Spirituality Column #480
January 26, 2016
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

By Bob Walters

“You’ve taken your first step into a larger world.” – Obi-Wan Kenobi to Luke Skywalker in the original 1977 Star Wars movie, “Episode IV: A New Hope.”

Newly-discovered and budding Jedi Knight Luke has just “used the Force” in his first “light saber” lesson when Jedi master and mentor Obi-Wan offers this world-enlarging encouragement.

Finally free of his remote, nothing-happening-here home planet, good-guy Luke is on a star ship speeding off to galactic adventure, personal discovery and legendary fame fighting the evil empire controlled by The Dark Side of the Force.  If you know the Star Wars movies, you know how that all goes.  And with the seventh movie just out, it’s still going.  Luke indeed finds a far larger world.

There’s no real need to over-think all the good vs. evil, salvation vs. destruction, love vs. hate imagery, symbols and metaphors in these movies.  Mostly Star Wars is fun; it’s about outer space and fighting the bad guys; about cool space ships, exotic worlds, mysterious powers and imaginative weaponry that still does basically the same, familiar things contemporary weapons do: shoot things and blow stuff up.

We can clearly perceive our plainly-human hopes, fears, failings and aspirations amid the movies’ glitzy alien characters, technical fantasy and stark morality.  There is family, fellowship and trust among Luke and his Good Side of the Force; there is slavery, power and treachery rampant in the Dark Side of the Force.

Ours is a modern world of ceaseless information and endless entertainment.  We note a global, generational human predilection – given the worldly influences in any age – that mankind tends to worship the wrong things.  We worship what we think will spare us anguish, make us comfortable, give us status, make life easier and generally gratify our physical hungers, spiritual thirsts and psychological appetites.  We think life is complete, but our satisfactions are superficial.

What we truly need is something that “The Force” in the Star Wars movies never offers, describes or claims to be: Love.  It is often said, and I believe it, that love is the most powerful force in the universe.  How ironic then that the one thing love cannot be, actually, is forced.  Love is about giving, not forcing.  Love is a tie that binds, certainly, but it can’t be coerced.  Love is the most complete – and forceful – of mysteries.

The Bible tells us “God is love” (1 John 4:8) and God “so loved the world that he gave his only son Jesus …” (John 3:16).  God’s love, you see, is the true force of good.

Want a larger world?   Jesus Christ is proof of how big God really is.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) suggests baptism to step into a truly larger world.

Spirituality Column #479
January 19, 2016
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

By Bob Walters
"And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” – on Jesus, Colossians 1:17

We are exploring the fantastical “Force” of Star Wars movie fame.  Laying aside for the moment blockbuster movies, a multi-media entertainment mega-franchise, outer space adventures and the familiar moral drama of Good vs. Evil, there truly is an unimaginably strong force in our known, created world that no one quite understands.

To wit: Why is it so hard to break up an atom?

Sure, science has been splitting atoms for going on 100 years.  The awesome force of the atomic bomb 70 years ago ended a great war and, stripping decades of shifting global geopolitical dynamics right down to its core, the reality of even more powerful hydrogen bombs kept other large-scale wars from happening even to this day.

But, backing up a moment, what holds those little suckers – atoms – together so tightly?  What makes nuclear energy so potent?  What, while we’re on the subject, holds “us” – our physical world and even our corporeal human person – together?

In the physical realm of gravity, strong forces, weak forces, Newtonian Laws, Planck’s constant, Einstein’s Theory of Relativity and errant Cosmological Constant, Hubble’s “Red Shift,” the assumption-breaking antics of quantum physics, the technical ascendency of nanotechnology and mind-blowing advances of modern nuclear medicine … how can these little bitty things – atoms – be so inexplicably strong?

Well, the Apostle Paul tells us in Colossians 1:17, backed up by Genesis 1, Hebrews 1 and countless other less obvious places in the Bible:

In Jesus “…all things hold together.”  Jesus is the author of life (Acts 3:15) and has authority over all things (Romans 28:18). Jesus “upholds the universe by the Word of His power” (Hebrews 1:3).  That’s the job God assigned to Him.

So along come these terrifically entertaining (to many) Star Wars movies and the mythical “Force” of the Jedi Knights.  Though great fun and depicting familiar moral grist – the duality of good and evil – the Force teaches us less truth than we already know.

Fictional movies tickle our senses, and plenty of mysteries remain as to how things work and why things are.  Scientists will continue to report on the science of life and the forces of physics.  But the God part of “why things hold together” has been written for thousands of years.

The strongest force in all creation is Jesus Christ.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) appreciates an email response sent last week from IU Law School professor, philosophy PhD, author and friend Dr. John Hill, who eruditely pointed out that modernist “Good and Evil as Equals” imagery of “The Force” mimics the early-centuries post-pagan Christian heresy of Manicheism. St. Augustine knew it well. Great observation, John.

Spirituality Column #478
January 12, 2016
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

By Bob Walters

“They will turn their ears away from the truth and turn aside to myths.” – the Apostle Paul, 2 Timothy 4:4

Regardless whether one is entertained by the smashingly successful Star Wars movies over the decades, it’s hard to imagine anyone being utterly unfamiliar with “Luke Skywalker,” “Yoda,” “Darth Vader,” “Obi-Wan,” “Jedi Knights” or, of course, “The Force.” “Star Wars” movies inform modern Western cultural language.

I’ve seen them all, liked them all, own the first six movies on DVD, and saw “Episode VII, The Force Awakens” over Christmas break in IMAX 3D.  Great fun.  But this isn’t a movie review; it’s an observation and commentary on the mythical and limited Force vs. the truth and sufficiency of Jesus Christ.

And no, I do not think this is too dumb to discuss.  A lot about the Force, and the Jedi Knights’ cinematic access to it, is what many people wish religion actually were: a broad moral code with on-demand, personally actuated, telekinetic powers.

“Use the Force, Luke.”

Think about how that is very nearly identical, in an opposite kind of way, to a very common lament of Christian doubters: “What good is Jesus if He won’t give me what I want?”  The Force, apparently, gives the Jedi want they want, right now.  But the Jedi knights have problems too – they can’t control the intentions and actions of those imbued with the Dark Side of the Force.  They, like everyone else, have to fight.

Sounds familiar.  The Jedi code governing the use of the Force is to serve and protect others with humble, selfless courage.  That’s an unmistakable, if incomplete,  Jesus reference.  The Dark Side uses the Force for its own gain, glory and what appears to be an uncomplicated, unvarnished and uncompromising hatred of the Good Side.  That’s a starkly clear and complete allusion to Satan.

As noted last week, the Force is “…created by all living things.”  It’s easy to miss what that’s saying: the Force is created by life, it doesn’t create life.  So among many things missing from the Force is God, the Creator of all things including life, and the person of Jesus Christ, whom God placed in charge of Creation.  John 1:1-18 explains what Jesus is and, de facto, what the Force is not.

A temptation persists in society – as old as Adam and Eve and irrespective of Star Wars movies, novels, technology, education, entertainment or politics – to replace the Creator God, Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit of the Bible with a less powerful truth.

In Christ, so much more than “The Force” is with us.

Continued next week.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) realizes myths may express some truth, but the only complete truth is Jesus Christ.

Spirituality Column #477
January 5, 2016
Common Christianity / Uncommon Commentary

By Bob Walters

“The Force is what gives a Jedi his power. It's an energy field created by all living things. It surrounds us, and penetrates us. It binds the galaxy together …” – Obi-Wan Kenobi, Star Wars

Congratulations to the Star Wars entertainment juggernaut for its continuing commercial success and cultural omnipresence.

It’s coming up on 40 years.  The Force has definitely re-Awakened.

My first encounter with Star Wars was a long time ago and far, far away … well, 1977 and just up the road in my home town of Kokomo, Indiana.  For me it was a guy’s movie, not a date movie.  As Ron, Chuck and I, in our early 20s, watched the closing credits roll (Star Wars was the first movie not to have the credits at the beginning), I remember Chuck, like it was yesterday, sitting two seats over reflexively letting out a stunned, low but audible, “Wow ….”

It was that kind of movie.

In the years since, Ron and Chuck forged successful careers, respectively, as a physician (Dallas) and attorney (Minneapolis).  To my knowledge neither of them has ever dressed up as Darth Vader at a GenCon convention.  Nor have I.

But I have to admit that I pretty much memorized the first three movies (Episodes IV, V and VI), and that I actually liked the fourth one (1999’s much-maligned “Episode I: The Phantom Menace” with Jar Jar Binks, etc.).  Did you know that Jake Lloyd, the child actor who played Anakin Skywalker (later “Darth Vader) in “The Phantom Menace”, attended Carmel (Ind.) High School?  His photo was in my son’s 2005 yearbook.

But, I digress.  Let’s talk about the “Force” – what it is and what it’s not.

The Force is a wonderfully made-up fantasy device that animates a fictional cosmology – i.e., how things work – for a fictional universe in a fictional story.  Interesting thing about fiction, whether Dickens, Hemingway, Tolkien, Rowling or George Lucas, is how fiction generally reflects real truths and conflicts of human existence.  Without that humanizing familiarity, a story isn’t interesting; in fact, it’s not even a story.  So, fine; if it makes a good story, let the Force be with us.

What the Force is not, of course, is a salvation invitation.  “Hokie religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid” says cynical smuggler Han Solo to light-saber wielding and budding Jedi “Force” learner Luke Skywalker in the original movie.

 While portrayed as a religion having a good side and a “dark” (evil) side, the Force lacks components Christians should perceive as missing, but secularists won’t.

Here’s a Bible hint: read John 1:1-18.  More next week.

Walters (rlwcom@aol.com) owns all six prior Star Wars movies.