First Baptist Church

Postal Address: 317 Church Street, Clifton, Tennessee

Telephone: (931) 676-5211

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How to Respond to the DaVinci Code

Excerpts from responses by Pastor Calvin Wittman of Applewood Baptist Church

How to Respond to the DaVinci Code - Guide for Pastors

Come mid May the film  version of Dan Brown's DaVinci Code will hit theaters across the globe. Rightly classified in the bookstores as fiction, the book is a well written murder mystery novel and is very readable. The book's problem lies, not with its literary style, but with the blatant message it seeks to propagate: That Jesus is not God.

Throughout the story we are told that Jesus is not really God, but that He was deified by the Roman emperor Constantine at the Council of Nicea for political purposes. Brown writes that Mary Magdalene and Jesus were married and that she carried His child, or His blood, making her the "Holy Grail." In fact, worship of the Sacred Feminine," or pagan goddess worship, is what Christianity is all about. It is the church, say Brown's characters, which have twisted this message for their own purposes of control.

Throughout the book we are told of the Priory of Sion, a secret organization that protected the historical proof that substantiates all of these claims. According to the book, DaVinci a supposed grandmaster of this group, hid clues in his paintings. Thus, the DaVinci Code.

Scholars from across the theological spectrum have denounced Brown's work as slanderous and accused him of intentionally trying to undermine the Christian faith. Brown's historical "facts" are little more than mere fabrication. For the student of history this is an easy book to refute.

For example:

The Priori of Sion has been proven a hoax. It was started in the middle of the last century by a convicted con man. The claims that DaVinci was gay cannot be substantiated historically as well as what he says about the "Sacred Feminine." His claims about the Council of Nicea are boldface lies. We have the minutes from that meeting and none of what he says is true.

So why all the fuss? Because most of the people who read this book or watch this movie are not scholars. We live in an age and, culture where people are biblically illiterate and will believe almost anything if it is entertaining. In a society where people watch Oprah to get marital advice, it should come as no surprise if people seek theological advice from a murder mystery.

The DaVinci Code truly represents the spirit of our age, a spirit which denies the deity of Christ and seeks to undermine our faith. As Christian, and especially as pastors, we must contend for the faith once for all delivered to the saints (Jude 3).

How Our Church Can Respond to the DaVinci Code

There has been much talk in Christian circles about how we as Christians are to respond. The DaVinci Code's basic message is one which says that everything we have learned about Christ is false. He sets forth a theory wherein Christ was merely human but was deified by Roman Emperor Constantine. As students of history, we know Brown's work is pure fiction. But merely saying this is not sufficient. As followers of the Lord Jesus Christ, we must be ready to contend for the faith, as Jude 3 tells us.

The spirit of this world in our age has taken the form of postmodernism, a philosophy which says that everything we know as "Truth" has been propagated by those in positions of authority, for the sole purpose of keeping them in power. In other words, according to postmodernists, there is no real overarching truth (they say all "truth' is subjective), and whatever we understand to be true must be "deconstructed," or torn down, because it only serves to keep us oppressed.

This is the spirit in which the DaVinci Code was written. It should come as no surprise to Christians that it should be popular with the world. If there is no truth, there is not God; and if there is no God then we are our own moral authorities.

As Christians we can respond in one of several ways. Most Christians will simply not respond. Most Christians are more concerned with the affairs of their own life than they are with confronting their culture. The devil wants Christians to remain silent.

A second response is to stand in our holy huddle and throw stones at the world. While we must speak the truth and point out error, merely condemning the heresy set forth within our culture will do little good.

There is another response. We can use this opportunity to engage our culture. We can take this book/movie and use it as an occasion to tell others the truth and introduce them to The Truth. While this will take some work, it will pay eternal dividends.

My prayer for you is that you will allow God to stretch you and use you in ways you cannot even imagine. As a part of His Body, Jesus wants to use you to reach the world around you. Will you let Him?