(WARNING: The following article includes discussion of one scene from the movie, Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest. Although the plot and the ending are not revealed, you may want to withhold reading if you’ve planned to see the movie but haven’t yet.)
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About a year and half ago, I used my Netflix subscription to order Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Having enjoyed the movie, I naturally desired to see the sequel when it was released a little more than a month ago. This past week, my wife, Linda, and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary by having dinner together at our favorite restaurant and then catching the movie that we had been longing to see all summer... Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man’s Chest.
There is a pivotal scene in the movie when Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) tempts the damsel, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley), to become a ruthless pirate. Elizabeth responds by tempting the pirate, Jack Sparrow, to become a “good” man.
I immediately began to reflect upon this scene as it unfolded in the movie. There should be no doubt that this movie has redemption as its theme. However, in the real world, there is no redemption apart from grace. It is much easier for Elizabeth to be tempted into becoming a pirate than it is for Jack to be tempted into becoming “good.” In fact, the Gospel of Mark, chapter 10, verse 18, reminds us that no one is good except God.
What one learns later in the movie probably speaks more to the reality of human nature when the viewer sees that there is a little bit of pirate in Elizabeth after all.
Isn’t that in fact the reality of human nature? Our problem is that there is a little a bit of pirate in us all, and if it were not for God’s common grace, there would be a whole lot of pirate in us all. And as for anyone being “good,” there is the exercise of God’s special grace in which the righteousness of Christ is attributed to our account, and we are found to be “good” only in Him. Thus, we are not good according to our own goodness, but we our viewed by God as being good because He has given us Christ’s goodness while laying upon Christ our sin and paying the debt of our sin on the cross.
This all reminds me of a conversation that I had with a gentleman in a hospital waiting room back when the “DC Sniper” was still on the loose. We were watching the TV in the waiting room as another news report of the sniper’s latest attack was being broadcast, and the gentleman looked at me and said something about there being only a few such people as the sniper in the world and that most people were typically good. I politely disagreed with the man because apart from God’s grace we would all be “pirates” preying upon each other on the open road as the sniper was doing.
Yes, there is a little bit of pirate in us all, but thanks be unto God who has the power to transform us by His grace from being ruthless pirates to being members of His royal navy.
BB
*****************************************************
About a year and half ago, I used my Netflix subscription to order Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. Having enjoyed the movie, I naturally desired to see the sequel when it was released a little more than a month ago. This past week, my wife, Linda, and I celebrated our tenth wedding anniversary by having dinner together at our favorite restaurant and then catching the movie that we had been longing to see all summer... Pirates of the Caribbean 2: Dead Man’s Chest.
There is a pivotal scene in the movie when Captain Jack Sparrow (Johnny Depp) tempts the damsel, Elizabeth Swann (Keira Knightley), to become a ruthless pirate. Elizabeth responds by tempting the pirate, Jack Sparrow, to become a “good” man.
I immediately began to reflect upon this scene as it unfolded in the movie. There should be no doubt that this movie has redemption as its theme. However, in the real world, there is no redemption apart from grace. It is much easier for Elizabeth to be tempted into becoming a pirate than it is for Jack to be tempted into becoming “good.” In fact, the Gospel of Mark, chapter 10, verse 18, reminds us that no one is good except God.
What one learns later in the movie probably speaks more to the reality of human nature when the viewer sees that there is a little bit of pirate in Elizabeth after all.
Isn’t that in fact the reality of human nature? Our problem is that there is a little a bit of pirate in us all, and if it were not for God’s common grace, there would be a whole lot of pirate in us all. And as for anyone being “good,” there is the exercise of God’s special grace in which the righteousness of Christ is attributed to our account, and we are found to be “good” only in Him. Thus, we are not good according to our own goodness, but we our viewed by God as being good because He has given us Christ’s goodness while laying upon Christ our sin and paying the debt of our sin on the cross.
This all reminds me of a conversation that I had with a gentleman in a hospital waiting room back when the “DC Sniper” was still on the loose. We were watching the TV in the waiting room as another news report of the sniper’s latest attack was being broadcast, and the gentleman looked at me and said something about there being only a few such people as the sniper in the world and that most people were typically good. I politely disagreed with the man because apart from God’s grace we would all be “pirates” preying upon each other on the open road as the sniper was doing.
Yes, there is a little bit of pirate in us all, but thanks be unto God who has the power to transform us by His grace from being ruthless pirates to being members of His royal navy.
BB
1 comment:
Great post Billy. I confess, at one time I thought I could have been a good pirate.
You know they're still out there. If you haven't seen Life Aquatic (not one for little ears), there are some great scenes involving modern day pirates.
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