I watched 'The Fountain' (that artistic, “semi-hit” from a year or two ago) the other day. I'm pretty sure it was poignant, well-shot and very deserving of the critical praise that it received. It was also probably an allegory and a metaphor and I’m sure it must have profound implications for us right now, in this very moment. In fact, it’s probably telling me something about eternity, and about how I probably wasted too much time on the couch today. To be honest though I didn't really enjoy the movie, I didn't get it, I think I could have, but I honestly didn't care that much. And it was one of those movies where you have to care to get it (unlike Harold and Kumar, not that you
would care or should care about Harold and Kumar, I'm just saying.) to understand it.

Its how I sometimes feel about church. I see the same exact things that everyone else is seeing but for some reason, it just seems boring, life-less, irrelevant, and I won't use the word unnecessary because I know that sounds terrible and that “Biblically” its on-tap with saying that Paris Hilton is a virgin, but to be honest, it sometimes seems like it.

I did pick up a few things though watching the movie, and so without further introduction, heres my list of what I discovered during my viewing of the 'The Fountain.'

1. That guy, the one who was the fat guy on 'Remember the Titans' and I think 'Varsity
Blues,' and now is on that show that a lot of people find funny but that I've never really watched called 'My name is Earl' was in it.

2. They operated on the monkey of a brain. That was cool. It looked very sweet. It looked exactly how I thought it would look to see a monkey having his brain operated on.

3. Rachel Weise is just beautiful, I mean absolutely gorgeous. She could seriously have fur and I would still be attracted to her (?).

4. I put too much butter on my pop corn.

5. I'd rather watch 3 Ben Afleck movies back to back to back (not including Pearl Harbor or the onewith Matt Damon where he says, "how u like them apples!" but whose title I currently am blanking on) before I watch this movie again.

Speaking of movies, Why do we continue watching-why do we “stick out” movies-that don’t seem to make any sense? Why do we keep watching them even though we can’t see where their going or how all the scenes we’ve seen so far are going to fit together?

We keep watching because we believe it’s going somewhere. At least I suppose. Because we believe-with good evidence, that a creator-a director-has pieced these scenes together-indeed actually chosen them to unfold the very way they are happening. The creator has made a trajectory.

And so even though we don’t like that that one jerk has gotten the girl. And that the nice guy with red hair got killed for some reason, and that the cute blond girl is being blamed for something she obviously didn’t-we keep watching the movie. Because, it’s going somewhere.

Now, I’m not trying to make light of, or wrap a cute bow on what we face in this life-but I do feel the need to encourage and remind us that the lives we live do have trajectories whether they seem very random or not. They are not pieces of a story held together by nothing.

This doesn’t meant that if we walk super close to God that we will be able to fit all we go through together, into some nice puzzle of God’s proved faithfullnes. In short, it doesen’t mean that it will all “make sense” to us as we live our lives. Because often times it simply will not.

The rain falls on the righteous and the unrighteous and God’s ways are higher than ours (aka the jerk will get the girl, the nice red-headed guy will get killed, and the cute blond who did nothing wrong will get blamed).

Life can really hurt and cause our minds to wander when we don’t recognize the inherent story within. The earthly redemption….BUT, central to our faith is the abiding conviction that not only is history going somewhere-but we are too. Our lives (our excitement, our pain, our joy, our outbursts, our relapses, our victories, our transitions yadayada!). Our faiths. Our souls. I need to know that. I need to believe that.

-kevin j.