Dallas Jenkins, the evangelical creator of the wildly popular The Chosen series portraying the ministry of Jesus Christ and life of His apostles, just posted a video explaining his take on the controversy that started after a crew member's LGBT flag was seen on set and at least 3 of the show's main actors decried the "homophobia" of fans.
Watch 👇
What do you think?
Is Jenkins' explanation satisfactory?
I'll leave you with your thoughts, but here's my two cents for what it's worth.
I don't disagree that Jenkins, as a business owner, has the right to choose his own employees and wants to remain non-discriminatory in hiring based on merit and skill. And if he were my landscaper or my regional paper sales manager, that would be completely understandable. This would be a non-controversy.
Here's my issue: Jenkins doesn't seem to understand the weight of the work he's set out on. Portraying the life of Jesus is not running a mere bakery. It's more serious than running the D-Day landing or handling the operations of a nuclear reactor, except the entire thing is riding or dying not on technical knowledge but on the theological recipe of the project.
...strangers to the show or people online who keep saying ‘The Chosen Inc', is a ministry or a church or should be like one, that doesn't necessarily make it true. Our company's standards and practices and my own personal calling and ministry in my personal life and how I run my business, it might not be the same as yours. Can that be okay?
Being non-discriminatory in the restaurant business is a good idea, although this silly American notion we have about discrimination always being bad is a farce. Your value system might not make you the most qualified person for every job, sure, but there are some jobs where your values and beliefs are actually the crux of the entire thing.
But here Jenkins is handling the most weighty thing in the universe: The person and character of Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, the Alpha and Omega, the Second Person of the Trinity who sits at the right hand of the Father and will come one day in power to judge the living and the dead. This is not a mere TV show with artistic differences. To not be laser-focused on nailing a theologically precise portrayal of Christ and the Word of God, above all else, completely derails the entire purpose of the show. It's like a surgeon killing his patient on the operating table but telling the grieving family how diverse, talented, and friendly his surgical team was.
The entire purpose of the work has failed... that is, unless the purpose was always money or to stroke Jenkins' own ego. To elevate one's own endeavors and dismiss biblical criticism on anti-Christian ideology that might influence such a project as "agree-to-disagree" differences under the justification of "we're not a church or ministry" is laughable.
In the process, Jenkins is also elevating his business tribe over his brothers and sisters in Christ (not to mention his funders), talking about how the members of his show, his company, are "family," as if artistic ventures come close to the camaraderie we are supposed to have as co-heirs with Christ as children of the living God.
I say this as a fellow brother who has seen many men tempted by the work of their own hands: There is room to defend your Chosen "family" and have artistic license along the lines of your own convictions, but it must not be done by treating Christ as an afterthought of a business policy. He is king of the universe, as you are fond of making your actors say in the show.
