One of my favorite movies growing up was Disney’s Aladdin. I enjoyed it because of the music and the outrageously exaggerated antics of Genie, a character voiced by the late comedian Robin Williams. Though I didn’t realize it as a little boy, I think I enjoyed it most of all because it was one of the few cartoons we owned that featured a male character as the protagonist in the story. I could identify with Aladdin much more easily than I could with Snow White or Cinderella.
Though they had done it before, sometime around 2014 Disney began releasing live-action remakes of their most popular animated films. If I had to guess, the rationale behind this move went something like this: The current movie-going crowd grew up on these animated stories; now that they have “come of age,” ticket sales will skyrocket as they try to relive their childhood by watching the remakes in the theater.
Imagine my excitement, then, when I learned a live-action version of Aladdin was in the works. I had seen a few of the others, but they weren’t that special to me. This one, I thought, had some promise. Unfortunately, I was wrong. People have different tastes when it comes to food, fashion, and movies. I’m sure plenty of people really enjoyed the Aladdin remake. I didn’t. The reason was simple. Someone changed the story. The emphasis of the new film was not on Aladdin, but on Jasmine. A female character. As far as I was concerned, this was a fundamental shift in the very fabric of the story. The new movie changed one of the most compelling aspects of the original movie. This was a change I simply could not appreciate.
Forgive me for spending so much time on fictional characters. I have a very important point to make – one that has nothing to do with fiction and everything to do with truth. God’s Word does not change. No matter how people may change, culture may change, and what is socially acceptable may change, God’s Word will remain the same.
Many people in the world today would like to “update” the Bible. They do not like what it says about sin, the order of creation, and the nature of God’s one church. Any such efforts to change the Bible would ultimately destroy its most valuable asset. The Bible is God’s changeless truth, built upon His changeless character. When it comes to the Bible, anything less than the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth simply won’t do. Will we seek to change it, or will we obey it? The answer has eternal implications.
Clay Leonard
