Couldn't Help Noticing

The Story of All of Us

I sat down on Saturday night to watch a chick flick, with some other chicks, and after tossing up our various options we went for The Story of Us.

It is the tale of one couple's marriage, seen from about 15 years after the “big day”. I watched on as the whole relationship disintegrated literally before our eyes. About halfway through, I turned to my friend and said “It's kind of scary isn't it...”. Scary because of how ordinary the whole scenario was and how easily it seemed like it could be any of us on the screen.

What made me tense throughout the whole film was just observing at how many points there was a decision, be it ever so small, that was made—a decision between working at the relationship and building the marriage, or giving it up as all too hard. I'd wait to see the way each conversation or encounter went, and then sigh when it fell to pieces, as one person or the other dragged up a past grievance, or railed about various inequalities, or just acted like they couldn't be bothered anymore. The state of the relationship was very apparently the result of years of small, “bad” decisions.

The movie made me think again about how living a life for Jesus, and in growing likeness of him, is the product of a million little decisions every day: do I snap now, or do I remind myself “love is patient” and be kind; do I stroll around Cremorne Point, looking at the magnificent houses with water views and luxury yachts, and think “some people are lucky—wish it was me” or take stock and remind myself that “we take nothing with us that we carry in our hands” (Eccl 5:15); do I invite that awkward, but lonely, person to join me and my friends in an outing or decide it's just more fun without the bother...

The consequences may not always be as big as a saved or failed marriage, but our obedience and godliness depends on the small decisions, as well as the big. The good news is that the very power that raised Christ from the dead is available, and indeed necessary, to make us holy in all these things; and we can and should pray for that (Eph 1:15-20, 3:14-21). Don Carson, in his great book A Call to Spiritual Reformation elaborates on the prayer of Ephesians 3:14-21 as a “plea for power—power to be holy, power to think, act and talk in ways utterly pleasing to Christ, power to strengthen moral resolve, power to walk in transparent gratitude to God, power to be humble, power to be discerning, power to be obedient and trusting, power to grow in conformity to Jesus Christ”. The couple from The Story of Us could use some of that, as could we all.

Here we go…

According to the latest Barnabas Fund newsletter:

The Victorian Civil and Administrative Tribunal (VCAT) met this morning (21/4/05) to consider a call to ban Alpha, the well known introductory course to Christianity.

Robin Fletcher, a self described witch, called for the ban under the Racial and Religious Tolerance Act passed in the state of Victoria in 2001. This is the same law that pastors Daniel Scot and Danny Nalliah were convicted under for “inciting hatred” in December 2004. In that case it was hatred against Muslims; in this case, Fletcher claims, it is hatred against witches. “It constitutes a personal danger to my health and safety within the prison system,” he said, citing negative references to witchcraft in the course material. He is currently serving a 10 year prison sentence for sexually abusing two teenage girls.

Lest we forget

On ANZAC Day I went to the dawn ceremony at the foot of the Australian War Memorial in Canberra. From the early hours of the morning, the crowd had been steadily growing, the mass of dark faces punctuated by pinpoints of candlelight. We stood and sang hymns we didn't know very well, listened quietly to various ceremonial niceties (musical and unmusical), reverentially observed the one minute silence and gave our attention to the Right Reverend Dr Tom Frame's address.

He quoted Psalm 112:6:

For the righteous will never be moved;
he will be remembered forever.

and said that the ANZAC legend proved that the righteous will be remembered throughout the ages and that, in another hundred years, people would still be gathering in this place to remember the lives that were lost and the sacrifice that was made.

Unfortunately nothing was said about Jesus who confers his righteousness upon us. And I doubt, because of Romans 3:10-12, that the ANZACs were truly righteous. How sad that we remember as righteous those who were not, but the one—indeed, the only one—who was, we remember not at all.

However, thankfully for us, the Lord is not so fickle nor his memory so short.

(Listen to the dawn service and view the program. (PDF))

An excellent advert

On a billboard on the way to work I saw a picture of an embryo, a baby, and a person with the caption “You are nine months older than you think”.

It's a gentle but powerful reminder that there's no sudden point at which the foetus becomes a human. We were who we were from the moment of conception.

Illustrated Sermon

Creative? Check. Christian? Check.

A promising blend of technology, creativity and Bible reading over at http://www.the-mount.net. The designer, Tilman, has placed the text of The Sermon on the Mount online, within a nice interface that allows anybody to comment, annotate or respond, not only in words but in pictures, not only in pictures but in Flash animations.

I'm not saying that it's going to be useful as a commentary for critical Bible reading any time soon (the site's still quite new, with not too much user input yet), but anything that encourages creativity, in response to the reading of the words of Jesus, gets a thumbs-up in my books.