When I was probably fourteen or fifteen I read a book called, “The Stand,” by Stephen King. Now I’ll admit, I picked up the book with the hope that it would scare me…I don’t really know why, but watching a scary movie or reading a scary book has always appealed to me. I enjoy something that makes your spine tingle, your palms sweat, your heart race, and something that totally catches you off guard. And while most “scary” or “horror” movies and books are all the same, some catch you by surprise…and that’s what Stephen King did in his book, “The Stand.” You might go into a book like that with this notion that it will be scary mixed in with blood, guts, gore, sex, violence and so much more that would make your skin crawl….and I’ll be honest, the book has all of that and much more. But where Mr. King surprised me was in the fact that just scaring people was not good enough….he had to tell a story! He needed to get you up close and personal with the characters, so that you could identify with their dilemmas and feel their pain when things started to go crazy. He connected me with each and every character he introduced, and I consumed the 1,000 plus page book in a matter of days. From there I read many more of his books, and was amazed at the writing and how good it was…..and it was upon reading a book by Stephen King called, “The Green Mile,” about a death row inmate with supernatural powers that I began to wonder….how cool would it be if you went to your local bookstore, and found a book like this in the “Christian Book” section? That would be insane! But what would you call the genre, “Christian Horror”? That doesn’t make sense at all!
Ted Dekker (left) Frank Peretti (right)
But it was this question that drove me to see if such a thing existed, and to my surprise….it did. Now the genre wasn’t called “Christian Horror,” but the books themselves dealt with scary and horrific things like demons and monsters and many other things that go bump in the night, but the only author that really captured me was Frank Peretti. The man creates a world in his books that you can’t even imagine. Most of his books are about ordinary people surrounded by a world they can’t see….a world where angels and demons fight constantly and each individual’s fall into evils hands is always right around the corner, but Peretti was able to accomplish what Stephen King can not….Peretti was able to always shine the light of Christ in all his books, and I was amazed at the twists and turns and amazement of his stories…Peretti put this new genre on the map, and created a revolution in the “Christian” book market that is more popular today than ever before. But even after this amazing discovery, I still was left wondering….is it possible to take things even further? Would a “Christian” market ever go for stories with insanely dark themes, much darker than Peretti had ever written about?
My answer came courtesy of a man named Ted Dekker. To say that Ted Dekker has caused a stir in the Christian community is a huge UNDERSTATEMENT. If you’ve never heard of Ted Dekker, just know that his books have been critisized by the Christian community for years as being hurtful to Christians…and not encouriging in the least. You see, Ted Dekker didn’t just bring evil stories to the Christian populace…he made evil, mean….nasty…unmerciful….ruthless…dark…murderous….and unafraid. Up to this point, many books written in this new genre only hinted at the ways of the devil…and in that I mean, it played Satin as an ELEMENT in the story, instead of a character. In all the stories before, satan had influence, but very little power…and while evil wanted to curropt and have power, you never really knew what the point was to all of it.
But Dekker changed all that, he introduced evil in his stories as a character, and not just a character that wanted to make you stumble and trip up in your “spiritual” walk with God….no instead, Dekker introduced an evil that wanted to literally take the life from your body….and really, that’s just a nice way of saying the evil in Dekker’s books wants to rip your heart out and squeeze it in its hands. It seems to me, that Dekker wanted people to know, that evil has a purpose, it has a point….it doesn’t want you close to God…but it doesn’t want you alive either…evil wants you dead….it HATES you, and it’s always trying to find ways to hurt you physically, as well as spiritually. It could have turned on Dekker easily, but instead, he is one of the most best selling Christian novelist to date, and not because of the contriversy his books bring out…but because Dekker is honest about what he does. He doesn’t write to scare people or to prove a point…he writes what he does so people know that evil is out there, and it’s so much more dangerous than we think or can even imagine. And it’s in these dark stories that the light is seen more clearely.”
“It’s critical as a storyteller, as anybody who’s interested in impacting culture, [that] you must speak the language of the culture you wish to impact.” Dekker once said in an interview with the 700 club. “When I sit down to write a novel, I am exploring my own relationship with God, with the struggle between good and evil, my own purpose. My journey is so similar to everyone else’s journey, because we all are human. We all have been defeated by the powers of darkness, and we all find redemption in the light of Christ.”
And when asked why it is important for him to show evil as it is, he said, “It’s critical that we use a very dark brush to paint evil,” Ted explains. “When you bring the light into that darkness as characterized in John 1, that light is very vivid. When it dispels the darkness, we see the brilliance that’s there.”
So now to the point of this blog, and I’m sorry for the length, but this has become an important topic for me as I have found myself squashing my own story ideas because of how they might be perceived by Christians. Ted Dekker and Frank Peretti teamed up a few years ago and wrote the book, “House”. I haven’t had the chance to read this book yet, but I’ve heard over and over it’s the scariest book you’ll ever read in a “Christian” book store. Too my surprise, about a year ago, I read in an online magazine that said “House” was being adapted into a movie! And yesterday, I finally got to preview the chilling trailer to the movie. But what will probably surprise you most, is that this “Christian” film, has been given a rating of “R”. If you go to teddekker.com you’ll find in Ted’s blog that he says, the film is not really all that terryfing…there’s no blood or gore, no sex or language except for the word “hell” one time. And Dekker also talks about the Pentagram on the movie poster that LionsGate (the company producing the film) created to promote the film.
Now I must say, I was kinda stunned when I saw the movie poster yesterday…I mean, what are the odds that a “Christian” film would have the very sign that represents the thing we’re daily fighting at it’s forefront of a movie poster. But then I realized, this movie is not being produced by a “Christian” company. LionsGate, is
not Fox Faith Corporation, and in fact, LionsGate has produced crazy horror movies like SAW and The Texas Chainsaw Massacre! If anything, this film is not being promoted as a “Christian” film at all…but instead as your everyday, crazy horror film. I’ve thought about this a lot since yesterday, and I think I’ve finally come to a conclusion.
If this film was to be promoted as a “Christian” film…how many lives would be changed by watching it? Would it even make a difference? Or would it cause even more controversy? I mean, we already know that there’s not many churches out there that are going to promote an “R” rated film….except for “The Passion of The Christ,” maybe. So when you look at it that way, this may be a better avenue for the film…potentially, some lives could be changed by its message. I know many out there would think that the message will get overshadowed by the scary themes…. but I’m not so sure. We live in a culture that pays billions of dollars a year to be scared in a movie theater; billions of dollars! Isn’t it possible that this film could make a difference….maybe show something to someone a little deeper than a tingle of arenaline. I defenatley think it’s possible….but i’m curious what you think about it…is the movie poster too much for this movie…..the pentegram to me represents the evil the characters are fighting….but being that this book was written by two Christians, and claims to reveal the light of Christ….is it too much?
Let me know what you think, leave a comment below, and check back to see what someone else might think about it. This may seem like a waste of time…but trust me, Christian writers are penning more movies out there than you think…do some research and you’ll find out….this won’t be the last time this topic comes up.
Oh yeah, if you want to see the trailer for the movie, go here, http://www.housethemovie.net
I’ll warn you though, while you’ll see no blood or anything like that…it is really intense, and in my opinion, probably the intensity is what got the movie an “R” rating. Dont forget to leave comments telling your thoughts!
