Two Reviews of The Passion

Two Reviews of The Passion

I’ve devoted a remarkable amount of space to The Passion, and it’s time to bring some closure to that chapter by posting two brief reviews of the movie. Please read them both, and thanks to all of you who have read my reviews of other “Jesus movies” and sent along notes of encouragement.

Review #2: “For me, who Him to death pursued…”

One of the marks of the uniqueness of The Passion is the fact that so many people have blogged their personal reaction separate from their review of the film. There are a number of reasons for this, but the most important one for me is that this movie concerns the core beliefs of my life. Everything about me that I carry about in my life and will hold on to in my dying is conveyed in this film. Unlike any other movie I’ve ever seen, I am totally, personally involved with the story, and of course, with the main character. Many other Christians apparently have similar feelings.

For that reason, a personal reaction needs to be separated from a review. Bias isn’t the right word to describe what I mean. The word has to be something like “conviction.” I am convinced that the events pictured in The Passion are the defining events of all human history. No matter what happens anywhere, anytime that shapes our world, what happened in those 12 hours matters more. This isn’t an argument, or even an opinion like other opinions that I feel strongly about. This is a conviction. An anchor. A definition of truth for me, and for millions of others.

I am not a “crier” in movies. I can tear up at a sentimental scene, and I can get choked up as well. But for me to weep in a theater is unthinkable. Particularly when I have spent months blogging, reading and researching the film. I knew what was coming at every turn. Yet, I was deeply and emotionally moved by the film. Not so much by the cinema, as by the connections made with my own life and experience.

This is the Jesus to whom I’ve entrusted my life. This is the Jesus I’ve raised my children to believe in. It’s the Jesus I told my father to trust as he declined and died. It’s the Jesus I preach about and offer every week. I Peter says that we do not see him, yet we love him, and that is true. When Mel Gibson is able, through film, to connect me to this person for two hours, I am going to be emotional.

As I have blogged in this space and elsewhere, Jesus movies are a hobby of mine. Only in rare instances do those movies cause me to feel genuine emotion. When the shepherds kneel before the baby in Jesus of Nazareth. When Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” in The Gospel of John. But in this film I cried often.

Not at the violence. The beating of Jesus was a part of the movie I had researched extensively, and I believe Gibson exaggerated it beyond what we can know. (In fact, showing the soldiers going beyond their orders to beat/whip Jesus 80+ times was a flaw.) What moved me were two things:

I was deeply moved by the forgiveness Jesus showed to his tormenters. This wasn’t just a mumbled line, it was an intense embracing of the very meaning of grace. “While we were yet sinners, Christ died for us.” Jesus repeated words of forgiveness and mercy for those killing him stands in start contrast to human nature on so many levels, from the way we treat one another in ordinary relationships, to the violence in the Madrid subways.

I was also deeply affected by the clear intention of Jesus to embrace this death as our salvation. From the beginning to the end of the film, and many times throughout, Gibson again and again gives us opportunity to see a Christ embracing the cross, and fully aware that by his death, he makes “all things new.” That Jesus endured the cross “for the joy set before him, despising the shame..,” was a deeply personal encounter with the love of God for the likes of me.

Charles Wesley said, “… Died He for me, who caused His pain–for me, who Him to death pursued?” In The Passion, I deeply felt the truth of those words.

I am 47 years old. Old enough to have done many things that I regret. Most of my sins are the stale sins of our American culture. I can easily forgive myself for them, and I do not struggle with the forgiveness of God. This is wrong, because all sin is rebellion against God’s goodness and holiness, and all sin is part of why Jesus suffered and died. But that is the truth.

Of course, there are many sins that I cannot overlook, and that I know are wrong. I have confessed them, and I believe God has forgiven me for Christ’s sake. I can preach that Christ forgives sinners, and I know the truth of what I am saying.

Yet, in those 47 years, there is one sin- one season of sin really- that has escaped any kind of forgiveness. It was premeditated through years of wrong thoughts and actions. It hurt me, and those I love. It was the sort of sin the Bible points out as being heinous and life-ruining. I once knew the mental gymnastics to believe I could excuse myself from it, but I am past that now. I know it for what it is: the very worst thing I have ever done. My lowest, most wretched human moment.

And I have never been able to walk out of a church and feel that this matter was done. It followed me and taunted me over months and years. I never felt that God had forgiven me, even if I said I believed it. Maybe because the repercussions of this sin continue even today. Maybe because my conscience is outraged on a delayed schedule. Maybe because Satan is an accuser. I don’t know, but I have never felt forgiven for the worst thing I’ve ever done.

Until last Tuesday. When the stripes that healed me were repeatedly in my eyes and ears. Till the blood that covered my sin was lying in pools for me to see. Until the body of Jesus, broken for me, was whipped and nailed and pulled apart before me. Until I saw Jesus enduring what I should endure, and then saying “It is accomplished.” I cried. And I left that theater like I was leaving the most sacred church in all Christendom. Forgiven.

The Passion is a strong and provocative piece of art. It is offensive and controversial. At this moment, I don’t know if I will ever see it again. It doesn’t matter. For a few moments, the art of Mel Gibson made the Gospel blessedly real to me. As a soldier knelt there, showered in blood and water, I thought “That is me. My sin. My wretched choice. His innocence. His blood. My forgiveness.”

What anyone else may have thought or experienced doesn’t matter as much to me as that moment. Why didn’t I find this same forgiveness in some sermon or book? I don’t know. Why am I so hard, that it takes this brutalizing film to bring home to me the simple message of substitution and atonement? I do not know.

My personal reaction to The Passion isn’t an attempt to say it is flawless or anointed or that you should see it. All I can say is that for a few moments, the artist allowed me into that place where Christ’s suffering, and my sin could meet. And I could leave forgiven.

(Here’s my previous review of the film. Not quite as personal 🙂