Do Judases become Peter?
Toward the end of the movie, ‘Aliens,’ the heroine (Ripley) escapes the alien nest by threatening to torch the alien queen’s batch of eggs with a flame-thrower. Ripley inches slowly toward the door while the queen eyes her menacingly, afraid to move lest her precious brood be incinerated. Just before Ripley dashes down the hall, she turns and sets the nest ablaze. The queen shrieks in rage.
Later, Ripley is recounting the tale to some friends at church. “I destroyed the entire hive,” she says. “I brought a little girl to safety when I escaped.”
The Christians are horrified.
“Ripley, you jerk! Who are you to judge those alien babies?!! How awful for that poor, alien mother!!! Jesus never held a flamethrower!!! You have only pushed other space creatures farther from God!!!!”
You see, Ripley, Christians hold out hope that God will miraculously turn a cluster of blood-thirsty aliens into a children’s choir. They believe that since God CAN transform anyone that He WILL transform everyone. (Of course, He can’t work with the alien spawn that you reduced to ashes.)
In other words, Christians don’t actually believe it’s possible to tell a tree by its fruit. A popular theology in American churches says that God is just as likely to use a face-sucking, lizard-brained alien as He is to use a self-denying, cross-carrying saint. The only thing we know for sure is that we’re to love everyone, especially those who slaughtered our crewmates in a remote space outpost.
God works in mysterious ways, Ripley. His ways are not our ways. For all you know, that Queen was destined to become a missionary to some remote, unholy region of the galaxy (like Los Angeles or Detroit). There is no difference in God’s eyes between Judas, Peter, and flesh eating space-reptiles.
Christians don’t believe in evil anymore. We think every pagan villain is on the same journey toward salvation as ourselves. We know judgment is coming some day but we don’t think anyone is going to be condemned. That’s the reason the church is overrun by enemies.
(Matthew 12:23) “Make a tree good and its fruit will be good, or make a tree bad and its fruit will be bad, for a tree is recognized by its fruit. You brood of vipers, how can you who are evil say anything good? For out of the overflow of the heart the mouth speaks. The good man brings good things out of the good stored up in him, and the evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in him. But I tell you that men will have to give account on the day of judgment for every careless word they have spoken. For by your words you will be acquitted, and by your words you will be condemned.”
4 Responses
Matthew 7:14
Because strait is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that find it.
I don’t disagree that there are times when violence is the appropriate answer. Evil sometimes get punished in a way that is permanent. However, this leaves little room for the Sauls that become Pauls. I reckon the argument can be made that God can/will preserve the proverbial Saul. If put in a situation, our compassion should be directed towards the victims and the law abiders, never the lawbreakers. We as a society have been duped into misdirected theology.
This was not intended to be a call for violence. My intention was to criticize the notion that everyone is on the same path toward God. Many Christians are unable to acknowledge that there will be souls that don’t make it into the Kingdom. They continue to trying to raise baby aliens to be something other than adult aliens.
I had to look up the word “acquitted”. 😊