Show Notes
Six little men and a young boy run down a long portal pursued by a glowing face of Light and a booming voice that bellows, “Return what you have stolen from me. Return the map. Stop!” They don’t stop but fall into the outer darkness. That’s how the story begins in the old movie: Time Bandits.
The six little men (like the six days of Creation) had been hired by the Supreme Being to fix holes in the fabric of spacetime. However, they had just stolen the map that identified the location of these holes, and so they were running from God. They were planning to use the map to steal things throughout spacetime and then escape through more holes. One of those holes led to Kevin’s bedroom, and another out of his bedroom. That’s how Kevin found himself running from the Judgment of God, along with other little men.
And I think that explains the human condition. If you say, “I’ve never stolen a map, and I’m not running from God,” you’re wrong.
John 12:23-25: “... The hour has come for the Son of Man, to be glorified. Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth, and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life [psyche: soul] loses it, and whoever hates his life [psyche: soul] in this world will keep it for eternal life [zoe].”
Did Jesus hate His own soul in this world? Does a seed hate its lonely self in this world for the sake of another? Does it pray “Save me from this hour!” like each one of us?
John 12:27-29: “Now is my soul [psyche] troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? But for this purpose, I have come to this hour. Father, glorify your name.” Then a voice came from heaven: “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd that stood there and heard it said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” Jesus answered, “This voice has come for your sake, not mine.”
They all hear something, but they don’t hear “The voice of God.” Maybe they don’t want to hear, for what they would hear just won’t fit in their psyche? These are the people that have the map.
In Exodus 19, the Israelites arrive at the Holy Mountain. They must not touch the mountain, but in verse 13, they are told to “go up into the mountain” at the sound of the long trumpet blast. In verses 16 through 19, they hear a long loud “trumpet voice [qowl],” tremble with fear, and then plead with Moses, saying, “Do not let God speak with us, lest we die” (20:19). So, God writes his Word in stone and has Moses place it in a coffin, also called an “Ark.” Of course I’m talking about the Law, the knowledge of Good and evil — the Map.
In Genesis 2, Adam and Eve see it, or Him, hanging like fruit on a tree. They take the fruit of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, which is also “The Life.” And then they hear “the Voice [qowl] of the Lord walking in the garden,” and they run and hide deep in their own psyches. They’ve stolen the map.
People think Scripture is a map. Someone was once surprised to find W. C. Fields reading the Bible and so asked him what he was doing. He replied, “Looking for loopholes, my dear. …Looking for loopholes.”
Some think John’s Revelation is a map — with loopholes through which we can avoid the Judgment of God — but it’s not a map; it’s a testimony to a person. It’s titled “The Revelation of Jesus.”
John 12:31-33: “...Now is the judgment of this world; now will the ruler of this world be cast out. And I, when I am lifted up from the earth will draw [romance] all people to myself.” He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die.
When we don’t “get” the image of God — who is Jesus — We don’t get the logic of Love — which is the sacrifice of Love: “to lose your life and find it.” And so, we run from the Judgment of God — which is to run into nowhere and nothing. It is to run from the Light and so hide in your own shadow.
I can’t begin to explain this without three pictures that I share in sermons all th
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