User:Godly Dragon Reviews and Apologetics

Godly Dragon Reviews and Apologetics is a Youtube channel created in January 2016 by Ethan Horn. It is an online Christian ministry that uses a cartoon dragon mascot with the desire to advance the kingdom of God. The purpose of this channel is to provide reviews of entertainment from a Christian worldview, to defend the Christian faith and share the gospel, and talk about religious and political issues. Ethan currently lives in Mission Viejo, CA and attends Saddleback Covenant Church.

About Ethan
Ethan identifies himself as Christian. He was raised in a Jewish home before he accepted Jesus Christ as his Lord when he was 20. He is currently 23 years old. He has a passion for video making and he loves dragons and cartoon animals. He also loves watching reviews on Youtube, which gave him the inspiration to use his talents for God's glory. He appears to be non denominational, which Ethan actually resents. "I'm not part of a denomination in particular. But I don't call myself 'non denominational' either if that makes any sense. I find that non denominational churches still have their own beliefs like the denominational churches do. You don't need a denomination of any kind to be a Christian. I believe all that's needed is to believe in the one true God that exists as a trinity. Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And to believe the Son came down to earth to die on the cross for our sins and rise again so we may have eternal life and to believe that He will come again to judge the world. And to read and study and believe in the Bible. That's what I believe. Plain and simple. I believe in God and in His Son Jesus and in the Bible alone. No denomination needed" Ethan said. But as of February 19th 2017, he attended a Lutheran church, and has chosen the denomination of Lutheran. But now as of August 2017, he goes to Saddleback Covenant Church.

Ethan's beliefs
Ethan has tackled several religious issues so far. And has given his own stances. While other issues he has remained silent on.

Preferred bible translation: In his "Can a Christian be part of the furry fandom?" video, he is seen quoting from the King James Version. But in his video about faith vs works, he is seen quoting from the New International Version. Later on though, he has come out and said that his preferred bible of choice is the King James Version.

Homosexuality: Ethan is against homosexuality and gay marriage. He goes over the verses that speak against it in his video about the furry fandom. He also goes over bestiality in the same video. But he has nothing personal against gays.

Eschatology: Ethan recently expressed that he rejects Dispensational Premillennialism. He leans towards the early Historic viewpoints of eschatology

Faith vs Works: Ethan believes in salvation by grace through faith. But that our good works prove we have faith

Predestination vs. Free Will: Though not stated in his videos, Ethan is a molinist. He believes that although God knows ahead of time who will be saved, God doesn't interfere with our Free Will and that God lets us come to him. "I believe there must be a middle ground between predestination and free will. But I don't think it's a big deal if someone's views differ from mine. It's not an essential doctrine. In the end, Calvinism, Arminianism, and Molinism are just human attempts to try to reconcile the sovereignty of God with the free will of man. Something we can't fully understand with our limited minds" Ethan believes.

Abortion: Ethan is against abortion and identifies as pro life. "Abortion is murder. It's killing an innocent child for often selfish reasons" Ethan believes. But he also believes being pro life means helping children have families after they're born.

Political views: Though not stated in his videos, Ethan is a Republican

Creation vs. Evolution: Ethan identifies as a "young earth creationist". He flat out says so in his Jurassic World review. "As much as I love Jurassic World, I don't agree with the evolutionary worldview it's based on" Ethan stated.

Witchcraft and Eastern Philosophy: Ethan has expressed dislike for both. In his video about magic the gathering, he has a dislike for fantasy card games because of their witchcraft. He also shows dislike for eastern philosophy by calling it unbiblical and stating that it contradicts God's Word in his Kung Fu Panda 3 review.

R rated movies: Ethan appears to have a dislike for R rated movies because he considers them immoral, as shown in his review of the recent Deadpool movie

Criticism, Controversy, and Backlash.
Ethan's original mascot in his early videos was that of a golden dragon with a brown underbelly, a brown flat mane, horns, and bat wings. The mascot received concern and criticism. It was criticized for being "too scary" and unsuitable for a Christian YouTube channel. Further criticism also comes from the dragon being a symbol for Satan in the book of revelation. "I didn't know what to do. I just love dragons so much. I think they're cool. But not everyone likes dragons" Ethan stated. Because of the criticism, Ethan made major modifications to the mascot by making it look like a feathered angelic dinosaur instead of a traditional dragon in hopes of attracting a larger audience. "I had to compromise. I decided to break away from the traditional dragon style instead of choosing a different animal altogether" Ethan stated. However, as of June 2017, Ethan decided he wanted to bring back the old mascot. After a fan vote between the old mascot, new mascot, or a custom mascot, Ethan decided to bring back the mascot with a minor modification of feathered wings, to balance fully expressing himself and the mixed voting results of his fans. "I decided I was done being scared. I'm done pleasing other people and I want to express myself how I wanted to. So I decided to throw things back to the way it was, for the most part" Ethan said. A few months later, Ethan decided to use both his old mascot and the white feathered mascot in his videos.

Ethan first topical video which was about the furry fandom received controversy for his stance against homosexuality and for his fire and brimstone attitude. He also received backlash on his Miracles From Heaven review when his praise report was about a facebook friend of his who said he wanted to become straight from listening to Ethan talk about Christian families. Youtube user bloodybella646 threatened Ethan, saying that his friend's blood would be on his hands. His Miracles from Heaven video is one of his most popular videos. Either due to the controversy or due to Miracles from Heaven being a high interest film at the time.



Other Mascots
These are additional mascots created to be in certain videos, and do not appear every time. Percival has been making a return and Angelicus is new. However, Diablo and Bloodfang were dropped as Ethan has no more use for them.

Percival: Percival is a gold dragon like creature with feathered wings, white stripes, and a white underbelly. He has a high squeaky voice. He is known for his high squeaky voice and his innocent yet guilty personality, always requiring conviction from Ethan. He first appears in the second session of Ethan's series on Mormonism Diablo: A pure evil dragon like demon. He is mean't to be the opposite of Ethan and Ethan's Nemesis. Diablo loves immorality, and wishes to take over reviews, as shown in Ethan's Deadpool review Bloodfang: A red dragon with gold horns, gold spikes, and a gold underbelly. He is not pure evil, but very angry and skeptical and likes to be a bully. As shown in Ethan's review of Risen. He is Ethan's second nemesis Angelicus: Angelicus is a big six winged angel resembling a dragon and a seraph. He is like a teacher and father figure. He first appears in the 2017 GDRA Christmas special

Ethan's disabilities
Ethan suffers from high functioning autism. Diagnosed at age 3, he has suffered from it all his life. In his early videos with his old mascot, he often came off as aggressive and condemning. Later videos with the white feathered mascot prove to be more calm and loving. Now videos are mixed between calm and collected to aggressive outspokenness.

Structure and Topics of GDRAA
Godly Dragon Reviews: This category is for reviews of entertainment. Reviews of movies, games, music, or books from a Christian worldview

Topical videos: These are videos that go over a religious or political controversy. Ethan gives his take on these issues in these videos

Sermons: These are audio only videos where Ethan himself talks to the audience about a particular topic. Rather than talking behind a mascot

Structure of Reviews
When Ethan reviews something, he tries to get a clear picture of what's healthy for families and what's healthy for their faith. He analyzes films based on 4 things:

Quality: The quality of the film itself, from a mostly worldly standpoint. Though for Christian movies, he will judge quality based on Godly standards

Family friendly rating: Analysis of whether or not kids would be able to watch the movie with their parents. Factors that can keep films from being family friendly are scaryness, violence, intenseness, cussing, and inappropriate jokes.

Faith friendly rating: Analysis of how safe or dangerous the movie is for one's Christian faith. Factors that can keep films from being faith friendly are false philosophies, witchcraft, cussing, and inappropriate jokes. Anything that is not godly is considered dangerous

MPAA rating: The rating of the movie given by the Motion Picture Association of America, to keep in mind when choosing a movie

Church history
Ethan has attended a few churches. He currently attends one of them

Adat HaMashiach (July 2014-August 2014): This was the first Messianic Congregation that Ethan attended. He went here to see what Messianic Judaism was like, and this was the congregation that made Ethan decide to become a Christian. Reason for departure is the congregation being too ritualistic and looking down on other churches and Christian tradition

Mission Viejo Christian Church (September 2014-May 2016, June 2016-February 2017): Ethan used to attend MVCC on Sundays back when he lived in Mission Viejo. And joined them the 2nd and 4th Tuesday for Prayer night and every Thursday for Men's Bible Study. This was Ethan's first church and where he got baptized. The church had concert style contemporary worship mixed with a singing choir and deep and inspiring messages from scripture were preached by Pastor Mike Maiolo. He also used to attend Monday College Group, but departed so that Creative Support could come to his house on Mondays to help him with independent living once he moved to Orange. Reason for departure is changing jobs to a job closer to his new home in Orange, where he's lived since August 2015. Therefore, deciding to attend a church that's closer to his home in Orange. But as of now he had to move back to Mission Viejo due to the landlord of the group home selling the house and moving away. So he returned to Mission Viejo and MVCC. Reason for permanent departure is that MVCC became a dying church. The music and messages became boring and certain members pushed tithing. And Ethan felt controlled and taken advantage of by people who wanted to tell him how to live his life. He did not appreciate having his hand held just because he has autism. He firmly believes that he is an adult and that he can take care of himself. The annoyance he felt because of the members along with MVCC dying spiritually are the reasons for Ethan's departure after a 3 year long stay.

Shuvah Yisrael (October 2015-March 2016): Shuvah Yisreal is the second Messianic Congregation Ethan tried. They share a building with Woodbridge Community Church in Irvine. When Ethan was at a book signing at Rejoice Christian Bookstore, a member of Shuvah Yisrael came up to him, overhearing that he's a Jewish believer in Jesus Christ. She told him about Shuvah Yisrael and said that they aren't dogmatic over what parts of the Law Christians still have to keep. Feeling convinced, he gave it a try. It was a nice congregation at first. The music and sermons were great. Then in the start of February it took a turn for the worse. Some more extreme Messianic members entered the congregation and brought their bitterness with them. When Easter came around, the Messianic Rabbi, Larry Feldman, criticized people who wondered why they didn't do Easter at the congregation. Larry made a snarky comment, saying they don't do Easter because Easter comes from Ishtar and that it's pagan and unbiblical. And that if you disagree with him, then you can throw a temper tantrum outside. He furthermore said that if someone says "Happy Easter" to him, he will say "Merry Christmas". Further showing his dislike for Christian tradition. It made Ethan feel misled. Snarky members and a snarky rabbi all hating Christian tradition was the reason for Ethan's departure.

Eastside Christian Church (April 2016-May 2016): After leaving Shuvah Yisrael, Ethan went on an online search for Saturday churches and found Eastside Christian Church, an Evangelical megachurch located in Anaheim. The church has a big auditorium where they do concert style worship. Then the pastor gives a 25 minute message. He attended this church on Saturdays to fill in the gap that Shuvah Yisrael left behind. Reason for departure was feeling unsatisfied with the church services and being unable to attend a bible study during the summer.

Calvary Church (May 2016-June 2016): After securing a new job in Santa Ana, Ethan tried Calvary Church in Santa Ana by the suggestion of Rejoice Christian Bookstore. Sunday services are divided into two styles. Choir worship at 9am and Modern style worship at 11am. He was planning to attend the LifeGroups during the week, in hopes of new fellowship. Reason for departure is having to move out of Orange and back to Mission Viejo.

Living Word Evangelical Lutheran (February 2017-August 2017): Ethan made the conscious decision to convert to the Lutheran denomination, due to his desire to explore his dad's side of the family and the desire for something more traditional. He has taken private adult education on what Lutherans believe and became a member. Reason for departure is that there were not enough people his age and not enough outreach in the church.

Saddleback Covenant Church (August 2017-Present): This is the Church Ethan currently goes to. He found this church by Google search and loved the statement of faith. He goes every Sunday and has been making a lot of new friends and learning new things. This is Ethan's current church.