Editor's Note: This is the first of many articles on FaithVisuals.com that will ask the important "why?" questions. As we seek to provide the highest quality videos and training for people interested in "doing" church media better, we also want to engage in discussion about the reasons we use video to communicate the message of the gospel. We hope that these articles will cause you to stop and think, interact with one another in the comments section, and help you consider some of these crucial questions.

We can all agree that the 21st century is decidedly visual—in terms of entertainment, advertising, mass communication, and so on. Naturally, humans have become increasingly savvy in their reception of visual languages. Whereas typical tenth graders today might have an extremely difficult time deciphering the textual classics of Homer, Virgil, and Shakespeare, they likely have no problem at all decoding the complex, digital imagery of a film about the classics—say 300 or Troy.

But what does living in a visual culture mean for Christians? Should the fact that images are more important than text in today's world change our methods of communicating the gospel? Does the fact that we have endlessly evolving communication technologies and amazing new digi-design tools necessitate some sort of adaptation of the message? As much as the term "adaptation" bothers me (it's always screamed "corrupting" to me), I've come to the conclusion that yes, adaptation of our Christian message is necessary. We shouldn't adapt the message to fit different media/technologies, but we can adapt and manipulate the variables within new media/technologies to best express the message.

However, we must be very careful in our uses of new media forms. There is great potential for good in them, but only if they are understood and utilized with discretion; only if we recognize that the medium is just as crucial as the message.

All of us are ever-more-literate readers of visual texts—able to decipher the message being communicated, even when that message is shrouded in frenetic effects, hyper-digitized stylizations, and super-speedy editing that would prove nausea-inducing to our grandmas and all but unwatchable to our great-grandparents.

To be truly visual-literate, however, is to go beyond an ability to process images and "content" that is being visually communicated. This is easy. A true visual literacy contains an awareness that the message—as told in any given video, film, or slideshow—is necessarily different from that same message if it were told in a newspaper, book, or pamphlet. That is, the medium that communicates the message always changes or shapes the message itself. This is why you always hear people comparing (and complaining about) films based on books. Some argue that the film is better, some argue the other way. The unspoken heart of the debate is this fact: books and movies are completely different forms. It is a very difficult task to match a film to a book, or vice-versa—it'd be like writing a song for a symphony orchestra and then handing it over to Snoop Dogg and expecting the same musical idea to come across in his—however skillful—raps and rhymes.

The reality is that "messages" are abstract ideas that can only be communicated through "mediums," or forms of communication. And since each form has vastly different affinities, capabilities, and limitations, the "message" is defined by the way in which it is presented. We could look at the Incarnation in these terms. God's love was the message. Jesus—the physical person who was crucified for us as a way to communicate this love—was the medium that expressed this message. Jesus was not just the best form for this message; he was the only true form. His physicality, DNA, heritage (the line of David), and place in history and geography were all perfectly attuned to the fulfillment of prophecy and embodiment of divinity. We could point to no greater example of the vital connection between form and content.

The great Catholic cultural critic, Marshall McLuhan, introduced these concepts back in the '60s as a way of thinking about media. His famous line is one you have probably heard: "The medium is the message." Essentially McLuhan's argument was that the form of a message shapes its content. Indeed, the form is itself a kind of content.

Consider this example: Say you want to propose to your girlfriend, and you are considering two options for popping the question: 1) Ask her in person, on one knee, in a private romantic setting with little pretense and the utmost simplicity, or 2) Go to a crowded beach, point her to the sky, and watch as a plane sky-writes the text "will you marry me?" across the blue expanse. In both cases, the abstract idea ("I'm asking you to marry me") is conveyed, but the medium is decidedly different. The first example implies an almost sacred reverence for the rite of proposal; the latter is a silly, circus-like public display of unabashed affection. I'm not saying one way is right and one is wrong, just that they are different. And depending on your girlfriend's sensibilities, one message might come across better than the other!

This notion of form as content, medium as message, is too important to ignore. And yet, I fear the church has often been guilty of negligence. Whether it is the movies we produce in Hollywood or videos we create to show in church, too often we are much more concerned about the "content" than the form. Sure, we are concerned with form insofar as it is stylish, cutting-edge, and full of really sleek fonts—basically, as something that enhances the content. But, how often do we look at form as something that is part of the content, something that carries its own content?

We are convinced that the message of the gospel—strong, enduring, universal as it is—comes across the same way in a wide variety of aesthetics and formats, so as soon as a new technology arises, we are quick to adopt it for our "message" proclamation. These new technologies look good on paper, but I wonder if sometimes we are so caught up in the thrill of newness, that we fail to examine closely just what these technologies are, how they work, and what sorts of messages they are suited for.

Ken Myers wrote a lot about this in his 1989 book, All God's Children and Blue Suede Shoes: Christians & Popular Culture, in which he argued that "a generation after Marshall McLuhan, the Church still behaves as if the forms of culture, especially the forms of mass media and the role they play in our lives, are value-neutral."

Indeed, the problem is not that one technology is bad and one is good, but that we so often view them as neutral. No technology or medium is neutral. Every medium, as McLuhan wrote, creates its own unique environment that affects how a message is constructed and perceived. And this is vitally important to remember as we try to communicate important ideas in a world where new forms, technologies, and methods of communication are being introduced at a staggering speed.

These considerations are never more pertinent than in the discussions and choices that go on regarding church media. What kinds of videos and styles of visual expression can we incorporate into our worship services? What kinds should we incorporate? How can we be more mindful of the forms of these new media—and all the potentials (and downfalls) therein? As we seek to create new content, how can thinking about the form of the media inform our creative process?

Discussion of these questions is vital. Human communication is complex when it face-to-face, and even more so when mediated. We can't approach this stuff cavalierly or recklessly—making stylish videos that employ all the latest visual trends "just because we can." No, we must be very mindful of how our message is affected by the ways in which we present it, for our message—the gospel of Christ—is infinitely more complex and important than any other message we might try to mediate.

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