Praise the Lord and pass the popcorn. Moviemaking churches are venturing into the cineplex to attract souls who might never set foot in a megachurch.
Associate pastor Alex Kendrick, right, sets up a shot with photography director Bob Scott. Courageous is the fourth faith-based movie produced by Sherwood Baptist Church.
Like Hollywood films, they take on real-life issues in dramatic packages:
•A resentful white cop and his black partner struggle with race and fatherhood before taking a lesson in reconciliation from Oscar winner Lou Gossett Jr. in a cameo role. That’s The Grace Card, underwritten by an optometrist for his small church in Tennessee.
•An aimless 20-year-old, adventuring with his buddies in India, discovers the global horror of sex slavery and makes it his life-changing cause. That’s Not Today, backed by a California Quaker church.
•Cops facing rough times on the streets realize their real failures are at home — as fathers who don’t know, or don’t care, how to truly love their kids. That’s Courageous, the fourth film from Sherwood Baptist Church, which is so successful in its moviemaking ministry that it now coaches others.
“Movies are the stained-glass windows of the 21st century, the place to tell the Gospel story to people who may not read a Bible,” says Michael Catt, senior pastor of Sherwood in Albany, Ga.
