If you’re a devotee of a particular religion, you probably don’t want the story on which its whole belief system rests told by someone facing challenges to his credibility. But that’s not even the main problem with “Killing Jesus,” which has its premiere Sunday on the National Geographic Channel and is based on a book by Martin Dugard and the embattled Bill O’Reilly. The main problem is that this three-hour affair is unrelentingly drab. The program dramatizes the life of Jesus, culminating, of course, in his crucifixion. Mr. O’Reilly and Mr. Dugard turned the tale into a best seller in 2013 with “Killing Jesus: A History,” part of a franchise that has also seen them kill Presidents Abraham Lincoln and John F. Kennedy and Gen. George S. Patton.

Lately, Mr. O’Reilly has been fending off accusations that he has exaggerated his experiences covering the war in the Falklands in 1982. The “Killing Jesus” book, too, had its detractors, who claimed it contained inaccuracies and was shallow and slanted. But at least the book, which was written in a breathless, ticktock style, tried to have a pulse. The television adaptation turns what an earlier film called “The Greatest Story Ever Told” into one of the snoozier stories ever told.

Haaz Sleiman doesn’t make much of an impression as Jesus and certainly doesn’t come across as a man who would inspire a world-changing movement. The book tried to put Jesus’ story in the broader context of the politics and practices of the day, but here the account is largely pared down to the biblical rendition, with Jesus casting out a demon, preventing the stoning of a woman accused of adultery and delivering the touchstone teachings that all Christians know by heart.

The power of these messages is somehow lost here. The story has been adapted for screens large and small so often at this point that any new effort has to make clear why it needed to be made and what it’s bringing to the task that we haven’t seen before. This one never does.