I miss Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles. I watched it when it was on TV and caught many episodes. Then I got season 1 on DVD for Christmas and used a gift card to buy season 2. And that’s it. It was canceled by Fox after only two seasons. Why? The simplest answer is that it never got the ratings Fox was looking for. Fox can be ruthless with even good shows that don’t make it. Firefly was another excellent show they killed.

I like Sarah Connor for a number of reasons. It was a thoughtful show with tight writing. It explored an interesting universe. I liked all of the actors. It just had a good chemistry. But there was more to it.

James Cameron wrote and directed the first two Terminator movies. He is very much anti-Christianity but Christian themes still came through in Terminator. Miraculous birth of the savior of humanity. In Terminator 2 we see Sarah Connor as a driven woman at the beginning but when she goes to kill Miles Dyson, the man who is reverse engineering the remains of the Terminator from the first film, she can’t. In the pinch Sarah finds that human life is special and I think in that moment she saw herself behaving more like a Terminator than a human.

Sarah Conner Chronicles picks up at the end of T2 and time jumps past the events of that horrible T3 film. So the Sarah we see in the TV series is the Sarah we saw in T2. A tough woman, not the cupcake who needed to be protected, she kicks metal butt. And she cares for people too. “Human life is sacred” is a lesson an artificial intelligence is taught in the series.

But the Christianity in the TV series is much more blatant than that. The FBI agent assigned to investigate Miles Dyson’s death is a Christian. Agent Ellison carries a Bible and even gives it to a fleeing couple. He is seen in a small group reading the Bible together. Scripture is quoted quite often and not in a demeaning manner. It is actually a development point of the story. Even the music often contains religious messages. When the FBI raids the home of the man they believe has murdered a number of people (he’s been replaced by a Terminator) the music that starts playing is Johnny Cash’s “When The Man Comes Around”. It starts and ends with Johnny reading from Revelation and the song itself is about Jesus’ return. That ends season 1. Season 2 starts with a song about Samson and Delilah. In season 2 the Connors are hiding in a church. Derek, a solider from the future who is working with them, when asked what he did all night, he points to the large crucifix and says “I spent the night talking to him.”

The show is dripping with scripture. No wonder it was cancelled. Hollywood doesn’t often know what to do with faith in film. Often black people are allowed to be believers (Ellison is black) but white people who have faith are either the bad guys or idiots. To see Christianity treated so carefully and kindly in a TV series is rare. And I wonder if it cost Terminator: Sarah Connor Chronicles a longer run? Surely it was the ratings, right? Either way, I am enjoying slowly working through each episode and enjoying the little bit we got. Maybe, like Firefly, Sarah Conner will get a film made to wrap it up. Probably only be a TV movie but I’d be happy with that. The forth movie, Terminator Salvation was horrible. I hope the franchise doesn’t end on that note. The entire thing has been sold and there are talks about T5 & 6 but I don’t know how they’ll recover the movie series after that.

Bob Zerhausen wrote an article a long time ago that explains the miracle in Acts 2 not as the Apostles speaking in languages they didn’t know, rather that they were all speaking in Greek. The lingua franca of all the places mentioned there was Greek. So why were people amazed at that? Because, Bob maintains, the event took place at the temple and only the sacred tongue of Hebrew would be spoken there. So it was an amazing thing to hear people at the temple speaking in the common tongue.

Yeah, I didn’t buy it either and Bob and I have been round and round about the problems with that interpretation. Not the least of which is the fact that the temple is not mentioned in Acts 2.

Today as I’m studying Nehemiah 8 something hit me. The people gather, Ezra prays and reads the Law and a group of men explain it. For me, this is the high point of Nehemiah. It shows the covenant community returning to their covenantal center with all their heart.

And what this has to do with Bob’s idea is that it didn’t take place at the temple. It took place at the Water Gate which was in the City of David, a district on the other side of Jerusalem. Bob claims that the only place in Jerusalem you could get 3,000 people together to hear the Apostles would be at the temple and therefore the Apostles must have moved there from their upper room. But that isn’t what we see in Nehemiah 8. The people gathered at a convenient spot and a big city gate was opened enough for them.

To be fair, there are a lot of differences between Nehemiah and Acts. Centuries had passed. Jerusalem at Nehemiah’s time was a mess except for the rebuilt temple and the city walls. In Acts, the city had grown considerably. In Acts we’re told explicitly how many people were there and in Nehemiah we’re not.

All of that not withstanding, it is still a remarkable thing that Nehemiah 8 did not take place at the temple. I mean it was a significantly religious event. If I were the planner the temple would have been the first place I would have thought of. The city was in bad shape but the temple had been rebuilt so that is something too.

Super Bowl. Football. Food. Commercials. Fellowship. Ah, the great American past time.  I want to comment on the commercials for a moment. Some were offensive, some were funny, some were stupid. Then there was a moderate flap over the Tim Tebow/Focus on the Family spot. NOW was still rather bothered about it but not all feminists are on board with them. ’nuff about that.

Of all the commercials that I actually watched, the one that stood out was one for the Dodge Charger titled “Mans Last Stand” (a car I’d like as a mid-life crisis present, please). It shows a series of men with a voice over promising to do things like put the seat down, eating fruit for breakfast and putting underwear in the basket. (Men’s underwear was a theme this year, apparently.) After reciting a list of things he will do, the voice over ends with “And because I do this…” and cuts to the Charger racing around looking manly.

What bugged me is was how immature the whole premise is. Basically the message was “Be a good boy and you’ll get to play.” That’s it? Really? Why can’t we do at least some of those things because they’re the right thing to do? Why can’t we get a car because we want a car? A lot of the problems we face in American (and Western) culture comes from the fact that men don’t want to grow up and this kind of advertising really underscores that problem.

To me there is difference between a holiday, a Federal holiday and a national holiday. A holiday is a religious observation. A Federal holiday are those days the Feds take off like Martin Luther King Jr. Day and Christmas. But a national holiday is not formally recognized by either church or state. These days national holidays seem to be driven by retail marketing. For example

• Valentines Day – Used to be St. Valentines day when I was a kid. A day to be humiliated at school when you only got Valentines cards from girls you didn’t like and you got a lot less than anyone else. This is a chance to sell cards, flowers and chocolate. Before that, it was the feast day of fairly unknown saint in the Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Church.
• St. Patrick’s Day – A day to drink green beer and wear green cloths. At least this one got to keep the honorific. Go to a retail outlet on this day and you’ll see shamrocks and a lot of green. A chance to sell beer and corned beef and cabbage. No mention of the man who was kidnapped and made a slave in Ireland only to escape and return years later to bring Christianity to the island.
• Cinco De Mayo – This is a recently invented/imported American national holiday. Started out as a commemoration of the 1860s resistance of Mexico to paying taxes to France. Practically ignored in Mexico but we had to market to Hispanics some how so America started celebrating it. An opportunity to market Mexican beer and food.
• Christmas – The daddy of them all. This national holiday drives the American economy in a many ways. Originally a very religious holiday, celebrating the incarnation of Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, as a national holiday it features Santa Claus or Chris Cringle, Frosty the Snowman and Johnny Mathis. The number of secular “Christmas Songs” is rising but we still get to hear Christmas carols between “Rockin’ Around The Christmas Tree” and “Santa Baby”.

But, I would have to say that the most American of the national holidays would have to be Super Bowl Sunday! Why would I say that? Because it is the only national holiday whose name is trademarked. If you go to a grocery store in the week or two before the big game, odds are that you’ll find a ton of food with generic football players on the signage and talk about “The Big Game” but you won’t see “Super Bowl” too often. To use that name in your marketing, you have to pay the NFL. But “The Big Game” drives a LOT of beer, chip and guacamole sales at retail outlets even if you can’t mention the name of the game or use images of the teams playing in it.

Don’t think it is a national holiday? When I was driving home from a Super Bowl party at a friend’s last night I passed a high school. The sign out front said that Monday morning the buses would be run an hour and a half late. Why? Because of the Super Bowl on Sunday night. Also, commercial airtime goes for $1m/minute. Major acts do the halftime show. It is a big deal. And it is all trademarked. Amazing. I think the Superb Owl (an attempt to get around the trademarked name) is clearly a national holiday and I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t become a federal holiday too. The question is whether the Super Bowl has, on its own, grown into a religious holiday or not? Hummm

This morning I read an odd convergence of things that came together to remind me about practical theology. Practical Theology  in formal education often involves subjects like pastoral care, preaching, administration, etc. The other part of theology is systematic or Biblical or something like that. But what I read this morning reminded me that all theology is practical theology.

First, I was cruising the latest Christianity Today and saw a photo of some Ugandan protesters. Uganda passed a very strong law against homosexuality recently and it is causing a bit of a stir in the international community. I listen to BBC World Update in the morning on the way to the train and the reporting they did on this story was telling. They reported the facts and then repeatedly intimated that the reason the law got passed was because of the interference of American Evangelicals. A week or so later they interviewed a young, gay Ugandan man who claimed that the reason people voted for the law was because American Evangelicals paid them.  In good investigative reporting, you’d expect some push back on that claim and the BBC interviewer did ask, “How do you know that?” The man said that he’d read it on the internet. I was amazed when the interviewer just let that pass. And again before the close of the story there was a reference to the interference of American Evangelicals. The Christianity Today article covers this story and reports not that us rich American Evangelicals are funneling money to pay Ugandans to vote, but it did talk about some of the turmoil in evangelicalism over this issue. Rick Warran and Chuck Colson have made statements opposing the law while other evangelicals support it.

Then I read half way through another CT story, this time about sports and Christianity by Shirl James Hoffman. In it she seems to be unable to sports and Christianity.

[Described] by those inside and outside as narcissistic, materialistic, violent, sensationalist, coarse, racist, sexist, brazen, raunchy, hedonistic, body-destroying, and militaristic, big-time sports culture lifts up values in sharp contrast with what Christians for centuries have understood as the embodiment of the Gospel.

So how can so many Christians work in it? How can they knock a man to the ground and then point to the sky to thank God? I haven’t finished the article so I don’t know if Shirl ever resolves the issue but the question is thought provoking.

Finally, I read Isaiah 36 & 37. Sennacherib comes to invade Judah and sends the Rabshakeh to wage the campaign. The Rabshakeh pulls up to the walls of Jerusalem and begins to explain the way things are to the inhabitants. Disconcerting to the city’s leadership is that the Rabshakeh does it in Hebrew. They ask that he speak in Aramaic but he refuses. The guards on the wall can fully understand all that he is saying.

The first part of his speech is actually pretty good for a foreigner. He saw that Hezekiah had torn down the altars and high places and he assumes that these were holy places dedicated to Yahweh. He’s wrong but he figures if those were holy places dedicated to Judah’s God then that God must not be too happy with Judah at this point. The Rabshakeh even says “Moreover, is it without Yahweh that I have come up against this lad to destroy it? Yahweh said to me, ‘Go up against this land and destroy it.'” (Isaiah 36:10) If it is true that Yahweh said this to him, then the men on the walls have cause to fear, great cause!

But as is the case with most hot heads, give them enough time to keep talking and eventually they’ll slip and let their true colors show. It isn’t long before the Rebshakeh taunts Yahweh rather than Israel. “Who among all of the gods of these lands have delivered their lands out of my hand, that Yahweh should deliver Jerusalem out of my hand?” (20) Oops, he over stated his case here. It isn’t that Yahweh won’t deliver as he claimed before, not it is that he can’t deliver.

The people go to Isaiah and he promises that Sennacherib will return home and die in his own land. And he does while worshiping his false god.

So what do all these things have to do with practical theology? They each are an application of theology to daily living. Or at least they should be. Theology isn’t an abstract mental discipline that doesn’t do much. It isn’t wondering how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. It is an effort to answer the question “If God is, what then?” In Uganda the question is whether a society which is 85% Christian should tolerate what God has rejected in his word? Don’t forget in the kerfuffle that is the Anglican Communion, it has been the African churches who have been the clearest and strongest in opposition to including homosexuals in church leadership. It isn’t just a few “nut jobs” in Uganda who want to spoil everyone’s fun, it is largely church leadership on the continent. Does God’s word and God’s law only apply to those who believe it or can and should it be applied broadly across a culture? That is a very good question! It seems in America in particular and in the West in general we’ve given up on this issue. The American Revolution was supposed to ensure religious freedom for all. It meant that we were all free to live our lives in accordance with our beliefs and we could all do it together even if we disagree. The French Revolution took that in a different direction and said that we’re all free to believe what we want but religion is a private matter so keep it quiet.  Society is secular so no overt religious display. In the America it seems that the French version is seeking to supplant the American version. Hence the hand-wringing and foot-shuffling over Britt Hume and Tim Tebow who have the audacity to be Christians in a public forum.

Do you see what is happening there? The issue is how we fit together faith and society. Does faith rule society? Do faith and society coexist? Does society trump faith? Uganda is wrestling with that question in one direction while the West is going the other way.

What about sports then? The thing that struck me about Hoffman’s quote above as I typed it was that it sounds an awful lot like American society more than just sports! If Hoffman is advocating Christian withdrawal from sports (and her statement “Less than a century ago, major segments of the evangelical community considered sports a cancer on the spiritual life…” seems to indicate she is) then by the same reasoning we should abandon American culture as well. Hoffman’s point in the article is that America’s fascination with sports is not healthy. Agreed. But if she is then trying to apply theology so that Christians should abandon playing and watching sports, I don’t agree. C.J. Mahaney recently did a great post on how to watch the Super  Bowl like a Christian. C.J. is a big sports fan but he does it under Christ with care and attention to guard his heart from idolatry. That is what we should do as we apply Christianity to sports. Not abandon it but, as with the rest of life, do it with care.

So when Hezekiah got the report from Sennacherib about what Sennacherib intended to do, he went to Isaiah to get God’s perspective on this. Exactly the right move. Hezekiah sought to apply theology to his political situation. Tearing down idols was the right thing to do. Even if some folks claimed that on those high places, under those oak trees they were worshiping Yahweh, Hezekiah knew that that wasn’t how or where God had commanded he be worshiped. The answer wasn’t compromise. Hezekiah wasn’t supposed to make a deal with Sennacherib or allow people to put back up the poles and high places. Nor was he supposed to charge out of the gates of Jerusalem and triumphantly slaughter the Assyrians. God took care of this. The Angel of the Lord took out 185,00 in the night (Isaiah 37:36) and ordained that Sennacherib would get it in his own land. The answer wasn’t conquest or compromise, it was to be God’s people in the place God had placed them and to let God do the work and to give God the glory. Notice that it wasn’t passiveness on Hezekiah’s part. He didn’t just kick back in the palace, he tore down idols and passed laws. He prayed and sought out God. But it wasn’t taking charge either. He sought to apply theology to his life and the life of Judah. God is sovereign and good. He rules the nations and demands faithfulness from his people.

This is a way of understanding the world that we would be wise to adopt. The nations will rage. They will ridicule who we are and what we believe and what we do. We must remain true to who we are in the midst of that storm. This requires action and attention as well as waiting on Jesus and watching for how he will deal with those who oppose.