The Hero We Need

Hollywood has made a killing off our ideal hero-image. For years, this hero was hyper-masculine, cartoonishly muscular, uniquely-abled, good-looking, had an extreme sense of morality, and wore underwear on the outside of his pants (not really sure what that was about). The consummate hero-image was Superman when I was growing up.

More recently, heroes have started to seem a lot different. Heroes are much more diverse. They have a "moral-compass," but are flawed. The strongest ones may be men or women. They embody something we want more of in ourselves, but with humanity that previous generation's heroes seemed to stand above. The consummate hero today is far more complex, and far more difficult to pin down. Captain America + Black Panther + Wonder Woman + Iron Man + Hulk + Captain Marvel + ... Even Superman is no longer portrayed as someone of near-perfection.

Regardless of the generation, humanity creates its own heroes based on what seems to be best at the time. What if the hero we need doesn't look anything like the hero we wanted? Actually, that's kind of why I like the hero-depictions today a little more. They can do the very best thing possible to save people from certain doom, and people may still reject them. Case-in-point, the Avengers save the world time after time, but a popular mass turns on them because they didn't save enough people, or their actions to "save" caused destruction, and what makes them any better than the villains anyhow?

Reminds me of the consummate hero.

John 5 depicts Jesus saving one person from suffering. He is the hero that the man at the Pool of Bethesda needed, but not the one he initially wanted. The man would have been happy with a Jesus that tossed him into the pool first before someone else got the healing the rippling waters were supposed to bring. Jesus showed Himself more powerful than any myth, or any false god or demon that day, healing the man with a simple command: "Take up your bed and walk home." He wasn't the hero that was wanted (at least initially), but He was the hero that was needed.

He also wasn't the hero that was wanted by the popular "hero-watchers" of His day. He healed on the Sabbath, commanding the man to do something on Sabbath that He wasn't really supposed to do. Then Jesus claimed to be the Son of God, doing what the Father told Him to do. He told them that to believe that He was the Son of God was to have eternal life. He told them He was there to save them. He told them that His works confirmed His identity. He told them the Scriptures were always talking about Him.

They wanted to kill Him. He was the hero they needed, but not the hero they wanted.

Here's the formula for the consummate Biblical hero: God's Word + Jesus's Action = Jesus's true identity as Messiah. And with the "formula" comes a challenge for each of us. We must prove Christ for ourselves based on who He claims to be, not on who we want Him to be.

He is not the hero who will just give us what we want when we want it. He is not the hero that is here to please those with a cookie-cutter image of who they think he needs to be. He is not properly defined on our terms: "Nice Jesus," "Warring Jesus," "European/Asian/African/American Jesus," etc. He can only be properly defined on His own terms--what the Word teaches Him to be.

God help us if Jesus is just who we want Him to be. Superman can't save us from what we need saving from. The totality of the Avengers/Defenders/Justice League/X-men can't save us from what we need saving from. They form the "saviors" we think fit our time and needs, but will never save us from the absolute worst villian. Only Jesus can do that.

But when He is right in front of you, don't miss out because He doesn't look like what you thought He'd look like, or do what you thought He'd do. Don't play the Pharisee game we are so tempted to play with today's heroes.

Prove Christ for Who He claims to be, based on the Word He claims as proof.

"Word plus action prove the worth of any claim. Look for Messiah of your own making, miss the Messiah you need. Accept the Messiah of the Word's making, receive the life you need." (A Proverb, by me, based on today's reading).

The Idol in the Mirror

You've been around them, probably. The ones who are constantly talking about themselves. Drives you crazy, doesn't it? Me too.

Saturday Night Live had a series of skits with Kristen Wiig starring as "Penelope," the girl that had to one-up everyone's stories. If she overheard you talking about your uncle, the astronaut, she'd butt in with her story about her trip to Mars. It was fairly entertaining, as most of us have been around "that person" before.

I think there is a narcissist inside all of us, however, wanting out. Left unchecked, with nothing to remind us that are real successes and failures, advantages and disadvantages, triumphs and tragedies outside of ourselves, most (if not all) of us have a tendency to admire ourselves for our "greatness," or we do the really weird thing and grant ourselves points for how much worse off we have had it.

Genesis 11 tells the story of the Tower of Babel. The way Eugene Peterson puts in The Message is interesting:

"Then they said, 'Come, let's build ourselves a city and a tower that reaches Heaven. Let's make ourselves famous so we won't be scattered here and there across the Earth.'"

People build cities for a sense of community. Jerry Seinfeld jokes about all the land surrounding New York City, and yet everyone crams themselves into that city because they'd rather literally live on top of each other. That's not wrong on its own.

The tower reaching Heaven? Without some idea of why they were building it, it's hard to judge it as wrong. We're still doing things like that now all the time.

It's the "Let's make ourselves famous..." part that is problematic. "Fame" is to be well-known and talked about for ones notable achievements. Now, this is odd. When I read this passage, it occurs to me that everyone is pretty much still living in the same place. They are all pretty much starting to work on, more or less, the same thing. It almost seems like they wanted something to congratulate themselves on, to unify around their own creations. They wanted to be able to talk about how great they were and how foolish it would be to disperse.

Here's the thing. According to God, they'd never stop doing this. They'd keep achieving, keep patting themselves on the back, and keep building themselves up as great until they'd see no need for Him.

We have a narcissist in us that would love to get out. He'd love to look in the mirror and congratulate himself for his work, even his "work for the Lord." She'd love to be able to see how much better she is than the other girl at work, or at church. He'd smile over how "sinless" he has become, and how he is helping God make the decision to "come sooner."

That narcissist sees herself in her own skin and compares herself to others, judging them as clearly inferior and less-desirable. He may even think to himself, "My world would be perfect if '______' wasn't in it."

You see the fingerprints of narcissism--self-idolization--in all kinds of things: racism, sexism, and abuse, addictions, but maybe even in overachievement, workaholism, and rehearsing the good things you've done for others.

So learn the lesson of the inhabitants of Shinar. The idol's gotta go! My fame is nothing. God's fame is everything. Lift your eyes and thoughts above the mirror and spend time looking at God. Look at Christ Himself, the best "image" of God you'll ever see. Take regular note--write it down on the mirror if you must--of what He has done. He must increase. We must decrease. When Christ is who we witness, we become our true, and our best, selves.