BY STEVE DUNN
I came across this T-Shirt in a Facebook ad on my news feed. (If you want to order click here.) I love both the message and the presentation (although right now I don't have spare cash to buy one).
Superheroes are popular today in American culture. It's not particularly a new phenomenon but we have certainly ramped up the interest--both in proliferation of heroes and the multiplying media forms which bring them into our world of entertainment. From the cartoon Mighty Mouse to the Marvel comics of Spiderman and Wonderwoman to the television renditions of Superman and Batman, superheroes were around in my childhood more than half a century ago. Now I have simply lost count of how many of them are sought after, admired and marketed.
Invariably a superhero is called to save a city or a nation or the world from villains that have grown so powerful that humanity has no way to control them or defeat them. Some superheroes are tragic people who have found purpose (like Spiderman) or children of Middle America (like Superman) who are finally accepting their destiny. (Yes, I know. Superman came from another planet but he was raised by a Norman Rockwell family.)
But here is what I want us to reflect on. Superheroes are called upon because humanity cannot save itself. That, however, is not a device of literary fiction. The Bible tells us "Oh, what a miserable person I am! Who will free me from this life that is dominated by sin and death?. Thanks be to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord." - Romans 7:24-25a
But none of these superheroes can bring a salvation that endures. Another mutation emerges from the dark side, another planet casts a maliced eye on Planet Earth, and even machines take on a life that seeks to smash all that is good and even normal into submission or oblivion. That, too, although embellished by fresh characters, also matches the Scriptural record: "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers,
against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and
against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." Ephesians 6.12
In reality, however, there is One who gets it right. His name is Jesus Christ. His purpose was indeed to save the world. "For the Son of Man (Jesus) came to seek and save the lost.." - Luke 19.10 "Here is a trustworthy saying that deserves full acceptance: Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst."- I Timothy 1:15 "For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him." - John 3:17
And the apostle Paul, reflecting on the work of the Savior of the World teaches this: "No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord." - Romans 8:38-39
I still have enough kid in me to love stories of superheroes. But in reality, there is only One upon Whom I (and we) can depend to save the world. His name is Jesus.
© 2017 by Stephen L. Dunn. Permission is given to repost or
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