In this section of our website, we engage with artists of all types, especially storytellers. You can also enjoy these videos on our YouTube channel’s Arts and Theology playlist!

This is our 11 part video series exploring Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings, with references to The Hobbit, The Silmarillion, and other books in the Legendarium. The story is a beautiful exploration of the character of God, the purposes of God described as a musical symphony where God wants apprentice musicians to learn and play their parts well, evil as dissonant music and redemption as musical reintegration, human being and human becoming, the addictive power of evil, the hero’s journey and the defeat of evil as atonement and salvation, the possibility of created beings to become divine light-bearers, ethics and epistemology, lessons on power and politics, and how pagan virtue points to Christian faith, hope, and love.

Tolkien wrote to create a story that contained the languages he studied and invented or reconstructed, to create a pre-Christian myth for England, and to suggest an explanation for why the historic Angles converted to Christian faith so quickly. So his story foreshadows Jesus. Click here or on the graphic to the right.

This is our 5 part video series exploring Marvel’s Black Panther. Dr. Vince Bantu, Assistant Professor of Church History at Fuller Seminary and Founder-Director of the Meachum School of Haymanot, joins Mako Nagasawa to appreciate the movies. We talk about church history, Christian ethics and theology, and the lessons we need to learn today.

The Civil Rights Movement in the U.S., led by the Black Church, and some of the anti-imperial resistance movements in Africa, are part of a larger tapestry of Christian non-violent resistance movements. Wakanda was a "chosen people" like Israel in the Hebrew Bible, especially when we look at a human community in a garden land, who have received a divine from above, resulting in the power of women and more. Eric Killmonger's refusal to suffer again, especially for others, made him the tragic hero. This prompts us to face the biblical portrayal of human beings, too, and how Scripture portrays us as tragic heroes. Whereas T’Challa’s willingness to be vulnerable and descend again and again made him the hero. Wakanda Forever shows us the importance of grieving and ritual, especially for leaders. Click here or on the graphic to the right.

Stay tuned!

Stay tuned! A preliminary:

David Bates, Half Pint with Mako Nagasawa: Atonement and the Stone Table. Pints with Jack, May 13, 2023. A 35 minute video where Mako was a guest with David Bates. David and Mako focused especially on the death of Aslan the Lion in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. But we also engaged with The Magician’s Nephew and The Great Divorce. Mako suggested that Aslan’s death represented a medical substitutionary atonement. It was a short summary of his longer paper, C.S. Lewis’ Theology of Atonement.