I recently spent a day on the set of Courageous, the fourth film being made Sherwood Baptist Church for my story today on this new trend.

There I met several of the actors in the films, including associate pastor, scriptwriter, producer and actor Alex Kendrick who explained why they have chosen this ministry.

The first film he wrote and starred in, Flywheel, he says, was about a (used car salesman) who didn’t have peace in his heart, a man without integrity. The flywheel is essential to a car. And in the movie he learns that God is essential to him.

It doesn’t bother Kendrick if most audiences for the Sherwood films are already believers, he says, because many who claim faith don’t live it. Kendrick also observes that Courageous, about four policeman and a struggling immigrant worker, is not as neat and pretty as Sherwood’s prior films where happy endings abound.

We aren’t saying, just say a prayer and it all works out. We’re showing people, If you don’t step up to God, trust God, you’ll have a troubled end, in this life and beyond.

This was the day they filmed a critical scene in which Kevin Downes plays a deputy dad who goes astray. The cast and crew were bowed in prayer to give Downes, whose day job is co-owner of Christian Cinema, the original distributors of Flywheel, the courage to play a bad man.

Says Downes,
The heart of a film has to be authentic and the audience is smart enough to know it. This audience wants honest and real stories.

What movies have touched your soul? Would an overtly evangelical movie draw you in — or drive you away?

Read More (including over 30 comments): http://content.usatoday.com/communities/Religion/post/2010/07/movies-church-christian-faith-fireproof-sherwood-baptist/1#uslPageReturn