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Do You Have a Caged-Up Gorilla in Your Trunk?

Todd R Leave a comment

I’ve been a fan of the rock band King’s X for many years and am currently reading King’s X: The Oral History, a book by Greg Prato that chronicles the history of the band entirely through quotes from the band, those who have worked with the band, music journalists, and other musicians.  They have a musical style all their own, combining heavy rock influences with complicated arrangements and Beatle-esque vocal harmonies.  Some even credit them with inventing the “grunge” genre, not just by often tuning their instruments to a lower, heavier tone, but also through their gritty lyrics as a contrast to the “hair metal” that dominated rock in the early and mid 1980s.  On top of the musical style, I also liked that in the late 1980s and early 1990s there were a lot of Christian themes in their lyrics but written around the reality of their struggles with their faith and with aspects of Christian culture and the music industry.  Unfortunately, these struggles continue for them, and only one of the three members seems to still be a Christian.

One of the reasons I bought the book was that it promised to cover “every song” in their catalog, and since some of their lyrics are enigmatic, I wanted more of the story.  The rest of this post is about one of those songs, how the book (understandably) didn’t explain it, and what I was able to get from it anyway.

When I unwrapped the book, the first thing I did was to find the hoped-for explanation of the lyrics for “Six Broken Soldiers.”  Written by the band’s drummer, Jerry Gaskill, it’s a different style than other songs and the lyrics seem intriguingly random.  Flipping through pages, I quickly found Jerry’s only comment on the song:

“It’s always hard for me to talk about lyrics, because I don’t like to say exactly what I’m thinking, because then that takes away from anything that you may get from it. When I write, I put everything I feel and think into each line, so it comes off very ambiguous sometimes, and even unintelligible sometimes. But I have specific things I’m thinking when I wrote that. Basically, it’s just me talking about me.”[1]

Jerry Gaskill

Bummer.  Although I was hoping for more specifics, I definitely understand an artist’s desire to let the audience interpret the work in their own way.  So, if “it’s just me talking about me,” what do I see knowing that, and re-reading the lyrics?  Below I’ll go into some of the lines and my take-aways, but it might be handy to have the lyrics, which you can find here, or if you want to hear the song, click here.  There are parts of it I don’t get, and will skip in my comments, but which meant something to the author and that might mean something to you.

Us Talking About Us
In general, I think the song describes the complexity of human personality, not just Jerry’s, but everyone’s, and how little we understand it.  First, the title of the song says a lot.  Brokenness is right there, but also “six” says we are broken in many ways.  We can all identify with having problems, and more than one of them.  With “soldiers” I think of our struggle against our problems, and that even the “soldiers” we have to fight them with have their own problems.  Our brokenness affects our ability to combat it and there’s no easy fix.

The opening verse suggests that our surrounding culture and heritage are not enough to solve these problems, and often don’t even care about them.  Is all we have an “American library” to deal with our sickness?  How often do you hear something on the news, or something a politician promises, and think – that’s exactly the answer to my specific situation?  Probably rarely, and even rarer if you consider whether they can actually do it, and on time for it to help you.  A lot of what is available to us is too vague and too ineffective to be what we really need.

The next part is series of seemingly random short phrases that are metaphorically part of our personality.  For me the lyrics include these parts:

  • Among the “Six broken soldiers in the trunk of my car”, there are parts of us we share with others (“Two of them speak”) and parts we’d rather not (“four go to bars”).  If this is what it means, then it also implies the parts we hide are much larger than the parts we let others know about.  All of it is baggage we carry with us everywhere we go, as in the trunk of our car.
  • “A caged up gorilla” – There are parts of us we don’t like, that might be harmful, and that we can barely control.
  • “three local bands” – There are parts of us that are experiences that led to where we are now, for good or ill.  King’s X had multiple, earlier versions before the current one, and so do we all.

Lastly, Jerry mentions an internal parrot that speaks multiple languages, all of them unintelligible, while “the audience he scans.”  Parrots repeat what they hear without understanding it so this line could mean there’s a lot that goes on inside ourselves that we don’t understand.  This echoes Paul’s frustration with himself in Romans 7:15 where he says: “For I do not understand my own actions. For I do not do what I want, but I do the very thing I hate.”  Our internal thoughts and motivations aren’t always reliable, and we don’t always know where they come from.

The parrot scanning the audience means he is looking for confirmation from outside that he is doing the right thing.  The irony is that when we don’t understand ourselves, why would we expect others to consistently understand us better and be able to guide us?  Do other people’s internal parrots speak more intelligibly than ours?  If they don’t, is popularity or majority rule a good guide for our decisions?  He has “sixpence and a quarter,” but doesn’t know what to do with it.

Not a very hopeful song, so what to take away from it?

First, that there is far, far more diversity inside of any one individual for even that individual to understand.  How can any society, armed with only an “American library,” hope to truly deal with people as actual individuals?  We can claim to respect the individual and stand for diversity and inclusion, but are such things even possible without vastly oversimplifying the situation?

Second, that there is far, far more brokenness in each individual for anyone other than God to fully diagnose and treat.  From what vantage point can we actually see the truth we each need, know the answers to our problems, and effectively apply them?

Before moving to the last section, I must clarify that I’m not saying human efforts at solving our problems are totally wrong and useless.  Many people manage their problems well enough alone and others manage with a lot of help from different sources.  Good friends, family, and in some cases therapy and medication, are very helpful.  We know a lot more about human psychology and other related topics than we used to.  The “American library” is not a static thing, but grows and changes over time, sometimes improving and becoming more effective, but not always.  Sometimes “progress” creates more, newer, problems before the old ones are solved.   Therefore, when honestly looking at the human condition with eyes wide open, we seem doomed to always fall short of a full solution with the resources we have.  What we have is not sufficient, but we have hope.

Where Does Hope Come From?
While our Six Broken Soldiers seem hopeless, there is an answer from outside our inner confusion and from beyond our material existence.  Members of King’s X are (or were) fans of C.S. Lewis[2], who wrote this description of mankind from Aslan, the fictional kingly lion who represents Jesus, in Prince Caspian, part of the Chronicles of Narnia series:

“You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve. And that is both honor enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth.  Be content.”[3]

Against our problems, we have far, far more dignity and nobility and talent than could possibly come by some cosmic accident.  We are each individual creatures of a loving God, and we have far more than an “American library” at our disposal.  We have Someone who knows us fully as the complex people we are, who loves us completely, and who was broken so that we might be delivered from our brokenness.

Therefore, come to Jesus, bring your Six Broken Soldiers, and ask Him to heal all of them.  He is an infinite resource.  There’s nothing about you He doesn’t already know and understand, and nothing He does not have a solution for.

If you don’t know how to do that or what that means, read this earlier post about what it means to have a loving, personal relationship with our Maker and Lord Jesus, who guides and empowers us to love as He does.

[1] Prato, Greg. King’s X: The Oral History (2019).  P. 97.
[2] Their first album was titled “Out of the Silent Planet,” and they later released a song referencing a chapter in “That Hideous Strength,” two books written by Lewis.
[3] Lewis, C.S.  Prince Caspian (1951).

4 8 15 16 23 42 – Blessed are the Meek #3

Todd R Leave a comment

Do you ever feel that God has appointed a task to you that you can’t see the point of?  These opening verses refer back to previous posts about Jesus asking Martha to move the stone away from the opening of Lazarus’ grave, and also to the man who was given only one talent to put to work for his Master’s benefit:
“Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone.’ Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, ‘Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” – John 11:39
“He also who had received the one talent came forward, saying, ‘Master, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you did not sow, and gathering where you scattered no seed, so I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Here, you have what is yours.’” – Matthew 25:24-25

As we continue a series on the Beatitudes with the third Beatitude “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth”[1] I am reminded of the mid-2000’s TV series Lost, where character Desmond Hume is trapped on a mysterious island and enters a code into a computer every 108 minutes.  He does it – even in the middle of the night – because he was told he is “saving the world” by someone he trusts.  When the code – 4 8 15 16 23 42 – is entered on time nothing happens except the re-setting of a clock to 108 minutes.  “The numbers” are referenced over and over again in the show, individually or all together, and seem to have a mystic power over events.  The number of minutes allowed to enter the code – 108 – is the sum of the six numbers.  Even fans seemed to believe “the numbers” had power – there was a boom in playing them in the lottery.

As other characters find Desmond and ask questions, the numbers and the button become a case study of faith versus reason.  Why is he doing this?  Eventually, the button isn’t pushed on two occasions and the consequences are very serious indeed, but this lesson is only learned by failing to act on faith.  While initially faith demands that Desmond enter the numbers over and over again, the two failures show that there was a reason behind Desmond’s faith even if he didn’t know it.  It wasn’t pointless after all.  However, failure isn’t always the best way to learn to be meek.

Every Talent Matters
In a story told by Jesus in Matthew 25:14-30, a man entrusts his servants with some money (the “talents” in the story were a large unit of currency, and the word later came to mean a natural or special ability): five to one servant, two to the next, and one to the last servant.  The first two servants use their “talents” to bring in more for their master, but the last buries the money in the ground to keep it safe.  This servant might have been thinking: “What’s the point?  The other guy has five talents, and with that I might be able to do something.  But with only one…Why bother?”  But if the master’s intent was to keep the talent safe, why would he give it to a servant?  It was only after some time, when the master returned from a journey, that the servant learned the consequence of his inactivity.  The servant is cast out and his talent is given to the better servant.

Waiting until we have more to offer, more to do, or a better sense of the possible consequences is like burying our talent in the sand and therefore determining for ourselves that it does not matter and there is no point.  In the words of “Shy Away” by twenty øne piløts, you “manifest a ceiling when you shy away.”  Whatever purpose God has for our talents – in their exact amounts and types – it wasn’t for us to bury them.  The meek servants who took what they had and worked for their master’s interest, were rewarded.  “For to everyone who has will more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.”[2]

For me personally – sometimes I put off, or want to give up, writing because it seems pointless – who reads this anyway?  But it’s what I currently feel compelled to offer.  Blogging may seem a strange thing to do, but it’s better than burying these ideas in the ground and hoping a fruit tree magically pops up.  I don’t know what will happen when I do or don’t write, but I know a refusal to be meek to our Lord has consequences.  Sometimes we aren’t sure why, but we know Who is asking.

Play Your Own Numbers
Jesus has not asked me (and probably not you) to enter “4 8 15 16 23 42” into a computer or to move a stone from a tomb, but He knows exactly what He wants us to do, to become, and how He wants to impact others through us.  There are specific needs He wants only us to meet, including our own needs for meaning and joy.  We should never just copy someone else’s “numbers,” but seek our own.  If Lost fans won the lottery with those numbers, they would have to share the prize, but if each won playing their own way their prize would be much bigger.  Likewise, I believe the eternal reward is higher when you play the numbers – and only the numbers – God gave you personally[3].

Consider God’s personal instructions to you as your own lottery ticket, or the most important treasure you will ever have:
“The kingdom of heaven is like treasure hidden in a field, which a man found and covered up. Then in his joy he goes and sells all that he has and buys that field…
Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls, who, on finding one pearl of great value, went and sold all that he had and bought it.” – Matthew 13:44-45

Being meek is not a matter of how much one has to offer but knowing who you offer it to and being faithful to that master’s interests.  It is not a matter of knowing why, but a matter of trusting the One who asks you to be meek.  He is the King of the Kingdom.

Finally, just because the consequences aren’t obvious to you doesn’t mean there aren’t any:
“Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives. When he isn’t around he leaves an awful hole, doesn’t he?” – Guardian angel Clarence Oddbody, in It’s a Wonderful Life

This post continues a series on the Beatitudes. To start at the beginning, click here, and for the next post click here

[1] Matthew 5:5
[2] Matthew 25:29
[3] Is it stretching the point to say what happened to Nadab and Abihu in Leviticus 10:1-3 resulted from them trying to “make up their own numbers”?

The Benevolent Incarnation – Blessed are the Meek #2

Todd R Leave a comment

“And the LORD commanded us to do all these statutes, to fear the LORD our God, for our good always, that he might preserve us alive, as we are this day.” – Deuteronomy 6:24
“I am the LORD; that is my name; my glory I give to no other, nor my praise to carved idols.” – Isaiah 42:8

In part 1 on Jesus’ statement that “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth” (Matthew 5:5), I wrote about one of my favorite movies, The Matrix, and how Agent Smith thought mankind stinks and he only wants them to obey his rules so he can be left alone.  Also in that movie, Neo fights to free mankind from rules so they can be “free” even if that freedom does nothing to address that they stink.  Agent Smith was the “malevolent incarnation,” and Neo the “ambivalent incarnation.”

By now you probably anticipated that Jesus is the “benevolent incarnation,” but to show what that means we return to the story of Jesus raising Lazarus from the dead (last discussed in detail here).  A messenger came to Jesus telling Him that Lazarus was ill, but instead of returning to Bethany immediately to help, Jesus intentionally delayed in coming until Lazarus had been dead for four days.  Jesus knew all along that He would immediately raise Lazarus, but nobody else knew that and He found everyone in mourning.  Martha heard Jesus’ hints but thought Lazarus would have a future “resurrection on the last day.”[1]

Then, one of my favorite verses in the Bible: “Jesus said, ‘Take away the stone.’ Martha, the sister of the dead man, said to him, ‘Lord, by this time there will be an odor, for he has been dead four days.” – John 11:39

In this one exchange we see the contrast of Jesus to both Agent Smith and to Neo:

  • The odor does not keep Jesus from loving His people.  He does not even comment on it but responds “Did I not tell you that if you believed you would see the glory of God?”[2]  He did not become human to tell us we stink and how he can’t stand being with us, as Agent Smith did.  He was willing to live among us in order to bring us to a better place, to be with Him.
  • His rule is for the good of Lazarus, Martha, all the witnesses to this event, and everyone hearing the story today.  When Jesus tells Martha to move the stone, He isn’t bullying her or oppressing her, but He is giving her a command.  For Lazarus to come out of the tomb the stone needs to be moved, and Jesus is asking her to participate in a good work.  Likewise, Jesus asks us to do many things, some listed explicitly in the Bible and others spoken to our conscience.  All these rules are there to generate good works, as all His rules are expressions of “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind”, and “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.”[3]  Therefore He is being neither malevolent nor ambivalent.  As a benevolent God, Jesus cares about what we do because He knows what is good and bad for us.  Unless we agree with what He knows is good and bad, we are actively rejecting the cure for our odor, the Christ who is “the resurrection and the life.”[4]
  • His rule brings Him glory, and Him alone.  Jesus delayed in coming to raise Lazarus specifically “so that the Son of God may be glorified through it”[5]  The entire situation was set up to deliver the lesson that as our Creator and Lord, He deserves all the credit.

In the opening verses, we see that His rules are “for our good always” (Deuteronomy 6:24), and also that He says, “my glory I give to no other” (Isaiah 42:8).  In my church, prayers often end with “for our good and your glory, Amen.”  I find that it’s often harder to give up the glory than it is to realize which path is the right one.  But as I wrote in the last post of the series, “the value of meekness depends on who or what you are meek towards.”  So giving Him the glory is just awareness that we are meek because He is worthy of our meekness.

Winning the Lottery
I’ll close with one illustration: Would you rather have someone deliver tomorrow’s newspaper to you with the winning lottery numbers, or would you rather work eternally on a system to try and predict them but never win?  Rejecting God’s truth and trying to make our own is like choosing the second option.  I too often would rather get credit for losing than win but not get credit for it, and I suspect I’m not the only one.  Picking the second option has replaced God in the hearts of many, from the inscription across the Pantheon in Rome, a temple to the many gods they claimed to serve (“M AGRIPPA L F COS TERTIVM FECIT”, which loosely means “Marcus Agrippa built this”[6]) to Frank Sinatra’s “I Did It My Way” or Bon Jovi’s “It’s My Life.”

If we accept that Jesus is our God, that He is benevolent and that His rule is for our good and His glory, then we win the best prize every time – eternal life in a perfect world.  Every sacrifice we make is worth it, and we end up being the person we were created to be, full of joy and peace and love.  If we choose a malevolent or ambivalent lord to follow, not only do we lose the prize, but we have to take the credit for losing it.  These ‘lords’ often don’t even claim to have the prize, just abstractions like “freedom” or “order.”  In Jesus, the winning lottery ticket has been offered to us all along, but we didn’t want to admit where we got it from, or that its prize was more important than what we thought we wanted.

This post continues a series on the Beatitudes. To start at the beginning, click here, and for the next post click here

[1] John 11:24
[2] John 11:40
[3] From Matthew 22:37 and 39
[4] John 11:25
[5] John 11:4b
[6] When I visited Rome in 2003, I learned that the Catholic Church, when building St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, removed the gold from above the entrance to the Parthenon and used it in the Basilica.  Only exposed, rotten wood planks remain where the gold was removed.  While St. Peter’s drive the Protestant Reformation since it was largely funded with the ‘indulgences’ that launched Martin Luther’s protest, the transfer of this gold was an obvious rebuke to the pantheism of the old Roman Empire.

Why This is (Mostly) Not a Political Blog

Todd R Leave a comment

Fellow travelers,

In a world of soundbites in the media and memes on the internet, quotes get passed around regularly – often out of context, attributed to the wrong sources, and re-purposed for whatever the writer wants to say.  I’m not immune.  In an earlier post I used this quote from C.S. Lewis, but had to look up its source for that post’s footnote:

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations – these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit – immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.”

During the pandemic, I spent more time reading and decided to continue to read and write more even after the pandemic ended.  Even though “regular” activities would resume, it seemed odd to me to come out of a global calamity like a pandemic the same way I went in, as if the pandemic didn’t matter.  I’m finally reading The Weight of Glory, the source of the above quote, and now I know what comes before it:

“It is a serious thing to live in a society of possible gods and goddesses, to remember that the dullest and most uninteresting person you can talk to may one day be a creature which, if you saw it now, you would be strongly tempted to worship, or else a horror and a corruption such as you now meet, if at all, only in a nightmare…It is in the light of these overwhelming possibilities, it is with the awe and the circumspection proper to them, that we should conduct all our dealings with one another, all friendships, all loves, all play, all politics.” [emphasis mine][1]

According to Vida Health, during the Covid-19 pandemic one in six Americans started therapy for the first time, and nearly 90% of people in the US are experiencing one or more depressive symptoms.  Part of this was directly caused by the pandemic – sickness and death, job loss, etc.  But in addition, the level of disdain people have for each other went hyperbolic.  Many across the political spectrum are treating each other as “existential threats” and mortal enemies.  In the metaphor of my earlier posts on “He Who Sits in the Heavens Laughs”, everybody was screaming Big Monster like the Hulk in the Thor:Ragnarok movie.   In fact, many were accusing each other of being the Big Monster!

There is no shortage of Big Monsters.  There never has been in all of history, and some of them have been real.  James Montgomery Boice said that many “end of the world” scenarios such as atomic holocaust, worldwide famine, rule by machines, or apocalyptic climate change, might actually come to pass.  But he adds: “this will not be the end.  The Bible teaches that there is a future beyond them when the Lord Jesus Christ…will reign in righteousness and will establish a social order in which love and justice prevail.”[2]

On this future hope, the Apostle Peter wrote in 1 Peter 3:15: “in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect”.  Peter implies that a life truly lived based on eternal hope gets noticed.  People who don’t panic in the face of every Big Monster seem abnormal to this world and it opens the door to sharing Jesus as the Answer.  It was true then and its true now.

The people reading this blog may be reading it today or 20 years from now and may be in favor of any number of political or economic solutions.  I definitely have opinions on politics and economics and if I write honestly here, I can’t avoid them, but why is this blog (mostly) not a political one? 

Because I used to have a more political blog where I screamed “Big Monster!” on a near-daily basis.  It’s still out there, but when I re-read it, I see myself as the impulsive Peter drawing his sword to prevent Jesus from being arrested.[3]  Today, I’d rather write about the progress that turned Peter into the Apostle who wrote: “So put away all malice and all deceit and hypocrisy and envy and all slander.”[4]  In my earlier two-part post on “He Who Sits in the Heavens Laughs” I wrote about Peter’s progress, and I recommend re-reading those posts in light of this one.  Part 1 is at this link and Part 2 is here.

Economic and political systems do matter, and if we don’t care about them, we disregard our responsibilities as citizens of the places where we live, ignoring the words of Jeremiah 29:7 – “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the LORD on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.”  But eternity matters more, in all places and times.  If we disregard it, we ignore that in all times and all places we “live in a society of possible gods and goddesses” who our Father asks us to treat with the love His Son demonstrated on the cross.

So, back to the now-in-better-context C.S. Lewis quote:

“There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations – these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub and exploit – immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.”

I pray that this blog is a reminder that eternity matters.  That the work of Christ changes everything – no matter your circumstances when you read this.  That the 24-hour news cycle is not unimportant but is less important.

“Jesus said to them, ‘Render to Caesar the things that are Caesar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.’ And they marveled at him.” – Mark 12:17

Coming up: a History Bit for March 5th from early American history, a weekend thought on the “Psalms of Ascent”, and a return to “Blessed are the meek.”

[1] Lewis, C.S.  The Weight of Glory (1941).  P. 45-46.
[2] From “May 12.” James Montgomery Boice and Marion Clark. Come to the Waters: Daily Bible Devotions for Spiritual Refreshment.  (2017).
[3] John 18:1-11
[4] 1 Peter 2:1

Malevolent and Ambivalent Incarnations- Blessed are the Meek #1

Todd R Leave a comment

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately sick; who can understand it?” – Jeremiah 17:9
“And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” – John 8:32

Finally, we continue the series on the Beatitudes, the opening statements from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount, with Matthew 5:5 – “Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.”  This one is particularly tough to write about because meekness has such a negative meaning to many people.  Merriam-Webster’s online dictionary defines meek[1] primarily as what you are not: courageous and strong.  It even references the first Beatitude accidentally, saying that being meek is being “deficient in spirit.”  But as we saw in Matthew 5:3, “Blessed are the poor in spirit.”  The dictionary gives an example of “a meek child dominated by his brothers.”  A good way to start this series on “Blessed are the meek” comes from one of my favorite movies, but unfortunately one which has little to do with Christian truth.

The Malevolent Incarnation
In The Matrix, humanity has been imprisoned inside a computer simulation by artificially intelligent machines.  A group of rebels are fighting within and without the simulation to free humanity, and the machines created super-powered Agents to track down and destroy rebels within the Matrix, which is what the simulated world is called.  These Agents hate the Matrix, which to humanity is their “real” world.  Hugo Weaving plays Agent Smith, the main Agent in the story, who says:

“I hate this place. This zoo. This prison. This reality, whatever you want to call it, I can’t stand it any longer. It’s the smell, if there is such a thing. I feel saturated by it. I can taste your stink and every time I do, I fear that I’ve somehow been infected by it. It’s — it’s repulsive! Isn’t it? I must get out of here. I must get free…”

Agent Smith is a “Malevolent Incarnation,” an artificial intelligence who took on human form to represent the rulers of the Matrix, and his job was to make sure humanity stayed enslaved, which required brutally suppressing any rebellion.  What Smith couldn’t stand however was “the smell”!  His biggest motivation was to get the rebels in line so he could leave the world behind.  Agent Smith’s objective was to keep mankind imprisoned in a set of rules.

The Ambivalent Incarnation
Set against Agent Smith in the story is Neo, played by Keanu Reeves (“whoa!”), who wants to liberate mankind from rules altogether.  At the end of the movie, he says to the rulers of the Matrix: “I’m going to show them a world without you. A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible.”  The contrast of these characters is a thinly veiled expression of atheistic Marxism, which argues that rules (particularly religious ones) exist only as an expression of power, particularly the power of “oppressors” which must be overthrown.

It’s no wonder why meekness has a negative association for many people, if authority figures are portrayed as malevolent oppressors, and our heroes are ambivalent, requiring nothing of us, so we can avoid being meek, pursuing whatever we want (even if it leaves an odor).  It is also undeniable that many rulers throughout history, including religious ones, have been malevolent.  Therefore, freedom good; rules bad.  Simple.

But it’s not that simple.  When Neo destroys Agent Smith in the end, the audience cheers, but if Neo is the hero of a “world without rules”, where does his authority over Agent Smith come from?  Agent Smith should be Exhibit A that letting everyone live as they please leads directly to oppression by the powerful, because this ethic does nothing to cure self-interest.  It only encourages it.  Under Neo’s “world without rules,” who rules Agent Smith?  He rules himself, and as we know, he hates all of mankind.  Also, what if Neo turns into a malevolent oppressor?  His own ethical system does nothing to stop him, and he’s more powerful than everyone else.  In the famous Latin phrase: Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?  Who watches the watchmen?

Wonderful Counselor Redux
Merriam-Webster thinks being meek is undeniably a negative, but in reality, the value of meekness depends on who or what you are meek towards.  Do we often think about or realize who or what is guiding us?  We all submit to something, even if it’s our own desires, but is the thing we’re submitting to malevolent, ambivalent, or benevolent?  In my recent Christmas series, I wrote about Jesus as Wonderful Counselor (here).  I encourage you to read that if you have not already, or even read it again, because we are blessed by God through meekness because He is Wonderful. This series will expand on that post.

This post continues a series on the Beatitudes. To start at the beginning, click here, and for the next post click here

[1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/meek