A Bunch of Christians Watch Year-End Movies

Between late night parties, reading up on Luke, noshing on good kebab at Sultan Kebab and cards from the usual suspects who didn't quite make overseas mail in time for Christmas, the last few days of 2006 were spent in a completely different fashion from the rest of the year: watching blockbusters. Going to the movies is fun and all, the hot popcorn, the candy floss (if your movie theatre of choice is The Cathay), the shared experience, the discussion and meals after, but the movies themselves always seemed gratuitous frittering of money and time*.

When the female advance party returned with gushy reports of Daniel Craig's bulges and his charming vulnerability, Casino Royale was relegated to the ranks of an unwatchable kissy movie.

But.

After some coercion (which included lots of popcorn), and some time in the darkened theatre, it didn't turn out to be half bad: the retro-themed opening, the breathless le parkour segment (current favourite armchair sport) starring the superb freerunning creator Sebastien Foucan, the dry wit of Dame Judi Dench as M, Ian Fleming's original "Three measures of Gordon's, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it's ice-cold, then add a large slice of lemon-peel.", bluffing that wasn't just cards, misplaced trust and betrayal, a James Bond that fought with his fists, bled and drew blood. Gen X noir. And not too much of that kissy stuff.

Zhang Yimou's Curse of the Golden Flowers, based on Cao Yu's "Thunderstorm", wasn't half bad either despite Jay Chou as Prince Jai. Yee Chung Man's luxurious costumes got the male segment of the audience giggling at very jiggle of a squished boob the result of 10th century Maximizers (there were many. Giggles, that is.). The sheer riotous intensity of colours on set was calculated to stun. There was nefarious scheming amongst members of the royal family and jockeying for power, loads of fighting and blood, some kissing, more fighting and blood and gore and people dying in many creative ways, incest and alot of melodrama. "Gold and jade on the outside, rot and decay on the inside."

Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, alas, though much anticipated, turned out more bore than boor. Sure, there was the denigration of Jews and gypsies, misogyny, scatalogical references, a series of faux pas, a terrible green slingshot thong, hand parties, hairy naked men and incest (which must be this season's shock tactic). But Borat Sagdiyev's accent and standard of English varied widely between takes, there was a surfeit of contradictions and, really, sold as a shocker, it just wasn't shocking enough. A segment on Eurotrash would have been better.

Confession of Pain, directed by Infernal Affairs pair Alan Mak and Andrew Lau, starring Tony Leung, Takeshi Kaneshiro, Shu Qi and Chinese blogger, Xu Jing Lei, was passable. There was a dark past, whiskey, betrayal, bludgeoning with heavy office decorations, beer, some product placement, less whodunnit than willtheguiltybecaught, and being sandwiched between 2 girls swooning over Tony and Takeshi, one leaning over to gush during a particularly emotionally-wrecked scene to say of the latter, "so cute hor".

(I suppose no one will ever offer me a job as a movie reviewer, but the movies weren't that outstanding.)

*This certainly stems more from aesthetic taste than from any theological conviction that movies are sinful per se. Movies are after all, merely a mode of communication like talking or singing or poetry.

Christian Difference
However, the way Christians view movies must naturally greatly differ from the way the world views movies. If we have been made new then how can we still live in our old ways? We are not to be conformed to this world, but are to be transformed by the renewal of our minds through the reading of God's Word, that by testing we may discern what is the will of God, what is good and acceptable and perfect (Romans 12:2). And knowing what is good, we leave behind what is worthless and bad. We will not set before our eyes any vile thing (Psalm 101:3) because we see through such things and they no longer afford us any illusory pleasure.

It is all too easy to justify our movie-watching habits because it is the thing that everyone else does, or because Singapore-is-so-boring-what-else-can-you-do?, or because we get free tickets and don't want them to go to waste. Christians do not live by the standards of this world (2 Corinthians 10:2).

Discernment
Let us examine our ways and test them. Let us exercise those lovely critical thinking skills in full awareness of what we are viewing: what worldviews are this movie promulgating? What messages are preached on that flickering screen in that darkened theatre? What does it say about our existence, or what is ultimately valuable or meaningful in life? Which parts are true? Which bits are false?

Christian Freedom
No one can dictate that this means Christians should only watch Merchant-Ivory films and not horror flicks. It is ultimately part of the Christian freedom that we can choose which movies to watch. In non-gospel issues, each one should be fully convinced in his own mind (Romans 14:5) that what we are doing is done in obedience to God.

Temptation
Some may say then that "Everything is permissible for Christians". Ah, says Paul, but not everything is beneficial (1 Corinthians 6:12). Others may say "all things are lawful for me", but says Paul, we should be be enslaved by anything (1 Corinthians 6:12).

So in our freedom, we must guard against that which replaces or threatens to replace the true and living God with idols of human construct. Depending on our age, gender, personalities and circumstances in life, we will be tempted by different things. Females, especially unmarried ones, maybe tempted to watch, revel and sigh at romantic comedies, where meaning in life is dictated by finding Mr. Right. Males may be tempted to define their worth in fast cars, proficiency in picking up beautiful women, ability to come up tops in any altercation and being generally competent. We need to check the idols proffered by movies against what we know of reality in the Bible. If the temptation is too great for us, what does it profit a man to watch a silly movie but lose his life?

Loving One's Brothers
In picking out a movie with a bunch of friends, it's best to ask if any one has misgivings about a particular movie. We would rather not to watch that movie, even if we think that someone's fears are unfounded, than have one person stumble because he watched something that he felt should not be watched by Christians. For if our brother is grieved by what we watch, we put a stumbling block, a hindrance in his way, and we are no longer walking in love. What we watch ought not destroy one for whom Christ died. The reasoning is the same as that found in Romans 14:13-15. And none of us should be so adamant about watching a particular show that we would not give it up for the sake of a brother or sister.

In our society, coolness and hardened worldliness are highly valued. We sneer at those are overly affected by violence, horror, sex or nudity. We think they are weak: losers. But as Christians we know we are weak and we boast in our loserness, for that is why we depend on God in the first place: we boast of our weakness because in our weakness is the power of God (2 Corinthians 11:29-30; 12:5ff).

*all images from image.google.com
Sultan Kebab
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Christmas Week and The Babe In The Manger

Sticky messes (as opposed to sticky date toffee puddings and strawberry messes) are: leaving little lavender ribbon-wrapped packages of toffees on the laptop in the car on a grandly sunny Christmas morn in Singapore.

Christmas on Mondays means that celebrations start, properly, assiduously, like Letitia Baldridge's star student with set pearls, a week prior, with many roasted turkeys stuffed with all manner of stuffing and cranberry sauce and gravy, chardonnay, many carvings of roast beef and lamb and dollops of mint sauce, pinot noir, meatballs and meeting up with old friends, pasta and passing presents, logcakes and lolling about, laughing, natgeog preaching involving little plastic trees and reindeer and half-eaten logcakes, chocolate fondues and champagne, cheesecakes, fruit tarts, Christmas letters with updates on weddings, funerals, engagements, elopements, births and same-old same-olds, mincepies, botrytis semillion and brown paper packages tied up with string, pine trees and baubles, fruitcake, rescuing toddlers from pine trees and baubles and flashing fairy lights, gravlax and gathering around pianos and singing spoofing carols till hapless pianists are blinded by tears and helpless giggling...(at one of the houses, there was also something about a Christian workout video but no one probed too far)

...so on Christmas eve, the best place to be is with good friends at the nice-and-quiet (until it came upon the midnight clear, those glorious sparklers of old, and screaming and bending near the earth to spray each other with cans of streamers (until cellphones beep with festive greetings to all)) of km8...

...so on Christmas morning, there is crawling out of bed to put out Christmas presents and rescuing the newly-anointed laptop, and then there is crawling back under the covers before a round of parties and carolling later and then more piano/guitar karaoke (complete with nationalistic songs and a mock fly-past) until it is past midnight and the hostess calls time.

...ah but later, there is a fresh pot of tea, mincepies and brandy butter, and the unwrapping of a little pile of presents and sinking into the heftiest: Neil Gaiman's "The Absolute Sandman, Volume 1".

As the onion said to the tomato after the tomato was run over by a truck, so I said to sleep,"Catch-up! Catch-up!"

The Babe in the Manger
Christians know that Christmas isn't just a festive holiday or a season (in Asia, I suppose, the season is monsoon). Regardless of Desmond Morris' "Christmas Traditions" and the historicity (as the carollers at the back of the pack were discussing) of the date of Jesus' birth, Christmas is really about who the babe in the manger was.

If he was yet another cute kid born in underprivileged circumstances, bullied by the heartless bourgeois class, the world easily sympathises. If this was the beginnings of power or genius, the world loves stories of a humble person's rise to greatness.

But the truth is neither so romantic nor sentimental. We cannot just smile benignly, make coo-ing noises and move on. The babe in the manger is no less than God incarnate.

He, through whom time was made, was made in time; and He, older by eternity that the world itself, was younger in age than many of His servants in the world; He, who made man, was made man; He was given existence by a mother whom He brought into existence; He was carried in hands which He formed; He nursed at breasts which He filled; He cried like a babe in the manger in speechless infancy - this Word without which human eloquence is speechless! (Augustine of Hippo, Sermon on Christmas)

The babe is fully God and fully man, and the fully God bit is a scary thing for a sinful world.

It used to be a tradition in our house that once a year, on Christmas Day, because the walls were like cardboard in England, I who lived in the garret would throw open the windows and turn up the volume on Handel's "Messiah". People were offended. Not by the noise, but by the message. What terrible things to say on this joyous occasion! For Handel's "Messiah" isn't all Hallelujah Chorus: the libretto gives us a great Bible overview, from the promises of God through the prophets of old, to the fulfilment of prophecy, to the death and resurrection of Jesus.

We cannot separate the babe in the manger from Jesus who rebuked the Pharisees; who made a whip out of cords and drove all from the temple area, both sheep and cattle and scattered the coins of the money changers and overturned their tables (John 2:15); who cursed the fig tree; who claimed that he alone was the Way, the Truth, the Life and no one could be saved except through him; who died bloodied on the cross and rose again from the dead in 3 days; who now sits at the right hand of the Father, ready to judge the world (Acts 2:33, 1 Peter 4:5); who is portrayed in Revelation 19 as the avenger of God's wrath, with eyes like blazing fire and robes dipped in blood. Out of his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations.

...who may abide the day of His coming, and who shall stand when He appeareth? For He is like a refiner's fire. (Malachi 3:2)

Jesus' birth is to be greeted with both rejoicing and fear. It is the birth of a saviour who will save us from the penalty of our sins and it is also the birth of he who will judge the guilty world.

So why do you celebrate Christmas, oh you who do not yet live under the rule of Christ? Do you not know that your rebellion has already marked you for death? Fear the babe in the manger, tremble at the incarnation of God made man, for his birth (and death and resurrection) means that the world is one step closer to the day when all will be judged, both living and dead, great and small: those who repented of their rebellion against God and trusted in Jesus and his death and resurrection to save them, to everlasting life; and those who had not, to everlasting death where there will be terrible weeping and gnashing of teeth.

If all peoples everywhere could truly celebrate Christmas, and there is much we should do to so assist them...

Christmas and Sufjan Stevens' Christmas Songs

You know it's Christmas when, it's cold and grey and rainy outside, but inside, on account of someone's early morning spritz of DKNY's "Be Delicious" and someone else's grande Starbucks itsredagain! toffee nut latte, the office lift smells deliciously of toffee apple; and in the fridge, all manner of ribbon-wrapped packages from The Patissier and Cedele and Canele and Hot Fuschia (yay, Lish!) and Harrods and Fauchon; and spilling off tables and onto shelves and all about the floor, wicker-basket hampers of wine and fruit cake and chocolate and gingerbread and jars of cookies; and amongst clusters of friends, turkey and stuffing recipes are bantered about; and over many a deli counter, where legs of honey-glazed ham are reserved, there is the promise of rousing good parties to come; and everywhere, baubles, garlands, bottles of bubbly tucked under arms, good cheer and carolling. And best of all, you know it's Christmas when, pottering down supermarket aisles, you can sing praises to God (said carols do not include the words "Santa", "winter", "yuletide", "snow" or "reindeer") and complete strangers smile and hum along in tune; and whilst swotting Luke 24, the post-gym chaps having a coffee at the next table earnestly debate the Resurrection.

(You know it's Christmas in Singapore when you almost run over a gaggle of jaywalkers who've suddenly halted in their dangerous trek across the crowded slippery dark Orchard Road to stand in the middle of the street and capture, on their mobile phone cameras, the fire at Tangs.)

So.

Hot, like mulled wine, on the heels of the end of a painful yet joyfully encouraging youth camp, the season's partying starts tomorrow night (even if it is with a bunch of outrageous intrepid journalists (ed: even if said journalists have a predilection for liquid diets - notably Pan Pacific's Keyaki Bar saketinis, thoroughly confusing pubescent waiters, Scottish accents, suicide-inducing Doris Lessing, and, at the same time, kitschy blinking LED Christmas tree brooches)) and ends past the New Year.

But first.

Hold on to your stockings (Christmas, not fishnet). For the indie kid out there (the all of one of you); for you who won't hurl your eggnog on the carpet, here're banjos, oboes, Casiotones, glockenspiels, ukeleles, crappy guitars, hand claps, sleigh bells, Hammond organs, a frail tottery voice, a throw of tinsel and a sprinkling of exclamations, here's Sufjan I'm-not-CCM-I-just-happen-to-be-Christian ("God'll Never Let You Down", "Woman At The Well") (as opposed to Cat) Stevens:

Yes, the look is parmesan, cheddar and gruyere.

Noel: Songs for Christmas, Vol. I (recorded December 2001)
1. Silent Night
2. O Come O Come Emmanuel
3. We're Goin' To the Country!*
4. Lo How A Rose E'er Blooming
5. It’s Christmas! Let’s Be Glad!*
6. Holy Holy, etc.
7. Amazing Grace

Hark!: Songs for Christmas, Vol. II (recorded December 2002)
1. Angels We Have Heard on High
2. Put the Lights on the Tree*
3. Come Thou Fount of Every Blessing
4. I Saw Three Ships
5. Only at Christmas Time*
6. Once in Royal David’s City
7. Hark! The Herald Angels Sing!
8. What Child Is This Anyway?
9. Bring A Torch, Jeanette, Isabella

Ding! Dong!: Songs for Christmas, Vol. III (recorded December 2003)
1. O Come, O Come Emmanuel
2. Come on! Let’s Boogey to the Elf Dance!*
3. We Three Kings
4. O Holy Night
5. That Was the Worst Christmas Ever!*
6. Ding! Dong!*
7. All the King’s Horns*
8. The Friendly Beasts
(thanks to drop7)

Joy: Songs for Christmas, Vol. IV (recorded December 2005)
1. The Little Drummer Boy
2. Away In A Manger
3. Hey Guys! It’s Christmas Time!*
4. The First Noel
5. Did I Make You Cry On Christmas Day? (Well, You Deserved It!)*
6. The Incarnation*
7. Joy To The World

Peace: Songs for Christmas, Vol. V (recorded June 2006)
1. Once in Royal David’s City
2. Get Behind Me, Santa!*
3. Jingle Bells
4. Christmas in July*
5. Lo! How A Rose E’er Blooming
6. Jupiter Winter*
7. Sister Winter*
8. O Come O Come Emmanuel
9. Star of Wonder*
10. Holy, Holy, Holy
11. The Winter Solstice*

* denotes original songs by Sufjan Stevens © 2006 New Jerusalem Music/ASCAP

(Blue Collar's collection here. Asthmatic Kitty's stream here)

...and also Majesty, Snowbird from his next album.

(Songs slapped together by the good man and sent round to his friends over the last 5 years. Said friends subsequently shared the joy on the net. Messy copyright-royalties situation, really. Some are up for a limited period. Buy the CDs if you like 'em.)

It's great, innit, to be able to celebrate Christ's birth?

Youth Camp

Ah, youth camp! It is finally over!

Thanks everyone for your prayers and your encouraging smses and calls throughout!

How was it? Where shall we start?

Perhaps we could start with L brandishing a cake knife about, proverbially in the face of the Devil, whom, she was convinced, was certainly up to his tricks, because leaders were down with the 'flu and/or completely inundated with work just before camp, because last minute prep was so last minute that emails were still flying about in the wee hours of the morning before camp.

Perhaps then we could continue with how some campers, arriving at camp under imperial parental edict, had faces black and grumpy enough to scare Medusa; and also how despite best efforts and detailed planning, loads of things didn't quite turn out right; and also how there was fighting sleeplessness and tiredness and infected insect bites and general sinfulness.

Ah, but then we must thank God that all the campers went home, still living and breathing, in one piece (dislocated fingers still count, innit?)! And we must thank Him also for the Chair Name Game, the loads of people who didn't like their neighbours and K's cheesy human bingo and Giants, Elves and Wizards, which got everyone warmed up; and also for how, every soon, there were smiles all around; and also for the sun in the morning for crocker and beach volleyball and beach soccer and frisbee in the sand and ice cold Ribena after; and also for people who kept us fed and tanked up on sweet apples; and also for DY who modelled in small but important ways how the Christian life is lived in the context of a youth camp; and also for people whose apologetic knowledge extended to Taoist scripture and dinosaurs; and also for a brill couple who interrupted their hol to lend us their much-needed gift of tongueslanguage; and also for the wonderfully faithful teaching everywhere (and I mean everywhere) in people's bedrooms, by the pool, at bistros, in food courts, by smoking barbecues and along the beach, so that no one, that is, no one even if they were half-asleep and had half a brain and spoke a different language, could have missed the good news of the chance to be saved from the terrible consequences of our sin.

"Beautiful plumage, the Norwegian Blue"

And that last thing is most important. Surely we want a fun, entertaining, comfortable holiday for the campers, an environment conducive for them to hear and perhaps accept the gospel. But, really, the most crucial environment is the soil of their hearts and minds. And only God alone can (and we pray that He will, even as the campers go back to their lives) make things grow.

For the praise of His glory.

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory. (Ephesians 1:3-14)

Oh thank God for the mercy of God.

So then, we must also thank Him for allowing us fallible sinful human agents to be part of His great work in gathering His people to Himself. Nice stuff. Ged jiggy widdit.