The Crazies - 7.8/10

Just watched "The Crazies" on my girlfriends laptop. It seems like just another Zombie/infection horror film... but it's not really a zombie movie at all. As much as I love films about the undead, this one was refreshingly different. Infection spreads through a small town's water supply, turning those who drink it into violent and maniacal killers. So even though it is a remake of an old 1973 horror film, it's original in that it's concept is different enough to set it apart from many other typical sci-fi infection films. The "Crazies" in this movie aren't always absent-minded and dumb, nor are they only out to feed on the flesh of the living. They just want to kill everyone. The best part about this movie? It's tense and nerve-wracking from start to finish. You know that feeling you get during the select few scenes in a horror movie when you know that something bad is going to happen? Stretch that across an hour and a half and you get "The Crazies". Without the tension I would probably give this movie a 6.5 to a 7, but it kept me on edge and in anticipation for a good chunk of the running time, which really made this movie much more involving and enjoyable. So significantly better than a 7, although not quite an 8 because of the lame ending.

Simplicity

"Simplicity begins in inward focus and unity. It means to live out of what Thomas Kelly calls 'The Divine Center.'

...Experiencing the inward reality liberates us outwardly. Speech becomes truthful and honest. The lust for status and position is gone because we no longer need status and position. We cease from showy extravagance not on the ground of being unable to afford it, but on the grounds of principle. Our goods become available to others. We join the experience that Richard E. Byrd, after months alone in the barren Arctic, recorded in his journal, 'I am learning... that a man can live profoundly without masses of things'

Contemporary culture lacks both the inward reality and the outward life-style of simplicity. We must live in the modern world, and we are affected by its fractured and fragmented state. We are trapped in a maze of competing attachments. One moment we make decisions on the basis of sound reason and the next moment out of fear of what others will think of us. We have no unity or focus around which our lives are oriented.

Because we lack a divine Center our need for security has led us into an insane attachment to things. We really must understand that the lust for affluence in contemporary society is psychotic. It is psychotic because it has completely lost touch with reality. We crave things we neither need nor enjoy. 'We buy things we do not want to impress people we do not like.' Where planned obsolescence leaves off, psychological obsolescence takes over. We are made to feel ashamed to wear clothes or drive cars until they are worn out. The mass media have convinced us that to be out of step with fashion is to be out of step with reality. It is time we awaken to the fact that conformity to a sick society is to be sick. Until we see how unbalanced our culture has become at this point, we will not be able to deal with the mammon spirit within ourselves nor will we desire Christian simplicity.

This psychosis permeates even our mythology. The modern hero is the poor boy who purposefully becomes rich rather than the rich boy who voluntarily becomes poor. Covetousness we call ambition. Hoarding we call prudence. Greed we call industry."

- Richard Foster, Celebration of Discipline

Eternity in the Hearts of Men

We are imperfect beings who are told to follow after the One who was, in every way, without flaw. How could a purpose such as this not be painful? It defies our flesh, our earthly desires and even our comfort. And yet, we somehow realize that we discover more fulfillment in this pursuit of something that is seemingly eternal - something that God has inarguably set in our hearts long before we were formed - than in any of the passing things offered by this world that may distract us from Him, His plans and His glory.

Eternity is always within our grasp and is available to us, but we always seem to be occupied with chasing after the wind. All of these other things will be here for a moment, and then gone.

You are not your sin

"To put it bluntly, your flesh is a weasel, a poser, and a selfish pig. And your flesh is not you. Did you know that? Your flesh is not the real you. When Paul gives us his famous passage on what it's like to struggle with sin (Rom. 7), he tells a story we are all too familiar with:

I decide to do good, but I don't really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time. It happens so regularly that it's predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God's commands, but it's pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take the charge. (The Message)

Okay, we've all been there many times. But what Paul concludes is just astounding: "I am not really the one doing it; the sin within me is doing it" (Rom 7:20 NLT). Did you notice the distinction he makes? Paul says "Hey, I know I struggle with sin. But I also know that my sin is not me - this is not my true heart." You are not your sin; sin is no longer the truest thing about the man who has come into union with Jesus. Your heart is good. "I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you..." (Ezek. 36:26). The Big Lie in the church today is that you are nothing more than "a sinner saved by grace." You are a lot more than that. You are a new creation in Christ. The New Testament calls you a saint, a holy one, a son of God. In the core of your being you are a good man. Yes, there is a war within us, but it is a civil war. The battle is not between us and God; no, there is a traitor within who wars against our true heart fighting alongside the Spirit of God in us:

A new power is in operation. The Spirit of life in Christ, like a strong wind, has magnificently cleared the air, freeing you from a fated lifetime of brutal tyranny at the hands of sin and death... Anyone, of course, who has not welcomed this invisible but clearly present God, the spirit of Christ, won't know what we're talking about. But for you who welcome him, in whom he dwells... if the alive-and-present God who raised Jesus from the dead moves into your life, he'll do the same thing in you that he did in Jesus... When God lives and breathes in you (and he does, as surely as he did in Jesus), you are delivered from that dead life. (Rom. 8:2-3, 9-11 The Message)

The real you is on the side of God against the false self. Knowing this makes all the difference in the world. The man who wants to live valiantly will lose heart quickly if he believes that his heart is nothing but sin. Why fight? The battle feels lost before it even begins. No, your flesh is your false self - the poser, manifest in cowardice and self-preservation - and the only way to deal with it is to crucify it. Now follow me very closely here: We are never, ever told to crucify our heart. We are never told to kill the true man within us, never told to get rid of those deep desires for battle and adventure and beauty. We are told to shoot the traitor. How? Choose against him every time you see him raise his ugly head. Walk right into those situations you normally run from. Speak right to the issues you normally remain silent over. If you want to grow in true masculine strength, then you must stop sabotaging yours."

-Wild at Heart

I think that for some reason, I've always believed that I'm truly nothing more than a "sinner saved by grace". It's a mentality that I developed at some point and continued to feed. But this passage reminds us that it's a lie to believe in this as the definitive picture of who we are. Believing it is neglecting the redemption that Christ brings, and in doing so we just place ourselves under a lot of guilt and frustration. That's exactly what the enemy wants. He will try the hardest to impose that belief upon us, and he'll stop at nothing because he's afraid. He knows what we're capable of as sons and daughters of God, so he'll feed us lies - that we aren't good enough, that we have no authority, that we can't be leaders. But, like the passage says, we are new creations, with new hearts and new spirits. And as new creations, our hearts are good.

Ripe for Harvest

"I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest." I've been hearing a lot over the past year about a spiritual revival going on in Boston. Pastor Josh of Highrock Brookline mentioned it again yesterday while telling the story of the Samaritan woman who, in her excitement, decided to go back to her town and spread word of the "strange man" that she had met by the well. I see evidence all around us that such a "revival" is real, happening now, and that the fields really are ripe for harvest. On our campus alone there are many Godly men and women that are passionately promoting this spiritual revival. I know some brothers and sisters who have started GIGs (Groups Investigating God), and have been putting their own time and energy on the line, week after week, for their non-believing/cynical/seeking friends. When new people decide to eat with and/or visit our West Small Group, there seems to be an understanding among all of us that this newcomer is be pursued and invited into our group. It's as if everyone is on their toes, actively trying to pull others in. In just the past year, Men and Women Groups have been started, and they've been dedicated to raising up and empowering Godly men and women to serve and lead in our fellowships, and to pursue Christlike perfection in every aspect of their lives. A group of brothers I know, two sophomores and a senior, decided last year that they'd live in a Quad in a freshman dorm so that they'd be able to live amongst the freshmen that they'd be working with, hoping to eventually draw them into our community. I've also seen a fellow sister pursue a seeker, having her efforts met by other sisters who, without missing a beat, followed up with their own attempts to be an inviting and welcoming body of Christ. I think that things are really changing in this city and on this campus. God is moving.

A Sacred Flame

"Well then, I will tell you. Alexander, Caesar, Charlemagne and I myself have founded great empires; but upon what did these creations of our genius depend? Upon force. Jesus alone founded His empire upon love, and to this very day millions will die for Him. . . . I think I understand something of human nature; and I tell you, all these were men, and I am a man; none else is like Him: Jesus Christ was more than a man. . . . I have inspired multitudes with such an enthusiastic devotion that they would have died for me . . . but to do this it was necessary that I should be visibly present with the electric influence of my looks, my words, of my voice. When I saw men and spoke to them, I lightened up the flame of self-devotion in their hearts. . . . Christ alone has succeeded in so raising the mind of man toward the unseen, that it becomes insensible to the barriers of time and space. Across a chasm of eighteen hundred years, Jesus Christ makes a demand which is beyond all others difficult to satisfy; He asks for that which a philosopher may often seek in vain at the hands of his friends, or a father of his children, or a bride of her spouse, or a man of his brother.

He asks for the human heart; He will have it entirely to Himself.

He demands it unconditionally; and forthwith His demand is granted. Wonderful! In defiance of time and space,the soul of man, with all its powers and faculties, becomes an annexation to the empire of Christ. All who sincerely believe in Him, experience that remarkable, supernatural love toward Him. This phenomenon is unaccountable; it is altogether beyond the scope of man's creative powers. Time, the great destroyer, is powerless to extinguish this sacred flame; time can neither exhaust its strength nor put a limit to its range. This is it, which strikes me most; I have often thought of it. This it is which proves to me quite convincingly the Divinity of Jesus Christ."

-Napoleon Bonaparte