Classical Movie Wisdom: Great Art for Christians

Knight & Rose Show — Wintery Knight and Desert Rose

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Classical Movie Wisdom: Great Art for Christians

July 3, 2022

Knight & Rose ShowWintery Knight and Desert Rose

Wintery Knight and Desert Rose discuss classical movies that offer wisdom for practical Christian living. The first movie is a war movie that offers insight to Christians about our motivation for serving the Lord at a time when serving is no longer easy or popular. The second movie is a classical romance movie, which offers a superb portrait of classical masculinity in action. The third movie is an adventure / romance movie that challenges us to put our duty to higher causes above our own suffering and disappointment.

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Show notes: https://winteryknight.com/2022/07/03/knight-and-rose-show-episode-12-classical-movie-wisdom

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Transcript

Welcome to the Knight and Rose Show, where we discuss practical ways of living out an authentic Christian worldview. Today's topic is Classical Movie Wisdom. I'm Wintery Knight and I'm Desert Rose.

So today we want to do something a little different. In our conversations with each other, we've realized that both of us have benefited quite a bit from the wisdom, and the inspiration of classical movies. So today we want to take a break from some of our heavier topics and talk about some of those movies.

The first movie we want to discuss is called Rules of Engagement. WK, do you want to start us off with a brief summary of that movie? Absolutely. So this movie for me is the best picture in a movie of the life of a Christian apologist.

So I'll introduce it with that. The movie takes place in 1968 during the Vietnam War. The two main characters are Marine Lieutenant Hayes Hodges, who is played by Tommy Lee Jones, and Marine Lieutenant Terry Childers, who is played by Samuel L. Jackson.

So both of these lieutenants are deployed in Vietnam, and the movie begins with Hodges and Childers searching for enemies in the Vietnamese jungle. Hodges leads about 30 Marines through a marsh on the low ground in a valley, and his friend Childers takes the other 30 Marines in their company and goes up on the high ground, and he's moving along in parallel with Childers. Hodges men in the valley and the marsh below get ambushed by northern Vietnamese soldiers.

There's a lot of shooting and mortars and grenades and explosions, and they all just take cover because they are pinned down and encircled. Meanwhile, up on the high ground, Childers finds the enemy commander who is on the radio controlling the ambush of Hodges' team below. So Childers sneaks up on the commander, pulls out his pistol, and points it at the commander's radio operator and says, "If you don't call off this attack, I'm going to shoot your radio operator." The enemy commander refuses to call off the ambush, so Childers executes the radio man, and then he turns his pistol on the enemy commander.

The enemy commander immediately calls off the ambush to avoid being shot. Later on, we find out that only Hodges, out of all those Marines in the marsh, were able to survive the ambush. The movie continues 28 years later when we find out that Hodges and Childers are still in the Marines, and they've both risen to the rank of colonel.

Hodges got his law degree, and he is serving as a lawyer in the Marines, whereas Childers is now commanding a Marine expeditionary unit deployed on an amphibious assault ship. So Hodges and Childers meet at Hodges' retirement party, and everyone is celebrating, and then the movie moves to Childers being deployed on this amphibious assault ship. And he's called in and told that he needs to load up all his Marines onto helicopters and travel to the U.S. Embassy in Yemen to provide security during some anti-American protests.

So they get onto the helicopters, and they travel to the Embassy in Yemen, and they dismount, and they go up on the roof of the Embassy, and they find the protests are very loud and dangerous. There's a lot of yelling and signs, but there's also snipers on the surrounding buildings, on the roofs of the surrounding buildings, and they start shooting at the Marines and wounding and even killing them. So Childers, seeing that his men are being shot, he kind of sees that the snipers are shooting, but he also looks over the edge of the roof of the Embassy, and he sees that there's gunmen in the crowd below.

So he orders his Marines to open fire on the crowd below, and he kills a lot of civilians that are mixed in with the gunmen. So the movie continues with Childers evacuating the U.S. ambassador and his family by helicopter, but before they go, Childers runs back into the Embassy, and he retrieves the American flag and gives it to the ambassador. And the ambassador thanks him and says, "I'll never forget that you saved us like this." So the bulk of the movie actually concerns what follows from this event.

So the U.S. government, there's a big uproar. So all the Middle Eastern nations are furious that the Marines would shoot at protesters and kill a bunch of civilians. And the government, and even the Marine generals, are looking for someone to blame for this.

So they decide to court-martial Childers and charge him with murder in order to appease the Middle Eastern nations who are very angry. So Childers has to find a lawyer, but no one really wants to defend him because they know that the government wants him to be guilty, and it would hurt their career to defend him. So Childers decides to ask his old friend Hodges to defend him.

Hodges is seen by everyone as a kind of a drunk. He drinks a lot, and he's a terrible lawyer. Hodges' father tells him not to take the case.

But even though Hodges knows he's not the best lawyer, he takes the case anyway because he wants to help his friend who saved his life in Vietnam. And at the beginning of the trial, all of the available evidence seems to point to Childers being guilty because nobody has any evidence that there was anyone in the crowd who was shooting. So that's a great summary.

Yeah, that's excellent. So, yeah, you mentioned that this is a great kind of analogy of the life of the Christian apologist. And I can see a few parallels right away.

So one thing is that Hodges is motivated to defend Childers because Childers saved his life in Vietnam, right? Yes. It's not going to help Hodges' career to defend his friend. It's not going to win him friends.

It's not going to please his family. As you mentioned, his own father told him not to take the case. And so, you know, there is a cost to this, but he owes this man his life.

And similarly, we owe Christ our lives and not just this temporary life, but our eternal souls. He is the one who has saved us and given us eternal life. There's absolutely no way in the world we could ever pay him back in any sort of way.

But what we can do is live our lives in a way that is completely devoted to him and that celebrates him and honors him. And we can speak the truth about him and share his goodness and greatness with others. The way the church is, you know, kind of presenting Christianity is not focusing on the debt that we owe Christ for making the sacrifice that will save us from our sin, you know, dying in our place.

It seems to be more like, let's have a really fun community where you can come and feel good and have fun activities and eat pizza. And we'll talk about the more difficult, complicated stuff, you know, later. But for now, you know, come here and feel good and be accepted no matter who you are.

It's so ironic because in this movie, it's the exact opposite. You aren't going to be accepted. You aren't going to be popular.

It's not going to be fun. But you do this because you stand in a relationship with Christ who died in your place. And so there's just no question that you have to do things that are difficult on you, but honor demands that you do it.

Exactly. Yeah, that's a good point. This doesn't necessarily remind me of too many of my experiences in the typical American church, but it absolutely reminds me of the New Testament.

And Jesus saying, you know, this is going to cost you friends. This is going to cost you family. Yeah.

But, you know, your choice. Yeah. Everybody check out Philippians and see what Paul says about the people who are risking their lives and risking death, you know, for the gospel to partner with him.

It's right. I think. Yeah, I think this I think this movie provides a kind of a neat picture of what it means to be a follower of Jesus in terms of what you can expect from the people around you.

So, look, I got a bunch of questions about this movie I want to ask you. So I mentioned in the movie that when they're loading up the diplomat, his wife and his child into the helicopter, the the the ambassador, I should say, the ambassador turns to children and says, I'll never forget this. Does he ever forget this? He he yeah, he forgets pretty darn quickly.

This guy is such a coward. He is the epitome of a people pleasing pansy, you know, which is just something that I have such a hard time with. Yeah.

You know, he owes his entire life. He owes his family's lives. Children had saved the ambassador's life as well as his wife and his child.

And he got the flag for the ambassador. And this guy says he's never going to forget him. But then when it seems that even very little is on the line, the ambassador just, you know, just takes a little bit of pressure from his earthly bosses who he wants to please.

And, you know, a little bit of pressure against his career for this guy to fold and to go up on the stand and lie about Childers and about what he did. And I really think this guy ought to serve as a warning to all of us because it is part of our, you know, our sinful nature to want to please people to want to advance our careers, I guess, you know, to want to look good in the eyes of others to make more money, things like that. But that we just cannot prioritize those things in the Christian life.

We must prioritize our loyalty to Christ and speaking the truth. Yeah, I think in every day, every single one of us is who's working or even, you know, either any kind of, you know, job that you're doing for money, not for money, where you're doing goal oriented activities with a group of people. There comes a time where you get the sense that your allegiance to Jesus is not going to be well received.

And so we are all facing this choice that the ambassador faced where, you know, sticking up for the guy who saved your life. It's like a contrast with Hodges, right? You know, Childers also saves this guy's life. And his response is to say, you know what, the more I talk about that and the more I defend him, the worse it is for me in my day to day life working with these people.

So I'm just going to make the decision to not talk about him. And maybe I'll even go a little further and I'll say bad things about him because what's really important is me, you know, and not doing the right thing or honoring the sacrifices of others. So just that element of understanding Christianity that, again, what you're doing when you stand up for Jesus, when you study apologetics, when you prepare to make your defense, when you make your defense and kind of declare who you are to the people around you.

If that's a normal part of the Christian life, you should be taking a little hit from that. I'm going to link in the show notes to the book I'm reading right now and maybe feature it on the blog. And I'm reading a book about Walter Bradley's life.

And that was the big thing he used to do was he used to go in front of his college students and introduce himself and say, I'm a follower of Jesus. It's something that's important to me. If you want to talk to me about it, you can come to my office and we'll talk about it.

His colleagues never liked him doing that. So it's just people need to understand that and expect that, I think. Anyway, moving on to the next point.

So at one point in the movie, the prosecuting attorney, who I think is played by Guy Pearce, he's talking to his team of prosecutors. And he's talking about who Childers is. And he says, Childers is the warrior's warrior.

And he also says that he's our best. And he talks about Childers's decorations, the Navy Cross, two silver stars for composure in battle. He mentions that Childers has no wife, no kids, just the Marine Corps.

So this is painting a picture of someone who is a warrior. He is aggressive. He is determined, comfortable with disagreement.

He is comfortable giving orders. He doesn't easily get cowed by things not going his way. He's persistent.

So the reason I say this is because I think about the church and I think about who is famous in the church. Is it going to be someone like William Lane Craig who goes out and gets a couple of master's degrees, a couple of doctorate degrees, and who travels all around the country debating the most famous atheists you can imagine in the most prestigious universities, campuses that you can you could think of going toe to toe with them on camera in front of thousands of students and having videos of those debates posted everywhere. This guy is the counterpart to Childers.

He is the warrior. He is the one who has composure in battle. He is the one who doesn't get distracted by civilian affairs, but instead he's completely focused on fighting and winning against the enemy, on the issues that Christians ought to care about the most, the existence of God, the resurrection of Jesus, and so on.

So what do you think about this? Is this a correct link between the church and the Marine Corps kind of turning on their warriors? So William Lane Craig is a great analogy for Childers in the Christian life. He is absolutely phenomenal. And yet he's not the guy who most Christians know about.

He's not the guy who most Christians are following, who are watching, are learning from, are being discipled by. I really think that as a general, as a broad generalization, we have the wrong heroes in the church. We are looking to the wrong people as our models and our examples.

We have so many Christians who are looked up to for reasons like they're tall and they're handsome and they're charismatic and they make us feel certain emotions and they tell really good stories as part of their sermons. Or in women's Bible studies, I think of the women who write these studies that are most popular and they love to talk about themselves. They love to tell cute, funny little stories that are entertaining and then have women fill in a couple of blanks, like an elementary school type of learning.

And yet these are not the people I think we should be looking to. We look to musicians who make us feel emotions but who are happy to benefit greatly from Christianity when Christianity is popular. It's the thing to do and the thing to be.

And they get crowds of people swooning over them. But then Christianity starts to be unpopular and next thing you know, they're saying that they're not actually Christians after all and things like this. So we have great Christian heroes out there who are not the people who are being looked to by and large.

We've got William Lane Craig and Stephen Meyer and Jay Richards and guys like this who are absolutely phenomenal. And to me, if you can't go, if the basic core of Christianity is God exists and Jesus rose bodily from the dead, if you're not known for defending those views against prominent people who dispute those views, you've moved away from the most important part of Christianity. And when I think about the people you're mentioning, you know, I'm going to name them, people like Rachel Hollis and Jan Hatmaker and Beth Moore and these people who talk about their own lives and how they manage their time and things like this.

And it's like, who cares? You know, who really cares about that? What I care about is who is defending the core truth claims of Christianity. So that like in the movie, our guy looks good. We defend his reputation.

You know, we defend his character. We defend what he's done. Christianity isn't for us.

It's not meant to make us feel good. It's about our boss. And so naturally, we respect the people who are who have ability in putting forward the goals and the purposes and the reputation of our boss.

All right. Let's move on. Last one for this movie.

So in the movie, the government basically says we have to turn on our best warrior in order to appease the people who disagree with us. Have you ever seen the church turn on its best person in order to make people who disagreed with them like them? You know, that yeah, that as soon as as soon as you said that, you know, about the government in the movie, I started thinking of all sorts of examples that have happened, you know, over the past couple of years as as several in very influential, well known evangelical leaders have decided that that we need to criticize people who are solid conservative Christians upholding the truth. Every opportunity we get.

And we need to we need to praise the secular left so that they'll like us because we don't want to be disliked by atheists and, you know, abortionists and things like that. So we're just we're not going to talk about abortion. But if we see a conservative do anything that isn't perfect and in lockstep with what we want, we're going to just criticize the heck out of them.

Yeah. The first people I think about are the Christian business owners. I was having a conversation with a guy in my office who who kind of thinks that Christianity consists of getting married and having children and attending church.

And so not like Jesus. Not like Jesus. Not like Paul.

So what he was saying to me, I said, well, like you voted for Biden. And he said, yeah, I go, do you know what the Equality Act is? He goes, no, I go. This is an act that's a nationwide.

So I explain nationwide soju laws and all what that would involve. And then I said, do you want it to be the case that in all the states, in every state, Christian business owners can be prosecuted by the state for refusing to participate in same sex marriage ceremonies? And he said, yeah, I don't know about that. But I mean, if someone asked me to go to a same sex marriage ceremony, I would probably go.

So this is so this is this is a case where the guys who actually and I'm not saying that those guys who got into this were necessarily the most informed about this issue. I like, you know, I like Ryan T. Anderson. I like Jennifer back more.

I like Michael Brown, you know, on these types of issues. Right. Robert Daniel.

I'm not sure if that's how he pronounces his name, but I can speak French. So I pronounce it in the French way. I like our scholars.

But the people who get prosecuted for this and don't break. I like them, too. I think that we've just made such a mess of Christianity as being about love that we we don't respect people who dissent and disagree and take the hit for it.

Right. Exactly. And we've redefined love because Jesus was perfect love.

And yet he was very critical of lies and falsehood and heresy and people who were leading others astray. I agree. I want everybody to check out that movie who defends the faith.

Go and watch Rules of Engagement. There is some violence. There is some swearing.

They're Marines. But I think you'll do yourself a favor and give yourself a pat on the back when you when you see how that movie goes. Excellent.

So how about if we move on to the second movie, then? Yes. So the second movie we want to talk about is called A Patch of Blue. And this movie is phenomenal.

It's sad. It's kind of heart wrenching, but it's outstanding. This movie takes place in America in 1965.

And one of the two main characters is named Selena. She's an 18 year old blind girl who lives with her mother, Roseanne, and her grandfather. Her mother is a prostitute and her grandfather is an alcoholic.

And Selena was actually blinded by Roseanne, her mother, during a fight in which Selena's father caught Roseanne with one of her clients. She was even raped by one of Roseanne's clients, we find out in the movie. And even though she's blind, Selena does all the cleaning.

She does all the cooking. She also makes necklaces of beads to sell. She does not attend school.

She has no friends and she never even gets to leave the apartment, really. She had one friend in the past named Pearl who used to play with her and teach her things. And Selena really liked Pearl a lot.

But Roseanne chased Pearl away because Pearl was black and she didn't want her daughter playing with a black girl. So keep in mind that 1960s America. Yeah.

Very racist time in American history. So one day Selena was taken to the park by this man who he was the man who bought her necklaces from her that she would make. And when she's there, she meets the other main character whose name is Gordon.

Gordon is played by Sidney Poitier and Gordon works the night shift in an office building near the park. And so he ends up visiting pretty regularly and over many park visits, he hears Selena's whole story and he really wants to help her. He starts to fix her problems kind of one at a time.

You know, he he helps her make her necklaces. He brings her apple or sorry, pineapple juice. He brings her sunglasses to cover her eye scars when she asks him how ugly her face is from the scars from when she went blind when the acid was thrown at her.

He basically gives her sunglasses and has her put them on to cover the scars and he's like, yeah, now you look great. You're beautiful. He teaches her how to speak properly because she has not received that at home and she hasn't been going to school.

At one point in the movie, he throws away her bag of crackers and he buys her a corned beef sandwich instead. He does other things like he shows her where the bathroom is in the park. He teaches her how to find her way around the park using the positioning of the sun.

He teaches her how to cross a crosswalk on her own. He takes her grocery shopping and she rides around in the cart and have a great time. And he picks out food for her.

It's really sweet. He lets her pick out food too. Yeah, yeah, that's right.

He even shows her how to call him from a payphone in case she ever gets in trouble and needs to call him. He plays classical music records for her and he starts thinking about how he can get her out of the abusive environment that she's in and starts thinking about how he could maybe even get her into school. So this is like everything you describe there is like a clinic on classical masculine virtues.

He's protecting her. He's providing for her and he's trying to lead her as well. Yeah, exactly.

So I love this character so much. He knows what is right and he knows what is good. He has excellent character and he has this definite vision of where he would like Selena to be.

He's not worried about affirming things that are not important or making her feel good about herself without doing anything to actually help her. He knows where she is. He knows where she needs to be.

He knows what's good for her and he enters into this messy situation and imposes order on the situation, imposes order on her life, which is so incredibly good for her. Which kind of reminds me both of the character of God and how in the beginning, in the chaos, he created orderly in an orderly manner. And then he commanded Adam to impose order upon the world from that point on.

And so this character is just phenomenal. Yeah, again, this reminds me of our masculinity episode about leadership. He doesn't just say, "Command her.

Do this, do this, do this." He likes to do things with her, you know? Yeah. And build up her skills so that every time he asks, she can do more because, you know, he does some with her and then she does some on her own. Mm-hmm.

Yeah, it's phenomenal. Yeah, he's such a great teacher. Yeah, the other thing I like about this movie is because Selena is blind, she isn't really choosing him based on his appearance.

So we talk about this a lot in our podcast and on my blog, I'm constantly harping about this, but we have a problem in the society where people basically go, "Okay, the other person is a commodity. What I need is a good appearance and then I'm going to go on a date with that person and show them off to the people around me." I actually heard this, like, in a J.P. Moreland lecture. He was saying to his daughter, "Don't worry too much." She was saying, "Well, what about all the people who have boyfriends? When will I get a boyfriend?" And he was saying, "Well, I think what you'll find is that those people are kind of stuck on themselves." That was his phrase, "stuck on themselves." And he says, "They're kind of using those other people so that they can look good." And so I think that's why we focus so much on appearance because it does the work of validating us, validating us to ourselves and validating us to our peers.

But in this case, Selena starts to fall in love with Gordon and it has nothing to do with his appearance. It has to do with the way that people haven't had any interest in what she needed, you know, in growing her and strengthening her and challenging her and building her up and caring about her story and looking after her feelings. Exactly.

Yeah. I mean, you know, the people who are looking for self-validation and looking for a partner who is good looking as, you know, something that's really important, they're going to be happy with that for probably about 10 seconds after they say I do. Maybe up to 18 months or so, according to studies.

And then you've got another, you know, 50, 60, 70 years with someone who you didn't care about the most important things, their character. In this situation, though, in contrast with a man like Gordon, who is a man of such character, he's going to be able to provide her with a stable and permanent and fulfilling relationship, you know, for the rest of their lives. You know, if that's the direction they go.

I mean, this is a guy who is really committed to investing in her and building her up and seeing her become everything that she can possibly be. Right. If that's what you want, you know, if that's what you need for the next 50 years of your life, you have to evaluate that and choose that.

You can't complain later if you choose, you know, I don't know, a tiger. You bring it home and go, I like petting and it's really, you know, big and warm and it bites you. You know, it's like, well, you got to choose stability and commitment if that's what you want in the long term.

Okay. Let's go on to the last point for this movie. So, yeah, this is interesting.

So in the movie, there's different scenes where Gordon is walking Selena around in the park and a bunch of elderly white women stare at him in disapproval. And then in the movie, Roseanne sees him walking Selena home and she goes inside the house and screams that Selena and slaps Selena and says, how dare you talk to a black man? And then finally, Gordon's brother finds out that he's helping Gordon's helping Selena. And he says, listen, you don't want to get involved in this.

There could be big problems if this blows up in your face because, you know, if she says anything, there could be false accusations. You know, people are going to frown on you. You know, people in your office might not like it.

And what's Gordon's response to all this? Yeah. So Gordon's brother was not wrong. You know, there was some to some degree, there was a risk for Gordon to be investing in a white girl on that time and place.

But what I love about Gordon is he just doesn't care about social disapproval from others or fear about how things will look to others. He's not a people pleaser. He's not looking to preserve his own security and safety first.

He wants to help her first. He's such a man of character and he's he's confident and determined in his plan to lead Selena into something better, whatever it costs him. And, you know, we see a lot of compassion from him, which is also really sweet because we see, you know, we see this competence, this capability from him, but we also see tremendous compassion for him.

And I really think that that's probably related to his experience of being discounted because of the color of his skin in that culture. Yeah. Yeah.

So before we move on to our next movie, I just want to say that I guess I want to address all the male Christians who are listening. Like if you want to be appreciated for your capabilities that are deep, you know, your wisdom, your ability as a protector, your ability as a provider, everything depends on the woman that you choose. If you pass over women who are, you know, young and pretty and kind of looking to use you to build up their own self-esteem or signal social status, you're going to get burned.

So a much better idea is to pick a woman like Selena and do your actions, your Christian actions towards her. And you will find that you will get the recognition and the respect that is what men really want. I think their deepest desire is to be respected.

Absolutely. So true. And if you don't find that kind of a woman, you're better off serving the king alone.

I think it attracts those. But it does. It absolutely does.

Yeah. It's very, very attractive. Focus on serving the boss and those those women like Selena will come to you.

Let's move on to the third movie. This is a famous movie. This is always on everybody's top 10 list.

Some people say it's the best movie ever made. Number one, this movie is Casablanca. Yes.

So we both like this movie. So this movie is set in North Africa in 1942. This is at the time of the Second World War.

So everybody knows that the Germans invade France and they they defeat them. And France had properties in North Africa. Specifically, Morocco was one of the countries that they were in charge of.

And the Germans take over Morocco. And then there's a fight between the Americans and the Germans. The main character in this movie is an American named Rick.

And he owns a nightclub and a casino in the city of Casablanca, which is in Morocco. And Rick is famous for telling everybody in this movie how he's completely neutral about foreign policy. He doesn't take sides and he sticks his neck out for no one.

That's his quote. I stick my neck out for no one. But we find out in the movie that in the past, he actually has fought for causes that were morally right, even if it would have been more profitable for him to fight for the side that was morally wrong.

Rick is in his nightclub and all of a sudden a former girlfriend of his named Ilse, who's very beautiful, shows up with her new husband, Victor. And Victor is famous. He is a powerful leader in the Czech resistance to the Germans.

He has gone to a concentration camp and escaped and he warns everyone about the Germans and advocates that everybody gets serious about fighting them. So he's kind of helping everybody to know why they should get into the fight against the Germans. So Ilse and Victor needs Rick's help to escape Morocco to America, where they can continue to advocate for the Western nations to band together and fight the Germans before the Germans get too strong.

So Rick has the decision. He has actually, he somehow has come into possession of two visas that would allow Ilse and Victor to get out of Casablanca and escape to America. But he's so angry about the way that Ilse broke up with him in the past.

He's just crushed by it. That he kind of doesn't, he doesn't feel like helping her and her husband. That's where the, that's a good summary of the beginning of the movie.

So let me ask you this. So I've noticed that a lot of Christian men have some kind of beef. They have a disappointment with women in the church.

And because their relationships with women in the church kind of didn't work out for them, they sometimes take a step away from Christianity, kind of blaming God for what happened, you know, with them in the church. What would you say to men like that who are basically saying, you know, this terrible thing happened to me in the church, she chose, you know, a secular guy or whatever. What advice would you give to those men? Well, I certainly feel compassion for them.

But at the same time, I would say, you know, something that we've said over and over again, God is not our cosmic butler. God does not exist to give us our every desire right now in this world, in this time. So, I mean, if people are taking a step away from Christianity, if they're walking away from God because they didn't get what they wanted in a woman, that is a huge, huge mistake.

There is nothing more satisfying and fulfilling than serving the King, than being on his side, being in his army, you know, helping to fulfill the Great Commission, making the truth known through adventure and sacrifice and even danger. We, you know, we exist to obey God's will now, to glorify God now, to honor him now, and our reward will come later. We're not going to get to heaven and be like, oh, bummer, this isn't all I thought it would be.

It's going to blow our minds how amazing our inheritance is. And so, I would just encourage men to hang in there, find out if God is real, find out the evidence for theism, the evidence for Christianity. And if you know that, you know, if you find that compelling, get on board regardless of the cost, you will not regret it.

Yeah, I agree completely. I think that Christian life doesn't promise you that you're going to have a fantastic relationship with a woman. The best thing you can do is focus on producing results for God, and that will become noticeable to the right kind of women.

You know, you don't want to be wasting your time and money on trying to impress women by having a fancy car, or having a fancy watch. You don't want those women. They're not going to satisfy you in the long run.

They're too much work. Just focus on God. He's the perfect boss, and the right women will respect that.

They'll become interested in that. And even if they don't, who cares? You're a warrior. That's your job, first and foremost.

You're not. Exactly. So here's the last point about this movie.

So at the end of the movie, Rick shows that he has changed his mind about being bitter about his breakup with Elsa. And he takes a he talks to Elsa and he says, it doesn't take much to see that the problems of three little people don't amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. That's one of the famous lines.

Yeah, I love that quote. That's one of the best parts of the movie. Yeah, for him for the whole movie, it really did amount to a hill of beans.

It's like, oh, you broke up with me. I'm going to forget about the war between the West and the West. Who cares about fascism? I'm sad.

Look, I'm not making fun of Humphrey Bogart. That's who plays Rick, by the way. I should have mentioned that, you know, a very famous actor.

And I think it's just very silly, you know, that he is like that, given the way the world is. But the important thing is at the end of the movie, he changes his mind. He actually gives Victor the the two visas to get Victor and Elsa out of the country.

And Victor says, well, I'm not making fun of Humphrey Bogart. And Victor says to Rick, and I think this is the key point of the movie. He says, welcome back to the fight.

Yeah, so I think that's awesome. Yeah, that's that's the real message of the movie is you don't let your emotion. A man doesn't let and I'm not saying women can't do this to.

It's great when women do this. It's great when they recognize this and then. But men don't let their feelings about a woman getting away, you know, or hurting them that you do not let that stop you.

You put on the best thing about Christianity is the armor. Okay, the armor, the banner, the reputation that you have with God. And you cannot let women come between you and God.

You can't let the need for their approval come between you and being a soldier. Yeah, yeah. And I love the contrast as Rick changes, you know, from his kind of pathetic.

All I care about is my bar, my money, my piece throughout most of the movie to then having to make a big decision. He actually has the opportunity to run away with Elsa himself and leave Victor behind. But he knows that that would be devastating to the cause overall.

Victor would would certainly be killed if he stayed in Casablanca. And Victor was was critical to the overall war to the overall cause. And so Rick sacrifices his own feelings, his own emotions and he self sacrificially gives the passports to Victor and Elsa for the sake of the overall war.

And, you know, likewise in Christianity, there is a war on. We are at war against the spiritual forces of darkness. And our power is at war.

And our personal problems and preferences really don't ultimately amount to a hill of beans when it comes down to it. I mean, I know that, you know, it feels like it right now. I'm not some, you know, some sort of unfeeling robot who, you know, doesn't understand that heartbreak is real and it's powerful and it's devastating.

But in the big grand scheme of things, we can't allow that to stop us from being a part of the war effort from being God's ambassadors representing him. Well, making the most of every single opportunity to advance the kingdom. That is just far more critical, far more ultimately far more satisfying.

And we really need men and women to set aside their wounds and get into the battle. Yeah, definitely. This is a movie, I think, for both men and women.

For Christian men, I would say if you've had a situation in the past where you were had a disappointment with God, particularly a relationship disappointment, you know, that, you know, where a Christian girl let you down. This movie is a reminder of your identity in Christ as a warrior and that what makes you an excellent man is your awareness of the battle and your engagement with the battle. And for Christian women, I would say it's kind of neat to see a portrayal of masculinity so that you recognize it when you see it and maybe choose to get involved with men like that.

Yeah, and I think this extends even the point extends even beyond the male-female relationship beyond the romance or, you know, a marriage type relationship. Because I come across a lot of people who have been hurt by other people in the church and who have walked away because they were hurt by a pastor or by a woman hurt by other women in the church or men hurt by other men in the church as well. And they just walk away.

But, you know, let this be a call and an inspiration to get back into the battle. Yeah. Yeah, to be fair, these things that happen to us, they don't affect the truth value of the proposition.

God exists and Jesus rose from the dead. I know that's cold. Grieve, have feelings, talk to your friends, be sad, but just understand that if these bigger things are true, there's a war on and you're needed.

You know, that reminds me of the Avengers where the male spy, you say to the females by Mrs. Peele, we're needed. I think, yeah, we'll give. Well, there is time for grieving, but Christian men and women, we're needed.

All right. So let's get to the conclusion. So let me ask you a question about this.

We've been looking at some classical movies and in addition to movies, there's also classical literature. What do you think is a place of these classical movies and books are in the life of the Christian? Yeah. So, you know, every time and place has their own cultural blind spots and, you know, kind of there because of whatever has been focused on, whatever has been lifted up as most important.

We just don't see the bigger picture sometimes or we miss things that are more important than what is going on in our culture or our time or our family. The classics give us a broader perspective than what we can just get from our family or our schools or our culture. You know, a lot of adults have chosen to focus on their careers more than on raising their children and passing on what was passed to them.

A lot of school teachers are focused on their radical leftist agenda and their indoctrination. Our culture, you know, from the media to entertainment and everything else is very much a disaster today. But when so when we let the when we just kind of go on automatic pilot and we don't really seek out books and movies from other times and places, we're going to maintain those blind spots.

We're going to get wrapped up in ourselves and we're going to be consumed by narcissism. But when we do take time to read and watch art that was created in a different time and place, we start to see other ways of responding to our world and to people. We start to become aware of our blind spots and we have more options for acting differently and we can really apply the truths that we learn from those to our daily lives.

Yeah. Wisdom from the classics gives you the option to get out of the time and place where you are. Yeah.

And this was something I saw from from studying church history as well. But movies provide kind of a they really bring it to life in a fun way that oftentimes, you know, just reading a history book may not may not do so much. Yeah, definitely.

Great art does that. All right. I think that's all we have for this episode.

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