I don’t point these people out to pick on them. I’ll freely admit I’m a non-smoker, and I can’t tolerate the smell of smoke. I try not to breathe around smokers. It’s not that they aren’t entitled to do what they want… it’s that I’m an allergic asthmatic, and my body is already having to compensate with every breath I take. The added challenge of smoke literally makes me ill. My lungs can’t cope with the same level of stuff other people’s can. I take medicines to help get me to functional, but that also means I have to take steps to protect myself… and one of those is that I actively avoid smokers.

But… this isn’t about smokers versus non-smokers. You see, when it comes down to it, it could be said that we are all addicted to something. Sure, some addictions are easier to see. Some are more obvious. Look at the wreck left behind by addictions to illegal drugs… meth labs, meth mouth. Crack babies. Heroine addiction. The danger of sharing needles. Bad trips. Overdoses. Oh, yeah, those addictions are easy to call out as dangerous and detrimental. And by the time smokers get to the point that they’re huddled outside in the cold, wheeling their oxygen tank behind them, outside the hospital, and still desperate for a drag, yeah, it’s easy to see how addiction is in control of them. Or when an alcoholic has drunk through their liver, their skin and eyes yellowed from the jaundice of liver failure, their families and job gone because they drank them away… yeah, it’s easy to see addiction there.

But… addiction isn’t that simple. It wears many faces. It comes in many shapes. Sure, there’s the obvious ones… the gambler who loses everything he has at the tables and in the slots. The sex addict who is a walking textbook of STDs but has no one to keep her warm at night, or who has killed his wife but can’t bear to tell her that the child they conceived is almost certainly HIV+ because he picked it up, and he’s passed it on to them both (and yes, passing on HIV is the same as killing your partner, because HIV is incurable, and it will progress into full-blown AIDS and kill them, every single time, unless they meet death sooner by some other, more violent means).

Addiction comes as the spouse that’s so busy with work and community that the marriage is forgotten. Or the parent that wraps their children’s lives up with activities, but never engages with them individually, too busy shuttling them from one practice to another, from one activity to the next that there’s never time to stop and and just BE with your child. It’s the golf game, or tennis, or fishing, or hunting, or NASCAR, that devours your time. It’s the TV or internet that devours your attention instead of other people.

Addiction is any person, thing, activity or interaction that steals attention from where it properly belongs. It’s what throws a life out of balance. And we all have them. How do I know? Because we’re all human, and we’re all imperfect. Oh, sure, we all work hard to keep life in balance, and some of us are better at it than others, but there’s always something that creeps up, something we have to check ourselves on and make certain it doesn’t overtake the balance.

In my life, the only means I’ve found to counter addiction with any amount of success is to depend on an active, living relationship with the God who has everything in perspective. The idea is that God, from outside the limits of time, from beyond my small perspective of my life, beyond my momentary crises, can see what the larger balance looks like. God knows which things are paramount, and which things can slide. And if I’m in an active relationship with God, then I’m in communication with Him, and He can help me keep things balanced. If I seek His will in my decisions, then I find that my life begins to find balance. It evens out. I keep things in the right perspective… my position to other people, my relationships with my friends, my family, my church, the world at large. I am able to look at my life and see where I’m unbalanced and trim back. More than that, He influences me in ways that naturally bring me into greater balance… for instance, I’m more creative when I’m reliant upon Him, because my creativity is a gift He gave me for the benefit of others.

Am I perfect? Far from it. I suffer with my own addictions. Just last week, as we were headed out for an evening, I HAD to have chocolate ice cream. HAD TO. As in, instead of driving south to the event, we drove north to the store so I could get a little single serve dish of chocolate ice cream. John teased that if he didn’t know better, he’d have thought I was pregnant! And that’s just one example. I’m forever working on keeping addictions at bay and life in balance. But I can’t do it alone, and neither can you.

Just because your addiction isn’t as obvious or as obviously destructive as some doesn’t mean it won’t take everything you have away from you. All addictions end the same way: the addict is broken, alone, and a slave to something they thought they mastered. Your story doesn’t have to end that way. If you can recognize your addictions, you can begin to overcome them, with the help of the Savior who’s got it all in perspective.

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I know I’ve blogged on the Death Cab For Cutie song before. I suspect I’ve written about the Jars of Clay song before, but as I lay in bed tonight, listening to the lyrics of the first, I was reminded of the second, and of all the mentions of language in the Bible (Genesis 11, when God confused the languages to prevent the pride of man from overreaching themselves, Acts 2, when Peter speaks to an assembled crowd, and they all hear him in their own native language, and 5000 respond to the message, 1 Corinthians 13, which mentions the importance of tempering language gifts with love, Revelation 7, when we are told that there will be people from every language in heaven, to name a few).

See, language is one of the things I’ve been passionate about for a long time. I started studying French in 8^th grade, but even as a tiny child, I was learning words here and there from other languages; when Big Bird when to China, I learned how to say hello and I love you, two terms I still remember. I started learning American Sign Language from the time I was small, too, saying “I love you” to my Grammie with a hand sign every time I saw her. By the time I was in 8^th grade, I began formal language studies, enrolling in my first year of French, the language I would eventually earn a Bachelor’s degree in. By my senior year in high school, I was slowly teaching myself Russian… just a word here and there, but I could say good and hello and thank you, and tell you that the key or lamp or elevator or chair didn’t work (I was studying from an OLD Berlitz book!). I wanted to study it in college, but the college that was my best fit didn’t have it… so I added German instead. After German came Spanish, and I eventually took a semester of Biblical Greek, not because I had to, but because I needed a minimum number hours to be eligible for financial aid again, and it just sounded like a lot of fun (I even took a prerequisite course for it that I didn’t have JUST so I could take Greek!) A trip to Europe in 2008 saw me teach myself some Italian, and I can read Portuguese a little bit… thanks to all the French and Spanish I’ve had. And I’m not done; since we’re adopting from Indian nations, I’m teaching myself Cherokee (very slowly. Wesa means cat, and Osiyo means hello. I kinda forget at the moment more).

When I’m asked why study languages, why do I learn them, why do I learn so many, I always have the same answer. To me, it is the height of arrogance to go to a people, to share with them the radical love of Christ who stepped out of eternity, out of glory, who put on humility and met with sinners WHERE THEY WERE, and demand they learn to speak MY language to hear the best news of their lives. I believe with all my heart that Jesus doesn’t have a language barrier, though one was imposed upon us, and if we are truly living to be like Christ, if we are truly operating out of love, then we will actively seek to remove language barriers so that we can carry the good news to everyone.

Unfortunately, I know that not everyone has the same affinity for learning languages that I do. We all have different gifts and different skills, different talents and abilities that are meant to be used to the edification, or building up of the body of Christ (both the encouragement of other believers, and the increase of the family by the sharing of the good news that men and women might be freed from the slavery of sin). I think that’s where the lines in these songs come in for me.

The song by Jars of Clay speaks of “showing love in every language”, and using “words that need no form”. Beloved, there are some gestures that mean different things from one country to another, from one town to another… but there are some things that are universal across us all. We all recognize a smile, the simple joy and pure delight as it lights up a face. We can all identify grief. And surely generosity needs no words to translate it. Certainly, gestural languages are different across languages; British Sign Language and American Sign Language are different, and they both are used to convey the same spoken language: English. But Love, Beloved. Joy. Compassion. These are consistent, and need little translation. Anyone can speak these without a single word. The Haitians are understanding them in the food they’re being given, in the medical care being received, in the men and women helping them dig out the rubble and bury their dead. The Chileans understand it. The victims of the Tsunami in 2006. New Orleans and the Gulf Coast after Katrina struck. All across the world, Beloved, we show love in every language precisely we because we have no words and can only demonstrate it through our actions.

The other thing to consider is that learning another language, learning to communicate in the language of another human being, speaks volumes. They know you don’t speak it well. They’re not judging you for a grammar or vocabulary test. You’re making an effort to acknowledge who they are, where they are. It’s like they’re the book that’s elegantly bound, in a language that you can’t read just yet. But don’t give up hope yet… things worth doing, worth having, take time. And all people are worth the investment of time. Let me say that again. ALL PEOPLE ARE WORTH THE INVESTMENT OF TIME.

I believe that going to people where they are, in their language, learning to speak their language instead of assuming they must learn mine, is Biblical. In Acts chapter 2, Peter preaches to the assembled crowd. He could have spoken in the common language of the day… but God miraculously allows the people to hear the message in their OWN language, spoken to them as if by a native. There is power when you hear truth spoken to you in your OWN language.

In Revelation Chapter 7, we’re told that ever tribe, every nation, every language will be assembled before the throne of God. He may have confused their languages in Genesis 11, but he never excluded them. But remember; just telling them isn’t enough. Just speaking the language isn’t good enough. You need to love them. You need to show them love. 1 Corinthians warns that if we speak in the tongues of men and angels without love, we are just clanging cymbals and sounding gongs.

So there we have it. Why am I passionately driven to learn new languages? Because my God promises that every language will be in heaven. We’ll all be there, together, worshiping before the throne of Heaven. When I meet people who don’t speak my language, I want to show them the kind of love that does… because that’s the kind of Love that stepped out eternity, out of immortality, out of glory and omnipotence, to be born an infant, to walk the earth He shaped for 33 years, to bleed and die on a cross for the men and women who put him there, and to rise again, to redeem us all. I want to learn new languages so that the tower that pride built between us in Babel never stands in the path of the Savior that came to seek and save us all. I want to show you that you’re the book that’s worth spending time to learn the language so I can read it and appreciate it, because Beloved, Jesus says you’re worth everything! I want to show you Love in every language, because nothing compares to spending some time, Love, with the Lover of your Soul.

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I want to talk about each of these projects separately, and please understand that while I work with some of them, I’m not exactly an expert. Please, follow the links I provide, go explore on your own the organizations I discuss, and consider what you can do to get involved. Keep in mind that I’m just highlighting a few projects here; if I were to try to make an exhaustive list, it would form a book by itself.

The first of the three projects discussed last night is something called the FabLab. Born in MIT, FabLab is short for Fabrication Laboratory, and is quite simply a sort of shop class for anyone and everyone. You walk in with an idea, and with the help of the experts, tools, and materials on-site, you walk out with a product. You can do patent searches or seek a patent with the help of their patent lawyers. Best of all, FabLabs are spread across the world, with locations in Ghana (on the African continent), India, and Afghanistan. In developing nations like these, the ability to walk in with an idea and walk out with a product can literally change or save lives. We were told the story of a girl in Ghana who made a milk tester. Now she knows when the sellers in the marketplace try to sell her bad milk, and she doesn’t buy from them. She protects her family, and she’s earning a new respect that she didn’t have before. You can find more out at http://fab.cba.mit.edu/ .

The second of the three projects is a cause that is near and dear to my heart. A foster mother (Oh, sorry, the PC term these days is “resource parent”) got up and talked about why to become a foster parent. She pointed out that you don’t have to be married, young, Christian, straight, or any particular race. You do need to be physically and emotionally healthy, and you do need to be able to take care of yourself and another human being without the financial support of others (the financial support from the state is only approximately 60% of what it actually costs to raise a child).

I’ll be the first to admit that becoming a resource parent isn’t easy. John and I are currently waiting to adopt, and we had to go through all the same steps that foster parents have to go through. I’ll even admit that I don’t have it in me, at least not now, to be a foster parent. Part of fostering children means that you work with the child and the parents to help reunify the family, making it a stronger whole than it was before. That’s an awesome goal. But as a former foster child, as the oldest sister who watched two sisters spend more time in the system than I did, I tend to be too skeptical to hope for successful reunifications. I tend to love forever, and I don’t know how to let go of someone, and yet, as a foster parent, that’s the nature of the job. You bring them into your home, you love them with every thing you have (because they deserve no less) and then you help them transition out.

Oh, but the impact that foster parents have on their kids’ lives. You are a sea of normalcy to a child who has no concept of what normal looks like. You are health to a child who’s never had it before. You are stability to a child who’s known only instability. You are love, you are safety, you meet basic needs that they learned early on they couldn’t count on to have met. These are kids who have been broken, and you are wholeness. These kids are wounded, and you are healing. You can be the difference between them repeating the cycle of substance abuse, poverty, neglect and abuse, or them breaking free of all of that, and becoming thriving, successful, joyful members of society. As a foster parent, you have the opportunity to do for your kids what my parents did for me; they took an angry, flailing teenager in, smoothed off the rough edges, loved me faithfully, and watched me blossom into a woman who is now turning around to give other children the same gift through adoption.

No, it isn’t easy. But it’s rewarding. It’s something you can do that makes a huge impact in the life or lives of another. Adoption.com has more information in general on foster parenting, but if you’re really interested in finding out more, contact your local state government. Or, if you are of Native American heritage, and can prove it with a CDIB card (Certified Degree of Indian Blood), then contact your tribe. Because the Indian nations serve as sovereign nations, they often have their own adoption and foster care departments, and by law, they give placement preference for their children to Indians.

Speaking of the Native Americans, that brings us to the third topic from last night. The Native Language Project was presented last night. This project has some awesome goals; not only are they aiming to preserve the languages of the Native tribes while there are still people around who speak them, but they want to do it in a way that reconnects the elders of the tribes, who are guardians of the language, culture, and stories, with the young people of the tribes, who tend to be more drawn to technology and modern life. It’s also working to give these same young people the sorts of marketable skills that will make them valuable in the marketplace, giving them confidence in themselves and a step up that they might not have had otherwise.

In short, (Yeah, too late for that, I know), the project is working to get audio and visual recordings of the elders telling their stories and relaying their culture, in their native language, and then to post these recordings in an online archive in a way that makes is accessible and navigable to others. It’s also excited by some of the progress in technology that makes accessing the written language easier, such as the keyboard overlay developed by the Cherokee that allows them to access the syllabary the same way we access an English language keyboard. You can follow their progress and get in touch with them at http://www.nativelanguageproject.com/ .

Blood:Water Mission is an awesome project. They focus on Africa, and on two of the fluids that are desperately needed for life, liquids that we, in the developed world, take for granted as safe. But in Africa, a continent where AIDS is decimating the population, where malaria still kills, where the blood supply just isn’t safe, no one can count on safe blood. And with the Sahara desert growing every year, much of subSaharan Africa torn by war, drought, or just lack of infrastructure that allows diseases long wiped out in the rest of the world to thrive, access to safe drinking water is often at best a day-long chore that keeps young girls out of school just to help keep up with the demands of their family.

The Blood:Water mission works to combat those problems. They work to restore destroyed wells, a task that is far cheaper than drilling new ones, but just as effective at providing a village with water. They raise money to buy simple, sustainable, long-lasting filtration systems, things that will filter out most of the disease causing organisms in the water the people drink, making it cleaner and safer. These two things alone have an enormous impact; by making what water the people have safer, fewer people die from water-borne pathogens, more time can be spent in school learning, giving the children a chance to escape poverty, more time can be spent working instead of sick, giving the family a chance to escape poverty & subsistence existence. Even the ability to have water closer has a huge impact; because water is such a precious commodity, the same water is used to drink, cook, wash clothes, body, and dishes. The mother is often busy with her younger children (which she has more of, because children aren’t as likely to live long enough to take care of her when she’s older, so she has more, in hopes of some of them making it that far), and the tasks of the home, so the task of getting enough water for just that day falls on the girls in the family… meaning they don’t get to have an education. By bringing water closer, it’s no longer near as scarce, and it doesn’t take the girls away from school anymore.

So how do you get involved? Well, John and I got involved by participating in the 40 days of water challenge. By drinking only tap water for 40 days, and saving the difference that we would have spent on other beverages (milk, juice, soda, tea, coffee, sports drinks, alcohol, whatever), then we are able to send that difference to the project. And while we could certainly designate an amount to give without making the beverage sacrifice, drinking only water serves as a reminder that when we bemoan the “hardship” of drinking “only water”, we’re actually taking part in unspeakable luxury. We have all the clean, safe, drinkable water we want, right there, when we want it, available from the nearest sink. For more information, go to http://www.bloodwatermission.com/ .

The next project is called Compassion. There’s a similar one called World Vision, but I’ve not worked with them, so while I’ll link them at the end, I can’t speak to any of their details. Compassion International was started 50 years ago and now has one million children being sponsored by one million sponsors. With centers in Africa, Asia, South America, and the Caribbean, they reach out to kids in desperate poverty and offer them an education, clothing, food, and medical care. Sponsors write to their sponsored children, and the children write back, exchanging photos, drawings and letters. Compassion sponsors trips to the countries where the children live, allowing the sponsors to go meet the children they’re supporting and what the money they’re sending is actually doing. Further, Compassion works in the community, rushing aid in times of disaster and bringing basic improvements to everyone around them.

This morning, I shared some tweets from Shaun Groves, who is on one of the Compassion tours in Kenya. He shared a picture of a water treatment device that Compassion put in, giving the children access to safe, clean water. It looks to be about the size of a 55 gallon drum, but this little drum is a life saver. He shared a picture of a little boy, who 4 years ago was mute, malnourished, and couldn’t move. Today, because of what Compassion does, this little boy is alive. These kids don’t just learn and get the necessities of survival; they get to play and be safe.

Compassion was one of the first ones on the scene in Haiti, because Compassion had dozens of locations in that country. They quickly rushed to work, digging people out of the rubble, assessing the damage, rushing in humanitarian aid, and notifying sponsors who’d lost their child. And that’s the heartbreaking side of sponsorship. Your sponsored child is far away from you, and you fall in love with him or her or them, and you share your lives together, always knowing that the reason you met is because they are in a place of desperate need. You hope that they will be one of the thousands upon thousands of success stories that Compassion has to tell, the children who grow up, who are successful beyond anything they ever hoped or imagined, who go back to the centers to work with the children themselves, the kids who give back the way you gave to them. In the end, that’s all you can do; hope, pray, and love your kid. But what an impact it has. And what does it cost to sponsor a child? $38. For $38 a month, you have the privilege of falling in love with a kid who needs your love, your encouragement, and your hope as much as he needs the change you send. And yeah, Compassion will ask for more. They’ll ask you to contribute to a fund that helps support the kids that don’t have sponsors yet, so that they can provide life-saving medical care to kids who need it, even though they haven’t found someone to cheer them on. They’ll ask when disaster strikes, to help offset the funds they’re spending to rescue the ones in need NOW. But what they ask for is chump change. Your gift gives LIFE. You can contact Compassion at http://www.compassion.com/ . World Vision, which has a similar program, is found at http://www.worldvision.org/ .

I could go on. I could list awesome programs where a little bit makes a huge impact all day long. Soles4souls gives shoes away to people who have none. Heifer International provides livestock to people to help them earn a living for themselves. The Salvation Army not only provides for the homeless and does disaster relief, but it also runs rehabilitation centers and after school programs. The Hanna Project brings medical aid to people who need it all over globe. And that’s just the first 4 I thought of right off.

The point? I’ve decided to make the world a better place, a brighter place. I don’t have the resources to go out and single-handedly make a huge philanthropic gesture. I can’t be an Oprah an open a school in Africa, or be Angelina Jolie and tour the globe raising awareness for this cause or that problem. But I can make a huge impact with the little bit I have, in little steps, in little ways. I can change the world with my own two hands. But to be truly effective, I can’t do it alone. It works because I’m not alone. You’ve got to use your own two hands. Won’t you join me?

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I think I’ve said before that I’ll have songs get stuck with me, and I’m not entirely sure where I’m supposed to go with them, or what larger message they’re carrying to message, just that the melody and the lyric got a hook into me, and I know I’m supposed to do something with it. This was one of those songs. John recently discovered the band and has been incorporating it into our “car music” (the mix of MP3 cds he plays in the car while we’re driving, particularly for long trips, and we’ve taken 2 of those in the past month). Invariably, when I get a song that hooks me, I either dig out the laptop and write immediately (rare) or I email myself the name of the song, artist, and any thoughts I might have had on it in the moment, giving me time to sort of marinate on the idea and come back to it. This was the latter; I emailed this song and title to myself, but I had no notes about it – I just knew I needed to write about it.

I read the lyrics, and wondered what I was supposed to do. I’ve had more challenging subjects to cover (Bob Dylan’s “Goin’ to Acapulco” is about visiting a brothel) but this certainly ranks among them. After all, the dark in title of the song is not a generic night or place without light. No, the lyricist makes this dark a place that is outside of both heaven and hell. What or where this place might be isn’t made clear… is it non-existence? Limbo? There are no answers. It’s just “the dark”.

But… what if we just ignore that? After all, the condition for the lover following the beloved into the dark is the assumption that the beloved has been rejected from both heaven and hell… not the assumption that neither place exists. So it’s possible that they COULD go to heaven. No, the point of this song isn’t really where their souls end up… the point of this song is about the lover’s commitment to the beloved. And that… Oh, that, Beloved… that’s a very different story.

We’ve all heard the statistics. We’ve all heard about the disposable marriages, how divorce is on the rise. We’ve heard about marriages that last hours, and all the serial marriages in Hollywood, with stars marrying one person after another, faster than anyone can keep up with. It seems that the media are terribly fond of tracking the destruction of marriages and commitment… but what they’re ignoring is the other side of that statistic. If half of marriages are ending in divorce, what about the other half? What about the stars who have been married for 20, 30, 40, 50, 60 years? What about the men and women who meet one another and stay happily married to each other, faithfully committed to their vows for decades? Why do we ignore the faithful for the faithless?

You may argue that I’m not being realistic. That I’m too surrounded by “church people” to be unbiased. I think I’m surrounded by ordinary people. I think I’m talking about normal, healthy, well adjusted people who are more committed to making a marriage and their lives work than they are to being selfish and immature. I’m talking about my grandparents, who will celebrate their 52^nd anniversary in a few days. Or my adoptive parents, who just celebrated 40 years of marriage. Or John’s parents, who celebrated 38 years. Or John’s brother, who’s been married more than 16 years. Or my older sister, who’s been married something like 15 years, or my younger sister, who’s coming up on 11 years of marriage, or John and I, who will celebrate our 12^th anniversary in May. One of my uncles has been married 25 years, and the other has been married 18 years. My great aunts and uncles have been married to the same people as long as I’ve known them… they’ve met or surpassed my grandparents’ anniversaries by now.

My grandparents, as awesome as they are, aren’t some superheroes of marriage. They’re two people who made a decision to commit to one another, and have kept that promise. They’ve done the sleepless nights with the baby, 4 times (3 of their own, and me). They’ve raised or help raise 6 children into adulthood (their 3, me, and my two youngest sisters). They’re watching their 7 grandchildren mature into adults, and now make them great-grandparents (two great-granddaughters, one great-grandson) and eagerly await the arrival of more. They’re just normal people who have lived their lives together, keeping the promises they made to one another on they day they married each other.

Marriage isn’t easy. It’s not something that just happens overnight. There are struggles along the way. You think it’s just as easy as who does what, but even that is always in flux; if he doesn’t feel well, you can’t leave his half of things undone. If she’s busy with the children, he might need to step in and take over some of the things she’s always taken care of. You have to sacrifice your right to always be right and be willing to listen and compromise. Marriage isn’t a scorecard of who’s right and who’s wrong, who’s winning and who’s losing, and who’s got what percentage of what. It’s a partnership, two people coming together to create a gestalt, a richer whole than they ever were by themselves.

Now, I don’t mean to suggest that you lose who you are in a marriage. You don’t. I’m still very much who I was before I was married; still love Star Trek and writing (hello!) and languages and cats, a mother at my heart. John is still who he has always been; still loves movies and electronics and dogs, a problem solver and rationalist first. I can even look at my grandparents and see my great-grandparents’ influence on each of them still; my grandmother is still very much the way I remember her mother being, the way her father is, and my grandfather is still very much the way I remember his mother (I don’t remember his father). That’s not a bad thing; they’ve kept who they were before while still combining to become a greater whole. That’s what a gestalt is. It means that the whole is greater than the sum of it’s individual parts.

At its heart, I think this song is talking about that kind of commitment, the sort that builds a marriage for a lifetime. The singer has been told what someone else’s view of love is; instead, the lover chooses another path. Together, the lover and beloved travel the world, seeing and experiencing life together, coming together to the end of life. It is at this point that we join them, as the lover promises that, no matter what is yet to come, the commitment that has been made stands. It’s the promise that though the vow says “until death parts us,” the lover won’t leave the beloved alone to face what comes next alone.

OK, so that’s a little macabre. But let’s face it; death is rather overwhelming, even if you know where you’re going to end up. You’re leaving the ones you love. If you’re lucky, they will be mature enough to “release” you… to tell you to let go. But it’s not easy to slip loose of the ties that have bound you to this life, and to have your lover promise to accompany you even into this impossible journey is a little bit of a sweet promise. And it’s that kind of commitment… to actually be there when the end comes, however it comes, that builds strong marriages that last decades.

I haven’t always had the healthiest role models to look at as I’ve built my life. But no matter what Hollywood says, no matter what statistics the experts come up with, I’m convinces of this: marriage is stronger than we give it credit for. I had amazing men and women to show me what marriage could be, what it should be, how ordinary men and women lived out the extraordinary commitment it takes to follow someone into the dark.

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One, it tends to create a very insular society, one in which the body of believers that have been commanded to go into all the world are entirely too comfortable staying inside their little bubble, insulated from the culture around them. While I can certainly appreciate the concern that my fellow believers have for the trends we see in popular culture (really, reality television? Sexting? Paris, Britany, Miley, and Lindsey Lohan?) if we completely insulate ourselves from every facet of it, we risk becoming irrelevant to the people to whom we’re supposed to be going. And we risk missing some awsome stuff.

Two, can we just all admit it? “Christian” entertainment is all too often, at best, mediocre. There are some awesome bands out there, doing awesome stuff. Flyleaf, for instance, gets much respect from me for making it commercially without sacrificing their message. Veggie Tales are absolutely amazing; they get love in the secular and Christian markets. But, and I’m sorry you have to hear this Kirk Cameron, “Fireproof” had a good message, but wasn’t that good a movie. Even Christians agree. So if I want quality, I have to look outside of the “christian” market. If I want innovation, I’ve got to get out of my bubble.

And finally, just because it’s coming from a secular source doesn’t mean they didn’t have something worthwhile, or even, *gasp* scripturally sound, to say. Perhaps they didn’t sit down and write Bible verses into their song. Maybe they didn’t even realize how much Scripture they’d poured into it, or even meant to… but that doesn’t mean that you can’t find God speaking rich truth in surprising places. After all, in Acts, Paul told the Athenians that when they worshiped their unknown god, they’d been worshiping God, the Christian God. And in Romans, he teaches that God makes Himself known to all men, so that man is without excuse. In other words… even when you’re disobedient and insular, God finds ways to make sure mankind knows who He is.

But enough of that; I came to discuss one such song that came from a secular source: OKgo’s “This Too Shall Pass.” They have an awesome (and completely kid-friendly) video on youtube right now, featuring a huge Rube Goldberg machine that they maneuver around as they sing the song. The chorus, which dominates the song, and actually changes, is bright and cheerful, making the song infectious and easy to learn. And the message… well, Beloved, OKgo may not be a “Christian” band, but this is so scripturally sound that it’s practically a sermon, only without the snoring!

The first verse opens talking about the weight that ties you down, and questioning if you’re going to let that hold you back. Hrm. That sounds familiar. There’s something in Hebrew about that… Oh, yes. Hebrews 12:1 “Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses, let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles, and let us run with perseverance the race marked out for us.” And Jesus tells us in Matthew “my yoke is easy and my burden is light.” He tells us to not look back, and to not let our dead hold us back.

The second verse then goes on to talk about not stopping kids from dancing, and about minds that don’t move and knees that don’t bend. I think that if the first verse is about letting go of the things that hold you back, this second verse is talking about not being hypocritical and not holding others back (especially with the line “especially when you’re already gettin’ yours”). It’s about letting go of the legalism and the traditions and the old way of doing things and understanding that maybe fixed ideas aren’t the best way to go about a thing.

Jesus was a radical. When he came, he did things that violated the laws that the Pharisees had put in place in hopes of guiding the people to salvation. The Pharisees couldn’t see that this was God in flesh, the One who had originally given them the laws that they had then added to, that this was the One who had come to set them free from the legalism that so tightly controlled how far they could walk, what they could eat when, what they could do, who they could talk to, every aspect of their lives, so when He started to challenge them, to break their laws, they were incensed. Furious. Who did he think he was?

He goes around with those… thieves! The tax collectors! Either he’s stupid, and doesn’t know what sort of people they are, or he’s a thief and sinner just like them, and how dare he break their laws and gather a following?!? And he doesn’t fast! That’s just shameful. Even that crazy man out in the desert, John… even his followers fast. And he breaks the Sabbath! That’s one of the big 10! *gasp*

Jesus’ reply was simple. “My followers don’t fast because the bridegroom is with them. When the bridegroom is taken away, then they will fast.” He said “The law was made for man, the Sabbath was made for man, not man for the law or the Sabbath.” In other words, He told them, “you’ve got it all backwards. You’ve gotten all bound up in your laws, and you bind others in them. The law was made for you, not you for the law. And why would anyone skip the party when the guest of honor is here? I’m here; it’s time for rejoicing.”

Oh, and was it ever! You see, Beloved, in the beginning, when God made everything, God and man walked together. We shared the earth with God, walking in the cool of the day with him, in a personal relationship with Him. When it says in Genesis chapter 3 that God was walking in the garden in the cool of the day, the original language indicates that this wasn’t a unique event. This was a habit. But that all stopped when Adam and Eve sinned. God left earth. There was no God and man walking in the garden every evening anymore. That gulf was keenly felt.

And then God put on flesh and made his dwelling among us. God with us. Emmanuel. Walking with us. Talking with us. Spending time with us. Hello? God on earth with man again. This is grounds for a party, and who is going to skip this party? Jesus is right; it only makes sense for his followers not to fast while He is with them. Don’t let your rules and traditions hold them back!

You see, beloved, the heart of it all is in the repeated chorus, even as it changes. We tend to forget that we live a temporal, temporary, short existence. Nothing in this life is permanent, and yet, we are destined for eternity. This world we live in, all that we build around us, all of that… it’s all going to pass away. Behold, all things pass away, all things shall be made new. Weeping lasts a night… joy comes in the morning! Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for His compassions never fail; they are new every morning; Great is your faithfulness! Where we have ashes, God gives us beauty. Where we have grief, he gives us gladness; despair, praise.

All the burdens in your life? This too shall pass. You can’t let it get you down. It’s all going to pass away. All the legalism that have shaped your existence? This too shall pass. You can’t let it get you down. It’s all going to pass away. Beloved, when the morning comes, and oh, the morning ALWAYS comes, it always comes, the morning brings joy. Let it all go; this too shall pass, when the morning comes.

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Witnesses are people who, being physically present, have seen or perceived a thing. They beheld it. They saw, heard, they know by personal presence and perception, or so it is defined by dictionary.com. To be a witness is to possess personal knowledge of a thing or event. It implies a certain level of intimacy of knowledge and awareness with events in question.

In Ben Harper’s “Blessed To Be A Witness”, he references the stone statue of Christ the Redeemer standing on Corcovado, a mountain in Brazil. It is possibly one of the most recognizable images of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, forming a short-hand reference for that city and even the country as a while; you see the image of Jesus, his arms outstretched on the top of this mountain overlooking the city and you immediately think of Brazil.

But while he’s spelling out this imagery in Brazil, he’s using it as shorthand for the larger story behind it. Cristo Redentor, the statue that stands atop the mountain he names, isn’t actually a scene of crucifixion; it’s a statue of Jesus with His arms open wide, welcoming. By referring to a figure crucified in stone, Harper calls our attention back to the sacrifice that made Christ a redeemer, that caused Thomas to doubt. He further invokes this imagery by pointing out that “his blood is my own.” Then he intones that he is blessed to be a witness.

What is he witness to? The crucifixion he’s invoked occurred nearly two millenia ago, so he could not have been there physically to see it. But he uses the image of a statue that is almost a 100 years old to draw our attention to events that are nearly 2000 years old, and does so very effectively. From the first time I heard this song, I thought of Thomas, I thought of the disciples who walked everyday with Jesus.

Jesus, after He had risen from the tomb, came and sought Thomas out intentionally. He knew that Thomas had doubts. He knew that Thomas was uncertain. Let’s be fair; Thomas wasn’t exactly unreasonable to doubt that a man could raise HIMSELF from the dead. I mean, yes, he’d seen Jesus do some stunning things, including raising several people from the dead. But operating from outside of death on another person to give them life… well, that’s one thing. To be dead yourself? And the way he had died… really… everyone else had died of prolonged illnesses. It would have been very easy for him to talk himself into thinking that Jesus had just healed them of their illness… that they’d been near death, but not dead. To have met such a violent death… to have been scourged so completely, then literally NAILED to a cross, and then stabbed in the side? Of course he doubted. Many reasonable, rational men doubt. You might be doubting.

We damn Thomas for doubting. Jesus sought him out in love. “Oh, Thomas, Beloved, come here. Come here and don’t be satisfied with the testimony of your eyes. There will be those who come after you who need more than eyewitnesses. Come, Beloved, and be a witness to those who will come behind you. Put your finger in the nail holes. Put your hand in the hole in my side. Come, my Beloved, Come, see, and believe.” There’s no judgment. There’s no anger. There’s no condemnation. There may be humor, but this is love.

Thomas, confronted with the evidence, facing wounds that no man could survive, and a man that stood before him speaking to him, alive and well, again made a rational decision. He fell on his face and worshiped his Redeemer. “My Lord and my God!” he cried. And Jesus, in His love, in His mercy, said, “You have believed because you have seen. Blessed are those who believe but do not see.”

Jesus was referring to you and I there. He was talking to Ben Harper. We can’t be literal witnesses to the crucifixion, so we are blessed through our belief in the redeemer. But how do we get to belief in a redeemer we never see? How can we be witnesses to something we’ve never seen?

Because, Beloved, we see redemption all around us. Cristo Redentor isn’t just a stone statue on a mountain in Brazil. He’s actively living and working all around us and through us. Every child that leaves the foster care system and leads a successful life is an example of a life redeemed. Every time a life is reclaimed from addiction, we see the power of redemption. Every child adopted is a powerful reminder that redemption is available to us all. Even when we choose to live after loss we see life redeemed from pain and grief.

Life, Beloved, by its very nature, LIFE is redemptive. Every time you choose life or love or joy over death or hate or grief, every time, you see redemption at work. Sometimes, it’s in the little things, the small choices we make as we go through life. But as we go through life, small choices add up, they accumulate, and they can have a huge impact.

And then, of course, there are the big ones… the baby born into an impossibly awful situation, adopted into a great one, who grows up, defying all the odds, and goes on to make a huge impact on society for the better… discovers a new medicine, becomes a judge or legislator, or an activist, and makes the world a safer place for children like him or her. Or the drug addict who cleans up and turns around and opens a rehab to help other addicts get clean, literally saving lives and turning them around forever, giving them the skills they need to climb out of their life of crime and hopelessness. Or the woman who was raised in and out of foster care, physically, sexually, verbally, emotionally abused, who determines that’s not who she’s going to be, who walks away from it all, marries an amazing man who teaches her about love, learns about the stunning love of God in new ways, decides to adopt, and becomes a vocal proponent for sharing the radical and life-changing redemptive love of Christ the Redeemer.

I never saw the crucifixion. But oh, Beloved, I am so blessed to be a witness of Christ the Redeemer. I have intimate, first-hand, eyewitness knowledge of a life redeemed. I have seen it, participated in it. And not only have I seen my own life changed, Beloved, I’ve learned how to see it, and I can’t not see Him all around me, redeeming lives and loving us all.

What, in your life, have you seen? To what things or events are you a witness? Could you say, as go through your life, even in the pain (as Ben Harper admits, and even I do) and still say that you have been blessed to be a witness?

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I know, that’s so obvious as to be nearly ridiculous. Of course people who call themselves “Christian” should be like Christ. And the churches they form, when they gather together to worship and do the work corporately that they can’t do individually, like overseas missions and homeless ministries and schools, those should be like Christ. And the works they do, those should be like the work Christ did. I mean, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure that out. It’s common sense.

But it seems, the more I encounter from people living in this world around me, the more I hear in the news, the more I observe in life, the less Christ I see in “Christianity”. It’s the opposite from what it should be. When I reflect on what I see in much of “Christianity”, I am little surprised that people are turned off by it. If “Christianity” reflects who Christ is, why would they ever want any part of Him? If He is judgment and hypocrisy, self-righteousness and mercilessness, ugliness and rejection, why would they ever choose Him?

And yet, this is what they find in the modern church! They hear Pat Robertson advocating the destruction of domestic and foreign governments, including assassinations, and damning innocent victims of natural disasters for an imagined sin of their forefathers! They hear about an Archbishop who forgave two doctors for providing an abortion to a nine year old rape victim, now having to fight calls for his resignation over his “questionable call” on the case. They hear sermons of hellfire and damnation, and nothing of grace and mercy. They come to us for help and are turned away because we’re too busy, or we decide they’re abusing us.

I don’t deny for a moment that there are people who take unfair advantage of the goodness of the others. I grew up with someone who did that, traveling from church to church, trotting out her three little girls, until she burned them out, and then she’d move on to the next church for help. It happens. I’m not saying that the church shouldn’t be wary; indeed, Jesus Himself warned us to be wary. But He also told us to be innocent. And more than that, He told us to go. He told us to love. He told us to be neighbors. And Beloved, we are disobedient. The fields are white for harvest, but the people who claim His name want nothing to do with who He is or the work He called them to.

You know what, though? That’s not OK. Wearing His name, and having nothing to do with who He is? You serve to drive people away from Him. You form an exclusive “members only” clique, where you suddenly get to decide who’s up to your standards to get into heaven. Suddenly, you become the final authority, you become the judge and god over everyone you meet, and you hold up a measuring rod that, let’s face it, you yourselves can’t meet. Or did you not realize you were setting yourselves up as idols? Did you not realize that modern christianity is nothing more than a golden calf in a new shape, and we’re all chewing our cud, lumbering after it straight into the abattoir? No wonder the world wants nothing to do with us!

Jesus was radical. He was born into a bad situation… an unwed mother who couldn’t explain how she became pregnant except by saying “It’s a miracle.” His parents have to relocate right before He’s born because of a government program, but they don’t have a house to go to, not even a hotel to stay in… so He’s born in a stable. He’s homeless. The first visitors are shepherds, men who live in the fields, taking care of animals. While He’s still small, his family has to flee for their lives when another government program comes in and kills all the children, looking for Him. And this is all before He’s potty trained!

By the time we find Him as an adult, He’s making friends with society’s rejects; tax collectors who lined their own pockets by inflating tax rates, political activists, women of low reputation, lepers who are forbidden from human contact. These people voluntarily change their entire way of life because of the influence of Jesus in their life. The tax collectors give back all they’ve taken and then some. The lepers, literally touched by Jesus, thank Him and go home to families, leaping for joy. The dead live. The blind see. Lives are changed for the better.

Jesus teaches us about radical forgiveness. Don’t forgive once, or twice… make forgiveness so much a habit that you can’t keep count. If some one wrongs you by taking your coat, give them your shirt. Don’t seek revenge for the wrongs done to you. Let it go.

Jesus teaches about radical love. It’s easy to love your brother; we all do that. But what about your enemy. And what about your neighbor? Who is your neighbor? Jesus tells the story of a man beaten and robbed. A priest walks by, sees him, and ignores him. A righteous man walks by, sees him, ignores him. Finally, a man from a warring group walks by. He sees him, binds up his wounds, puts him on his own donkey, takes him to shelter, pays for his care, and promises to come back and provide more care. The clear teaching is that the man who gave of himself, no matter what group

I’ve spelled this out before, but I want to do it again. It seems it can’t be done enough. This is the litmus test, people. Jesus Himself told us: “By this will all men know you are my disciples (students, followers, LIKE ME), if you love one another (not just yourselves, but the way I love).” (Parenthetical comments mine). Then we are told by Paul what love is: “Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”

How do I know that THIS is the litmus test? Because later, when we are told what to look for in the life of a person who is living by the Spirit of God, many of the same things come up. See for yourself: the list is found in Galatians 5:22-23. “But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.” Do you see them? Patience. Kindness. Faithfulness… because to persevere is to be faithful. Goodness, in opposition to evil. Self-controlled, not easily angered, or boastful or rude or self-seeking. Love.

If you want to really be like Christ, then you have to do what He did. You have to be the way He is. You have to love. You have to love freely, radically. You’ve got to make compassion a driving part of who you are and what you do and why you do it. You have to be willing to give up everything you have, to step out of everything you “deserve” in your life in order to love another. You have to die to yourself, to all your selfishness, if you’re going to be Christian. Because to be like Christ, you have to follow Him, even when it means you get taken advantage of, even when you aren’t sure what the outcome is, even when they hate you. You have to love them even when they reject you. To be like Christ, you have to accept the fact that He didn’t die for the ones YOU chose, He died for ALL of us. EVERY LAST ONE OF US.

There are lives and souls on the line. There are lost people who think that christians are happy that they will burn in hell. Stop. Just stop and think about that for a minute. If you really belong to Christ, I want you to stop and think about this for a minute. While the followers of Christ, the people who Loved radically like He called us to, are in Heaven, enjoying His presence, living eternally, there are going to be people in Hell, suffering forever. For every minute that Christians enjoy, they suffer. And the lost think we’re PLEASED about this prospect.

God isn’t. In Ezekiel, God pleads with the Hebrews: “Why, why will you die? Repent and live!” Why would ANYONE ever be pleased at this idea? If you really believe that hell exists, that it is a real place of suffering and torment, WHY ARE YOU SITTING HERE, DOING NOTHING? Your friends, your neighbors, your loved ones, your loved ones’ friends and neighbors and their loved ones are all going to that HORRIBLE PLACE unless some one demonstrates the radical love of Christ to them! All they’ve seen is the ugly calf of modern cliquish christianity, of “I’m better than you, and I’m going to fish in heaven” or whatever, and they don’t want that! Or they think they’re good enough and that’s going to get them in. Or they went to church when they were kids, and think that’s going to get them in. WHAT ARE YOU DOING? WHY ARE YOU SITTING HERE WHEN PEOPLE ARE GOING TO HELL ALL AROUND YOU?

I’m not talking to the lost. They don’t need to be scared out of hell. They’re turned off of that. They need to be loved into heaven. They need the same mercy and grace we’ve received so freely. They need us to get off our complacent behinds and GET INTO THE FIELDS and GET TO WORK.

The modern church is a shame. If you recognized yourself as a cud chewer, get out of line. There’s still time before the blade falls. You can still be a follower of the radical Christ. If you want to be part of the radical love of Jesus, then get out there. Love people. They aren’t projects. They’re people. They’re no different from you and I, no more or less deserving of God’s grace and forgiveness than we ever have been. So Go. Go into all the world… across the room, across the street, across the block, across the city, across the state, across the country, across the world… go and love them. There’s no time to lose.

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I found myself in that situation recently, so this evening, John and I sat down and watched 1981’s “Clash of the Titans” with Harry Hamlin, Laurence Olivier, and Maggie Smith. I’d list off the other people in the movie, but if you don’t follow classic films, you’re unlikely to recognise any of them. (Actually, you might be doing well to recognize Harry Hamlin from anything but television, but at least Maggie Smith has made a name for herself recently playing Professor McGonagall in the Harry Potter franchise). This film is a “cult classic”, known among fans of stop motion animation as the last film ever made by Ray Harryhausen, who was an enormously influential filmmaker for more than 30 years, in the era before CGI and digital effects, when all special effects had to be created by hand.

With that in mind, a certain amount of consideration must be given to the effects in the film. A certain amount. I’m not giving this movie a free pass on effects, not when “2001: A Space Odyssey” came out in 1968, when “Star Wars” came out in 1977, when “The Empire Strikes Back” came out in 1980, and “Star Trek” came out in 1979 (not to mention the television show that aired from 1966-1969!). OK, sure, stop motion and the sorts of effects in other movies listed aren’t the same sort of effects. Except, see, “Coraline”, which was released last year, used stop motion animation and was really very well done. Seriously, if we compare the quality of effects for the time period, then there’s clearly a disparity there. If we compare the quality of effects across the same sort of effects (stop motion against stop motion), there’s still a telling disparity. So sure, be fans of the guy and love him, but at some point, crappy effects are crappy effects, no matter how awesome the filmmaker may be or what sort of influence he had on the industry.

But even if we set the effects aside, this movie is so flawed that I really don’t know where to start. I suppose we could argue that it doesn’t even want to be remotely accurate to history or mythology, and poof all the problems go away. Except, see, when you take characters from mythology and then just play with them this way, it kind of feels… dirty. Wrong. Like putting Abraham Lincoln at the Boston Tea Party with an Uzi and blowing up the British with the first atomic bomb. Yeah, that’s the level of messed up this movie is, and if you think that a) Abraham Lincoln was alive in 1773, b) in Boston, c)that Uzis existed in 1773, d) were used at the Boston Tea Party, e) that bombs were used against the British at the Boston Tea Party, f) that atomic bombs existed in 1773, and that g) any of this is remotely likely… well, maybe you should go brush up on your history instead of reading this review or watching this movie (or, um, any movie, or television, or ANYTHING else).

Warning: If you have yet to see this movie, or you want to go into the 2010 version (which I’ve only seen trailers for, but I assume must follow the plot of the original even remotely) without knowing anything, spoilers follow. Also, if you have like, ANY respect for classics, the following might drive you insane. You have been warned. (This is the Wiki article with added comments from me).

“King Acrisius of Argos (Donald Houston) locks his daughter Danaë (Vida Taylor) away from mortal men to avoid a prophecy that he would die if his daughter had a son. While she is imprisoned, the god Zeus (Laurence Olivier) visits her and she becomes pregnant. After discovering the pregnancy, Acrisius casts his daughter and her newborn son Perseus out to sea in a wooden coffin, hoping to kill both and avoid his fate. In retribution, Zeus orders the god of the sea Poseidon (Jack Gwillim) to release an ancient monster known as the Kraken to destroy Argos, fulfilling the prophecy. Meanwhile, Danaë and Perseus safely float to the island of Seriphos.”

Wow. We go off track in the first scene. That’s got to be some kind of record or something. OK. According to myth, there was an Acrisius of Argos. He was the king, his daughter was Danaë, and he did imprison her to keep her from bearing the son who would be his prophesied death. Zeus comes in a shower of gold (or maybe it was her uncle) and she turns up pregnant with Perseus. Enraged, Acrisius locks the daughter and infant son in a chest and has her tossed in the sea. Zeus DOES get Poseidon involved… to guide the two to safety on Seriphos where the child grows up. But where does the Kraken come from? And what happens to King Acrisius? History says that Perseus eventually accidentally kills him years later, fulfilling the prophesy. We’ll discuss the mysterious Kraken later, but it certainly didn’t destroy Argos! (Besides, if it destroyed Argos, then what is Perseus supposed to rule?)

Calibos (Neil McCarthy), son of the sea goddess Thetis (Maggie Smith), is a handsome young man destined to marry Princess Andromeda (Judi Bowker), the daughter of Queen Cassiopeia (Sian Phillips) and heir to the rich city of Joppa. But cruel and destructive Calibos has hunted and destroyed every living thing surrounding the Wells of The Moon, including Zeus’ entire sacred herd of flying horses (except for Pegasus). As punishment for this and his many other transgressions, Zeus transforms Calibos into a goat-like monster who is subsequently shunned and forced to live as an outcast in the swamps and marshes. Thetis, furious at her son’s fate, vows that if Calibos cannot marry Andromeda, no other man will either. Equally infuriated by Zeus’s total devotion for his own son, Thetis transports Perseus (Harry Hamlin) from Seriphos to Joppa.

Um, where to begin. Who is Calibos? Thetis is a sea nymph. Her son is ACHILLES, the one she dipped in the River Styx while she held him by the heel, thus resulting in that being his only vulnerable spot and the origin of the term “Achille’s Heel”. Andromeda and Casseiopeia live in Ethopia, and their coastal port city is Jaffa. Wells of the Moon? What wells of the moon (and why, in every scene shot here, does it look like DAYLIGHT)? Pegasus exists already? No, no he doesn’t. Pegasus is born when Perseus cuts off Medusa’s head.

So we have a non-existent son in a non-existent city pledged to marry a princess who’s on another CONTINENT and has killed everything around an non-existent sacred site, except for a sacred stallion that SHOULDN’T EXIST YET. And we magically transport Perseus to the non-existent city to get him in on the action.

Perseus, befriended by the scholar and playwright Ammon (Burgess Meredith), learns of Andromeda and her plight: she cannot marry unless her suitor successfully answers a riddle, and any suitor who fails to answer the riddle correctly is burned at the stake.

In a scene that is clearly “THIS IS EXPOSITION”, a guard explains poor prisoner Andromeda’s plight. He also clearly tells us that the riddle is known ONLY to the poor sap who fails to correctly answer it. This is an important point. Remember it.

Armed with gifts from the gods (a sword, shield, and a helmet that renders its wearer invisible), Perseus captures Pegasus and follows Andromeda’s shade on her nightly journey to learn a new riddle from Calibos. Armed with the answer, Perseus is nearly killed by Calibos, but escapes, losing the magical helmet in the swamps in the process.

Perseus appears at the next ceremony for a new suitor and answers the riddle correctly, presenting Calibos’s severed hand (with a gold ring on one of the fingers, which is the answer to the riddle) and winning Andromeda’s hand in marriage.

Remember where I pointed out that the friendly expository guard said the only one who knows what the riddle was is the poor sap who answered it wrong and is thus today’s torch? Yeah, in this scene, Andromeda just blurts it out to everyone in the temple. And the clue Calibos gave her in the swamp? How the crap did THAT become the riddle? And if THAT’s the sort of riddles she’s been giving, really, why did it take Perseus to figure it out, because that was pretty dumb. Yikes. Of course, this is all objections to THIS crappy plot line. In mythology, NONE OF THIS TAKES PLACE, because WHO IS CALIBOS AGAIN? Perseus and Andromeda haven’t even met yet!

At the temple to Thetis, Calibos prays to his mother Thetis to take vengeance on Perseus. Thetis tells Calibos that she cannot do so because Perseus is protected by Zeus, but she can take vengeance on Joppa. At the wedding, Queen Cassiopeia compares Andromeda’s beauty to that of Thetis herself, which angers the goddess. The statue of Thetis collapses and its head comes to life, demanding Andromeda as a virgin sacrifice to the Kraken in thirty days, or else Joppa will be destroyed.

Do I really have to address the whole “Calibos doesn’t exist plot line” again? I’ll deal with it later. Perseus STILL has not met Andromeda, so there’s no wedding. Cassiopeia just boasts, unprovoked, that her daughter is the most beautiful, even more than the nymph daughters of the sea. Thetis isn’t even invoked. It’s Poseidon, King of the sea, who sends the Cetus, on his own, to punish the vain queen and her country. Andromeda’s father, the KING, begs for help for his people at the Oracle of Zeus, and is told that his virgin daughter must be sacrificed to the Cetus on the coast of Jaffa. NO THETIS, NO KRAKEN, NO JOPPA, and NO CALIBOS.

Perseus seeks a way to defeat the Kraken. Zeus commands Athena (Susan Fleetwood) to give Perseus her owl Bubo as a replacement for his lost helmet of invisibility. Instead she orders Hephaestus (Pat Roach) to build a mechanical replica of Bubo as an aid for Perseus.

Let’s ignore the fact that Perseus isn’t in this story yet, there is no Kraken (it’s a Cetus) and that he can’t be looking for a way to kill it because he’s not aware of the problem. Let’s just look at the Bubo issue. Her owl’s name is Bubo? How is that name remotely Greek? It’s right up there with Kraken! Oh, wait, I’m dealing with the Kraken later. Ignore that. Worse than the name, though, is the fact that Athena goes to Hephaestus and orders a mechanical replica of the bird to replace it. It’s not like Zeus won’t notice she’s still got her owl on her shoulder or anything… so now, in prehistoric Greece, in a mythical story, we have a ROBOTIC BIRD flying around. It chirps, whistles, flaps its wings, blinks its eyes, and only Perseus can understand it. Harryhausen claimed it predates R2D2. Sure, Harryhausen. And my mother was a hamster, and my father smelled of elderberries.

Bubo leads Perseus to the Stygian Witches, three blind women (Flora Robson, Anna Manahan and Freda Jackson) who disclose that the only hope of survival in combat against the Kraken is by using the head of another monster, Medusa the Gorgon. Once a beautiful woman, Medusa had been punished by the gods by being transformed by the goddess Aphrodite (Ursula Andress) into a horrible monster.

They climb up to get to the STYGIAN Witches. Stygian mean “of the River Styx”, which flows through the UNDERWORLD. So why are they climbing UP to get to witches who are part of the Underworld? Maybe the witches decided to take a page out of George Jefferson’s book and move on up to the Eastside. Actually, they’re described in mythology as graeae, primordial deities of the sea or earth. They share one eye and one tooth, and while the movie gets right that Perseus steals the eye and holds it ransom for information on the gorgons, there’s no indication that this is an “all powerful eye” as it is described in the movie, or that a mechanical owl helped him, or that they have jack diddly to do with the river styx. Nor does he go to them to get help fighting the Kraken or the Cetus: he goes to get help fighting the GORGON, Medusa, whom the Stygian witches in the film introduce as an aside, a means to kill the Kraken, not the end that Perseus was actually there for in mythology.

Also, if this is an all powerful eye, why return it? Why not use the eye to kill the monster, or the Gorgon? Why give it back to witches that are eating people? Why risk them using it against you? Even if you accept that there is an all powerful eye, WHY GIVE IT BACK?

Worse, we’re told that Medusa is a Titan. No. She might be a monster that dates from the age of the Titans, having been created to aid them against the Olympians, but she’s not a Titan herself. We’re also told that Aphrodite turned her into a monster. No again. ATHENA caught Medusa, who was a beautiful woman, with Poseidon, in her temple. In revenge, ATHENA transformed Medusa in the horrible ugly creature. ATHENA. Not Aphrodite.

Meeting Medusa’s gaze will turn any living creature to stone, including the Kraken. She makes her home on the Isle of the Dead, which lies across the River Styx, at the very edge of the Underworld. Perseus travels there and manages to decapitate her with help of his shield and collects her head, but loses the shield in the process. As he and his party set to return, Calibos raids the camp, drives off the group’s horses and punctures the cloak carrying Medusa’s head, causing her blood to spill and spawn giant scorpions. The scorpions and Calibos attack the party. Left alone, Perseus is able to kill the scorpions and manages to best Calibos, whom he finally kills with Aphrodite’s sword.

I’m not given a location for the home of Medusa, but when Perseus crosses the Styx, he’s given a coin to give to the ferryman, Charon, to pay his passage. Of course, how he’s supposed to get back isn’t made clear. In myth, this isn’t a problem; THIS is where Pegasus comes from; Medusa is pregnant with the winged horse, and when Perseus cuts off her head, the winged horse comes forth. No more worries about how to travel. There’s also some legend about her having poisonous blood, or her blood turning into snakes, but nothing about scorpions. Also, if her blood turns into scorpions, why does it wait until Calibos pierces the head later, and not when it globs out gracelessly at her death? At least Calibos is finally out of the picture.

Perseus, weakened by his struggle and running out of time, asks Bubo to find Pegasus. The owl locates Pegasus in the swamp, guarded by Calibos’ men and the vulture. Perseus manages to scare them off, destroy the camp, and free the winged stallion.

Maybe I wasn’t paying attention at this point, having concluded that this movies was laughably awful by now, but I saw the robot bird that had, to this point, been nothing more than comic relief (and not good comic relief even), suddenly becomes an awesome hero and swoops in to save the day. I didn’t see Perseus once. The horse has to be rescued though, so that the story can get some sort of back on track.

Just as Andromeda is about to be sacrificed to the Kraken, Bubo appears, trying to stall the Kraken while Perseus is seen flying to her on Pegasus. Perseus approaches the Kraken but is knocked off, falling into the ocean. Bubo retrieves the head and delivers it to Perseus, who frees the head, turning the Kraken into stone which collapses into the bay. Perseus throws the head into the ocean and frees Andromeda. Pegasus emerges from the sea to the crowd’s delight.

Perseus flies in, kills CETUS, and is given permission to marry the rescued Andromeda. He uses the head of Medusa to turn her uncle, to whom she’s been promised, Phineus, into stone. When Perseus eventually does get rid of Medusa’s head, he gives it to Athena, who puts it on her shield. Had he thrown her head into the sea, the head would have turned everything into stone. This would have been a huge disaster.

The gods discuss the outcome of the adventure: Perseus and Andromeda will live happily, rule wisely and produce good children. The other gods are forbidden to pursue any vengeance against them. In addition, the likenesses of Perseus, Andromeda, Pegasus and Cassiopeia are set among the stars as constellations to forever remind mankind of the values of heroism and bravery.

The figures were placed in the stars. Athena places Andromeda near Perseus, but it is Poseidon who places Cassiopeia in the heavens, and it is a punishment that places her there… not a reward or a reminder for mankind of the values of heroism and bravery.

Now… the Kraken. There is a sea monster that threatens the city of Jaffa and the lovely princess Andromeda. Perseus, on Pegasus, slays the sea monster, thus winning the lovely princess Andromeda, marrying her and living happily ever after. The monster is called Cetus, though, not Kraken, and this really is a big difference. It’s thousands of miles and an entire PHYLUM of difference. Cetus is a fish like creature that lives in the Mediterranean Sea or possibly the Indian Ocean. Fish like means it’s a vertebrate, has a spine. And note that like Calibos (the man who doesn’t exist), Perseus, or any of the other myriad of names here, Cetus is actually vaguely greco-roman sounding. It actually sounds like it might fit the story.

Kraken, on the other hand, is a Norwegian or Icelandic monster that most closely resembles the giant squid or octopi that live in the Atlantic. In fact, the word “kraken” is the German plural for octopus. It doesn’t sound like it fits because it doesn’t. It comes from the wrong mythic structure, it’s an invertebrate, and it’s not found around Greece or Ethiopia.

So, let’s sum up: We have a hero who gets a horse from a sacred site that doesn’t exist before it’s born, is sent on an epic journey to save a princess after her fiancé, who doesn’t exist, is punished for killing everything at the sacred site except the horse that is pre-existent, from a Norwegian monster, described as the last Titan, by first killing the gorgon who is supposed to give birth to the pre-existent horse he rode to get the information on how to kill the monster…

This plot is so twisted and broken that I can’t even figure out how to fix it! From the standpoint of the mythic structure, it’s hopeless broken and abused. From the standpoint of its own continuity and plot line, it’s broken, weak, and inconsistent. And the effects in this movie are so awful as to be laughable! It’s SO bad that “Clash of the Titans” actually contains no actual Titans, not even one! The closest we get to one is Medusa, and she’s not a Titan; she’s a Gorgon, who might have been created to assist the Titans against the Olympians. So no Titans which means no clash of non-existent Titans!

Still, I was raised with the motto “If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all.” For all the numerous flaws in this film, there are things worth noting. For instance, Vida Taylor, who turns in a tiny role (mostly nude) as Perseus’ mother, Danae, is lovely and believable as first terrified and then devoted to her son. Maggie Smith, playing Thetis, who is given a weak script, manages to still redeem her performance, begging for her son, and managing to bring life to a cold marble head. Even Sian Phillips’ Cassiopeia is believable in her portrayal. It’s a shame these actors didn’t have actual meat to work with; the story of Perseus might have been worth watching if it had actually been crafted with some skill.

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This world is a heavy place, full of heartbreak and despair. If you let it, it will drag you down, break your spirit, and drown what remains. If you look at the ugliness that some people have towards one another, you wonder how anyone could ever say that man is basically good. You begin to understand why people question how God could be loving, good, and all powerful when you see the natural disasters around you… and not just the big ones, like the tsunami in Asia, or Hurricane Katrina, or the earthquake and aftershocks in Haiti, but the floods that strike homes all over the world, or the quiet march of lava that claims homes in places like Hawaii or on other Pacific rim nations or other volcanic areas. You wonder about the babies born too soon, who, oh, Lord, just one more month, one more week, one more day would have been enough to give them a chance to fight for their lives. You wonder about people who are unfortunate enough to be born in the wrong place and fall victim to diseases that no longer exist in the developed world, taking their lives or crippling them. This world would suck your hope away from you with every contaminated glass of water, with every infant born infected with AIDS, or infected by his mother’s breastmilk. This world seems built to steal, kill, and destroy.

It doesn’t have to be that way. Where fire leaves ashes behind, new life can be stirred, beauty picked up from the decay burned away. It’s the story of the phoenix, something we all long for, and cling to… and God promises it for us all. Out of death comes new life.

In Isaiah 61, the prophet speaks some powerful promises. “The Spirit of the Sovereign Lord is upon me, because the Lord has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to bind up the broken hearted, to proclaim freedom for the captives, and release from darkness for prisoners, to proclaim a year of the Lord’s favor, and the day of vengeance of our God, to comfort all who mourn, to provide for all who mourn in Zion- to bestow on them a crown of beauty instead of ashes, the oil of gladness instead of mourning, and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair. They will be called oaks of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor. They will rebuild the ancient ruins and restore the places long devastated; the will renew the ruined cities that have been ruined for generations.”

I feel like we are watching this scripture come to fruition in Haiti. It’s not instant… but life is never instant. Growth takes time. It takes 40 weeks for a child to mature in his mother’s body before he’s ready to breathe air and face the world outside, and another 36 months before he’s eating solid food, walking steadily, speaking in any sort of coherent sentence, and even then, he’s not prepared for life on his own. This was a nation that had been ruined for generations. It was long devastated before the earthquake struck. Growth and rebuilding is going to take a long time.

Yet we are seeing men and women flock into this tiny nation to preach good news to these poor. They are binding up their broken bodies and hearts. They are helping to rebuild and restore them. In place of the ashes of their destruction, we are seeing the beauty of selflessness as people give freely of themselves to bring life to this place. In this place of despair, we are seeing praise go up when simple needs are met.

It’s not perfect; every comparison breaks down somewhere. But these people are learning that there is life in this broken world. That despite the weight of this world, there is a yoke that is light, a burden that is easy, because the Anointed One came into this world, stepped out of Life into Death and into Life again, all for love of them, and they need only rest in His promise. That those who follow His call and go make all the difference, setting captives free, and bringing a light into this dark world.

Oh, Beloved, if you know my Jesus, we are the plantings, we are the hands and feet of Jesus that show His love to the least of these, just like we were told. Going isn’t a choice; if you are His, then you love the way He loves, and how can you not go? How can you not long to set the captives free?

And if you’re reading this, and you don’t know my Jesus, and you don’t see how He could ever be good… Oh, Beloved, don’t lose hope. He has beauty for your ashes. He has joy for your mourning. He longs to lighten your burden and set you free. He’s waiting, arms wide open, and you are the only thing between you. Don’t let this world destroy you.

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Sweet King Fisher

Baby boy

Whose name I do not know

Whose face I never saw

Whom I never held in my arms

Though you captured my heart

And I treasure you still there

Sweet little King Fisher

Innocent child

Whose fate I do not know

Whose mother I never met

Who went home with someone else

Though we longed for you

And would have you still

Beloved King Fisher

Treasured one

Who is held in powerful arms

Whose name is known well

Who was never, ever a mistake

Though others may disagree

And think me a fool to love you

Oh, Sweet King Fisher

Precious Child

Who came to us for a reason

Who was known before his birth

Who is loved by our Saviour

Though you don’t know Him

And I think I understand

Baby King Fisher,

Helpless Infant

Who needed a prayer covering

Who needs a hero in the heavenlies

Who has a connection to the Creator

Though you never met me

And I can only call you

Baby King Fisher.

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