About Deidox
Who we are, why we go - and the families who send us.
Media is a new missions field.
Quick video on why media missions matters · 2:44
We're Brent & Danielle.
A married couple, and media missionaries. Brent directs; Danielle produces - a producer by gifting, a pastor at heart. Deidox is our ministry: telling true stories of God at work, and carrying them to the Church and the world.
DEI - of God · DOXA - glory · DOX - for the documentaries. God's stories, for God's glory.
We see a path where the Church and Christian artists work together to know God and make God known, through media. In fact, a healthy partnership between local churches and Christian artists is one of the greatest overlooked resources in local churches. But for the first time in history, the media content artists create, as co-laborers, can go out into every area of society - every nation, tribe, and tongue. This is media missions.
Our history
Deidox Films began in 2007, started by two preacher's kids with a desire to see what true faith looked like, and to show that to their communities and the world. Brent Gudgel had a background in art and underground ministry filmmaking, while Dave Mahanes, a former aide to the governor of Ohio, was now a struggling actor in Hollywood. They met while volunteering with a youth group in Pasadena, CA.
Everything changed with a prayer on an airplane.
They prayed, "God, we've never heard of anyone making a living telling stories about your work, as ministry, for you. Would you make a way for us to serve you in this way, if it would be your will?"
Incredibly, when the plane landed they had a voicemail from Saddleback Church, asking if they wanted to travel the world and film stories about the Kingdom. That experience laid the foundation for the launch of Deidox in 2007 - to tell stories with no marketing, no bullet-list agendas, just trying to faithfully proclaim how God is at work around the world.
With its launch, Deidox pioneered the release of short documentary-style testimonies online for churches to use in services, small groups, and outreach. Its innovations, such as being one of the first to use DSLR cameras for filmmaking, have shaped modern documentary storytelling - and its films have gone on to serve over 3,500 churches in their Sunday services and sermons.
Along the way, Hollywood knocked twice and almost pulled them away - with a comedy series for Hulu with Kristen Bell, and a best friend who wrote John Wick and opened a path into the heart of Hollywood. But the guys had tasted and seen how good it was to proclaim God's work, and they stayed on the ministry filmmaking path with Deidox.
After seven years of hard work and a lot of prayer, Free Burma Rangers released in 2020 in over 850 theaters and garnered incredible reactions from audiences.
Then, in 2022, everything changed. Dave Mahanes felt called to Austin and stepped aside from Deidox officially. What would happen? Should the ministry continue?
Brent and his wife Danielle started praying. They began to feel a call that this was what their family should pursue - but it was a big risk, with no financial backing to continue forward. Given the season they were in, it would mean starting all over.
In prayer, Brent asked God to make it abundantly clear if He wanted this.
Once again, God used an unexpected phone call to answer prayer. Mid-prayer, the phone rang and it was a ministry leader friend saying God had put Brent and Danielle on his heart.
The conversation felt like confirmation in many ways - and he became our first new donor for this new phase of ministry. Media is a new missions field, and Brent and Danielle began heralding that truth, telling the stories God lets them tell.
Now, Deidox is a small but scrappy unit - Brent and Danielle, and a group of artist volunteers and subcontractors. We're supported by a small but mighty group of partners, including donated office space from Gateway Church in Merced, CA, and a small group of monthly donor partners who help us keep the lights on and move forward with big dreams and open hands. Our goal isn't to build a big organization - it's to tell big stories the Lord can use to build His kingdom, through His Church. He gets the credit.
God's stories, for God's glory.
Only because of partners.
None of this is self-funded, and there's no big donor behind us. This ministry exists because ordinary families send us - the way churches send missionaries. Today that's 72 families, and we're praying God brings it to 100 this year, so we can run toward even more stories that can change people's eternities.
Become one of the 100What we're working on.
Right now we serve as the story team for Francis Chan's Crazy Love Studios - with two productions in motion.
Are you an artist that wants to join us?
We're intentionally small, and we don't have the ability to hire full-time staff right now. But every project, we scale up with a collective of skilled contractors - video editors, sound designers, app coders, marketers, and other specialists who want to use their gifts to proclaim God's stories into culture, for God's glory. Remote or local, both welcome.
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