The irony is that Rose’s background in the story was one that would have justified hatred. She’d been raised in a mining colony, lost everything and joined the rebellion to fight the war. The movie started with her sister playing a pivotal role and being killed in the opening battle scene. She had every right to hate her enemy. In fact, she didn’t say that she didn’t hate, but had something to save that was more valuable to her than the hate.
I understand Finn though. Hatred is powerful. Hatred can be motivating and can be disguised by the feeling that you are actually protecting something. I mean, in Finn’s case he was.
I’ve been thinking
on this concept the past months.
Hatred impacts us
negatively more than the person it’s directed towards. Justifying it doesn’t make it okay but the
knowledge that it’s not okay doesn’t change the feelings or the hurt that led to
the hatred. We know better than to
hate. It’s not nice but we still do
it. Self-justified hatred is even more debilitating
and consuming. When it is justified
there is this need to defend or protect something or someone. Sometimes it’s all you can do to just try to
let go and rest in God’s grace. Most
times, it takes an act of God to do the letting go for us as we mask hatred
with justifiable reasons.
I’m generally a
passionate person which I’ve realized over the last year can leave me with the
constant reality of checking emotions, feistiness levels, self-filters and
staying out of my own head when trying to recognize where others are at in
situations.
I can only think of
one time I genuinely hated. Frustrated? Sure. Hatred
though runs deep and is a rare emotion that if I’ve gotten that far with I am able
to soundly justify it. I can guarantee that
it’s deserved and that I’m “protecting” something; but at what cost?
While wrestling
through some of these concepts of hate and grace a few Bible stories were laid
on my heart to read, re-read and dwell in. By laid on
my heart I mean I couldn’t get away from them.
They kept appearing in different areas of my life randomly to the point
where my mom mentioned one of them and I inwardly rolled my eyes at God and his
sense of humor in how He loves me. Sometimes
when I read stories or dialogues in the Bible I try to picture how I would
respond in that moment without knowing the end of the story, or how a
conversation would look in modern day times.
I was reminded of
two cities in the Bible where God’s judgement was carried out. Two cities where the communities reached a
point where God decided wickedness was so great they needed to be destroyed, Sodom
and Nineveh. Two very different towns and
characters in the story deserving of God’s judgement….and God’s grace.
The Bible is a
gruesome book depicting humanity. When I
reference Sodom and Nineveh as “wicked” know that the things being done in the
cities were far beyond what any of us would consider a political difference or
disagreements on life choices. There was
attempted gang rape to men, torturous murder and other acts of wickedness
occurring…. this wasn’t just a confused people in need of a cultural hand slap. They were wicked to their core.
Sodom (Spoiler alert: Sodom
gets destroyed)
In Sodom we have
Lot, the nephew of Abraham (a big name in the Bible). He would have been present in Abraham’s life
and seen God’s provision multiple times even in Abraham’s weaknesses. Eventually they parted ways to avoid strife
because their wealth was too much and their people were fighting. When they split up, Lot chose the Jordan
valley and moved his tents to Sodom. It
was already noted that the men of Sodom were wicked yet Lot still chose to move
into that.
The people of Sodom’s
wickedness became so great that God destroyed the city. God chose to reveal his intentions toward Sodom
to Abraham and rather than Abraham saying “it’s about time God, they’ve had it
coming,” he pleaded with God to save the city if as few as ten righteous people
were there, and God agrees. Genesis 19
relays the story of two angels who go to the city to destroy it. They stay with Lot who meets them at the gate
(probably not coincidentally on God’s part) but do not find righteous people in
Sodom. Instead they encounter the wickedness
of Sodom.
The men of the city
show up at Lot’s house and ask him to hand over the angel guests so that they
can rape them. Such was the wickedness
of Sodom. Lot even offers his virgin daughters
(who were engaged to other men) to the men of the city to appease them. Lot’s “generous” offer was turned down and
the Sodom men tell him they will do worse to Lot. It got so bad that the angels blinded the men
of the city with bright light and the men still didn’t back down, they just wore
themselves out groping for the door. I
can’t imagine the wickedness of a city reaching this level.
What is even more
interesting to me about Sodom is Lot’s response. After all of this, the angels tell Lot to get
out of the city and to take everyone he has because they are going to destroy
it. Lot tells his sons-in-law to get out
of the city because the Lord was going to destroy it but they thought he was
joking (I wonder if their relationship was strained after he offered their
virgin fiancés to the men of the city).
In Genesis 19:16 we
see Lot’s response to his city being destroyed.
The angels urged him to leave…. “But he lingered.” He lingered to the point where the angels had
to actually seize him, his wife and daughters by the hand and take them out of
the city. The angels tell him to escape
to the hills but Lot still pushes back and boldly asks if he can escape to a
different little city nearby instead.
The story goes on
and never discusses Abraham and Lot being reunited after Lot lost
everything. He instead ends up living in
a cave with some awkward family dynamics which lead to him becoming the father
of all Moabites (Ruth’s people from the book of Ruth).
In the destruction
of Sodom, God remembered Abraham and showed mercy towards his family in spite
of them lingering and not trusting God in that moment.
Abraham had no
reason to ask God to show mercy on this wicked city. He would’ve known how wicked it was. He started pleading for God saving the city
at 50 righteous people, but continued to lower that number in contemplation of
how many would actually be present in the city.
Obviously, not even ten. Not even
Lot’s own family.
I hope in this
scenario I would just get out of the city. I can’t imagine lingering if God
told me the city was being destroyed and to get out. I can be more sympathetic towards Lot when I
realize if my city, friends, future in-laws, and life as I knew it was going to
be destroyed…. I would probably linger too.
In this story God’s
grace and mercy is given to Lot in spite of him as God destroys an entire city
in judgement. It never says that Lot was
found to be righteous or that he was only one of ten righteous, or anything remotely
to being righteous, but instead that God remembered Abraham and sent Lot out of
the city when he destroyed it. God saved
him in spite of him.
Nineveh (Spoiler Alert:
Nineveh survives)
Then we have
Nineveh! A completely different city in
the book of Jonah. For context, Nineveh
was located in modern day northern Iraq.
It was also a city known for its wickedness. God instructed Jonah to go preach against it
and instead Jonah fled from God’s presence.
Can you blame him? Rather than go
to the wicked city he decides it would be better to leave his fate to God and
just go in the opposite direction. I can
sometimes relate to that.
To calm a storm
Jonah tells sailors to throw him overboard to die rather than following what
God has asked of him. God doesn’t let
him get away with that and “rescues him” by having a fish swallow him. In the meantime, the pagan sailors end up
crying out to God in spite of Jonah’s actions as a believer in God.
Jonah eventually
ends up in Nineveh, by no effort on his part, and he finally goes and preaches to
Nineveh. When I say no effort, I
literally mean no effort. According to Jonah
3 it would have taken Jonah three days to go through the city yet Jonah only
spent ONE day. The message he preached
was simply, “Forty more days and Nineveh will be overthrown.” He actually doesn’t talk about mercy or grace
but just coming destruction. The word
spread and the people called on God in spite of Jonah. There are theories that Jonah would have had
bleached white skin and looked inhuman after spending three days in a fish
which may have put a little more weight to his words.
In the end, God heard
their repentance and spared the city.
This would generally be FANTASTIC news.
Jonah, however, in
his justified hatred of their wickedness ended up sitting bitterly on a hill
waiting for God to destroy the city and was mad at God when he didn’t destroy
them. Jonah was only hurting himself in
his hatred and bitterness.
Jonah wasn’t
fighting for what he loved. He wasn’t
fighting for God. He was fighting
against what he hated. He may have even
thought that he WAS fighting for what he loved and that their wickedness deserved
judgement. What he hated was wickedness
manifested in people but was unable to separate them and look at them as people
that God actually loved and redeemed.
I’ve found these
stories and characters relatable in my own life as I navigate hurt and anger
and recognize God’s response as different than man’s response. We have Nineveh where Jonah sits to judge and
remains angry at God’s grace. There are
times when I have seen people hurt me or others and it’s hard not to be angry
and to trust God in that. Then we have
Lot who is afraid to leave his city on the brink of destruction for the
unknown. Fear drives him to living in
caves away from everyone including Abraham, the very person who pleaded with
God for mercy.
God used Jonah in
spite of Jonah. There was nothing Jonah did
on his own or wanted to do to be used. God
saved Lot in spite of Lot. There was
nothing Lot did or wanted to do to be saved.
When I read these
stories it’s easy to think that these characters were ridiculous. Of course, you would want to see an entire city
repent and saved! Of course, you want to
leave a city where the wickedness is so great and would be thankful for God
rescuing you.
But in reality, if we were there, would we? Would we give up our justified hatred to
fight for the things we love or to fight for the people God loves? Would we humbly follow God out of the city
without negotiating first? Would we be Finn and convince ourselves that the only way is our heroic self? Thank God we
have a God that loves us enough to know that we can’t and who does it for us in
spite of us.
