Category: Uncategorized

You Sank My…

I have been to a couple of movies recently which have subjected me to previews for Battleship, the upcoming film which was still being promoted as being from Hasbro, the same people who brought us the Transformers franchise and the table game Battleship.  Early trailers and write-ups were emphasizing that the movie was based on the board game, although they seem to be de-emphasizing that now.

This probably has to do with the fact that the movie actually appears to be Transformers 4: Hey, Now We’re In The Ocean!  In fact, I have struggled for weeks to understand what the movie has to do with the board game, other than the actual presence of a Battleship: lots of aliens that look like the aliens from Transformers, and make lots of metallic clicking and growling sounds like the aliens from Transformers, but no kids incorrectly guessing where Liam Neeson’s battleship is.

And then I realized that I know what a Battleship movie that is actually based on the board game would be like:

Two nations have full, ample naval fleets – but no intelligence agencies.  So, as tensions build and war breaks out, the two nations are relegated to taking turns firing missiles to random locations, hoping to hit one of the enemy ships.

They also have no air force, so to find out if they have actually hit the enemy fleet, each nation is dependent upon the other calling periodically to say “miss” or “hit”.  When they occasionally hit the enemy, there is great excitement: “Oh, we have hit the enemy.  Unfortunately, we don’t know what type of ship we hit (our enemy failed to mention it during their last phone call).  So, let’s fire near the last location, and see if we have hit again!”  This gripping battle goes back and forth, until one fleet has been entirely sunk, and the audience has died of boredom.

Now, wouldn’t you go see that, again and again, eventually buying it on blu-ray?

Having figured out how to make a really exciting movie about a board game, I thought we should take it to the next level.  So, let’s crowdsource this: what other board and table games would you like to see as movies, and what type of movie would your game of choice be?  What do you think would be the hardest board game to make into a movie?

For example: My brother and I began thinking about this, and he suggested that Connect Four might be the hardest game to make into a movie.  After a little thought, though, I suggested that, in the spirit of Battleship, Connect Four would be a romantic comedy about four hip young urban friends trying to find love but being repeatedly blocked just short of the goal.  Depending on if this was a big studio project or an indie, in the end one of the young beautifuls would find true love (or not); in the closing scene, a giant sinkhole would open up, and all of the checker/hipsters would collapse into it.

Okay, now it’s your turn!  Let’s make a movie!

Stop Making Sense

On Sunday morning, we talked at St. Paul Church about how Chuck Colson after his prison conversion was an example of what 1 John 3:1 was talking about: The reason why the world does not know us is that it did not know him. (1 John 3:1 ESV) The man who came out of prison didn’t look like the man who went in to prison, and rest of his life told a different story than the one that landed him in federal prison: it told the story of Jesus, the King who invites us into the family of God even while we are his enemies.  The link below is to a piece talking more about how this changed life is being wrestled with in obituaries.

What is the story that your life is telling?  Is it a story of self-service, or the story of Jesus?

Chuck Colson and the Conscience of a Hatchet-Man | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction.

Preaching about Singing, Singing about Suffering

Yesterday’s sermon came out of Jeremiah 31:31-34. It’s a passage of hope and beauty about the New Covenant. It’s also a text that’s pointing the reader forward. The original recipients, exiled Judah, were being pointed to a promise that even though they were going back into a wilderness, there was going to be something of God for them on the other side. In fact, there would be something better; unfortunately for them, we’re still waiting for that something. For us, too, we are wilderness walkers, even the best of us, on our way to a place where God’s law courses through our veins and worship is worship, not 3 songs and a prayer that we might learn something new from the preacher today.

So, having looked at that text yesterday and still steeping in it today, I was caught by surprise to realize that i was listening to the old song “Wilderness” by The Choir, one of my favorite bands since, well, pretty much forever, as far as musical tastes go. Here’s the chorus:

Is your faith so right
Are you so blessed
Everybody wanders in the forest
Is your heart so true
Are you that good
Everybody wanders in the woods
Everybody wanders in the forest
Everybody wanders in the wilderness

It’s true. Every one of us. Thank you, God, that we’re not alone.

Correction

I was wrong when I said that only 7 of 8 days had set record highs around here.  Turns out the day that I didn’t think made it actually did.  8 days in a row, and tomorrow projects to be 9.

So, what will our summer be?  Longer and hotter than usual?  Early, then moving to Fall in August? My mind is officially boggled.

 

The Wonder of Weather

For the last week, the Chicago area has had an unbelieveable streak of warm weather.  How unprecedented it truly is has been hitting me slowly over the last few days, as I have heard facts like:

  • 7 of 8 days in this stretch have set records for high temperature; if the 8th day had set the record, too, that would have been the longest stretch of consecutive days with a record high temperature in Chicago.
  • Today, Chicago was warmer than Havana, Cuba and Cabo san Lucas, Mexico and Cancun.
  • The low temperatures during the last week have been 10-15 degrees higher than the average high temperature for these dates.

As these bizarre days of warmth have piled up, I have realized that I can’t take the weather for granted.  I can’t fall back on any of the tired cliches about what March weather in Chicago is like.  Every one of those cliches is a statement of boredom at the variety of weather, and God’s provision within it.  Well, for me, I think that’s the case.  You might be different.  But a week of totally un-likely, unbelievable weather has caused me to actually pay attention to the mundane again.  Praise God.