Buddhist Catholic Contemplative Evangelical General Christian Hindu Jewish Latter-day Saint Muslim New Visions Progressive Christian

Beliefs

Topics

Columnists

Resource Library

Research Tools

Video

Podcasts

Thought Readers

Faith In Media Tracker

Newsletters

Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In Subscription Support

Follow Patheos

Home
Evangelical
Genie Jesus and the War Room Problem

Genie Jesus and the War Room Problem

Last updated on: May 8, 2022 at 12:17 pm by John Mark N. Reynolds

Genie Jesus and the War Room Problem 2022-05-08T12:17:10-04:00 John Mark N. Reynolds

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

No matter what I say, somebody is going to be mad because people take their movies seriously. Try pointing out that the third season of Star Trek is pretty bad at a fan convention. They might agree, but the justifications will begin. How do I know? I have made the excuses. There is good to be found, if you are fan, even in Spock’s Brain. O.K. No. There is not.

We justify what we want to enjoy even when we should not.

War Room isn’t a good movie. I hate to say that War Room is not a good movie because I want to encourage Christians to make movies. The movie isn’t very well made, the acting is marginal, and the writing is wretched. Nobody talks like the characters in the film and the plot holes are very great. Trust me. If you steal drugs and money for your stash, you will go to jail.

War Room is a film that allows African-Americans a voice. That is a good thing, but a bad thing is that voice given To these characters is so sanitized and homogenized. This movie plays it so safe with the audience it hopes to lure that it betrays any authenticity.

If you enjoyed the film, I am not saying you are wrong to enjoy it. Enjoy. Yet know this: the fact that so many Christian films are wretched, overly written, and full of religious jargon is harming this generation. Do you want to know one reason for people leaving the church?

We have made wretched pop culture and called it Christian. We have taught lies and called them good theology. We have tolerated television preachers that shamed the cause of Christ such as Robert Tilton or Benny Hinn. I have a high tolerance for bad pop culture: I watched all of the third season of Star Trek and enjoyed it. I would also enjoy to see a good movie deal on Woolworths Catalogue because they sometimes have them. I love the Hallmark Channel and I can watch any Christmas film.

The problem is not that cheesy is not sometimes fun (go watch Birdemic), but that cheese is almost all we have done. Nobody has to go to the multiplex to see Andrei Rublev every time. Sometimes we want some fun (Avengers!) or a date film (Notebook) and they don’t have to be great. I will watch any version of A Christmas Carol with you anytime. When War Room is one of the better films in the genre, we are bloated on cheese . . . and it is American cheese not the real cheese.

I know some movies in the multiplex mock what we hold dear, destroy the values of the nation, and call evil good. We are tempted to love anyone who says they love us. But films like these are worse than honest hatred, because they are dishonest love. They tell lies about reality, God, and our own experience.

And yet . . . O.K. Perhaps things will get better. War Room is better made than earlier films from these producers. As I have suggested in the past, we can be patient while our younger filmmakers learn. We don’t want our criticism to cut off their experiments . . . as anybody who has ever taught student filmmakers knows. Nobody runs up to a student preacher and crushes him. Instead, we encourage and hope. War Room is not a student film. . . Facing the Giants maybe, but this is part of a series that all contain the same basic error.

These filmmakers have had some time. They have made multiple films and the chief problem, the real danger, has not improved. The message of the movie is scary. The problem with War Room is that the Christianity isn’t really Christianity. Somebody is going to say: “Movies cannot contain an entire theology.” This is true. It need not. The difficulty is that all these films make the same mistake.

They worship Genie Jesus: not the real Jesus. Here is a basic fact: Christianity is a religion of the Cross. We take up our cross daily and follow Jesus. Prayers are the work of the soul and all our prayers are answered, but some are answered “not yet” or with continued pain. God sits in the Heavens and governs the universe. He desires what is best for me . . . but also for every being in the cosmos. I cannot always have my way in the short term in a broken universe.

Prayer is not a short cut to my will, but it is a surrender to the Will of God. I have seen great miracles in my life: healing that cannot be explained, people set free of demonic oppression, and insights that can only have come from God. I have also seen people walk long hard roads, because other people around them are evil. To continually tell people that prayer solves everything is functionally a lie. Prayer does solve everything, but it does not keep us from needing to do what God has called us to do. We go to the doctor. We leave an abusive relationship.

When the film has a woman stay in an emotionally abusive relationship and pray, then the film is encouraging a thing that has harmed people I know. I personally know women who stayed in the “war room” praying while their husband fornicated, spent their money, ruined their families, and then questioned God because He did not behave like Genie Jesus. The God of the Bible tells us to flee sin . . . including abusive husbands and pray for them from a distance.

Flee abuse if you can. Flee now.

Let’s be blunt: this is not so much a Christian film as a perversion of Christianity driven by a consumerist American heresy. We have reduced God to wish fulfillment and a person created in God’s image. Genie Jesus is not part of the Holy Trinity and if he exists then he is whimsical and unworthy of worship. Genie Jesus answers some prayers (Did the person pray hard enough? Use the right words? Screw up their faith to the sticking point?) while he ignores others.

Jesus of Nazareth suffers with us and does all He can. He desires no man to die, but is with every man as they die. He is not weak, He is strong enough to wish our eternal good and not our mere short term good.

Sadly, most “faith based” films are the products of a theologically impoverished Christianity that produces bad art. One suspects the profit motive is as great as the prophetic motive: sincere people will accept inferior films in the name of the message. That we turn of a generation and make our non-Christian neighbors less likely to be Christian matters little.

There will be exceptions to this rule. Nothing is so bad that God cannot use it to bless us. I once visited the church of a healing evangelist that Robin Williams ridiculed for years and saw God at work. The theology was dreadful, the antics clownish, and there was no justification for the corruption, but God honored the faith of the people in the congregation. Few pastors are so wicked that God cannot bring good from their evil.

If you were blessed by this film, thank God. If we both pray more, without ceasing really, great. But remember: we all reject arguments from others based on perceived blessings.

Someone will say: look how badly written this piece on bad writing is. And so it is. The difference is I am not charging you to read it.

This is a bad film. It is a film that might cause some women to stay longer in an abusive relationship. It is a film with a bad view of prayer. I don’t dislike it because it is simple, but because it is simply unreal. We often pray and things go badly . . . not because God is not listening, but because God is bringing what is best for us in an eternal perspective in the constraints of a free will universe.

The martyrs of Syria, Iraq, and Iran cry out against this facile film making. The martyrs of the Soviet Union cry: “How long Lord!” Meanwhile, the American multiplex spits on their suffering by pretending, somehow, they did not pray hard enough or in the right way. After many films, these filmmakers are still presenting Genie Jesus and not the Jesus of the Cross, the martyrs, and the real world.

Pop Culture

Spiritual Reflections

Previous Post

August 30, 2015

The Twilight Struggle: Depression is a Hell of Thing

Next Post

September 1, 2015 The Twilight Struggle: Lies We Believe

Browse Our Archives

Select a Category Apologetics Art Culture Education On Books On Education Philosophy Politics Pop Culture Spiritual Reflections Uncategorized

Select a Month October 2026 September 2026 August 2026 July 2026 July 2025 June 2025 September 2024 July 2024 June 2024 December 2023 June 2023 September 2022 May 2022 April 2022 March 2022 February 2022 July 2021 June 2021 May 2021 April 2021 March 2021 February 2021 January 2021 December 2020 November 2020 October 2020 September 2020 August 2020 July 2020 June 2020 May 2020 April 2020 March 2020 February 2020 January 2020 December 2019 November 2019 October 2019 September 2019 August 2019 July 2019 June 2019 May 2019 April 2019 March 2019 February 2019 January 2019 December 2018 November 2018 October 2018 September 2018 August 2018 July 2018 June 2018 May 2018 April 2018 March 2018 February 2018 January 2018 December 2017 November 2017 October 2017 September 2017 August 2017 July 2017 June 2017 May 2017 April 2017 March 2017 February 2017 January 2017 December 2016 November 2016 October 2016 September 2016 August 2016 July 2016 June 2016 May 2016 April 2016 March 2016 February 2016 January 2016 December 2015 November 2015 October 2015 September 2015 August 2015 July 2015 June 2015 May 2015 April 2015 March 2015 February 2015 January 2015 November 2014 October 2014 September 2014 August 2014 July 2014 June 2014 May 2014 April 2014 March 2014 February 2014 January 2014 December 2013 November 2013 October 2013 September 2013 August 2013 July 2013 June 2013 May 2013 April 2013 March 2013 February 2013 January 2013 December 2012 November 2012 October 2012 September 2012 August 2012 July 2012 June 2012 May 2012

TAKE THE

Religious Wisdom Quiz

Who said, "I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me"?

Select your answer to see how you score.

John Peter James Paul

Books by This Author John Mark Reynolds

See All Titles »