I Hate You

Here is my message from Sunday. The text was 1 John 4:7-21 and the movie was Revenge of the Sith:

One of the big questions that gets posed around all of the Star Wars films, as there are now 11 feature films, is in what order you should view them. Probably the most recommended is to see them in the order that they were released. So, start, as we did, with Star Wars, watch the rest of the original trilogy, then what the prequels, which are episodes 1-3, then go to episodes 7-9, which are sometimes called the sequels, and then onto Rogue One and Solo. Without putting a lot of thought into them, that would be the order I would recommend. But, another recommendation is to watch them in chronological order, which would be to start with episode 1, adding in Rogue One and Solo at the end of the prequels, then move into the original trilogy and the sequels to complete it. I can see some logic in that, except that doing it in that order removes the reveal in Empire, which was the last movie we covered, that Darth Vader is actually Luke’s father, as well as the reveal that Leia is his sister as we learn all of those things at the end of Revenge of the Sith, which is the film we cover today. Now maybe since those reveals happened 43 and 40 years ago, respectively they don’t matter, but I still think cinematically that they do, which is also the reason that I started with the first two films and then jumped backward to episode three which then, in my reasoning, and I will argue that my reasoning is correct here, for where we end up next week in moving on to Return of the Jedi, which is my particular favorite of the films for many reasons.

Now I do have to admit that Revenge of the Sith is the only Star Wars film that I never saw originally in the theater. In fact, I had never seen it on the big screen until we showed it there on Monday. And the reason I didn’t see it was because I was in the midst of seminary and I was so disappointed in Episode 2, Attack of the Clones, that I actually wasn’t interested in seeing Lucas make the franchise even worse. I will admit that I was mistaken, and while it is not what the originals were, it’s not as bad as I originally imagined, and it’s grown on me and is usually ranked as the best of the prequels, and is even as high as number four on some lists of the best, with the original trilogy occupying the top three. But that’s more nerdy filler. Two weeks ago, when we talked about The Empire Strikes back, we talked about the choices that Luke is presented with and has to make to follow the way of the Jedi or to follow the pull to turn to the dark side like Vader. And I said those choices are presented to all of us and that what Luke comes to discover is that what separates him from his father is not that he father was evil and he is good, but the choices that his father made that led him there. And we’ll save whether those choices are permanent or not for where we move to next week. But Revenge of the Sith sets up how and why Anakin Skywalker, who becomes Darth Vader, makes those choices. And in seeing them you can have some sympathy for him and understand his reasoning. He is trying to do the best that he can and trying to protect the people and the things that he loves, and in doing so he ends up destroying those same things. But he is not evil, it’s as they say that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and Anakin ends up fighting Obi-Wan Kenobi at the end of the film in what might be seen as a metaphor for hell, but that’s jumping ahead of the story.

All You Need Is Love

Here is my sermon from Sunday.  The text was 1 Corinthians 13:1-13:

Perhaps no other subject has been written and sung about more than love.  I’m sure that almost all of us could name at least five songs dealing with love without even thinking about it, for Paul McCartney is probably right, “You'd Think That People Would Have Had Enough Of Silly Love Songs.  But I Look Around Me And I See It Isn't So.” Of course McCartney, as part of the Beatles, would probably have at least one song on any list of love songs that we created.  For me at least, I can’t think of love songs without several Beatles songs popping into my head, not counting Helter Skelter, and I think their focusing on this subject was directly related to what was going on at the time when they were writing.  The 60’s were a time of turmoil and crisis.  The nation was deeply divided over many issues; we were fighting a war with no clear end in sight that some said was absolutely important to protect America and to others it seemed meaningless and believed that we were led into the war by deceit if not outright lies.  People didn’t trust the president or congress, and things generally seemed to be getting worse rather than better.  Who says that history doesn’t repeat itself?

And yet in the midst of this turmoil, musicians were singing about love and we were being told that all you need is love.  But could that really be true?  Could love solve all of our problems?  Is love really all we need?

Part of the problem of answering that question lies in the definition of love.  What is love?  What does it look like?  What does it feel like?  These are not easy questions because in our culture love is a lot of things.  We talk about falling in love, as if love is a hole or a pit, and for some maybe it is.  And we use the same word to describe our feelings about lots of different things.  So I can say I love my wife and I love my daughters.  But, I also love Italian food, I love to read, I love baseball and I love God.  Certainly, the meaning of love is not the same in all of these things, so what is love?  What does it mean?  What does it look like?  And what do we do with it?  Perhaps Eliza Doolittle is right.  In My Fair Lady, she cries out “Words, words, words!  I’m so sick of words!  Don’t talk to me of love, don’t talk to me of June, don’t talk to me of anything at all, just show me!”  I think that is what Paul is trying to do in this passage.

Battling Giants: Racism and Violence

Here is my sermon from Sunday.  The text was the familiar story of David and Goliath in 1 Samuel 17:4-11, 19-23 and 32-49, but the message was changed because of the shooting at Emmanuel AME in Charleston:

I dislike weeks like this past one.  First there was the strange story of the NAACP in Spokane, Washington, and who knew Spokane needed an NAACP chapter?  Then there was the announcement by Pizza Hut that they were releasing a pizza that had 21 mini hotdogs baked into the crust, because that’s exactly what we all need.  And finally Donald Trump declared that he was going to be running for president, and every comedian rejoiced.  For a normal week that would be enough and unfortunately, these stories sort of typify certain aspects of American culture.  But then there was the news that we all woke up to on Thursday morning of the shooting at Emmanuel AME Church in Charleston, which sadly is also a part of American culture.  As a pastor I know that such tragedies need to be addressed, but as a preacher I’m never quite sure what to do.  Do I stay with what I was originally going to say, or do I change it all up in order to address these issues?

I had a good sermon about David and Goliath all planned out that I was going to try and somehow connect to Fathers’ Day.  And while I wasn’t really struggling with that message, it wasn’t exactly coming together either, and so Linda asked if perhaps I needed to stop working on that message and instead talk about what happened in Charleston.  And yet the story of David and Goliath I think also has a lot to say to us about this very issue because of two things that are easily overlooked.

But let me start by saying what might be the most important thing and that is that God did not cause this event to happen, or allow it to happen, as some part of God’s master plan.  Because if that is true, then God is not on the side of the victims, but instead on the side of the perpetrators.  But what we see time and time again is that God sides with the victims and with the least, the last and the lost, and that takes part in the story of David and Goliath as well.

This passage can be seen as a story of violence and yet it’s also a story against violence.  Goliath calls to the Israelites and asks for one person to come forward and fight him.  This is known as single combat, and the purpose was to try and eliminate the largescale death and destruction of war, by having only two people fight.  Sometimes the people doing battle would be the best soldiers, and other times it would be the respective leaders who fought each other.  Perhaps this should be something we should think about as it would certainly greatly limit the saber rattling of our politicians if they knew that instead of sending others off to fight for them that they themselves would be fighting.