Half-Watched Movies

At the beginning of the year, Nancy and I decided we needed to start taking better care of ourselves, eating healthier and joining a gym. It sucks.

After years of neglect, my body isn't quite sure what it is I’m doing. So, it is trying to convince my mind that this was a stupid idea and I should return to my natural state of slothfulness. Any given day, it’s a crapshoot which will win.

We get up early, trying to beat the young stallions to the gym. I’m not interested in looking at rippling mussels when I’m feeling closer to the glue factory than the racetrack.

The gym is shinny and new with a fancy theater. I hide in the theater because the volume covers my panicked gasps for air. And there’s something about the movies that help with the hallucinations.

The problem with going first thing in the morning is I only catch the first hour of movie. You may not realize this, but an hour into a movie life is really starting to suck for the hero.

In his book, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years, Donald Miller talks about what makes a good story and part of it is an obstacle, challenge or hardship the hero has to overcome. Well, the first hour of a good film is all about the obstacle and nothing about the overcoming.

So I keep leaving all of these movies unresolved and full of brokenness.

It occurred to me, we are in the middle of God’s story. When you look around and see the pain, brokenness and chaos, it’s enough to make you wonder if there’s a script at all. But I need to remember, this is the middle of the story.

There will be a day when the story comes to an end, where the painful questions of the journey are answered, where the obstacles are overcome, when we find resolution.

It’s natural to ask questions in the middle of the story and wonder how it will end. The tension is too great to avoid it. Go ahead. Ask the questions. And hope for the day God writes the last line and we all have the joy of seeing the end of the movie.