From the time I began feeling that I wanted to make Christian films I have believed that I ddin’t want to create films where the action and plot stop suddenly so one character can actually lead another to Christ and they end up sitting on the steps quoting scripture verses. I just feel that so often those scenes are very heavy handed and a complete interruption of the story. I’ve never felt like my conviction on this matter was a complete disregard for putting Christ in my “Christian Films” but at the same time I’ve always felt a little torn about how you can make a film that teaches a moral message or encourages the viewer to give their life to Christ and yet not have the “scripture and prayer” scene. About a week ago I felt the Lord telling me it can be done.
Recently I had the great privelage and opportunity of seeing some old friends, Billy and Joanna Coppege, who today work as missionaries with WGM in Northern Uganda and are key players in the strategy to enter Sudan. It was quite a surprise to see them at Tenwek Hospital in Bomet, Kenya, but I was very happy to spend a few minutes with them while we were each “randomly” at Tenwek at the same time. I was there to get some extra footage for the video I’ve been working on lately, and they were there with a group of people sharing their burden for Sudan with members of the Tenwek Medical staff.
Much of Billy’s work in Uganda and Sudan involves “storying” or the telling of stories to groups as just a fascinating story and then separately telling how that story can be applied to every day life or a dramatic change in the spiritual life in order to bring the listener closer to Christ. The day that I saw Billy and Jo at Tenwek he told the story of the paralytic who was brought to Jesus and lowered through the ceiling. Though I had heard the story many times before, I found myself riveted during Billy’s telling and excited to see what he had to say about it. Those who know Billy will recognize that he has a very magnetic personality which helps draw you in no matter what he says, but there was more to it. Billy simply let the power of the story carry itself out and did not interrupt to explain it. As this particular story-telling was a demonstration for the medical staff he was pretending to be a doctor in Sudan using the story to witness to a patient, played by Joanna, and so he continued by explaining his purpose for the story, to show her that Jesus has the power to forgive sins.
Billy then addressed all in attendance and explained how he uses storying in ministry. Considering myself a story teller, with video as my medium, I was really excited to hear Billy ask the crowd if they agreed that stories are one of the best ways to teach people things and have them all agree with him. The thing that stuck out to me most though was when Billy said that he believes that the Bible has the BEST stories and again everyone agreed. I thought on that fact for just a moment, because to me it was obvious that the Bible has the best stories from a Christian stance, as in the stories in the Bible point to Christ, but it had been a long time since I’d really considered the power of the stories in the Bible as pieces of great story-telling and drama.
After the meeting I didn’t have a lot of time to think about how Billy had used the story as I ran off to do some more shooting and then editing on my video. However, a few days later I was back in Kericho and getting ready for bed. I do my devotions each night before I go to sleep and on this particular evening I was reading another very familiar story in scripture. In Genesis, Abraham, following God’s instructions, nearly sacrifices his only son, Isaac, as a burnt offering to God. At the last minute God intervenes and provides a wild ram for the sacrifice. As I read the story that night I thought of how that story is a metaphore for the grace God provided for all of us in His Son Jesus. We were all doomed to pay the greatest price for our sins but the God sent His Son to take our place as the one lain on the altar.
Suddenly I realized something that came to me as quite a surprise, no where in the story is it mentioned that several hundred years later Jesus would be for us all like that ram for isaac. In fact, it leads one to question why the story was even kept in the Hebraic tradition long enough for Christians to come along and realize the great value of the story. My guess is that the Hebrews saw in this story the kind of devotion to God which they, and we, should strive to emulate and they decided that it was an important story for that reason, and I agree. But even that message is only communicated in the reader seing and understanding the great sacrifice Abraham was willing to make for his God. Then I thought quickly of other stories in both the Old and New Testaments where various heros of the faith are truly celebrated, to my recollection none of them stop to say anything along the lines of, "If you've read this and want to become a Christian here's what you do." Even Jesus when asked directly what one must do to inherit the Kingdom of Heaven doesn't respond with "Okay come over here and we'll say this prayer together." He advises the person who asked to change the aspects of his character which are not in-line with God's character.
So now I feel more encouraged and inspired to try to craft and tell unique and compelling stories which can be used to encourage others to live a Godly life, but don't require hitting the audience over the head with it. It's encouraging to know that I can concentrate on what I actually think my characters would do in their circumstances and not worry about stopping the action to teach a sunday school lesson.
Friday, August 28, 2009
Sunday, August 23, 2009
The Longest Walk
Thursday night, August 20th I premiereed the Tenwek video at Tenwek, and it was very warmly recieved. Having a large weight lifted off my shoulders on friday and being at y childhood home I decided it was a good time to take a walk. I knew right where to head, the waterfall at Tenwek is one of my favorite places in the world. I took a nice leasurely walk down, down down the road and came upon the tranquil familiar sight of the water cascading over the falls and pummeling the pools below. I took a deep breath and began to relish the sound of the falling water, when i happened to look down stream and see a teenage boy standing akwardly behind a large rock, covering himself and looking at me as though trying to figure out what I was doing. Realizing he was taking a bath over there, I decided it would be rather less comfortable for both of us if I stuck around even if I decided not to look his direction.
As I headed back up the hill, a little disappointed in my venture to the falls I noticed a path just off from the road that led on up the hill. Feeling my disappointment replaced with a sense of adventure I set off on this rough steep path, not really sure if it would take me out to the road or not, but I knew I wouldn't get lost so it was merely a matter of trying and if I failed I could just turn back. It was clear the path was not used frequently and it was very overgrown, but it was quite fun trying to pick my way through the bushes and see where I would come out. That is, it was fun until I got a few feet off the path and planted my foot squarely into the gewiest, thickest, mud I've ever encountered. At this point it is worth telling you that I was wearing sandals. One of my favorite pair of shoes, they are "tiva" style sandals featuring the South African flag repeated on the straps. I've had these sandals since my parents made their first trip to SA in about 1996/7. Now, those shoes did spend several years in storage in that time, but still, they have carried my feet for many many miles.
With my feet caked in mud, I pressed on squishing grimey goowie mud out from between my feet and the sandal and also from in between my toes, and only a minute later I was back on the road to my next destination, the bridge across the dam. Each step of my journey saw my feet squishing and sliding around on my sandal, and as I turned and headed down the steep hill toward the dam I took one step that was extra steep and my foot slid right out of my shoe. After a brief awkward dance I regained my balance and tried to secure my foot back in the sandal. That's when I realized my foot had actually broken the sandal. Apparently in the slip and near fall my foot had pushed right through the strap and dislodged it from the sole of the shoe, I removed the upper strap and decided there was nothing that could be done except to continue without that shoe. So I continued on my way down the hill and stood at the dam for a few moments enjoying the peaceful sound of the falls and laughing to myself about how this had been one of my most eventful journeys to the river ever.
I debated weather or not i should just drop both my shoes from the bridge and watch them float away over the dam and off the falls. I felt this would be a very poetic end to their journey, but my new found "green-conscience" wouldn't let me throw a bunch of nylon and rubber into a river. I tried to see if my poetic side could outweigh the green side when suddenly my visual arts side piped up and said "well if you're gonna do it you should at least take some pictures of them going over the falls and such, and you forgot your camera." That decided things for the time being, there was no way I could pollute the river in the name of poetry and not have something to show for it. So I had to carry one shoe and wear the other back up the hill, and if I felt like it later, return to pitch my shoes in the river.
WIth my mind made up I set out back up the hill taking what was probably the slightly longer route, but the one that had more sidewalk. Thankfully the mud on my feet dried up by this time so I could concentrate all my walking focus on not stepping on sharp rocks. The rest of the way up the hill was mostly uneventful, but I was greatly looking forward to getting back to my room for a nice shower to clean my feet off.
Upon reaching the room I headed straight to the shower and cranked on the hot water. Stepping in I found the water exceedingly hot! I turned the cold tap and waited, nothing happened. I turned the hot down a bit, still no cooler. I decided to turn the hot all the way down and see just how much cold i had coming. When the hot was off there was no water! I turned up the cold, but nothing came. I spun the handle till I thought it was about to come off, not a drop. I turned everything back off and tried the sink, no cold. The water had been cut off temporarily. I think i only had hot because of what was sitting in the water heater. I was disappointed in not being able to take a full on shower, but knew I would survive, the big problem now became, how to clean the mud off my feet without burning them. After a moment the solution came to me to wet my wash cloth with water from the sink's hot tap, and wipe my feet off. It was a little less satisfying, but got the job done so I could go through the rest of the day without feeling like a jerk for tracking mud everywhere.
So that's my story, I guess if were a preacher I could come up with a sermon from it or something, but I feel like it's just an interesting story of a days walk and that's good enough. What I can say is that I praise God that He gave me a joyful spirit that could laugh at each unique beat on this path.
As I headed back up the hill, a little disappointed in my venture to the falls I noticed a path just off from the road that led on up the hill. Feeling my disappointment replaced with a sense of adventure I set off on this rough steep path, not really sure if it would take me out to the road or not, but I knew I wouldn't get lost so it was merely a matter of trying and if I failed I could just turn back. It was clear the path was not used frequently and it was very overgrown, but it was quite fun trying to pick my way through the bushes and see where I would come out. That is, it was fun until I got a few feet off the path and planted my foot squarely into the gewiest, thickest, mud I've ever encountered. At this point it is worth telling you that I was wearing sandals. One of my favorite pair of shoes, they are "tiva" style sandals featuring the South African flag repeated on the straps. I've had these sandals since my parents made their first trip to SA in about 1996/7. Now, those shoes did spend several years in storage in that time, but still, they have carried my feet for many many miles.
With my feet caked in mud, I pressed on squishing grimey goowie mud out from between my feet and the sandal and also from in between my toes, and only a minute later I was back on the road to my next destination, the bridge across the dam. Each step of my journey saw my feet squishing and sliding around on my sandal, and as I turned and headed down the steep hill toward the dam I took one step that was extra steep and my foot slid right out of my shoe. After a brief awkward dance I regained my balance and tried to secure my foot back in the sandal. That's when I realized my foot had actually broken the sandal. Apparently in the slip and near fall my foot had pushed right through the strap and dislodged it from the sole of the shoe, I removed the upper strap and decided there was nothing that could be done except to continue without that shoe. So I continued on my way down the hill and stood at the dam for a few moments enjoying the peaceful sound of the falls and laughing to myself about how this had been one of my most eventful journeys to the river ever.
I debated weather or not i should just drop both my shoes from the bridge and watch them float away over the dam and off the falls. I felt this would be a very poetic end to their journey, but my new found "green-conscience" wouldn't let me throw a bunch of nylon and rubber into a river. I tried to see if my poetic side could outweigh the green side when suddenly my visual arts side piped up and said "well if you're gonna do it you should at least take some pictures of them going over the falls and such, and you forgot your camera." That decided things for the time being, there was no way I could pollute the river in the name of poetry and not have something to show for it. So I had to carry one shoe and wear the other back up the hill, and if I felt like it later, return to pitch my shoes in the river.
WIth my mind made up I set out back up the hill taking what was probably the slightly longer route, but the one that had more sidewalk. Thankfully the mud on my feet dried up by this time so I could concentrate all my walking focus on not stepping on sharp rocks. The rest of the way up the hill was mostly uneventful, but I was greatly looking forward to getting back to my room for a nice shower to clean my feet off.
Upon reaching the room I headed straight to the shower and cranked on the hot water. Stepping in I found the water exceedingly hot! I turned the cold tap and waited, nothing happened. I turned the hot down a bit, still no cooler. I decided to turn the hot all the way down and see just how much cold i had coming. When the hot was off there was no water! I turned up the cold, but nothing came. I spun the handle till I thought it was about to come off, not a drop. I turned everything back off and tried the sink, no cold. The water had been cut off temporarily. I think i only had hot because of what was sitting in the water heater. I was disappointed in not being able to take a full on shower, but knew I would survive, the big problem now became, how to clean the mud off my feet without burning them. After a moment the solution came to me to wet my wash cloth with water from the sink's hot tap, and wipe my feet off. It was a little less satisfying, but got the job done so I could go through the rest of the day without feeling like a jerk for tracking mud everywhere.
So that's my story, I guess if were a preacher I could come up with a sermon from it or something, but I feel like it's just an interesting story of a days walk and that's good enough. What I can say is that I praise God that He gave me a joyful spirit that could laugh at each unique beat on this path.
Monday, August 10, 2009
Project Update 8/10
So there's been a request that I update people on my projects from time to time.
Well the BIG news of today is that I finished inserting interview clips and "scratch narration" today. These are the elements that are basically carrying the story so it's a huge step toward completing the video. There's still a lot to be done, but at least I now have a complete story that runs all the way from 1935 to today.
The next steps include getting proper recordings of my narration, adding b-roll footage and old photos, music, color correction and audio mixing. I have just over a week.
Well the BIG news of today is that I finished inserting interview clips and "scratch narration" today. These are the elements that are basically carrying the story so it's a huge step toward completing the video. There's still a lot to be done, but at least I now have a complete story that runs all the way from 1935 to today.
The next steps include getting proper recordings of my narration, adding b-roll footage and old photos, music, color correction and audio mixing. I have just over a week.
Friday, August 7, 2009
Re-redirected
Apparently this blog is still evolving. Over the past month or so I have been posting an update each week just spilling out what I've been doing for the past week. This started as an exciting new challenge, but wuickly became one of my most loathsome weekend chores. The problem was the sheer massive amount of information. I started cutting corners writing things like, "I went to work every day this week." And still the post was incredibly long and would sometimes be written over 2 or 3 days. Soon I felt I was neither presenting interesting information or having any fun doing it.
Therefore I've decided to change things again. My plan now is to come up with one thing each week that is interesting and write on that. I want to keep the weekly commitment because otherwise I will return to the days when I would post once a month at best. But my posts will probably be shorter and hopefully more interesting to both write and read.
Below you will find the first of these posts. I won't guarantee that all forthcoming posts will have such a spiritual bend, some I hope will be funny and some just interesting thoughts, but who knows, like I said this blog is still evolving.
Therefore I've decided to change things again. My plan now is to come up with one thing each week that is interesting and write on that. I want to keep the weekly commitment because otherwise I will return to the days when I would post once a month at best. But my posts will probably be shorter and hopefully more interesting to both write and read.
Below you will find the first of these posts. I won't guarantee that all forthcoming posts will have such a spiritual bend, some I hope will be funny and some just interesting thoughts, but who knows, like I said this blog is still evolving.
Poor Planning Skills or Trust in God?
While I've been here in Africa one of the major areas of personal development that I've been working on has been planning. Somehow this is a skill that's I've never been great with. I was always one of those kids that would write an essay on the fly and then go back and do the outline. writing and preparations is undoubtedly my weakest area of the video production process. And I can never figure out what I'll want to eat in time to plan a shopping list so I just buy whatever looks good at the store.
I've seen this struggle recently in the specific area of transportation. Just today I realized at the last minute that I had not communicated to people when I was going to need a ride from Tenwek to Kericho and almost missed my opportunity. This past Tuesday as I was trying to make my way from Kericho to Tenwek, the ride I had arranged was coming later than I would have liked so I found another ride instead. Back at the end of June I spent a few days in Nairobi taking care of business and having some fun as well. I came to Nairobi not knowing how I was going to get to Kericho, but figured out pretty quickly what day I wanted to go. The day before I was to leave Nairobi I found a ride to take me back and everything worked perfectly. There are more as I keep going back, but you get the picture.
With all these incidents there's a common thread, each time I began to stress about getting to my destination and chastised myself for not planning things better or communicating more clearly. And yet each time everything worked out perfectly as if God had timed it all to happen just that way. On the way from Tenwek today i sat and reflected on this for a few minutes. I realized that there are some lessons that need to be learned the hard way, If I'm going to really see why it's important to arrange transport ahead of time I need to get stranded someplace. The problem is God keeps working it out so that I get where I need to be. Now don't get me wrong, I'm very happy that He is taking care of the details especially as my time on this trip is so limited, but I wonder how I will learn my lesson.
I feel like God is taking care of the details because I am trying to serve him in this ministry, but I also feel that I shouldn't just sit back and let Him work out the details, I need to try to improve my own sense of responsibility and develop my plans more. I guess what I'm saying is I can't look at God taking care of the details and say "okay so I won't make any plans, from here on God will work it out." Jeremiah 29:11 says "I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord 'Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." That wonderful promise encourages us that even when OUR plans fall through, or don't really get made to begin with, God is in control. However, if we look at the verse following, God says "Then you will call upon me and pray to me... You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." (vs. 12-13) These verses show us that He still expects action on our part. It's not enough to believe and trust Him to work out the details, we need to actively seek Him and I would add that in that we need to actively try to plan for the tasks that are before us, even if they never seem to come out like the plan.
How to learn tis lesson is something I still don't know, but I believe I just need to keep trying my best to make plans and arrangements, and continue trusting God to work out the details if I fail, or things change.
I've seen this struggle recently in the specific area of transportation. Just today I realized at the last minute that I had not communicated to people when I was going to need a ride from Tenwek to Kericho and almost missed my opportunity. This past Tuesday as I was trying to make my way from Kericho to Tenwek, the ride I had arranged was coming later than I would have liked so I found another ride instead. Back at the end of June I spent a few days in Nairobi taking care of business and having some fun as well. I came to Nairobi not knowing how I was going to get to Kericho, but figured out pretty quickly what day I wanted to go. The day before I was to leave Nairobi I found a ride to take me back and everything worked perfectly. There are more as I keep going back, but you get the picture.
With all these incidents there's a common thread, each time I began to stress about getting to my destination and chastised myself for not planning things better or communicating more clearly. And yet each time everything worked out perfectly as if God had timed it all to happen just that way. On the way from Tenwek today i sat and reflected on this for a few minutes. I realized that there are some lessons that need to be learned the hard way, If I'm going to really see why it's important to arrange transport ahead of time I need to get stranded someplace. The problem is God keeps working it out so that I get where I need to be. Now don't get me wrong, I'm very happy that He is taking care of the details especially as my time on this trip is so limited, but I wonder how I will learn my lesson.
I feel like God is taking care of the details because I am trying to serve him in this ministry, but I also feel that I shouldn't just sit back and let Him work out the details, I need to try to improve my own sense of responsibility and develop my plans more. I guess what I'm saying is I can't look at God taking care of the details and say "okay so I won't make any plans, from here on God will work it out." Jeremiah 29:11 says "I know the plans I have for you,' declares the Lord 'Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future." That wonderful promise encourages us that even when OUR plans fall through, or don't really get made to begin with, God is in control. However, if we look at the verse following, God says "Then you will call upon me and pray to me... You will seek me and find me when you seek me with all your heart." (vs. 12-13) These verses show us that He still expects action on our part. It's not enough to believe and trust Him to work out the details, we need to actively seek Him and I would add that in that we need to actively try to plan for the tasks that are before us, even if they never seem to come out like the plan.
How to learn tis lesson is something I still don't know, but I believe I just need to keep trying my best to make plans and arrangements, and continue trusting God to work out the details if I fail, or things change.
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