Holt Farrier is a dispirited father who lost his left arm in battle and his wife to influenza.

Yes, he still has his two young children and his job in the traveling Medici Brothers Circus, but things have changed since he returned from World War I. His relationship with his daughter has suffered. His job — as a horse-riding stuntman — has suffered, too. Circus owner Max Medici sold the horses.

This means Farrier has a new task: taking care of the pregnant elephant.  

“It’s a big job,” Medici tells him.

That’s because the elephant’s calf will become the center of the show. Newspapers will cover it. Most importantly, Medici will sell more tickets.

Yet something strange happens when Medici’s pregnant elephant gives birth. This new calf has most of the features of an elephant — a trunk, a large head and a body the size of a boulder — but it has larger-than-normal ears, too. They’re so big, in fact, that they cover its face.

Medici is incensed.

“I already got fake freaks in the freak show. I don’t need a real one in the center ring,” he says.

This new baby elephant, labeled “Dumbo,” gets insulted wherever it goes. Soon, though, it displays a unique talent that transforms it from “freak” into an attention-grabbing phenom.

Disney’s film Dumbo opens this weekend, giving us a live-action remake of the 1941 animated classic that was nominated for two Oscars and won one. It stars Colin Farrell (Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them) as Farrier, Danny DeVito (Throw Momma from the Train) as Medici, and Michael Keaton (Spider-Man: Homecoming) as V. A. Vandevere, a theme park owner who purchases Medici’s circus.

The movie stays true to the core story of the original while giving it a third act beyond Dumbo’s discovering that he can fly. Like the original, it also includes plenty of positive life lessons for children.

Warning: minor/moderate spoilers!

(Scale key: none, minimal, moderate, extreme)

Violence/Disturbing

Minimal. The film opens with the two children, Milly and Joe, meeting their father at the train station and discovering he lost an arm in World War I. We then learn their mother died from influenza. Holt later punches a man who is mistreating Dumbo’s mother. A circus tent pole falls on a man, who dies. (It’s not graphic; we then see the coroner.) One of the sections of Vandevere’s theme park Dreamland is “Nightmare Island,” where the “most dangerous beasts in the world” are kept. (It houses wolves and an elephant named Kali the Destroyer, but will trouble only sensitive children.) Several times in the film, Dumbo and other circus artists perform high-wire acts that place them in peril. Later in the film, a tent catches fire, endangering a family.

Sexuality/Sensuality/Nudity

None.

Coarse Language

Minimal. H-ll (3), misuse of “God,” and an unfinished “bull—-.”

Other Positive Elements

Dumbo’s mother protects her son, and he loves her in return. It’s touching. Milly and Joe love and encourage Dumbo in the midst of the taunts.

Other Stuff You Might Want To Know

Medici encourages Milly to learn telepathy (she doesn’t). A Hindu man, seeing Dumbo fly, say his people believe “gods can take animal form.”

Life Lessons

Our social media-crazed, hyper-critical society needs Dumbo, simply to help children understand and respond to bullying. It’s painful to watch him get insulted. Yet it’s wonderful to watch him overcome the taunts and to discover his unique ability. It’s also uplifting to watch Milly and Joe encourage him. Like Wonder, Dumbo helps us empathize with the character being bullied. It also gives us a positive example of responding to it.

The film provides not one but two characters with disabilities (Dumbo and Farrier). It also presents multiple characters who are battling a loss (Dumbo and Milly and Joe).  

Of course, the movie teaches us to have courage. After all, the feather Dumbo trusted had no magical power.

Worldview/Application

Dumbo isn’t a Christian movie, but its core message — all of us are unique and loved — is founded in Christian principles. We are all made in the image of God (Genesis 1:26) and we are all valuable to Him — disabled and non-disabled. That’s a message all children need to learn from Dumbo.  

Sponsors

Spirit Airlines and The Giving Keys are the primary sponsors.

What Works

The interaction between animation and real-life characters. Yes, it’s a normal part of movie magic, but it never grows old. The film’s animal-human parallel — Dumbo and Farrier — is a nice touch, too.

What Doesn’t

Farrell’s Southern accent.

Discussion Questions

1. What did you learn about bullying from watching Dumbo?
2. What did Dumbo teach you about disabilities?
3. What can you do to encourage others who are different?

Entertainment rating: 3 out of 5 stars. Family-friendly rating: 4 out of 5 stars.

Rated PG for peril/action, some thematic elements, and brief mild language.

SWEETWATER  While many pastors experience reduced incomes after assuming the pulpit, few pay for the privilege of preaching. Yet that is what Richard Acuna did for almost a year, as the firefighter routinely shelled out $200 to hire a substitute to work for him at the firehouse on the Sundays he was scheduled for a shift. Acuna’s role as an interim pastor at Avondale Baptist Church in Sweetwater paid less than $200 a week.

That changed last October, when Avondale called Acuna, 41, to become its permanent pastor. It was validation of a most unlikely journey to pastoral ministry.

“Now I am getting paid enough to cover this expense,” Acuna told the TEXAN. “But I am not doing this for the money. I feel I am doing what God has called me to do: kingdom work, for the church.”

Acuna admitted he “hates” to see churches close, a situation that concerned Avondale leaders before he arrived.

“When I see church doors close, that is a slap against the kingdom, a victory for the devil,” Acuna said. 

The firefighters’ schedule of 24-hour shifts followed by 48 hours off provides time for Acuna to prepare sermons and handle church duties. As if two jobs weren’t enough, Acuna also serves as a trainer for the Sweetwater-Nolan County Health Department, teaching classes in emergency preparedness.

Each job reflects Acuna’s desire to minister to Nolan County, a passion shared by his wife, Becky, who is not only on staff at another local Baptist church, but is also director of The S.H.O.P—Sweetwater House of Peace—a community outreach center to youth.

Few people in Sweetwater imagined that hometown boy Acuna would grow up to serve his community as a pastor and firefighter, both unexpected career choices for the onetime juvenile offender who occasionally broke into houses and vehicles, experimented with illegal drugs and found himself locked up in juvie hall.

“Praise God that all that happened before I was 15 years old,” Acuna said of his youthful indiscretions. “Part of my story concerns where God brought us,” he added, admitting that his transformation to community leader has surprised some locals.

“Everybody in Sweetwater knows about my business,” Acuna said with a chuckle.

Acuna credits his relationship with Becky, his high school sweetheart, with starting him on the right road, even though their relationship has had rough patches. The two entered a common-law marriage after high school. Acuna worked for National Railcar as a welder.

Children quickly followed. So did problems.

Becky had been raised in a Christian home, although her father, who had been a pastor, abandoned the family, leaving all with unresolved issues. 

She struggled with guilt regarding her common-law marriage. Becky’s upbringing, despite its challenges, had given her an enduring faith. Her family had attended church and studied the Bible together. But their common-law arrangement “brought shame,” she said. “I knew right from wrong. It was blatant disobedience.”

Becky finally returned to church at the invitation of a friend.

“That made me mad,” Acuna said. “I went to church to make sure that guy knew she had a husband.”

After a few visits to the church, Acuna trusted Christ as Savior. “That day was great,” he recalled. “I told Becky things were going to be different. Later that night, she told me she was leaving me.”

The couple went through the process of a legal divorce and were apart for almost four years, until God restored their relationship in 2005.

“I knew she was the woman I would be with the rest of my life. Even when we were divorced, I knew we would get back together, that God could restore this marriage and redeem us,” Acuna said. Slowly God did just that, even though both of them dated others during their years apart.

They began attending church with their children and decided to remarry.

“We wanted to do things right, to teach our kids it is never too late to do the right thing. The day we got married is the day we moved in together,” Acuna said.

They became active at a Baptist church, volunteering extensively as Acuna changed careers from working in a chemical plant to joining the Sweetwater Fire Department in 2007. The department sent him to earn certification as an EMT and firefighter. 

He later received an associate’s degree in biblical studies from Liberty University and said he plans to continue his education someday.

Acuna called his appointment to Avondale “definitely a God thing,” which began when he felt God calling him to preach nearly three years ago. Preaching invitations started coming and he began filling local pulpits often, frequently at Avondale. He agreed to become the church’s interim pastor in January 2018, and within a few months was asked to apply for the full-time position.

With Becky’s support, and the church’s understanding that she would remain on staff at the family’s prior church, Acuna accepted the call to Avondale.

Acuna said the time as interim gave him the confidence to agree to a permanent position. He said he felt God telling him to love the people and that God would take care of the rest.

Avondale has responded. Average weekly attendance has almost doubled from 25 to 40, and a recent Sunday night special event put on by Teen Challenge drew 110.

“The church members are so caring. They have showed me grace, love, mercy,” Acuna said.

Paul Anderson, an SBTC field ministry strategist who attended Acuna’s installation at Avondale, said of the couple: “They are both entrenched in ministry and love the Lord.”

“We never thought we would be where are now,” Becky said. “I tell kids at The S.H.O.P that God uses all kinds of people. In our weakness he is made strong.”

Acuna said 1 John 4:19 motivates him to serve: “We love because he first loved us.”

“I have so much to be thankful for.” 

Editor’s note: As the SBTC continues in its 21st year, we are sharing reflections from those who laid the groundwork for a new state convention. The TEXAN interviewed Ronnie Yarber for this article, the fourth of a series.

ATHENS  Ronnie Yarber knows what it is to be a man without a theological “country.”

For Yarber, the first official employee of the fledgling Southern Baptists of Texas Convention, the issues of the inerrancy of Scripture and definition of the Cooperative Program were among the most pressing differences propelling the new group to break off from the Baptist General Convention of Texas in 1998.

“When changes began to happen in Texas because of the Conservative Resurgence, we [Texas Baptist conservatives] were like a people without a country. We were without a place,” Yarber told the TEXAN.

Yarber became the administrative director of what he called “a little protest group” that tried to persuade BGCT leaders to move to a more conservative doctrinal stance.

“The little band of protesters grew,” Yarber said, as the BGCT redefined the Cooperative Program—Southern Baptists’ shared missions funding mechanism—in 1994, diverging from the national Southern Baptist Convention.

Yarber was among five conservative leaders asked to meet with five from the BGCT at Love Field in February 1998 to see if the differences could be resolved without a split.

“All 10 men agreed by the end of the second day of meetings that we were not on the same page. We probably would not be able to work together,” Yarber said, explaining that in addition to biblical inerrancy and the nature of CP giving, the groups had different perspectives on abortion, homosexuality and the ordination of women as senior pastors.

“Regarding inerrancy, [conservatives] had the Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy to go by,” Yarber said, referring to the landmark document issued 40 years ago by the International Council on Biblical Inerrancy. 

Conservatives objected to the ordination of a practicing homosexual deacon at Austin’s University Baptist, a church then affiliated with the BGCT. They also disagreed with the BGCT’s adoption of its Christian Life Commission’s statement on abortion, which noted five “regrettable” exceptions where abortion could be morally acceptable. Finally, the BGCT’s stance on female senior pastors was at odds with conservative views, Yarber said.

Another divisive issue was the BGCT’s continued financial support of the increasingly liberal Baptist Joint Committee on Public Affairs after its funding was discontinued by the national SBC. 

Yarber recalled a pamphlet distributed by the Baptist Joint Committee to Southern Baptist pastors, the topic of which was “how to overthrow the religious right in your community.” The publication alarmed Yarber, who perceived an attack against theological conservatives who saw key moral issues as having political implications. 

“It was pretty intense,” Yarber recalled of the Love Field meetings, adding that all participants prayed together and shook hands at the end of the two days.

On Nov. 19, 1998, the SBTC was constituted in Houston.

“I’ve never been angry. I was disappointed in what could have happened in Texas,” Yarber mused of the separation from the BGCT.

Yarber called the selection of Jim Richards as the new convention’s first executive director “the most major and wise decision” the SBTC made.

Yarber, then also pastor of Mesquite’s Meadow Creek Community Church (formerly Gross Road Baptist), served in multiple roles in the SBTC’s early days and maintains involvement today.

“I was Jim Richards’ assistant, then interim director of the evangelism department, interim director of the pastor-church relations department, interim editor of the newspaper [The Plumbline, forerunner to the TEXAN] and chief financial officer,” Yarber said.

He liked it all except for the CFO designation, explaining that he would take deposits to the bank at the end of each day. “I don’t crunch numbers. Numbers crunch me,” Yarber said with a laugh. 

Of the SBTC’s initial budget of $903,000 approved by messengers of 120 churches in 1998, Yarber said he and Richards both thought the number “absurd.”

“Where is this going to come from?” Yarber remembered Richards asking.

“Who knows?” Yarber answered.

But the funds did come, and the new convention maintained its resolve to give at least half to the Cooperative Program of the SBC. The SBTC’s current practice of sending 55 percent of undesignated CP receipts on to the national convention makes it the highest CP-giving state convention by percentage.

“We stay near the top of all state conventions in total giving, too,” Yarber said. “Did the national CP lose money when the SBTC formed? I think not.”

Today, Yarber and his wife of 59 years, Carol, live on farmland 10 miles from Athens. Yarber continues his work with the SBTC, visiting with churches that express interest in affiliating with the convention.

He estimates that he has conducted just shy of 1,000 informational meetings for churches and groups of churches since 1998, including three in late February and early March.

Yarber said he does not try to persuade a church to leave one convention for another, or even to opt for dual affiliation.

“Do not split your church over the question,” he advises pastors. 

As for Carol, “she has been a jewel” and a “prayer warrior,” Yarber said, adding, “I listen to her when she speaks. I know she walks with the Lord. I’d be a fool not to listen to her. She’s been my blessed help.”