Faith and Running: 'Good Morning, Client Services!'

I'm not sure if anyone's ever witnessed someone aggressively empty a packet of Starburst into a jar.

This morning, for a variety of reasons (including being woken up at 2am by some very noisy people on the street, and a man on the tube who listened to his music at a needless volume then hatched an evil scheme to make it look like it was me), I was in a pretty rubbish mood.

The nice thing about being at work at 7.30am is that no-one else is at work because it's 7.30am. That allowed me to vent my frustration on a variety on inanimate objects with no-one any the wiser (except when I publicly wrote this blog post about it). I very rarely feel 'physical' anger but this morning for some reason I felt the need to slam every cupboard door I used (which is a lot), and I didn't so much as retrieve the butter from the fridge as shove it in the general direction of the toast making set up. As for those packets of Starburst, I hope they don't form a union.

But, of course, the second my work-colleagues and the clients were anywhere near the building, I defaulted to calm, smiley Naomi. I still slammed a couple of cupboard doors, but only because that's how you make them stay shut. In most jobs, if you're having a rubbish day, people will allow for you to be a bit grumpy and withdrawn, but in client services that just isn't an option. You're there for other people. However little you feel like it you have to start up and engage in conversations, smile as you hand people their coffee and take their lunch orders. Thankfully as our company has many lovely, friendly staff, and we have a really nice set of clients in, it wasn't long at all before enforced niceness turned into a genuine aim to please.

For Jesus, looking out for other people wasn't done in shifts. There's a passage in Mark 6 where Jesus and His disciples were exhausted - they had even made a point of finding a quiet, remote place to rest, but as soon as the people came Jesus began to teach them. No matter how tired He was, His heart was for the people who were crying out for His help. Yes, there were other times when Jesus requested to be alone, but when He was needed, He served.

This is an industry where a lot of people work very hard and invariably there will be some days when we're tired, one thing after another goes wrong and we just can't be bothered. Obviously it's important to rest when the time is right, but sometimes we need a default mode, a kick-starter to launch us into God's service when all we want to do is kick a cupboard door. Just like an editor's reliance on coffee doesn't disappear just because I've had a bad start to the day, God's work doesn't take a day off just because life hasn't gone our way.

We all have bad days, but at those times we're no less a servant of God than I am a servant of editors after a bad journey in. Except being a Christian doesn't happen in shifts. Just like as being a client services assistant means I can't simply go around grumpily placing coffee on people's desks, as Christians we should be thinking of God and other people before what we want, even if it seems like you're the only one doing so. Of course we should be honest when we're having a rough time of it, but that doesn't excuse us from being a person of God full stop.

It can be a tough concept to live by, but thankfully, we don't have to do it alone, or even by our own strength. Plus you can always take it out on the Starburst.

Faith and Running: Nerves

Bear with me. This post is going to bring some quite painful sharing. It'll be worth it, my pain will most likely be to your amusement.

I am not always the most confident of people. I think I've well established this fact. When it comes to talking to people, the more I feel a need to get it right, the more certain it is I will freeze up and become a nervous mess. Give me a bit of time and patience and I'll probably be the polar opposite - embarrassing myself from being a bit too comfortable and doing weird things like hiding under edit suites or curling up on the floor or writing poems about codecs. (Not that I've done any of those things ever...ahem)

Back to my rubbish over-thinking-every-moment self. Imagine my shaking (sadly literally, more on that later), trembling self when someone I'm a huge fan of was a client at work for a while. I'm talking a huge star who's worked on many shows that I'm a little bit in love with. Imagine, then read the painful reality.

So let me put off telling you for a moment, in order to pre-emptively and fairly pointlessly try and redeem myself. There maybe could have been ways I could have avoided putting myself across so catastrophically. I have, believe it or not, been known to be able to communicate clearly and happily with people I want to in the past. A spare moment to have even a brief conversation that wasn't about lunch or drink orders, or if I hadn't known this person would be there in advance, for example, would have kept Overly-Anxious-Naomi at bay. However, since there was a door sign with their name on for days before their arrival (which I may have even put up), and every time I went in the room everyone was engrossed in their work, I over-thought things before I even got to the door, and then when I did get the other side of it I found it very difficult to judge the room and just sort of floundered.

The wording of which has pushed me straight into embarrassing 'Naomi looks like an idiot in front of famous people' moment number 1.

She walks through the door, and, despite the million panicky, frantic yet completely useless thoughts running through her head, she manages to hand out the drinks with a relative calmness. (Comparative to a duck appearing calm whilst paddling madly under the surface, albeit the duck's still shaking a little). She spots some used mugs on the desk, so she dutifully collects them up. One is empty and one about a quarter full. 
'That's a relief' she thinks. 'Carrying full mugs in these circumstances could only lead to bad things.'
The suite's habitants get back to work. Excellent. She's almost appeared normal. Time to get out fast.
Unfortunately, as a clumsy person, this is one the worst decisions she had ever made. She may have pondered this upon her exit had she not walked fairly violently into the door frame at that particular moment. Violently enough to cause the quarter-full mug to become slightly less than a quarter full. Quite spectacularly. 

When it comes to other things, like a piece of editing or an exam, I can use that nervous energy and really make the best of it, but when it comes to this sort of situation I sort of fall apart a bit, and walk into door frames, apparently.

I should clarify for anyone who knows/works out who it is I met, the person in question was extremely lovely and remarkably patient with me. They clearly made the effort to learn my name because they used it once and I certainly hadn't the wits about me to introduce myself.

And here's the thing that really annoys me about the way I was. As much as I admire their work, they are still just a person, a human being who more than likely just wants to be treated as such.
There is a small comfort to be found in that I have floundered in front of many people, not just ones involved in telly, but it really is the tiniest of comforts. Yes, ok, I'm putting off 'Naomi looks like an idiot in front of famous people' moment number 2.

She walks into the edit suite, coffee on tray and tray on hand. Challenge 1. Don't walk into door frame. Challenge complete. Challenge 2. Hand out drinks. For a person who over-thinks every second of their life, this is somewhat trickier. Option 1: Hand drink over to the client, this is slightly awkward as only one person can get the handle, leaving the other with the scalding hot mug. Option 2: Put drink on table, a safer option but somehow always feels a bit abrupt and impolite. 

Sadly, she went for both options. Not quite at the same time, but nonetheless very quickly, one after the other, in the process accidentally taunting the client as to whether they'd get their coffee or not. Fantastic.

In my defence, I'd like to point out that I'm normally much better at my job. Honest.

Believe it or not, there are many points about my faith I could pull from this, but, with hindsight, I think this is the most significant one - sometimes it's better that we don't know what's coming. I am convinced that had I simply walked unknowingly into the room with my usual smile and 'good morning!', the tone would have been set and my shell well and truly smashed before it could make so much as an appearance. Granted, I may have been somewhat shocked but I would have just had to deal with it.
After all, I had, in some ways been unknowingly preparing for this. I spend all day serving people who's work in the industry I greatly admire, and at first it was daunting and scary but it was what I had to do day-in, day-out so I got used to it and learned that the best way to handle myself was to simply realise that these people are real, hard working human beings and try to give them the best service possible.

In my desperation to make it in the world of editing I always really want to know what's coming next and if that big chance is ever going to happen, but that's for God to know and me to find out. That's not to say He doesn't always tell people where they're going to end up (or that I'm going to stop really wanting to know) but He knows when it's good for us to know and when it's best for us to just walk through that door and find out, perhaps be a little shell-shocked, let Him dust us off and carry on, using what we've already learned, the tone already set.

I'm already seeing great signs of hope in the television industry and that God has great plans for it. I look back at the past few months and can see that God is definitely preparing me for something or other. I really hope I'm the two are linked, but for now I'm going to do my very best to keep working away at my career, learning what I can about the job I want to do, without knowing for sure where it's going to lead me. It's the only way to avoid embarrassing coffee moments, metaphorical or otherwise.

I'm just going to hide under my duvet and pretend the world doesn't exist for a while now.

Watching the Message

The other day a nostalgia trip ending in me considering the inherent dangers faced when trying to make attractive programming about God. How's that for an opening sentence?

For those who haven't heard of it, a big hit in the world of Christian media is a show called 'VeggieTales'. It sounds bizarre and silly, and many ways it definitely is. You haven't really seen it all until you've watched David and Goliath play out as a tiny asparagus fighting a giant pickle. The Israelites order pizza at one point, the sheep that 'Dave' tends to frequently fall over, and the Philistines are all peas that cry ' 'Allo Israelites (they have vaguely French sounding accents). You are pigs and soon we will put apples in your mouths and stick you in our toaster ovens!'. I think that to this day it's still one of the best pieces of openly Christian video to be found.

The show has its own sense of humour, a very original premise (sorry Miranda, this was around way before vegti-pals) and always stays true to its purpose, which is to teach children about Christian morals.  It's perfectly pitched for it's target audience but is well-written enough that adults don't feel like watching it with their kids it some sort of endurance test. Actually, I'll admit that many of us still quite enjoy watching it. As it's primarily aimed at children, it does spell out its message somewhat, but it's always careful that the message is uplifting and encourages a positive contribution to the world. Plus, somehow it's slightly less irritating being told 'what we've learned today' when the message is constantly being interrupted by the 'what we have learned' song.

With such fond memories, that left me interested to see how this thespian ratatouille was doing, all these years on. A quick search on Youtube brought up lots of pirated nostalgia, but also an official channel, and the first video I stumbled across from it was the theme song for a production that came out in 2012 called 'The League of Incredible Vegetables'. Once you get past the idea of a crime fighting salad selection, it's actually not a bad song for its target audience. It's (infuriatingly) catchy, creates a tone for the film, has some fun word play ('flex our veggie-mite'...heh), and is performed by an established band. (One of my favourite worship songs is by them, and no, it contains no mention of vegetables). However, there is one element of it that just made my heart break a little. There is only one female character, and her sole selling point is that she's 'looking stylish, yeah she's wearing it well.' Has sexism in the church really only moved onto being on the same level as sexism in much of the secular media industry? Of course it hasn't, but in a world where there is very little Christian media with both budget and talent behind it, it would be very easy to get that impression. The church already attracts a lot of negative attention for its supposed views on women, and this really doesn't help our case.

Children often like to pick a favourite character that is the same gender as them, and as a child I would have not been impressed with my choice. I was never really interested in the way I looked, my parents taught me that there's so much more to the world than that. For children that young it could go one of either two ways. It can isolate them, leaving them to shun what would otherwise be a beneficial film for them to enjoy, or it could convince a young girl that in order to matter in this world the most important thing for her to do is to look good. I know it's only one song from one film but we already have plenty of very popular media that plays out that little lie, the last thing we need is Christians joining in.

I can see the difficulties that Big Idea (the original company behind the show) face. When the show started, almost every edition featured the telling of a Bible story, and there are a lot of men in the Bible, especially the parts often taught to children. However, how hard would it really have been to have at least one female character who's capable of actually doing something interesting.

I don't believe that the makers set out to deliver a sexist message at all - it's not like Bob the tomato is going to pop up at the end, look disgruntled as the 'what we have learned' song plays through, then turn to the kids and say 'and don't forget girls, the only way you can get to where the guys are is by standing round and looking pretty', but that's the impression the song gives. We can make things cool and modern, but we have to watch the message we're portraying. When we start to retell or create our own versions of God's word, we're already putting our own spin on the truth - that's inevitable, many people see their Christian faith differently, hence so many denominations, but we must be careful that our truth doesn't cover up God's truth. It can be incredibly easy to accidentally send out the wrong message when story-telling. Every decision you make (consciously or unconsciously) sends out a message. Who the characters are, how much of their story you tell, who's point of view you focus on, what happens in the narrative, all tell the audience something, and it's much easier to accidentally fire out a message than it is to really touch people with an intentional moral. It's not about brainwashing people into believing one thing or another, it's about saying as Christians that we are going to take responsibility for the media we create.

It's a hurdle to face rather than an excuse to not do it, but I think we need to be extremely careful when we put media out in the name of God. I've said before that good storytelling is powerful, but good storytelling doesn't always send out a good message. If our stories touch upon subjects that transfer into the real world, then we need to think about the effect it will have and address it appropriately. Think about it this way - some of the best stories don't have to tell you what to think all the time, the story speaks for itself. That inevitably means that sometimes people are going to draw things from a narrative, line of dialogue or character that we don't intend. That can often be a really positive thing, but we need to watch what we're unintentionally saying. It may even be that we've drawn up a mirror to a way of thinking that isn't healthy and need to take a look at our own attitudes back in the real world.

As a church I think we should embrace the fun, smart, original telling of God's word, in fact I'm crying out for more of it, but let's do it properly. thoughtfully, prayerfully and yes, let's appeal to certain audiences that are on our heart, but not at the expense of the portrayal of others.

Faith and Running: Getting Rusty

This is a bit of a cheat as technically this post is about what I've been up to outside of my shifts as a runner, but as what I'm going to talk about has come off the back of my running job I feel like I can sneak it into this series (as I'm presumptuously calling it).                
                                    
In my previous post I talked about how asking to sit in with people is not something that comes easily to me. Well, I've finally plucked up the courage (common sense) to make a start on facing that particular character-flaw, and have started sitting in with some people at work.

One one hand there's a wonderful air of familiarity in some of the stuff I'm seeing. Obviously there's still plenty to learn, and probably always will be, but it was very reassuring to know I'm not in a totally alien world. On the other hand, I'm also realising that the good half a year between now and finishing at uni has taken it's toll. There's a lot of stuff hidden away in my mind somewhere that I need to lure back to the surface. For example, when I was sitting in today I was asked how to do something very simple that I did countless times at uni without even thinking, but today gave completely the wrong answer...which was somewhat embarrassing!

I'm sure many of you have cottoned on to where this is leading by now. Yes, I'm also getting rusty when it comes to God. I wouldn't say I've lost my faith. I still love God and try to do right by what I believe, but the daily discipleship isn't happening, so I lose my way on a regular basis.  As with post production - much of it is there, somewhere. I've grown up in a Christian family and have had the benefit of years of Christian teachings, but it means nothing if I don't act on it. God remains amazing and unchanging, just as Final Cut Pro remains... unchanging, but it does require effort on my part. I don't learn without interaction, and passiveness leads to forgetfulness. The analogy doesn't quite work (just like FCP really) - you don't need to be 'trained' to know God, and with God there's no such thing as a 'general error', but the point remains that following Jesus isn't a one-way street.

God can and will do amazing things in people, and on one level it's out of our control, taking absolutely nothing from us, I've seen and believe that, but although the effort on our part won't affect God's ability to work miracles, without it we won't allow ourselves to grow.

This is why it really is about time I found a church, it's something I've neglected to do for too long - every weekend I manage to find myself an excuse not to start hunting, which basically amounts to bad decision after bad decision. At work it was being around people who do the job day in, day out that made me realise just how much I need to spend some more quality time with certain pieces of software, and in the same way I'm sure being around people who are also trying to build their relationship with God day by day will help to give my faith some direction, and make it sink in how vital it is I start putting in some more hours with God.

Think that I've squeezed every morsel possible from this analogy? Think again. I was also fortunate enough to be allowed to play with some footage from one of the productions at work this week. It's one of the best things I've got to do since starting my job and it reminded me exactly why I'm in this. Time just flew by- everything I love about editing came flooding back. I was on a late shift followed by an early so my intention was to just watch through the footage ready to cut when I had more time, but as soon as I started watching it my mind just came alight and I couldn't help but get started. I got excited every time I saw a bit of performance I liked, started working out how best to fit it into the cut, and felt an enormous sense of achievement when I made something work. I was gripped by shaping the structure of the scene and ideas for little extra touches were bouncing around my mind.

Again, I'm sure you can see where this is going. Occasionally I actually bother to really try to connect with God and He always teaches me something new, and to coin an overused phrase, really does blow my mind. Time doesn't matter anymore, I've got something amazing here.

I find my job very hard work, and I know that won't change if I manage to work my way up the ladder, but it's all about doing something that I love to bits. I'll be honest and say that I don't get excited about the nitty-gritty of Christianity, but that's because I need to remind myself who it's all about. Once upon a time, I couldn't get enough of it. That 'once upon a time' happens to be when I started helping out more at church. It took effort on my part, but I took way more than I gave. There's a love there, I just need to rediscover it by actually doing something about it. It's not gone, it's just rusty. Thankfully the difference is that God is can work with rusty. Software just mocks you with its errors until you press the right buttons.

I know this has been a little more of a wishy-washy post than my last couple, and reading this back I'm not sure I've quite managed to pinpoint what's going on in my mind, but really the point is that this last week or so has started to bring home just how much work I have ahead of me. Just like with that cut, that over-sensible, paranoid part of my brain should take a back seat when it comes to God. I'm really looking forward to delving back into the technical side of post production, but I also need to start delving into the technical world of being a Christian. Not just the 'please God can I have', but actually opening my Bible, taking time out of my day to pray, to learn, to serve, and to finally have the guts to walk into a new church.

Faith and Running: Part 1

I've been a runner for a post production company for just over two months now, and it's thrown up so many challenges and raised so many questions for me that I'm going to split my thoughts into a few posts. Obviously this is a public blog so I have to be careful what I write about. This is my job - something that I'm really keen to progress in, and with yet to be released projects being worked on and some high profile clients running about, I can't just start reeling off everything that happens in specific detail, but that doesn't stop me being open and honest about myself and where that leaves me in my faith. So, here goes.

I am not a natural born runner. I mean, I don't it's think anyone's ultimate goal in life, but some people are just better at it. As much as it's considered an entry level position in the industry, it actually requires many skills that not everyone has full stop, and certainly not that you would naturally attribute to post production - or for that matter, myself. Knocking on doors and asking people if they want anything requires a lot of confidence when you're someone like me, carrying trays full of hot drinks requires a certain amount of strength and balance that I (discovered I) have a severe lack of, and asking people if you can shadow/sit in with them is not something I'm naturally attuned to doing - doing stuff for people is a lot nicer than asking something of them (or in Bible speak - 'It is more blessed to give than to receive') It never feels like an appropriate moment either. It's not that I'm not interested - in fact the total opposite applies, but when someone's running around like mad trying to do eighteen things at once, I never think 'would you mind if I sat in with you for a bit' is the most appropriate thing to say to them. There's so much about my job and the way you progress in it that is far from my natural skill set.

I can look at an Avid project and know exactly how to tidy it up- sort those bins, rename those sub-clips, transcode that media to codec x etc, but give me a messy kitchen at 8pm on a Friday evening, and I still have to carefully check the list of final tasks for the evening before going home. I think my first month as a runner could quite easily form its own sitcom, I made that many stupid, laughable mistakes. I hate it when I'm not good at what I do (yes, hate is a strong word, but I use it deliberately), because when I'm not good at what I do, I'm letting people down, I'm drawing attention to myself for all the wrong reasons, and as far as I'm concerned, I'm not earning my keep. I remember some guest speakers at uni saying they used to hate being a runner when they did it but for me I just hate my lack of ability at it, and I really don't enjoy walking into rooms all day and seeing people do a job I know I'd be better at (no, not better then the person doing it, better at it than I am at running). I'm not going to pretend that I know it all by any stretch of the imagination, but edit assisting (and hopefully one day editing) is the one job I truly believe I can do, and do well. Of course God calls us to be out of our comfort zone, but I am a massive believer that a job well done is honoring to God, so it really, really gets to be when I don't do my job properly. It's caused tears more than once because I've been so frustrated at myself. It's a daily, sometimes hourly struggle facing the fact that, even if I've done my very best, the job could have been done better. I like comfort zones not for an easy life but so I can be at my best, and I haven't felt at my best for a long time.

That said, at the very least I really do work at trying to be good at my job because it doesn't matter if you're cleaning a coffee machine or editing the next big feature, doing your absolute best at something must be always be a complete given. Just look at Colossians 3:23 - 'Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord'. Obviously that's a lot easier when it's something you're passionate about (at Ravensbourne 12-16 hour days were normal and I felt more than comfortable with that, whereas a nine hour day at work wipes me out), but the Bible teaches us to work hard at everything we do, not just when we're doing something we love or even are good at. I mean, I'm not passionate about tea and coffee, I don't even drink it, but I should strive to make every latte I make the best latte I can produce! I won't pretend to find this easy, and I certainly won't pretend that when my alarm goes off in the mornings my first thoughts are anywhere close to 'well, in Colossions 3 it says...' but when I'm struggling through the day (which is nearly always), or I'm feeling a bit disgruntled about traipsing round Soho looking for a certain type of olive or something, it's a really important verse to remember.

Plenty of characters in the Bible weren't naturally good where God called them to be, but God wanted them there so God used them. I don't sit comfortably with this in my own life, and actually it took someone a lot wiser than me to point this out to me, but maybe one day it will sink in. For now I can at least look at it this way - I may struggle to get passionate about tea and coffee in itself but ultimately, it's going to a person. It's much easier to get passionate about making people happy than just seeing it as 'making the tea'.

The last few months have been a real, real struggle and I've certainly had better points in my life, but however keen I am to be using Avid as part of my day job (which is unbelievably keen), right here and right now I am a runner, so whether I'm in the right place or not, or whether I have any natural ability at it, God's calling me to be my best at it. Obviously that doesn't stop me looking forward and trying to progress wherever possible, but the fact that this isn't 'the dream job' doesn't give me any leave not to be the best I can at it (even if my best isn't as good as I'd like it to be).

I hope I remember this come Monday morning.

Why Should Christians Care?

Welcome! I've set this blog aside for musings and maybe the occasional story concerning my Christian faith and trying to make it in the world of television, from general thoughts about media and Christianity to my personal attempts at breaking the industry and how this lines up (or doesn't) with my faith. I want to start with the basics - why I care so much about the media, and why I think it's so important for Christians to engage with it.

For a good portion of my life, I've wanted to work in the media in some form or other. When I was younger I wanted to work in marketing, then I wanted to be an actress, then a few years ago I finally settled on wanting to edit television shows. As a Christian, this has forced me to consider many questions about how my ambitions and my faith match up. Is the media a worthy career? Isn't it a selfish ambition to follow? Shouldn't I want to be involved in something more wholesome or at least something more meaningful? I think the problem lies not in the answers to those questions but the questions themselves. They make several assumptions that need to be re-evaluated:

Assumption 1: The media doesn't and shouldn't affect a Christian life

I want to make something very clear. The media is a powerful, relevant part of modern day life, whether or not we want it to be, whether we think it's good or bad, and whether we think we can ignore it or not. It's intertwined into modern day society and you can't escape it. What a newspaper chooses to report, what a comedian can write off by belittling and making look stupid and irrelevant, and what actions a TV drama choose to justify are just the beginning of an endless list of ways in which the media affects our opinions, our decisions and the way in which we live our lives. Countless times I've found myself going along with a TV drama or comedy show, getting to the end and having to stop myself and remember 'hang on, I don't agree with any of that'. In the wrong hands, the media can be truly dangerous and frightening – just look at the News International scandal. In the right hands, it can be an amazing force for good. Just look at the lives transformed by big charity events or remember a time a video that's gone viral online or been shown at church has touched you. It matters that it's there and it matters how it's created and who by. If we don't sit up and take notice of what we're watching, reading and listening to, we could easily let it overtake God as our source of guidance in our lives,

I think there's another vital point to be taken from this - as Christians how can we ignore something that has so much power and influence over so many people's lives, not just our own? If it affects us, it affects the person next door, and we all know what the Bible says about our attitude to our neighbours. (If not – check out Matthew 22:38-40)

I also really believe that sometimes this industry can stand as a mirror to us and our behaviour. I know we don't like having our traditions, values and beliefs picked apart in the press and in front of big television audiences, and of course we shouldn't automatically take on board everything that is said, however, as much as God is perfect, we are not .We get it wrong, and sometimes it takes an outsider to show us that. Even when we're not getting it wrong, the media can still show us how we come across to those who don't believe. That's an incredibly powerful and insightful tool, and I think we should be using it instead of always getting upset when the topic falls to Christianity in a way in which we're uncomfortable.

Assumption 2: The media is no place for Christian values and ideas

I was told from day one at Ravensbourne that 'editing is about storytelling,' but I don't think the concept is limited to video editing. If you think about it, the entire media is about stories, some of them true, some of them made up and some of them masquerading as truth, but whether a news piece, documentary, film, piece of television drama or someone's blog, it almost always bottles down to a story, and there's something else full of stories: the Bible. Jesus told stories all the time, we call them parables. What's more, he told stories that were relevant to the people of the time, just as the stories in the media now are intended to be. For Jesus to have used them, they must have been important.

This really bottles down to why I am so passionate about the media, particularly television. I long to try and reflect even just a tiny bit of Jesus' actions by telling stories that are relevant to people today and reveal truths about who God is, about today's society and how we go about living a Christian life. One of the great things about the stories Jesus told is that they didn't ram the message down people's throats – it was there if you wanted to see it, but to others, it could just be a story. In fact, in Matthew 13 Jesus explains that He doesn't actually expect everyone who hears His parables to understand them. I think this approach is vital in this day and age. Proselytising is not allowed in public service broadcasting, but more than that – people don't like it, and don't want to see it. But people like to be told a good story. I really believe that you can tell a story that's a completely enjoyable piece of drama, and has a deeper level to those open to it without shoving religion down people's throats.

Assumption 3: The media is a completely immoral entity we should steer clear of

It can be surprising when something seemingly unrelated to our faith can provide incredible insights to our lives. Sometimes it's not even something a Christian might 'approve' of. I remember watching an episode of Torchwood – a show that is full of bad language and adult references, and being overwhelmed by the help and insight it gave me in helping to deal with the death of my grandma. That clip was full of language I wouldn't repeat and is in the context of a very twisted storyline, but I truly believe God spoke to me through it. Stories can provide such clarity and I don't think God is narrow minded enough to only use the squeaky clean ones to give us insight into our lives.

Something else that's really to important to consider is this – the media isn't actually one big evil 'thing' that's determined to take over our lives– it's made up of people. In this case it tends to be people under a lot of pressure to meet deadlines, work to budgets and (in the case of television), maintain viewing figures. Sometimes that leads to less than admirable output, and sometimes it brings out the worst in people – and often we only see and hear about these incidences, but in my experience so far, I've seen people work incredibly hard to make the best programming possible and work their way up in this incredibly competitive industry. That's not evil, that's human, and I have yet to meet anyone I would even come close to describing as evil.

We shouldn't just care about the people consuming media, we should care about those making it. I've been pretty rubbish at sharing my faith, or even just being a good, compassionate Christian at work but I am starting to see just how much I need to. I genuinely don't know how I would have got through my first couple of months in the industry without the love and grace of God and the support of my Christian friends and family, and I think it would be incredible for some of my work colleagues to experience that level of God's goodness. Remember – as a Christian I don't come into the industry as one tiny bit of a better person than anyone else, just with an incredible, powerful and loving God by my side. Trust me, I'm going to need Him, but I shouldn't be keeping Him to myself.

So. The media affects us, it affects others, it tells stories just as Jesus did and it's made up of people. I can't pretend that there aren't also some wholly selfish reasons for me to want to get into editing, but I don't think it's impossible to line up with my faith either.