Is Rob Schneider and ‘Movie Night Ministry’ Helping the Church Grow?
Comedian Rob Schneider is known for his antics as a foul-mouthed actor, playing such characters as a male prostitute in his raunchy comedy Deuce Bigalow: Male Gigolo. Schneider has recently been in the news for his libertarian political positions and comments about cancel culture, which allegedly landed Schneider on Hollywood’s conservative actor blacklist. In an effort to continue producing movies, Schneider has teamed up with Movie Night Ministries to produce Daddy Daughter Trip, a family-friendly movie.
Normally the production of a family-friendly “Christian” movie would be considered a non-story, and normally it would be considered encouraging to see a movie star who specializes in raunchy humor decide to change his tune and produce something wholesome and kid-friendly. The seeker-friendly strategy of Movie Night Ministries, however, is to take the attractional power of a movie star with a reputation for producing a certain form of entertainment, add it to an otherwise average family-friendly movie, and then top the whole thing off with just enough Christianese or “Christ-centered undertones” to reel people into the seeker-sensitive church permanently.
Details on Movie Night Ministry’s actual evangelism strategy are virtually non-existent in their promotional material, but the program claims to have the ability to attract, convert, and retain unchurched visitors who venture through the doors of the church.
Movie Night Ministry touts its conversion formula for moving a visitor from a movie-goer to a permanent movie-goer. Establish trust with a free movie. Offer a new film that is only available at church as an exclusive opportunity frequently (this step takes the place of the urgency created by knowing that you will spend eternity in hell if you don’t have saving faith in Jesus). Create credibility by using “credible talent” in films (because the ministry doesn’t believe in the credible witness of the scriptures). Finally, win the lost soul over with “value.” The poor lost soul “is not offended by any cost” and “feels safe to attend.” It’s almost as if Movie Night Ministry believes that Jesus never said anything about counting the cost of discipleship (Luke 14:25-33).
Of course, the Movie Night Ministries’ model doesn’t need scripture, Gospel preaching, or Jesus to win the lost because it utilizes the key secret seeker-sensitive ingredient, an unregenerate foul-mouthed Pagan celebrity who needs the Gospel just as much as every unchurched attendee of a Movie Night Ministry event. At the same time that the Daddy Daughter Trip movie trailer was making the rounds, Schneider was taking the Lord’s name in vain and dropping F-bombs on Bill Maher’s Club Random Podcast, which should come as no surprise because Pagan’s gonna Pag. According to Movie Night Ministries, this method is now the “#1 method in attracting non-churchgoers to local congregations” and the “first to deploy ‘A-list’ talent to grow local congregations.”
Unsurprisingly, Movie Night Ministries touts the endorsement of Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church, which pretty much sums up the ministry’s lack of true Gospel presentation in a nutshell.
To be fair, while Movie Night Ministries is the first ministry to produce its own seeker-sensitive films, LifeChurch has been pushing this attractional model for several years with their At the Movies-themed worship services that present a seeker-sensitive message through the lens of a Blockbuster film.
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There is a saying: “you can put lipstick on a pig, but it is still a pig.” These business models just keep getting new labels put on them, but are no different from what Drucker, Warren and Hybels started over 30 years ago. Look at what that has done to the American Church.