Last night I had the opportunity to check out the new movie Evan Almighty down at the AMC on the Levee. The movie doesn’t open until June 22nd, but Journey Church’s media guru hooked us up with some sneak peek passes.
To tell you the truth I was little worried about the movie going in. You see, all of the church people have been hyping this movie. Study guides, small group materials, and web-sites rallying the cause of this family friendly Bible promoting movie. Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for family friendly, appropriate humor, and I’m definitely for anything that puts God’s story into mainstream culture. It’s just that typically when a bunch of Christians rally behind something, there’s a good chance it’s really cheesy, and will only serve to further alienate disconnected people from the local church.
With all of that said. I was pleasantly surprised. The movie was hilarious! (Can Steve Carell be in anything that’s not funny?) Wanda Sykes nearly stole the show… she is so funny. It was not cheesy, or corny, in fact it was quite revealing, and carried much truth in the midst of all the humor. In fact, there was one scene where God is talking to Evan’s wife (Joan… Joan of Ark) about prayer, and how God answers prayers. He said:
“If you pray for courage, do you think I’m going to give you courage, or the opportunity to be courageous… If you pray for your family to become closer, do you think I’m going to give you warm fuzzy feelings about one another, or give you the opportunity to grow closer as a family”.
Quite a different perspective on prayer. What are some of the things that you are praying for that you are waiting for God to simply bestow upon you, when in reality he is giving you the opportunity to act, do, or be what you are praying for. Maybe we should start seeing opportunities as answers to prayers.
All in all, it was a good movie. I highly recommend it to you. Great for the family, great for kids, great for adults. Go see it. Oh, and just for the record, I would probably give it 4 SchruteBucks!
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