| February 24, 2004 My “The Passion of the Christ” Challenge --Go alone. That’s my challenge. I challenge you to go see this movie alone. Don’t go with friends or family. Don’t go with your boyfriend or girlfriend. Don’t go with a group of people or with your church. Go alone. Keith why the heck would you suggest going to such a communal movie as this? I mean it’s about the church right? Shouldn’t we fellowship with other believers by celebrating this movie together? I mean wouldn’t it be great to go see with friends and family? Let me tell you something. If the God of the Bible is in fact the one true God, then by default everything in the Bible is perfect and true. If that is indeed the case you will die physically one day. Transcending space, time, and whatever....you will stand in front of your Creator Jesus Christ and he will ask you one thing. Did I know you? I picture it as Jesus seemingly being like an amnesia patient...sort of like King Theoden acted after Eowyn slayed the Witch King and attended to his dying and broken body (Return of the King reference). Did I know you....a simple question, yet with so much on the line. And at that moment Christ, and you, will know the answer to that question. Eternity in his arms and presence or eternity in damnation awaits... The reason I set up this little story is because when you die, you’ll take only two things with you; your soul and your sin. Your body will be long gone, your family and friends will be no-shows, your church will be decaying brick and mortar back on that spherical chunk of dirt stuck in length, width, depth, and time,, and your good works will be called out for the dirty maggoty rags that they are. In short...you’ll have nothing but sin to show for (not a good situation when facing your Maker). And at that moment, when Christ looks at you he’ll see either two things; your gargantuan sin, or a reflection of himself; perfection. You see folks, I challenge you to go see the “Passion” by yourself for the simple fact that the aforementioned will take place one day and you’ll have no one, no thing, and no church to turn to. You’ll either have Christ in your heart or you won’t. You’ll either be graced and go to Heaven or be convicted and sentenced to Hell; tis the nature of sin and the cosmos. And this process will have already been decided whilst we occupy these degrading bodies. No chance after this folks. So under that premise, I challenge you, I plead with you, to go see this movie alone. Let it break you, let the tears flow freely, let the anger out, let the sin go... If you go with other people, as nice and wonderful as they are, they will only deter you from letting God do what he wants to do in your heart. He wants to break you so he can heal you. But unlike the physical flogging God went through on his way to Calvary, he wants you to go through a spiritual flogging. He wants this movie to drive you to your knees. Let it, don't fight it. Folks, this whole life thing is just one big (well small and short in the cosmic sense) test. Do we accept the Christ for who he claimed to be, or do we reject? I don’t know about you but my whole life I’ve rejected him. I’ve lived the way I want to, did the things I want to, thought I could fix my sin problem in my own human way, and I figured being “good” was good enough. But it’s the point when we realize we can never pay for sin. It’s that point at complete destitution, complete brokenness that something lights up in our hearts, something we’ve never know could exist.....grace....amazing grace. It starts as a small spark but gets larger. And somehow, in a complete twist of human logic, in my utter desolation I become strong. When you watch this movie it won’t make sense to you. You’ll wonder why Jesus lets himself take the beating he does. Oh we’ve heard the stories in Sunday School and we’ve seen the crucifixes, but when you see it in this movie, something you’ve never felt before will begin to surface. You’ll realize that through the whole torturous process, Christ could’ve ended it at any moment. He could’ve been the God that we humans like to glorify; the always conquering, always powerful, never submitting king. He could’ve done what we would’ve all done in his place which is give up and say “That’s enough!”. Never in our wildest dreams would we imagine a God who humbles himself even below his flawed creations. We'd never expect submission from the Creator...we'd never. So you’ll watch this and wonder why he doesn’t be what we want him to be. And you’re heart will drop, faster than a anvil, when you realize he going through this for me. For me......me.....the failure, loser, the dropout, the sinner, the damned Keith Wojciech. The God of the universe is going through this pain, this humilitation, this torture.....for me!? A measely human prone to miskates?!? And I guess it’s at that point when I break. I can’t take it anymore, my pride, my ego, my self righteousness. And I say to him what amazing love is this, that you, my king, would die for me? Go alone to “The Passion of the Chirst” and let it break you. Don’t shy away from the blood, from the cruelty. Don’t let your cellphone distract you and don’t let the kid in the 3rd row take your eyes off the Christ. Because if you do, you’ll be in danger of missing out on a love which the likes have never been seen before this side of the Milky Way. And cry. Cry like you’ve never cried before. Take tissue boxes if you have to, but cry. For tears of sorrow bring a heart's restoration. Cry during the movie and cry after it. Go somewhere when it's over, to a big tree, a desolate parking lot, open field, where ever, and cry some more...Lord knows you'll have a shoulder to cry on. reviews that make you wonder just how powerful this movie is... |