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One ‘Harmless’ Movie

by —CMI–Australia

27 May 2002

This is the true story of a young boy who, on his way to adulthood, travelled down the slippery slope of unbelief without really knowing what caused it.

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This Australian-born teenager was living in England at the time. He always remembered Australia—the sea, the pristine beaches and his love of all things ‘back home’. When the movie Jaws was released in the mid-1970s, it rekindled his interest and love of the sea. Jaws became one of the highest grossing movies of its day. Shortly after, there was a plethora of materials made available to satisfy the public’s increasing fascination with sharks. He was no different, devouring books, publications and anything to do with sharks and marine mammals. He would often intrigue his English friends with tales of the ‘White Death’, recounting stories he had read about Great White Shark attacks in his native country.

Although he would have described himself as a Christian at the time—‘after all, we sang hymns and said prayers every morning at school assembly’, he also devoured the evolutionary concepts behind all of the material that he was reading. ‘Over and over I would read that sharks were the perfect killing machine, so perfectly evolved that they had remained unchanged for 270 million years.’ Slowly and without realizing it, he had become a ‘full on’ evolutionist. Worse still, how could he believe the Bible, particularly Genesis, when it was a ‘fact’ that sharks had been around for millions and millions of years? As his secondary-school science classes day after day reinforced this long-age evolutionary view, they drove the final nails into the coffin of his childhood faith. His Religious Education classes became irrelevant, made worse because his R.E. teacher had no answers to the conflict in his mind. A ‘harmless’ movie had become the catalyst for unbelief.

When he had children of his own, he could not reconcile how a so-called ‘loving God’ could allow all of the death, suffering and cruelty in the world. His mind recalled his study of sharks and how they ‘appeared’ to be created for one purpose only—killing! Then, on viewing the terrible injustices that man inflicts upon his own kind, he finally decided, ‘There is no God.’

His initial love of God’s creation, but unfortunately portrayed in an evolutionary framework, had finally led to unbelief, despite his ‘Christian’ upbringing at school. In later years he was able to return to the roots of his faith and profess Jesus as Saviour due to the Christian witness of some friends (despite the fact that they had no answers to the ‘difficult questions’ he raised). However, God is always gracious.

But how do I know that this story is true? Because it’s my story, it happened to me. I know if it happened to me, it is undoubtedly happening to someone else right now. This is why I was excited at the invitation to join the team at CMI, because my own story demonstrates how subtle worldly influences can be upon our lives if we don’t have the right foundation to start with. I thank CMI for teaching me how to prepare my children so they can understand the underlying (but now much more overt) evolutionary teaching in schools and in the media. They now have the correct foundation of God as the Genesis Creator, as a basis for viewing the world.

Lives changed-Souls healed

So far, my time here has been an ‘emotional one’, as I have been moved by reading testimony after testimony—many similar to my own—reinforcing the need for a ministry such as ours. I am also in awe at the way God provides through the faith and giving of our many supporters. Like myself, they realize that people are in desperate need of answers in a world full of evolutionary propaganda. I remember how Carl Wieland invited me to ‘join the battle’. I hope and pray that you’ll join us too, by way of financial support and prayers. Together, let’s work to stop people ‘going to hell’.

I still remember Jaws the movie with some affection, but my love of the sea is now viewed wearing ‘Biblical glasses’. Although some may wonder how a relatively ‘harmless’ movie may have had such an influence, we should be mindful that Jesus remarked that Satan has much influence over this world and its systems. (1 John 5:19, John 12:31, 14:30, 16:11). Satan Seeks to deceive at any opportunity.

Published: 3 February 2006