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Robin Hood with Russell Crowe

Robin Hood with Russell Crowe

I found this movie fascinating. It tried to give the historical and political underpinnings for the real person, if he was real, Robin Hood. I liked it, even though it rarely referred to the Christian faith of the parties who pressured King John into signing the Magna Carta. In fact, the only one relying upon God was King John, who referred to the divine right of kings. Thus, the movie shows the skewed view, no, the ignorance of the modern world: That the only Christian influence upon history was in favor of tyrannical kings, while freedom was something invented by humans, not instilled in humans by the gospel.

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Oaths 9 – Does God Forget?

Oaths 9 – Does God Forget?

As mentioned in a previous post on Oaths (Oaths 2), the first colonists arriving on the shores of the American continent were Christians, some more explicit in their commitment to a biblical system of civil government than others. The forms of government ranged from that of the Puritans, who explicitly sought to set up a biblical commonwealth, to that of the Pilgrims, who also sought to set up a civil government on Christian principles, to the Virginia settlement, which simply sought to continue the political Christianity of Great Britain. The most compromised of versions would put modern, 21st century America to shame with respect to commitment to the true God of the bible.

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Rambo

Rambo

It can be easy to forget that Rambo was not just an action movie; it was a movie about the psychological issues a Vietnam vet was going through. It was not a pro-Vietnam War movie; it was a pro-Vietnam Vet movie. Only Rambo was such a good warrior and was such a psychologically damaged vet that he was practically autistic, or like an idiot savant, only in weapons and warfare instead of with numbers, like the character in Rainman. The last sequel was the resolution for Rambo, who saw something of himself in the mercenaries hired by the missionaries and whom he was transporting into the jungle of Burma.

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Oaths 8 – The Real Constitution?

Oaths 8 – The Real Constitution?

So, how can we process this history of religious test oaths in America? We must use the bible. Conservatives accuse liberals of regularly departing from, even forgetting, the principles of the U.S. Constitution. And rightly so. However, what if the U.S. Constitution were not the founding document of America? You ask, “What do you mean? Of course, it’s the founding document!” Remember, we decided we must look at this issue biblically.

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Forsaking God & Higher Taxes

Forsaking God & Higher Taxes

Through Moses, God commanded limits upon the king.

“When thou art come unto the land which the LORD thy God giveth thee, and shalt possess it, and shalt dwell therein, and shalt say, I will set a king over me, like as all the nations that are about me; Thou shalt in any wise set him king over thee, whom the LORD thy God shall choose: one from among thy brethren shalt thou set king over thee: thou mayest not set a stranger over thee, which is not thy brother. But he shall not multiply horses to himself, nor cause the people to return to Egypt, to the end that he should multiply horses: forasmuch as the LORD hath said unto you, Ye shall henceforth return no more that way. Neither shall he multiply wives to himself, that his heart turn not away: neither shall he greatly multiply to himself silver and gold.”

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Dawn of the Dead

Dawn of the Dead

Yes, Dawn of the Dead also demonstrates the bible. Question: Does Satan have the power to raise the dead? No. So, how do the dead have the power to rise from the dead and eat and kill people? Only God can raise the dead. OK, so the movie actually combines two things – the evil of murder, cannibalism, and mindless mania with the power of the Good God to raise the dead. That is why the living dead seem to have such power – the movie has combined two opposite things, giving evil a power it does not have. It glorifies God in a backhanded way. But giving evil and death the power that only God has, the movie gave to Satan a power only God has. Fear is the normal response to the power of God exercised in an awesome way. Combine that legitimate fear with the fear of murderous monsters, and you mix hell and heaven. This is not a legitimate theme for inspiring understanding of the gospel; however, even this movie cannot deny the awesome unrelenting power of resurrection, even when it is perversely applied.

In Dawn of the Dead, there is a scene in which the attacking, murderous dead are doused with gasoline and lit. A more fitting view of hell has rarely been portrayed. The love of the family above that which is righteous is portrayed in the black man who hid from the others the fact that she was infected. She becomes a walking dead, tied to the bed, has her baby, who then becomes walking dead. The father defends his wife and infected baby from an uninfected person, thus becoming a murderer because he loved his family more than what is good. The family made into an idol and placed before God becomes the family from hell.

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Oaths 7 – A Change in Faith

Oaths 7 – A Change in Faith

The decision to switch from a Trinitarian oath to an oath to the Constitution must have been based on a fundamental change in beliefs. The colonies had recognized that a Christian oath is essential to a Christian republic. Unless the authors of the Constitution didn’t really understand the importance of the oaths, why would they have inserted them into their founding documents? If they were committed to a Christian form of government before the debates at the Constitutional Convention, then something must have changed at some point. How did it happen? What fundamental change had occurred in their thinking, their faith, their philosophy? Continue reading “Oaths 7 – A Change in Faith”

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Avatar – Double Entendres

Avatar – Double Entendres

The movie has many double entendres. For example, the destruction of “home tree” shows a couple of the multiple trunks toppling. It brings to mind the falling of the twin towers. Combined with the Colonel’s comment just before the final battle about fighting terror with terror could be a comment on the GWOT, Global War on Terror.

Do you get the sense that there’s something of a reflection of the War in Iraq as you see the military, hired mercenaries, trying to take the valuable asset (read “Oil”) from the natives (read “innocent Iraqis”)? Continue reading “Avatar – Double Entendres”

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Oaths 6 – Debating the Test Oath at the Constitutional Convention

Oaths 6 – Debating the Test Oath at the Constitutional Convention

So, you might ask, “Didn’t the Constitutional Convention have a point in stating that a religious test oath wouldn’t work?” Here’s a portion of the debate on the matter.

One of the arguments at the Convention was that religious test oaths are ineffectual.

“In one of his famous letters of ‘a Landholder,’ published in December, 1787, Oliver Ellsworth, a member of the Federal Constitutional Convention and later Chief Justice of this Court, included among his strong arguments against religious test oaths the following statement:

” ‘In short, test laws are utterly ineffectual; they are no security at all, because men of loose principles will, by an external compliance, evade them. If they exclude any persons, it will be honest men, men of principle, who will rather suffer an injury than act contrary to the dictates of their consciences. . . .’ ”

But was this a logical & consistent position to take in regard to an oath? What about an oath to the Constitution? Couldn’t we, no, don’t we have people today who fraudulently take an oath to uphold the US Constitution? And don’t we want to exclude “honest men” who don’t hold to faith in the bible & Christ?
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