In 1998 I went to see the movie Titanic. At first I’ll be honest I didn't’t want to see the movie. I remember dropping my sixteen year old daughter and her girlfriend off at the theater and saying “I know how that story ends”! Eventually I succumbed to the pressure and went to see the movie….six times (lots of pressure). I was undone to say the least, and so were many others making Titanic not just a blockbuster but a phenomenon.

James Cameron did the impossible; he captured the epic sinking of Titanic while weaving a beautiful love story over it to capture the human heart and the human tragedy. From the haunting opening scenes of the actual footage of the Titanic at the bottom of the ocean to the touching scenes of Rose’s reunion with Jack at the end; the power of the movie was well for lack of a better word…titanic.

The Titanic was in the news the other day; it was the anniversary of the discovery of its resting place. This is not what propels me to write on Titanic today, no it’s another story much in the news these days. I am referring to the story of refugees from Africa and the Middle East seeking asylum in the West which has been so poignantly personified by the horrific tragedy of three year old Aylan Kurdi, whose lifeless body washed up on Turkey’s shore.

So what is the connection?

Titanic in its historical context was a floating palace; the symbolic culmination of the “Gilded Age” while at the same time being a technological wonder presaging what was thought to be a new epoch of material acquisition unknown to man. She was thus a metaphor for the world at the beginning of the 20^th century sailing along in a bright blue universe. And like that world she was divided into three classes; First-, Second-, and Third-class or “Steerage”.

To grasp the full meaning of the word steerage I quote from Wyn Craig Wade’s book The Titanic: End of a Dream:

“The Titanic carried accommodations for a potential 1,024 third-class passengers, the vast majority of whom would be emigrants. Depending on the booking, portions of third-class quarters could be converted to freight and baggage compartments--- a tradition lingering from the days when “steerage” had meant exactly that. In the 1860’s, for example, it had been legal to transport human beings to one shore and then carry cattle in the same quarters on the trip back. One shipboard notice of that era adjured first- and second-class passengers “not to throw money or eatables to the steerage passengers, thereby creating disturbance and annoyance”. Things had now changed considerably. American immigration laws still made it mandatory to keep gates securely locked between third-class and other passengers; the policy was intended to limit the spread of infectious diseases.”

If you have seen the movie Titanic you will remember those locked gates. The ship is sinking; those in steerage are desperately trying to escape the incoming flood and those locked gates are keeping them trapped in certain death. In one memorable scene Rose and Jack break through a wall and are told by the official steward in a neat and tidy uniform “That’s White Star Line property….You can’t do that”!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RxiJ80lr3Mg

And there is the connection. Every time I hear the First-class Post Modern West say to those in “steerage” trying to escape the flood of death sweeping over the third world “You can’t come in here; you’ll have to go back”. I think of Titanic and those locked gates.

The “unsinkable” ship went down. She was a portend not to the heights to which man in his pomp could ascend but one to which man in his arrogance and greed must descend. Her corroded ruin on the ocean floor is a prophetic picture of the 20^th century’s descent into wars and destruction the likes of which the world had never known.

So here we are today in 2015. The Third and Second Worlds have been under water for some time. Those on the upper deck have ignored the tragedy below while taking tea and listening to music. But we cannot ignore it anymore; the flood is coming. This is not a religious, political, cultural, economic, or east –west problem. When a three year old boy created in the image of God washes up on shore like a piece of “steerage” it is a human problem. Something is wrong with humanity.

So if my hope were in humanity to “fix” the problem I would be lost. But it is not. For just as James Cameron could not write a screenplay simply about the disastrous sinking of the Titanic and the loss of 1,522 souls, but had to write a larger story of sacrificial love; a love so powerful it transcended death….so did God.

For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. John 3:16-17

"Rescue won't come from anybody else! There is no other name given under heaven and among humans by which we must be rescued" Acts 4:12 NT Wright translation.

"For he has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves" Colossians 1:13 NIV.

Salvation in the Bible means rescue; rescue from death and the dominion of darkness. Unfortunately for many people today the word salvation in reference to Jesus Christ's death and resurrection has come to mean a religious conversion to Christianity, not a rescue from death.The word conversion implies the change of ones mind or belief. "I used to hate vegetables, now I am a vegetarian; I've been converted". Yes, a religious conversion can be a bit more dramatic but so can the conversion to becoming a football fan. " I used to hate sports but then I moved to Green Bay Wisconsin; now I'm a cheesehead". The problem is when we replace rescue with conversion we lose the full meaning of what it means to be saved from death and given a new life in Christ.

Jessica Buchanan was an American aid worker in Africa when she was abducted by Somali land pirates in 2011. She was held captive for over three months and then dramatically rescued by Navy Seals. In an interview with 60 Minutes's Scott Pelley she describes her ordeal. Watch the clip below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GkkgSy2jPpY&feature=youtu.be

Jessica was betrayed by the person she entrusted with her safety. She was taken into the dominion of darkness and held in a helpless state. Her vivid description is powerful and leaves little to the imagination. Death surrounded her and held her in a tight grip.

This is the condition into which every human being is born. There was a betrayal which brought humanity into into the dominion of darkness and made it subject to death.

After three months of horrific treatment and inhumane conditions, a bodily infection worsened and Jessica's body began to rapidly deteriorate. She made a last call to tell the outside world she could not hold on much longer. She believed because she was , in her words," just an aid worker" she was not worthy of being rescued. However, to the President of the United States who was well aware of her circumstances, Jessica was not just an aid worker she was an American.

By analogy most people feel deep down they are "nobodies". Strip away all the glitter and false selves and most people feel they are of very little significance or worth. However to God the Father who created human beings in His own image they are of inestimable value and precious in His sight.They are His children. 

The President gave the orders to send in an elite team of Navy Seals to rescue Jessica. Her recounting of the operation is gripping and powerful. They knew who she was; she did not have a clue who they were. They had everything she needed; food, water, medicine. All of this was beyond her comprehension. They laid their bodies down over hers literally, to protect and save her.

If we could actually see into the spiritual realm when a soul is being saved from the dominion of darkness we might just see something like Jessica's rescue for :

" Are not all angels ministering spirits sent to serve those who will inherit salvation?" Hebrews 1:14

Certainly we would see the Good Shepherd who laid down His life for the sheep covering them with His body and blood.

After Jessica was on board the helicopter and it took off she broke down and began to cry. The Seals handed her an American flag. As she says in the interview, she had never been so proud to be an American as she was at that moment. It would be impossible for Jessica to live a life after her abduction, captivity, and rescue as if it had never happened. There would be no going back to the old Jessica, she had been forever changed by her ordeal and will forever be singing the praises of those who risked their lives to save hers.

Jessica was rescued not converted; so are Christians. "Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story---those he redeemed from the hand of the foe." Psalm 107:2

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Sometimes Christians speak in a language the world does not understand; a kind of Christianese if you please. Words like sin, salvation, redemption, baptism, born again, sanctification, and sealed with the Holy Spirit get tossed around lightly; and the assumption is made that everyone knows and understands these terms and their deep theological meaning. But the average person doesn’t have a clue about their “theological “ meaning and so when a Christian speaks in Christianese, well it just sounds like a bunch of religious gobbledygook and they want no part of it.

Jesus got this. He knew how to communicate the most profound truth in the simplest way and one which went straight to the heart…he told stories. So in the spirit of using the ordinary, common, everyday happenings to explain the beauty of salvation, please watch the story of Charlie.

http://www.lifebuzz.com/charlie/

Charlie the stray dog is found on the streets of Los Angeles he is homeless and ensnared with painful burrs. There couldn’t be a more powerful picture of what it means to be “lost” ……homeless and ensnared with something that brings pain. This is the human condition apart from God the Father; we are simply homeless and entangled in sin. You can see what this condition did to Charlie; fear and shame are in his eyes, his whole posture tells you he is unloved, uncared for, and without hope.

And then one day he is picked up off the streets, given a new name and an incredible transformation. Someone loves him enough to see there is something more to Charlie than the ugly coat and the painful burrs. It is a fast forward film project that shows the removal of the painful burrs and the old fur, the washing and cleansing of all filth, and the immergence of the brand new Charlie. The finishing touch is the scarf put on in slow-motion as if to signify his complete transformation. And Charlie feels it, you can see in the way he holds his head and the brightness of his eyes.

This is a salvation story and the reason it resonates with human beings and brings people to tears is because at some deep level they  are seeing what salvation looks like…..the lost are found, cleansed, healed, restored, loved, sealed with a symbol of ownership and given a home. Sometimes, its that simple.

I went to see Nebraska yesterday....well I got there in a round about way. I actually went to see Her but that lasted all of five minutes before I had to exit the theater. Nebraska was just starting so I slipped into the only seat available ...front row..not my favorite but it was better than Her!

 Nebraska like other Alexander Payne movies is painful to watch. Painfully slow yes but more than that just painful; yet they all are popular, so what's with the pain? Well Payne ( no pun intended) knows just how to take you into painful reality; he did it in About Schmidt, and Sideways ( which won the Oscar) and now he does it again in Nebraska ( nominated for an Oscar). These are people you know and recognize and too often you see something of yourself in one of them and that is perhaps why it is so painful.

In his latest story a son accompanies his elderly father on what everyone would call a ridiculous road trip to collect a million dollar prize which everyone knows is a scam...everyone except the old man. And that is part of his story; this old man once had a good heart and believed people and was taken advantage of (you get this in remembrances not flashbacks)and now he believes what he reads in the certificate which proclaims he is a million dollar prize winner. He is going to Nebraska come hell or high water and he is going to get his prize.

When he sees he cannot stop his father, a faithful son comes along on the road trip more or less to protect the elderly man and in so doing he learns more about his father in a few days than he has learned in his life time. That is the point; we live with people and we think we know them and we make terrible judgments about them( like the wife and other son do) BUT we really do not know their story and we don't really know them.

Of course this is a road trip where the son learns who his father was and how he became who he is. Of course there is a climatic scene where the father is taken back into his painful past and is mocked by his old arch nemesis and the son stands up for justice. Of course they reach the journey's end and there is no million dollar prize. Of course.

But the best part of the entire movie and so worth the long slow road to get there is the ending. The million dollars wasn't really what the father was after. What he really wanted was to right an old wrong ( stolen compressor), buy a new truck ( the symbol he was still a man), and leave something for his sons. I would guess this is all most men really want ( its a guess because I am not a man)! He confides his three desires to the faithful son...the right person to confide in.

Unlike just about everyone else in the father's life the son does not mock, berate, ridicule or use the old man; he loves him. And the best way to demonstrate his love is by sacrificing himself and giving his father his dignity back. He trades his own car in for the newest truck he can afford putting the title in his fathers's name. He buys a new compressor and loads it up and then lets the aged man drive down the main street of his old home town one more time.

The movie is painful yes but it is also powerful. I have tears now thinking of that scene; why? Because there really isn't a person male or female who cannot be touched by it. Everyone has lost their dignity ( their worth); that comes with a fallen world. And all the self help, self esteem, self improvement, c--p won't give you your dignity back! Dignity must be bestowed; it comes from outside the self.

And I suppose that is what I liked least about the movie in all honesty.I saw too much of myself in the other characters and not in the faithful son. I saw how more often than not I will take away another person's dignity in order to protect my own self interests and it was right there before me, way up close in yes, painful black and white.

This morning I sat down and was reading the Gospel of John but with new eyes. I was seeing it through the lens of Nebraska. There was the Son and what was He doing? ......Bestowing dignity; to a woman caught in adultery, to a blind beggar, to a woman he met by a well, to a young couple on their wedding day, and on it goes. The one faithful Son walked a road bestowing dignity; a road which led right up to a cross where He willingly  sacrificed all of His. And maybe , just maybe all He asks of us is to go out tomorrow and just walk a road and whoever we come across try and bestow a little human dignity on them even if it costs us something.

Last summer I spent some time talking to a church/business consultant. He showed me a graph he uses to depict the life cycle of a church or organization ( kind of scary ....I know). It is the typical mountain graph where you start at the bottom with an idea....grow the idea while climbing the mountain with the peak as your goal. Then starts the decline....all going downhill ending in the demise of the group whereby you need another new idea or vision to start a new climb.

Well it doesn't take a genius to see where this "life cycle" graph comes from. It is the cycle of life most people believe in ...and live in ( scary I know) ! You are born, and you start to grow and all the while you are heading up in the world. At some point you "make it" to the top ( or as far as your ever going to) and suddenly you are "over the hill" and you start the long sure descent into loss and decline ending of course in the grave. Period end of story.

For me there are lots of problems with this "life cycle" graph; the greatest one being that it promises something it cannot by its very nature produce...LIFE. Face it climbing the mountain to get to the top of anything can be very hard....it is even harder to arrive at the top thinking you have it "made for life"...only to find out it is all falling apart and your over the hill! Going down with only death to look forward to is no picnic, no wonder so many people and groups who believe this cycle is life are totally depressed! I would be too if that is all I had before me.

So what is the alternative? What should the graph of LIFE look like? Well I think it follows the very pattern of Life Himself....Jesus Christ (John 1:4). Jesus was born into this world and from the moment of his birth his life was on a descent....down into Egypt....down to a no name place called Galilee....down into a carpenter shop....DOWN not UP! His face was set for his ultimate descent into Jerusalem where he would be lowered into a pit ( Psalm 88) the night before his crucifixion only to go down further and be nailed to a Roman cross ( that is as low as one could go). This was the ordeal of going down into death which his entire life had been focused on. And because he was faithful there is not and end of story but a beginning...not a new idea but a new Life and a new Creation( 2 Cor. 5:17).

Easter should be the greatest day of the year because it proclaims Resurrection; death does not win ...the grave was empty! So what does this look like for us two thousand years after the Resurrection; after Jesus' victory over death?

Well, let's follow Christ on his journey...the true hero journey. We are born and cross a threshold into this world and the truth is from that moment we are descending into the valley of the shadow. There are lots of tests and trials along the way( can I hear an amen?); we meet allies who come along side of us but we also encounter enemies. We are following Christ's life but we are not alone for He gives us a mentor, the Holy Spirit; who provides us with spiritual gifts and the wisdom we need on this perilous descent. Finally we come into an ordeal, the likes of which we have never known...the inmost cave of the journey, ( the bottom of the valley). There is a deep truth to be revealed in this place where we have arrived and feel so lost and alone; it is unique to each and everyone of us. There is a truth the Father and Son want us to know; perhaps it is the revelation of just who we are ( think Simba seeing his father in the water); or a task which we have been appointed( think Frodo in Rivendell). Whatever it is it will require a death...a death to self ( Galatians 2:20).

Having come through the ordeal we are on the road back; we are living a resurrection life and we carry an elixir with us that can bring life and healing to others. ( Remember now, Jesus' victory over death was left to the church to be implemented by the church...John 20:21-22)This is the time of ascent...think of coming up the other side of the valley. Our physical "death" is not down into a grave of eternal nothing, it is crossing the final threshold and a glorious ascension into the presence of the Lord.

If you want to see a great visual of this go to see the movie Gravity. ( Spoiler alert...don't read the rest of this paragraph unless you want to!) The most glorious scene in the movie is Sandra Bullock's return to earth...glorious balls of fire...she passes through a threshold and is baptized ...removes the old garment and comes to new life in new creation...on Earth! This is the glorious promise of the gospel....we shall all be changed in the twinkling of an eye...( 1Cor. 15:51-52) receiving our new resurrection bodies....which will be GLORIOUS! ( As you can see we can't get enough of glory, neither could Jesus, His glory was revealed on the cross.)

So which life pattern would you rather be living? The world's "life cycle" or the Life Journey of Jesus Christ? For me there is no comparison. I will be turning 65 next week. I can feel from the "world" their interpretation of what this age means....your old, your diminishing, your way over the hill, all you have to look forward to is loss and death, your done....the end. But I am living in a very different story because of Christ. I have great joy. Joy is the life of heaven which means I am present tense receiving life from the age to come. Since I am already in the Kingdom I am not diminishing but actually increasing in....yes...glory. I feel very much like one of those flaming balls passing through the final threshold and on a wild ride. ....which again is glorious. Will things begin to shake, rattle and fall apart? You bettcha! That is part of the ride...but it all ends in Glory! And that ending is only the beginning..............

I watched the news last night even though I really didn't want to. I knew it would be filled with endless accounts of Monday's shooting spree at the Naval Yard in Washington DC. Sure enough they started releasing the victim's identities and showing interviews with their loved ones. A daughter's tearful testimony grabbed my attention....she did not want her father remembered as a victim of some crazy shooter...he was her father, her dad and she wanted that story to be his legacy not the one which tragically took his life.

This is a powerful statement. What she was in essence saying is that her father had a story....one she and her sisters and her mother had been privileged to inhabit. She knew him as a person not a mug shot. Her memory banks are filled with treasures of golden moments of life shared with this man. Her body was imprinted with his hugs from the moment she was born and she grew up learning to read his face knowing what every little expression meant. She knows the kind of cologne he wore and will spend the rest of her life being taken off guard when she suddenly captures a whiff of it on a stranger.

She lived in his world, his story and what she was so tearfully trying to communicate was how this world filled with so many different dimensions; not just the five senses of taste, touch, sight, smell and hearing, but a world with dimensions of love, life, memory, and joy had now in an instant all been reduced to a mug shot on a screen. A robust life flattened out into something she could not even begin to grasp; and so her tearful plea to remember him as a dad not a victim.

Her words are true and good and precious. We should honor them but we should understand that this truth of "a person not a mug shot" goes far beyond the victims of tragic events. This is the great tragedy at the heart of a fallen world. This is what death does....it takes all the dimensions ( and we cannot possibly know how many) of what God originally intended for His children, all the fullness of life and flattens it, crushes it, extinguishes it....leaving at best only a mug shot; a grotesque caricature of the real person. We have a lot of walking mug shots wandering around. I would bet money that the perpetrator of this tragedy had been a dead man walking for quite sometime.

So what are we to do? Just roll over and say eat, drink and be merry for tomorrow we die? Are we just to throw our hands up and turn off the news like I wanted to because we don't want to be confronted with more senseless acts of violence? Are we just to accept that tomorrow there will be another tragedy and the next day another and so let's all just numb ourselves with the painkiller of our own individual choice? ( We are numbing ourselves....one hundred thousand mug shots have come out of Syria and we hardly blink an eye.)

No I say emphatically we are not. Why? Because God did not leave His world, His creation in a fallen state. On the contrary He entered in to it, in a Person, in a Story, in a Life, and that Life walked straight into the deepest darkest Death for us all. The Resurrection of the Son of God Jesus Christ is the sign that death has been defeated and a new kind of life ...eternal life is now being infused into the broken fragments of this world bringing New Creation ( 2 Corinthians 5:17).

I know for some of you the moment you read the name Jesus Christ your heart sank......"Oh you're getting religious...Darn!!!!" That is Death speaking...for death always tries to reduce Jesus Christ to a mug shot not a person and certainly not God in the Flesh.

So here is the point to all of this.... you have to get back into your Father's Story and inhabit it and not believe the lie that it's over. I write this not just to the "lost" but to the "saved" as well. Let me say it again....you have to get back into your Father's Story and inhabit all the dimensions of His glory, His grace, and His love. I can promise you this....if you get to know Him as intimately as this daughter knew her father wonderful things will begin to happen to you; not least of which you will begin to see the other as your heavenly Father see him or her and always has....as a person not a mug shot.

Jesus bestowed the dignity of personhood on broken, crushed, flattened out individuals. He listened to their stories....He was acquainted with their sufferings; he bore their grief and carried their sorrows. We who are called "Christian" are called to do no less. So perhaps the very first step is to turn off our television ( or other screen devices) and starting right in our very own home, neighborhood, or workplace begin the journey of following Jesus and becoming the means by which He continues through the power of the Holy Spirit to bestow the dignity of personhood; the means by which He continues to defeat death and bring LIFE!

What you encounter,recognize or discover depends to a large degree on the quality of your approach. Many of the ancient cultures practiced careful rituals of approach. An encounter of depth and spirit was preceded by careful preparation.

When we approach with reverence, great things decide to approach us. Our real life comes to the surface and its light awakens the concealed beauty in things. When we walk on the earth with reverence, beauty will decide to trust us. The rushed heart and arrogant mind lack the gentleness and patience to enter that embrace" John O'Donohue

I came across this quote today and marveled at its beauty, truth, and timeliness for my life. I have just returned from a small town about sixty five miles away which I visit quite frequently....my daughter and her family live there. I have to confess right up front it has never entered my mind to stop and consider how I approach my visits. Truth be told I usually buzz in and out and could easily qualify for being in the "rushed heart" category if not the "arrogant mind"!

This visit was different. I decided to go to this town early to take my dreaded driver's license renewal exam. No four hour wait here, just a short fifteen minute stop and suddenly I had some extra time to to kill. I went to the cemetery (no pun intended). I don't know anyone buried in this cemetery so I was not going to "visit" a grave, I just have grown quite fond of this particular place. Instead of being hidden on the outskirts of town, this cemetery is located right smack dab in the middle. There is an elementary school, a YMCA, and some beautiful homes riming its borders, all making the silent statement that death is very much a part of life.

So I pulled into this quiet spot and parked under the shade of a large oak tree with no real agenda on my mind other than to sit and wait. Without realizing it I was approaching my upcoming family visit with reverence; the very quality of my approach was being transformed by this unusual pause in a holy place.

There is nothing like a cemetery to pull you out of a "rushed heart and arrogant mind" state of being. Try it! "As we are, you will be" cry out all the names on those stone markers. No one escapes passing through the thin veil separating time and eternity...very humbling. As for rushing; generations are on display here...years and years and years...centuries even, and the question arises in my heart "what's all the hurry"?

My family visit was very different this time and until I read John O'Donohue's words this morning I did not know why. Now I realize those moments of approach I passed in the cemetery brought to light the concealed beauty in many things. A verse of scripture was  highlighted on one of those graves; a verse I sorely needed to see and know. And later the concealed beauty was revealed in my daughter and grandchildren sharing a meal together and watching a beautiful sunset. Great things came forward and I was embraced. Yes the visit was very different.

These words challenge me to examine how I approach so many things in my life. Do I approach a new day with reverence? Or am I rushed and arrogant taking it for granted? Do I approach another human being with reverence? or am I rushed and arrogant concerned only with myself? Do I approach God with reverence? Or am I rushed and arrogant wanting only a quick fix for one of my problems?

Read the first line again.....What you encounter, recognize, or discover depends to a large degree on the quality of your approach. How will you approach life tomorrow? In a rushed and arrogant state of mind? Or are you willing to try a new approach, to pause with reverence and be grateful for one more day?

I have a young friend who recently was cast into a small part in a local production of Les Miserables. As if this wasn't exciting enough guess who came to see it and guess who she got to meet? No, not any of those people.....she got to meet Rolfe-from The Sound of Music. Don't ask me why he was there I don't know the details, but I was fascinated that she called him Rolfe-from The Sound of Music. We all know who Rolfe is or rather was; the cute seventeen year old who sang the famous song "16 going on17" in the Gazebo to Liesl and then betrayed the Von Trapp family after he joined the Nazi party (which is why we both love and hate him).

After hearing how my friend referred to him as Rolfe-from The Sound of Music making it his given name rather than saying "I met Daniel Truhitte"; I couldn't help wonder if he liked going through life as Rolfe-from The Sound of Music. When he was cast in the role did he know the movie would become one of the most beloved films of all time? Did he sign up for being forever fixed in the public imagination as a seventeen year old Austrian singing a catchy tune? Did he realize he would spend the rest of his life being introduced as Rolfe-from The Sound of Music? Maybe yes...maybe no. Of course this may have been wonderful for him, maybe he would rather be Rolfe than Daniel who knows? But it has to be somewhat difficult to age gracefully when every stranger you meet cannot understand why you don't look seventeen anymore and they are secretly disappointed. Your Rolfe????Okay...loved the movie!

At the same time I was pondering these questions I went to see Fox Searchlight's new release The Way Way Back ( which I highly recommend). The movie opens with a slouching awkward fourteen year old boy sitting in the way way back seat of a classic station wagon. He is going on vacation with his mother, her new boyfriend, and the boyfriend's teenage daughter. In the first scene the boyfriend Trent looks at Duncan in the rear view mirror and asks the youth to rate himself by picking a number between one and ten. You can literally feel Duncan's discomfort at being asked to put a number on himself. First refusing he eventually succumbs to Trent's goading and selects a safe choice, the number six; to which the older man replies "I think you're a three". Ouch!!!

Fortunately the movie is a hero's journey and does not leave Duncan in the loser role Trent wants to cast him in. Escaping the house one day the boy crosses a threshold and enters the new world of "Water Wizz"; the local waterpark. Here he meets his mentor Owen the waterpark manager, makes allies of the other employees and passes tests that prove he is much more than a three. The best line of the film comes toward the end when Duncan opens his wound to Owen and repeats what Trent said to him; this time the "older man" speaks truth to Duncan and says "that's about him and has nothing to do with you". Wow!!! That's about him and has nothing to do with you!

So my question is Who cast you into the role your playing" Are you like Rolfe living out of a false persona because at some vulnerable age you were offered this chance to become a "somebody" if you would only take the part? Or did some older and supposedly "wiser" person label you a three or speak ugly words over you which in your youthful insecurity you accepted as fact? Did you ever have a mentor who knew you, loved you and was able to expose the lies and give you truth?

More important than any of these questions is this one: What role did God want to cast you in? If you are in any other role than the one He chose and created you for, your not only missing life with Him....your in the wrong story.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6qoaVUdbWMs

A writer I respect, Ian Morgan Cron posted this poem on his Facebook page.

   The Healing Time

                                                Finally on my way to yes
                                                I bump into
                                                all the places
                                                where I said no
                                                to my life
                                                all the untended wounds
                                                the red and purple scars
                                                those hieroglyphs of pain
                                                carved into my skin, my bones,
                                                those coded messages
                                                that send me down
                                                the wrong street
                                                again and again
                                                where I find them
                                                the old wounds
                                                the old misdirections
                                                and I lift them
                                                one by one
                                                close to my heart
                                                and I say    holy
                                                          holy.

                                                               © Pesha Joyce Gertler

I was deeply moved by this poem and my heart was captured by a few words in particular....red and purple scars...hieroglyphs of pain....holy. What happened next I can only describe. I saw a scene in the new DreamWorks movie The Croods ( if you have not seen the movie its ok!). The caveman father Grug is sitting with his family in their dark cave and he is telling them stories which he then illustrates on the walls of the cave. All of his stories end in death so he puts an emphatic The End to each one by placing a large red handprint on it. The effect is dramatic for when you look at the walls of the cave you don't see the family stories...you see large red handprints. Death has won, life has been blotted out.

But....my mind raced to another cave thousands of years ago, one that actually looked much like the Crood's cave. It had every story of death ever told for it was the very home of Death. I saw that The Son of God Jesus Christ went down into Death's dark cave and spent three days there. What He did we cannot put into words but we know that when He came forth from that grave He brought Life and Light and New Creation. Death was not the end of the story; Christ wrote Holy over it all!

If you are In Christ you no longer abide in Death's dark cave of fear. Every story of your life illustrated on those walls the Son of God inscribed HOLY over and it can never be erased for it was written in His blood. Death holds no power over you. Those stories have no power over you. Your purple and red scars, hieroglyphs of pain have been healed, redeemed....marked Holy to the Lord.

Can you see your cave, your body, your life, your heart, your soul; your story is holy to the Lord? You are a Holy one, a Saint marked out by the Holy Spirit created in Christ Jesus for life in His New Creation. When you see this you are finally on your way to saying Yes...Amen...so be it. You are on your way to the true healing time.

I don't think it is an accident that Dreamworks new animated movie The Croods arrived in theaters just before Easter. And before anyone jumps to the conclusion that I am going to bash the movie and the time of its release let me assure you I am NOT. As a matter of fact I think one of the ways you could learn a valuable lesson about the real meaning of Jesus' life, death and resurrection would be to go see this movie. Okay, some of you are reeling now or worse, and asking how could an animated movie about cavemen have anything to do with Jesus. Well here goes....

The meaning of Jesus' life, death, resurrection and ascension has been reduced ever since the Reformation to a gospel of "Jesus died for your sins so you can go to heaven when you die", or as Dallas Willard calls it a gospel of "sin management". A gospel which focuses more on death than on life. I do not have the time here to go into detail but let me just say the Gospel of Jesus Christ is much larger and more wonderful because it focuses on LIFE. Yes, He dies for the sins of the world but He rose to bring the Life of the New Creation; a concept which unfortunately has been lost to much of the Christian Church especially in the West.

So here it is in a nutshell.....Jesus proclaimed the Coming of the Kingdom of God....the reign of God when all sin and corruption of the Old Creation would be judged and dealt with. He died on the cross as the King of Israel bringing to a climax the story of Gods plan of redemption through Israel for the world. He rose from the dead as the first alive of the New Creation signifying the inbreaking of the New Creation and inviting others to follow Him into that Creation. He ascended as King of Kings and now reigns from the right hand throne of God. We live in the "already and not yet" of His Kingdom. It has begun....it is here....it will come in its fullest at a time known only to God.

So what does this have to do with The Croods?

Well if you have eyes to see and ears to hear you can see a beautiful picture of this "inaugurated eschatology"...fancy words meaning the inauguration of the "last days" that began when Jesus rose from the dead. The Old Creation is ending...you see this beautifully in the movie...the world or darkness, fear and death is coming to an end. There is one last family ( interesting that the Old Creation started with one first family) the Croods a pun on crude obviously. The daughter Eep ( a pun on Eve or Eek whichever you prefer) hates the dark and reaches with a prayer for the light...and the LIGHT comes into her darkness. I won't spoil the movie but the whole theme is leaving the Old Creation and following the Light into the New Creation. It is no accident that at the beginning of the movie the family has spent three days in their cave of death and then the Light comes. Nor is it just a coincidence that the light is symbolized by fire; reminiscent of following the pillar of fire in Exodus which foreshadowed following the One who baptizes with fire leading the greatest Exodus of all time ( John 1:33).

The phrase that sums up the entire movie is "riding the sun into tomorrow". The word tomorrow takes on a whole new meaning as not just another day of survival but of the Day that will never end, the Day of New Creation. The film makes relevant in ways we have too easily forgotten the urgency of the Gospel. The Old Creation is crumbling and has been for two thousand years...we must go to the Mountain of God that is already on the horizon by following the Light of Jesus Christ who came into the darkness to deliver us. So for this Easter there is a beautiful metaphor of the already and not yet, of "riding the Son into tomorrow". Go see Dreamworks The Croods and be blessed.