Mad Max: Fury Road February 14, 2016 Luke 4:1-13 Today is the first Sunday in Lent and for us that means it is also the first Sunday in our Movie Pilgrimage. We are starting with a film called Max Max: Fury Road. How many of you have had a chance to see the movie? I m not going to spend a lot of time explaining the plot of this movie, but I do need to give you the basics. Before the movie begins the world has experienced a nuclear holocaust, our planet Earth has become a desert wasteland and civilization has collapsed. Those who are still alive are fighting over scarce resources such as gasoline and water. One group of survivors lives at a place called The Citadel and this group led by a man named Immortan Joe. He rules with force and he controls a precious supply of underground water. One of the main characters, named Furiosa, is a female soldier in Immortan Joe s army. She is given the task of taking an armoured tanker truck to go and obtain much needed gasoline. She heads out on her journey secretly taking with her Immortan Joes five wives. These women have been selected for breeding purposes and they are basically his slaves. Furiosa has a vague memory of her childhood home, she calls it the Green Place, and her plan is to take the women to this idyllic place where she believes they and their unborn children will be safe. 1
The other main character in the movie is Mad Max. He has been captured by Immortan Joe s army and is being used as a universal blood donor this makes him a priceless commodity. But Max manages to escape and reluctantly joins forces with Furiosa. Max is a loner whose main goal is survival. He believes that he can do that best on his own. When Immortan Joe realizes his wives are gone, he sends his army to chase Furiosa and a lengthy road battle, in the desert wasteland, begins. This movie is an action thriller filled with grotesque costumes, massive vehicles and lots of guns and explosions. Not exactly my favourite genre, but it seems to have caught the eye of the Academy and has been nominated for best picture. So what does Mad Max: Fury Road have in common with today s scripture reading? Let s see... first of all, they are both set in a wilderness, a desert-like landscape, the perfect landscape for this season of Lent. Lent, of course, began last Wednesday and is made up of the forty days leading up to Easter (if you don t include Sundays). This season of Lent is often seen as a time set-apart, a time for reflection, a time for drawing closer to God. Some Christian denominations even emphasize the idea of giving up something for the season of Lent - maybe chocolate, or dessert in general, or some other luxury. This helps set the days of Lent apart from the rest of the year, of making Lent feel more like a wilderness or desert experience. The theme of scarcity, of being without, is another way that our scripture reading and today s movie are 2
connected. According to the scripture, Jesus ate nothing for forty days. In the movie we see Mad Max eating a mutated lizard, another character eating a beetle that lands on him and it becomes clear that breast milk is being harvested for consumption by adults as well as infants. Food and water are both at a premium. In the scripture reading Jesus is being tempted by the devil. He is being tempted with food first, but also with authority and power. In our movie, both of the main characters are facing their own demons. Furiosa, despite being a woman in what is obviously a man s world, has risen to a place of authority and privilege in Joe s army. She is being tempted with the relative safety and security that this position has given her. The easy choice, for her, would be to just stay in Immortan Joe s army and follow his bidding. Mad Max is experiencing flashbacks to previous times in his life when he has known the loss of loved ones and it is obvious that he is plagued with guilt and grief. He just wants to be alone, to have only himself to worry about. He wants to run and certainly doesn t feel that he is capable of caring for anyone else. We all have our demons to face. We may be lonely or depressed, some of us may even be hungry or struggling financially. Maybe we have led lives that are deemed successful in this culture and yet we feel empty, like we are missing something, like we are perpetually thirsty. Maybe we have reasons to feel guilt or remorse or grief. Maybe our demon comes in the form of a physical or mental illness. 3
We know that Jesus was stronger than his demons. He was able to say, No! to the devil who tempted him with food, with fame and even with foolish demonstrations of God s power. In the movie, Furiosa takes the leap and decides to strike out for her own promised land and to take Joe s wives with her. She has a dream of a place of peace and abundance and she is facing her fears in order to get there. Mad Max, despite his need to be alone, finds himself fighting alongside Furiosa and risking his own life to save the women he is travelling with. Where does this strength come from? How do these people have the ability to go against their basic needs of food, shelter and safety in order to fight for justice for others? I believe that George Miller, the writer and director of the movie Mad Max: Fury Road, was asking this same question. At the end of the movie we see the following quote on the screen. It goes by fairly quickly and could easily be ignored by those who are watching but for me it gave the movie a deeper meaning. It made watching all those gun fights and explosions worthwhile. This is what it said: Where must we go, we who wander this wasteland, in search of our better selves? Where must we go? Jesus knew where to go. Whenever he needed help, he went inward, he went to the source of living water inside himself. In fact, today s 4
scripture reading begins with the words, Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan, and was led by the Spirit in the wilderness. Why had Jesus been at the Jordan River? He was there to be baptized by John. Jesus was able to say, No, to the devil because he was tapped into a source of faith, hope and love that fed him in a way that bread, power and glory couldn t even touch. We all have that source of living water within us. In the movie Furiosa tapped into the strength that was within her. When she found out that her Green Place, the place that she remembered, no longer existed, she had the strength to go home and to fight for the life-giving water that resided within the mountains of the Citadel. Mad Max, even in the midst of his pain and his solitary drive for survival, was able to tap into the trace of goodness that remained in his soul. He was able to find that better self within and to stay with Furiosa and the wives until they were safe again. During this season of Lent, this time set apart, I encourage you to tap into your own source of living water: that place within you where the Spirit of Love resides. Even in the wilderness, when the going is painful and dry, even when when all else is gone, God s living water, God s amazing grace, God s eternal love remains. 5