Movies
As a pastor and missionary, I meet talented people who are working hard to spread the Good News of God through preaching, books, and sometimes movies. Here are a couple of movies I played a minor part in. They tell the amazing story of a Romanian missionary. He is a dear friend of mine–Garry Matheny.
God & Spies
Based on a true story. A young man struggles with following God’s will or having his heart’s desire. US Navy Saturation Divers in Soviet territorial waters. If you like adventure, history, and old-fashioned American bravado, you will enjoy this film!
About a young man who reluctantly enters the navy and becomes a diver to please his father, but later finds himself in the most dangerous spy mission of the Cold War. Though he had trusted Christ for salvation he still wanted to decide on what to do with his life and making the dive had become an idol to him.
Operation Ivy Bells, involving two nuclear submarines and 21 US Navy saturation divers. Only eight of the divers would make the dives, and they were jockeying for a chance to be chosen. This film involves the betrayal of the operation to the Soviets, their response, the dangers involved, and impact this operation had on the Cold War.
God, Get Us to Romania
True Story of a family traveling to Romania.
In 1991, a preacher, his wife, and six children, flew from the US to Portugal, and then by trains to Romania. This resulted in one comical calamity after another. But when they crossed into Eastern Europe, it became like a tense roller coaster ride. And at the border of Romania there is an unexpected ending.