Truth Unites - These A.I. Videos Raise a Theology Question

Episode Date: July 22, 2025

Gavin Ortlund discusses whether it is acceptable to depict Christ visually, looking at new A.I. videos of Christ as one recent example.Truth Unites (https://truthunites.org) exists to promote gospel assurance through theological depth. Gavin Ortlund (PhD, Fuller Theological Seminary) is President of Truth Unites, Visiting Professor of Historical Theology at Phoenix Seminary, and Theologian-in-Residence at Immanuel Nashville.SUPPORT:Tax Deductible Support: https://truthunites.org/donate/Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/truthunitesFOLLOW:Website: https://truthunites.org/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/truth.unites/X: https://x.com/gavinortlundFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/TruthUnitesPage/

Perhaps you've seen this trend on social media right now, where AI is generating videos of scenes from the Bible, as if they were modern vlogs. So you can see David and Goliath. David's talking about how he's about to attack Goliath. Daniel's in the lion's den, as if he's talking into an iPhone and so forth. Here's one from Moses. All right, guys, me and Aaron just got inside the palace. We're about to ask Pharaoh to let our people go. No idea how this is going to go, but wish us luck.

Okay, we just left the meeting. We asked, he laughed, said no one's going anywhere. Anyway, the fight goes on. Pharaoh, if you're watching this, this is your last chance. Let the people go, or it's going to rain, hail, frogs, whatever. Hashtag, let my people go. And this trend includes AI-generated videos of Jesus. By the way, there's going to be some images of Christ in this video.

So if that offends you, I want to give warning up front. You can stop watching now. Here's an example from the multiplying of loaves that you can see on screen. And there's lots of others like this, Jesus talking to the disciples, various things. and there's probably going to be more of these as well. So we want to think discerningly about this. Some of these are clever. They make you laugh. And I want to be clear, I'm not against creativity. I think we should be imaginative in how we communicate the Bible. Humor can be of great value. Art and beauty are wonderful to use. But we also want to be discerning to say, what is the boundary

between humor and irreverence? How should Christians feel about the use of AI for this kind of purpose? what is the theology that may be conveyed in each particular video? Sometimes theology can be kind of smuggled in and conveyed in a subtle way. And the question I want to address here that comes up with these images of Christ is, are pictures of Christ ever acceptable? Let's talk about that for a second. I've been asked about this a lot. In this video, I want to make basically two arguments. First, that it's not inherently wrong to make artistic representation of Christ. But second, there are many dangers in how we do so. It's easy to do badly, and I want to highlight three particular dangers here. Number one, making Jesus too nice. Number two, making Jesus too white, and number three, neglecting

or backgrounding the cross. But let me start by arguing, and this may surprise some people, that not all artistic representation of Christ is necessarily wrong. Now, some Christians feel that it is, and that's a common view in my own reformed tradition, for example, though it's not universal. but you can see on screen from the Westminster Larger Catechism, for example, which says that the sins forbidden by the Second Commandment include any representation of God, any of the three persons, and it even specifies that as either inwardly in our mind or outwardly with any kind of picture or likeness. Now, I respect the concern here, and I want to try to honor the consciences of Christians who adhere to that view. But let me explain why I wouldn't hold to that view myself. And of course, here we're going way beyond AI. You know, whether or not Jesus can be portrayed in art or drama would also concern TV shows like The Chosen, which has been so enormously popular.

Many of us have found particular scenes from that show to be didactically useful. This would also include the Jesus film, of course, or other films like Mel Gibson's movie. Remember the Passion of the Christ? About 20 years old now. This would also include plays or theater or drama about Christ, even in the world. including pictures of the baby Jesus, like Christmas plays or something like that. This would also concern paintings of Christ, say a historic picture of Jesus teaching the crowds, maybe from the Sermon on the Mount or something like that.

This would also include having a picture of Christ being baptized by John the Baptist sketched on a tomb or having Christ's overturning the temple on an embroidered fabric or something like this. We have lots of images like this throughout church history. here's an image from a sarcophagus from the third century of the magi visiting Christ from the catacombs of Rome, ancient burial places, in or near Rome. A sarcophagus is a type of coffin, basically. Obviously, it's been updated visually here. But even a picture of the baby Christ would be of concern here if all images of Christ are ruled out. Here's another painting, also from the third century of Christ healing the paralytic. So let me explain why I don't take the same.

stricter view common among many reformed Christians that it's always wrong to portray the incarnate Christ. The reason my thinking here has to do with both scripture and then the incarnation. First, I would say that the prohibition of the Second Commandment is not a blanket rejection of all images of a religious nature. It's about what you do with those images. And we know this because religious art is commanded by God. Okay. So with the temple or the tabernacle before that, You have the Ark of the Covenant with the Golden Cherubim, as well as the golden lampstands that God commanded to be constructed in the tabernacle and other physical objects that are serving a religious purpose. Or you think of God commanding certain images on the clothing of the priests, like the pome and granites, for example. Or you think of the curtains and doors of the Holy of Holies, where they're covered with images.

carvings of cherubim, for example, as well as trees and flowers that are then overlaid with gold. Similarly, in the books of Revelation and Daniel and Zechariah and elsewhere, Ezekiel, for example, God shows pictures to the prophet of heavenly realities and then instructs them to write it down in scripture. It would include images of Christ like Revelation 5 and 6. It would also include theophanes, which means appearances of God, like in Ezekiel 1. So if we're not supposed to have these images in our mind, it would seem strange that God would give us such a detailed description of them in His Word. I would agree that we should not ourselves construct images of the divine nature,

but that doesn't mean it's wrong for our minds to be able to picture, say, the pillar of fire that accompanied the Israelites in the wilderness at night, or for that to be pictured in a children's Bible, for example. And when it comes to Jesus, what we have to understand is that we're not attempting to depict the divine nature, which is infinite and incomprehensible. Rather, we're trying to predict Christ, can't talk today. We're trying to portray Christ as a human being in his incarnate state. By assuming a human nature, the Son of God has made himself able to be known in a visual way. That's part of the incarnation.

I mean, if you lived in the year 25 AD, and you walk by Jesus on a. regular basis on the street, you'd be able to have an image in your mind of what his face looked like. He assumed a particular human body, and that means he can be seen. Now, some people are surprised that I think it's okay to have portraits of Christ, potentially, depending on how they're done, because I've been critical of venerating icons and the theology of that at Nicaea, too. But as I've said from the very beginning, my first video, January, 2003, about this. I've always been clear. The theology of that council is very specific about venerating and praying through icons. It is not about the general religious use of art. So from my very first video, I've always, even though this gets misrepresented a lot, I've always said

didactic, decorative, and commemorative uses of art are totally acceptable. That's not the issue. And I've always said that a more balanced account is offered by the Council of Frankfurt, which was convoked by Charlemagne, whom you can see on screen here. This was a Western Council in 794, which rejected both the destruction of images as well as the requirement of their veneration. You can see my initial video. I actually worked so hard on that initial video. Most of many of the objections I'm already anticipating there, and I address, just watch what I say about in that initial video there about that. So I think it's okay potentially to have some images of Christ. I think that's a product of the incarnation, and I don't see anything in

scripture that prohibits that, to be honest. But it is really easy to be, to do this badly. And so the need here is for discernment. I think this article at the Gospel Coalition that I'll link to puts it well, it says, instead of imposing an absolute prohibition against all depictions of Jesus, or accepting all depictions without question, churches must teach members how to practice discernment. That is the need here is discernment. And so with AI generated images, for example, we need to be alert to the real danger of reshaping Jesus to fit our culture, especially in a flippant or satirical way. One of the concerns here is just does this feel reverent? And let me unfold this a little bit further.

I'm going to give three specific concerns, and if someone is involved in production of art that is portraying Jesus, I hope this could be worth considering. The first is making Jesus too nice or sentimentalizing Jesus. Sometimes portraits of Jesus make him very laid back. You just feel comfortable around him. You know, he's got a twinkle in his eye. He approaches life with good humor. You feel like you could hang out with this person.

With these AI videos especially, you've got Jesus who is having perfect teeth, using modern slang. This doesn't help either. But even in other depictions that are intended to be serious and can have didactic value, teaching value, there's a danger here of simply distorting the personality of Christ as it's portrayed in the Gospels. And this is a real issue because this is shaping our imagination. This is a subtle form of theology. And we need to be careful here about losing the fierceness and majesty of Christ. I think a good example, something that doesn't fall into this danger would be the Narnia stories and the recurrent line that Aslan is not a tame lion, so he is good, but he's not safe.

That's a theme throughout the first book. That's one of the motifs of the lion, the witch, and the wardrobe. but do you remember the first time the children see Aslan? And the text says, people who have not been in Narnia sometimes think that a thing cannot be good and terrible at the same time if the children had ever thought so, they were cured of it now. And they find they can't really look at his face and it says they feel all trembly.

Now, when he speaks to them, it says it takes the trembles out of them and they feel glad and still afraid as well. I often, when I'm preaching about the fear of the Lord, I often try to use metaphors like from the wind of the willows and other literature to show there can be a kind of glad fear. It's not like you're a fear in the way you feel afraid of a horror movie or something like that. We want to help people understand the fear of the Lord is different from sheer terror or something like that. There's this kind of gladness to it,

but we want to convey the majesty of Christ. I think C.S. Lewis does a good job in the Narnia books. We want to, now that's not the only way you could distort the character of Christ. You can lose his gentleness and compassion as well. But I think probably the greater temptation in our culture is just chopping down the sheer lordliness of Christ. Do we have a Jesus who can speak the woes of Matthew 23? We need to be so careful that we're not making Jesus in our own image. And it's so difficult to do this well. It doesn't mean it's impossible and it doesn't mean that God cannot use imperfect efforts,

but the need here is for discernment. And the value behind that is that Christ is the most thrilling and wonderful and full and human personality in all history. And we should tremble before this responsibility we have if we want to be faithful to what the gospel. So I think that the need here is for ruthless fidelity to Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Ruthless faithfulness to what the Gospels portray and resisting the urge to sort of translate the message too much and make a Jesus in our own image. A second danger is making Jesus too white. Jesus did not look like a guy for Scandinavia and tragically, throughout church history, we have a lot of paintings like this

and other artistic representations of Christ that go in this direction. For example, the all-time most reproduced image of Jesus is from 1940. And you can see Jesus here with light hair, light skin. You've probably seen this image. This is a serious problem because it's another form, just like theological liberalism. It's another form of making Jesus in our own image or the image of the person who's making it. And while we don't know what Jesus looked like with detail, we can safely conclude Jesus wouldn't have looked like that. He would have had darker skin, coarser hair, one effort to recreate what an average Middle Eastern Jew from the first century would have looked like is this. And that's as good a guess as any, though we can't be certain. And we understand

that an image is not intended to look exactly like an identical twin like the person it's representing. We understand that. But we can't know for sure, but that's as good a guess as any because the book of Isaiah says, the suffering servant will not have anything about his form or beauty that makes us love him. What makes, so Jesus was an ordinary looking guy. He probably didn't have perfect teeth. What makes Jesus so infinitely precious is not outward appearance, but the fact that he's the most loving and righteous and wonderful person whoever existed. He's the kind of person who literally says to you, I want to take your sins and make them my problem, and I want to give you my righteousness forever. That's what the gospel, that's what he does for us in the gospel if we trust in him.

And it's the most amazing love, the most amazing gift ever, because the righteousness of Christ is the best thing you can possibly have, because it means on the most vulnerable and consequential moment of your life, when you're standing before God on judgment day, you will be totally safe and covered if your trust is in Christ. Jesus loves us like we cannot even fathom. we need to come back to this over and over again. The world will use you and manipulate you and lie to you and toss you to the curb. Jesus is a faithful friend who will love you forever.

That's why we love Jesus so much. It's not his physical appearance. It's who he is. That leads to the third danger, and that's neglecting or backgrounding the cross. Whenever we start to make Jesus in our own image and distort the gospel presentation, almost invariably we move away from the cross, because the cross is so offensive and so painful. of course the cross is the whole point of Jesus is coming.

His primary mission in this world was to die. For example, in John's Gospel, right after the triumphal entry, Jesus is troubled, and he's basically saying, okay, should I pray for salvation from this? No, this was the whole purpose for which I have come into the world. Jesus came into this world to give up his life as a ransom for us. That means through his death and resurrection, we can be reconciled to God. we can have our sins forgiven and receive eternal life when we place our faith in Christ and surrender our life to him. That is the message we must keep central. And any depiction of Jesus should

ultimately point us toward that, even if it's just doing so in a very partial way. That is what we see in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. The climactic moment of each of the Gospels is the death and resurrection narrative. That's where it all terminates. Let's be faithful to that message. So let's conclude here on a positive note. We can be dismayed sometimes where images of Christ fall short, and sometimes it might just feel off, and we can't put into words what feels wrong about it, and so we want to be discerning. The call here is for discernment, but there's a positive side, and that is people are fascinated by Jesus right now. There's a sort of openness right now to considering questions, and that's of a spiritual nature, and that's encouraging. And so the call here in this video is first for

discernment, but then for boldness. May I just say, now is the time to speak up and encourage our friends to read the Gospels. Now is the time. Today is the day. 2025 is the moment, or if you're watching this later, I'm sure it'll still be the same in 2006. To say to people, the real Jesus is so compelling, so challenging, so beautiful, beyond anything you can possibly imagine. So this AI video, you know, okay, you're watching that. We want to say to our friends, can I tell you the fuller picture? That's the need is discernment, but then boldness to speak the gospel message and tell people, Jesus loves you so much that he took your sins on his shoulders and bore them moment by moment hanging on that cross, and he wants to spend eternity with you

in total joy. That is a message that needs to be trumpeted right now, because in all the chaos of the world, we're in such a chaotic time. It's also a time of openness. Today is the day for evangelism. So the call of this video is let's be discerning about this. Let's measure this by Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. Let's recognize there's real dangers. This often goes awry. But then let's pivot to boldness and talk about the real Jesus and use this interest as an opportunity for sharing people, sharing with people the good news of the gospel. All right, let me know what you think in the comments. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this topic. I know it's controversial. But this is my best effort to put forth

what I hope is helpful. I'll read the comments with great interest. Thanks for watching everybody.