Thanksgiving...

I do realize I'm not American and will confess to the fact that I 'feel' American and often wish to be.

It's just that we've always celebrated American Thanksgiving in addition to the Canadian one. Pretty good deal huh?  Two turkeys, two apple pies, two afternoon naps, then (on the second one) the endless NFL games.  Wonderful childhood memories.

This year, as father of my own family, we didn't really celebrate either.  We're not yet at the 'cook a turkey and a pie ourselves' stage.  Mostly our life is about trying to survive.

But I was online today at 'Wordplayer', a screenwriting community I'm part of, and had the chance to read a post I'd submitted earlier this year about the first public screening of my first feature-film, "THE STORM".  It was really healthy, and quite humbling, to see 1) how thankful I was post-screening and 2) how quickly I'd forgotten the joy/high of that moment of thanksgiving.

I happen to think that thanksgiving is the definition of what it means to be godly.  

So I repent.  For being ungrateful, for getting calloused, for losing my first love, for being un-childlike.

And on that front...

Was making breakfast this morning and talking with my wife about my eldest son who's as crazy and eccentric as all get out (and we have NO idea where he gets that from...) and who was in the process of storming upstairs 'cause I wouldn't let him put MJ's 'Thriller' on the iPod (he's become quite the fan) because Mommy and I typically like to listen to John Mayer when we cook breakfast.  I said to Nik, "Classic.  The child coming to grips with his utter powerlessness. Someday he'll be able to identify as he tells his kids that, no, they can't listen to 'jayden spears' because Daddy wants to listen to 'Thriller'."  

And then it hit me.

Maybe when the Bible's talking about us being like little children it's not just saying that we should exhibit all the great things kids exhibit (fearlessness, faith, hope, lovingkindness etc...) but maybe its telling us to get in touch with our utter powerlessness.

"Unless you embrace your utter helplessness/powerlessness, you cannot inherit the kingdom of Heaven..."

How you like them apples?

All this time.  All these years.  All those sermons.  And I'd missed that point.  

I am powerless.

Even as an adult, wielding power over my eldest son, my power is temporary, passing away, mostly an illusion.  There's a radical admission of weakness there that I'm not intuitively comfortable with.

And how can you be thankful, truly thankful, for something you deserve?  Isn't that the essence?  I've been given good things I don't deserve and for that-

I give thanks.

T

Literally true...

This is me lacking a 'communicative outlet'...

About to hit the sack last night.  Phone rings.  It's my biz-partner.  It's 11:00pm (which I do realize is early if you're 23 and single, but I'm 33 and father of four...) and I'm cursing under my breath as I reach for the phone.

"Are you watching 'The Hour'?"  

So I turn it on.  Georgie is interviewing Creflo Dollar.  One question in particular got me thinking.  George was asking Creffie about the whole literalist approach to interpreting scripture.  Creflo did the typical "You can use the Bible for whatever you want if you take it out of context..." thing.  I got to thinking how I would have answered.

See, if you're going to pull the whole 'literalism=fundamentalism" card there's not much I can do about it.  Put aside the verbal jousting for a second though and I think there's another way to look at it.  Naturally I wouldn't want to say I don't believe that what the Bible says is true, absolutely true, because to do so is to take the teeth out of Christianity.  If Christianity is just another philosophy you can try on for size it ceases to become that which it is intended to be.  It's Christianity's exclusivism that is both its great asset and liability.  If we were just 'one among many', nobody'd hate us and we wouldn't mean a thing to a World in pain.

But is it 'LITERALLY' true?

How hard you going to press me?  See, George mentioned how his Christian mother had forbidden him to get an earring because of an obscure passage in the Bible that forbids cutting/piercing of the body.  So George is like; "That wouldn't really work for me 'cause I couldn't shave if that was true and I'd be, all bushy and stuff."  Classic.  Either it's all completely literally true or it's all completely subjective and open to interpretation.

I thought that maybe Creflo could've pointed out the following...

Perhaps it's not just about what's 'literally true' but rather, maybe it's about what's 'actually true'.  See?  Did the Bible literally forbid cutting, piercing, etc?  Well yes. But why?  What did God actually mean (for us) in that passage.  Now, granted, I recognize we're delving into dangerous territory here as I (a human with all the cravenness that goes along with that...) attempt to say what God was thinking. The thing is, this is what guys like me (Preacher/Pastors) do.  We interpret the Bible in an effort to help it 'speak' to our audience today.  That's the job.  Which, by the way, is why so many Preachers are so lousy, but that's another story. 

[also, 'interpreting' a piece of text, like a screenplay, is what Directors do. The two jobs aren't very different in actuality.  Different canvases and different mechanics but very, very similar] 

What was actually at stake with the whole 'no cutting/piercing' thing was idolatry. Worshipping something other than YHWH, the God of Abraham, Issac, and Jacob the God who, we Christians believe, took on flesh (incarnate) by being born of a woman and entered into human history as the long-promised Messiah of Jewish prophecy to live and die and rise again so that we-the-dead might live.  You're only supposed to worship Him, is what the Bible's saying.  One of the great tensions of all of scripture is the tension between God's desire for us to be devoted (captivated by) to Him over and against the constant pull of the life that surrounds us with its constant pressure to place other 'things' in the highest place of attention in our lives.  

Creflo could've turned that corner.  Could've said: "Y'know George, what's at stake there is not a literal interpretation of 'don't cut/pierce' but rather the actual call of God to you to be His, to love Him, walk with Him, devote your entire being to Him."  Yes the Bible literally says that and here's what it actually means.  Instead we got to see another 'liberal talk show host' bests 'fundamentalist televangelist' by pointing out how silly it really is to believe that the Bible is literally (actually) true, moment.

Sigh.

Sometimes I wish I could jump through the screen.

Someday.

T

Hanging 'em out there...

So I'm at it again.  Back at the keyboard.  Trying to pull some 'magic' out of my...

Imagination.

By way of background:

For the past six months, at least, my business partner and I have been 'courting' a significant deal with a major television network.  I can't remember the number of times we've thought the deal's dead but I recall clearly that by the end of this summer my wife and I were looking for a 'day-job' for me.

Now it's quite common for people in show business who're working at 'breaking in' to have one of those- a job that keeps them fed- while they wait, and wait, and wait to see if they're going to get their break.  The thing with me is that I've got four kids.  'Yup, count 'em. 1...2...3...4!  All under the age of seven.  My house is busy and my bank account, in the year and a half since leaving my former career (as a Church planter), mostly hovers on the edge of some degree of panic.  A day job's not really an option for me since most of 'em don't pay nearly enough to float our family-packed boat.  For me it's either 'this works' or 'we're dead'.  

And as uncomfortable as that kind of intensely 'faith-demanding' lifestyle is, the thing that occurs to me is that living this way is almost pre-requisite for 'making it'. The more I read, the more common it seems that my experience is.  Somebody leaves their old 'way' of living to pursue (or more fully pursue) the way they've always thought they should be living; and that kind of a 'lifestyle choice' comes at a cost.  It's almost always at the end of their rope that things come through.

And if you're reading this you're thinking, "Yeah and that's saying nothing about the countless thousands who take the leap and fall.  Straight up fail."  You're right. That's what makes this so terrifying.  

We have babies to feed.

So, back to the 'craft' (I'm always trying to mix something 'spiritually useful' with something productive for those of us living in 'the biz') part of this post.

We've got four (like the kids...how scary is that?) deals pending right now.  Three TV series (for a combined total of 364 episodes!) and one new media project.  As they firm up I'll talk more about them, but for now it's enough to say that this deal is the biggest of my career so far.  

And it just won't close.

It was supposed to close a month ago and every week that passes brings with it a new 'hoop' I have to jump through.  I'm blogging today to say that I'm almost through the last hoop. 

The biggest series (aka: most risk-filled for me and the network) is the one holding up the whole deal right now.  Until I've got them fully and finally 'hooked' on this one they won't approve the other three which are, otherwise, almost academic. So I've been sitting at my desk, mostly procrastinating, waiting for the muse to sing loud enough and for time to work its magic strong enough so that the disparate ideas floating around in my head combine into something that looks like something a TV network would like to plop down some serious cash to have.

How scary is that?

I have to write it.  If they like it, we're good.  If they don't, my kids don't eat.

So as soon as I finish this I'ma kiss my wife, sit myself down at my desk and do my best to pull magic out of thin air.

"Faith is the evidence of things hoped for, the substance of things not seen."

T

That Pesky Voice...

So I alluded to it a little in my last post, referencing the whole journey from preacher to filmmaker.

Growing up, two men in particular (other than my Dad) really influenced me in terms of the man I hoped to grow up to be.  I've got a little plaque on my desk as I write this, a gift from the lead actor (Jeff Stout) on my first film.  It's a picture of two stars on the 'Hollywood walk of fame'.  The left star is Billy Graham's (never knew he had one...) the right is-you guessed it- Mr. Spielberg's.  I wanted to be those guys. Well, not be them, but try to grow up and do, to some small degree, a combination of what they do.

It's not so different if you think about it.

Billy gets up on a stage and tells a story to tens of thousands.  When you combine the TV broadcasts of his 'meetings' over the years he's reached millions.  Steven Spielberg makes movies, which many of my 'Church-oriented' peers have confessed is the 'new preaching' in our day and age, and those movies reach millions.  Billy's work is adaptation, taking an ancient text, studying it, working his imagination around it, listening to what it's trying to say, and crafting a message (or story) based on it to inspire, 'touch', and speak to, his audience.  Same thing Spielberg's doing.  Taking a script (whether he wrote it or not), studying it, listening to it, finding a way to translate it from paper to 'real life' in order to 'touch' an audience.

Storytellers.

And, in even later breaking news, it seems to me that both of them have a similar motivation.  No, Steven's not trying to 'save souls', granted.  But he's certainly trying to 'convert' his audience to his way of seeing things.  All filmmakers have a bias.  They see the world a certain way and the great privilege of being a director is being given the resources and the opportunity to tell a story that will be delivered to millions and that, if done well, will shape the opinions of those same millions.  One 'sermon' every two years or so, if you're a director.  But those 'sermon-movies' live forever, if they're good.  

On the other side of it, a preacher preaches and, if he's any good, that sermon rises to the level of 'great entertainment', almost live theater if he's really on fire.  The audience is moved, provoked, inspired, convicted, and on some deep level (if the preacher brings it back to the 'redemptive urge' as he ought) told that 'everything's going to be o.k'.  Week in week out.  Delivered then (mostly) forgotten, a sermon is a little 'movie of the Spirit', gradually hacking away at the listener's lives.

That's the kind of filmmaker Steven is; the 'it's gonna' be alright' kind.  That's why, when he makes a departure from the kind of story we're used to him telling (from E.T to A.I), some of his typical audience of millions stays away because he's thrown them off-balance.  It's cool for him to make that departure, that's his right as an artist, just like a preacher can mix it up now and again switching from a 'topical' approach to an expository one (or whatever) but at heart we've come to expect a 'thing', or a 'tao' (way), from our preachers and when they don't deliver we're disappointed.  

That's the kind of work I try to do.  I've always figured life is dark enough without me adding any to it.  I tried to write a horror script a few years ago, but it scared the shiz out of me 'cause I happen to believe in 'evil' and the power of the dark.  I had to stop.  Plus my wife, who's ultimately the only one I'm trying to impress, would've hated the movie anyway.  So I try to write, and preach, 'The Light'.  Even while battling a minor depression (and a deep disillusionment) in 2006, the year after resigning from my Church and 'the year of the movie' ('The Storm') I tried very hard to live and preach and write and direct 'The Light' from the darkness.

That's not to say all is good all the time in my life or yours or in the world of our stories.  Just that, from my perspective, much of life is about finding a way through to the good, the light, the life.

So here I sit, continuing to struggle with this voice that comes from inside and outside.  I'm itching to shoot another picture and am itching to get back in the pulpit and just yesterday I get another facebook comment from a dude who used to listen to me preach week after week asking me when I'm going to stop playin' and get back at it.  Seriously, I've been getting at least one of those per week, which seems to me to not be about ego or encouragement but rather about 'The Voice' prodding me to get at it and keep at it.

So, we'll see how it goes trying to keep both sides (and both voices) fed and well-served.

T

Enough already...

So it's been months now, lurking around, reading four or five blogs with some consistency and (stop the press) actually getting something, quite valuable, out of the whole experience.  I guess, at heart, it's because I, like you...

Am a bit of a voyeur.

A voyeur who needs to be encouraged and who needs to learn.  A voyeur who's trying to find his way through to the life I had imagined having while living in the midst of the life that's 'happening' to me.

The other thing that's been driving me (a life-long 'non-diarist') in this direction is the slowly dawning realization that, in spite of my best efforts to ignore it, I'm starting to 'age' a bit and that means, among other things, that I have to exercise more and that my options (in terms of career etc.) are 'narrowing' but it also means that I've gained some (italics mine) limited experience (maybe I should've italicized the 'limited' too...) in what I do and that said experience might, in some small way, be of 'use' to some other voyeurs out there.

So what is it, exactly, that I do?

Well, I used to be a full-time preacher.  The kind who preaches at big concerts and small retreats.  The kind who started a small 'youth church' in the mid-nineties then another independent one in 2001.  A preacher, son of a preacher, son of a preacher, son (no kidding) of a preacher.  

Then I got into the movies.

Last year (2006) I directed my first feature-film.  I'm sure I'll be writing more about it as this blog unspools but it's enough for this first post to say that the experience (t'was a very small film with an even small budget) nearly killed me and (nearly a year and a half later) has opened up some very interesting new doors for me to, potentially, continue my trip into 'directordom'. 

I feel some things strongly about faith in practice and about organized religion.  I hope some things strongly about story and the art-meets-business of making picture-stories for the screen.

These themes will come up here and I'll try to be really honest about it all.

That way, at least somebody, even if it's just me, might get something out of it.

Peace,

T