Virtual Reality: Your next faith frontier?

By Geoff Tunnicliffe, CP Contributor Wednesday, June 19, 2019

Imagine if you could hop into a time machine and go back to the time of Christ. “7 Miracles VR,” a new virtual reality movie from HTC Vive, makes it possible. When I experienced 7 Miracles – which is amazing by the way – I started thinking about how virtual reality will change our lives, and affect our faith.

When you watch 7 Miracles VR, you’re transported into Jesus’s miracles from the Book of John. At the Wedding at Cana, you find yourself in a celebration with finely dressed guests, laughing, dancing, eating and drinking. Servants start scurrying about when they realize they’ve run out of wine.

As the miracle of water to wine unfolds, you feel like you’re right there in the action. You can turn in every direction and see the room and the people around you. You wonder if someone’s going to suddenly look over at you and say, “Hey, who’s that guy? And what are those strange clothes he’s wearing?”

If you haven’t yet seen the life of Christ in virtual reality, you need to check it out at www.7MiraclesVR.com. In addition to the Wedding at Cana, you’ll see the healing of the paralytic, raising of Lazarus, and other great moments. If you don’t have a VR headset, you can view the content on your smart phone.

So where is this new VR stuff going? Are these new technology-driven realities eventually going to replace reality itself, like we see in the movies? And how will that affect our faith?

Imagine a world where…

…You can go back in time and watch Martin Luther King Jr. or Abe Lincoln give famous speeches, or watch the building of pyramids and meet a Pharaoh.

…You can walk on the moon, or Mars, or skate around the rings of Saturn.

…You can go inside an atom, or molecule, or strand of DNA, and explore the structure of things.

…You can walk through a house you’re designing, before it’s built, to decide what changes to make. Or walk through houses you’re considering buying or renting.

…You can test drive a car at home.

…You can ride through the French countryside while you’re at the gym on a stationary bike.

All of these scenarios, and practically any other you can imagine, will soon be possible.

So how will it affect our faith? I believe it will enhance it, not detract from it. Regardless of where technology might take us, what will never change is the fact that we were created and redeemed by a God who loves us.

God knows where we’re heading, and He’s already there.

Geoff Tunnicliffe is the Former Secretary General of World Evangelical Alliance and Co-founder of Oikos International.