The storms of life

This third week of January has brought us some of the craziest weather I've seen in a long time. The other night I witnessed torrential downpours, hail the size of blueberry's, lightning and thunder, howling winds and flooding. As a father and husband I find myself on the constant lookout for potential trouble around our house. I'll call it instinctual protection for my wife and kids.

My kids on the other hand, are giddy with excitement and taking it all in with a sense of wonderment only a kid has. This morning my 8 year old couldn't wait to pull out of the freezer the hail we collected last night. I have to admit, it's pretty cool seeing a bowl full of hail in our San Diego freezer. It's a safe bet to say that it's the closest thing we'll ever get to snow here in the southwestern most tip of the continental U.S.

I learned early on in our marriage and parenting that whether they ever actually say it or not, they are counting on me to "protect the castle." And you know what, to the best of my ability, that is my job. I take the task seriously and do my best to look out for all our safety. If I'm doing my job right, then my wife and kids will feel safe and secure.

I will always be limited in my earthly capacity as a husband and father. In reality, the ultimate protection comes from our heavenly Father. If I am doing my best to follow God's leading in my life, prayerfully considering each choice and action that follows, then my family has a greater protection than I can ever offer. When the storms of life hit, be it a disaster on the grand scale of Haiti, or the rain we've received here, we need to remember that God is still in control. Our job is to be prepared, use the ingenuity and skills God has given us, make wise choices and follow his lead out of the storms.

The best "post-nuclear western, biblically themed, thought provoking movie" I've seen.

The first time Denzel Washington read the "Training Day" script, he
had an intensely personal reaction to his character -- the
charismatic, but fatally corrupt, detective Alonzo Harris.

"I try to bend even the worst of my roles, like 'Training Day,' " said
Washington, the day after a press screening of "The Book of Eli" in
Los Angeles. "The first thing I wrote on my script was 'the wages of
sin is death.' "

After that biblical pronouncement, the superstar pleaded for a crucial
change in this role, for which he won the Oscar as Best Actor. In the
original script, viewers learned about his character's death in a
television newscast. Washington insisted that this urban wolf be
yanked out of his car and forced to "crawl like a snake" before being
riddled with bullets, while people in the neighborhood turned their
backs on him.

"I said, 'No, no. ... In order for me to justify him living in the
worst way, he has to die in the worst way,' " explained Washington.

For Washington, this "bending" process is part of his ongoing efforts
to make sense of his Christian faith in the midst of a career as one
of Hollywood's most powerful players in front of, and behind, the
camera. The goal isn't to sneak faith into mainstream films, but to
pinpoint themes about sin, redemption, justice, dignity and compassion
that mesh with what he believes to be true as the son of Pentecostal
pastor and an active member of the giant West Angeles Church of God in
Christ.

That's what he was doing while playing Malcolm X, emphasizing that his
sermons built on racial hatred were evolving into messages rooted in
equality. In the violent "Man on Fire," Washington played a bodyguard
who decides to sacrifice his own life to save a young girl from
kidnappers. This "bending" process is easier in some movies than
others.

In the R-rated "Book of Eli" -- directors Albert and Allen Hughes call
it a "post-nuclear western" -- the actor plays a warrior who marches
through a devastated American landscape while, literally, on a mission
from God. He is carrying the last surviving copy of the King James
Bible, along with his machete and a few other weapons that he uses
with righteous fervor. Call it "Mad Moses" in "The Prayer Warrior."

"Here's a man who, like Saul, or Paul, gets knocked off his horse and
has this epiphany, this moment," said Washington.

In a vision, the voice of God tells Eli, "Take this book west," and
promises to protect him until he can deliver it into safekeeping.
There is one big difference between Eli's story and the biblical
account of St. Paul's conversion, the actor admitted, with a laugh. "I
don't know if it said anywhere in there, 'And kill everybody on your
way.' "

While early drafts of the script contained even more religious
material, the film does show Eli reading the Bible and praying every
day. In a pivotal scene, he teaches a young woman how to pray, while
trying to protect her from a strongman who wants to seize the Bible to
use it as "a weapon aimed at the hearts of the weak and the
desperate."

Eli's basic message is simple: "Do more for others than you do for
yourself." The movie ends with a prayer that includes a famous
quotation from St. Paul: "I fought the good fight. I finished the
race. I kept the faith."

Washington said these are the kinds of messages that linger after the
Bible studies that he strives to fit into each day. He has worked his
way through the Bible three times, spurred on by the example of
Pauletta, his wife of 26 years.

While reading the Book of Proverbs recently, he began looking around
his house, marveling over "all this stuff." This led to a sobering
question: "What do you want, Denzel?" He focused on "wisdom," which
led to the word "understanding."

"I said, 'Hey, there's something to work on. How about wisdom and
understanding? How about that? I started praying, I said, 'God, give
me a dose of that,' " said Washington. "I mean, I can't get … anymore
successful, you know, but I can get better. I can learn to love more.
I can learn to be more understanding. I can gain more wisdom.

"So that's where I'm at."

Terry Mattingly (www.tmatt.net) directs the Washington Journalism
Center at the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities.

Some basics of the faith to reflect on as we start a new year

Foundational Faith, Time with God
Matthew 7:24-27
Intro…solid house and a crumbling house…
• The foundation of our life needs to be built on our faith.
• I’d like to propose a foundation that starts with daily time with God, morphs into a weekly worship gathering and morphs again into a small group setting.
• Each aspect of time with God is important and vital to the foundation of our faith and life in Christ.

Text: Matthew 7:24-27
Thesis: Time spent with God is vital to our growth as Christians. It starts on an individual basis, builds to corporate worship and is rounded out with small group fellowship and accountability.

Let’s look at the necessity and value of each area.
Personal time with God John 17:3
• The goal of the Christian life should be to know God.
• As we get to know God better, his desires, his character, we are going to want to please him more and life a godly life.
• How do we get to know someone? By spending time with them, and that starts on an individual level.
• Think about your best friends. The best time you spend with them is on an individual basis or in small groups.
• We are created to have fellowship with God.
• God patiently waits for us to spend time with him every day.
• Our heart, Christ’s home illustration…
• Some people get overwhelmed with the idea of personal time with God. What do I read? What do I pray for? Where and when do I do this?
• Good communication involves what two things? Talking and listening.
• For us as Christians, that means prayer and bible reading.
• I recommend you do that in the morning, give God your day, checking in with God.
• Read expectantly, read to meet God.
• Pick a quiet place free of interruptions. You may need to start with 5 or 10 min. Read through a whole book of the Bible, study guides are good too. Journal, write in your bible, interact with the scriptures!
• Pray and ask God’s blessing for your day.

Corporate worship
• “united or combined into one, pertaining to a unified group”
• I’m talking here about the value of people worshipping together.
• We gather in worship for support, community, fellowship etc.
• However, the main reason we gather to worship is out of respect for God, to worship God.
Let’s take a look at some scriptures that reinforce that.
• Exodus 20:8 One of the ways we keep that commandment is by attending church. I also encourage you to “rest” on the Sabbath, get out of the normal routine.
• Hebrews 10:22-25
• Isaiah 37:1 The church is a place of refuge. When King Hezekiah was deeply grieved, he went into the temple of the Lord.
• I can’t tell you exactly how many days to be in church this year, but I will tell us all to be in church more often than not this year.
• Church allows us to gather corporately, reflect on God’s goodness, worship, sing, pray, be convicted etc.

Small group fellowship and accountability
• Take a minute and think about some of your toughest classes in school.
• I got through Anatomy and Hebrew with the help of study groups.
• This is a small group working together for a common goal, the goal of growing deeper in our faith.
• Colossian 1:10
• Think of a healthy family gathering.
• Good food, laughter, sharing, conversation, love, acceptance.
• That’s what a good small group or home fellowship is with the added bonus of study the Bible together.
• Jesus himself invested in a small group of men and passed on the future of Christianity to these 12 men. Mark 3:13-14
• He also invested in just a few of those 12 (Luke 9:28) Peter, John and James.
• I want to encourage us all to be in a small group bible study as well as have 1 or 2 people you meet with regularly.
• We need to have people in our lives that tell us the things we don’t want to hear.

Proverbs 27:17

Conclusion:
Matthew 7:24-27 Back to the illustration of the house/our lives and what kind of a foundation we are building on. Let’s avoid drastic measures…
Let’s build our lives on the word of God, corporate worship and small group accountability.
Foundational Faith, Time with God
Matthew 7:24-27

It'll make you think...

Can't wait to see "The book of Eli" when it comes out on Friday. I'm pretty sure it will fall into the category of a "great Christian movie that isn't a Christian movie." Check out this review:

Hollywood's 'The Book of Eli' casts Bible, Christian character as central

By Bob Allen

MALIBU, Calif. (ABP) -- The Bible plays a starring role in "The Book of Eli," a post-apocalyptic action film starring Denzel Washington that opens in theaters Jan. 15.

Washington, a two-time Academy Award winner widely known in Hollywood
for his Christian beliefs, portrays a lone warrior making his way
across a desolate American landscape defending the world's last
remaining copy of the King James Version of holy writ.

"This is a story about a man named Eli, who's been sent a message, who
hears voices from God that told him to take this book, the Bible,
across the country and to deliver it out West," Washington says in a
movie trailer posted on ScreenVue.com, which provides movie clips for
churches and ministries to use in their teachings.

Though in the vein of recent films like "2012," a blockbuster about
the end of the world as predicted by the Mayan calendar, evangelical
movie buffs are touting "The Book of Eli" as a rare major studio
release where the protagonist is unabashedly a Christian.

"How far are we willing to go in response to God's call?" Craig
Detweiler, director of Pepperdine University's Center for
Entertainment, Media and Culture, writes in a study guide written for
Christian viewers of the film. "What kind of sacrifices would we make
to defend the Word of God?"

The movie, which has Washington's character facing down villains
trying to stop him, earned an "R" rating for graphic violence and
coarse language.

"In following his mission he's been given by God, he becomes more and
more violent in order to get the job done," Washington explains in the
trailer. "This man, Eli, has a very difficult task, but he has faith.
And he makes mistakes, as we all do. Someone said there's no testimony
without a test."

The movie's hard edge may give some religious moviegoers pause. Angela
Walker, director of producer relations for ChristianCinema.com, wrote
that she pondered the movie's objectionable content for a month after
seeing an advance screening before deciding the film's spiritual
themes were redeeming qualities.

"Personally, I want to support filmmakers who explore questions of
faith in their films," she wrote. "For me, choosing to see this film
is casting a vote for Hollywood filmmakers to keep making films about
faith. It is telling them I will buy tickets to films they create
about topics I'm interested in."

Detweiler pointed out that no words of profanity come from
Washington's mouth. "He is clearly set apart as a holy character on a
godly mission," he said. "So he acts as one would hope a man of God
would act."

While Washington's character does resort to violence, Detweiler said,
it is always in self-defense against another character's aggression.

"It seems comparable to the situation most of us find ourselves in --
trying to follow God in a fallen world where profanity, violence and
temptation is all around us," Detweiler said.

Screenwriter Gary Whitta told ChristianCinema.com that he spent a lot
of time going through the Bible to find passages that Eli could quote
at appropriate moments in the film. Washington, the son of a
Pentecostal preacher who attends the West Angeles Church of God in
Christ in Los Angeles, added some verses of his own.

Washington -- ranked by Beliefnet as the second most powerful
Christian in Hollywood behind Mel Gibson -- described "The Book of
Eli" as both "a story about faith" and "a story about good and evil"
with parallels to real life.

"We're all a work in progress," he said in the trailer. "I think we're
all on a journey on this earth to be better human beings and to
hopefully follow the Word of God. That's about all any of us can ask
for is to do the best we can with what we're given."

'Avatar' and the faith instinct
Humans are hard-wired to believe in the transcendent; the faith instinct manifests itself across the ideological spectrum.
Jonah Goldberg


You probably don't need a long synopsis of James Cameron's half-billion-dollar epic, "Avatar," in part because even if you haven't seen it, you've seen it. As many reviewers have noted, Cameron rips off Hollywood cliches to the point you could cut and paste dialogue from "Pocahontas" or "Dances with Wolves" into "Avatar" without appreciably changing the story.

In short, "Avatar" tells the tale of a disabled Marine, Jake Sully, who -- through the wonders of movie magic -- occupies the body of a 10-foot-tall alien so he can live among the mystical forest denizens of the moon world Pandora. Sully is sent in mufti, like a futuristic Lawrence of Arabia, to further the schemes of the evil corporate nature-rapists desperate to obtain the precious mineral "unobtainium" (no, really). Jake inevitably goes native, embraces the eco-faith of Pandora's Na'Vi inhabitants and their tree goddess, the "all mother," and rallies the Pandoran aborigines (not to mention the Pandoran ecosystem itself) against the evil forces of a thinly veiled 22nd century combine of Blackwater and Halliburton.

The film has been subjected to a sustained assault from many on the right, most notably by Ross Douthat in the New York Times, as an "apologia for pantheism." Douthat's criticisms hit the mark, but the most relevant point was raised by John Podhoretz in the Weekly Standard. Cameron wrote "Avatar," says Podhoretz, "not to be controversial, but quite the opposite: He was making something he thought would be most pleasing to the greatest number of people."

What would have been controversial is if -- somehow -- Cameron had made a movie in which the good guys accepted Jesus Christ into their hearts.

Of course, that sounds outlandish and absurd, but that's the point, isn't it? We live in an age in which it's the norm to speak glowingly of spirituality but derisively of traditional religion. If the Na'Vi were Roman Catholics, there would be boycotts and protests. Make the oversized Smurfs Rousseauian noble savages and everyone nods along, save for a few cranky right-wingers.

I'm certainly one of those cranky right-wingers (wanna see my decoder ring?), though I probably enjoyed the movie as cinematic escapism as much as the next guy.

But what I find interesting about the film is how what is "pleasing to the most people" is so unapologetically religious.

Nicholas Wade's new book, "The Faith Instinct," lucidly compiles the scientific evidence supporting something philosophers have known for ages: Humans are hard-wired to believe in the transcendent. That transcendence can be divine or simply Kantian, a notion of something unknowable from mere experience. Either way, in the words of philosopher Will Herberg, "Man is homo religiosus, by 'nature' religious: as much as he needs food to eat or air to breathe, he needs a faith for living."

Wade argues that the Darwinian evolution of man depended not only on individual natural selection but also on the natural selection of groups. And groups that subscribe to a religious worldview are more apt to survive -- and hence pass on their genes. Religious rules impose moral norms that facilitate collective survival in the name of a "cause larger than yourself," to use a modern locution. It's no wonder that everything from altruism to martyrdom is inextricably bound up in virtually every religion.

The faith instinct may be baked into our genes, but it is also profoundly malleable. Robespierre, the French revolutionary who wanted to replace Christianity with a new "age of reason," emphatically sought to exploit what he called the "religious instinct which imprints upon our souls the idea of a sanction given to moral precepts by a power that is higher than man."

Many environmentalists are quite open about their desire to turn their cause into a religious imperative akin to the plight of the Na'Vi, hence Al Gore's uncontroversial insistence that global warming is a "spiritual challenge to all of humanity." The symbolism and rhetoric behind much of Barack Obama's campaign was overtly religious at times, as when he proclaimed that "we are the ones we've been waiting for" -- a line that could have come straight out of the mouths of Cameron's Na'Vi.

What I find fascinating, and infuriating, is how the culture war debate is routinely described by antagonists on both sides as a conflict between the religious and the un-religious. The faith instinct manifests itself across the ideological spectrum, even if it masquerades as something else.

On the right, many conservatives have been trying to fashion what might be called theological diversity amid moral unity. Culturally conservative Catholics, Protestants and -- increasingly -- Jews find common cause. The left is undergoing a similar process, but the terms of the debate are far more inchoate and fluid. What is not happening is a similar effort between left and right, which is why the culture war, like the faith instinct, isn't going away any time soon.