Upstaged

By Joe Phillips 

I have looked a little ridiculous for the last twelve years. I have played the character Ebenezer Scrooge on stages across America. I don a wig, wear a gown tucked into wool pants and put on makeup. I sort of look like one of the Golden Girls with a thyroid issue. I do it for one simple reason: lost people. It has been a non-traditional route to see many people enter a relationship with God.

I have wanted to reach the masses with the gospel my entire Christian Life. When I was the pastor of a small church full of beautiful people in the mountains of West Virginia, we never saw even 200 people in attendance. Not once. Not even close.

I eventually left that pastorate for the evangelistic field and saw some good results, but I always wanted to see more. When I was 47, I stumbled upon a very powerful way to reach many more people. It was simply by using art as evangelism.

I wasn’t booked one Sunday in November, and I was sitting in a regular service at my home church. I heard the Holy Spirit say, “Don’t travel next year. Be in a play.” I was a middle-aged man who hadn’t been in a play since high school. The impression was so strong that I immediately wrote down the instruction to not travel 13 months into the future.

The following June I saw a community theater flyer announcing auditions for A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens. I remembered the whisper, so I showed up as an act of obedience feeling a bit out of place. They asked me to read something with a British accent. I had a Bible in my bag and read something from the book of Acts. I was shocked to later discover I had been picked for the lead—Ebenezer Scrooge.

Two weeks into the rehearsals I approached the director. I told him that since we were using a large church as the production venue, would it be possible to allow me five minutes at the end of each show to share the simple gospel. In the 100-member cast and crew we had people of every religious stripe, as well as the irreligious. He pledged to think about it, and at the next week’s rehearsal he said, “I think I’m going let you and see how it goes.”

Since those initial sold-out shows in 2011, remarkable things have happened. I decided to leverage all of that memorization and take the show on the road. In four iterations of Scrooge, the drama has been seen 107 times by 43,392 people in 41 cities and 11 states. The most remarkable thing is that 1,326 people have asked Jesus to forgive their sin. Ebenezer has invited the lost in megachurches, mountain churches, traditional churches, country churches, progressive churches and even in penitentiaries.

The Ebenezer Experience is just a part of the way God has used art in this ever-evolving ministry. I have done 210 stand-up comedy shows, written a novel, been in other stage productions and preached illustrated sermons with elaborate sets. My company, JPM, even produced a film that networks have incorporated into their programming

Here are some important reasons for churches to pray about utilizing art as evangelism:

Art can be “bait.”

If we fish for men, we need good bait. When I go into a city, I ask the churches to provide our team with some actors—often children. If a child (or even an adult) is on stage, there always seems to be a couple of rows of people there to see them perform. Many times those close family and friends are patently irreligious. Pablo Picasso said, “Art washes away from the soul the dust of everyday life.”

In Walter Isaacson’s biography of Steve Jobs, he gave us a glimpse of the iPhone founder’s theology: “Sometimes I believe in God, sometimes I don’t. I think it’s 50-50 maybe.” When Jobs heard the artistic genius of cellist Yo-Yo Ma, he conceded a powerful possibility: “You playing is the best argument I’ve ever heard for the existence of God, because I don’t really believe a human alone can do this.” That is the power of art. As Aristotle said, “The aim of art is to represent not the outward appearance of things, but their inward significance.”

Art fosters camaraderie.

Art brings people together. I interviewed Patricia McTigue, the executive leader of In-Tune Productions in the Charlotte, North Carolina, area. In 16 seasons almost 5,000 kids and staff have cycled through their annual S.M.A.C.K. camps (Summer Music Arts Camp for Kids). The campers pay or receive scholarship for the $450 two-week camp. It sells out in a matter of hours with long waiting lists each year.

The campers are divided into two large casts. They produce Broadway-caliber shows like The Lion King and The Little Mermaid to sold-out crowds. There is a gospel message at the end of every extraordinary production. The number of people seeing the shows is 26,200 to date. Some of the unchurched campers even refer to the organization as “S.M.A.C.K. Church.” People have been grafted into the actual church through the power of this art.

McTigue shared the observation that preachers often use athletic imagery and illustrations. Many kids aren’t athletic or interested in sports. She teaches sports marketing in a Charlotte high school and appreciates athleticism. But she notes that non-athletic kids often feel like they don’t fit. The creative arts give people a place of belonging and connection. She tearfully spoke of one of her campers with autism. He had been bullied a lot at school. His mother dropped him off at camp one day and wept. The mom said, “When my son gets in the car after rehearsal, he is happy. It makes me feel like I can breathe.”

Art pulls talent out of people.

Author Maya Angelou said, “Everybody born comes from the Creator trailing wisps of glory. We come from the Creator with creativity.” JPM made a film in Thailand in 2019, and after the first day of filming, the missionary who helped us with logistics had a very strange look on his face. I walked over and asked him if everything was alright. He motioned his hand toward the 15 Thai young people that had just wrapped the scene. I’ll never forget what he said: “I have been a missionary here for 37 years. I had no idea that this kind of talent was in any of these people, let alone all of these people.”

André Gide, winner of the 1947 Nobel Prize in Literature said, “Art is a collaboration between God and the artist, and the less the artist does the better.” Artistic endeavors draw out of people God-given talent that they sometimes did not know they had. Productions, talent festivals, paintings, open mics and other artistic agents have allowed people to stumble upon something that sometimes forever changes their lives. The job of a pastor is to “equip the saints for the work of the ministry.” Good art with evangelistic purpose can do exactly that. Albert Einstein said, “Creativity is contagious, pass it on.”

Art is transcendent.

Good art is transcendent. Richard Viladesau quotes novelist Iris Murdoch in his book, Theology and the Arts: “Good art … provides a stirring image of pure transcendent value, a steady invisible image of a higher good.” It is possible that our art can be used by God to communicate eternal truth even long after we are dead.

The Mona Lisa was painted by Leonardo da Vinci between the years 1503 and 1506. In the 517 years since he painted it, nations have risen and fallen. The United States is only 246 years old. According to The Guardian, ten million people stood and looked at the Mona Lisa in 2019 at the Louvre.

If a church endeavors to utilize God-honoring art, here are some suggestions:

Just start. God delights to see the work begin. Our traveling Ebenezer Experience grew from a simple monologue in costume to a high production event over time. We start where we are and use what we have.

Look around. There is talent in your circle. Once a great friend of mine in a large charismatic church told me that he preached a sermon while someone painted a beautiful scene behind him. He said it was a powerful moment. I told him that in my West Virginia pool we didn’t have that ability. I joked, “Last week I had a guy change a transmission on stage while I preached but it didn’t have the same pop.” I am sure that in our circle of influence we had much more talent than that if I had only looked around.

Don’t be afraid. If we know the gospel deeply and know how to present it succinctly, crowds that show up to see our artistic enterprises are ripe for walking into the Kingdom of a God who is the author of creativity and beauty.

Makoto Fujimura notes that creating art fulfills three paths. It fulfills the paths of the mercy work of justice, beauty and evangelism. I am willing to look a little silly on stage for the sake of lost people. Actress and acting teacher Stella Adler said, “Life beats down and crushes the soul, and art reminds you that you have one.”