Don’t You Know Who You Are?
Cry and shout, O inhabitants of Zion, For great is the Holy One of Israel in your midst! Isaiah 12:6
Also see Micah 4-5
I’m reminded of a great movie, Hook, starring Robin Williams as a middle-aged Peter Pan.
If you haven’t seen the movie, the basic story is that Peter Pan continues to come see Wendy until she has a granddaughter. Peter Pan falls in love with the granddaughter and gives up his life in Neverland to be with her. Years pass and he forgets he was ever Peter Pan.
Peter (Robin Williams) returns to London to honor Wendy and her work with orphans, which he remembers himself to be. At one point, Wendy asks what Peter is doing now, and he says, “Corporate takeovers.”
Wendy replies, with surprise, “Peter, you’ve become a pirate.”
Well, Captain Hook has been bored all this time without Peter Pan and comes looking for Peter to rekindle the old rivalry by kidnapping Peter’s two children.
As the family returns from their evening out, they find the children gone. They call the police, but the authorities of our world can do nothing in Neverland.
Wendy pulls Peter into her bedroom and tells him, “You must fight, you must crow, you must fly. You must save your children.”
Peter gets confused. He thinks she’s gone batty. Then Wendy delivers one of the greatest lines: “Peter, don’t you know who you are?” Then she opens an old book to show him a picture of a young Peter Pan.
As our world continues to erupt in crisis, either now or in the future or both, I have one question for the Church:
Don’t you know who you are?
You’re the hero of this story. You are the agent of redemption. You’ve been given the ministry of reconciliation.
Not your ministers or professional leaders. You. All of you. Together. You’re the hero.
Stop looking to the authorities of this world to accomplish what can only be affected in the heavenlies, what only you have been anointed to do. Stop looking to governments, political parties, economic systems, religious systems, candidates, celebrities, causes, organizations, or professional ministers to give you hope.
You, the collective YOU, Church, are the hope because the Hope resides in your midst.
The King of kings is your Father. That is more authority by inheritance and promise than any worldly leader could ever attain or gather to him or herself by any means. The will of God always trumps the will of the people.
Who shall we obey, God or man?
You might be confused. You might think I’ve gone batty, but my message is this:
You are the hero of this story.
You must learn to fight. You must learn to crow. You must learn to fly.
The story depends upon the HERO realizing YOUR destiny.
Peace.
November 6th, 2008 at 9:30 pm
Great post, and much needed.
I’m also reminded of Unbreakable, where the realization of the hero’s destiny makes the sadness (despondency) go away.