. So all that with the person

00:35:29.320 who watches the chosen and then that, you know, works as an appetizer, you know, and stirs up a

00:35:34.320 desire for the word and they move on from the chosen to the Bible and they get saved. You know,

00:35:38.160 the devil's advocate would be saying, well, don't we need the chosen at least for that? If it does

00:35:42.160 that, that's good. And I would say within that Reformed theology, looking at that person's

00:35:47.060 testimony, I would say, well, who's to say that what was actually taking place is that the Holy

00:35:52.660 Spirit was drawing that person unto salvation, drawing them to Christ, the Son of God, drawing

00:35:58.700 them to the scripture. And the chosen didn't give them that desire for the Bible, but they were

00:36:03.660 actually being drawn by the Holy Spirit of God to the scripture. And the chosen was actually a

00:36:09.020 They actually got hung up on the chosen for three months and actually would have come to the Bible even quicker had it not been for this hindrance.

00:36:17.260 So the chosen didn't spark a desire for the scripture.

00:36:20.100 The Holy Spirit was drawing them.

00:36:21.700 That's where the desire was coming from. 0.92

00:36:23.280 And the chosen actually slowed them down.

00:36:25.560 Right.

00:36:25.800 So we're not saying this thing that the person's claiming in their testimony happened didn't happen.

00:36:32.060 And we're giving simply proposing, suggesting another way of interpreting this thing that objectively happened and saying, yeah, but in biblical terms, it means this and not that.

00:36:44.660 Do you have any comment on that or thoughts?

00:36:47.100 No, I think you're spot on with that.

00:36:49.100 So couldn't it have been, I mean, you're looking at it from the perspective of thinking that the chosen brought them to Christ, but why couldn't you see it from the vantage point of the chosen was actually hindering them?

00:37:02.060 from being able to come to a knowledge of the understanding of the truth and that's going to be

00:37:05.740 the case with most people you're also talking about exceptions to the rule if a person comes

00:37:10.780 to a knowledge of christ because they watch the chosen and then they went to the bible that's not

00:37:16.700 going to be the common story that you're going to hear coming out of this what what you're commonly

00:37:21.260 going to hear are people who are very very unlearned in scripture that are going to stay

00:37:26.380 ignorant of the scriptures because they're watching the chosen and they think that they're getting

00:37:30.540 the Bible or whatever else, because I watched this TV show. One of the things that the apostle 0.90

00:37:35.580 Paul said to the Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 4, 6, learn by us, talking about himself and Apollos

00:37:40.760 and Peter, learn by us not to go beyond what is written so that you will not be puffed up against

00:37:46.820 each other. So by, oh, sorry, hit my mouse here. So by going beyond what is written, it actually

00:37:55.260 creates arrogance and division. It does not unify. It divides us. And so that would be,

00:38:02.600 if I could put a third problem on this particular show, it would be that it's going to be divisive.

00:38:07.080 It's not going to unify people. It breaks people up. The only thing that's going to bring us

00:38:11.460 together as a church is the word of Christ. This is something that for a lot of people has got to

00:38:16.860 supplement the word. The word is not sufficient for them. The Bible is not enough. I need something

00:38:22.760 else. I wasn't able to understand this until I saw it in the show. And now it makes more sense to

00:38:27.740 me. But you don't realize that what it is that they're giving you in the show is not really

00:38:31.960 faithful to the text. So these things, like you said, are going to be much more of a hindrance

00:38:36.380 than they are going to be guiding or helping people come to a knowledge of Christ. The sad

00:38:43.460 thing is the creators of the show, you learn this when you watch some of the other interviews and

00:38:47.380 things like that, behind the scenes footage and stuff that they've done. They really think they're

00:38:52.760 They're positively enhancing people's lives in the name of Christ with this program.

00:38:58.440 Yeah, well, I'm sure they do.

00:39:00.720 Everybody has to believe something to sleep at night.

00:39:05.120 That's the presuppositional mantra.

00:39:07.960 But with that, I guess one of my thoughts is just, well, I guess I'll pose it as a question.

00:39:20.240 Did you ever see a scene?

00:39:22.280 Did it get in the first, you know, season or two to John chapter eight and the woman

00:39:27.180 caught in adultery?

00:39:28.480 Is that depicted?

00:39:28.800 I haven't seen that yet.

00:39:29.700 No.

00:39:30.080 Okay.

00:39:30.460 But you said you saw the scene of John chapter four, right?

00:39:34.500 With a Samaritan woman.

00:39:36.180 Is that right?

00:39:36.760 Yes.

00:39:37.580 But how did they, you know, you gave us a little bit of detail in regards to John three

00:39:41.440 with Nicodemus, but with the Samaritan woman, you know, I perceive you are a prophet.

00:39:47.300 You know, you've had five husbands.

00:39:49.700 The man you're now with is not your husband.

00:39:51.300 And how did you said they switched the order of the language there?

00:39:55.140 How did they depict that?

00:39:57.160 Well, really, it was the dialogue between Jesus and Nicodemus where they're switching

00:40:00.760 the order of things, which really very much changed the message.

00:40:04.300 Yeah, things were moved around with the woman at the well as well.

00:40:08.020 One of the things I remember happening is that when Jesus does reveal to her that he's

00:40:14.500 a prophet, you know, saying to her, you've had five husbands and the man that you're

00:40:17.540 with now is not your husband.

00:40:18.720 And she says, Oh, I see you're a prophet and you're to preach at me. And he said, No. Yeah, that's exactly why he was there. He was there to preach and lead an entire town to a knowledge of who he was. And all of this flows through the text.

00:40:35.540 When you read John 2 of Jesus purging the temple and then doing miracles, and there were people that wanted to be around Jesus because he was doing miracles, at the end of chapter 2 it says, but Jesus did not entrust himself to them because he knew what was in the heart of man.

00:40:50.720 So then you go right from that into the story of Jesus and Nicodemus, and Nicodemus is not coming to Jesus as some good faith actor just asking some questions because I want to be a believer, but I need to get all this stuff straight.

00:41:03.380 Nicodemus does not believe Jesus is the Christ, and Jesus doesn't reveal himself to Nicodemus

00:41:09.360 as the Christ.

00:41:10.380 When he talks about the Son of Man, when he says, just as Moses lifted up the serpent

00:41:15.360 in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, Jesus used that language, did

00:41:20.640 not personally apply it to himself directly because he was not revealing to Nicodemus

00:41:27.400 that he was the Son of Man, and Nicodemus, in his clouded judgment, wouldn't have recognized

00:41:31.580 that anyway.

00:41:32.580 But then you go from that story into John 4 with Jesus and the woman at the well, and while he would not reveal who he was to the Jews, here he is in Samaria, and he reveals who he is to this woman who goes back into town, tells everybody, could this be the Christ?

00:41:50.340 He stays there for two days. He preaches the gospel to them. And they say, now we know that this is the Christ because we have heard it for ourselves, not just because of what the woman had said, but because they heard it for themselves.

00:42:03.500 That's not depicted in the show. The very last scene of season one is that encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well.

00:42:10.960 So when you start season two, you're picking up in Sychar with Jesus ministering there as the season would have finished with that exchange at the well of Jacob.

00:42:25.860 And when you're watching it in the show, he's there for like several days.

00:42:29.880 I was trying to figure out if they put a timeline on it.

00:42:32.100 It almost seemed like it was several weeks when the scripture says he was there for two days.

00:42:36.800 And he's also seen like helping people with daily chores.

00:42:41.820 So they're trying to show Jesus being like hands and feet and look at how charitable he was.

00:42:47.620 That wasn't what he did.

00:42:49.700 He preached.

00:42:50.840 He preached to them for two days.

00:42:53.460 And in Mark, he even tells Peter, let's go to the other towns to preach because that's what I came out to do.

00:43:00.020 So they diminish the fact that Jesus is there to preach.

00:43:04.180 He tells the woman that I'm not going to preach at you. 0.74

00:43:07.300 They show him in Sychar.

00:43:08.720 And yeah, he does a little bit of preaching in Sychar, but he also is doing all these chores and work and trying to help people and things like that.

00:43:15.340 And that's not what's depicted in the text.

00:43:17.160 So over and over again, you're seeing this diminishing of the importance of the words of what Christ actually said and how people came to faith through what he said.

00:43:26.780 and instead are trying to throw, you know, a works righteousness into this testimony of Jesus that they're giving.

00:43:35.520 Interesting.

00:43:36.900 Well, is there any part in the show, this is one of my last questions,

00:43:40.080 but is there any part that talks about the wrath of God, that Jesus, you know, that your problem, mankind,

00:43:48.460 is that you're currently under the just condemnation of God, that you're under his wrath,

00:43:56.040 That Jesus, is there anything that says, you know, that it's one thing to ask, you know, what is God saving us to or for?

00:44:06.540 But it's another question to ask, you know, what does God save us from?

00:44:10.960 And, you know, at one level, the answer is sin.

00:44:13.060 He saves us from sin.

00:44:14.680 But at another level, it's God saves us from his own wrath for our sin.

00:44:21.320 And is there anything in the show that depicts, you know, that Jesus is going to be enduring the wrath of God?

00:44:28.320 That it's not just that the cross isn't just, you know, the moral example of sacrificial love that a man would lay down his life for his friends,

00:44:36.400 but that Jesus actually dies as the Lamb of God under God's wrath that takes away the sins of the world?

00:44:41.980 I have not seen anything about the wrath of God.

00:44:44.740 The closest that I've heard, there was a scene where Jesus was teaching some people in the house.

00:44:50.420 This was right before he healed the lame man who was the paralytic who was lowered through the roof.

00:44:56.220 And so they have him teaching and they're just, you know, pulling together a bunch of different sayings that Jesus said throughout the Gospels.

00:45:02.360 None of that is necessarily wrong.

00:45:04.560 One of the things that he says, he quotes from Luke 13, where he says, how about the people in in Siloam when they perished, when the tower at Siloam fell on them? 0.85

00:45:14.320 Do you think that they were worse sinners than all the rest of these in Jerusalem?

00:45:17.380 I tell you, no, but unless you repent, you will likewise perish.

00:45:21.100 Now, that's probably the closest they've come in the show to saying anything like the wrath of God.

00:45:26.740 There has been a statement where Jesus has said, I came to save them from sin, but that's never explained.

00:45:32.660 So like I said, he could say that and somebody could just take that as, you know, all the wrong that people have done to me.

00:45:39.260 Jesus is saving me from sin.

00:45:40.920 Or even your personal sin, but just reinterpreting what sin is. 0.62

00:45:45.340 like the sin of Jesus is coming to save me, not from the sin of homosexuality, but the sin of

00:45:51.240 hate speech against homosexuality, you know, whatever. So, yeah, that definitely leaves it

00:45:55.800 wide open. Well, as we kind of come to a close here, do you have any final thoughts about the

00:46:01.660 show or anything that, you know, you want Christians to be aware of? Well, there's a lot 0.73

00:46:06.080 of people that have said to me, you know, can't I just watch it for entertainment? Or they will

00:46:10.940 criticize me and say, oh, you're against any kind of Christian entertainment or whatever. And that's

00:46:15.300 not true at all. I'm constantly looking for things that I know is safe for my kids to watch.

00:46:21.500 And I would love for them to be able to watch some things that are good tellings of Bible stories.

00:46:26.520 There are some cinematic depictions of Bible stories that I've enjoyed. I'm not going to say

00:46:31.860 what they are, though, because some of that is so subjective. And I just don't want to cause

00:46:37.800 anybody to stumble. All of that just simply to say that I'm not opposed to depictions of things like

00:46:43.280 this. But like you had said early on in the interview, it's not about showing a Bible story

00:46:49.820 on screen. It's the depiction of Christ himself that's really problematic with the chosen.

00:46:54.500 I think you can go through Old Testament stories, even New Testament stories, 0.88

00:46:58.340 doing a story of the Apostle Paul or something like that. And I think that you would come up

00:47:02.160 with something that's way better than what they're showing in the show. You can be faithful

00:47:07.220 to the text and come up with a good cinematic depiction of a Bible story without it having to

00:47:11.120 be Jesus and his disciples. Which, by the way, having said that, I think that the times when

00:47:16.820 the show is best, when the show excels, is when Jesus is not on screen and will actually have

00:47:24.440 very little to do in that show. It's what people are saying about him rather than what you're

00:47:30.400 seeing them do. That's always the most intriguing parts of the show. And when I'm seeing them do

00:47:36.220 that. I thought that that's what the show was originally when people were first telling me

00:47:41.340 about it. And they're telling me about, well, the chosen is like the life of Jesus through the eyes

00:47:45.500 of his disciples. I thought it was going to be like them talking about what Jesus did, but you're

00:47:49.820 not really seeing Jesus until I actually saw the show. And I'm like, well, no, this is another

00:47:53.980 Jesus show. It's all centered around entirely Christ. I think you could do something like that

00:47:59.300 where the, you know, maybe it's after Jesus has ascended and then the disciples are telling people

00:48:05.060 here's who he is and here's what he did. I think that that could be a really compelling program,

00:48:10.300 but unfortunately that's not what the chosen is. So yeah, if somebody asked me, just as a matter

00:48:16.700 of entertainment, can I just watch this to be entertained? And I would implore you not to,

00:48:22.740 simply because there's too much risk of whatever you think about the second or third commandment,

00:48:29.540 there's too much risk that you could potentially see that as an accurate depiction of Christ

00:48:34.820 And now you're imagining that when you come to the Bible and you're reading the scripture.

00:48:39.860 Or the other warning that I gave before is it could lead to confusion.

00:48:43.800 And it doesn't matter how faithfully you've been in reading the Gospels or how well you think you know the Gospels.

00:48:49.300 I encounter Christians all the time that think that they know the Gospels extremely well and then come to find that they really don't know them all that well.

00:48:56.480 These things are going to lead to confusion as to what the text actually says.

00:48:59.820 you're seeing an ecumenical, broad faith version of Jesus that is going to be appealing to the

00:49:06.820 most number of people. It should just give a lot of Christians pause to recognize that the show

00:49:12.120 is extremely popular and look at the different people that are promoting the show. That's enough 0.96

00:49:16.860 to make you go, it's probably not something good about this when that many questionable teachers

00:49:21.940 are on board with this and think that this is such a great thing. So I would encourage you

00:49:26.460 not to watch The Chosen. Go to the scriptures, especially if you're not as regular in Bible 0.83

00:49:33.620 study. You need to be reading the Bible and leading your family in that a lot more than

00:49:37.760 you're coming to these kinds of TV shows and watching them. But look for some other things

00:49:42.720 out there to watch or read or just turn the TV off altogether. That's not a bad game plan either.

00:49:50.120 Great. Just one final disclaimer here at the end for anybody who's thinking,

00:49:54.960 well, what about Narnia? What about Aslan? Or what about, um, it's worth noting that there's

00:49:59.860 a dynamic difference in terms of second commandment violations between, um, Christ and

00:50:06.040 a Christ figure. Um, there's, you know, we, we could, we can have a, the arc encounter for

00:50:12.740 instance. Um, and the arc is a type of Christ, but it's not Christ. Um, you know, you can have

00:50:18.260 a lion in another world like Narnia. And so you can have, you can tell powerful Christian stories

00:50:25.840 with Christian characters and even a Christ figure himself. I have a painting behind me

00:50:33.380 in my studio that has, you know, it's a, it's a painting of the church personified corporately

00:50:39.180 as one individual soldier. So it's the church militant on earth. There's a dragon, you know,

00:50:44.360 It's coming to the ground. It's just been fatally wounded. It's crashing to the ground, but its hole is opening up and all these other inferior monsters are coming out of its hole. And there is a Christ figure who has his hand on the shoulder of the church militant saying he's drawn back his bow. He just gave the fatal wound to the Satan figure and bound, you know, binding Satan.

00:51:07.220 But there's all these minions. There's still a lot of work to be done. And he's giving directions to the church militant on earth to go and finish the job. But it's not a picture. Sometimes people will ask, it's not a painting of Christ. It's a fictional painting in the same way that the church isn't one human being.

00:51:26.300 It's a it's a fictional painting of a fictional scenario with a church figure and a Christ figure.

00:51:34.780 And so that's entirely different than saying this is a depiction, a retelling of Jesus.

00:51:40.700 It's not a it's not a parallel story, you know, in another universe that has a savior type figure who, you know, does it kind of thing and is modeled after Jesus.

00:51:50.460 I think that that's totally appropriate and, and, and powerful, you know, whether it be Tolkien's, you know, his series, you know, or C.S. Lewis or other things like that. That's, that's a wonderful way to do it. And I think we need more fantastical fictional stories, especially for our children that are good Christian stories. But without saying this is Jesus, and this is what he said when it's literally not. That's, that's the difference.

00:52:15.720 Yeah. Any any any comments on that? If not, we'll go ahead and call it quits here.

00:52:21.700 No, I appreciate it. And you had drawn the lesson from R.C. Sproul earlier about how cautious he was about not depicting Jesus or showing the face of Christ in his stories.

00:52:31.000 My kids love R.C. Sproul stories. I think we got every one of his kids books and it's all allegorical.

00:52:36.860 but yet my kids are really able to easily grasp the message that's being said in the book because

00:52:44.060 they compare that with the devotional lessons that I lead them through or the catechism that

00:52:48.240 we do and so when they see it in the in the story that R.C. Sproul does as an allegory

00:52:53.220 then they're going oh yeah I see a Jesus does that for us you know and they're able to make

00:52:57.400 the connections so especially when you're looking for family friendly entertainment and stuff like

00:53:01.620 this be aware that your children are absorbing a lot more than you think they are that should

00:53:06.280 encourage you more in Bible study and less in shows like this in The Chosen. Right. Especially

00:53:13.760 for young kids. I mean, I just imagine, you know, I have a five-year-old, three-year-old, two-year-old

00:53:17.760 and six-month-old. And, uh, if we sat down and watched The Chosen, like my, my little girls are

00:53:23.460 going to be like eyes, you know, all aglow, wide opened, you know, this is Jesus. And like, that's,

00:53:30.480 that's what they're going to be thinking. And it's, uh, no sweetheart, that is not Jesus. And

00:53:35.060 even with all of my, you know, careful guardrails and conversation before the show and after the

00:53:40.200 show, it would not be helpful for my little children. Yes, sir. I think you're wise in that.

00:53:46.500 Absolutely. All right. Well, thanks so much for coming on the show, Pastor Gabriel. We appreciate

00:53:51.000 it. How can our listeners keep track with what you're doing? So the podcast that I do is Bible

00:53:57.040 teaching five days a week. I do New Testament Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, Old Testament

00:54:01.020 on Thursday. And then my wife and I do a Q&A where we take questions from the listeners on

00:54:04.980 Friday. And you can find that at www.utt.com or whatever podcast app that you use, just type in

00:54:14.680 www.utt. Even through Spotify, you'd be able to find us. And of course, the videos on YouTube as

00:54:20.820 well under those same letters. And we've done so many videos now up to this point. I think it's

00:54:25.520 pretty close to 400. You can type in a Bible topic and the letters www.utt and any video that

00:54:31.620 I've done on that subject will come up in your YouTube search. Great. All right. Well, thank you

00:54:36.340 so much for coming on the show. Thank you, brother. God bless you. Can I be frank with you for just a

00:54:41.040 second right here at the end? Look, some of you guys, you're financially supporting this ministry

00:54:46.060 and from the bottom of my heart, I say, thank you. I cannot thank you enough. However, some of you,

00:54:53.080 you just, you can't afford it. In fact, some of you, you shouldn't afford it. Let's be honest.

00:54:59.700 I mean, we're living in Joe Biden's ridiculous economy. 0.96

00:55:03.960 Our nation and our totalitarian political elites lost their minds over the last three 0.91

00:55:11.240 years due to COVID.

00:55:13.320 We have written checks that we simply cannot cash.

00:55:17.300 It doesn't matter if people change the definition of a recession.

00:55:21.120 We are living in a recession right now, regardless.

00:55:25.480 Some of you are struggling to afford a carton of eggs at the grocery store.

00:55:30.120 You cannot support financially this ministry at this time, nor should you, but you could

00:55:36.900 still help us tremendously.

00:55:39.180 I am asking you, please, if you're willing to do so, take one minute of your time.

00:55:45.100 Leave us a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform, iTunes, Spotify, whatever

00:55:51.260 that might be.

00:55:52.480 This is the way the system works.

00:55:54.240 We want to be innocent as doves, but shrewd as vipers.

00:55:58.800 We need to be strategic.

00:56:00.640 You leave us a five-star review, and our podcast shows up for more people.

00:56:05.640 And the Word of God and courageous theology applied in practical ways to every realm of

00:56:12.380 life gets out there.

00:56:14.480 Help us get it out there.

00:56:16.160 Thanks for tuning in.

The NXR Podcast - March 22, 2023

THEOLOGY APPLIED - 3 Reasons Why “The Chosen” Does More Harm Than Good ｜ with Pastor Gabriel Hughes

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