While widespread use of the Internet has been blamed for the light-speed travel of rumors and pornography, the ever-growing communications medium has also been used as a tool spreading inspiration to thousands who have seen the web video "Interview with Jesus."
Created by Scott Kinney, the popular Flash movie runs shortly under four minutes and displays nature scenes as the backdrop of a written "interview" with Jesus Christ. The words and pictures are accompanied by soft guitar music. In the interview, Christ is asked what surprised him about humanity and what advice he has for God's children.
Kinney is an e-card developer who also created the popular Independence Day Flash movie to which WorldNetDaily linked on July 4. He was inspired to create "Interview with Jesus" after seeing a similar Flash movie called "Interview with God."
The latter is comparable in length and format to Kinney's video, but the two vary slightly in their message. Kinney used Bible verses as the basis for Jesus' responses in the "interview," which presents the message of the Gospel. The video "Interview with God," created by graphic artist Reata Strickland of Alabama, centers more on life lessons as related by God.
Strickland, a Methodist whose husband is a part-time minister, said she was inspired to create her video after the "interview" was presented by a speaker at the conclusion of a University of Alabama conference. The original author of "Interview with God" is unknown. Strickland obtained a copy of the inspirational message at the conference, put it in a Flash movie and posted it on her personal website on May 29. Since then, the video has been seen more than 10 million times.
One of those viewers was Kinney, who, also a Christian, decided to change the message slightly to reflect Jesus Christ. It's impossible to have an interview with God without including Jesus Christ, Kinney said.
"My mission is simply to use the web and multimedia to tell people about the love of Jesus Christ," he remarked. "If people are interested in watching these movies and being inspired, I want them to actually be inspired by something that can have meaning in their lives, instead of just a fluffy Internet poem."
Kinney's "interview" has been seen by thousands of Internet users around the world. His website has received about 600 unique visitors every day since it was first brought online three weeks ago.
Both Flash artists have been amazed at the power of the Internet as evidenced by the swiftness with which their videos have grown in popularity. In fact, Strickland has seen so much response to her presentation that she periodically must shut down her website due to traffic overload.
"If I've had any success" with the video, said Strickland, "it was nothing that I planned, nothing that I set out to do. I just created this thing because the words touched me. I never intended for millions of people to see it. Where it goes from here, I have absolutely no idea. It kind of has a life of its own."
She does expect, however, the "Interview with God" message to be published in a hardcover gift-book form early next year. And the graphic designer has since created other inspirational Flash features as well, which she also posts on her website.
"I'm probably more amazed than anyone," Strickland said about the web movie's popularity. "I think that maybe if there's any success to what I've done or what the 'Interview with Jesus' has done, it's opened eyes that the Internet is not necessarily a great evil," she said, noting that many critics of the Internet see the medium as a danger since material such as pornography is so readily available. But Strickland believes the Internet can also be used just as effectively to spread the Gospel.
"If all we do is cast stones at (the Internet), I think we miss a great opportunity," she said, pointing to her video's appeal across denominational and even religious lines. "We have a chance to plant a seed. A lot of people are not going to go to something that screams religion. We have turned a lot of people off by being Baptist or Catholic or Evangelical or anything like that."
Strickland acknowledges that the unknown author of her video's message says nothing about Jesus or the specifics of religion, but she says the missive is still beneficial.
"It may not change people, but I know I've got several hundreds of e-mails from people who say it has encouraged their day," she concluded.