A popular pastor recently said, “If Jesus were alive today, he would be a filmmaker.”

That is a stark contrast to the attitude of my grandparents’ day, that good Christians don’t go to the movies.

I’m a writer. When people ask me what my big dream is, I say that I want to write movies. For a long time, I grappled with the fact that my big dream in life wasn’t about feeding orphans, or standing on arena stages proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Even though those things are fulfilling to me, my soul is truly aflame when I am telling stories.

Novel stimuli, or ‘fun’ as we call it, is ranked as a human need. We were created with a desire to be entertained. It’s a hallmark of who we are as the living, breathing image of God. Many people think entertainment to be frivolous or unnecessary in the light of all the important work to be done. But as C.S. Lewis says, “Joy (a frequent bi-product of entertainment) is the serious business of heaven.”

I want to tell stories, because stories don’t just entertain, they shape culture, inspire action, and they heal hearts. Many of us can reference, a book, a movie or a song that actually changed our lives and the way we saw the world. The Payton Skyy Series by Stephanie Perry Moore was one of those stories in my life. As an impressionable, naïve teenager trying to navigate the world of faith and romance, following her characters’ journeys made me ponder my own life and empowered me to chart out a course with God. All of this, while I was still in high school and for that I’m grateful.

Christians often shy away from the entertainment industry, thinking it an abyss of all things appalling and amoral, but I think that’s the reason we desperately need to be there. I want to tell stories, because that’s what Jesus did. The majority of Jesus’ teaching took place in parables. He often used profound and entertaining analogies to illuminate the secrets and principles of the Kingdom in a way that people could otherwise never accept or even comprehend. The weightiest concepts Jesus ever discussed often begin with the phrase, “Then He spoke a parable to them…”. or “The Kingdom of Heaven is like…”

Finally, I want to tell stories, because that’s what Jesus has invited us to do, to share the story of how His love changed our lives and the way we see the world. With that in mind, take a good look at the stories that stir your heart. Do they point to a deeper truth? A longing unfulfilled, or do you find the threads of the greatest story ever told weaving through them? Challenge yourself to choose songs and stories that speak to the story of God, however they may. And if you can’t find any, perhaps it’s time you wrote your own.