I enjoy animated movies, so it is not torture for me to watch them with my kids. On the other hand, it is torturous for my husband! He just couldn’t get into any movies that don’t involve live actions. He managed to sit with us for the first twenty minutes of The LEGO Movie. But he was restless and edgy so we had to release him.
Over the weekend, our friends came over with their three boys. They rented the new Disney animation film “Moana” for us to watch. Halfway through the movie, I saw my husband looking for his phone. Then with half an hour left, he offered to bring out desserts. Other than that, he sat through the movie and even cracked up laughing. I was surprised.
As a mom, I am sensitive to subtle messages conveyed in movies in pop culture. So I would watch these Disney or Pixar animation movies with a mental notebook, ready to debunk any humanistic teaching and address any contradictions to the Biblical truth. At the end of the movie Moana, I already had a list of things I wanted to talk over with my kids, such as how to reconcile mythical demigods with the Triune God of the Bible.
“Did you get confused about the gods in the movie and the God you learned in the Bible?” I asked my older daughter.
“What?”
“I mean, the myth about the stolen heart, did you wonder whether it’s true?”
“Mom, kids don’t think about these things. We just watch.”
“But what is your takeaway from the movie?” I was insistent on having an intellectual discussion.
She gave me a blank stare and replied, “I don’t know.”
That was the end of our very un-lively post-movie discussion.
I don’t buy it though when kids say they don’t think much about the movies they watch. I think they do and they are just not telling!
When I think back to my childhood, I don’t quite remember what my teachers or parents taught me besides arithmetics. (Amazingly, I still do my long division in Chinese.) My value was shaped by Aesop’s fables, and my worldview was shaped by…Disney and its fairy tales. I grew up believing I must fall in love with Prince Charming and marriage was my ticket to eternal happiness.
Once I went on a church retreat in my 20s. One night, a few of us were startled by a frog that jumped into our car. Everyone screamed and ran for cover. Not I. I stared at the frog and prayed he’d be transformed into a prince for me to marry. I kid you not. That crazy thought went through my head! And guess where I got that idea from.
Stories are powerful. That’s why Jesus told stories. Bible is simply a book about people and their stories.
Now I am going to tackle a very weighty subject. Why do bad things happen to people, especially good, innocent people? Why a string of bad luck? How can we tell the difference between divine judgment and divine trials?
I don’t think anyone has the authority to give an answer. I will simply offer my humble opinions.
I wrote about King Ahab and his follies in my earlier posts. His trouble perpetuated to the next generation as his son Ahaziah met a similar fate. Like his father, Ahaziah sought out a foreign god, Baal, and was severely judged by the God of Israel.
“Elijah said to the king, “This is what the Lord says, ‘You sent messengers to seek an oracle from Baal Zebub, the god of Ekron. You must think there is no God in Israel from whom you can seek an oracle! Therefore you will not leave the bed you lie on, for you will certainly die.’ He died just as the Lord had prophesied through Elijah.” (2 Kings 1:16-17)
I couldn’t get into the Old Testament for the longest time when I was much younger. The stories I read were violent and twisted. I found this god unfriendly and angry most of the time. As I dug deeper, however, I felt drawn to the God of Israel. This God is straightforward. He is just. He is not wishy-washy. He is absolute. He can love like no one can, yet you don’t want to mess around with him. I learned about God’s character and his ways in dealing with us…mortals.
There is a universal law called the Law of Cause and Effect. This law operates underneath not only in the stories of the Bible but in our everyday life. For every effect there is a definite cause; likewise, for every cause, there is a definite effect. I see this law at work in the Old Testament. No one, NO ONE, gets away with anything.
To create a convincing tale, even a fairy tale, there is a need to bring to light the law of cause and effect in order for the story to be complete.
In the movie Moana, the villagers find diseased coconuts and a diminishing supply of fishes. Moana as an inexperienced leader tells the villagers to plant their coconut trees elsewhere and fish from another cove…with the same outcome. The story would not take off without knowing the cause of their plight. “A demigod stole the heart of the island goddess.” Moana’s grandmother, who is known as the village crazy lady, reveals the reason. It sounds absurd yet it is the only logical explanation.
With the Old Testament alone, the story doesn’t seem complete either. It starts with Genesis in which a broken trust between man and God led to the fallen humanity. Just as a criminal that has to face jail terms, sinners too have to face judgment. God watched His people fail miserably as they were crippled by their sins. What is a just God to do?
Since the beginning of time, people from many cultures have rituals to appease their gods by offering dead animals as sacrifices. These practices might sound ludicrous to those living in North America, but to those that live in Africa and Asia, they are the ways of life. I grew up in Taiwan, and I watched my grandmother preparing chickens as offerings to the goddess in the temple. I never understood how these gods could eat the food she prepared. So when we were finally allowed to eat the foods that had been offered to the statues, I felt uncomfortable. I didn’t feel like eating them. How can we eat foods that were already eaten?
Back to the question – what was a just God to do? He already tried wiping out the sinful world with the Flood. It didn’t work. God continued to watch His people fail miserably. The sin of mankind would require a man to pay…but who would pay? One day, a Jew named Jesus from Nazareth stood before the God of the Universe and submitted to His will. “I will go. I will die in their place.” He said he’s God’s Son. John who believed him penned one of the most well-known verses of the Bible,
“For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” (John 3:16)
Modern people might laugh at the idea that a man executed as a political criminal two thousand years ago would have anything to do with us. Let alone believing that he could save us.
We can get so caught up living this life that we stop thinking critically about life itself. As I take a step back, I do recognize there is a real problem with humanity. There is a grave sin in the world. Sin is like a genetic disease that passes down from generation to generation. We all have inherited this sin. We can say it’s not our fault, and we are good people doing the best we can. But our good intention cannot solve the problem of sin. We cannot just try harder to get out of this predicament. If the effect is sin, what is the cause then? The cause is that at the root of our ancestry there was sin and this sin now runs in our veins and is ruining our lives. This sin is so foul and abominable to a holy God. God who is just…had already provided a way out for us.
“Jesus. The answer is Jesus.” Someone told me. “He died as a sacrifice for your sin. Simply accept Him as your Savior and Lord.”
My grandmother would have killed fifteen chickens to atone for my sins if she ever had a chance. “We must appease the gods else they will punish you with bad luck.”
If you understand animal sacrifices, you will understand why Jesus is called the sacrificial lamb, and why Christians would sing their hearts out to the song “Worthy is the Lamb.” Receiving Jesus as my Savior was a logical thing to do. It’s like getting a “Get Out of Jail Free” card in the game of Monopoly.
No longer foul and abominable, I can boldly approach the Holy God. I have the instruction manual, the Bible, so I know how to carefully and soberly follow His ways before making any decisions.
Where we are today is simply the results of all the past causes, or actions, or inactions. In short, life is nothing but a series of decisions we make, or not make, on a daily basis.
For that reason, my life did take a turn for the better. And it has nothing to do with luck.
Why do bad things happen? Are we being judged and punished or are we going through refiner’s fire? We might never know. I do know this – for every effect there is a definite cause and for every cause, there is a definite effect. Things don’t just happen.
Find the cause and address it bravely, just like what Moana did in the movie. That is my takeaway from this animation film. I shall discuss it with my children, and with my husband who now has one Disney animation under his belt.