I pray that everyone who reads this post has been blessed this Christmas. I want to clarify the term blessing as well. Blessed in it’s most literal sense means “Oh so very happy!”. Now undoubtedly presents given and received, family, friends, holiday music, etc. can all lend to having a blessed Christmas. I know I was blessed as well as my family by the wide variety of Christmas programs on SkyAngel that pointed us to Christ and the true reason for the season. However, you may have had all the things above including great SKyAngel programming, and still missed the blessing. Yet, you could be reading this and on the other hand have missed any and/or all of the things above in the season and had the greatest Christmas ever. All because Christmas and all the hype and all the billions spent in relation to it are only side issues in reality. If you did not take the last couple months to reflect on the incredible gift of Christ, you missed the biggest blessing of Christmas! It is all about Christ humbling Himself and coming to be our savior that makes all the songs woth singing and all the gifts worth giving. So if for some reason you felt a little cheated this year by Christmas, please, look in awe and wonder to the Christ for whom we celebrate the season. Immanuel, God with us! Now looking at the same coin from the other side please consider this. If for some reason you had an incredible Christmas. If all the gifts and all the celebration left you fulfilled and blessed. Left you feeling as if it couldn’t have been a better Christmas. Yet, you recognize that Christ was not the center of your celebrations or the reason for which you gave and received gifts. Then please, humble yourself in the sight of God and beg His forgiveness for neglecting to keep your heart and mind focussed on our Savior, The Lord Jesus Christ. The day is not so important as the heart that celebrates the Christ of Christmas day. Take this day and humbly ask God to give you a heart to praise Him everyday! God bless and have a blessed new year and maybe for some, new life!         �

Head over to JCTV at 2200 on 11/21/10 and sit back and enjoy two great films giving excellent evidence and entertainment regarding Jesus Christ! Now don’t worry because it Says “Laugh with the Skit Guys”. That is just mislabeling(Which sadly sometimes happens with some of SKyAngel’s service providers.) This will start you off on Lee Strobel’s documentary based on his best selling book “The Case for Christ”. This is a very well made documentary giving much evidence for Jesus Christ. I don’t agree with Lee on everything or even like all his guests theology. However, in this film everything seems very solid. It is part documentary and autobiography. Following directly after TCFC is “The Perfect Stranger”. This actually starts in the TCFC time slot. I have this movie on DVD as well as the sequel. I have enjoyed every “Stranger” film and there are many. This is a film where a skeptic lawyer is invited to dinner with Jesus. She asks many ?’s skeptics ask and the actor playing Jesus seems quite Christlike in his answering. This film is both entertaining and informative. I think you’ll enjoy it. If you want to get some evidence for yourself without breaking out the books this would be a good block of tv to sit back and enjoy. Prayerfully consider sharing these films w/your non believer friends. Share the scripture with them and encourage them to turn from sin to Christ. While we must always trust in God to do the saving these films may be used by Him in concert with your testimnoy and sharing in the Bible to plant and water seeds of the Gospel that He may bring to fruition in His time. God bless and enjoy!

http://www.christiancinema.com/trailers/layitdown.html <—CLICK TO VIEW THE TRAILER HERE

One of the Christiano Brothers films, “Lay it Down” is a well made film preseting evangelism in the midst of illegal street racing. Made as a Christian response to movies like the popular series, “The Fast and the Furious” w/Vin Diesel. Like most Christiano films the quality is good. Not big Hollywood budget quality but better than many Christian production teams. The message is clear and sincere and it is all about redemption in Christ. Character depth is good as well as acting. Basically you have two brothes as main CHaracter who love to street race. The older brother races the younger tunes his ride. The older brother “Bam” is the king of racing. He gets in a freak accident and realizes life is short. A pastor friend of his mothers shares the Gospel and he “Lays it Down” to Christ. Of course everybody close to Bam feels betrayed especially his brother. The movie ends well but not as you may expect. There is some good twists and Christ is exalted. While no sinner is seeking God(Rom. 3)and many youth are even vocally opposed or demeaning to Christianity. Some may watch this that are interested in street racing with an air of making fun of it. However, faith comes from and hearing from the word of God(Rom. 10:17). And there is plenty of the word preached here in a non preachy way. In the end seeds will be planted for the Gospel. You can also pick this up on DVD. Check it out!�

Relive the classic trilogy of “Back to the Future” 1-3 with Michael J. Fox and the gang all on GMC starting Monday the 20th! GMC is now playing lots of movies from the 80’s and 90’s. Most are PG rated movies and are edited. These are not Christian films for the most part so there is need for caution. Most are at least family friendly with some explanation when things get cultish. As an example my wife and I watched “Always” with Richard Dreyfuss last night. This is a fun movie and a pretty good love story and adventuresome. John Goodman is great with his comedic/dramatic supporting role. However, the theology for this Spielberg film is far from Biblical. Think “Ghost Whisperer” without a medium and much better acting! It kind of reminds me of another film I enjoyed but totally disagreed with the theology in. “Defending your Life” with Albert Brooks and Meryl Streep. Basically, “good” people go to heaven or move on up the reincarnation chain. “bad” people don’t. Obviously the Bible makes it clear we are all sinners worthy of Hell and it is only by God’s amazing grace that any of us find repentance and faith and thus salvation. Christianity has nothing to do with good people making it to heaven but rather a good God saving bad people from Hell out of unexplainable grace and love. Anyway enjoy the movies but be cautious and prayerful. Take care!

My wife and I watched the new film “Dialtone” on VOD the other night and I thought it was pretty well done. It has a twist ending to it and some real suspense. The story revolves around a nominal Christian who recently lost his wife in a car accident. He is soon introduced to a phone that can call two days into the past. He gets a police list with names of people every day who have died in the last 48hrs. His wife died less than two days ago.  What will he do? The movie is about sharing your faith. It is influenced by Ray Comfort and Kirk Cameron’s “Way of the Master” witnesing style. It is only 42 minutes long so won’t keep you there forever. I reccomend it for it’s quality and conviction. We all need to get out there and share our faith. I can’t reccomend too highly Ray and Kirk’s system. Only because it is truly a Biblical system. Check it out at www.livingwaters.com

I watched this movie a while back and enjoyed it. I saw it was again on JCTV and skimmed through it again. It is a good family movie about a family man with a struggling business who meets his absentee eccentric father who is trying to find God through science. He won’t believe in God till he can prove it with science. He is also a hermit who is driven to find God because he’s still heartbroken years after his Christian wife died whom he loved dearly but whose faith he could not share. This man had heard the Gospel but continually rejected it. He seemed like a lost cause. However God never fails to find those sheep He’s searching for. The most biblically correct line in the movie is when the father is talking to the son and talks about trying to find God. The son responds by saying something akin to - “Maybe it’s God who finds us.” God does find His lost sheep. His sheep hear His voice and come to Him. If you hear His voice, call out to Him for mercy and He will give you more. He’ll give you grace! Repent and believe the Gospel! A good movie for people with a science bent. Pretty well produced for a Christian film. The climax scene and it’s visual and soundtrack are stunning. A worthwhile watch. Take care!    �

This is another Pure Flix film selection. If you read my earlier reviews you know I enjoy Pure Flix. I have to say for the most part I enjoyed this film as well. Pure Flix does a good job of making presentable quality films with tiny budgets. The acting was OK and the story followed the Bible well with some “creative license” thrown in of course. Now I must warn. The license tends to be a lot of speculation. None of it is needed for the Biblical story but it helps set up the characters for the film. All in all the message of the Biblical narrative is intact. Boaz is the story’s Kinsmen redeemer. A picture of Christ. As Boaz was a kinsman redeemer whose redemption was for a  Jew(Naomi) and a gentile(Ruth) so Christ is the kinsmen redeemer for all who have been called of every flock of sheep all over the world. Jew or greek. For any who have been granted the gift of salvation by the gift of grace through humble repentance and faith. While not a must see it is a good film for fans of this Biblical love story. Remember to read the true story of Ruth in the Bible before, after, or both, to seperate fact from fiction. Enjoy the film and more so enjoy the knowledge of salvation from our kinsmen redeemer Jesus Christ!

You know with all the great stuff on TV I rarely swing by the radio stations on SkyAngel. In fact some people may not even realize SkyAngel has them. Well….They do! There are some good ones too! Especially His Kids radio. My little ones love the songs and so do my wife and I. The station is full of gospel rich music and story telling that is Bible rich and a blessing for little ones. My wife often has it on during the day just for my 3yr old and 1 yr old to listen to while playing. So if you haven’t checked the stations yet then please swing on by and give the radio stations a look, or better a listen! God bless!

This is a good movie for the right demographic. You see some movies are Christian films that can be evangelistic. Sadly few from Christian producers have the ability to catch the eye and attention of heathens in such a way as to keep them interested. However, this movie is definitely for Christians. Not a cinematic masterpiece but well done all things considered. As you may know I am  a fan of David White. This is one of his first films. You may know him from more recent work like: “The Moment After” and “Moment After 2″. Both of those were end times apocalyptic films of a pre trib rapture perspective. Even more recent in that vein is “In the Blink of an Eye”. My all time favorite though is probably still “Mercy Streets”. Anyway, I’m rambling. In short this is a Christian version of “What a Wonderful Life”. We see what life would be like if David’s character Daniel, was never saved. He throws a hasty comment out one night that God honors. He wishes he were never a believer. He wakes up to a whole new world. Now despite some theological problems the premise makes a good movie and is supposed to make us think. I reccommend it for any believer. God bless and enjoy. If you like this movie it was produced by the Christiano film group. They make quality Christian films. A couple of their newer ones are “Time Changer”, “Unidentified”, and their newest, “The Secret of Jonathan Sperry” I reviewed earlier. I think about all their films are on VOD.  They also produce the good show “7th Street Theater” on many SkyAngel channels as well as VOD. Check their website at www.christiancinema.com  �

If you haven’t check some of the Sermonspice.com shorts you are missing out. I really enjoy the
“Bible trailer”. This clip highlights the incredible power and wonder of the Bible that we so often neglect and actually see as boring sometimes. I actually put it together with a clip from John Piper on Youtube where he makes clear the Bible can’t be boring! These are good resources for Bible teachers and home group leaders for group discussions or topic lead ins. Also just fun to share with others! You may also enjoy “Coffee with Jesus” and I believe it is called “God’s Pie”. Too many good ones to list. Take a look today!  �