The Long Road from Babylon to Bethlehem: A Christmas Sermon

Christmas is a crazy time of year. I know every month is marked by another holiday with its own set of decorations traditions and celebrations. But I don’t know of any holiday that so overwhelms our lives like Christmas. The season is unavoidable. The lights are everywhere, it fills up our TV programming, we even went all out last time I was up here and Christmasified our church. This is a busy season, and it is easy to get distracted. So I want today to try and get us to focus. I want us to re-center our lives. In the gospel of John there is a story about some men from Greece who are in Jerusalem during the Passover. And Jerusalem is a city that is alive with the life and joy of a national holiday. The family is all back in the same place, the traditional meals are being prepared, it is a busy busy season. And in the midst of this revelry these men from Greece approach Philip, one of the disciples because they have heard about this charismatic preacher. And the text says that these men have a request, and so Philip politely listens to them and asks them what they want. And John records them saying this, “Sir, we want to see Jesus.”

That is all I want to do today, I want to see Jesus, and I want you to see Jesus. And I honestly believe that sometimes the best way to do that is to do everything that we can to avoid all of the hustle and bustle of the holiday celebrations. So we are going to take the long way around the city and see if we can catch Jesus even if only for a moment on the other side.

Christmas is an emotionally complex season, and in a strange sort of way, I believe part of this emotional complexity comes from the emotionally simplistic way in which we tell the Christmas story.

I mean if someone were to ask you, what is Christmas all about, what would you say? In as few words as possible. What is Christmas? I want to try and break the record. Fewest words possible are you ready?

A Baby.

If you want to try for fewer letters you can say a kid. But that is what Christmas is, it is a birthday story. And those are simple. It may be a bit of a hassle getting to the delivery room, but you know how the story is going to end up. And you know in advance how you are supposed to feel. Babies are generally a good thing, so be happy. Full stop.

A Simple story with a happy ending. Who can’t get behind that?

But what happens when we enter this season of joy, and the circumstances of our life are anything but joyful. What about those family get-togethers that are complicated, and messy and full of tension.

What about those of us who cannot help but remember that we used to share this season of joy with someone very special, and now they are no longer with us.

What are you supposed to do when what is going on, on the inside is worlds apart from how you are supposed to feel on the outside?

I want to talk this morning about joy. Which is not an easy thing to do. Joy is something that is difficult to define and impossible to conjure up. In my experience joy is an emotional gift from God that lights you up on the inside regardless of what is happening on the outside.

When I’m talking about joy I’m not talking about entertainment, I’m not talking about a mere escapism. I’m interested in that deep sense of pleasure that wells up from the inside of us. The sort of inner light that cannot help but express itself through songs.

And let me tell you, I’m not just speaking as an interested outsider. Can I tell you something? I have learned the secret to true joy that cannot be taken away from you. Through years of experimentation I have discovered a surefire way to instantly transport your heart to a place of sustained delight. Do you want to know what it is? It takes a little work to get there, but once you're there you have instant access to joy. An immediate mood changer.

Learn to ride a unicycle.

I'm serious. I've no doubt that few of you that have heard me speak are hardly surprised to learn that another of my secret skills is the art of unicycling. And I want to share with you why this is such a joyous practice.

I believe there is something deeply human, and deeply pleasurable about doing something simply for the sake of doing that thing. There is something beautifully unnecessary about climbing upon a 6 foot pole and remaining aloft and rolling. It is the joy of doing something difficult well. It is public, it something that is beautiful to do and beautiful to watch. And I cannot stop myself from bursting into profound and sincere simple praise that I am a creature who is honoring his maker by doing something wonderful. The Olympic sprinting gold medalist and later Christian missionary Eric Liddel said, “I believe God made me for a purpose, but he also made me fast. And when I run I feel His pleasure.” And I can really get behind this quote because I feel the pleasure of God when I unicycle.

But even something as simple as the joy of unicycling does not come without some emotional complexity.

When I first moved out here I could not fit my unicycle in my carry on so I had to leave it behind. It wasn't until my brother visited me 9 months later and brought my blessed, sweet Cecilia with him that I was reunited with my lost lover. But I was reunited in the midst of complicated circumstances.

You see not a month after my brother came to visit, the church that I had recently served at in Virginia began to implode. The leader of my church decided that it was more important to serve himself than it was to serve to people whom God had entrusted to his care. Moral failures and deep betrayals of trust quickly followed. My family and I were very close to this situation and after the dust settled we were and remain to this day very broken people. We entered into a time of deep and sustained grief as we reflected on the ways in which sin destroyed something beautiful that God had called into being.

One October day when I was at a loss for what to do that I decided to do something with my pent up emotional energy. So I went out to the backyard and I got sweet sweet Cecilia out of the shed and I began to prop myself up on her seatpost and roll down the sidewalk.

And before I knew it my arms were swinging in rhythm and a song starting to swell up in my heart as I was reminded again about the goodness of God. But something started to feel very wrong about this whole activity. I was conflicted, I couldn’t keep the troubles in my life from entering my mind, but I also couldn’t stop singing as I was cycling. I had to stop and climb down off the unicycle. And as I was sitting there on the ground The LORD brought to my mind one of the psalms of lament. And I want to share this song with you this morning.

Psalm 137
1 By the rivers of Babylon we sat and wept
    when we remembered Zion.
2 There on the poplars
    we hung our harps,
3 for there our captors asked us for songs,
    our tormentors demanded songs of joy;
    they said, “Sing us one of the songs of Zion!”

4 How can we sing the songs of the Lord
    while in a foreign land?
5 If I forget you, Jerusalem,
    may my right hand forget its skill.
6 May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth
    if I do not remember you,
if I do not consider Jerusalem
    my highest joy.

I will pause at verse 6 because the final three verses create some complicated issues that I don't intend to deal with in this sermon. But I will be more than happy to talk with you about them afterwards. If you find them troubling.

This psalm can be called the Psalm to end all psalms. In it the artist sings a song about how he will never sing again. The background to this song is significant. One of the most traumatic moments in the history of Israel occurred when they were led into exile. Israel was this group of people that God had gathered together in order to build a nation out of them. His intent was to plant this sort of tree of righteousness that would live their entire life dedicated to God. They would enjoy communion with God and they would reap the benefits of God’s presence. God’s intent was that they would then take the joys of this special relationship and share it with the rest of the world. This was God’s plan for making Himself known to the world.

But Israel eventually lost the plot. They began to take the good gifts of God for granted and they began to abuse the gifts and neglect the giver of those gifts. Their willful neglect of God was the first step in their moral decay.

It eventually got to the point where Israel’s leaders had consciously decided that it was more important to serve themselves than it was to serve the people God had put into their care.

But here’s the thing, God loves his people so much that he will not allow such a situation to remain forever. Eventually God’s patience ran out and he stopped waiting for them to see the error of their ways and turn back to God. He removed His hand of protection from them and very quickly an invading empire broke through the walls of the capital city of Jerusalem and burned it to the ground. The Palace of Solomon was torn down to the ground. The expansive temple of the LORD. The very house of God, the maker of heaven and Earth was razed and turned into rubble. And all those who lived in this land that God had given to his children, well they were taken prisoner. And they were forced to march hundreds of miles to a distant land. The place removed from family. A place removed from their heritage. They were never going to see their home again. They would never be able to visit the graves of their fathers and they would be buried in an anonymous field in a foreign land. They were never going home again.

And in Psalm 137 they are singing about this very experience. As we are marching, our captors began to mock us. “Sing one of those old folk songs. Sing about How God lives in Jerusalem. Oh I know Psalm 122, sing that one about how good it is to be in the city of David.” They laughed. And one psalmist began to sing not about the past but about their present. This tragedy is so terrible I don't know how I can get up in the morning. I don't know how to keep going.

The song turns into a solo as the poet sings about the end of music. We hung our lyres in the trees. The world is so bad it is inappropriate for us to play music. I can't do this anymore. I'm done. How can I sing songs about Jerusalem in the land of false idols, who mock God every day? If I, a poet, a songwriter. Someone who makes his living, whose very life is bound up with my art, if I forget you Jerusalem, may my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth. I don’t want to speak, let alone sing any longer. May my right hand shrivel up and fall off.

Considering the grief my family and I were enduring in that moment. I was struck by the thought that sometimes joy and pleasure are inappropriate attitudes to cultivate. I resolved there on the sidewalk to hang my unicycle up in the poplars next to the psalmist’s lyre. I walked the mile or so back to my house and hung it up in my shed. I closed the door and I thought, I may never ride this again. There lay Cecilia in the dark for a very long time. Because sometimes joy is inappropriate.

I don't know where any of you are at, but I know some of you are close to the heart of this Psalm. And I want you to know that your heart is not defective. You aren't wrong, you're hurting, we all hurt, suffering is a staple of the human condition on this Earth. And sometimes it feels like the more we love, the more we trust, the more we get hurt. I know, and I want you to know that God put these words in your Bible. These words are for you. They have been a tremendous blessing to me. And now I am sharing them with you.

But this is not the end of the story. Another of the great poetic geniuses wrote about this same event. But he had a very different take and a very different emotional response. He saw the horror of the coming exile, but he also so saw the remarkable things God would do after the horrors of the Babylonian march. He was trying to warn God's people. But he was also trying to tell them that as tragic as this episode is. It is not the end of the story. God is not done with us. The prophet Isaiah writes in Isaiah 40: in the past words that will only true resonant with the people who are now weeping by the rivers of Babylon. And he says:

Isaiah 40
1Comfort, comfort my people,
    says your God.
2 Speak tenderly to Jerusalem,
    and proclaim to her
that her hard service has been completed,
    that her sin has been paid for,
that she has received from the Lord’s hand
    double for all her sins.

3 A voice of one calling:
“In the wilderness prepare
    the way for the Lord;
make straight in the desert
    a highway for our God.
4 Every valley shall be raised up,
    every mountain and hill made low;
the rough ground shall become level,
    the rugged places a plain.
5 And the glory of the Lord will be revealed,
    and all people will see it together.
For the mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Isaiah spoke to the despairing Jews and told them in poetic details that the immediate future looks bleak beyond words. But this is not the end of the story. God is not done with you. God has not given up on you. Your hard service is ended.

Some of us are suffering because of our sins. We have broken the laws of God and the laws of the universe and we are now enduring the consequences of those breaches of faith.

Others of us are suffering because we have not sinned, but we have been foolish. We haven't broken God's laws, but we have ignored or been ignorant of the way the world works. We have not paid careful enough attention to the world that God has given us to live within, and we are suffering the consequences of trying to do what cannot be done.

And others of us are suffering not because of anything we have done, but because of what someone else has done to you.

And some of us are just hurting, our bodies age, they decay. We suffer natural disasters. A big storm swoops up and we lose power. Our basement floods. We didn't do anything wrong and bad still happens.

And God says, to his people here, the days of hard service are ended. Your time on the chain gang is over. School is out and Summer is here.

The Glory of the LORD will be revealed, and everyone will see it. Nobody will be able to deny that God loves Israel. God is for Israel and God protects Israel.

A few years before Jesus begins his ministry. His cousin John the Baptist begins preaching. He has been told by God that he needs to do what he can to make the people ready to receive Jesus when he comes. And John picks up this Scripture as the center of his ministry. When people ask him, “John why are you doing this. What is all this baptizing stuff about?” John would say, “my Job is to stand in the wilderness and to cry out. The comfort of God is coming. It is almost here. I have been commissioned as a lookout. And the LORD has sworn that I will see God's comfort arrive.”

This is a monumental claim. This is a monumental hope. And these are not wishy washy sentimental individuals. These are men who lived through dangerous and violent times. Political revolutions, invading armies and bloody suppressions of God's people are the events by which they reckon the history of their lives. In the last 500 years they have experienced numerous 9-11’s on a scale that we cannot comprehend.

But now, the glory of the LORD will be revealed. What happened?

You remember that simple story? The one about the lady about to give birth who was forced to go through labor in a barn? Let us turn there.

Luke 2
In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world. ² (This was the first census that took place while^[a] Quirinius was governor of Syria.) ³ And everyone went to their own town to register.

⁴ So Joseph also went up from the town of Nazareth in Galilee to Judea, to Bethlehem the town of David, because he belonged to the house and line of David. ⁵ He went there to register with Mary, who was pledged to be married to him and was expecting a child. 

Stop there for a second, do you know what this passage means? God’s people are back in their land, but there is a new ruler in town. And His name is Caeser. Augustus, one of the most powerful and gifted leaders in all of human history. This is the man who saved the Roman Empire in the midst of political turmoil and revolution. And he has ordered a census. He wants to know how many people his is sovereign over. And he wants to know how much money he can extort from them. Casear is a big man with big ambitions. He has wars to wage and coliseums to build. And in order to get his big ambitions done. He is able from almost 3000 miles away he gives a command and this pregnant woman has to get up and leave home so that she can pay her taxes.

We have another leader, who decided that it was more important to serve himself than it was to serve the people God had put into his care.And as we have already seen, God loves his children so much, that he will not let these things last forever. And now today here in Bethlehem the glory of the lord has been revealed.

⁶ While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born, ⁷ and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them.

And we are back where we started. Simple story right? Well not really. It’s a little more complicated than all of this. You see this was no ordinary baby. He was far poorer than most Americans. Powerless, meek and vulnerable, the baby in the barn was born the son of a poor carpenter. And to make matter worse soon he would be on the run for his life. Barely two years old and already words like political asylum and refugee are part of his vocabulary. As a very small child, the word home had no meaning for him. He went from his birth in a strange city, to fleeing to a strange country. As he is struggling just to learn language. Learning his first words, he has to come to grips with the fact that everyone outside of his door is speaking a different language. We call him Jesus of Nazareth but it isn’t until after his terrible 2’s are over that he has even seen Nazareth.

But that is not the sum total of his identity. His mother Mary knows that her child is special. She knows that what you see on the outside doesn’t begin to reveal what is inside of him. An angel had told her as much.

Just prior to the miraculous conception of Jesus Christ, his mother Mary was visited by an angel and she was told. That the glory of the LORD would be revealed. And He will be great and will be called the Son of the Most High. The Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, ³³ and he will reign over Jacob’s descendants forever; his kingdom will never end.”

The story of her people has been a long sad story of rulers who decided that it was more important to serve themselves than it was to serve the people God had put into his care.But that is all about to change. Finally God is going to give us the leader that we have been longing for. God is going to give us the leader we need.

But even with the birth of Jesus. This is not the end of the story. This is only the beginning.

After Jesus comes back to Jerusalem, there is very old man who has been waiting a very long time for Jesus. God had told him in prayer that he would not die until he had seen God’s salvation with his own eyes. And when he sees Jesus, that verse from Isaiah fills his mind, and it flows forth from his lips into a song.

30 For my eyes have seen your salvation,
31     which you have prepared in the sight of all nations:
32 a light for revelation to the Gentiles,
    and the glory of your people Israel.”

Did you catch that line? Your salvation, which you have prepared in the sight of all nations.
The glory of the lord has been revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

Simeon knows the songs, and even though what he is singing on the inside feel so different from what is happening on the outside, he is able to take hope from these songs.

The glory of the LORD will be revealed, and all people will see it together.

Simeon will not see the conclusion of Christ’s remarkable life. In fact in his prayer he thanks God, I can now die in peace. Not because I have seen the LORD conclude the story, but because I have seen him begin to bring about the conclusion to the story.

Many of us are in a similar position. We don’t always get the resolution that we would like. Not all of our relationships will be healed. Not all of our disease will be relieved, some of the people that we desperately want to love us will not reciprocate. But we can rest assured that God can be trusted with our lives.

I don’t know what you are carrying this morning. I don’t know what is on the inside. I don’t know how complicated this season is for you. But I want you to know, regardless of what you are going through, that is not the end of the story. You will sing again. And if you cannot sing right now, then I give you permission to humbly give your silence to God. You can trust him with it. He will not take advantage of you. He wants what is best for you. He knows what you are going through.

Finally after hundreds of years we have a king, we have a leader who has determined that it is more important to serve the people God had put into his care.
The apostle Paul in his letter to his brothers and sisters in Phillipi said just this thing. Christ who was God Himself, did not think so much of his exalted status. In fact it is because he was God that forsook it all, he descended to Earth, took upon Himself our human condition, he experienced the full weight of our suffering, even to the point of dying the death of a wretched slave.

That is the depth to which God was willing to descend in order to demonstrate his love for us. And when we remember how far God descended we can take comfort in the fact that no matter how far away God feels, no matter how deep in the pit we feel like we have fallen, we can take comfort in the fact that God has been there before, and God is with us now. And God can lead us out.

Hollywood produced a famous movie several years back that described the life of Jesus as the greatest story ever told. As I look back on the long road from Babylon to Bethlehem and beyond, I have to agree with them.

Reese Roper, one of my favorite songwriters wrote a song with his band Five Iron Frenzy with that same title, “The greatest story ever told.” In it he reflects on the long, difficult unexpected paths that our lives take. I would like to share a few words from that song in closing.


All my dreams are slowly dying.
I can count my years in scars.
The only one that's never left me,
Has carried me so very far.
I've heard it said that he wastes nothing,
So beautiful to behold,
The Author of my hope is writing,
The greatest story ever told.

Amen and amen, may we be able to say the same thing, one day Oh Lord our God.

A Christmas Eve Meditation

This is the text of my brief devotion for the Christmas Eve candlelight service of the church that I serve in Westport.


I know this is my first year with you all, but I understand you have a tradition of distributing angel ornaments on your Christmas Eve service. And I understand that there is a question that we always ponder when we are thinking about these ornaments. And I’d like to pose that question to you afresh this year.

What would you do if an angel visited you?

How would you respond? We understand from Scripture that angels are messengers. That is their job. They carry messages from God to people here on Earth. So if an angel were to visit you, it would be on a mission from God to give you a message from God. What sort of message do you think an angel would have for you? What do you think God wants to say to you tonight?

I can say one thing for certain. I know exactly what an angel would say to you. I know this because nearly every time in the Bible a person realizes that they are talking to an angel, the angel always immediately says the same thing.

“Don’t be afraid.”

Why is everyone always so afraid of angels?

I think part of the reason angels always induce fear is because of where they come from. Earlier in the Christmas story, a man named Zechariah meets an angel. After he recovers from his initial bewilderment he musters up the courage to ask who this angel is. And the angel tells him. "I am Gabriel. I stand in the presence of God."

The presence of God is an interesting place. It is a wonderful place. And why wouldn’t it be, it is the location, so to speak, of God. This is the place the most clearly reflects that nature of the one who is pure love and the source of all joy. But the presence of God can be a dangerous place. You see, often when the Bible talks about the presence of God, it moves very quickly to talking about God’s holiness. Now I know that holiness sounds like a stodgy and churchy word. But it is nothing of the sort. When you think about holiness I want you to give you a different image.

In caricatures holiness is often used to describe those who are too uptight and overly conscious. The sort of people who believe that having too much fun just might be a sin. But that’s not what holiness is at all. When you think about holiness, I want you to think of the furious goodness of God.

God is purely, perfectly good, and his goodness is contagious. He always has an effect on everyone and everything that comes into contact with him. So when God comes into contact with anything that is less than pure good, well that thing or that person will get either be transformed or consumed.
This is why the Bible makes such a big deal about law and rules, not because God wants to deprive us of joy. No God wants to train us in righteousness so that we might have the skills necessary to experience this joy to the fullest.

Angels live in the presence of God, they have been made to absorb and withstand the furious goodness of God. They are morally pure and thus it is fitting and appropriate that they dwell in the presence of God. But what happens when these creatures come down and deliver messages to conflicted, and compromised creatures like you and me?

When we encounter, not the majestic beauty of that consuming fire of furious goodness that is God Himself, but just creatures that have seen that goodness with their own eyes. Creatures that have been forever affected by that experience of transcendent goodness? Is it any wonder that we cringe in fear? Is it any wonder that we would need to be reassured?

When we come into contact with a creature who is absolutely pure. A creature who is totally uncompromised. Who doesn’t even have the inclination to do anything that does not flow from a true love for everyone they interact with. When we encounter just such a creature, their character throws our character into sharp relief. We realize how compromised we are. We realize how often we act out of a sense of fearful self-preservation. We realize how often we serve ourselves at the expense of others.

When we encounter angels, those beings that live in the presence of God one thing becomes very clear. There is a place of transcendent goodness. A place where the one who is the source of all joy dwells.

And we do not belong there.

I believe that this is why when angels appear, we are terrified. We recognize the truth about ourselves. And it is a frightening truth. It is a truth that activates our survival mechanism.

And it is for this reason that the mystery of Christmas is so unbelievably wonderful. On Christmas, that all-consuming, furious goodness, became a human being. We spend our entire lives totally exposed and utterly vulnerable to the penetrating gaze of that consuming fire.

And on Christmas, that consuming fire became totally vulnerable to us. The furious goodness that is God, had to be fed by his parents to ensure that he would not starve.

The Furious goodness that is God has drawn near to us in a lowly, humble fashion so that we might see what it is like to be a human being who is fully alive with the divine fire of God’s furious goodness. He has drawn near to us in order that he might draw us back to the Father. So that we might be able to enjoy the source of all joy forever.

So this Christmas I want to invite you to come near, to the burning flame of furious goodness. The one who is pure love. I invite you to come near because He himself has drawn near. He has made himself vulnerable. Because this is what love does. Because of His coming we can draw near to God.

And we don’t need to be afraid.

Star Wars: Episode VII An Old Hope.

Why Kylo is the perfect villain for JJ Abrams

I’m going to get strung up on a pole for this.
Seriously, you don’t have to read this if you don’t want to.
If you truly enjoyed the Force Awakens and don’t want some uppity punk with an awful blog and some brazen accusations to sully that joy, please pass these words by and pay me no more mind. I freely confess that Friedrich Nietzsche has seduced me to the dark side of the force. I’ve sold my soul in the hopes that I might better be able to see and speak the truth as I see it. So here it goes.

Spoilers abound

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                With the passing of the mantle from George Lucas to JJ Abrams, there was a lingering doubt hanging over my head. Is the new guy going to be able to bring back the Star Wars magic? Can he re-enchant a cynical generation burnt out by poorly written prequels that tarnished the legacy of one of the most iconic villains in all of cinema? After seeing Star Wars: The Force Awakens I can honestly say that JJ Abrams has managed to bring back absolutely everything that was good about the original Star Wars trilogy. And this is exactly what is wrong with this film.
                I think the simplest way to illustrate my point is to explain why I believe that Kylo Ren is the perfect villain for the latest Star Wars trilogy. In particular the core of Kylo Ren’s character and one crucial scene demonstrate to my mind that Kylo Ren is the symbolic embodiment of The Force Awakens and its’ director, JJ Abrams.

Kylo Ren’s Character

                From the moment you first encounter Kylo Ren on the planet of Jakku in the opening minutes of the film It is difficult to keep oneself from drawing direct comparisons between Kylo Ren and Darth Vader. He dresses purely in black. He wears a mask with a voice disfiguring breathing apparatus. He ruthlessly orders the mass murder of innocent civilians in a desert village. There is just one problem with Kylo Ren’s appearance. He doesn’t have any breathing problems. The asthma inhaler is purely aesthetic.
                We learn later in the film that Kylo Ren is a perfectly healthy young man with a tremendous command of the force. Kylo Ren adopted his appearance because he is self-consciously trying to emulate his idol, Darth Vader.
                There is something deeply sympathetic about the character of Kylo Ren. His given name is Ben Solo, and he is the son of the famous rebellion heroes Leia Skywalker and Han Solo.it is perfectly reasonable to believe that has long felt the anxiety how he can possibly fill the shoes of such lofty and accomplished parents. How do you live up to the legacy of your parents when they are the ones who saved the galaxy?
                What quickly becomes clear about Ben Solo is his deep insecurity. It is almost laughable how uncomfortable he seems to be in his own skin. Rather than try to learn how live the honest life of Ben Solo, he retreats behind the theatrical mask of Darth Vader and seems to be self-consciously trying to mimic in his own life the legacy and work of his Grandfather. But just like the problem with the Asthma inhaler, Ben Solo has another and bigger problem, he is not Darth Vader. Rather than go through the difficult work of trying to achieve some self-knowledge that could lead him to understand how best to live Ben Solo’s life, he hides from this knowledge and flees to an identity that is safer for him to adopt. Why risk living the honest yet vulnerable life of Ben Solo, when you can be assured of respect and fear by living the life of Darth Vader?
                Just as Kylo Ren cannot live his own life, but feels like he must achieve significance by re-enacting the life of Darth Vader, I get the distinct sense that JJ Abrams did not make a JJ Abrams film. He re-performed a George Lucas film. If you don’t believe me let me reiterate some of the pertinent plot points from The Force Awakens.

-A rebel agent collects a secret message but is intercepted by the evil authoritarian establishment before he can deliver it.
-The rebel agent hides the message in a droid. This droid then escapes to a barely inhabited desert planet.
-The droid is saved by a humble lonely hero who turns out to have a tremendous amount of aptitude in the force.
-The droid and the lonely hero escape from the desert planet on the Millenium Falcon.
-In the meantime we learn that the evil Sith villain has a complicated filial/Paternal relationship with one of the primary heroes of the film.
-And this evil Sith lord has built a planet destroying battle station and prepares to use it for the first time.
-As the Force adept heroine begins to become aware of her powers she has a visionary experience in a dark underground place where she si confronted by a spectre of the main Sith villain.
-The strong female lead is then captured and held prisoner aboard the planet destroying space station.
-She is rescued by the male lead and an old hero from a bygone era.
-As they are escaping the two newly initiated heroes are forced to witness from a distance as the elderly hero confronts the main villain with whom he has a paternal relationship.
-The elderly hero is struck down by the villain’s lightsaber as our new heroes must watch helplessly from a great distance away, just prior to making their escape from the planet destroying space station.
-The movie concludes with our new force adept journeying alone to a distant planet where she encounters an old Jedi master hiding in self-imposed exile.

Do I need to go on?

Wait yes, don’t forget about the scantily clad lady leaning against the enormous, gross alien monster.

                There is a reason everyone is saying that this feels just like the old Star Wars trilogy. It’s because this is the old Star Wars trilogy. It’s not just the same story, it is the same set pieces, the same character relationships, the same plot elements. This is not a new movie.
                But don’t get me wrong, no work of art is truly original. The first Star Wars film is a textbook example of Joseph Campbell’s hero’s journey. This is the reason A New Hope feels like a brand new American myth. George Lucas intentionally patterned his story after Joseph Campbell’s archetypal structure of ancient myths. The reason The Force Awakens felt so forced to me is because it isn’t a copy of a mythic template. It is a copy of a copy of a mythic template. Unfortunately Abrams chose to communicate not the mythic archetypes of the original trilogy but rather the specific concrete forms that those archetypes took in the original Star Wars. The Force awakens has consciously dressed itself in Darth Vaders disguise and hoped we wouldn’t notice the insecure villain underneath.

The Torture Scene

                One of the most jarring scenes for me is the moment that Kylo Ren interacts with Rey when she is captured on the Death Star. In this scene Kylo Ren uses his command of the force to probe deep into Rey’s mind and unearth her deepest, most vulnerable memories. I don’t think I’m stretching when I call this a rape scene. It’s not physical but it is a profound violation of Rey’s personal integrity.
                And again I think it is clear that Kylo Ren feels a certain affection towards Rey. He invites her to join the dark side and learn the true power of her abilities. But Kylo Ren is so insecure that he cannot do the slow and difficult work of seducing her towards the dark side. He brazenly blunders into her mind and forcibly unearths her deepest secrets.
                This is the sort of activity that should only take place in a mutually vulnerable, trusting relationship. But Kylo Ren doesn't have time for that so he barges into her brain and drags her deepest secrets into the light.
                But then he begins to try and act compassionate towards Rey. His voice gets soft and warm as he ponders her secrets. But his knowledge of Rey’s secrets are not because they have an intimate connection. Rey did not graciously offer up her true self to Kylo Ren. These are stolen memories that he has no right to know because he has not earned Rey’s trust.

                In a similar manner I think JJ Abrams’ did not exercise the patience necessary to build a new world and generate a trusting relationship between his audience and his characters. He was able to get around our natural aversion to this sort of character development by using templates of characters from older movies that we already know. Abrams can give us the sensation of knowing Rey and Finn without actually knowing them. I don’t know Rey, I know Luke Skywalker. And most of the film is not designed to let you see Rey, but rather it tries to tell you that Rey is just like Luke Skywalker. You don’t need to be concerned about the new characters that are introduced into the Star Wars universe because they are just like the old characters.

                My biggest fear after seeing the initial trailers is that this film was going to be a tremendous nostalgia-fest. It was going to be less about going deeper into the Star Wars universe and more about remembering through a new film how good the old Star Wars films were. If you are anything like me you have strong emotional ties to these films. Ties that were forged in early childhood. I remember seeing Return of the Jedi for the first time while on vacation. As soon as the movie was over I snuck into the master bathroom and was running around the Jacuzzi that had suddenly turned into a Sarlacc pit. I’m sure many of you have similar stories to tell, and I’m sure JJ Abrams has similar memories as well. And he took advantage of those memories. He pulled them out of our heads and acted like we were in a trusting relationship where he was vulnerably telling a story that would build a new set of powerful emotional memories. But he wasn’t creating new memories, he was reminding me of the existence of those old memories and stealing the emotional capital that was already present in my mind.

[Also, BB-8 could not have maneuvered over all that dense terrain. He should have gotten stuck in the sands of Jakku very quickly. There was a specific moment in the woods when I saw him begin to climb a hill and I thought, “that robot can’t roll up that hill.” The film then suddenly cuts away to a different angle and BB-8 is magically on the top of the hill.]

                In conclusion, all art is communication. And communication in its best form is revelatory. I believe that unless we are incredibly skilled manipulators we cannot help but reveal ourselves to others when we communicate. Even when we are trying to communicate something that we do not believe, my beliefs about human character tell me that the truth leaks out. And I think the truth about the Force Awakens leaks out in a big way through the character of Kylo Ren. Kylo Ren didn’t kill Han Solo, JJ Abrams killed Han Solo to prove that he could Star Wars as good as late 70’s George Lucas.

        This is all my subjective opinion Blame me for everything you don't like in this piece. But people have told me for the longest time that I am a very good listener. I’m just trying to tell you what I heard and saw when I watched Star Wars the Force Awakens.
         And I know that the politics that lie behind such a massive commercial undertaking like Star Wars probably means that JJ Abrams probably did not have as much creative control as he would have liked. I suppose it is possible that JJ Abrams consciously adopted the guise of Kylo Ren to punish his creative handlers for their restraints. And if that is the case I have to admire the man’s wily creativity. I just don’t know.

                And even now, all hope is not lost. In the film, Ben Solo’s murder of his father seems to be a definite turning point in his character. I’m sure Sigmund Freud would be very proud of him. I believe that from this point on Ben Solo will begin to feel more comfortable in his Darth Vader guise, leading him to act more authentically as an heir of Darth Vader’s legacy. Unfortunately this will just make him a more honest villain, and thus a far more dangerous adversary.
                I truly hope that JJ Abrams just needed to get George Lucas out of his system. Much like Emperor Palpatine needed to purge the entire Jedi order before he could finalize his governmental takeover, I hope that JJ Abrams was doing a sort of creative ground clearing. I just wish that Han Solo didn’t have die in the service of JJ Abram’s creative palate cleanser.
                Abrams has proved to an excruciating detail that this is a Star Wars film. But the way he demonstrated his Star Wars credentials does not lead me to trust him going into episode VIII. He is still going to get an awful lot of my money. I am going to continue to enjoy the films of a very talented filmmaker. But he does not have my trust.

I have much more that could be said on this topic but I welcome your complaints and look forward to responding to them.