On the second leg of our flight home from San Frasisco (Salt Lake City to Raleigh/Durham) Rachel and I watched Juno – an endearing and quirky movie about a sixteen year-old highschool girl (Juno MacGuff) and her family as they help her journey through a surprise pregnancy and the accompanying adoption. Apparently I was overdue for a good cry. I had an aisle seat – exposing more fully my weepy condition. The guy across the aisle in 26D seemed genuinely concerned. It was a little awkward.
While this film had no intentions of making a statement on faith or beliefs – it had some inspired moments where great love shone through. And if we believe that all men and women are created in the image of God, it isn’t a stretch to believe that sometimes men and women – even those far from faith – express love in a God-like manner seemingly beyond their ability or capacity. This movie had some of those moments. Moments where we can see – albeit faintly – glimpses of a greater love (and perhaps even the Author of this greater love).
There is a scene in the latter stages of the movie where things with the soon-to-be adoptive parents are falling apart. Without giving the story away, the prospective father lets it known he wants out of the marriage … and he does not want the baby. Juno is standing in their house and watches as the hurt flies and everything falls apart.
As she heads home, her thoughts narrate “I never realize how much I like being home unless I’ve been somewhere really different for a while.”
This line hit me hard. And it’s been rolling around in my head ever since Wednesday night’s flight. Like Juno, we too (all of us) have been somewhere really different for a while. And I think – in our most honest moments – we too would admit that we long for home. We thirst for the land of no-mores. No more pain. No more sorrow. No more death. No more heartache. And the longing is heightened by “those moments in our own lives when with only the dullest understanding but with the sharpest longing we have glimpsed Christ” (Frederick Buechner) lived out in others and sometimes even in ourselves.
Foretastes.
But our hope and longing is not just a human hope - that when our lives end we will be thought of fondly for a little while for the little good that we have done. Our hope is that these foretastes will one day be brought to completeness and fruition in unimaginable ways. Our hope is that one day He will return (and He will). And so we do not labor in the vanity of human hope. We labor as those ushering in the first-fruits – the foretastes – of a kingdom that will last forever.
Come, Lord Jesus, Come.
6 comments:
curtis, this is beautiful. really, really beautiful. and so are you. xoxo
(The Girls say "hi dad!") :)
I love this! Just in the reading of this lovely post, we experience for ourselves a foretaste. Thank you!
I loved that movie. So many great truths in there.
Regarding the foretastes we have, Lewis wrote "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world."
All good things come from God. I think sometimes we need to broaden our view of where he might be. Otherwise we probably miss out on a lot of him.
Glad you saw God in Juno.
One of the more unique and interesting opinion of this movie I have heard.... and the only one that makes me want to see it. Very nice.
I read this again this morning C. I think about the story from many angles, as you would know. I think about how life is uncertain, and can change in an instant, and yet every moment is an opportunity. I too love the idea of knowing the beauty of our own soul home. We lose it when we stay indoors, don't we. Kind of fits with your passion to be "outside." Write again - this has been up for a while. smile
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