Not Your Sunday School Noah

I attended a Friday showing of the new movie, "Noah", that has seen much debate in the days and weeks leading to it's release. It is crazy how many people had formed such strong opinions about a movie before they even saw it!

"Noah" is quite well made and features several great performances by the cast. One of my favorite things about the movie is how well it demonstrated what life was like in the days of Noah, before the flood. The world truly was a dark and wicked place. Often when we hear about Noah, we envision the sunday school character that was perfect, along with his perfect family. There were definitely liberties taken throughout the movie that are not in the bible, and a few in which many scholars would say are not accurate, however, the story of Noah, as told in the Bible, remains strong in the movie, just a very different Noah that we heard before.

In this movie Noah is a man struggling to identify what the will of God is (sound familiar), and what he is supposed to do to follow God(again sound familiar). These struggles create tension before boarding the ark, and on the ark. The idea that the days aboard the ark were difficult and stressful is believable based on what we read in scripture. The bible says after getting off the ark, Noah gets drunk! I had never thought about the story from the angle the director interpreted it, and as much as I want to think the sunday school Noah is real, I think Russel Crowe's portrayal of Noah maybe more like the real thing than traditional Christian ideas.

The events may not have played out exactly the same, and the age of Noah's kids (and his son's wives) were likely very different, in reality (and biblically), but the way they found wives may be very similar to that of the movie. The truth is, the days of the old testament were very different both today and in the new testament. God has used supernatural power throughout history, including now, but we read over and over in the old testament about supernatural acts that seem, to the human mind, to be much more supernatural than at any other time in history.

"Noah" is not a kids movie, but it most certainly isn't against the bible. Yes, some of the supernatural acts may have looked very different, but no one really knows that exact details, Christian or not. Don't bring kids to this movie, and be prepared to see Noah in a different light. The exact details to what really happened will not be known until Jesus returns, but know that the portrayal of Noah in the movie is likely much closer to what really happened than the church as ever taught.