New World Get real. Romans 8:18-25 Rev. John H. Hice August 23, 2015 Royal Oak First United Methodist Church, Royal Oak, Michigan Fake World Every morning Truman Burbank leaves his front door on his way to work and sees the neighbors across the street: a dad and a mom holding a pretty little girl. Good morning, he says with a wave. Good morning! they wave back. Then Truman adds, And in case I don t see ya: good afternoon, good evening, and goodnight. He adds another wave, and a bow to the side with a big-toothy smile; then bounds down his porch steps and off to the car. 1 The first time I saw The Truman Show it felt like the whole scene was a little bit of a put on. Oh well, I quickly passed it off. The Truman Show is a very different story about a man who was selected at birth to be the star of a 24 hour-a-day, 7 day-a-week reality show. He grows up to adulthood without ever knowing that his world is really a huge studio set: from the manufactured domed sky above him to the sea beyond the port. All the other people in his world are actors hundreds of them who all play into the façade Truman is made to believe. And the 5,000 tiny cameras that are placed throughout his world pick up everything he does and everything he says. We ve become bored with actors giving us phony emotions. We ve become tired of pyrotechnics and special effects. While the world he inhabits is in some respects counterfeit, there s nothing fake about Truman himself. That s the analysis of the mastermind behind all this: Christof, the producer who refers to himself as the creator. He goes on to describe it: No scripts. No cue cards. It isn t always Shakespeare but it s genuine. It s a life. 2 The actor who plays Truman s best friend says, Nothing you see here on this show is fake. It s merely controlled. And it s watched by millions of people around the world: two old ladies sitting on their couch; two bar maids in front of a tavern full of people all eyes glued on the set; a guy in a bath tub who never seems to leave; a couple of security guards eating pizza as they watch. All eyes are on Truman and the unfolding story of his life, especially during 1
the course of the film, which develops his growing awareness that his world is, indeed, not what it seems. The only way the producers can contain him is control by fear. They make him afraid of the water, afraid of the world beyond Sea Island, afraid of anything that isn t familiar. At least they try. The question that looms over the course of the story is: which world is real? Is it the world out here or the world manufactured by Christof and his staff of producers and actors? Indeed, which is the real world? For that matter, how real is ours? Throughout the course of your day, you re likely to run into people with toothy smiles and friendly waves who are simply wearing the actor s mask. You won t know what is really going on underneath. Are they seething with anger? Worry? Grief? Are they feeling giddy with news that really delights? Are they harboring plans you wouldn t like? The real world can be filled with actors. You could be one, yourself. Christof s judgment of the world out here might be deadly right. There s so much that isn t the way you d think it s supposed to be. Politicians seem incapable of entering honest debate without unleashing disrespect. They seem more bent on destroying their competition than leadership. The stock market tumbles in free-fall when someone in the world makes a wrong policy move. Jobs are lost. Lives get ruined. Others take advantage and get rich. In Ferguson, Missouri this week a 9 year old was shot and killed as she was doing homework, sitting on her mother s bed at home. It apparently had something to do with the resurgence of protests over police brutality and racism. Next door a neighbor had posted a sign that reads WE MUST STOP KILLING EACH OTHER. 3 And yet we don t. After the hottest month on record in a year that promises to be the hottest year on record, you may challenge the veracity of those who conclude the earth s climate is changing. 4 But the facts that a mass-extinction of species has taken place in the last 100 years that has no precedence since a large asteroid struck the earth and wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago mass extinction, and all indications point to a human cause. 5 2
Breaking Out Christof has a point. The world is full of lies and deceit. Perhaps it can be said that the universe we live in is counterfeit, itself. The author of the Book of Romans thought so. Paul wrote: Creation was subjected to frustration, not by its own choice it was the choice of the one who subjected it but in the hope that the creation itself will be set free from slavery to decay and brought into the glorious freedom of God s children. Creation itself, he says, is in bondage. It s not what it appears to be. Human sin, in league with the powers of evil, have subjected the whole place to violence and futility. It s like the failure in our relationship with God has created a cosmic wrinkle in the whole of the universe. Nothing is entirely right. 6 The world in fact the universe needs to have its own exodus from bondage and decay to the glory that awaits us up-ahead. The fundamental promise of the Christian Faith is that the destructiveness of our artificial lives may be healed by God through the saving power of Jesus who died for us. Look at the Resurrected Christ and you don t see anything fake. You see nothing but authenticity. You see nothing but glory. That s what s going to save you from everything false and damaging. And that glory will be yours. This is what is meant when Christians say, Redemption. And Paul is saying that the entire cosmos, also subjected to futility because of us, is waiting on tip-toes to be rescued from its counterfeit prison and share that redemption with us. Who knew? Your redemption makes a difference to the Universe! Back to Truman. His journey to reality started a long time before, when he was still in college. An actress assigned to a bit part snatched more of a role than she was supposed to have. She encountered him and they fell in love. Their time was brief, but Sylvia was honest. No one else told the truth. She told him about his world being fake and that everyone was watching him. Now he can t keep Sylvia out of his mind. He s in love with her. More and more, he sees mistakes on his world-set that wouldn t make sense if his world were real. Then finally he breaks free. 3
He sneaks out of his basement and evades the cameras, finds his way to the sea and, in spite of his fear, he sails off through the night. Once the producers spot him, he s in the middle of the vast water on his way to the horizon, where the fake sky meets the water. Christof, convinced that Truman really prefers his prison of artificiality, had said that if he was absolutely determined to discover the truth, there was no way they could stop him. Now, when it comes down to it, the producer is almost willing to kill him. He manufactures a storm and overturns the boat; and Truman almost drowns before Christof relents. The storm ceases and eventually the boat hits and breaks through the backdrop of the sky where Truman walks along the walkway to stairs that lead to an exit door. If you really want to know the truth, you need to believe in more than what you see. You need to know that perfect love casts out fear and that love can motivate you to push beyond your limits to touch the very edge The Truman Show is science fiction, which on the one hand can mess with your mind and not make sense at all. On the other, it can open your eyes to see your own world with new and helpful realizations. Some interpreters have concluded that the story as an anti-christian statement, suggesting that Christof represents a manipulative creator-god manipulating people for his own amusement. Then Truman becomes the hero who uncovers this god s capriciousness and finds out the truth and makes his own way in world that, for all its faults, has more truth in it than the world religion makes. I don t think so. I think Christof is someone who tries to take the place of God and even gets to thinking that s who he is. In the end, all his work unravels. His world can t be made to work. Finally the self-proclaimed creator of the TV show speaks to Truman from the sky, coaxing him to stay where he won t be afraid, where he can be kept safe. Truman finally decides. His last words to Christof are delivered with that same fake smile he wore every morning as he says Good afternoon, good evening, and goodnight, and he takes a bow: an actor just like all the rest; then walks through the door into the real world. Television Transmission is ended and the world of viewers goes wild. It s rather Sylvia who points Truman to something more. She bears the truth. She reveals the truth for him letting him see his world for the sham it is and giving him glimpse the truth that is beyond. As you ll see in a moment, she watches Truman at his moment of decision and prays, Please God (then says to Truman) You can do it. 4
Redemption 1. The certain power of faith. Redemption comes when in believing Jesus, we stop listening to the voices that tell us this is all there is. Redemption comes when the crucified and resurrected Lord draws us into the love of God. A love that overcomes fear. Love that brings us to venture and hope and strive for something better. Love that gives us power to be real to each other and ourselves. 2. Redemption of the Faithful and the Universe. Redemption comes in God s truth. And when redemption is complete in us, the whole universe will be free. 1 The Truman Show, written by Andrew Niccol, directed by Peter Weir, produced by Scott Rudin Productions, Distributed by Paramount Pictures. Copyright 1998. DVD Chapter 2, Day 10,909. 2 Ibid., DVD Chapter 1. 3 Jason Molinet, 'Didn't even get to see the rest of the world': Ferguson 9-year-old girl shot dead doing homework on mom's bed: cops, New York Daily News. August 20, 2015. http://www.nydailynews.com/news/crime/ferguson-9-yearold-girl-shot-dead-homework-bed-article-1.2331544?cid=msn. 4 Mariano Castillo and Brandon Miller, NOAA: July hottest month on record, and 2015 could be hottest year, CNN. August 20, 2015. http://www.cnn.com/2015/08/20/us/noaa-global-climate-analysis/. 5 Katharine Lackey, Study: 6th mass extinction already underway -- and we're the cause, USA Today. June 25, 2015. http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/06/20/sixth-mass-extinction-study/29028887/. 6 Wright, N.T., The Letter to the Romans, The New Interpreter s Bible Commentary, vol. X. Nashville: Abingdon Press. Copyright 2002. p 596. 5