Verse: 1 Samuel 16:75 The Lord does not look at the things that man looks at. Man looks at the outward appearance but the Lord looks at the heart.

            If there’s one question I’ve heard Christian Actors ask all the time it’s “Am I sinning if my character does something bad onstage?” And we’ve all been in that situation. We get cast playing the villain in a show or something our character does onstage is something we wouldn’t be caught dead doing onstage. You begin to wonder if doing these things onstage, and getting into the character of one who would do them is leading you to sin yourself. Because of this issue a lot of actors and Drama Ministries shy away from perfectly good scripts and stories with potential to do the Lord’s work.

            But instead of shying away from this issue like some people I’m going to point out a key point in the issue that people often look over in discussion. The core issue of sin is that it is a blatant disobedience of God’s law. You are shopping at the store and an old lady in front of her leaves her cart. You see that she has left her purse inside it and it is wide open stuffed with dollar bills. You know it’s her property and that you shouldn’t but you choose to take some of the money and run out of the store. Now that is a blatant disobedience of God’s law telling us to respect other people’s property.

But let’s say that we take this scene to the stage. Now you’re not yourself. You’re pretending to be a person who is shopping at the store. One of your fellow actors is in front of you pretending to be the old lady with the purse. Both of you read the script and saw the part where your character steals the money and you’ve rehearsed this part for a couple weeks now. And to top it all off the money isn’t even real, it’s the property of the troupe’s along with the purse and at the end of the show it comes out of your pocket and stays in prop storage. So the question is: if this theft was prearranged beforehand and you have had permission to do it did you really steal the money or were you just pretending to?

            In the theatre world our characters might be asked to do several things including break several commandments, be mean, and hurt other character’s feelings. But all of it is done for pretend. To assume that God will see you committing any of these acts onstage, you pretending to do these things, and hold it against you implies that you think God is stupid. God is omniscient, meaning that he knows everything that’s going on and not only that, he can see into your heart. Just like when he counseled Samuel on who to choose as the next king of Israel he can read your mind, look into your inner most self and see what’s going on inside you. That means he knows the difference between what you’re doing and what you’re pretending to do.

            So what is acceptable to do onstage and what isn’t? Well it’s not as easy as offering a list of hard and fast rules. I can only offer two guidelines that I offer every Christian actor that comes to me with these problems.

·         Look to the message of the piece: Just as you are to avoid causing you brother to stumble and fall you are responsible for the message your play puts it across. If you advocate a stance or posture that goes against God’s teachings then you are responsible for their sin.

·         If what you’re doing onstage negatively affects your life offstage don’t do it:  Obviously even though you are pretending to be someone else onstage when you smoke that cigarette on stage the smoke is still going into your lungs. In that case what you did onstage negatively affects your life offstage. In the church world this can take other forms, like maybe you are cast to play a married couple opposite one of your best friends. You look into the audience offstage and see your best friend’s boyfriend or husband giving you the stink eye. In that case what you’re doing onstage can affect your relationship with your friend offstage.

While again these are not exhaustive hard and fast rules they can stand as guidelines to direct your thinking to the real issues. If you’re ever in doubt feel free to talk it over with your director or the rest of the cast. Drama Ministries should be a place where you can talk and discuss the issue in the play and how they affect your walk with God. You never know if one of your cast mates is having the exact same problem.