‘Facing the Giants’ tops $10 million at box office ahead of DVD release
In Hollywood, $10 million is mere change. In Albany, Ga., it’s a sign of God’s blessing.
“Facing the Giants,” the inspirational movie made by the staff and members of Sherwood Baptist Church in Albany, Ga., on a shoestring budget, passed the $10 million gross mark the week before Christmas. Not bad for a movie that cost only $100,000 to make.
It is still showing in a handful of theaters nationwide and is set to be released on DVD Jan. 30. Churches, though, can go ahead and purchase the DVD, along with the required license, to show it to their congregation. More than 900 churches have done so thus far. (Information is available at www.facingthegiants.com.)
“For us to make a movie for $100,000 and then to see it make $10 million just in the box office has been overwhelming,” Jim McBride, the executive pastor of Sherwood Baptist who has a role in the movie, told Baptist Press. “We just all came out and volunteered. You just can’t explain how that all turned out so well with a bunch of novices, other than God’s hand was on it.”
McBride and others hope that churches across the nation will use the movie for outreach. Some 4,000 people have e-mailed the church, testifying to the movie’s impact on them. More than 800 people have prayed to receive Christ after watching the film, he said.
‘Left behind’ game causes stir
It has been endorsed by Focus on the Family and other conservative groups, but liberal Christian organizations are calling “Left Behind: Eternal Forces” a video game that is too violent, intolerant and divisive to be called Christian, the Los Angeles Times reported.
“It’s essentially a training video for faith-based killing, marketed to children,” Tim Simpson, a Presbyterian pastor in Florida and interim president of Christian Alliance for Progress, told the Times. An offshoot of the popular novel series dealing with the end times, the video game released in November challenges players to evangelize and care for the people of New York City while the enemy attempts to gain control.
“You start out with a few people (units) in your control, send them out to gather resources (money and real estate) and train them up to become musicians, builders, nurses, pastors, disciples and soldiers, each with his or her own function for the community and impact on the world,” Bob Hoose explains in a review for Focus on the Family’s Plugged In Online.
Hoose said players are offered sniper rifles, gun turrets, tanks and helicopters to destroy the enemy, but there is no gore because people who are killed simply fade away. The player soon learns violence isn’t the way to win. “It quickly becomes clear that the strongest weapons in your arsenal are your top-level missionaries and worship leaders,” Hoose wrote. “It’s easier to convert a group of enemies than it is to shoot them.”
‘Church ATM’ for tithing
In an effort to keep up with the culture, a church in Georgia has developed a type of ATM, which it calls an “automatic tithe machine,” to facilitate monetary donations each week through the use of a credit or debit card.
“We’re just trying to connect with the culture,” Marty Baker, pastor of Stevens Creek Community Church in Martinez, told the Associated Press. “And that’s how the culture does business. It’s more than an ATM for Jesus. It’s about erasing barriers.”
People can swipe a card, choose a fund in which to deposit their donation, enter an amount and get a receipt. Since installing the machines in his 1,100-member church, he has seen an 18 percent increase in giving and the average gift through the machines exceeds $100, AP said. Some, though, say the machine leads people to ignore the principal of sacrificial giving from the heart as a form of worship.