You Don't Need Wings Or Red Bull To Fly

Last night at our Home Group BBQ, it just so happened that down the end of the table where I happened to be sitting there was a vigorous discussion happening about alternate realities. This, at times fiery, discussion debated whether the Bourne Trilogy (Bourne Identity, Bourne Ultimatum, Bourne Supremacy) was a docu-drama based on reality (my contention) or just sheer fantasy based on an alternate reality (everyone else’s contention). Things got particularly heated when we began discussing whether Narniareally existed or was, again, an alternate reality. I can only wonder what sparks would have flown if we had gone into the centuries long debate which has pitted philosopher against philosopher whether Clark Kent (A.K.A. Kal-El) belonged to this reality or some alternate reality. If there’s anything we learn from the story of Kal-El, it’s that you don’t need wings or Red Bull to fly – as long as you continually renew your strength.

And I say, “Oh, that I had wings like a dove!
 I would fly away and be at rest;
Psalm 55:6

When Lois Lane was asked what she knew about Superman (Kal-El) she stated that he was from the planet Krypton, that he could fly, and he renewed his strength from the Sun. In the docu-drama, Superman Returns, we see Kal-El taking time out from saving people and averting disasters by flying out of earth’s atmosphere and basking in sunlight to renew his strength.

but they who wait for the LORD shall renew their strength;
they shall mount up with wings like eagles;
they shall run and not be weary;
they shall walk and not faint.
Isaiah 40:31

We each have different categories of strengths. Each of these strengths need renewing. For example, our physical strength needs hydrating, nourishing, and rest. Our mental strength needs stimulating, instructing, and musing. Our spiritual strength needs to worship, to pray, to meditate on God and His Word. 

¶ So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day.
Second Corinthians 4:16

After discovering that my spine was severely degenerated, I learned that spines need renewing. Sports scientists now teach elite sports people how to care for and renew their spines through proper hydration, active warm-ups, warm-downs, proper stretching, and use of a back roll. I’ve just spent 4 days on my back, largely unable to move, because I have spent too many years ignoring these elements of renewal. 

There is of course a more valuable spiritual application in all this talk about alternate realities and back care. Our souls need to be continually renewed. As Kim reminded us all last Sunday, this requires maintenance. But spiritual maintenance, Kim said, was different to regular maintenance – for each time we do spiritual maintenance we grow.

and have put on the new self, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its Creator.
Colossians 3:10

ONE OF THOSE BEAUTIFUL THINGS

One of the beautiful things about what Christ does in a believer is allowing us to see the world the way it actually is (Eph. 1:18). The Scriptures declare that those outside of Christ are blind (2Cor. 4:4). They cannot see the real world – they are virtually living in an alternate reality. While our Home Group BBQ discussed alternate realities last night, we also reflected on the reality that life is short and death is certain, yet so few people prepare for it. While we can get our finances in order, our health care plan in order, too few people take the time to get their souls in order by the daily renewing of their hearts and minds in Christ.

¶ I appeal to you therefore, brothers, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God, which is your spiritual worship. Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that by testing you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect.
Romans 12:1-2

Even Superman has to take regular time out and renew his strength in the glory of the Sun. Even the True Superman took time out from the demands of a needy world to renew His strength by coming aside to be with His Father (Matthew 14:23). How much more then do we need renewing? While Kal-El renewed his strength from the radiance of the Sun, we renew ours from the radiance of the Son. Like the dripping wet and weary Peter meeting the resurrected Christ for an impromptu fish breakfast on the shores of the Galilee having just unsuccessfully fished all night, his strength was supernaturally renewed by the presence, words, and radiance of Christ. When the ten other disciples struggled to haul their spontaneous catch of fish to shore, it was Peter who then got up renewed from having been with Jesus and at the word of Christ he single-handedly dragged the net of 153 large fish onto the shore.  

Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn.
John 21:10-11

The journey of following Christ is a journey of continual renewal and growth. This is why our goal is not just simply to get people savedbut to help people to grow in Christlikeness. In reflecting on these things this week, I read something yesterday that challenged me. “There has never been an easier time to get people saved and yet there has never been a more difficult time to disciple people into committed growing followers of Christ.” This Sunday we will meet together to be renewed. It could be the day when some people realise for the first time that they have been blind and living in a delusion as Christ opens their eyes. And, it should be the day when for those of us whose eyes have already been opened we will see the world a little more clearly because we will, like those seekers from Bethsaida, see Christ a little more clearly.

So these came to Philip, who was from Bethsaida in Galilee, and asked him, “Sir, we wish to see Jesus.”
John 12:21

Pastor Andrew

The Gospel In Batman Versus Superman

The Gospel In

Batman V Superman

I have just seen Batman Versus Superman and I left the theatre a little stunned. After seeing all the internet noise about how bad this movie was, I was stunned that it was so good! But I was more stunned by the deep profundity that the movie explored and the spectacular job it did in introducing viewers to one of the most important questions any human being can ask: Who and what is “God”? Could Batman V Superman be the greatest Christian Apologetic Supposal since The Chronicles of Narnia? 

I can understand why so many reviewers have given this movie such negative feedback. It’s not light. In fact, it’s heavy. Most movie consumers want to be amused rather than provoked to muse. But I’m not like most movie consumers. I rarely watch a movie just once and I often watch a movie at least three times. 

“I didn’t see it Lois, because I wasn’t looking!”

Kal-El (Superman's real name), stated in Batman V Superman

The Undeniable Theme Of
Batman V Superman

When the Jewish creators of Superman, Jeremiah Siegel and Joseph Shuster, invested into their original comic-book character the long held hopes that many Jewish people believed the Messiah would possess, they inadvertently created a very Christ-like figure. 

You will travel far, my little Kal-El. But we will never leave you... even in the face of our death. The richness of our lives shall be yours. All that I have, all that I've learned, everything I feel... all this, and more, I... I bequeath you, my son. You will carry me inside you, all the days of your life. You will make my strength your own, and see my life through your eyes, as your life will be seen through mine. The son becomes the father, and the father the son. This is all I... all I can send you, Kal-El…They can be a great people, Kal-El, they wish to be. They only lack the light to show the way. For this reason above all, their capacity for good, I have sent them you... my only son.

Jor-El’s last speech to his son, Kal-El (“Superman”)

From the outset of Batman Versus Superman, the theme is made abundantly clear (and perhaps this is why so many reviewers have disliked the movie?). Who and what is God? After all, Kal-El (which in Hebrew roughly translates to Voice of God with “El” meaning ‘God’) possesses many godlike qualities. Does the existence of Superman prove or disprove God? the movie asks. The are numerous glimpses of TV talkshows where this question is shown to be all abuzz around the world. Neil DeGrasse Tyson, an astrophysicist and host of the Startalk radio show, is interviewed discussing his reasons why the existence of Superman proves Darwinian Evolution and that there is no God. Putting aside that none of DeGrasse Tyson’s comments are actually scientific (since he is dabbling in Philosophical speculation) the fact that a scientist is stating that this proves there can not be a God sounds like scientific fact. DeGrasse Tyson’s comments reminded me of the quip, Only that which can be proven mathematically or scientifically can be considered true fails its own standard of truthfulness (since that statement is neither mathematical or scientific!). Perhaps Zack Snyder, the Director of the movie, wanted his audience to realise this.

The world is turning against the once beloved Superman. There is a Senate Enquiry being conducted into Superman’s role and lack of accountability. The media are beginning to question Superman’s morality especially after he took on General Zod and in the process hundreds of innocent lives in the twin cities of Metropolis and Gotham died collaterally. Questions are being asked, like: Why does only rescue some? And add into this cauldron the contribution of someone whose name sounds remarkably like Lucifer - Lex Luther - and we end up with an uncanny Christ-like scenario where the once adoring crowds of Jesus suddenly turned and screamed for His execution. 

Batman is presented as a very Apostle-Paul-like character. He misunderstands Kal-El and is bewildered by those who support him. He sets out to destroy him in much the same way that Saul of Tarsus set out to destroy the Christ of Christians. Just as the Apostle Paul came to realise who Jesus really was, so does Bruce Wayne. In fact, he realises that they have much in common. But in the meantime, Batman must employ forces beyond this world to reduce Superman to the status of a mere mortal human being. Just when victory was within his grasp, his eyes are opened (in the movie, in a highly symbolic fashion, his eyes literally are uncovered) and he sees Superman as the answer not the problem. 

¶ Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus.

John 11:5

Martha Kent is shown throughout the movie as a very devout woman who prominently wears a Christian Cross around her neck. She becomes pivotal to the plot of this movie. This is the point in the movie when we realise that both Bruce Wayne and Clark Kent were both orphans. While Bruce Wayne grew up bitter and vengeful after the murder of his mother, Martha, Clark Kent enjoyed a fostered childhood being raised by Jonathan and Martha Kent. Just as with the Biblical Martha, who was always busy preparing and serving meals (Luke 12:40) we meet Martha Kent in this movie busy serving in a café.

Lex Luthor: See, what we call ‘God’ depends upon our tribe, Clark, Joe, 'cause God is tribal; God takes sides! No man in the sky intervened when I was a boy to deliver me from daddy's fist and abominations. I figured out way back if God is all-powerful, He cannot be all good. And if He is all good, then He cannot be all-powerful. And neither can you be.

Meanwhile, Lex Luthor has employed some of the derelict Krypton Spacecraft technology to clone/reconstruct General Zod into the arch-enemy of Superman. This monstrous creature was seeded by Lex Luther’s own blood and is determined to destroy Superman. 

Lex Luthor: If man won't kill God, the Devil will do it!

He is ten times everything Superman is - except in virtue and the pursuit of justice. The movie culminates with this monster delivering Superman a very Christ-like end which simultaneously marks its own end. As the lifeless body of Superman is lowered down from the Golgotha-like mound (with two Christian crosses in the top left of the rubble), the cape of Kal-El becomes a shroud as his now beloved disciple, Batman, and the woman he loved, Lois, attend to him. 

Bruce Wayne: You don't know me, but I've known a few women like you.

Diana Prince: Oh, I don't think you've ever known a woman like me.

It is at this point that we have been introduced to an angelic creature who has taken on human form, Diana Prince. She uses “invisible” weaponry and seemingly has just as much power as Superman. By this stage, we have already learned that she has been interacting with humans for centuries and at one point could read Bruce Wayne’s mind.

¶ Then the devil left him, and behold, angels came and were ministering to him.

Matthew 4:11

C.S. Lewis coined the term, A Supposal, to describe his Chronicles of Narnia. Suppose, he reasoned, if God had created another world where there were talking animals, real-life mythical creatures, and humans. How would appear to them. He supposed the answer to this as the Chronicles of Narnia. While not every detail in the Narnia saga perfectly and tidily parallels the Gospel, it’s remarkable just how much of it beautifully illustrates Gospel truths. I suppose the Batman Vs Superman story is similar. It certainly doesn’t perfectly parallel the Gospel, but it too is remarkable just how much of it is a dramatic illustration of the Gospel that also addresses how we understand the key claims of the Sacred Script. This is perhaps not surprising since any good story is usually just a shadow of The Story of how God made the world, mankind rebelled, God made a way of salvation by sending His Son as our Saviour, and how this mission of eternal justice is now administered by His servants who must likewise step up and become heroes. 

Pastor Andrew Corbett, 13th April 2016

Pastor of Legana Christian Church, Tasmania