I really love film. I enjoy trips to the cinema, if I want to watch something on TV it is generally a film; I am a fan of Mark Kermode’s podcast and I was even in the film society at University!  My friend Russell is also a film fan and I have recently borrowed a pile of various DVDs off him which included the film “The Gospel According to St Matthew”, directed by Pasolini in 1964.

Pier Paolo Pasolini was an Italian poet, intellectual, writer, filmmaker and political figure. He was something of a renaissance man in his breadth of activity and gifting, but he was also a controversial figure, his communist views being just one source of scandal.

The fact that Pasolini was a Marxist and an atheist makes the reverential approach of the film particularly surprising. The dialogue is taken straight from Matthew’s Gospel and he vowed to make it from the perspective of a believer; though when the work was finished he realised he had made it in a way that reflected his own Marxist worldview.  Still, it has been critically acclaimed as one of the best adaptations of the life of Jesus, and despite being quite dated in feel (and subtitled due to it being in Italian), it is very powerful.

I recommend it because it presents a different perspective on a well known story.  I am always trying to find new ways of looking at things.  The Easter story is so important, so fundamental, but when you are dealing with a story that is so familiar how do you ensure that it stays alive, how do you see new paradigms, keep the material fresh and maintain the impact?

So leading up to Easter this year I had been looking at the story from new perspectives, Pasolini’s being one of them.  I have also been reading “The Cross of Christ” by John Stott (a book I cannot recommend highly enough) and I have been meditating on the story of the Centurion who stood at the foot of the cross while Jesus died – especially the passage of Matthew 27:27-54.

We all tell the gospel from a different point of view, our own perspective.  Even the four Gospels are highly reflective of the characters that wrote them: the Jewish perspective of Matthew, the punchy account of Mark, the precise account of the doctor Luke, the mystical perspective of John.

The way we tell of our encounter’s with Jesus also reflect our own history and character.  The blind man hardly knew anything about Jesus and when questioned he just said what he knew:

John 9:11  He replied “The man they called Jesus made some mud and put it on my eyes.  He told me to go to Siloam and wash.  So I went and washed and then I could see…whether he is a sinner or not I do not know.  One thing I know.  I was blind but now I see!”

It is not the whole gospel but it was the good news as he knew it, how it applied to him. There is nothing wrong with us because it is by telling our own story that it remains authentic, and when people see the change in our character they can see something of the power of the gospel.

After hanging out with victims of an armed robbery I got into the car and headed back to the newsroom. The car was freezing, like a penguin’s pocket, so as soon as the engine kicked in I whacked the heating on. Taking a deep breath and glancing over the Pennines, I carried out a task I had done a thousand times before. I turned the radio on.

Why is this in the opening chapter of my blog for this Easter weekend? Get this gentlemen.
The BBC Radio 1 presenter introduced a song as if he was waiting for me to get into the car.
As soon as I had pressed the on button he said this: “And number six in the updated chart show is Delirious with History Maker.”

There was so much wrong about this sentence that it forced me to put the car back into neutral and delay my journey back to the office.

This song was released in 1996, and is one of the many worship songs written by the most well-known Christian band to come out of the Twentieth Century. As I checked my pulse and wondered why on Earth a 14-year-old worship song, which had been sung in churches up and down the country, was being blasted out at number six in the UK chart, I cast my eyes back over the Pennines.

It was one of those moments which reinforced the idea that every passing moment in your life is a chance to feel alive again. I opened the windows and allowed the cold Lancashire air to fill the car and take the smell of rotten milkshake away temporarily.

I said a quiet prayer for the families in the terraced street I had just spoken to who had been left distraught after hearing one of their neighbours had been robbed at knife point in his own living room. I took stock of my life in the duration of the song which featured as a key anthem in the soundtrack of my Christian journey.

I stopped caring about why it was on BBC Radio 1 and just fixed my eyes on the snow-sprinkled mountains in the distance.

This week we remember the death and resurrection of Jesus; the hundreds of prophecies he fulfilled in the events we now call Easter. And though no one of can fully understand the secrets of the Cross and the mystery of the resurrection, I can testify with all my heart that Jesus is the hope of this generation.

Please, take a minute to glance at the lyrics of what may even be the number one on Sunday’s chart show, its a song called History Maker, by a band once called Delirious. Be encouraged.

Is it true today that when people pray, cloudless skies will break, kings and queens will shake?
Yes it’s true and I believe it, I’m living for you.
Is it true today that when people pray, we’ll see dead men rise and the blind set free?
Yes it’s true and I believe it, I’m living for you.
I’m gonna be a history maker in this land, I’m gonna be a speaker of truth to all mankind
I’m gonna stand, I’m gonna run, into your arms, into your arms again.
Well it’s true today that when people stand, with the fire of God, and the truth in hand
We’ll see miracles, we’ll see angels sing, we’ll see broken hearts making history.
Yes it’s true and I believe it, we’re living for you.

Luke 24:5 says it all.

This weekend is what its all about for us at CVM.  Following a captain, brother, rescuer and friend who gave up everything for us on Friday and on Sunday served death and hell its final notice.  We follow a risen Jesus.

We are men with resurrection DNA.  We can be knocked down but are never “out”.

Have an awe inspiring weekend brothers and a great time of rest and reflection.

Your brother and fellow contender for the gospel.

Carl (on behalf of the CVM team).