Difference between revisions of "Sermon for February 5th, 2023"

Latest revision as of 23:29, 4 February 2023

Matthew 13:10-17

10 Then the disciples came and asked him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” 11 He answered, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For to those who have, more will be given, and they will have an abundance, but from those who have nothing, even what they have will be taken away. 13 The reason I speak to them in parables is that ‘seeing they do not perceive, and hearing they do not listen, nor do they understand.’ 14 With them indeed is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah that says:

‘You will indeed listen but never understand, and you will indeed look but never perceive. 15 For this people’s heart has grown dull, and their ears are hard of hearing, and they have shut their eyes, so that they might not look with their eyes, and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn— and I would heal them.’

16 “But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. 17 Truly I tell you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see but did not see it and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

Faith & Film XI: The Fabelmans

• [Film Clip #1 - Trailer (2:23)]

Three Minute Film Summary

If you've ever heard of a guy named Steven Spielberg, this is his story--in more ways than one. Not only is Spielberg the director of the film, hence the one telling us the story, the film is also a lightly fictionalized version of his story, the story of his childhood and his family, and how he came to be interested in, well, telling stories through the medium of film.

The story begins when little Sammy Fabelman (that's Spielberg) goes with his parents to see his very first moving picture. He watches a train crash on the giant screen and feels every bit as out of control as the train itself. Later, his parents buy him a model train set for Hanukkah (the Fabelmans, like the Spielbergs, are Jewish). But instead of playing with the train cars, Sammy tells his mother, "I need to watch them crash," and she realizes that what he really needs is to process and understand his fear. So she lets him use his father's video camera to record the crash, over and over again, from every angle, behind the relative safety of the camera...and in the process he begins his filmmaking career.

As the film progresses and Sam grows older, we see him recording everything, recreating his favorite movies and techniques from his favorite directors, and attempting to understand the world and the people around him. He uses his family, his friends, his scout troop, as his productions become more elaborate. At the same time, his life becomes more complicated: His family moves several times to follow his father's career, his parents' marriage begins to fall apart, and he struggles to make sense of relationships at school and at home--always going back to the camera to see, to shape, and to understand his story, his truth, from every angle.

Order and Chaos

• [Film Clip #2 - Lament Bass (1:43)]

Sammy needs to recreate the train crash to bring order to his chaos. His mother, Mitzi, loves to play the piano because it is only within the order of a piece by Bach that she is free to surrender, to let her creativity, her chaos be turned into something beautiful, in the hands of a master.

We read in the very first verse of the Bible--in Genesis 1:1 that in the beginning the world was chaos and darkness, but God spoke order into that chaos, bringing forth the wonder and beauty of creation. And yet, sometimes we still chase after the chaos. In the next clip, the tornado foreshadows all that's about to happen the Fabelman family. It's also a metaphor for chaos.

• [Film Clip #3 - Tornado (2:06)]

Mitzi's repeated mantra at the end--everything happens for a reason--sounds kind of like a prayer: Please, God, let there be some order, some purpose to the things that are outside of our control. "Everything happens for a reason" also sounds a lot like the Presbyterian doctrine of predestination. We do believe, after all, in a God who does things for a reason, a God who is completely in control, and turns our chaos into order and beauty, and purpose.

Truth and Fable

• [Film Clip #4 - Totally Fake (1:36)]

Throughout the film, Sam is completely preoccupied with seeking out the "truth" and making his films look "real," even though all while he is actually perfecting the art of creating fiction. His last name, and the title of the film, is literally Fable-Man, the man who makes fables, or fictional stories that point to some grain of truth.

Jesus was a fable man, or rather a parable man (they are literally the same thing). When Jesus was asked (in today's scripture passage) why he made up all these crazy, fictional stories that no one quite seemed to understand, he quoted Isaiah, who basically said, "Look, some people don't want to know the truth, some people can't accept the truth." And so Jesus told them stories instead.

Sam Fableman makes two films, in the film, that really bookend his development as a storyteller, a creator, a Fable-man. The first one is when his father asks him to make a film using footage from their recent camping trip. When Sam is editing the footage, the camera reveals a difficult truth that Sam is reluctant to accept:

• [Film Clip #5 - Hard Truth (2:30)]

In the final edit of the camping film, Sam removes all traces of the affair between his mother and his uncle. The truth is too painful, and rather than confront it, he uses his craft to hide it and hide from it. The story controls him, instead of the other way around.

Later in the film, Sam is asked to make a film using footage of his Senior Class beach party. This time he is in complete control of the story, shaping it to elevate some characters, and to marginalize others. Interestingly, he chooses to make a hero out of the local bully--the one who had ridiculed him, called him anti-semitic names, and punched him in the face.

• [Film Clip $6 - Hero (1:42)]

Sam's film even helps the bully reconcile with his ex-girlfriend. Why would he do that for someone who treated him so badly? Incidentally, that's the exact question the bully asks him later in the film. Sam doesn't seem to know, but I know someone who does. It's the guy who said that we should love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us. The guy who said that if someone forces you to walk a mile with him, walk two. And if he strikes you on the cheek, turn and offer him the other one, too.

Undeserved kindness has a way of disarming even the most hardened people, and the bully and Sam part as friends.

The Family Tablemans

One of the things I loved about this film was just how many times the Fablemans gathered around the family table, where they talked, laughed, ate, fought, and generally supported one another.

[Table pics 1-6]

Even at the end of the film, when the family has broken up, we still see the empty table, with just Sam and his mother, or Sam and his father.

[Table pics 7-8]

The table, when full and when empty, serves as a powerful reminder to us of table around which we gather, and the adopted family that we call the church. People come and go from this table through the course of a lifetime in faith, and sometimes that can be heartbreaking. Sometimes it's messy. Sometimes it's awkward. But always, if Jesus is the one who calls us to the table, if Jesus is the one we do this in remembrance of, then always it's beautiful. Always it's blessed. And always it's the best way for us to frame our story, our fable, our parable, our message of faith, hope and love for the world. Come to the table of the Lord.