The hard part was deciding which movies to leave out. As we learned, coming up with which movies to include was the easy part. Our choices were winnowed from hundreds of titles submitted by more than 30 Variety critics, writers and editors. A great deal of ardent discussion and debate went into the creation of this list.

Think about it: You get an average of one film per year. But they’re just old enough to make compiling Variety’s first-ever list of the 100 Greatest Movies of All Time a more daunting task than it once might have been. That still makes them a young medium, at least in art-form years (how old is the novel? the theater? the painting?). We can find the encouragement and hope that will get us through them, when we turn to the scriptures.The movies are now more than 100 years old. When we find ourselves in a time of trouble, we know we can endure the trials, if we have taken the time to store the Word of God in our hearts. And if you’re not there, you probably will be at some point. I hope the cartoon will be an inspiration to those who are in the midst of their own, personal deserts. It seemed to me the verse really went well with the cartoon I had drawn. This verse talks about how the scriptures can teach us, and give us endurance, encouragement, and hope. With the help of, I believe the Lord lead me to a verse that is a better match for the picture: Romans 15:4. While I was at it, I thought I would see if I could find a better verse to go with it.

I decided to re-do the lettering and make the camel and riders a little larger in the picture. I went ahead and published the cartoon using that verse, and then I didn’t think much about it, until recently, when I was working on a Spanish translation of the cartoon. I eventually used James 5:11, which talks about the perseverance of Job, but I wasn’t completely certain it was the best choice. For this cartoon, I had the idea, but didn’t have any Bible verse in mind.

Usually, the idea for a cartoon comes from my reading, hearing, and thinking about a particular passage of scripture.

Mike waters joyful toons war