Posted by: Michael Feather in tv
The LOST finale was satisfying in a fallen world sort of way. It was a good ending to a great series, but it left me feeling there was something missing. There was. I think people are looking for what is significant, what gives their lives meaning, what helps them to see things correctly. What is frustrating is that they are stumbling around in the dark—on purpose! God has told us what is significant and what gives our lives meaning. He has given us all that we need to know and cared for us perfectly, but we choose to ignore what He says and to live our own ways.
It wasn’t a “Christian” ending, whatever that might mean. What people typically mean by that is that it doesn’t line up with the Christian worldview. I am constantly amazed that we expect things of this world to line up perfectly. It was as close as you can get from a pagan team. It was inclusive of most religions and true of none of them. Any time you mix all the religions together into a blob, you lose the significant aspects of each. I am most offended that the distinctives of Christianity are lost, but what would I expect. It is my job, as someone who believes in the one true God, to proclaim His excellencies to everyone. (1 Peter 2:9) I want a television show to do that for me, but how stupid is that?!
As I said, I finished watching this season with a feeling that something was missing. So much was missing. What I realized this morning was that I actually like that fact. If LOST fulfilled all my desires and ended as the perfect story, I would want to live in that story. I would make it into an idol. I would create my own version of the story and mentally live there for the rest of my life. I don’t want to do that.
I live in the only perfect story. I live in the one I was created for and it really is not about me. This story is about God and His glory.
We take something created and expect it to fill us, to help us, to fulfill us. Do we really think that will work? Are we that foolish? Are we that willing to turn away from what God says? In most cases, yes.
I have other thoughts and hope to post them soon. But the reality is that as Christians, we should not look to LOST for the answers. God has already given them.
Posted by: Michael Feather in tv
Watching LOST has helped me appreciate the Old Testament.
No it is not because I have found some obscure references that I just need to share with everyone. It is not even because I just wanted to capitalize on everyone who is searching for LOST stuff on the internet, not so patiently waiting for Tuesday to come.
Right now LOST is a work in progress that could go several different ways. In a sense, I am lost right now—lost in all the possibilities and eager to find out what is going to happen.
Can you imagine being a God-fearing man in the Old Testament times? What would you think about all the promises that the prophets were saying? How would you have pieced together the clues you were getting? Would you ever in your wildest dreams envisioned Jesus?
See, we read the Old knowing what is stated in the New. We know how things will go because they have already happened. We know that Jesus is the promised Messiah that will save His people by dying on a cross. We know that He is resurrected. We know that He has sent the Holy Spirit to dwell in us. They didn’t understand any of that. They had clues, like we do in LOST right now, but there are so many details and “clues” that they ignored because they had a vision for how they wanted it to happen.
Stories in process are fun, but we need the ending to know how to appreciate them to their fullest. Not knowing where you are going is enjoyable for a time because it is an adventure, but eventually you need the conclusion that ties everything together. We must read the Old Testament knowing what has happened in the New in order to appreciate it fully. God wrote both of them and had it all planned out from the beginning.
As LOST wraps up this last season, I have no hopes that the writers, directors and producers will give me such a satisfying story as that found in the Bible. Competing with God on story is a bit foolish. But I do eagerly wait for the key to unlock all that I have already seen. After the season is over, I will probably watch the whole series over again, appreciating all that has been put into this story to point to the end. Right now it is like I am living in the Old Testament and that gives me a new appreciation of the Old.