Heaven is for Real Movie Review

Abigail and Dolley readers last evening I settled down to watch "Heaven is for Real".  I came away with mixed emotions about the film.  Like much Christian entertainment these days it is Laodicean in it's theology, neither hot nor cold and thus unpalatable. There were times during the latter half of the film that I wondered if these folks on the screen were even Christians!  The total lack of Biblical understanding filled me with consternation and in the end serves no one.

We are so "seeker friendly" that we don't tell seekers the truth!  Afraid to offend and drive off anyone, we soft sell their eternal destiny so we don't hurt their feelings or make them uncomfortable.  This is dangerous theology friends.  "Many will say to Me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, and in Your name cast out demons, and in Your name perform many miracles?' And then I will declare to them, 'I never knew you; DEPART FROM ME, YOU WHO PRACTICE LAWLESSNESS.'

There are some positive elements to the film.  I enjoyed the depiction of a believable Christian family.  The husband and wife have a real marriage, with tenderness, struggles, compassion, and physical affection.  The family sings bible songs in the car and then rocks out to Queen in the next breath.  Financial pressures are real and so is compassion for people going through difficult times.  People of faith suffer in this life, the pastor broke his leg and then subsequently suffered terribly with kidney stones.  The depiction of this suffering rang true.  The fellowship of the church body at the beginning of the film is heart warming, it shows a true caring Christian family.  The call to prayer when Colton was sick and in the hospital brought me to tears.  To see the Body of Christ respond as intercessors before the Lord was powerful.  The first half of the film was fantastic.

The second half?  Not so much.  Filled with real questions about belief, the Pastor and his congregation go through a seeking journey that is more suited to those who have never believed in Christ.  This journey is fine and necessary for those who have not professed Christ as their Savior but is troubling in this context because what in the world do these people believe?  They seem to struggle with basic doctrine, what is salvation and how do we achieve it?  Is the Word of God true and correct?  Do we actually believe in Christ or is this just a social club?

The scene at the graveyard is particularly troublesome.  The pastor tells the grieving mother that he has nothing for her.  He admits that he did not say or do anything to comfort her at the death of her 19 year old son.  What?  It isn't difficult, this is Christianity 101 and these folks are treating it like it is a deep mystery.

I surmise they had a Believer direct the first part of the film and a Seeker the second.  A moving film in the beginning had my brow furled in the end.  Instead of clearly presenting the truth of the Gospel which is in order to go to Heaven you must confess your sins, accept the death, resurrection, and atonement of the death of Christ for your sins.  You must accept that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and ask Him into your heart and your life.  There is no other way to the Father except through the Son.  That is straight up truth and it isn't complicated.  Instead, the film says to the seeker that God loves us and that is enough to get us into Heaven.  If that were true then why did Jesus have to die?

I must conclude, that indeed "Heaven is for Real" but this movie and it's theology are not.

Bias Check

Recently, I have begun a mental exercise that has proven quite enlightening.  The exercise is about finding my own bias.  We all have a worldview and critical thinking demands that we understand this in ourselves and others.  We are passionate about things we care about - plain and simple.  If there is an injustice against someone or something we value then we are more apt to give that situation weight.  If we inherently do not like the person or the cause, even if the same injustice occurs, we will not feel the same.  A well balanced person, must recognize this in themselves.

Brit Hume, the Washington Journalist, was the first person I ever heard speak about media bias in a way that made it seem less insidious.  Check out this video, it gives you the gist of his take on this issue:

So here's the exercise:  If I read a headline or the major issue of the day, I reverse the characters in the story.  If I still care about it then I recognize that the outrage is justified, if I become more apathetic then I realize it is my own bias kicking in.

I invite you to do the same, I think if all of us begin to think critically, without our inherent bias about right and wrong we may begin to make progress.  Here are some examples:

Lena Dunham is someone I find quite repellent under normal circumstances, she recently wrote a book and conservatives were in an uproar about some of the stories she told about her sister.  I was completely grossed out.  I used my bias trick and substituted Bristol Palin, who is someone I view in a positive light.  When I did that, I was still creeped out but did not view it with the vehemence I did when it was someone that I disagreed with.

I inherently do not care for President Obama.  When I hear a story about him that makes me crazy, I substitute Ronald Reagan in the story to see if I still care.  Most of the time, I can catch my party bias this way.  

At the end of the day, we are all biased.  We all approach circumstances or stories with our own preconceived notions of what is right and what is wrong.  We care about things that are important to us, this is perfectly all right but we must be honest with ourselves, we must critically think, we must look at ourselves with true glasses.  If we do this, we obtain a self awareness sorely lacking in Reality TV America.

  

Magic

Abigail and Dolley readers I have always loved magical stories.  As a child, I ate up Patricia Coombs, Dorrie the Little Witch books.

I was an avid fan of Bewitched and I Dream of Jeannie, stories of fantasy sparked my imagination and I knew that if I just thought happy thoughts that I was going to fly like Wendy in Peter Pan.  I went through the wardrobe with CS Lewis and fought trolls with the Hobbit.  As an adult, I fell in love with Harry Potter.  In the last few years, my favorite stories are from the Outlander series which has an element of mystery and magic.

If I am honest, my vision of Heaven gives me some cool powers like flying or touching a plant and making it grow.  I see magic in the world, I see magic in my God but we are forbidden from witchcraft, sorcery, and divination, so I have always struggled with this part of me that just loves magic.

God doesn't deal in falsehoods so His prohibition against such things by the very nature of the prohibition tells me that this stuff is real.  In the end, my fantasy magic is just that, fantasy.  Real magic, real witches, real divination - well that's something altogether different.  Those practices, whether the practitioner will admit or not, are grounded in evil.  So, if we stay away from the real thing I am not going to sweat it too much that I like the tales.

I have to admit though, certain times during magical tales I think, "Man, they need to pray."  Because in the end there doesn't seem to be room for God in these tales.  There is a scene in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix where Mr. Weasley is critically injured.  In the book, they are fretting and pacing and worrying but they are not praying - that struck me.  I've read some fantasy romances where they are fighting evil but they are not fighting with the only weapon we are given, the Word.  NBC has a new show, Constantine, and there is such a twisted theology abounding in the story it's hard to watch.  How do you fight the devil without the Lord?

Fighting the Devil without the Spirit

Several authors have written great books that capture the magic from the Christian worldview.  This Present Darkness and Piercing the Darkness by Frank Peretti changed my life, by changing the way that I viewed everything.  Ted Dekker has written some great thrillers, Blink is one of my favorites to demonstrate the power of prayer.  There is magic all around us, there is power in our prayers and we DO serve a supernatural God.  We need not exchange the counterfeit for the real, I just wish there was more real well-done stuff in the market.

The Hectic Life of a Sports Family

Abigail and Dolley readers, today let's talk about something touchy, sports.   (Take a little ride with me, this is a not an attack on anyone but more of a dramatized tale.  Just pretend that I am the "Ghost of Christmas Present".  Even if your experience is not this extreme, perhaps you can find some truth in the below.)  Sports... the great American pastime, it evokes images of camaraderie, cheering spectators, and life's lessons learned on the ball field.  Just good plain fun, but is that the honest truth in today's world?  An idealized view of modern sports drive behavior and decision making in American families.  We maniacally throwing our children into one activity after the next, all in pursuit of a sports fantasy.  For countless families, the reality is far from fantastic.

In the not so distant past, kids played a variety of different sports.  Sports had seasons and kids moved from one season to another, not settling on a single sport until their late high school years, if ever.  This variety taught them different skill sets, types of movement, tempos, and paces.  Multiple sports insured kids had different friends, coaches, and experiences. Sports were a balanced part of a well rounded childhood, where the family did not revolve around the child or his activities. Today, it is widely believed and practiced that parents should select their "kid's sport" by age eight.  Once chosen, then the wholehearted investment, commitment/pressure, and expenses begin.  These kids embark on a journey of conditioning seasons during the heat of the Summer, special camps, travel teams, year round sports, clinics, personal trainers, and position coaches - for ten year olds.

Let's consider the time.  Public school demands more time from your child's life than ever before - 38 hours a week from bus ride to bus ride + homework.  Then we drag these kids to hours of sports practices and games.  Frazzled moms yell at tired kids to do their homework on the one hour commute to the "away" game and not get fast food mustard on the seat.  Are you tired yet?  Wait, there's more.  Now multiply this scenario by the number of kids, who play different sports, have different practice times, and different locations.  Mom takes one kid and Dad takes the other.  Other relatives are recruited and this insanity bleeds over into households that don't even have children.   Add in Scouts, Dance, Music, and Art because they need to be well rounded.  The truth is we try to give our kids everything that we wanted and didn't get.  Recently, I overheard a lady comment to a boy, "Where've you been, Justin?  We haven't seen you in weeks."  The young boy shook his head, sighed, and said, "I've had 11 games in the last 14 days."  This conversation took place as the 7th grade Junior Cotillion class that was dismissing at 8:30 pm.   That 12 year old boy had put in a 13 hour day and I'd bet he still had homework.

The Evolutionist World View of the Stars

Abigail and Dolley readers I was up early this morning to watch the second Lunar Eclipse of the Blood Moon Tetrad.  It was a glorious display but alas we live in a small valley with huge trees to the west and we lost sight of it about 6:40am.  Being an enterprising gal, I pulled up a live stream and watched it online.

One of the sites had commentators and I immediately had to mute them!  The evolutionist worldview came through in the first sentence they spoke.  It was entirely too early in the morning for yet another display of a lost world.  The exchange went like this."Well, I would not say the ancient Jews were astronomers, that's taking it a bit too far."

Boom - in one sentence the entire worldview is summed up.  First, the evolutionist thinks that ancient man was not as intelligent as he, the modern man, is.  The evidence, though, contradicts that assumption.  Archaeologists are constantly amazed at the complexity and intelligence they see in ancient ruins and civilizations.  If you read the articles, they are astounded by what they find and they can't quite wrap their worldview around the facts.  Second, the evolutionist ascribes the wisdom of the ancient Jews to the people themselves instead of the Creator.  By down playing the discoveries they deny both the Jews and their God.

Stairway to Heaven Nebula

Modern astronomers must struggle daily with the vast beauty before them.  The perfection of the universe, the complexities and the order displayed in the Heavens have for centuries drawn Man to God.  We instinctively know in our hearts, from the time we are children, that God is up there.  We lift our eyes in prayer, we lift our hands in praise, we gaze at the stars above and feel the vastness of the Creator.  I feel sorry for these scientists, the daily hardening of their hearts, the denial of God to His very face, must certainly take a toll on them.

Romans 1:18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in unrighteousness, 19 because that which is known about God is evident within them; for God made it evident to them. 20 For since the creation of the world His invisible attributes, His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly seen, being understood through what has been made, so that they are without excuse.…