Keep taking the tablets

I am just about to take a couple of tablets and it reminds me of the famous scene in The Matrix when our hero, Neo, is offered two pills (actually they look like Jelly Beans to me). The blue pill will keep him in what he assumes to be his present reality and the red pill will mean that he discovers the truth about life.

I have heard a lot of Christians use that image as an invitation for people to consider the life that they lead. They make Jesus the red pill and invite listeners to accept him and discover a new dimension to life that they had never experienced before. It is a compelling analogy.

But on reflection I am not sure that it works. It seems to me to be counter to what the Bible says. The Bible encourages God’s people to live in the reality of this world, but in the grace-filled way that he designed it rather than the self-centred way that we live without him. We are not called to abandon this life but to discover that by following Jesus we can experience more of it. The two tablets that Moses had show us how we can live in that sort of way, but we cannot do it by our willpower alone – we need God’s forgiveness and restoration for when we screw up and his Spirit to help us and transform us.

Yes we are called to be counter-cultural. Yes we are called to unmask the lies of a world that values you for what you can give or buy or earn or do rather than for who we are. Yes we are called to invite people to follow Jesus in a life that is not always easy but is fulfilling. But if the message of Christmas tells us anything it is that God is incarnational – he comes to us and gets involved rather than remotely telling us to get out of here.

So how incarnational am I? Do I get involved or sit back and watch? Do I want the red pill or the blue pill?

For an alternative look at the Matrix that will especially appeal to those with a juvenile sense of humour (aka blokes) click here and prepare to discover a new dimension.