Curious Case of Benjamin Button

Wow!

Let me say that again, WOW!!!

I had no idea what to expect when walking into the theater to watch “The Curious Case of Benjamin Button”. Well, other than there is a baby born old who turns young. I was very excited to see a new film from David Fincher (Seven, The Game, Fight Club, Zodiac) who has directed a few movies i consider to be among my favorites.

To say the least, i was definitely NOT disappointed. I would easily count this movie in one of my all-time favorite films. A great balance of story and cinematography. I smiled, laughed and cried(don’t tell anyone). It is absolutely amazing and i whole-heatedly recommend seeing it!

Restoration Videos

Here at Floodgate, we try our hardest to resource the Church with high quality resources. And make no mistake, that with the addition to our store of “An Unspoken Plea”, by our friends at Restoration Videos, we feel we are doing just that!

“An Unspoken Plea” takes a look at the thoughts and heart of someone who is on the “outside”, watching those of us who claim to be “in the know”… how we act, speak and live our lives. Watching to see if we really believe what we claim about our faith and if we actually live it out. Reminding us that a finger pointed in condemnation isn’t going to convince anyone to follow Jesus Christ… but what we all need is to be surrounded by people who are willing to walk with us and hold us up when we need it. True, sacrificial, unconditional love, that is willing to see us for who and what we are and how far we have to go… but still loving us all the while.

If you ask us, that’s a message we all need to hear! Do you and your congregation a favor and view “An Unspoken Plea” here, then put it in your cart, purchase it, and show it this Sunday.

Floodgate Wins Award

The new Collide Magazine issue just arrived in the mail. It’s the Reader’s Choice issue. We learned that Floodgate’s video “Welcome to Our Church” won the 2008 award for “Best Church Media Short Film”. According to the article, our video had a few more votes than FortyOne Twenty’s “Through the Storm” (an amazing video that should be shown in every church).

The Back Story: In December of 2007, we set out to create a video that aptly described our home church in Clovis, CA. It was a slow time in our business, so we easily found the time to simply create. The video script was straight-forward, and described our own church in no uncertain terms – one bullet point after another. We thought visitors would appreciate such honesty about who we are, and about who we’re striving to become.

Our Office Manager (Lorrie) saw it and told us that we should consider offering it to other churches. So we did, hoping there were a few other churches around the nation who might resonate with the same mission, vision, and core values.

A year later, we just laugh about its success. The video feels almost accidental – like we just fell into creating it. But (as with every other accident) there is a Creator behind the whole thing. We thank God that it’s resonating with so many churches. May we live out the vision this video speaks of, every day of our lives.

If this is a video you’ve used in your church, comment below about how (and when) you used it.  Did it work?  Did people yawn and throw things at you?  Were small countries saved in one day?

I Wish Someone Would Make a Video…

So you just spent two hours on a church video distribution site, and you couldn’t find what you really need. Now you’re approaching the “bad mood” emotional level. So in your current state of frustration, you look at someone on your team and exclaim, “I just wish someone would make a video about _________!”.

What’s goes in the blank?

Please let us know your answers. We’re not promising to produce anything, but we’re also not promising not to (that sentence doesn’t make sense at all – but you know what we’re saying).

The True Nature of Beauty

For as long as I have been a church-going Christian (basically, most of my life), pastors have begun sermons with a joke, an interesting story, or ancedote. If the story isn’t amusing, entertaining, or well-told, something crucial is lost, we start checking our watches. Even if the story may be technically accurate, it will fall flat, and probably not permeate the carefully constructed barrier surrounding the average person’s soul. But truly amusing or captivating stories contain, at the very least, some kernel of truth. The funniest jokes are those where you end up saying “That is so true!” It is the secret to the success of comedian Jerry Seinfeld whose clever observations of our mundane lives have us ROTFLMHO ( That’s the Christian version – Rolling On The Floor Laughing My A** Hinnie Off). Nowdays, we have the Church Video to add to this arsenal to help wake up the pew-sitters. A new tool with which we can use the time-honored phrase “If that doesn’t light your fire, maybe your wood’s wet!” A personal (guilty church pleasure) favorite of mine.

The recent flurry of activity surrounding to Gary’s piece on Collide about Church Video Standards, prompted me to add my voice to the discussion. There are many beliefs that I hold dear to my heart that seem to go hand in hand with this topic. Primarily, the true nature of beauty. His statement that … “Content in not King. Beauty is” has rattled many in the church media community, perhaps as it should, due to our long standing belief that Content is King and that form is secondary to function. Bad news Content, you’ve just been de-throned! Ok, well, maybe its not as simple as all that. Let’s take a look at beauty, and get to the heart of what I believe Gary is really on to here.

For me, I believe that beauty is inextricable from truth. I don’t believe that you can have one without the other. There are those that would argue that there may be many cases where you view art that is well-crafted, and visually pleasing, but tells a story that goes against fundamental principals that we hold to be true. To this I would say “You are correct Sir (or madam)!”

But “every good an perfect gift comes from God.”-James 1:7 Without God there would be no such thing as beautiful lighting, creative camera angles, the golden ratio, faithful rendition through clever codecs, etc. It is only by the true creator that we have these means to tell whatever story is being told. Whether or not we agree with the message, if the medium is done artfully, it contains truth. The reality is that none of our messages, be they conveyed with words printed or spoken, sung, played, filmed or otherwise, will be a completely accurate portrait of the Truth. And this I believe is due to the fact that we are doing our best to know and understand an infinite God with finite minds. Everything we do to try and understand Him, is but a small reflection of some facet of His nature. A great question is, to what purpose are we using these “reflections of truth.” They can some times be muddied and manipulated to serve our own agendas, but in doing so, the human condition is exposed, and we are left with an opportunity to see our true relationship to the Creator.

I believe that God leaves clues to the nature of this relationship in His creation. Consider the way in which our eyes work. We must have light to see. Everything we take in through our visual senses, is a reflection of light. Everything looks the way it does, based on the way that it reflects light. It is dependant on light to be seen. Apart from light, there can be no color. Apart from God, apart from Truth, there can be no beauty.

It is a wonder to me that God in his infinite creativity, wisdom and knowledge made trees. Trees with which we would harvest wood to not only build shelter, but craft into instruments like violins, guitars, etc. Take a moment to listen to a cello played by someone like Yo Yo Ma, and tell me if you can’t hear the voice of God on some level. Even when these instruments are coupled with lyrics or ideas that run contrary to our deep beliefs, the almost mystical beauty that comes from the reverberating wooden hollows belongs to God and would fail to exist apart from him. Its amazing that he entrusts us with such beauty.

Now beauty is a very large thing. It encompases such a vast expanse of the human experience and imagination, that it allows us to develop things such as taste. As we know, what may beautiful to one, is not beautiful to all. This subjectivity is part of God’s plan. It is part of His infinite nature. It tells us more of our particular nature, our particular conditioning based on our experiences, than it does our ability to judge objectively what is beautiful or ugly. Our personal experiences determine our proclivity for one thing to resonate as more beautiful or true than another. It is a combination of our rational mind, paired with our emotional heart, that we determine whether something is really of value, and worthy of living, or changing our lives for. If it looks, sounds, and feels good, but we can not intellectually get behind it, we are not fully committed to it. The converse is also true. It must contain both elements to be truly soul-satisfying.

When it comes to having a Standard for Church Videos, I believe the best way for this to occur is to develop within both the producers and the consumers, an understanding of what will best illuminate the truths that have been given us through the bible and the lives we live in relationship with God. Being a subjective thing, it would be impossible to put to fine a point on what is “correct” video/filmmaking practice. For most every rule, you can probably find a good example of someone who has broken it, and been the better for doing so. The question should be, does this piece resonate with truth? Can it cut through our defenses, and permeate both our hearts and minds? As, Christians, we should strive not to simply mimic the quality and styles of those who believe differently than we do. It should be to find truth and honor it in a way that is useful, and pleasing to God, the greatest artist of all.