Coming soon to a theater near you is a movie entitled “The Son of God”. In order to fully appreciate this movie one needs to fully understand how difficult it was to get it to the big screen. In case you haven’t noticed, it’s all but impossible to get a Christian movie in front of the public these days.
A tiny personal case in point is my book, Miracle on Luckie Street; it has plenty to offer to Hollywood in the way of sex, drugs, violence, mayhem, money, power, and fame, but it also has Jesus Christ defined as the merciful Savior who transformed my life and saved me from all of the foregoing.
Boink!
Not interested!
Interestingly I’ve had several offers of making the salacious filthy portion of my story and of course the rags to riches saga into a movie, but without mentioning Christ.
Boink!
Not interested – I’ve flatly refused to even discuss those offers.
Why is Hollywood so obsessed with evil and promoting that agenda, and abhorrent to producing anything decent? I believe it’s because it’s controlled by powerful demonic forces. In Ephesians 6:12 the Apostle Paul tells us of an enormous spiritual battle that is going on each day. He wrote: “For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places”.
His selection of words is interesting. In the next passage Paul instructs us to put on our spiritual armor because our battle in this world is a “spiritual” one and involves the power of satan and his demons, as opposed to a human battle; (even though human beings certainly play a role in line with their being used by these entities for the purposes of accomplishing evil).
What’s important is to understand that evil spirits are the true power behind those who oppose the things of God.
Satan has always sought to be God and tries to emulate Him in everything He does. Since he doesn’t have an original idea in his scaly head he’s established his hellish chain of command in similar fashion to God’s. He of course places himself at top as the pseudo god of this world, and then his principalities are second in command. (The archangel Michael is an example of a principality of God and is described in the Bible as the archangel and “prince” of Israel.) Next come “powers” in the chain of command and then “rulers”.
In the book of Daniel we see an angel of God trying to fight his way into Persia in an attempt to give assistance to Daniel, but a fallen angel, (who is a demon principality named the “Prince of Persia”) fiercely battles him, necessitating the archangel Michael to render assistance. In all it took 21 days even for the angels to battle their way their way through this satanic stronghold, but importantly they did get to Daniel and they did prevail by assisting him.
“Then he said to me, ‘Do not be afraid, Daniel, for from the first day that you set your heart on understanding this and on humbling yourself before your God, your words were heard, and I have come in response to your words. But for twenty-one days the prince of the kingdom of Persia blocked my way. Then Michael, one of the archangels, came to help me, and I left him there with the spirit prince of the kingdom of Persia.’” (Bold letters mine)
This passage gives us an excellent example of how these unseen spiritual princes, powers and rulers fiercely fight to maintain their territories and increase their realms of influence and control in order to hinder God’s purposes, but importantly how they can be defeated by humbling ourselves before God and praying.
It is interesting to me to note that demonic “princes” in the Bible are named after the nations or the principalities in which they rule. The one in Daniel is named for Persia, “The Prince of Persia”, and I have no doubt that satan has one assigned to Hollywood, New Orleans, San Francisco, and Manhattan that are named for their realms of influence too. “The Prince of Hollywood” sounds like a Hollywood movie – eh?
Personally I don’t like to give demonic forces too much credit. We can be successful in resisting their influence through prayer, fellowship with other believers, studying the word of God, and through truth, and faith in Jesus Christ by following Him, but it takes all of those components on a daily basis, hence the saying put on the “full armor of God” daily.
It is fascinating to know that when they were filming The Son of God on location, they would have someone from the production crew assigned to remove snakes and scorpions from the set prior to filming. Ordinarily they might find an isolated snake or two, or perhaps a scorpion here or there, but on the day they shot the crucifixion scene they collected over 40 snakes at the foot of the cross where the scene would be shot. This reminds me of all of that other brood of snakes they encountered back in Hollywood that hindered distribution, filming, and fund raising of this important movie.
So how does this affect you personally? Well Mark Burnett and his wife Roma Downey have battled for several years with the princes of darkness to get this movie made at great risk to their careers. They did the same thing when they produced the Bible series on television. I’d suggest that you go watch it, and please take someone that may not know Christ as their Savior with you; (what a great way to witness to them and get a conversation started). It premieres this Friday. If you or your church or group would like to purchase group tickets or maybe even buy out an entire theater call 888-209-8471.
Daniel prayed to God that help would come. Our Lord definitely responded but took some time to accomplish His goals. If we want to clean up this country and restore decency and a wholesome environment in which to raise our kids we must pray and we must have some courage and do something! Supporting this movie is a good start. But we must also be patient and work daily to bring it about.
Most of all pray for unity in this country whereby we can then receive every spiritual blessing in which to combat against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places”.
Eph. 1:3
All praise to God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly realms because we are united with Christ.
February 25, 2014 – Click here to listen