The story of Christ's death will be played out in local productions in churches across the country as Christians observe Good Friday. And in some observances, the showing of the passion of Christ will be darker and bloodier than others.
At one of Mars Hill Church's six campuses in Washington state, attendants will sit in on a graphic video portraying the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Other campuses will have a late night showing of Mel Gibson's "The Passion of The Christ" film.
The video that will be shown at Mars Hill's Ballard campus, which was set up to serve urban Seattle, comes with an MH-17 warning, where viewers under the age of 17 are required to get adult consent to watch the clip.
"The heart of what we believe as Christians is that Jesus Christ, our great God, died. He was crucified. He was murdered in our place for our sins," said Mars Hill founder Mark Driscoll on the church Web site, "and three days later he rose in newness of life, conquering our enemies of Satan’s sin and death and providing salvation, forgiveness of sin and new life."
He described the Good Friday service at the Ballard campus as "particularly intense," explaining that they will "crucify someone for 30 minutes."
According to Mars Hill Church, Good Friday services have always been "powerful" and "dark" in remembering the death of Jesus Christ.
Dawn Sigler–Miller, who is directing her own Easter drama titled "One Choice" at Cambria Baptist Church in Hillsdale, Mich., believes such an intense and bloody depiction may be just what some people need to be reached.
"Every person in our world is different and certainly, how the Lord reaches them is different," she told The Christian Post. "We have a lot of Christians to reach. Some need extreme graphics, and some need a gentle touch."
The intense services at Mars Hill have led many people to repent of sin and give their lives to Jesus, according to the Seattle church.
Sigler-Miller, however, chooses to go with the more "gentle touch" when telling the story of Christ's death.
Her musical production, which she has been directing for the past 11 years, consists of a moderately dressed Jesus during the crucifixion scene and visuals that are appropriate for a two-year-old to sit in the audience, she said.
"I think that any correct biblical portrayal of the Easter story can be a very powerful ministry," she commented. "My pastor says it well: When you do a play or a musical, you're doing a visual of the Bible and if you're accurate with that, the Lord will use that."
The drama "One Choice" opened Thursday evening at Cambria Baptist Church with additional performances scheduled into the weekend.
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One further point CP,
As I stated above, even words do not fully convey God's glory, thus even words distort the truth of God. And a person could pick and choose from the Bible and come up with a very distorted image of God. You have two solutions, accept inadequate modes of experiencing and speaking about God, or else say and think absolutely nothing about God. Clearly the former is ridiculous, thus we must accept the prior.
CP2008,
But even a perception of God based upon the Bible will be insufficient. It is literally impossible to fathom any single characteristic of God. Thus you risk running absurdities like saying, "The word "God" is not worthy of being used to depict God, so we must only write G_D and call Him the "One who cannot be named" But these are clearly not taken seriously, nor should they be. Have you heard the song with the lyrics, "Who can fathom the depth of Your love? You are beautiful beyond understanding"
That being said, God had not come to earth at the time of Moses and no man had seen Him. But God has come to earth in the person of Jesus Christ. People who saw Jesus were not blinded and prevented from seeing Him (indeed they were healed), but rather they saw God in the form of a man. Thus the OT law (if it should be interpreted as you suggest) no longer applies, it is null and void. To say otherwise is to deny that Christ came to earth.
I will ask you two questions and see if you can answer them,
1)Do you believe that Jesus Christ (being fully God) came to earth and that people actually saw Him?
2)If you could have, would you have taken a picture of Jesus?
If you say yes to either question, then your position is not sustainable. I urge you to rethink what you are saying, certainly we should not worship a picture (even if it is of God), and we should only worship the one true God, but this does not mean that we cannot admire a picture of Jesus (that is of course incomplete) or that we cannot grow closer to God by watching a rendition of the Passion. No one is worshipping these things, and as such are not breaking any commandment. If I look at a picture of my wife, I do not tell the picture, "I love you" and I do not have a relationship with the picture, but that does not mean I cannot look at the picture to remember her, or feel closer to her.
Chris333,
That is awesome - lol
xizwyck,
That is funny! My brother was working at a restaurant, and he and a friend (who was an atheist) were debating, and the atheist said, "If Jesus Christ comes and walks in here and orders a sandwhich then I would become a Christian!" And at that moment a guy fully dressed as Jesus, coming from a play, came and ordered a sandwich.
The atheist became a Christian.
CP2008,
"God has specifically instructed us to NOT make any image of Him, the likeness of MALE or female, lest we corrupt ourselves."
Actually, He did not tell us not to make any image of Him. He said,
"So watch yourselves carefully, since you did not see any form on the day the LORD spoke to you at Horeb from the midst of the fire, so that you do not act corruptly and make a graven image for yourselves in the form of any figure, the likeness of male or female, the likeness of any animal that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged bird that flies in the sky, the likeness of anything that creeps on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the water below the earth. And beware not to lift up your eyes to heaven and see the sun and the moon and the stars, all the host of heaven, and be drawn away and worship them and serve them, those which the LORD your God has allotted to all the peoples under the whole heaven."
However, we also see that God has commanded them to make the "image" of a serpent, and to make the "images" of the Cherubim. We see clearly that the command is addressed to not worshiping the images. Indeed, the premise of this statement is that God did not reveal Himself in physical form, however He now has in Jesus Christ! This statement is clearly not condemning Crosses, depictions of Christ, pictures of Saints or Christ, so long as we are not worshipping them. To say otherwise would be contradictory and make God a liar.
As for a rendition of the Passion of Christ? I think it is okay, so long as no one worships the actors, and so long as the viewers realize that it is not an exact rendition, and that what Christ has gone through was much more intense.
CP2008,
"If your earthly father were falsely accused, brutally beaten and cruelly killed would you want to watch it over and over each year in a video or in a visual representation? "
thats the point. As Christians we should feel horrible because our sins and mans wretchedness is what put Jesus on the cross. It is hard to watch because we know that we should be there on the cross not the Spottless Lamb. Dramas and videos of the crusifixtion put in prespective what acctually happend. Sometimes I think people make the crusifixtion all artsy and that can lose the gruesomness of our sin and what had to be done for us to be saved.
God bless,
Anthony
www.anthonymendoza.org
P.S. asdfg, usually its the users who flag not the site it self.
Some years ago, my uncle (who is a former sheriff) played as Jesus Christ and with some dramatic props help, he was crucified... looked pretty real. Well, the sounds he made during crucifixion were real because his hand got pinched with they "drove in the nails". After words, before he had a chance to change, he caught a thief red-handed trying to steal the actresses purses and wallets. Imagine being caught by "Jesus" as you are stealing!