God’s Not Dead is an entertaining, profound, powerful Christian movie about a college student who has to stand up for his faith when bullied by an atheist professor.
Josh Wheaton arrives on campus with his potential fiancée, Karen, and signs up for the best schedule. He’s told not to sign up for one philosophy class because the professor will crush your Christian faith. He does sign up, though, because Professor Radisson’s class fits his schedule.
Professor Radisson, played by Kevin Sorbo, forces each student to sign a pledge that God is dead at the beginning of his philosophy class. Josh refuses, and Radisson tells him he’s going to fail him and break him. Radisson spends a few minutes in each of the next three classes trying to get Kevin to change his mind that God is dead on pain of destroying his chances of getting a grade that will get him into law school. Josh’s fiancée, Karen, gets angry at him and tells him to just sign the form that God is dead.
Meanwhile, a beautiful Muslim lady in the school has secretly come to Christ. Her father violently kicks her out of her home. Also, the local pastor, Dave, is running on fumes when a Nigerian friend comes and challenges him to live his faith. A reporter named Amy, a radical vegan, does ambush interviews with Willie Robertson and his wife. Her dreams are dashed when Amy finds out she has cancer and her wealthy, successful boyfriend, Mark, dumps her and admits he’s just been using her. Mark’s sister happens to be Professor Radisson’s live-in girlfriend, Mena, who takes care of their mother, who’s got dementia. Mena suddenly announces to Radisson she’s a Christian.
Can Josh convince the class that God is not dead? Can Mena get out of the bullying control of Professor Radisson? Can the Muslim convert survive jihad? Will Rev. Dave reclaim his faith?
Although there are a lot of stories in God’s Not Dead, like Crash, they work because they all end up in the same place. The direction and acting is very good. The ending is terrific.
God’s Not Dead is a powerful apologetic and evangelistic movie. It has some of the most erudite dialogue ever in a movie. The dialogue refers to everybody from Stephen Hawking to Descartes to a slew of other philosophers and scientists.
The bottom line is that the film presents the problems Christians face on most college campuses today. As the credits roll, we see that there are hundreds of cases fighting for the rights of Christian students and professors on campus. In other words, this is a movie with a message.
Even so, the entertainment value of God’s Not Dead transcends the message. You will not be bored, and you will be enlightened and inspired. God’s Not Dead is highly recommended.
This article originally appeared on Movieguide.org.
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