Hollywood has an interesting way of taking Biblical lessons and applying them to their climatic scenes. Can you think of any examples of "faith" being used in the movies? A couple of scenes quickly come to my mind. The first one is in Star Wars when Luke was ready to take his shot at the Battle Star and Obi Wan's voice tells him to "use the force, Luke". So Luke turned his computer off and aimed up his shot and BOOM. The other instance was in Indian Jones, when Indiana is facing a great chasm but he needs to get to the other side in order to find the holy grail. The last code or riddle that he had to follow told him that he would have to take a "leap of faith". As Indiana looked down the seemingly bottomless pit and then across to the other side - I was thinking: "now is not the time!"
Typically, Hollywood glamorizes the things of this earth and that is where the hero puts his faith. We see a lot of times, faith in education, faith in logic or wisdom, faith in hard work, faith in human instinct, and the list goes on. Bobby Morrow reminded us in class of one of the great acts of actual faith that the Bible tells us about. He reminded us of the story of Abraham and Isaac and the sacrifice (Genesis 22:1-18). What an amazing picture of "what faith looks like".
In Luke 7:1-10, we get another picture of faith. Jesus tells us how significant this picture is when he said: "...not in all of Israel have I found such great faith." Why was this so amazing that our Lord would say such a thing? One possible explanation is that Jesus had been traveling, healing, and performing miracles with his disciples and yet his disciples had trouble with their faith (see Matthew 17:19-20 and Luke 17:5-6). The very followers that have seen the most still had difficulties with their faith. In fact, their faith seemed to grow very gradually.
I think of another example of faith or lack of faith, Peter's sinking in the water and I wonder where I would have been in my faith if Jesus said walk to me over the waves of water. Would I have walked on the water or sank like a rock.
In Luke 7, the Centurion was not Jewish and we are not even sure if he had ever witnessed Jesus's miracles. However, his faith was in Jesus and that Jesus could perform this miracle by just speaking a word and delegating some spiritual act of authority over man's physical needs. Performing miracles over people or things not in his presence was something that Jesus had not displayed at this time. Yet, the Centurion recognized better than the disciples that Jesus had full and absolute authority over the things of this world. How amazing is that?
Bobby and I have had a couple of talks about faith and this is a hard topic because many times I find my own faith falling short. When you see yourself out on the water with Jesus - what do you see? Where do you place your faith? Are you like the Hollywood's heroes relying of wisdom or hard work or are you like Abraham or the Centurion?
Have a blessed day.
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