Oh, I forgot the microphones again. I know you can hear me right now, but excuse me for a second. I gotta plug in the remote mic. Sorry. Welcome to the Household of Faith in Christ and our weekly gathering on Saturdays. You can follow us online. The easiest way to do that is go to our website, householdoffaithinchrist.com. All right, hopefully you're hearing me fine now, and we probably had a cutout in the audio. Anyway, last week we set a record. It was our longest Facebook Live as the Household of Faith in Christ. We went an hour and 45 minutes last week, by far our longest Facebook Live broadcast, if you want to call it that. This week we're going to actually set a record, too, of a different kind. This is probably a record that will never be broken. Today is, I promise you, it's going to be the longest message that I share. And it's partly because there's some certain things that I feel like need to be said, and I don't want it to turn into a two, three, four week series. I want it to be a one-off, a one and done. So there's some things I'm leaving out to accomplish that, but there's some things I didn't feel like I wanted to leave out. And so we're left with one message is quite a bit longer than normal. Usually our messages are 30 minutes plus or minus five minutes or almost always between 25 and 35 minutes long. This one's gonna be longer than that. So I'm just giving you a heads up on that. And so in the interest of time, we're not gonna do some of the niceties and normal things we might do before I get into the message, so we're just gonna have an opening prayer, and then we're gonna jump right into the message, and following that, we're gonna have a conversation. If you would like to join the conversation via the comments section, you are encouraged to do so, and we will be checking for those comments and interact with you if you choose to do so. Would you mind opening us in prayer, Angela? Heavenly Father, we thank you for gathering us here this evening, Father, and we thank you for this gathering. We invite the presence of your Holy Spirit to come and speak to us and through us. We ask that you bring to this broadcast who would be blessed by it, Father, and that they would be edified, and they would be strengthened in you, and they would be encouraged, and they would be corrected. And we just do this all to your glory, and we ask that your will be done in this. In Jesus' name, amen. Amen. I'm gonna go transfer over here. We're gonna start getting back into our habit of having a message from our makeshift pulpit. Haven't done that in a little while. So do you remember the Passion of the Christ? It was a movie that excited an awful lot of Christians about the prospects of the cinema having even more high quality films and high budget films like that that would be centered around the Bible. And in actuality, the volume of so-called Christian films did increase in the aftermath of the Passion of the Christ, but the quality and or the biblical faithfulness of the film many of these movies was sorely lacking, at least in most of them. Well, now there are a lot of believers who are really excited once more, this time not about a movie, but about a television series that's called The Chosen. And it's said that the plans are to make this into a seven season series. So it's gonna be with us for a little while. The first two seasons are done. I watched all of season one, maybe you've been watching it too. And, Maybe you're wondering, like I was wondering as I went into watching it, what are we to think of The Chosen? Is this solid stuff? Or is this another Heaven is for Real? Another Noah? Another The Shack? Well, so far, having seen the first season, my opinion is that The Chosen, it falls somewhere in between being solid and being another The Shack. There are definitely some good things about it, of course there are. And there are some significant red flags, and I'm tempted to say, of course there are. So let me explain what I mean here a little bit first by offering some background that might be helpful as we think through these questions. The Chosen series, it is created, executive produced, directed, and co-written by Dallas Jenkins. Now you might recognize that last name. His father's rather famous in Christian circles. His father, Jerry Jenkins, is the co-author of the immensely successful Left Behind book series, which has also been turned into two or three movies. Now, the Chosen series, it's distributed by a company called Angel Studios, and Angel Studios is owned by Mormons. And because of this, Dallas Jenkins, during interviews, has been asked for his thoughts about Mormon teaching, about the Mormon church, and in case you're not I'm overly sure this is, you know, an offshoot, some would argue, within the confines of the Christian tradition that sprang into existence in America in the 1800s by its founder Joseph Smith. Anyway, in these interviews, Dallas Jenkins' response when asked about this, his response has been to say that Christians and Latter-day Saints, they worship the same Jesus. And this is concerning to me as a pastor of the one true faith. And to be honest, it should get the attention of anyone, all of you who are followers of Christ. So I'm gonna be perfectly clear. I'm gonna slow down for a second and say, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not worship the Jesus Christ of the Bible. They say that they do. The Mormons say they do. And they use a lot of the same language that born-again true followers of Jesus Christ would use. And they even quote the Bible, oftentimes more frequently than you and I do, sadly. But let's keep in mind that oftentimes the most beguiling lies are those lies that most closely resemble the truth. And this is how Christian cults are given rise. And this is what the LDS are. It is a cult, a Christian cult that teaches people that the God of the universe is merely an exalted man. He has a physical body like you and I do. They teach the son of God is not eternal, but that he was born into existence and is therefore in a very literal sense, biologically speaking, our elder brother. In fact, they teach that Jesus and Satan are brothers. Mormons believe that the Father, the Son, the Holy Spirit are three separate gods. And that people, you and me, that we pre-existed as spirit children before we entered our current lives that we now live. So getting all these things wrong, one might imagine the Mormons church, They also get the gospel wrong. They teach a form of universal salvation. and the list of problems with Mormon doctrine, it could go on, but this is a message about the chosen. It's not a message about Mormonism. And so I'm gonna stop the list there because I think that the thrust of the point has been made. The teachings of the true, real, historical Jesus Christ of Nazareth and the instructions that he's given us to live by in obedience to him and his eternal lordship, they are in many cases diametrically opposed to what Joseph Smith and his cultic followers teach. They are completely different religions. One is the true religion of Christ, and one is a deceptive religion of Antichrist. So Dallas Jenkins, being confused about this. That's a problem. And it's a problem that could seep into the television series. And so I just want to encourage us to keep our eyes open. Now, before you're too quick to respond to what I've said so far, but look, try get it. I mean, I hear what you're saying, but let's not get carried away. It's just a TV show. Well, let me tell you a few more things. This TV show, it has developed study guides to complement the series. And these study guides are being used in so-called Bible studies and Sunday schools and so-called local Christian churches. This is exactly what happened with the shack. professing Christians and professing local churches, professing Christian churches, replacing the study of God's word with the study of a Hollywood style production. And this is not an accidental occurrence. Jenkins has said publicly that he expects his creative representations in the chosen to be what people think of when they're considering Jesus and his disciples. By the way, Dallas Jenkins also reportedly consults with a Roman Catholic priest and with a rabbi in order to, as he says, make sure the chosen is biblically accurate. Now, evangelical Protestants might raise their eyebrows at that. The general viewer might actually raise their eyebrows at that, given that there is nearly no dialogue and practically no scenes taken directly from Scripture. Hey, sweetie, you want me to hold that? How about if I put him here, is that good? All right. More than 95% of what we watch in The Chosen, it's pure fantasy. from the imagination of Dallas Jenkins. Now, this does not necessarily mean it's all bad. And it certainly hasn't negatively affected his popularity at all. In fact, the entire project is crowdfunded. This means that the fans are paying for all of the bills. That's how popular it is. The fans are footing the bill. Now, just because it doesn't necessarily mean it's all bad, of course, doesn't mean it's necessarily all good either. And if you've been paying attention to social media and kind of prevailing winds on this series, well, what I just said about it not all necessarily being good either could be news to you. I mean, all the critics it seems, most of them anyway, the online forums, the chitter chatter among friends, it is practically universally positive. One, in my experience, would estimate that you're lucky to find, you know, one negative critique for every, I don't know, hundred positive affirmations and praises for the show. And because of this consensus of support, and to be honest, love for this show, I am gonna spend most of our time today drawing attention to the concerns, because there's gotta be some balance. in this dialogue about this show. And so in my attempt to provide this balance, it might come off with me being a negative Nelly, me being a real killjoy, me being a stick in the mud. Well, you can call me those things if you like. I can take it. I've been called worse. But I don't want to be misunderstood here. I am not intending to ham-handedly, summarily condemn the series. That is not my goal. Because there are many things to truly appreciate about what is in this series. Some of them are technical in nature. Like, I think the cinematography, it's not extravagant, but I think it's beautiful in an understated way. And the pacing of the show, It's a tad slow, but you know what? This gives the story room to breathe, which is a good thing. And the acting, I think, for the most part, is pretty excellent. Although, I will say, there's an actor who plays the role of a character called Quintus, and he's a little bit theatrical, but even his theatrics are rather entertaining. The character development, I think, for the most part, is strong. There's a couple of notable exceptions to that, perhaps. I think it's mostly strong. Now there are some, they would argue that the character of Jesus shouldn't be depicted at all on the screen because of concerns about a second commandment violation. I don't share those concerns in this context. We're not going to get into that right this moment, but I understand where they're coming from and why they're concerned about that. And in many ways, I think that the script is top-notch. I think there are other ways in which the script fails, but I think there are a lot of aspects of the script writing that is very strong. And, you know, it wonderfully depicts an ancient Near Eastern wedding and gives us a sense of what that might have looked and felt like at the time. And interweave scenes kind of shows us people making wine by stomping the grapes and all that kind of brings you into the moment of the history of this historical narrative. And so, you know, that can all be good. It's understand. I mean, it's easy to understand why The Chosen has such an allure. I get it. You know, we as viewers, we feel as though we're watching Real people having real relationships in real life situations. Well, that's good. That's attractive. These are all pluses. But I'm not spending a lot of time today focusing on these pluses, because I don't see a need to offer extensive echoes of all of the plaudits that are coming from the pundits, both professional and amateur, regarding this show. If I'm simply going to add to that chorus, then I really should have a spender time doing something else tonight. And I've decided to have a spender time on this today. And why? because I am struck by the need to offer God's people a word of exhortation, an encouragement that will hopefully spur all of us to exercise discernment when and if we should watch The Chosen. So most of our remaining time in this message, I'm gonna be pointing out things that I think could easily escape the notice of a lot of people who watch The Chosen because some of them are subtle. And others, actually, I think they're more obvious, but even the obvious things, they can sometimes slip right past us when we get caught up in the artful storytelling and the winsome acting. And trust me, there's so much more that could be said about the series and what I'm gonna say here tonight. I can't possibly say everything or we'd be here for hours. I'd have to make it a multi-part series. And I just, I don't really wanna do that here today. So I'm gonna share as much as I can in the amount of time we have here together. And some of what I have to offer, simply questions. Like for instance, in episode three of season one, the Jesus character is tormented while sitting alone in his campground, and I'm watching the scene, and I'm wondering, why? What portion of scripture is this portraying? Now, there's no explanation given within the show, and I think that we could, if we wanted to work at it, could make some guesses, some good educated guesses, what's going on there, and maybe our guesses would be correct, but maybe not. Another question I had, Did Jesus really live like a contestant on the television game show Survivor on CBS these last 20 plus years before he entered his public ministry? I mean, maybe. Maybe not. Why is Matthew depicted as being on the autism spectrum? He clearly has Asperger's and some elements of OCD. There's no doubt about that. And I'm pretty sure that this is intended to make Matthew, the character of Matthew, seem more real to us, more relevant to our contemporary society. However, there's zero, nada, zilch, reason in scripture to think that Matthew had Asperger's. So the Matthew that feels more real as we watch the show, the one that feels more real, is not in fact The real Matthew. And speaking of Matthew, I haven't even said anything about kind of an elephant in the room, if you ask me. Why didn't Jesus heal Matthew of his autism? He could have very easily healed him. He chooses not to. So enjoy the show if you like to, that's fine. But please don't imagine an obsessive compulsive Matthew when you're reading your Bible, when you're studying the pages of Scripture. Now on the plus side, the show does help the viewer. to see the tax collectors like Matthew, they were despised by the general public. So the show gets that right. But I'm not sure the tax collectors, they would have been treated quite so rudely, even bullied as is Matthew in The Chosen. I find that to be unlikely, because you think about it, these tax collectors, they hold a position of power over the average person. The average person does not bully someone over which they have authority. Now watching the show, I also wondered, did Jerusalem really have a red district in the first century? Now I've looked at some sources on history and they do speak about there being prostitution in Jerusalem inns. And so it could be that there was a red light district, if you will, back then, like there is in many, most all of our cities today. But this is kind of a recurring and important theme throughout season one in The Chosen. So if it is, if it is historically inaccurate, well then it's given us a mental image that we're gonna have a hard time shaking. I mean, they give you some memorable scenes. I mean, in The Chosen, we're actually taken to a speakeasy, kind of like 1920s America during the Prohibition era. They have a secret password and everything. Is that how it really was 2,000 years ago? Now, in this red quarter, there is a barkeep, and he's very friendly and very protective, really, of a woman that he calls Lily. Now, I'm sure there could have been some exceptions back in the day, but we know that in the first century, their culture, they were not friendly and protective towards the average woman. Again, there could be an exception, but in my opinion, boy, what a swing and a miss here. It's unfortunate the chosen made the creative choice that they did here to have the barkeep be protective and friendly towards Lily because it ends up diminishing what we see Jesus do in the Gospels when he is so elevating of women, in contrast to society around him, that was in all likelihood absent of barkeeps like what we see in the chosen. Now on a similar issue, throughout season one, pretty much all of the marriages are presented to us as basically egalitarian as opposed to complementarian. Possibly even more than egalitarian, with the wife being the marriage partner who's wearing the pants, the wife is the one who wields the real power. I specifically have in view, as I say these things, the wives of Simon and Nicodemus. Especially recalling a moment when Simon's wife turns to him and she says, you can't tell me what I can and can't do. There's also a wife who's the mother of a little girl who spies on Jesus in season one. And I'll talk more about that in a minute. And this wife and this mother, she is depicted in the chosen It kind of seems like she's the head of the house and not the dad who's kind of off in the background in the scene. You know, I'd go so far as to say that in The Chosen, most of the men, they appear to be, at least sometimes, a little bit henpecked by their wives. Now, I understand in our today's culture, our contemporary society today, that this is very often how marriages play out. That's how it is today. But importing this idea into a story that represents life 2,000 years ago, It is at best anachronistic, and at worst, it could be an attempt by the show to pander to present day radical feminism. In fact, it might even be intending to promote today's radical feminist ideals. Other instances of this, this instinct to promote feminist political agendas, include the episodes that feature the group of young kids I mentioned just briefly a second ago. There's a girl in this group, her name is Abigail, and Abigail is brave. And her friend, Joshua, a boy, is not. He is fearful. The girl is brave. The boy is a scaredy pants. Among this group of kids, possibly like six to eight of the kids, I can't remember exactly how many in the show, but a little group of them, of this group of kids, mix of boys and girls, Abigail, the girl, is the leader of the gang, not one of the boys. at the very famous Cana wedding, where Jesus has his first public miracle, turning the water into wine. There's a woman there who trusts that Jesus will somehow make more wine, while her coworker, a man, does not trust. Mary Magdalene, a woman, participates in the telling of a parable. Now, it's odd that anyone would participate in the telling of one of Jesus Christ's parables. but a woman doing so is rather kind of stunning. And another woman, she publicly asks Jesus a question about prayer in front of a large crowd as if it's no big deal for her to have done so. It would have been a big deal for her to have done so. John, James, their mother, Salome, she's got, two little boys who are grown men, they're the apple of her eye, but she's that protective mother hen still well into their adulthood, and she tells them, hey, you listen. You do what Jesus tells you, and you stay by his side. All these examples of the women being elevated into behaviors that we would expect to see today, but not so much back then, they're recurring over and over again in the Chosen. Now, having mentioned the little girl Abigail, I'm gonna add that there are a number of times when there's one character that's called by another character in the show by a nickname. For example, this girl who was a leader of her gang, Abigail, she's called Abby. Nicodemus, he's referred to by his wife as Nico. And there are other nicknames given at the show. Now, this is a harmless thing. But I mentioned it because, well, given the societal conventions, At the turn of the first millennium, this cutesy habit of giving nicknames to people, it appears to me to be culturally out of place. And an indication that the producers of this show are just trying too hard to make it feel familiar to an American audience. I mean, that's my opinion, but I think that if my opinion is right, this could prove to be the Achilles heel of the series. They're trying too hard to make it feel relevant to us today, instead of telling us what really happened. Now back to more serious matters than nicknames. The show, it makes a conscious choice to magnify the characters of Mary Magdalene and Nicodemus. They are major, even central characters throughout season one of The Chosen. Now this is really interesting to me because these two people, Mary Magdalene and Nicodemus, they have very small roles in the telling of the gospel story that we read in our New Testament. So taking people like this, that have such small roles in the pages of scripture, and then turning them into major characters in the TV show, it gives Dallas Jenkins pretty much all the excuse that he would need to exercise pretty much all of the creative license he wants. Whatever he imagines in his mind, he can place it into the show. He's looking at the white space in our Bibles. He's looking at the space between the words, between the lines. And he's inserting concepts that are created out of whole cloth, thin air. Now this can make for a fun and engaging story and viewer experience. There's no doubt about that, but it does not help us know our Bibles better. And that's what people are saying. Have you heard them? I've heard them. People are saying, watching The Chosen has taught me so much about the Bible. No, it hasn't. The Chosen gives a name to Simon's wife. It calls her Eden. She is nameless in the Bible. The show, it refers to Mary Magdalene as Lilith or shorthand nickname Lil. Does the Bible ever call her any name like this? No. Now the TV show, it probably gets the name Lilith and assigns it to Mary Magdalene because of this Lilith name and its association with demon possession in Jewish lore. But this raises yet another problem. The Chosen, it depicts Nicodemus trying to do an exorcism on Mary. And the people actually think he's been successful in doing that exorcism. But can we find that story anywhere in the Bible? No. And the chosen portrays Mary as a prostitute. There is really no biblical reason for thinking that Mary Magdalene was a prostitute. It is a very common misunderstanding, but it is a misunderstanding and it's one of the show reinforces. And Jesus, he has a, Charming, truly charming interaction with the group of boys and girls that I mentioned. They appear to be maybe eight, nine, 10 years old, something like that. And I mean, I think it's the high point of the season. Season one is the most memorable, enjoyable parts of the series that I've seen so far. And so as enjoyable as it is, I got to ask this question. Does the Bible tell us that something like this ever happened? No. The chosen tells us that Thaddeus was a construction worker. Tells us that James was a choral singer. Nathaniel was an architect. Thomas was a caterer. Now this is all interesting backstory stuff, but do we find any of that information in the Bible? No, we do not. The imaginative extra-biblical additions that I've already mentioned, they don't end there. Like I said, we could be here for a long time. There are significant secondary characters in The Chosen, including two Romans, one named Quintus and one named Gaius. Now, Quintus and Gaius, as prominent as they are in season one of The Chosen, there are no people with either name in any of the four gospels. A huge storyline in season one revolves around the Jews and them illegally fishing on the Sabbath. In fact, it's a storyline that kind of knits the first season together into one coherent whole. So it's a big, important part of the story. So these Jews, they're fishing illegally on the Sabbath, and Simon actually is one of those doing so, and Simon's doing so because he's incurred these huge gambling debts. Why does he have gambling debts? Because he has had a number of failed street fighting schemes that he does in partnership with his brother Andrew. And so he's got these debts, he can't keep up on his taxes, so Matthew gives these brothers a deadline to pay their taxes, and Simon kind of panics, and he rushes off to the Roman Quintus, and says, I'll spy on those merchant ships for you if you'll give me some forgiveness on my taxes. And this causes all sorts of intrigue with Zebedee, the father of the Sons of Thunder. And things go poorly for Simon. He has his left ear cut by a Roman soldier. And man, what a whirlwind, such drama. And what page of scripture can I read about that? None of them. Not one piece of that story is found in the pages of the Bible. And adding insult to injury, it's kind of more of a personal pet peeve I'm gonna mention here, but one of my annoyances with the show has to do with Simon having his left ear cut. I mean, the scene clearly shows the soldier pulls out his sword and wields it against Simon. And there are other characters in the show who will later on will say, oh, Simon, what happened to your ear? But I'm telling you for the life of me, I can't see the wound. I couldn't even see any blood. And that distracted me, I gotta tell ya. But, I mean, that's really just a digression. These things I'm mentioning here, they are completely extra-biblical. They are pure fabrications of the mind from Dallas Jenkins. So if you don't read your Bible, and you watch this show, thinking that it's teaching you what happens in the Bible, You are misled. And I haven't even mentioned all that could be pointed out. And again, I have no intention of doing so, but we are gonna continue a bit longer. There's a few more things I feel like I should share. At one point in season one, Jesus tells Mary Magdalene that she should lead the Sabbath meal prayer and that she should handle the scripture readings as well. Now, based upon what we know about the culture of the time, in first century Israel, this never would have happened. And so this is not what we would expect, nor is it what we find in the pages of the New Testament. And on the subject of this Sabbath meal, it takes place in episode two of season one. It comes across as a sort of Shabbat of misfit toys. Mary, she leads these proceedings at Jesus' instruction after she invites pretty much all the people in her friend circle to come to her home for the meal. In her friend circle, it's mostly the outcasts, you know, society's rejects, the handicapped, disabled, the oppressed. This is such a blatant attempt to be hyper relevant to today's culture. I mean, without exaggeration, I'm watching this scene, I'm watching and I'm thinking in my head, man, if we change the costumes on these actors, this could be a scene from an episode of ABC's Million Little Things. And if you're unfamiliar, Million Little Things is a contemporary story told in today's day. It had the exact same vibe and feel And Million Little Things is trying to advance a leftist agenda for what it's worth, by the way. Now shifting gears, here's a real head-scratcher. As we know from the Bible, Simon's mother-in-law was very sick. And this is portrayed in The Chosen, so the TV series gets that one right, good for them. But for some reason, her illness, it plays out over several episodes in season one. I mean, Andrew and Simon, they never think to ask Jesus to heal her. How odd. This is after the series had shown us have Jesus heal Mary of her demon possession. It's after the TV series shows Jesus healing the leper. It's after the TV series shows Jesus healing the paralytic. And now the season's almost over. The woman is languishing. Simon is tending to this poor, dying soul at her bedside, singing her songs and everything, and nothing occurs to any of them. And then, just as the season is about to wrap up, and they're running out of time, Andrew actually says, we should get a doctor. To which Jesus says, there is no need. You think? Not only is this laughable, but it disagrees with the account that we find in the gospel according to Mark chapter one, where we read that they went to Jesus and told him about this poor, old, ill woman, when? Immediately. They did not delay. That's what it says. Immediately, or some of our English translations, they might opt for at once. They didn't wait a day, a week, a month, multiple episodes in a season. And things like this, they tend to get stuck in my craw. Now perhaps it's of little consequence, but the way the Chosen set the scene for one of Christ's miracles, that also bugged me. The healing that I mentioned of the leper. In the TV show, it happens out in the countryside. Only a handful of the disciples were there to witness it, along with a spying Ethiopian woman who's kind of hiding in the bushes. So they're the only witnesses. But in the gospel, according to Luke, we're told that this miracle didn't happen in the countryside, it happened in a town. And Matthew, he tells us that it happened with a large crowd gathered, not just a small smattering, a handful of people. This was a very public miracle, but the TV scene, it simply doesn't match the biblical narrative. And they could have, they for some reason chose not to. There's something else that's likely of little consequence, but I think it might be good for me to mention. Dallas Jenkins, for what it's worth, he opted for late dating of the Old Testament scenes in the show. For example, there's a flashback during season one to the time of Moses, and the timestamp that's placed on the screen places it in the 13th century BC. And there are a lot of scholars who would agree with that dating, so there's no problem with that as far as it goes. But there are a lot of other scholars that would say, no, not the 13th century, the 15th century BC, approximately 200 years sooner. Or further back in time, if you want to look at it that way. And in episode eight, there's another flashback. This time Jacob is digging a well, and the time stamp on the screen, it places this 2,000 years before Christ. An early date would place this about 200 years before that, about 2200 years-ish before Christ. Now, I'm not sure that this has to mean anything, but I wanna share with you, honestly, I tend to get at least a little bit suspicious. when someone is consistently pushing for a late dating of things. And why is that? Because in my experience, those pushing for the late date, too many of them push for those late dates because they have higher critical liberal agendas for doing so. Now there's another flashback. It's in episode five. And this one has Jesus when he's a little boy, 12 years old, separated from his earthly parents, Mary and Joseph. He's busy about the business of his heavenly father. He's at his heavenly father's house. And I actually think that the show does a pretty nice job with this scene. I like the way that they handled this particular scene. And it does a nice job later in this very same episode, it accurately mentions that Jesus was likely a craftsman who did stonemasonry work and didn't merely work with wood. They get that right by my estimation. In fact, there's a third portion of the season that I really liked, and it happened in the Jacob flashback that I mentioned just a second ago. Speaking of God, Jacob says, we didn't choose him, he chose us. I wish there was more Bible and more biblical theology like this in the show. Not that there aren't other biblical moments. There are, but they're almost always mixed with things that kind of miss the mark somehow. For example, Andrew calls the Messiah, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And very early in the season, the disciples, they all somehow seem to know that Jesus is the Messiah and they call him the Lamb of God. And Zebedee, he's having a conversation with Jesus and Jesus tells him, my earthly father, Joseph, he's now in heaven. And these things, they are all true. Every single one of those things is true. However, this is season one of seven. Consider the chronology here. And when you do that, to me, these truths, they seem a little bit out of time, a little anachronistic. The men around Jesus, they were beginning to understand. They could have even been said to believe in him in a certain kind of a way, but them having a fuller grasp of what it meant to be the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world, for them to really understand what it meant for Joseph to be in heaven, I don't believe this happened for the disciples in season one of Christ's earthly ministry. I mentioned a couple of scenes from episode five that I really liked. There was another scene from this episode that it almost joined the list, could have joined the list, but then the script writer dropped the ball, unfortunately. In this scene, Simon references the story of Elijah and Elisha, and Simon's talking about how Elijah told Elisha to follow him. The problem with this scene is the way that Simon relates the story. It does not square with 1 Kings chapter 19. In the Old Testament, Elijah doesn't say anything at all about following. And he's actually kind of wordless. And instead what he does is he takes his cloak and he places it upon Elisha as a symbol of his indication that he's transferring his ministry to Elisha. He's anointing him into the ministry with the giving of his cloak. And Elisha responds to this act by Elijah, by saying that he will follow Elijah. So Elisha talks about following, Elijah does not. And this is important because just then, when Elisha says, I will follow you, what does Elijah do? As if he's channeling Diane Court from Say Anything, he says, go back. What have I done to you? This is precisely the opposite of telling Elisha to follow him. He doesn't tell him to follow him, he tells him to go back. So Simon, the way he tells the story in The Chosen, has a very different sense, if you will, than the story that Simon tells. And we get a very different sense of the true history of things a few other times in The Chosen. One of these times is during the flashback of Moses that I already mentioned. In that scene, Moses is making the brown serpent that we read about in Numbers chapter 21. And Joshua challenges and doubts Moses's leadership in this scene. There is absolutely nothing in the Old Testament zero in the Old Testament, nothing to suggest that anything like this argument between Joshua and Moses ever would have happened. And as part of this argument, Joshua, he kind of intimates that that bronze snake, it's a pagan symbol. This is a modern insertion into the story. This is something that today's contemporaries in the last couple of generations have wrestled with that kind of a question. But Moses and Joshua, they would not have viewed that bronze snake as an idol any more than they would have viewed the golden angel sitting atop the mercy seat of the Ark of the Covenant as idols. Joshua would have never asked that question, would have never leveled that charge against Moses. It would not have happened. And Jesus makes it clear in the New Testament, this was not an idol. Instead, it was a foreshadow of the Son of Man coming to save his people. So this is another example of Dallas Jenkins trying too hard to connect with today's culture. It's why the show, it's plagued by so many American sayings that would be so completely out of place if uttered a couple of thousand years ago. Phrases like teacher's pet, Get used to different. Crowd cleanup is a pain. We're sitting ducks. You're kidding. Trying to keep things under wraps. These are just a handful of the many, many examples that could be mentioned. And there's also a moment in the episode six where Nicodemus, he alludes to what we today would call the Streisand effect. He's saying that trying to quiet John the Baptist had the effect of making John the Baptist more legitimate in the eyes of the surrounding culture. And I mentioned John the Baptist, now that his name's come up, maybe I'll talk about him here a minute. How was John the Baptist depicted for us in season one? Well, basically, we're given a fictional character. The way he speaks of things, is almost socialist. He has an incredibly negative attitude towards wealth, indicating that anybody who is a person of means should give all that they have to the poor. And he's paid, John the Baptist is, is paid a visit by Nicodemus while he's in prison, a visit that is mentioned nowhere in scripture. And during this visit, Nicodemus, he's positioned as a seeker with lots of questions about miracles. And then a couple of episodes later, it feels to me like the series is going out of its way to present Nicodemus in a very favorable light once again. It has him suggesting that he meet clandestinely with Jesus at night because of concern to protect Jesus. Now, in fairness, the Bible, it's silent on Nicodemus' motivation for meeting under cover of darkness, but most interpreters believe that his motivation to meet at night was out of self-preservation, out of fear for himself, out of fear of being found out by the Jews, particularly the Jewish leadership, rather than any concern about Christ's safety. If you think about the timeline, there was no need to be worried about Christ's safety at this stage in the story. So it's a really forced odd fit. And it struck me as strange that during this meeting between Nicodemus and Jesus, that two of Christ's disciples were eavesdropping on the conversation between their rabbi, their leader, their master, and this highly esteemed Jewish religious leader. It struck me as strange. Struck me as doubly strange when Jesus says, Nicodemus, follow me, and then adds, I hope you will come with us. And it struck me as triply strange when Nicodemus bows and kisses Christ's hand and Jesus discourages this act of worship. And it struck me as quadruply strange when Jesus asks Nicodemus, what does your heart tell you? This same concept, it appears elsewhere in the season when Andrew says to Matthew, what good is our answer if you don't listen to yourself? Listen to yourself. Follow your heart. What does your heart tell you? Listen to your heart. You know, some of the stuff I've mentioned here tonight, it's merely creative license on steroids, and therefore it really doesn't necessitate a call for the crew of our Christian battleship to take up battle stations and go to war over it. However, some of this stuff, it's blatantly unscriptural. The Bible does not tell us to follow our heart. Instead, It tells us, as it does in Jeremiah 17 verse nine, that the heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked. Who can know it? So the question in the Chosen is, what does your heart tell you? And the question in the Word of God is, Who can even know the human heart? Season one wraps up with Nicodemus rather conflicted about whether he should join Christ's traveling band of disciples or not. He kind of leaves them, what I view as kind of a guilt offering. He leaves them a bunch of money to help them along their way. And Jesus, he glances in the direction of where he knows Nicodemus is hiding behind the corner of a building. And he says out loud, he came so close. Ugh. This is beginning to smell like Pelagianism. That old heresy that people can save themselves. It certainly smells like the Seeker Sensitive Movement. A movement that dominated the American church landscape for the better part of a generation or two. All the way up until Arguably, it surrendered in more recent days to the post-modern cultural Marxism that sees you ruling the roost today. Although, perhaps the seeker-sensitive movement, that's just an aspect of it. I'll get into that debate later. Now, as attractive as some of these ideas, they might seem to our earthly instincts, they are not the truth. The Apostle Paul, Romans chapter three, is quoting from Psalm 14, He says, there is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands. There is no one who seeks God. End quote. If no one seeks God, this means that Nicodemus did not seek God. He wasn't conflicted. pacing around his room, oh, what to do, what to do? I think I've found God, but should I follow him? I have understanding, but what should I do about this understanding that I have? No. Nicodemus had no proper understanding outside of Christ. No one does. And that's not me saying it. That's the Bible. Again, Romans 3, 10, 11. There is no one righteous, not even one. There is no one who understands. Now this changes when Christ calls to himself those who are his. He seeks those who are lost. He chooses us and we hear his voice. He changes hearts. He gives understanding. And his righteousness then becomes his people's righteousness. That's gospel truth. And the Chosen misses this almost completely. It even in some sense could be said, possibly by accident, could be said to be subverting this Gospel truth. So be aware. Now there are a few remaining stray thoughts I want to share before we wrap up. I like that The Chosen, it works to incorporate some of the teachings of Jesus. I always appreciate when these movies and TV shows about Jesus do that and use his words. Unfortunately, though, the script in The Chosen, it tends to change a lot of Christ's words. I mean, I don't know, they could have just actually used actual parables from the actual pages of scripture. They're right there. The script's already been written for you. But for some reason it chooses not to. I mean, it's not the end of the world, maybe. but it does make the show at least feel quite a bit less authentic. And there's a running gag throughout season one. I don't know if people have been watching the series, picked up on it, most probably did, I guess, but the gag is that Simon, he runs slowly. In episode four, we see John at a blistering pace, you know, running really, really fast. Simon, he just plods along. Later in the series, there's a joke at Simon's expense, and the joke is about him being a slow runner. And this gag, it comes up again in the final episode of the season. And this is all alluding to the fact that John outran Peter to the empty tomb following Christ's resurrection. So it's kind of a clever thing for the show to have included the first time. Second time, by the third time, growing rather tired of that, gag. It was like they were a one-trick pony. Now, the fewer can see what seems to be clear Roman Catholic influence. At least one time that I noted happens in episode five, Jesus pretty much in the scene is unable to refuse his mother at the Cana wedding. Now, for those who don't know, the Roman Catholic view of Mary is very lofty. They have a very high Mariology. It's why Roman Catholics pray to Mary. because Jesus, he might not respond the way I want to my prayer, but if I can get Mary to intercede for me to Jesus, there's no way Jesus would refuse his mother. And so in this scene, it plays out in a way where Jesus just can't refuse his mother. So I think that that's definitely some Roman Catholic influence there. Now, keep in mind that one of the advisors for the show, I mentioned this earlier, is a Roman Catholic priest. Now again, Don't misunderstand, I don't want to put too much weight in places where you don't need to put too much weight. I'm not saying this is necessarily the end of the world, but it is something for us to keep in the back of our mind. The final episode of the first season has Jesus talking to the Samaritan woman at the well. And the show, it accurately makes clear that she is the first person to whom Christ publicly reveals himself as the Messiah. So the show gets that right. But, And he adds a comment about the Jews destroying the Samaritan temple after the Samaritans had desecrated the Jewish temple. And he says this in such a way that it kind of intimates that the two temples were equivalent. That is not the case. They were not equivalent. One is a true temple and one was not. And finally, if you watch the show, You might notice that the actor who plays the role of Jesus is quite a bit taller than almost any other actor on the show. There's a couple that are taller than him, but he's in the upper one percentile of height of those who are in the show. We have no reason to believe that Jesus was particularly tall in real life. In fact, Isaiah 53 tells us that he had no beauty or majesty to attract us to him, nothing in his appearance that we should desire him. And so actually it seems rather unlikely that the Messiah's height would have been outside of the norms of his generation and the general population around him. But I gotta tell ya, it does appear that the makers of the movies and the TV shows that have a Jesus character in them, they just can't help themselves. Jesus is almost always one of the tallest figures on the screen, it seems to me. As I end, I wanna amplify the disclaimer that I made earlier. Watch The Chosen if you want. Enjoy it. Glean from it lessons, both positive and negative, lessons you can apply to your life. Do this as you would, or at least as you should, with all that you watch and listen to. But don't look at this series as a replacement for the Bible. It's not that. And don't even look at this series as a supplement to the Bible. It's not that either. It's a reasonably well-made show that provides hours of wholesome entertainment, and there's something to be said for that in today's day and age. And it can even be used as a tool for jump-starting conversations about the real, true, biblical, historical Jesus. The Jesus who is the God-man, who rescues sinners from their death in sin, bringing his elect eternal life to be lived with him in glory forever, following our Christ's earthly return. This is what's true. because our Savior is worthy, and his life and his work are perfect, and he is the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. And he alone, as revealed to us in Holy Scripture, not as depicted on some glowing screen on an electronic device, no, no, the real Jesus, he alone is worthy. Let's never confuse him with a fabrication. Let's pray. Father, we thank you that you have preserved for us all these years your written word. that we can study and lean upon for the truth of who you are, who you've made us to be, how we are rescued from our sin and the condemnation that is due us because of the perfect work and perfect sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross. We thank you that through your Holy Spirit we can have discernment, that you can illumine our minds and reshape our hearts and cause us to be bold and proclaiming and defending the truth and to be on guard against the sneaky insidious lies of the enemy or accuser. We praise you and thank you that that accuser has been defeated. Defeated by our warrior king, Jesus Christ. It's in his name we pray. Amen. Let me wander over here. All right, so I told you it would be a record for length. That was probably 55 minutes or so, probably, I'm gonna guess. Anyway, I'm curious, how many people in this room have been watching The Chosen, have seen at least an episode of The Chosen? Yeah, so there's about half maybe of the people in the room have seen it, others haven't. How many people until today even knew The Chosen existed? Or didn't, is there anybody here who didn't even know The Chosen existed until tonight? Or recent weeks when I've been mentioning it a little bit? Everybody's heard of it at least? Okay, well, those who have seen it, what's your impression to the way I portrayed things in the message? And I thought it was boring, so I didn't hold my attention. The sermon or the series? Well, because I thought the series was not good. I didn't particularly care for the sermon either, but that's just because I didn't care for the show. It was underwhelming. What was underwhelming? The show. The show overall was underwhelming? The show overall, because I stopped watching after the third episode. It's interesting But it was also a gimmick it was also a gimmick episode so It stood out because it wasn't the first You agree they seem to be not fans of it Dina wasn't a fan So we got three in a row who aren't fans or you bearish fan out of a bearish on it. Yeah, yeah, okay I What captured me about the show was the portrayal of Jesus. I just believe that the person that they hired to portray Jesus, I just believe he had a A very good mixture of strength and tenderness in that in his portrayal of that character and that that that's the part Because Jesus is most important to me. That's the part that really got that really I really enjoyed about the show But in terms of the criticisms, I know that I've had criticisms about the show. I do agree That they do pander to our culture a little too much and trying to make the the show relatable And I had the exact criticism that you had in terms of the Americanisms, the idioms. I thought they sounded too Western and too Americanized. I appreciated the fact that they consulted the rabbis to try to make other things about the show authentic because the story of Christ happened within a culture just like anybody's story happens within a culture. And so I thought it was a nice touch to consult with the rabbi to say, well, what would this situation have looked like most likely back in Jesus' day when he was walking the earth? But that was diminished a little bit by all of the Americanisms and the gee whiz and the gollies and all that kind of stuff in their conversation. So I totally agree with that. That didn't help with the show's authenticity. In terms of the extra-biblical narrative, because I approached the show approaching it as a drama and not a documentary, that didn't really bother me. I expected them to dramatize and to maybe emphasize the backstory because I think one of the strategies of the series creator was to emphasize the backstory of the characters so that we could see the characters as people who had a life outside of what they, their communication with Christ when they encountered him. So they brought that, their baggage and that backstory with them. And it's total imagination, you know, like Mary, you know, having a drinking problem. I mean, it's not biblical, but it's plausible. I mean, she could have, you know, and she could have been a prostitute. And so I just that didn't that didn't really bother me and I I would I would advise people that That come to watch the show you do need to read the Bible to know exactly What was said so that when you go to the series you will know what is extra biblical But to your point though, sometimes they say they went too far, even with the extra biblical stuff. Like one time, I remember one, I forget which season it was, but Jesus, they were about to go somewhere and Jesus was going to go to the east or whatever. And they were like, oh no, no, we need to go this way. He's like, oh yeah, yeah, I forget, I forget. I'm like, no, I don't think you ever forgot anything. They went a little too far sometimes in humanizing them. You know, and I saw season two, cause I remember that scene in season one. Yeah. Yeah. They, yeah, they, they, they do that at one time and, and I didn't, I didn't really care for that, you know? Um, so they, at times I thought that they over humanized them to the point that they get to me, that was a fault for getting things as a fault and he, he, he didn't have any faults, but overall I thought the show, um, Well, everybody has a goal, right? So if your goal is to flesh out the backstory, to make these people have a backstory and a history so that they just, you know, the first thing that you see about them is not what they said with Christ. If that's their goal, then they succeeded. You know, but yeah, I agree that you do need to know the Bible and you need to bring, and if you don't know the Bible and you've seen the show, you need to go back and read the Bible to see what actually happened so that you can know what was added in terms of dramatization. Yeah, I'm wondering in season two about that, you know, Jesus, them going out of their way to make Jesus seem more and more like he's just one of us. That could be the Mormon influence, because that would be the Mormon view. The Mormon view is that us, if we're good Mormons, we're going to become gods and have our own planets. I have something to float to you on the Mormon influence, because it seemed to have gotten by you. You didn't mention it in the sermon, and I was watching it this episode last night, and that was during the the scene where he recruits Peter, Simon Peter, which I thought was poorly done, because they were already ashore, and they're in knee-deep water collecting all these fish. I thought that was poorly done. Yeah, and I didn't mention that, but I did notice, because the narrative in scripture is that they put out into deep water again. They had come to shore. Jesus instructs them to go back out into the deep water and drop the nets, and they didn't do that. That was a miss, but like I said, I couldn't say everything. I was describing the scene, not where I was going. So Jesus is telling a parable. He gets on their boat and tells a non-canonical parable. And he says the kingdom of heaven is like the fish that are gathered and the angels will sort out the good from the bad. It's like the angels don't do the judging of mankind. We judge the angels. Right. And they said that their Jesus said that the angels will judge the evil from the righteous. I wrote that quote down as I was watching it. No, that one slipped past me because I didn't... That's episode 4. And then afterwards, when he explains the catchers of men, he says, you catch them, I will sort them out later. And it's like, that's not the mission of the church. Our mission is not to catch a bunch of people and have Jesus sort them out. That's not the mission of the church. That is your seeker-friendly, mega-church mentality. Let's put a bunch of butts in seats, and then Jesus will sort them out later. Yeah, so that again is speaking to today's culture, right? Because that is the cultural norm in today's, what passes for today's American church. Right, so I thought that was like the most glaring instance of falseness. I, again, I've only watched the fourth, four episodes. And like the fourth episode to me was the most unbiblical because of that parable, that non-canonical parable, which was blatantly false teaching. What would any of you who have seen it, or those of you who maybe want to chime in even though you didn't see it, what would you do to make it better? How would you have made it differently to make it better? I have a thought, but I want to hear what other people's thoughts are. It's faithful to themes taught in scripture, which I thought was a very liberal way to do it. A lot of things that say based off of a true story takes some serious liberties, so that would be not That would be in keeping with a lot of based off of a true story. It's a tough call, because I think they had a good premise to me for a show. I just think the execution is horrible. The Simon character drives me nuts. He is a cliche from a kids movie. I feel like I'm watching Road to El Dorado, and he's the blonde guy in that movie. And they did it better. And the Chosen did not do that trope well at all. That's part of the relatable thing, I guess. So there's that. He's a cliché trope. Nicodemus is kind of like, I'm super curious. Yeah, he's a seeker, right? He's basically getting high or whatever, but he's getting high on the Joe Rogan experience. I missed that part of the season. No, he's getting high on the Joe Rogan experience, questioning whether, what if the law is more beautiful and mysterious than we ever imagined? Yeah. Like, it's something like that. By the way, you do have a comment. Yeah. Someone, I'm assuming you went to high school with Peter Jorgensen. Yeah. He is a member of the Church of the Latter Day Saints and thinks of some Some objection to you saying that it's not... Well, which part is not true? I'd be curious to know which part. Because I listed a number of Mormon beliefs. They believe in Jesus and God. Yeah, and I will... I will agree that they believe in Jesus, but not the Jesus of the Bible. My understanding of that belief system is that they kind of leave out the elements that make Jesus the Christ. So maybe they believe that, oh yeah, historical Jesus was there, and this is my understanding from what I've read about them and tried to do some research on, but they don't actually believe like they believe in Jesus, oh, you know, maybe he did some of the stuff that the Bible says he did, but anything that would make him the Christ, the Son of God, our Savior. Yeah, we had a discussion here, outside of Facebook time, talking about the idea of God and whether people are worshipping the same God, and this is just an extension there, they're worshipping the same Jesus. So let's talk about just God in general, because that's what the comment says. We believe in God, we believe in Jesus. Well, the God of the Bible, the God as described in the Bible, is the creator of the universe. But the Mormon belief is that matter pre-exists God. that God didn't create the matter, that the matter creates, so the matter is eternal, not that God is eternal, and that God is just like one of us. The God that we pray to and worship, according to a Mormon idea, is He was once just like one of us on a different planet, and He graduated up the ladder and became His own God of His own planet or solar system or whatever. I thought that they believed that God pre-existed, but then Jesus climbed His way up. Am I? My understanding is that they believe that the material universe is eternal. It pre-exists God, if you will. Oh yeah. And ultimately all of us kind of will. I mean, we all have different paths. We all get our own planets. We will eventually all get our own planets. And so that's where the universalism comes into their view. The Jesus of the Bible is God. The Jesus of Mormonism is not. The Jesus of the Bible is eternal. The Jesus of Mormonism is not. And we don't have to get hung up on the terms. You know what? Whatever. I mean, I think we should fight for our terms, but just for the sake of this discussion. Okay, fine. You can call your religion whatever you want to call it. I'm just going to tell you that it's not the religion of the Bible. And any Christian should be more than willing and should be increasingly equipped to go toe-to-toe with anybody to make that case, to say, the Bible as you're representing Him is not matching with the Bible on these pages. The God of the universe as represented in the Bible, the way you're representing Him, is not accurate to what is said in these pages. So if the Mormons want to say that I'm wrong and those who are gathered in this room that we're wrong, Okay, you have to admit though, I mean we're not wrong, but you have to admit though that they're different. You're saying that God, that Jesus came into existence, I'm saying no. We can't both be right. So there is also a possibility that an individual church preaches something that's closer to the truth. So for example, a lot of the stuff that we've said about Catholicism, I had friends as a kid who they did not I I don't believe that they worshipped Mary I don't think that they you know So they were Catholics and there's like a reformed version. Yeah their particular church their priest whatever it was Seemed a little bit closer to what I would have considered true Christianity. And I don't know if there's a reformed Mormonism or not, but yeah. I don't think that's possible in Mormonism. No, it's too other. Well, Catholic church started out good and then went astray. The Mormon church started out astray. I guess my point is that it's possible that those people who call themselves Mormons, maybe they grew up Mormon, but actually then read their Bible. I'm only saying this because there's a possibility that someone considers themselves to be as such, and actually does believe what the Bible teaches as well. But the Mormons really don't read the Bible, though, right? They read the Book of Mormon. They would claim it as part of their canon, but that's not the... Now, I want to talk about Matthew and that character a little bit more, because they portray him as a much greater learner than the Bible does. If you look in Luke 6, or particularly when Matthew's called by Jesus, he has friends that are tax collectors. So he has tax collector friends and he brings Jesus over and they celebrate together when that guy gets to the Pharisees grumbling that Jesus is hanging out with tax collectors. So they portrayed Matthew as being a much greater loner whose only friend is a dog and that's contradictory to scripture. which he would have had his own class of tax collectors, and tax collectors, I don't think they did enough to portray Matthew as particularly wealthy. It's weird, because they totally screw up the whole taxation system to make it seem more relatable, because the taxes back then were pretty light. You're paying 1% income tax, which doesn't even cover our social security tax. And he's so delinquent that he's going to lose his boat and house over falling behind on 1% income tax. I don't buy that. That's historically inaccurate. And they don't want to make it relatable. We today don't like the IRS because they take so much of our money. Back then, they didn't like having to give up their tax money, one, because they didn't want to give any sense of agreement that the Roman government had any authority over them. So there was that, they bristled out. But the other thing is, there was so much grifting going on. What would happen, so Herod, the king, he's a puppet king, and so for him to hold his position of authority over that region of the Roman Empire, he had to pay tribute to the emperor in Rome. So where did he get that tribute? He got it from the tax collectors, like Matthew. He would commission these tax collectors, and the way they were commissioned was, hey, you gotta make sure you bring back enough money so I can pay the emperor so I can keep my station in life here. So you've got to bring back what I need, but if you want to get more for yourself, have at it. And there was a ton of that coming on. And so people were taking way more than that. So one, they didn't think they should be paying taxes to Rome anyway. Now you've got Jews like Matthew who are participating in a system that Jews should not be participating in. So there's that. And then on top of that, not only are they participating, but they're stealing from their fellow Jews as they're doing something they should. So they had double, but still, I'm hard-pressed to imagine it could be accurate that a person in the general population would bully someone that could tax them, in theory, as much as he wanted because there were no limits on how much he could tax. Oh, you want to bully me? I'm going to tax you all your income. Not that that was happening, but they had so much authority. There's no way they were being bullied. Right, but Peter's filing extensions and stuff like that. What is this? He's waiting for an email that never comes. So I think though if you come to the series expecting it to be accurate in every respect, you will be disappointed by it. Or misled if you don't know the truth. Like to your point about Matthew having a bunch of friends. Tax collector friends. That makes sense to me, but maybe the reason why they didn't do that is because it would have made the story too cumbersome, or maybe they just didn't have the money to hire all the actors. What I'm saying is, I mean, there are fair criticisms about the way they portray certain things, but on the other hand, there's just the, there's just, you know, they have, I think they have limitations, you know, and they just, you know, Everything is not going to be that's why you've got to read the word You've got to go back to the word and know what the word actually says and then you come to it with Being prepared to give them some grace because they're they're not gonna hit every jot and tittle of scripture They're not gonna hit it and they're gonna add a lot of drama to it and I so I understand I understand what you're saying, but to me it's like I'm going to if you make a adaptation of a Let's let's do a book for instance an adaptation of a book. Is it a faithful adaptation of the book? That's made into a movie and so far. I've seen four episodes and the answer is no I don't think it's a faithful adaptation of scripture into a visual form. Is what you're calling, is what you're terming an adaptation really more of a documentary? No, like would you call a Harry Potter movie a documentary? No, but Harry Potter is totally fiction. What I'm saying is, I agree, but if it's a drama, I think that's the key word that it is a drama. It's not a documentary. So any drama any like if you will watch the series The Crown on Netflix, is that an actual adaptation of what happens in the royal family? I hear they go very in-depth as to how people look and stuff like that, but I couldn't tell you because I don't follow royal family. But that would be like another example, like probably about a great, I don't know, I'll just pick a number out of the air, probably at least 80% of that is just total drama. But they hit on historical things, they hit on World War II, they hit on that big plague that they had over there when they had a plague of smoke or something over there that they had in Britain. They touch on things that actually happen, but you know, they add because they're trying... Are you saying that they Forrest Gumped with the material? Kind of. Kind of. Yeah. Yeah. So I think that... I think Forrest Gump inspired a lot of bad... Movies and stuff like that. I do like Forrest Gump. I love Forrest Gump. I love Forrest Gump. They came after it trying to do the same thing. But I enjoyed Forrest Gump for Forrest Gump. I didn't expect it to tell you anything about World War II. Or Vietnam. I mean, yeah. You know, the Bubba Gump, all of that was made up. But it was entertaining and it drew your mind back to that time. Right, but when you call that faithful, I don't know, maybe that Forrest Gump's obviously not a great comparison for The Chosen, but to me it's not a faithful, I don't think it's been a faithful adaptation because I do see contradictions. I do see non-canonical parables that are false teaching, like that contradicts a bunch of other places in scripture. And to me, I don't see the portrayal of Peter as faithful to who Peter was. I just see that as childish. And to me, I think they're inserting Hollywood tropes into biblical narrative. I see it the other way around. Because you also have to keep in mind that, you know, you were talking about, is it a documentary? No, and I wouldn't have expected it to be. But the New Testament is itself a story. It's a narrative. Well, it is. If you want to go on the story that they didn't tell, yeah, you can finish. Thank you. So even if you didn't believe the Bible, even if you thought it was just a story, fiction, like Harry Potter, without the wands or something, then one would hope that it would still be relatively accurate compared to its own book, the own... Would you consider it relatively accurate, or would you consider it totally inaccurate? I have not seen it. I was just trying to... See, to me, this is kind of more in the... Have you ever seen the movie Risen? No. Oh, I hated that movie, because it basically... The premise was, okay, a Roman legionary's tasked with being a CSI with the empty tomb and stuff like that. And then it ended up just telling the story of Jesus in his final days on earth. It's like, you bait and switch me. I don't like that. And I like the premise of it. And then they just went off into the wilderness. So the premise of adding extra backstories to these people is not offensive to me at all, but it shouldn't contradict scripture. I agree. And to me, I think they don't even do it well within what they've done. Like John the Baptist to me seems like a clear missed opportunity that they could have told the story of John the Baptist and they chose not to. They ignore the, or correct me if I'm wrong, because I've only seen episode four, so I've just been introduced to John the Baptist in a jail cell and He is a very, very, very small part of the story in the season. You think they could have focused more on him? That, to me, is a missed, a clear missed opportunity. Yeah. Because he was huge. But that's not about, what you just described is not necessarily about an, it's not necessarily an accuracy issue. It's just a, you believe they should have focused more on that character. No, I'm saying I don't think they did a good job with the premise of the show. Well, well, I understand what you're saying. Where I'm coming from is, what was their premise? They may have had a different premise than your premise. And what was their goal? They may have had a different goal. I'm not saying that the story, please don't misunderstand me. I'm not saying the story is totally accurate. It is not. It is not a totally accurate story. But they had a premise and they had a goal, and I'm just saying, maybe they hit the mark, more or less, with their premise and their goal. I'm not saying that everything they said was accurate, though. I'm not agreeing with that. Okay, so I guess the question is, why would a person make something that contradicts scripture? Is there a good motivation for certain more blatant contradictions? Like to me that fish parable that Jesus tells on the boat was blatantly false teaching. And you know, I will say, you know, Dallas Jenkins, who, you know, this is his, this is his brainchild, you know, Dallas Jenkins is his creation. And he's on record saying publicly that I mentioned it in the message, that he is intending that people having watched, having watched The Chosen, when they think of Jesus, when they think of Matthew, when they think of Simon Peter, when they think of all these different characters, what they would have called to mind is the representation that Dallas Jenkins has given them in The Chosen. And I did not hear him say that. When the chosen gets so many things about those characters not right, that's a real problem. I feel like a solution, it might not have been as easily marketed, but I'm wondering if a solution could have been, okay, do a period piece. Do you want to be 95% fictional anyway? create entirely fictional characters name them Fred Wilma and Barney if you want you know from the Flintstones I don't care and then have them live out their lives and then intersplice moments when they were part of the crowd that saw the miracle they're part of the crowd that interacted with You know that because then you can make sure that those moments are like Much more close to mirroring what we've had in scripture and everybody's not confused like oh, those aren't even biblical characters But those biblical scenes within the story I mean would be perfect opportunity with John the Baptist to do something like that where he's preaching that the Jesus is coming and They just completely blow by that. I don't understand that decision. They didn't show the baptism of Jesus and They might in future seasons, I don't know, they might have a flashback season. I just see that as like a blatant, like, you know, it's just kind of shoehorned into, or hand-fisted, I don't know what the word is. They rush that into one episode, despite the fact that John the Baptist was kind of a big deal. Like, Josephus, doesn't he write more about John the Baptist than he does Jesus? He had a plaque, one of those signs on his desk. I'm kind of a big deal. Isn't that a thing? Like, Josephus writes more about John the Baptist than Jesus? What was the question, I'm sorry? Josephus? Josephus? Josephus, yeah. Wait, what? Doesn't he write more about John the Baptist than Josephus? Oh, the ancient historian? Yeah. Yeah, he writes very little about Jesus, actually. But he writes more about John the Baptist. Yeah, that's true. So you think that that would be a direction that they would have gone in, and that would have been more faithful to Scripture. Instead, they make Simon just a degenerate who, I guess, gets bossed around by his wife. That piece, I agree, that was not accurate. She would have been much more in that culture of reverence. Women didn't really have the kind of say that we have now. There was just this general, women, yeah, women were more diminished. They were supposed to basically sit down and shut up. Most women didn't talk that way. I mean, I'm more irritated with Simon's betrayal. I'm more irritated with Simon's betrayal than Eden's betrayal because I mean nobody knows what her name is. That's the kind of thing. I don't I'm totally okay with them Yeah, I don't mind is what we know that she had a name right totally okay Because what are they gonna do all season way? I just say hey you you know I mean, you know I don't get the impression that Matt that Simon cares that his mother-in-law sick though. I don't get that impression at all I just think I think the main overarching plot about the fishing on the Sabbath and Simon being the snitch and then Even though he was partners with James and John, the sons of Zebedee, they were partners. And they don't portray that at all. I think they contradict that. Oh, they're partners on that one night. It's like, really? Yeah. Anyway, I feel like they could have avoided this sort of thing if they had done things closer to my idea, but it might not have marketed as well because people want to think they're actually seeing the stories about Matthew and Simon and John and Jesus and all that sort of stuff. And so I get the marketing realities of that. And Mary Magdalene being the first of the chosen. Marketing the movie or the series should not be the number one concern. It's a practical reality though because they can't market it successfully, they can't fund it. They have the entire Mormon church apparatus marketing the product. So I agree making a Bible study based upon a dramatization of scripture is not, it should be, the Bible says it should be based upon the Bible. It should not be based upon a dramatization of scripture. I don't agree with that. I didn't know that they were doing that and I don't agree with that. By my estimation, the only way that would be acceptable, in fact, it could even be a good idea, is if you were to take the episode, prepare in advance to compare and contrast with the truth of scripture, right? And walk your class through, here's what they showed in the Chosen, here's what really happened. That could be educational and beneficial and fruitful for the, but I don't get the, if they're using the Chosen's study guide, That's not what they're doing and it's the shack all over again. That's a problem. Well, if we wanna be honest, Angel Studios, you mentioned them. To me, they're not very ethical of a company. I don't know a lot about their company. I know they were VidAngel. VidAngel had to declare bankruptcy because they lost a lawsuit or they were going to lose a lawsuit. They declared bankruptcy to avoid judgment, I guess. Because they were copyright infringement. They infringed on the copyright of all the major studios and all that. So they joined together. You don't get away with that for long. And they crushed them. So there's that. So they rebranded under Angel Studios. And it's interesting that they like the vidangel and Angel Studios because, going back to the Mormon question a little bit, The whole religion, according to Mormon teaching, is founded when Joseph Smith is paid a visit by the angel Moroni. Now, evangelicals would argue that either that never happened and Joseph was just a liar who made it up, or if he was paid a visitation, he was paid a visitation by a demon. It's basically Islam but Americanized. It's very prejudiced towards people with dark skin in their history. They've tried to alter that in recent years, but their history is very, very prejudiced. There's basically two peoples of God, two Israels, one in North America. I mean, they have all sorts of problems. Now, I will say to Peter or anybody else who, because I know I've got some people on our Facebook friends that I've, and I'm friendly with that are LDS. And look, if this is your Jesus, this is John, the gospel of John chapter one, verse one. And following, "...in the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God, and He was with God in the beginning. Through Him all things were made. Without Him nothing was made that has been made. In Him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it. There came a man who, and then the story goes on, talks about John the Baptist. If that's the Jesus that you believe in, then you very well could have salvation, even though you're identifying as a Mormon. But I'm gonna tell you, if you're believing in that Jesus, you are a piss-poor Mormon. You are not an obedient Mormon who understands the teachings of your own so-called church. It's the same with the Roman Catholics. I got in trouble once on the air on my radio show. I once, and I'm going to probably get in trouble if somebody sees this. I do believe that there are Roman Catholics that we will see in glory. But they're going to be there in glory with us because they're bad Catholics. Good Catholics who believe that that you should be praying to all these saints and Jesus's earthly mother Mary, and that the Pope is infallible when he makes some sort of a dictate in his papal authority, and buys into all the other bizarre traditions and histories of the Roman Catholic teaching. The gospel is part of what they teach, and if that's all you've glommed on to, but they've added so many things to the gospel, and what they've added on is that salvation is necessary by the work of Jesus Christ, and your own work, that you must have works to be saved, and that's salvation by law. The true Christian biblical teaching is that we are saved by Jesus Christ and his work, and the evidence of our salvation is that we live a lives of increasing sanctification where we have fruit in our lives and we have work that is evidence of what we have, but we don't have what we have because of our work. and Rome gets that wrong. But if you're a Roman Catholic and you don't understand that that's what your church is teaching and you think, no, I believe that I'm saved because Jesus saved me. I don't know about this works thing. What are you talking about? Okay, then you're a bad Catholic and you're a good Christian. Good for you. That's possible. Maybe it's possible. Seriously, how many people, let's see if we can get anybody else who wants to chime in who I didn't see the chosen, you have a much of a chance to talk. Do you know anybody, any people in your life, they call themselves Christians, but they don't have Almost any sense of what the Christian Church actually teaches. An actual Bible-believing church teaches. Hey. Apparently Nadia knows some people like that. Yeah. But I do. I'm sure we all do, right? I know them. Oh yeah, I've known plenty. It's the same with the Roman Catholics, same with the Mormons. There are a lot of people, they don't even know what their own church teaches. And so somebody- It's more like they just, they grew up, their parents were or whatever, you know. So for anybody who's LDS that's offended by, you know, my comments here tonight, I would encourage you to reach out to me. I'd love to talk with you about it and see if you can persuade me to become a Mormon. But know that while you do that, I'll be trying my darndest to make the case for biblical Christianity. And God will decide who wins that argument. Because if I'm right and the spirit moves on you, you will convert. If you are right, I will stay committed to the Jesus Christ of the Bible and we'll end in part as friends who disagree on this question. You are not gonna convert me. I am a child of God. I've been called by God. Christ does not lose one that the Father has given him. I am not gonna lose my salvation. So I'm not afraid of that conversation. I will have it every second of every day. If you're a Mormon, will you say the same thing? Will you meet and defend your faith while I meet with you to defend mine? And may the best faith win. and the Christian faith is the best faith, is the only true faith, it will win the argument. Whether it wins you to conversion, that's up to God and the move of his Holy Spirit on you. But I'm immovable from the truth. The question is, how movable are you from the lie? So I'm willing to have that. So I'm not accusing you of anything as a Mormon. I'm not saying you're any more of a sinner than I am. I'm not saying that you can get things wrong any more than I can, but on this particular question, The Bible is right. The Book of Mormon is wrong. The Pearl of Great Price is wrong. The Old Testament, the New Testament are right. So anyway, on that Mormon question, because that's a big part of this conversation, I think, broadly speaking. Anybody else have anything they wanted to add? What's that? You forgot the Doctrine of Covenants. That's not right either. No, yeah. OK, yeah. There are other part of their canon, the Doctrine of Covenants. Yeah, another part of their canon. Okay, I'll end with this one last thought. I thought somebody might question me about it, because I hinted at it in the message and said I'm not going to talk about it now, and then I didn't, but I will now. There are people who are Christians who have a concern about something like the Chosen, because it actually portrays Jesus. And Jesus, as we know, is God, and we're not supposed to make any sort of representation, sort of idol of, you know, that's a violation of the Second Commandment, in their view. I don't agree with them. I don't think they're heretical in their view. I think they're overly sensitive to that question. And the reason I feel that way is I think they're forgetting that yes, Jesus is God, but he is also truly man. And so we're getting the representation of Christ as a man walking the planet. I understand he's also God, but he's walking the planet as a man. I just feel like, you know, I think we'd be very careful as we talk about with the chosen, you can really misrepresent and get into some bad trouble. But is it a sin? Is it a breaking of the second commandment? I just don't see it. Although I'm open to having somebody persuade me on that case. I've thought it through, but maybe I've missed some things. I'd be glad to have you try to get me to change my mind on that, but I'm just not there. Anyway. All right, so. You didn't get a chance to talk much. You wanna close this in prayer? Heavenly Father, thank you for this time together. We ask that your Holy Spirit would move in our lives, that you would train us up in the one truth, that we would go and boldly declare the gospel, which is good news for your glory and your kingdom advancement. It's in Jesus' name that we pray. Amen. Amen. Now, right before we shut down the Facebook Live, as I'm moving in that direction, I'm gonna, not that Nadia can read just yet. But we're shifting, at least for the moment, to the NIV version. But Nadia. Hey, sweetie. I want you to see something. You don't know, but this is a Bible. And these, yeah, Bible. And these words right here say, our Father in heaven. Yeah, can you say that? Our Father in heaven. That's right. So you just read the Bible. Very cool. Did you read the book? You were reading from the book, the good book. Next time we'll try to add hallowed. I don't know if you can do be your name, but we'll see if we can do, if you can at least do hallowed, that might be a hard word. We'll see next week. Okay. All right. Well, thanks for joining us online. Thanks for the comments or comment anyway that I know we got. And, um, Like I said, I mean it. I'll interact with you all day long on these questions. It's actually, it's what I live for. So till next week, six o'clock, oh no, next week, we're not gonna be on Facebook Live. We're having a Advent feast here for those that can make it. The following week we will be, Saturday, six o'clock, we'll be doing a year starter message rooted around 2 Chronicles 7.14, one of the most misunderstood verses in the American church, in my opinion. So we'll be having a sermon based on that as we set ourselves up for 2022. So that's what's on the agenda. Until next week, or two weeks from now, God bless.