World Trade Center (the movie)
Well, my parents were off to spend the day in Erie yesterday for Labor Day. Half way through we decided we wanted to see a movie, but the only thing really worth seeing (as far as we were concerned) was World Trade Center. Pastor Tim had gone to see it. Him and I had talked about it and he thought it was just amazing, so why not go see it?
There's all those questions about movie executives just trying to make a buck off of this tragedy, but to be entirely honest... this is a movie I think we needed. In my mind, this is a movie that falls in the category of "The Passion of the Christ." This isn't a movie you pull out on a Friday night when you have nothing else to do.
GOing to see it on a whim like we did was probably a mistake. Shortly into the movie, I realized that I wasn't the slightest bit prepared to be seeing what I was seeing. It wasn't a movie that necessarilly focused on the enormity of the event. That was obvious due to the fact that most of us remember the enormity of it. That's a theme simply from the imagery and our own memories. It focuses on just a handful of characters... two police officers (and their families) and an ex-marine. Not to mention there's little subplots that just add so much to the movie... Characters who you only see in two or three scenes have significant life altering moments that you may or may not catch. Even if you don't it doesn't take away from the movie.
I just thought it was incredible. I recommend going to see it (there is some understandably strong language though). It woke me up and reminded me of the world we live in. We live in a world where people hate us... Whether you think that hate is warranted or not doesn't matter. The fact of the matter is that someone declared war on us on 9/11.
It also reminded me of words I said this past Wednesday night when we were praying... "If you don't feel like praying out loud... Think again. Pause and listen... There's someone out there who hates us, who does not want everything to turn out ok. They want the absolute worst to happen to the one we're praying for. If you still don't have anything to say about that... tap the person next to you and we'll move on in prayer."
Satan hates us. He doesn't want anything to go right in our lives. He wants you to be led astray... He wants you to be off in your own self-centered existence and to be completely unaware of your Creator and the love you can share with Him and for your fellow humans.
Doesn't that bother you? Doesn't that make you want to do something about it? On Wednesday we were particularly praying for our girl in our youth group who was having a fairly serious surgery... Doesn't the fact that Satan wasn't everything to go wrong int he surgery... the fact that he wants her to die... Doesn't that bother you? Doesn't it stir you to action?
We live in a world today where hate is a reality... not superficial hate... Not "I hate you because of what you said to me last week" but life-or-death hate. It's a hate that has existed since Lucifer chose to defy the Living God. We witnessed a piece of that hate in humanity on 9/11.
There's a Love out there that conquers this hate though... It's not a love that conquers with flower, cards, candy, dinner, or presents... It's a love that conquers with sacrifice. The extent of this evil could only be conquered with the greatest showing of love... sacrifice. It's a pro-active love. A love that takes a stand, digs in for the fight, ... and comes out on top.
So when are Christians going to do something about it? When are Christians going to take this love that we're so very aware of and show this world what it really is... the true depthes of it. When are we going to stop being black holes... keeping the light inside of us and turn back into stars taking that light to the ends of the Earth?
We don't have the time we once did...
There's all those questions about movie executives just trying to make a buck off of this tragedy, but to be entirely honest... this is a movie I think we needed. In my mind, this is a movie that falls in the category of "The Passion of the Christ." This isn't a movie you pull out on a Friday night when you have nothing else to do.
GOing to see it on a whim like we did was probably a mistake. Shortly into the movie, I realized that I wasn't the slightest bit prepared to be seeing what I was seeing. It wasn't a movie that necessarilly focused on the enormity of the event. That was obvious due to the fact that most of us remember the enormity of it. That's a theme simply from the imagery and our own memories. It focuses on just a handful of characters... two police officers (and their families) and an ex-marine. Not to mention there's little subplots that just add so much to the movie... Characters who you only see in two or three scenes have significant life altering moments that you may or may not catch. Even if you don't it doesn't take away from the movie.
I just thought it was incredible. I recommend going to see it (there is some understandably strong language though). It woke me up and reminded me of the world we live in. We live in a world where people hate us... Whether you think that hate is warranted or not doesn't matter. The fact of the matter is that someone declared war on us on 9/11.
It also reminded me of words I said this past Wednesday night when we were praying... "If you don't feel like praying out loud... Think again. Pause and listen... There's someone out there who hates us, who does not want everything to turn out ok. They want the absolute worst to happen to the one we're praying for. If you still don't have anything to say about that... tap the person next to you and we'll move on in prayer."
Satan hates us. He doesn't want anything to go right in our lives. He wants you to be led astray... He wants you to be off in your own self-centered existence and to be completely unaware of your Creator and the love you can share with Him and for your fellow humans.
Doesn't that bother you? Doesn't that make you want to do something about it? On Wednesday we were particularly praying for our girl in our youth group who was having a fairly serious surgery... Doesn't the fact that Satan wasn't everything to go wrong int he surgery... the fact that he wants her to die... Doesn't that bother you? Doesn't it stir you to action?
We live in a world today where hate is a reality... not superficial hate... Not "I hate you because of what you said to me last week" but life-or-death hate. It's a hate that has existed since Lucifer chose to defy the Living God. We witnessed a piece of that hate in humanity on 9/11.
There's a Love out there that conquers this hate though... It's not a love that conquers with flower, cards, candy, dinner, or presents... It's a love that conquers with sacrifice. The extent of this evil could only be conquered with the greatest showing of love... sacrifice. It's a pro-active love. A love that takes a stand, digs in for the fight, ... and comes out on top.
So when are Christians going to do something about it? When are Christians going to take this love that we're so very aware of and show this world what it really is... the true depthes of it. When are we going to stop being black holes... keeping the light inside of us and turn back into stars taking that light to the ends of the Earth?
We don't have the time we once did...