God bless you please Mrs. Beamish

Lots of us grew up with Saturday Night Live. I remember in high school we watched it so religiouslyit was almost 'family TV time', along side MASH and The Cosby Show . How many of you remember "In Living Color" (Fire marshal Bill, anyone?). Going even further back how about "Laugh In"? Don't worry, I didn't watch it either. But going back even further, have you ever heard of "Beyond the Fringe"? It was a British radio SNL of sorts (Dudley Moore got his start as part of it). There is a magnificent sermon making fun of the depressingly typical Church of England (C of E) vicar, which some day I will post for your amusement. In the meantime, here is a little number in a similar vein of Beyond the Fringe called "Mrs. Beamish". If you've been in the C of E or it's American equivalent (guess what that is?), I think you may have met her. And if not I hope this might send a smile your way anyway.

Church of Starbucks

Ok, so I'm not dead. I just haven't posted in a really long time. I've come across a blog called Beyond Relevance, a website devoted to helping churches figure out culture. Many churches try new things, often to discover that what they're doing was "in" ten years ago. For example, using a new font for bulletins and anouncements, like Papyrus - the most overused font on the face of the earth. Anyway, Beyond has put together a little video to make their point. What if Starbucks marketed itself like a church (i.e. a 'seeker friendly' evee-free church)

I'm not a big fan of church marketing to begin with, at least the concept in general. If by 'church marketing' you mean, we're going to try to make our letterheads match and have a website that doesn't look like it was made with Windows 3.0 and a crayon, fine. If you mean you are trying to figure out how the wider, essentially non-Christian-but-heard-enough-Christian-jargon-to-be-innoculated culture sees the church, fine. If you mean you are trying the latest fad to get attendance to go up, forget it, they'll see right through you like a clear, see-through thingy.

Cultural Christianity (funny but depressing)

After my last posting on Obama vs. The Rain Prayers I thought it can't get any worse than this. Well, it has. I came across this website which collects a different image of Jesus created by Christians from all over. I don't know if the site is run by non-Christians or not, but clearly Christians have domesticated Jesus to an extent where the Son of God, Lord and Savior, the God-Man who is the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, who is worthy of glory and honor and power and praise, the Lamb who was slain from the foundations of the world, is reduced in total to "Jesus is my friend." Awww. Isn't that sweet. Like, my favorite Jesus, like of all time, is like, the Buddy Jesus from that, like, Dogma movie.

Ladies and Gentlemen, may I present: Jesus of the Week (in stereo & Technicolor [tm] )

And I heartily recommend this particular Jesus, which comes from our brothers across the sea, The French. Be sure and click the link at the end of the commentary for more alien Jesus fun. (granted, this last one is not a Christian contribution)

It is a sad indication that Western Christianity has little if any ability to present the Lord Jesus Christ to its culture in any way that is faithful to who Jesus really is - that is, the Jesus of the New Testament. Most of the best cultural and pop cultural presentations of Christ actually come from non-Christians these days (for example, Spielberg's Amistad). I would loved to be proved wrong on this. Any takers?

Christians Being Stupid

So here's a video I just saw about a guy who wants God to send rain on Obama's acceptance speech in Denver later this month. It's so smarmy I want to vomit. Nevertheless, a deeper question remains. If a Christian does not agree with some (or even all) of Mr. Obama's platform, is this the appropriate recourse as a Christian? How about praying for God to work in and through the election process, or that God would move a particular politician to change their views on an issue. Lord knows tons of progressive Christians have done so for the last eight years (the ones who aren't staging protest rallies, that is). Furthermore, if a prayer request for supernatural intervention is on the table, why not just shoot for the moon and call down the thunder. Why not do as Moses did when Korah rebelled and the earth swallowed them up (Numbers 16:28-35). Or James and John when the Samaritan village refused to let Jesus in and they asked him, "Lord, do you want us to call down fire from heaven and consume them." (Luke 9:51-56). Oh wait, Jesus rebuked them when they said that.

The Dark Knight

The Dark Knight. Just the name itself is ridiculously cool, even if you've never read the Frank Miller graphic novel. It is fitting (and thankfully not ironically tragic) that the movie bearing the same name does not suck, but is in fact one of the best movie's I've seen in a long time.

I'm a pretty big movie fan, and when it comes to the comic-book hero genre of films my standards are pretty low and easily pleased. Perhaps that is why more often than not I am "pleasantly surprised" when at the comic book movies. But the Dark Knight, like it's predecessor Batman Begins, takes the genre to a whole new level. A few thoughts on this impressive film. By the by, the NYT's review is actually pretty good, although it is filled with art-house fancy-shmacy words that I really don't know the meaning of (which is saying something).

First, if you are my age, you will remember the hullabaloo surrounding Tim Burton's 1989 take on the franchise, which probably should have more appropriately been titled "Joker", since the film was really more about Jack Nicholson and his dermatologically bleached character. Batman was really an after-thought. But, while Heath Ledger's performance is undoubtedly riveting and repulsively engrossing, Batman/Bruce Wayne still weighs in heavily. And what really makes the film is how it wrestles with the questions surrounding human nature. Bruce Wayne's inner battle to actually no longer have to be the dark knight (i.e. the anti-hero) is fantastic. His hopes are in Harvey Dent, an ordinary citizen who will fight for justice. In a world with people like Harvey, maybe we won't need a Batman after all.

I can't help but think of Nietzsche at this point. In a world of 'good' people, who needs a savior. Who needs God, except to relegate him to 'a god' for our own petty self-gratifying needs. Thus the danger of Wayne's struggle. When good people stand up for justice he will no longer need to walk the precarious line as dark hero to save the city. After the Joker's little 'social experiment' with the ferry boats doesn't work, Batman claims that people aren't all evil and can tap into good (thus they didn't destroy the other boats). But the tables turn again because Harvey Dent goes nuts and Bruce has to take the fall as the dark hero and remain Batman. Ironically, Harvey was the one on whom all his hopes were placed. So much for that anthropology.

On the other hand, the Joker says of ordinary, 'good' people, "When the chips are on the table, normal people will eat each other." How true. The diagnosis of the monster within, which only has a very thin veneer of civility indeed, is given by the film's true monster. The only thing that breaks the cycle is sacrifice (a very Christian idea). And that is, amazingly, what we see in the film. The huge prisoner (played by "tiny" lester) tells the warden that he will take the blame for blowing up innocent civilians. You want to kill, but you've never seen someone die. I'll do it, he says. And when he gets the detonator, he throws it out the window, sits down, and bows his head with a few other inmates who gather, with bowed heads, around him. Now, while this character does not offer his own life in a sacrificial manner, in a real sense he does become the scapegoat, taking the iniquity of all the 'good' people (who are vehemently eager to blow up other people, incidentally) upon himself. Hands down favorite scene.

One last thought for you all to respond to. Check out this article published last week in The Wall Street Journal. It's created quite a stir in the blogosphere, and understandably so. Let me just say that the author's point is so valid it's hard to dispute, but his interpretation of fantasy as the means of the conservative branch of Hollywood is based on allegory (Batman = George Bush), which is actually the wrong way to interpret fantasy as a genre, including comic book based films. Discuss...

The Fruit of Grace

Here's a video of a newscast from Tennessee. An elderly Christian woman gets carjacked, but she shares her faith with the perp and he starts to cry. After talking with him in her car for a few minutes she gives him all her money anyway and he tearfully gives her a kiss on the cheek and leaves.




What an amazing picture of grace. We speak of the fruit of the spirit working in this way: that grace produces what the law requires. The response of a sinner to grace in this news clip is a tender expression of affection. Grace produces love - love does not elicit grace. That is to say, our love of God does not prompt him to be gracious to sinners. If it did, then it wouldn't be grace and Christ died for nothing (Gal 2:21).

Such one way love (grace) produces a reaction in its object: love! The carjacker, in that moment of grace, gave the old lady a kiss on the cheek. Spontaneously and probably quite to his own shock (although that would be conjecture, but I'm willing to bet on it). And in the end he got what he didn't deserve, the money he was trying to take by force in he first place.

It's Fun To Do Bad Things...

Over the last few weeks I've been reading the Book of Romans in the Bible. It talks about human nature in a very stark and, quite frankly, offensive manner. It says that we are all dead in sin (Adam's sin) and rebellion. It says that all people, by their wickedness, suppress the truth. Only God's radical intervention of grace in Jesus Christ, who died for our wickedness, can change us.

Most Americans think we are "basically good." What we really need is encouragement and to be pointed in the right direction. Very often this sentiment is expressed by stating that what troubled people need is "education." And even if adults and society in general are bad, children certainly are not bad. They come into the world innocent; that is, untainted by Adam's sin. Well, here's a video on YouTube from a recent news broadcast in Palm Beach Gardens, FL, which blows this sentimental (and unrealistic) view out of the water. The fact that a kid would do something like this is not hard to imagine. His own view of his behavior, is plainly demonstrative of our fallen nature.