God's Not Dead

In God’s Not Dead, Christian college student Josh Wheaton (Shane Harper) accepts a challenge by his atheist college professor, Jeffrey Radisson (Kevin Sorbo) to debate God’s existence versus non-existence.

God’s Not Dead has a good underlying message concerning speaking up about and sticking to your beliefs, but there are parts that are rather stereotypical.  Atheism doesn’t necessarily equal hating God, not all Muslims are violent and hate Christianity, and not all Christians are fanatics who try to force their beliefs on everyone else.  The purpose of this may have been to address some of the different belief systems.  However, this could have been accomplished in a less clichéd manner.

The classroom debate is my favorite part of the movie.   Harper’s character makes good points about how believing there is a Creator makes more sense than believing everything exists because of chance, and that we have free will.  Sorbo’s character is extremely hostile towards Christianity, and it turns out this is because he lost his mother at a young age.  I understand why someone would wonder why God would allow bad things to happen, but not everyone who goes through hard times blames God.  There is also a good message that God is bigger than your circumstances.

I liked this movie in spite of the issues I mentioned, and I am interested in watching the rest of the series.