Tag: Media reviews

Digging in Deeper: 1 John 1:5-10

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“This is the message we have heard from him and declare to you: God is light, and there is absolutely no darkness in him. If we say, ‘We have fellowship with him,’ and yet we walk in darkness, we are lying and are not practicing the truth. If we walk in the light as he himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus the Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say, ‘We have no sin,’ we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. If we say, ‘We have not sinned,’ we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

The world is broken. People are broken. They do what’s wrong at least as often as they do what is right…sometimes more often. They are selfish. They do what they want and don’t think too much about how getting what they want will affect the people around them. And nobody seems to be able to do much about it. What if there was a way, though, to fix it? What if there was a way to make everybody do the right thing, to make them be decent people? What it be worth it? The second season of Amazon Prime’s, Fallout, ponders that very question. Let’s talk about it.

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Digging in Deeper: Genesis 2:24

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“This is why a man leaves his father and mother and bonds with his wife, and they become one flesh.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Well, here we are at another Friday when I didn’t have any idea what I was going to write about as I finished the day and got into bed, but then just before going to sleep something dropped straight into my metaphorical lap that I just couldn’t avoid. One of the things that I tell my church as often as I can make it come up naturally is that being a follower of Jesus doesn’t mean completely disengaging from any media sources that are not fully supportive of the Christian worldview. Rather, it means engaging wisely and with their worldview radar on high alert so they can identify ideas that are contrary to the truth and consciously reject them. They should do this they are engaging with various media by themselves, of course, but they should be especially vigilant about doing it when engaging with their kids both so that they are teaching them what is correct, but also so they are teaching them how to engage critically and through the lens of the Christian worldview. Well, the most recent episode of Abbott Elementary that we watched last night gave me the opportunity to do just that. Let’s talk about it.

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Digging in Deeper: Mark 16:5-8

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“When they entered the tomb, they saw a young man dressed in a white robe sitting on the right side; they were alarmed. ‘Don’t be alarmed,’ he told them. ‘You are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen! He is not here. See the place where they put him. But go, tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going ahead of you to Galilee; you will see him there just as he told you.”’ They went out and ran from the tomb,  because trembling and astonishment overwhelmed them. And they said nothing to anyone, since they were afraid.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Most streaming services aim to have at least one series that defines them. Hopefully they manage to land more than one, but they want—they need—to have something that proves to be enough of a cultural phenomenon that subscribers will sign up for the service just to be able to watch that. For Netflix, that series is indisputably Stranger Things. After much hype and anticipation, the final season is out in total, I’ve finished watching it, and we’re going to talk about it.

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Morning Musing: Galatians 4:4-5

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“When the time came to completion, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

The family is the basic building block of any stable, healthy society. Thriving societies have a culture of strong, committed families. If you want to explain the breakdown of a society – take a society like ours for instance – you don’t really need to look much further than the breakdown of the families that constitute it. Nearly every social pathology can be traced back to a family problem of some kind. Communities with large numbers of stable, intact families are objectively better than those without. The trouble is, too many culture-shaping aspects of our society don’t seem to understand that. It is notable then, when a major Hollywood release not only highlights, but celebrates the goodness and worthwhileness of family. The latest major Marvel film, which I have finally been able to watch, does just that. Let’s talk about why Fantastic Four lives up to its moniker.

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Morning Musing: James 2:19

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“You believe that God is one. Good! Even the demons believe—and they shudder.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

Today is Halloween. It’s the night when ghosts and ghouls come out to play. The macabre takes over and everyone feels just a bit freer to lean into mischief and mayhem than away from it like normal. Evil is stronger than it is on other days of the year. Those who belong to Jesus need to lean extra hard into prayer and righteousness to stand against this rising tide in order that the world isn’t wiped away by it; in order that the judgment of God doesn’t come to bear on us all. And do you know what the worst part of all is? Too many people believe that kind of nonsense. Don’t get me wrong: I very much believe that evil is real, but this kind of pop cultural understanding of evil I do not. C.S. Lewis mockingly observed it is a ploy of the Devil to keep us unwittingly immersed in real evil, blissfully unaware that it is slowly poisoning our souls, all the way back in the 1940s in his classic, The Screwtape Letters. Evil does exist, but it doesn’t often look like we might expect. The horror genre was classically a way for us to explore evil through the fairly nonthreatening vehicle of a story. Today it is more often little more than an excuse for lazy filmmakers to splash lots of guts and gore and nudity on the screen. A fairly recent entry into the genre, though, leans back into its roots in really powerful ways. Let’s talk for just a few minutes about Nefarious.

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