Matt grew up in Utah, but now lives in Europe. He continues the theological wanderings of a spiritual mutt, who is continually confronted with the vastness of his own ignorance. ​

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​There a three theological discussions that perk my interest.

1. Female Ministry- Enough people have tried to derail theological discussions by throwing my gender out, I get kinda "attack dog"-like, when the subject comes up. So much so I find I can't help but engage it when the subject comes up.
2. Job- As it's the book that has shaped my theological journey so far, I make a point to read up on commentary. It makes it easy to engage in discussion when the subject comes up.
3. Satan- As the first physical appearance of Satan in the bible happens in Job, I've been interested in the subject.

Let me say. I was not pleased with the list that was given for this "simple sermon." Let me introduce the list to you, and follow up with a rewrite from me:

• If I were Satan I would deceive people as to myself- I understand this book was published in 1954. There  have been more than a few years with ministers touting the line, "The biggest trick Satan can pull is making us believe he doesn't exist."  I say, if there is a malevolent being trying to destroy us, the biggest trick is actually the opposite. If I were Satan I would make people believe everything is my fault so no one takes responsibility for their own misdeeds.  Then nothing gets solved, because no one believes it is their responsibility to solve it.
• If I were Satan, I'd make sin attractive- I personally believe sin is the act of a community or person causing the self or community to be further from God. Yes, that can appear very attractive, especially when it comes in the form of easy answers. You know, the quick pill that solves everything. Usually though, most people who are in sin, know they are in sin, and it's not attractive at all. Sometimes, a separation from God is soul wrenching, and extremely difficult. If I were Satan, I'd make other people's disconnect look scandalous so they are never really helped.
• If I were Satan I would hinder God's word- This one is so arrogant to me. This one is simply keeping the word being spoken. The writer, Pastor Hershel Ford, uses the "Sower and the Seed Parable" as an example. Especially in the United States, no one is keeping us from speaking from the Bible.  Especially not in 1954. I'd rather compare James 3:11. "Can both fresh water and salt water flow from the same spring?" If I were Satan, I'd manipulate the scripture, to make people joyfully spew junk. 
• If I were Satan I'd try to destroy the power of the Churches- Knowing that Pastor Ford was part of the SBC, let's me know he's not talking about the "power" from the Catholic church. I also find it insulting that during the heyday of the church, a minister was preaching about not having having church power. The culture current in the 50's was flowing with the church, not against it. While I doubt many of us ministers today want to return to that culture, we at least appreciate what it was. If I were Satan, I would trick congregants into thinking power came from the Church instead of God.
• If I were Satan I'd try to make the Church members stumble- Besides the fact that this is just as dangerous as the first one in the list, it is also comically humorous. I wanna see a meme of a red cloven hoof sticking out of a path, with Christians unknowingly walking the path.  We stumble enough on our own. We don't need Satan's help. This deserves a repeat of the the first rewrite: If I were Satan I would make people believe everything is my fault so no one takes responsibility for their own misdeeds.
• If I were Satan I would try to give the world another Gospel- I read this section and realized he's talking about churches that don't preach Substitutionary atonement. These are just hoity toity words for believing Jesus died for our sins. This was around the time of Karl Barth, and universal salvation. People were trying to understand basic justice issues in relation to God. Millions died during WWII, and the most horrendous deaths happened right under our noses at Concentration Camps. No one wanted to have the discussion of what happened to the souls of all the Jewish people who were murdered. None of us wanted to believe all those people were sent to hell after suffering through a living hell here on earth. Karl Barth said, Christ died for all in all time. That's what people wanted to talk about. So, if I were Satan I would obscure the Gospel to make people forget about love of God and neighbor. Perhaps, If I were Satan, I'd make people become super legalistic. 
• If I were Satan I would get men to give excuses- Whew. It's nice to know I've been left out of this one. (I kid. I kid.) Seriously though. This is the only one that makes complete sense to me. To the end of time, we will always have reasons not to do things. About 6 months ago a congregant was astonished at how much I do. I make bracelets, cross stitch, make birthday decorations and costumes for my kids, as well as everything I do for church. She said I must have tons of free time. I replied, "Everyone has free time. we have the choice of what to do with it." One of her last actions before she passed away was making Christmas gifts for everyone. "No" is such an easy answer because it doesn't require work after it is said. "Yes," can be a life changing word. "Yes," if used appropriately, can change the world. If I were Satan, I'd make people think they don't have time or ability to change the world for the better.

15 The Lord replied, “Go! This man is the agent I have chosen to carry my name before Gentiles, kings, and Israelites. 16 I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.”
17 Ananias went to the house. He placed his hands on Saul and said, “Brother Saul, the Lord sent me—Jesus, who appeared to you on the way as you were coming here. He sent me so that you could see again and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” 18 Instantly, flakes fell from Saul’s eyes and he could see again. He got up and was baptized. 19 After eating, he regained his strength.
He stayed with the disciples in Damascus for several days. 20 Right away, he began to preach about Jesus in the synagogues. “He is God’s Son,” he declared
Acts 9:15-20 NRSV

Movies have these cliches.  Let me share some of them with you. If there is a dog in the movie, that dog will always bark at the bad guy. An action hero never ever wears prescription glasses. Bombs are usually defused only if there are less than five seconds remaining on the clock. People can drive moving cars while looking directly at the passenger. They also tend to move the steering wheel 100 times more than the average driver.  In a chase scene, most women will fall down at some point. Whenever someone appears to be working on a computer, the screen is so bright it projects itself on the person’s face. Or at least, when they are accessing a computer that doesn’t belong to them, they can easily break the password by looking at the person’s desk or remember some obvious clue given in a previous scene.  Also, if a bad guy wants redemption they must die for it. It has to be a sacrificial death, where it saves the good guys in the process.
Maybe this is why biblical movies are a tough sell, especially the New Testament stories. Could you imagine the pitch?

Okay, so we have this guy. It turns out he is the Son of God.
The Son of God, really? Does he come in and destroy the bad guy with lightening or hellfire or anything?
Oh, no. He’s a pacifist. He doesn’t hurt a single person the entire movie.
Right… well, go on.
Anyway, he starts to gain this following. People are willingly leaving their family over this guy.
Oh, so with his big following he overtakes the government, and puts a new system in place?
Umm, no. In fact, the government in rule when we comes in is still the same government when the story ends.
Then the followers…
No, the followers mostly die terrible deaths.
The bad guys…
Mostly get away in the end.

It’s not the story we want to hear. We want our happy endings. We want our “and they lived happily ever after.” If not, we at least want to know the bad guys were punished. That’s just not how life works, and that’s not how Jesus asked us to react to life.
There are two important pieces of Jesus Christ we must understand before we can get what’s going on in our scripture.

First, Jesus died. The resurrection is only as spectacular as the real death that came before it. As Christians, as a church, we are continually called to that death. When we try to emulate the resurrection without allowing our old selves to truly die, we end up with an undead church. Seriously. It’s the zombie church, and I’ve seen it over and over again. They can’t do what they used to do, but they refuse to let it go. This means they only appear alive, but they are really already gone. Until they let go, they can’t truly be reborn. They bite others, infecting congregants. I’ve spent the last few years helping the wounded. It’s dangerous stuff. Saul, the man who gathered up Christians to be murdered, died on that road. Not literally. His heart did not stop, but who he was ended in that moment. This was the future leader of the early church. Anything from that previous life, necessarily had to die.

Second, Jesus came to end the cycle of violence and hate. You know what’s interesting about the place where I’m at? I hear the problem from every angle, but no one wants to take blame. So much is broken right now. The General church is broken. The region is broken. Churches all over the nation are broken. Ministers are broken. Congregants are broken… But, blame always belongs to someone else. We all have our stories about the minister, the church, the congregant, the region, or the general suck that caused the problem. Do we realize we scapegoat the problem? We place the blame on something or someone who can’t do anything about it. We can’t change the people or the long gone system that hurt us. Sure, we can put our burden on them, and send them out as our sacrifice, but it doesn’t solve the problem.

Do you realize Ananias could have scapegoated Saul? He could have taken one look at Saul and said, “Oh no, Lord. That guy is the reason we are in hiding. That guy is the reason several of my friends are now dead. I’m out.”  Can you see the seriousness of it all? The future of the Christian story was put in Ananias’ hands, and Ananias had justification to let Saul rot in his blindness.

“You have heard that it was said, An eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth.  But I say to you that you must not oppose those who want to hurt you. If people slap you on your right cheek, you must turn the left cheek to them as well.  When they wish to haul you to court and take your shirt, let them have your coat too.  When they force you to go one mile, go with them two. Give to those who ask, and don’t refuse those who wish to borrow from you. “You have heard that it was said, You must love your neighbor and hate your enemy.  But I say to you, love your enemies and pray for those who harass you so that you will be acting as children of your Father who is in heaven. He makes the sun rise on both the evil and the good and sends rain on both the righteous and the unrighteous. If you love only those who love you, what reward do you have? Don’t even the tax collectors do the same?
​
The words of Jesus from Matthew 5:38-46. Do you see the potential that sits in our laps? Do you see the possibility of the future of the church? God is not asking us to heal a murderer. God is not asking us to redeem a villain. God is asking us to forgive our fellow brother or sister in Christ, and invite them back into the family, with no strings attached.  What is being asked of us is not nearly as difficult as what God was asking of Ananias. Ananias did it. Ananias healed the murderous villain. In doing so the future of the Early Church took root. Can we do what God is asking of us? Can we give it up at the cross? Can we let go of the scapegoat, and personally sacrifice for the future?

Once, there was a young girl. She was born into poverty. Her parents had immigrated to the United States to escape the great potato famine of Ireland. From an early age she suffered. She had five siblings, but two passed away at birth. When her mother passed away, her dad was a horrible caregiver. Finally, giving up, he dropped her brother and her at a poor house. Meanwhile, the girl was also blind. As a child, she was an uneducated blind girl. Anyone who would have seen her would have thought: this girl would amount to nothing.  That was not the case. No one would have guessed this girl would find her way into an academy for the blind, become the top of her class, and eventually be the woman who would make the breakthrough with Helen Keller. Anne Sullivan was counted out as child, but there was potential in that soul. Potential that would change the world.

Our history is often shaped by second chances, or missed opportunities. For Anne Sullivan, she was determined not to spend her life in poverty. It was during a state inspection, Sullivan convinced one of them to allow her to leave and enroll in a school for the blind. For Franklin Sanborn, the man who agreed to let her go, it was saying yes to someone who appeared like a lost cause by most definitions.

I know it doesn't make sense to compare Anne Sullivan to Saul. It appears the only connection is both were blind.  I want to compare their potential greatness. For that matter, anyone's potential greatness. 

It is easy to see a diamond sitting in a setting, lying on a jeweler's table. Some of us can even tell the quality of the 4 C's to that diamond. Then it can be given a value. What many of us can't do is see the value of a diamond just dug up from the earth. I'm sure, many of us would ​think we are looking at a piece of trash. No real value at all.

We like to celebrate a beautiful person. We raise them up. We give them love and adoration. We tend to forget, many of these people started out as raw, unpolished, and unrefined. They didn't grace the jeweler's table with the other precious gems. In some cases, they had a terrible and dark history. Their history was paved with the death of others. Now whether that was the fault of others, like Anne Sullivan's story, or the person was responsible, like Saul, we don't want to give our focus to these people. They are not on the inside. They are not part of the group.

Newsflash, God likes outsiders. God likes the underdog. God is known to pick those on the outside to change the inside. Moses lived with the enemy before he became the liberator of the Israelites. Issac, Jacob, and Joseph were not first born children. Yet, they are the ones who inherited the birthright and changed the story. Saul was a bad guy. He watched Stephen being stoned to death! This was one of the Apostles! Before the blinding on the road to Damascus, no one within the Christian story would have seen anything redeemable in this man. In fact, he had to change his name because no one trusted "Saul."  Yet, this would be the guy who would write the next chapter in the Christian story. More than any other Apostle, Paul was the biggest evangelist in early Christendom.

What does that mean for us? Don't assume who are the people who are going to change the world. We can look at all those pretty diamonds out there, when we should be looking for an uncut gem. 

As of today Fig Tree will no longer be a source for Christian knowledge and exploration. I have found my true calling critiquing movies! I know, I know. There are already a million people out there who give their two-cents regarding cinema. I know my niche'. As a minister, I already over analyze the scripture. It just seems like a natural transition to over to movie reviewing. 

Hopefully, we can make this transition without much fuss. I'm sure everyone is ready for something new. I know I am.

I wanted to start with something beloved by anyone under the age of 40 and hated by anyone over that age. No, I'm not talking about "Return of the Jedi." I'm talking Ghostbusters II. Since the new movie is coming out, and it already looks like, based on the reviews, that one is going to be the worst of the bunch, I thought it would be fun too take a trip back in Ecto 1, (the real one) and discuss an interesting point to the second move: The number 2. 

When I noticed the number two, I thought it was too obvious. Others had to have written on it. After some light research, I found nothing. It is so intentional, I'm sure it's a secret theme in the movie. On the surface there is the obvious call to two: 

The Ghostbuster Logo is making the number 2. They go all in on this, by the way. It's at the beginning of the movie. It's the new sign outside the Firehouse. It's on all of their uniforms. 

Actually, you'll find most things happen two times in the movie. This doubling happens so much, it has to be on purpose.

Oscar is stolen twice in a baby carriage. At the beginning of the movie, Oscar is whisked away in his actual carriage. At the beginning of act three he was stolen by a ghost form of Janosz. (How is that even possible by the way? Did he have an out of body experience? Why did he choose to dress up like a nanny? Yeah, this is one of those shark jumping moments for the movie. Even so, you wanna bet this kept me from getting too close to windows above the 5th or so story.)

Peter has two guests on his television show. Both predict the end of the world. I was first drawn to the overblown use of twos because I chose to watch this movie Feb 14,2016. That was the date the woman gave for the end of the world. 

The Ghostbusters (in some form) are blocked from seeing the mayor, by his assistant, not once, but twice. The first time is right after Peter finishes his show. The second time, the mayor had given them two minutes, and the assistant takes matters into his own hands. Oh, and isn't that another Murray in the second shot. I'd make a bigger deal about two Murrays in a movie, but it's so gosh darn common, I'll add it as a side note here.

We visit the river of slime twice. The first time, Ray is dropped down through an illegal hole from the middle of the ground. The second time they get through by following an abandoned rail line.

The Ghostbusters are arrested and sent to jail twice. The first time was for digging an illegal hole, among other unmentioned charges. The second time, they willfully went to the police and were institutionalized afterwards.

While on trial, two ghosts, who happen to be murderous brothers, burst out of the slime. I might also note, the judge gives two rulings too. First he orders them to jail at Rikers Island, then he overturns his ruling. Also, when we first meet Lewis in this scene, he walks in with two stacks of books.

Ray is mesmerized by Vigo twice. The first time, Peter is taking pictures of the painting. This only leads to Ray being dumbfounded, The second time, the look led to Vigo overtaking Ray's body. Thank goodness for positively charged slime. (Or is it really that Vigo hates singing. After all, he kinda lost control when the New Yorkers were singing in the new year. Also, the positively charged slime took on a life of it's own when music played.)

Although, none of the traditional Ghostbusters ever see him, Slimer shows up twice to Lewis. The first time, he was scarfing down Lewis' food. The second time, Slimer picks Lewis up in a bus to take him to the museum. 

The dome of slime around the museum is hit with power packs twice. The first time by the Ghostbusters. The second time by Louis. Did Louis really help with his proton pack? Maybe. I like to think the poor guy actually did chip in a little.

The Ghostbusters use positive slime to animate an inanimate metal object, you guessed it, twice. Yeah, the slime would have been washed away travelling through the water. Sure, having all of New York see four bozos basically destroy the Statue of Liberty would make them angry, not happy. Still, I loved this scene as a kid.

This heretical movie screams of dualism. It makes it much more fascinating to watch when you are looking out for the doppelgangers. I purposefully left some of the doubles out. I stopped counting at 14 other dualities. Let us know if you catch them by leaving us a comment. Come on! Don't make me ask twice!