[Re]visiting

I've been re-reading some of Jack Caputo's stuff and come across this which I felt was relevant:

"When a stranger is lost in darkness, God makes his face to shine upon the face of the stranger; when the stranger is endangered by the desert heat, God leads him into the shelter and shade of his loving care. The self is already turned to God, who has in turn turned the self to the stranger, deflected it in a certain way, ordered and commanded the self to the stranger, who bears God's trace and seal. Being turned to the other means a devotion to God that responds without desire for reciprocity, in a love without eros, in a relation without correlation and reciprocity, like the non-reciprocity, the interruption of the symmetry and commensurability that constitutes the gift, or death itself. A-Dieu, to-God, to-the-infinite,to-the-tout autre, who is a positive infinity, an infinite yes, an unlimited oui, an event. To respond to the event is to say yes to what seperates itself, to welcome and greet what seperates itself, whose departure is not different from its coming, and this "deference" is the breath of the a-Dieu."

What he says here reminds me that God has created, or is, an infinite yes. An ever influentially present yes to and in life. Life that encompasses humanity, creation and the cosmos. A yes to life that was manifested through Jesus. When we respond to the yes, then a relationship is transformed. And as Caputo suggests, one of the foundations for such a transformed relationship in non-reciprocity. We love God in a selfless, honest, way that comes to expect nothing back from that which we give to. But in turn, as God loves us even more, he gives - not in return nor reciprocity - to us. Just as he gave us redemption, we have to realize it's present yes and accept it - the gift. I wonder how many people don't not think about spirituality, their relationship, to God reciprocally?

jimmy

P.S. I think this has something to say about a doctrine of prosperity as well. E.g. Creflo Dollar; be debt free and God will bless you - is this not a relationship based on reciprocity? Does it undermine love? How can we come to expect prosperity from God? Perhaps this is something I will look into.

A Thought

As a house near-by was playing loud christian worship music I was thinking on how that made me feel. I don't like it. I don't like that sort of good feely feelings stuff that often comes with ....well....playing christian worship music loud. But then I'm not going to look down on someone who does i.e. the people in the near-by flat. I find myself perhaps a bit too post-modern for that. Rather, if it works for them, and they are enjoying a closer relationship to God through playing loud christian worship music, then do it.

However this also brings up images of church, christian social groups, small groups, and church life. I'm not really into that either. I wonder if it's cause it takes more time to be involved in stuff like that than it does to build friendships with other non-christians? I mean I like church, and I go to church. But should we be spending more time in church than with non-believers? Christian religion can often become a comfortable ghetto. The cheesiness of christian religion reeks of complacency, and it is this that I guess I react to. Perhaps I react too strongly though and don't give some areas of christian religion enough time to prove itself. Most of the time though I'm just thinking about how there is still more good to be done in the world. Especially in some sermons. But then, unavoidably, I am a hypocrite.

Could Anything Flabbagast Jesus?

Could someone render Jesus speechless? What is there that someone could say? What is there that someone can do? Is it possible? I think so. But there is something necessary to understand first. You see, Briar (my wife) can be an all or nothing chick - which is great (especially in photography). Things get done really well. So, for example, when the house gets a clean, it's not a simple vacuum and dishes wash. Nope, the house gets something just short of a makeover. Everything gets done. When a photo is getting taken, it gets taken perfect. When a fish is getting filleted, every last piece of flesh is utilised. When a tree is chainsawed, she will get it done perfect. From the place of cut, to the place the tree lands, to the size of the wood to be carried - each piece cut to the specifications of the carrier. This is my wife.

So can something make Jesus speechless? Well I was thinking the other day, I could see him speechless. In fact, this was the closest scenario I could think of. Imagine that Jesus has come back, and has been back for sometime. Forget a complete rapture of the saved. Rather, a world-wide protection by God from Satan and his minions. What has been going on is an epic battle between good and evil. One much anticipated for all history. I mean, when Jesus died on the cross, that was him throwing the gloves on the floor, looking Satan in the eye and saying "I'll give you an hour to gather your best team and let's take this outside." The hour is up, and the fight is in full swing. Not just for humans, but for all of God's good creation. This fight is global, from NZ to America to Scots Base. But there are two arch-enemies dueling it out on Mt Zion. It's Jesus vs. Satan and Satan is getting the beat down. No one else, angels nor demons, are fighting. But all are transfixed on this fight. Finally with Satan lying on the ground prostrate, absolutely beaten and his sword metres away, Jesus holds back the historically expected killing strike, blowing the minds of everyone watching. And instead he stands there and takes in the moments he has as he prepares himself to show Satan and the world a love and grace that only God can, and does harbour. And when all are silent, and an atmosphere of anticipation is present, from out of no where leaps Briar. She scoops up Satan's sword, and in the flash of an eye drives it through his throat dealing a killing blow. Stands up, brushes her fiery red hair back, looks Jesus in the eye and says "Look, like I tell my husband, no half measures! Either do it properly, or don't do it at all!" And with that, I think Jesus would be flabagasted. The most anticipated moment in all of history, one that makes Jesus' redemptive death look a miniscule blip in the life of it all, taken by my wife Briar.

I know I'd be shocked.

Cheers.Jimmy.

Two Interesting Points

If anyone watches Battlestar Galactica here is a review posted by Christianity Today.

For anyone else who doesn't care about Battlestar Galactica and/or Christianity Today, I read these two interesting points of view on the TV series 24. The question asked by Scot was "Is there any point in watching 24? What sort of conversations does the program start?" Thus one person replied:

Bob Robinson

There is absolutely NO reason to watch 24

...Unless you want to give up your commitment to nonviolence

...Unless you want to endorse torture as a means for dealing with terrorists

...Unless you want to consume entertainment that glories in killing and destruction

...Unless you want to want to disavow your Christian commitment to loving your enemies

And another person responded in kind:

Mike

There is every reason to watch 24

....because a commitment to nonviolence doesn’t extend to those who only understand violence and won’t stop their violent acts

....because torture as a means to dealing with terrorists when innocent lives are hanging in the balance is understood

...because entertainment that reflects the noble reality of good triumphing over evil can be understood just as well in modern cinema as in the Bible

....because Christian love of my enemies does not give me permission to let my enemies violently take human life. Life is sacred.

I'm more with Mike than Bob. You can read it here.

Jimmy.

The Yes Man

**This may spoil the movie...a little...**

So we watched the 'Yes Man' tonight with Jim Carrey in it. Apart from one scene with the grandma it is a funny movie. I had a few good laughs. Got thinking though on the way home about how that movie could relate to christianity [cause every movie relates some how...]. I guess I would describe the Yes meeting as the church, the head speaker, Terrence, as the pastor, and the covenant made as entering the Christian faith. From there the abuse of the 'Yes' word could be equivilant to high standing morals (such the most christians are supposed to have). While it leads to a better quality of life, there is a tension between choosing to live the moralistic life and living true to feelings and desires. Perhaps best articulated as this: we don't need to say WWJD at every decision made in life and force ourselves to live that way. Fortunately Jim Carrey comes to understand this.

A Phenomenon of God

Different objects, and even the same object, can draw different meanings. Take for instance the flower of a plant. Many people (commonly our female counter-parts) take pleasure in the flower of a rose. Why? I guess usually because of the smell, colour, shape, and the cultural significance of the rose. A red rose from a boyfriend to a girlfriend can signify love and romance. However, a red rose is also often used at the funeral of a person in loving memory of them. The variation also streches across cultures. One persons flower of beauty is another persons weed. Some look at a flower with delight, another with disgust. Meaning seems to come from humanity - not the rose. So how do we interpret God? Or, how does God manifest himself to people (I have in mind un-believers here)? Is one persons observation of the manifestation of God beauty, while to another it is disgust? One would assume (and I think NZ people do believe this) that God manifests himself in a favourable way that would bring a person into a full [believing] relationship with him. So is every manifestation of God a good one? Or, how do we know that what we observe is actually God and not a human interpretation placing God in the event? It doesn't take a long look into contemporary protestantism to notice the many denominations and doctrines. How can one manifestation of God be contrary to another? For example, those who believe that the Gifts of the Spirit ended in the first century vs. those who believe it's in full swing today. I think there are two sides to this. I think there is the, what I will temporarily dub, 'the external' manifestation of God - where God is actually active in an event. And then there is (also temporarily dubbed) 'the internal' operation of God. That he is working in the interpretations of a person as they observe the external manifestation of God, or as they place God in an event. The external requires the internal observation, whether the observer believes the external manifestation is God or not, God is still working in the interpretation. Whereas the internal does not need the external, as observers can place God in an event, regardless of God's actual manifestation.

In regards to the seemingly contrary nature of God and the Church (i.e. Spiritual Gifts, Calvinism vs. Armenianism vs. Open Theism vs. Process Theism), I think it is to be remembered that there is a mystery to God. As humans we are unable to speak adequately of God, and therefore must not assign our beliefs to one logical way of thinking about God. It would seem that God isn't overly concerned with fitting into the logic of humans - hence Jesus as flying in the face of this - and would rather leave us in mystery as we observe and try to take part in the unfolding plans of God.

As a side note I think that external manifestations are more what people look for. They are defintely a more conscious awareness of God. This is opposed to the internal which is a more unconcious operation of God, though, I guess, we can be aware of the conviction/discernment of the Spirit in some circumstances without any external manifestation.

The Tension

There has been a tension within the churches over history as they swing between Unity and Purity. The reformation and consequent denominations (i.e. Anabaptists) are examples of a move to purity. From what I've seen we are currently swinging in the side of unity. Leading protestants and catholics are looking at finding unity between the two as well as lots of other inter-faith talk that's going on. There seems to be more free churches (those that call themselves non-denominational) who, at least theologically, state that they are part of the same big family - church. Most young people I meet are happy going to any denomination.

More recently I have been thinking about a tension between Grace and Holiness. I'm not exactly sure where the churches currently swing on this; perhaps they are at the bottom of the pendulum swinging left to grace? An example of a church swinging the way of holiness would be a church who see's themself as seperate from the world. Church membership requires various hurdles and hoops, and there is a clear definition of who is saved and who isn't - usually done through confessions etc. But then there seems to be this post-modern push of the church towards grace. Perhaps the Emerging Church represents an aspect of this as they focus on reaching culture in whatever form that may be required. The belief that there is no set of proper ways, but that God will accept all types of worship, theologies, beliefs and people. However, this is still something I'm workin out.

A Relationship of 3: Faith, Theology, & Philosophy

As I continue marching towards the end of this book, Graven Ideologies by Bruce Benson (I've had to stop and start due to exams and stuff) I reached some stuff on Martin Heidegger, faith, theology and philosophy. I'm just gonna write an excerpt below:

"Faith is the lived experience of the Christian believer, mediated by revelation and Christian history. Theology is "the science that faith motivates and justifies" (Heidegger, Pathmarks, 1998). Thus the task of theology is to understand the experience of faith. Faith is the content and theology merely supplies the form. Now, "if faith would totally oppose a conceptual interpretation, then theology would be a thoroughly inappropriate means of grasping its object, faith" (Heidegger, Pathmarks, 1998). Yet Heidegger clearly thinks that faith does not oppose (and should not oppose) the attempt of theology to make sense of faith. For faith needs the "formation" supplied by theology." pg 184.

So then what of philosophy? How does that come into the mix? Benson writes that he see's at least two roles that Heidegger outlines. Firstly, it helps us understand the experience of faith. There are some things that remain particular to Christian faith - i.e. guilt. He believes that philosophy can explain a more general human experience of guilt (as opposed to the particular) that does not replace the faith experience, but creates a larger experiential context and broader understanding.

Secondly, theology is not a philosophy-free zone. Heidegger points out that theology is founded in faith, but it also use what he calls "free operations of reason" which by Benson's read lends itself towards philosophy (perhaps more specifically, metaphysics). But this "free operations of reason" is not some disembodied logic that seeks to disemble theology, but corrective reasoning that clarifies theology.

So all up faith experience is the content, theology is the form that is founded in faith and draws from reason, philosophy supplies this reason and is able to provide a corrective by being able to observe the more general human experience rather than just the particular faith experience.

Does God Have A Head?

As Briar and I were flying over NZ last night I was looking down on the land and wondering if this is what it is like for God to be looking down on us. At least by my experience most people - including myself - tend to think of God as 'out there somewhere,' even though at the same time we try to think of him around us. So does he have a head up above the clouds looking down on us? Or is he an invisible Spirit around us in the world? Or is it the Holy Spirit that is around us in spirit form while God and Jesus both have heads up in the skies talking somewhere? Or are head's anthropomorphisms and God really is best described as a spirit that is both here and there, while Jesus remains in human form? Or has Jesus rid himself of his body and taken on Spirit form and resides around us too? Does the difference between the Trinity come down to function then as all three are Spirits? What does it mean for humans to have a body then if Jesus got rid of his?

I guess what I think is that God does not necessarily have a head (although he may do - I've never seen him, except I know Jesus was a human). So I describe him as something like a Spirit, but I do this understanding that the description of Spirit probably doesn't do justice to what God actually is (which I am guessing is something we aren't able to comprehend). I think Jesus remains in his human form, and that when the second coming happens and everything is wrapped up we will remain in a renewed human form. This is opposed to the idea that we become spirits in heaven or leave this body behind and move into eternity. God and Jesus are somewhere, I dunno where, and the Holy Spirit is what is in us and around us. The Holy Spirit connects us and the world to Jesus, and Jesus connects us to God. Yet weirdly we have to remember that they are at the same time all one. So I dunno how to reconcile a God in which we describe as one third human, and two thirds Spirit, but I'm sure God has that sussed and one day, when he reveals himself to us, we'll understand.

A Chat with a Hare Krishna

I ended up having a good yarn with a Hare Krishna today while taking a DVD back to the store. She was quite intelligent in the sense that she could explain some underlying philosophies and beliefs behind much of the religion. It got me thinking though as I walked home. If faith is the overflow of reason then it always seems to come down to what a person wants to believe. I am a strong Christian, she was a strong Hare Krishna. She could argue relatively consistently how her religion operates, I could talk the same about mine. How can we determine the difference? Well I believe that God is active in the world, I could talk about the Spirit and things I've seen. She could also come see them with me. A traditional Christian would say that the power of God is the defining difference. But this does not seem so, without God directly convicted her of his reality, then she will continue interpreting the work of the Holy Spirit as the work of Krishna or some other being. So what can I do about this? Nothing except allow God to do his stuff through me, I can't convince nor save her. God has to do that, until she finds God revealed to her then she will continue to interpret the world from her own worldview.

Philip

P.S. Briar and I are going south for my sisters birthday so posts will be a little irregular over the weekend - if there are any at all.

Positive Theology

Positive theology (by my understanding) is 'how to speak about God' - which seems to be a good question in itself. While negative theology is talking about what God is not, we reach a place where we talk about what God is. For example, God is sovereign over all things or God is limited by the bounds of time. This seems the more traditional and common approach to talk about God. The bible is read, and a statement about God is made. "God parted the Red Sea and therefore controls the natural elements."

However it also seems that too much positive talk also risks the creation of idols rather than recognizing God. God is not an object waiting to be defined, he is a subject in which we are to try understand. I think the key is to not hold too strongly to a definition of God, but allow fluidity and remain open to change. As humans I feel that we are unable to adequately talk about God, but find ourselves in a position where we are forced to. Positive Theology will never capture everything that God is because it is always limited to human language. Thus we must remain fluid and aware of the inadequacy of any sort of speech about God. The positive and negative should be used to temper each other.

Canaan-o-cide & Morality

This post is partially inspired by a post I wrote on another blog and part from a conversation I had with Briar the other day. It seems hard to deal with texts like Joshua 5 & 6 - i.e. is genocide ok? Recently I was listening to a lecture on morality and the lecturer talked about the possibility of viewing morality in 3 categories:

1) Autonomous: equality, rights, freedom.
2) Community: interdependance, duty, status, hierarchy.
3) Divinity: purity, sin, sanctity.

Apparently Autonomous Morality is what Western philosophers call morality. It is highly rational (Kantian morality is an example of this), e.g. is it ok for two adults who aren't married to sleep together? Autonomous morality would say yes, [Christian] Divinity Morality would say no, Community Morality would ask 'what does our culture and traditions say about this?' The West mostly operates from an autonomous morality, with a mix of the other two. But what does this have to do with genocide in the Old Testament?

I think it's more of a hermeneutical awareness. It has to be noticed that the Israelites didn't work from a rational autonomous morality like the West does. They were Community and Divinity; more concerned about maintaining the commands of the Holy Yahweh [God] than rationalising everything out. I guess I want to note two things here; 1) the Canaan-o-cide is a fulfillment of prophecy made many years before, it was going to come to pass anyway. It is said their inequities had come to fruition and this would have definitely influenced the Israelites if they lived side-by-side.
2) I'm not sure how else they were going to take the land, perhaps the inhabitants would pack up and move off? A natural disaster wipe them out first ready for the Israelites to walk in?

What ever the case God commanded the genocide, and [textually] the Israelites had no quelms executing the order. Which brings me to an interesting thought - how much was God accommodating the development of Israelite e.g. philosophically, psychologically, emotionally, spiritually etc. We are riding on the back of thousands of years of development and experience. We can learn in 3 years at Uni what initially took people their lifetimes. As we are still developing so were the Israelites, they hadn’t moved through an ‘enlightenment’ period which emphasized rationality. My guess is that they still thought in what we would call ‘primitive’ thinking, their conclusions perhaps not making a lot of rational sense e.g. the stoning of a family over stolen goods [Achan]. If you get what I mean here, I wonder how much God accommodated them at their stage of development. He operated in a way that made sense to them, but this way of operating is not indicative of all of God, nor revealing all he is nor how he actually operates if we could somehow manage full comprehension of God. My suspicion is that he continues to operate now in a way that makes some sense to us – which is different as we operate differently to the Israelites. For the sake of this post I might continue this line of thought in another post.

Machen on McLaren: A New Kind of Liberal?

Here is an interesting (while slightly lengthy) article on McLaren. He looks at a number of McLaren's beliefs; like 'living like Jesus is more important than believing in him.' But I'll let you guys read it.

Check it out here.

Philip

Negative Theology

Negative theology, by my understanding, is not speaking about God in a bad way. Rather, it is about how to not speak about him. We define God by saying what he is not. For example; God is not fickle, God is not hateful of all humans, God is not tempted by sin. I think that this is useful to keep in mind as a balance to the more traditional positive theology which will be a post coming soon.

However, to focus too much on 'how to not speak of God' is to create an idol rather than recognize God. One - perhaps influenced by the likes of Nietzsche - can take it too far and say that we can actually say nothing about God. This could be motivated by ideas such as; we cannot truly know 'God' or that any talk about God is just speculation - or both of these. It could also come from the idea that any human definition of God would put humans above God, rather than below. Even by saying what God is not, we are implying what he is, and therefore defining him.

Prince Caspian

Briar and I finally watched Prince Caspian last night. Despite what others have said I think it was alot better than the first. Mainly because the four of them could actually fight and contributed to the war. Edmund (if that's how it is spelt) was the man throughout, I think he is definitely developing his ninja skills.
When the Prince and Peter were arguing and about to fight I had to comment to Briar; Peter is the conservative - he wants the Narnians to rule and the Talmarines to bugger off. The Prince is the liberal - being a Talmarine himself he supports a Talmarine presence in the country. Both of them fought so much over their ideals they left little room for Aslan. We just needed a Karl Barth in there who could bring the liberal and the conservative together with a primary focus on Aslan.

Cheers

Philip

What is Classical Theism?

I recently did a post on Open Theism, so here is Classical Theism (or Orthodoxy). Once again this is my understanding of it and feel free to correct or question it. This view has been the dominate view since the beginning of the church and perhaps before then. Some people track its roots back to Plato and other Greek philosophers. They came up with a bunch of propositions that they thought would be needed in order for God to be truly 'God'. This is also affirmed throughout church history as well; for example Calvinism and even Arminianism to a point affirms many of these.

- God is eternal.
- God is absolute.
- God is all knowing.
- God is all powerful.
- God is perfect.
- God is the cause of the universe, but he himself remains uncaused.
- God is unaffected by other beings.

God doesn't need us, but we need him. He is outside of time, and as such knows everything past, present and future. He is unchanging, thus prayer is not so much us appealing for him to change his mind or intervene in a situation - because he has already determined what will happen - so much as prayer is about changing us; prayer helps us understand what God is doing. He has the ability to do whatever he likes, whenever he likes because he has complete sovereignty over everything.

When this is put side by side with Open Theism it is easy to see the differences and tensions between them. I find myself more on this side of the fence as opposed to Open Theism, but I like dancing with people from all sorts of walks and am trying to constantly challenge classical theism. This way of understanding God can seem quite sterile and distant.

Cheers

Philip

The Supremacy of Christ and ....... [fill the blank]

A little while ago I was reading a book by John Piper and Justin Taylor The Supremacy of Christ in a Postmodern World and posted on it. Well I've just come across the audio files of the conference that the book was based on. I haven't listened to them, but I'm sure they're good. It's good solid reformist theology type talk (if you like that stuff) as they look at Christ in our postmodern world.

Click here to follow through to them.

Philip

What is Open Theism?

Here I will try and give an honest but brief glimpse at open theism.  Also note that this is my understanding, so if I leave stuff out or get it wrong feel free to comment and correct me.

Open Theism
- God changes.
- God experiences the pain and pleasure of other beings.
- God exists in the 'now'.  That is, he is not timeless.  He does not exist infinitely in the past, present, and future for all eternity.  He only exists in the now and the past.
- Humans are complete free agents.

Largely this views seems to be a reaction to Greek philosophical understandings. The Christian synthesis of Greek philosophy taught that God was unchangeable, unaffected by other beings, outside of time, all knowing, and as a result humans are not complete free agents.  I guess that open theism came from some people who were looking at this and thinking 'what if God's not like this?'  Thus open theism explored the four points listed above and came up with the four most foundational aspects of God:

1) He is living
2) He is personal
3) He is good
4) He is loving

Thus God is a relational God.  This may seem like nothing, but this is the basic understanding of God that is read when reading scripture.  For example, at Mt Sinai Moses appealed to God and God changed his mind (Exodus 32 & 33).  This is opposed to the traditional understanding that God already knew what was going to happen and Moses was just appealing out of necessity of what had already be predetermined.  Thus God did not change his mind, he did not benefit from it, and remained unaffected.  The only people it did affect and benefit were the Israelites and Moses.
   So what we have is a relational understanding of God who exists within the constraints of time.  He exists in the present, ever calculating the future with extreme intelligence that is unlike anything we know of.  As a result humans are complete free agents.  Our actions affect the course of history and God.  Because of the relationality of God he is affected by the pain and pleasures of humans.  There becomes a sense of risk involved in the actions of God as humans are able to refuse to do what is asked.  For example; there was the risk that Jonah would not go to Nineveh.  But God is influencing the world as he is moving it towards the second coming of Christ.
  I guess one of the biggest things about it is that it cuts into God's sovereignty. He cannot do what ever he likes, whenever he like.  He does not have supreme power over all things throughout all time.  He is not outside of time where he is in the past, present, and future at the same time.  Instead he is a relational God who is here now with us.  He is affected by those he loves supremely, and this love he pours out into the world.  He does not know the future, but he lives in a more dynamic relationship with his creations.

I hope this has been helpful.  This is a view that I appreciate, however don't fully imbrace.  I think perhaps that what is said in Open Theism is stuff worth listening to.

For furthur reading:
http://www.opentheism.info
There is also this article written by Jonathan Erdman who did a Master's thesis on Open Theism.

Stay Gold

Philip

World Peace?

I've been thinking about a few things involving how so many people are wanting world peace.  While it is definitely a goal to strive for I also feel that 'world peace' is perhaps epitomized too much.  Genesis 11:1-9 (story of Babel) is what I have in mind here.  This was a bunch of people who all came together to build a tower in self-glorification.  We all know what happened, God managed to see the minuscule idol of the humans and scattered humanity across the earth and confused all their speech - thus the birth of multiple languages.  So in a sense, these guys had achieved world peace with each other, but they were missing something - relationship with God. 
   However, through Christ all believers are united again as one people sharing the same language - the gospel (see Acts 2).  Together as the church it could be said that we represent the unity of all people under the one God following Jesus' second coming.  So what does this mean for 'world peace' in the sense that it is thrown round today?  For believers (and I should say even for non-believers) it is something to strive for, but under the right pretenses.  Jesus taught that we are to live in peace with each other, if this were to occur on a world wide scale there would definitely be 'world peace.'  So peace flowing through a relationship with Christ as we love God and our neighbour is what we should strive for.  Peace without relationship with God is still not enough as evidenced in Genesis 11.  It is by this I mean that 'world peace' is being epitomized.  If it were the epitome, then it would be enough, but it's not - Christ first.

Jimmy

Movies and Toys

Spent a good part of today at Big Boys Toys. Most of it was great, I will post photo's up in next day or so.

A couple of mates and I went and saw May Payne the other day. Was a rather dark movie, I think 95% was set at night, and every outside scene was snowing. Overall I enjoyed it. Afterwards we were talking about some theological themes weaved throughout the movie. I have to admit it was hard to place anything christian, like redemption, in the film because of it's darkness and focus on evil (not that I'm a great film analyst or anything). But one thing did come to mind. It was that if Max Payne was the Christ-like, redemptive figure in the movie he went out against the illusions of the world and Satan. He goes up against this guy Jack Lupino (a crazy, amped up, power hungry, delusional, killing machine) and Lupino dies. Not by Max's doing, but by BB who I will come to next. Lupino represents the illusions of the world, for example power, wealth, possessions, selfishness, all fed by this guy who we call Satan. Through Max's encounter with Lupino, Max reveals the illusion for the shallowness that it is. That it is in fact thin, volatile, and the power that it esteems is, in the end, all in vain.

In this movie BB is Satan, the one feeding Lupino, the illusions, drugs to keep him going on the streets. When Lupino fails to serve him anymore BB shoots him. Max Payne discovers that BB is the cause for all the current grief and loss in his life. This loss is what drives Max's. Perhaps much like a similar loss of relationship drives the redemption plan behind God. Max confronts BB after pushing through many trials and hardships, get's shot multiple times by him, but in the end shots BB. Here he overcomes BB, or Satan. Thus bringing an end to the grief over the loss in his life. However, Max differs to Christ, in that Christ can restore the loss. Max cannot restore his dead family. Christ is about love and restoration, Max was about revenge.

These are just my thoughts, let me know if you guys have any of your own!

Stay Gold

Philip