Skip to main content

Matthew 18:1-5:Han Shot first

Our life can't be edited. It can be changed. I remember watching the original Star Wars in the theatre in 1977. In 1981 one of my friends had this neat new machine: a VCR. We could pause shows and even rewind parts of them and watch them over and over again. I saw Star Wars and The Empire Strikes Back more than once or twice.

Early this century a friend lent me DVDs of the trilogy. I couldn't believe it: Why was Jabba the Hutt in Star Wars? Who was this new Darth Vader at the end of Return of the Jedi? I don't remember Storm Troopers on lizards and I am pretty sure that Han shot first. I asked my friend why the movies were different; he replied that he hoped that the changes didn't ruin the movies for me.

Later when I was able to look on-line for movies, I looked for copies of the movies as I would have seen them in the 1970s or 1980s. I couldn't find them anywhere. But they are in my memory and the original versions of the movies have left significant impressions on many people. The movies, however, are no longer like that.

This is like our life. There are things that some of us have done that we wish that we had never done. The repercussions of those actions may stick with us and may effect others too. We cannot change what has happened. However, we can be changed so that these things never happen again. And God can change us even more than George Lucas can change his movies. God can forgive our sins, transform our stories, and make us brand new today. He can take out the parts that hurt and hinder us and rewrite our script so that we are a blessing to others. If we want our story rewritten and haven't offered our life up to the Lord for changing yet, I invite us to do this this very day.
More daily blogs at
More articles, sermons, and papers at
www.sheepspeak.com
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Luke 24:38-34: Revelation of a King

James V, the King of Scotland used to go around the country disguised as a common person. That is because he wanted to meet the everyday people of the country not just the rich and powerful. He wanted to see how the normal people lived. One day he was dressed in very old clothes and was going by a place known as Cramond Brig, when he is attacked by robbers who don’t know who he is. There is a fierce struggle and he is nearly overcome when, at just the right moment, a poor farm worker - Jock Howieson - hears the commotion comes to the disguised king’s aid. Now Jock, the poor labourer, who works on this portion of the King’s land, Cramond Brig, unawares takes the undercover king home and gives him a dinner of broth and Jock - as the king is recouping – naturally asks the man who he is. The King responds ‘I’m a good man of Edinburgh.’ ‘And where do you live in that city and where do you work?’ ‘Well,’ says James, ‘I live at the palace and I work there too.’ ‘The palace, is it?...
Post a Comment
Read more

Hosanna! The Triumphal Entry into Holy Week (Matthew 21:1-11)

Today  is Palm Sunday. Palm Sunday is when we commemorate the Sunday before Jesus’ death. Jerusalem was occupied then, like it is now; now it is occupied by the Israelis, then it was occupied by the Romans. The Judeans in the first century didn’t like being occupied then any more than the Palestinians like it today. The Romans were harsh, not nearly as brutal as modern Israel, but harsh enough that the first century had their version of … (Remember the suicide bombers of the ‘70s and ‘80s?) …suicide bombers: the Sicarii (zealots), Judean terrorists / revolutionaries would walk into crowds with daggers looking for Romans to kill –. One of Jesus’ followers, Simon, was arguably a Sicarii or zealot.   Passover is the commemoration of ancient Israel’s birth as a nation. The Angel of Death passed over Egypt and the nations of Isreal and Judah were created through the Exodus. Passover, in the Roman period, was a time when many people of Judean descent descended upon Jerusalem. I ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lanterns (Matthew 25:1-13, Psalm 146)

  The topics I chose from our Lenten list for today are “God has rescued us from the Dominion of Darkness”; “He has Freed Us from the Power of Sin”; the Kingdom of God is at hand. Do we believe that? Do we live that?   In theology we use the term ‘prolepsis’ to refer to the time when the Kingdom of God begins, which is now, the time between the resurrection of Christ and His return at the eschaton. This is the time in which we are living and as Christians it is our responsibility to be willing instruments of God to display what it means that He has rescued us from the Dominion of Darkness; He has Freed Us from the Power of Sin, that the Kingdom of God is at hand. But do we even actually believe that He has already done this? And if He has why does it not seem that the Sin and Darkness still reign?   We know the parable of the bridesmaids (holy ones) in the Bible who needed to keep their lanterns lit – because lit lanterns were to be there when the Bridegroom Jesus returns...
Post a Comment
Read more