Dedicated to Wompi J, and Do-Dah; the lovely ladies
who used to call me Bean.
Forrest Gump released the summer between my
freshman and sophomore years of high school. I consider it to be one of
the most culturally influential movies of the last 30 years and personally
influential movies of my life. In high school some friends and I even
took to calling ourselves the "Gumpisms." When we hung out we
usually watched Forest Gump, drank Mello Yellow, and I remember there being a
lot of pixie sticks. At this vantage point I mostly remember the laughter
and the great friendships we formed. Needless to say between this
peculiar relationship and the TBSing of movies, I have watched Forest Gump
dozens of times. I believe that good culture both reflects and challenges
society; sadly very few movies ever reach this high bar. Forest Gump
achieved this and so much more. I could probably write a whole book using
truth in Forest Gump to espouse theological truth. However, today I am
considering the theology of Forest Gump the character and his understanding of
what happened to Jenny as a little girl.
The significant relationship between Jenny and
Forest dominates the plot, and Jenny's abusive relationship with her father
informs her understanding of men, life, trust, self and even her value system.
Eric Roth and Robert Zemeckis manage to explore this dynamic without
exposing the audience to the abuse itself. Three of the more emotional
moments are foundational to this exploration. Early in the movie we see
Jenny and Forest run into the field as her father drunkenly hunts her down.
Jenny's prayer is haunting and profound, "Dear God, make me a bird
so I can fly far, far far away from here."
One afternoon after Jenny comes home she and
Forrest go for a walk. When they happen upon her childhood home and she
is confronted with hell on earth, her personal demons appear across her face in
a mixture of disgust, anger, and bit of a protective instinct for her inner
child as she stands looking at the setting of her childhood horrors. She
begins to throw her shoes and then rocks at the house because that is all she can
do. Forrest appears seemingly helpless, but complicit in allowing her to
feel her feelings. When she falls down in the complexity her pain, he
simply says, “Sometimes I guess there just aren’t enough rocks.”
Toward the end of the movie movie Forrest stands at
Jenny's grave and narrates the events following her death. He tells her
that he had her father's house bulldozed to the ground, and the audience sees
him standing there watching as it crumbles, as fragile as Jenny must have felt
on the inside. We understand what Forest must have pondered. I
could argue that this brief moment is one of the most emotionally complicated
moments ever portrayed on film.
Forrest takes action for the one he loves. As
a person with special needs, we can assume that he doesn't fully comprehend why
or how Jenny's father hurt her. He knows that he loved this woman; he
knows she experienced deep pain; and he needs to do something tangible to
protest the abuse. She deserves to be avenged. He is literally
moved to act out of emotion with only a simplistic understanding of the
circumstances. Isn’t that what it means to be faithful?
Knowing there is more happening than we understand, being compelled by the
emotion present in the situation, and finding ourselves moved to action out of
an intense need to participate in making outcome right?
I often wonder whether simple faith is legitimate
faith. I have a difficult time taking things at face value, and
that makes me hesitant to believe that some people are capable of doing
so. But instead of debating who deserves what kind of health care,
or what requirements a person must meet to obtain food stamps and the steps
they should take in order to leave assistance, shouldn’t we do something for
the hungry, for the sick, the mourning, the tired, the weary, the scared, the
lonely...the lost? How often are we distracted away from kingdom work in
which God calls us by debating the circumstances around the situation.
What if we simply acted more out of love and compassion? What would our
world look like?
I confess this question about simple faith
originates in the place that houses my arrogantly analytical faith. I
want to think that I am better than they are. But I am compelled to
recognize (because I’m wasting all this time contemplating it) that there is
room for both. Both are indeed legitimate, and neither is necessarily
better than the other. I think the Church needs both to be healthy.
Even with the knowledge and insight I have been lucky enough to receive,
sometimes it feels like I’m just holding a handful of dirt and thinking I
understand what it means to be a mountain.
I know I will always fall on the side of Paul at
Mars Hill: interested to make sense of God Almighty in both the intellectual
landscape and cultural context in which I live. And I will always be like
Jacob needing to engage Truth in a wrestling match. But what if I
didn’t need to try to understand every facet of theology for
myself?
Forrest does the very thing Jenny needed out of his
naive understanding. It was sacred; fraught with meaning, meaning that
was lost on the one doing it. Dare I say it was sacramental?
Did he do something more valuable out of his ignorant but earnest
understanding? What weight should we give emotion in our faith? When
do we give reason too much authority? I can’t help but wonder, if given
the opportunity, was Jenny strong enough to have pushed the house over?
Do we complicate and thus prevent ourselves from doing the most righteous
things by paying too much attention to the details? Don't you
already know God's heart for the world? If you don't, it's simple.
He grieves for our brokenness. He is constantly crying out for
reconciliation and Kingdom Come in all situations. How can you participate
in that?
I’m not saying we need to check our minds at the
door. I could never say that.
But, no matter how brilliant you are;
may you never forget that you’re just holding a clump of dirt.
Soundtrack: Famous One, Chris Tomlin; Against the Wind, Bob Seager
and the Silver City Bullet
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