We could, in the spirit of political correctness, suggest that such a question is out of bounds. We could affirm that everyone is special in their own way, and protect the self-esteem of the supers. On the other hand, we could have a debate over the right criteria by which to judge. Are we asking who has the coolest super-power? Who has the best alter ego? Whose transformation story is the most compelling? Indeed once one finds the proper criteria by which to judge, the answers just seem to come naturally.
I have two competing criteria that I value highly. Not wanting to choose I will therefore divide the question in two, affirming which is the greatest classic super-hero and which is the greatest modern superhero. First the classic.
By classic I mean those supers whose beginnings came in the heyday of the comic book. Here we find some astonishing super-powers, some engaging alter egos, and some compelling back stories. The best standard, I would argue, however, is this- who makes the most of what he’s got? Which means, of course, that Batman wins, hands down. Batman, frankly, has no super-powers. He is not from another planet, or a lost civilization. He has not been infected with radiation, nor visited by ancient gods. No, Batman fights with his wealth, his wits and his will. The first two, wealth and wits, create the technology that is so vital to his battle plan. It is his iron will, however, that brings it all together. Criminals fear him not because of what he can do, but because of what he wants- justice. In the first “battle” of the first modern movie account Batman holds a terrified petty criminal over the edge of a skyscraper. The terrified thug squeaks out, “What are you?” And Batman had me at “I’m Batman, and I want you to tell all your friends about me.”
I’m not the most physically gifted man in the world. I never was growing up. But I have always been competitive. Will means quite a bit to me, and so Batman receives one crown. On the other hand there is work to be done even more important than cleaning up Gotham. Most supers are socially awkward, isolated, islands. One modern hero, however, exhibits the greatest of virtues- he loves his wife and children. Indeed he loves his wife and children enough to endure the crushing weight of hiding his super-ness. Mr. Incredible wins my vote in the modern category not because of his astonishing super gifts, but because of his ordinary and therefore inspiring love for his family. I want not to be like his super-identity, but his alter ego, for that, in this instance, is not only who he really is, but who he really wants to be.
In the real world we value the wrong things. We value skills over drive, abilities over willingness. We think our job rather than our family is our calling. Which is why it’s good to have heroes, but why we have to choose them with care.
Suppose for a moment that the sky were falling. Now while you have your imagination engaged, imagine that Chicken Little was actively trying to sound the alarm, not that the sky is falling, but that a rat has successfully broken into the feed bin. Rats in the feed bin, that’s not such a good thing. Raising the alarm, all things being equal, would be a good thing. But if the sky were falling, concerns about rats and feed bins would be not just misguided, but dangerous, a genuine distraction of a truly calamitous event. Now suppose that Chicken Little suddenly hatched a bevy of baby Chicken Littles, all of whom became conservative pundits.
There we are. The danger of the day is war with Russia. Last month it was inflation. Before that it was vax mandates and before that, COVID itself. Talk radio is all abuzz with the awful things the President is doing to our economy. The ghost of inflation present is haunting us. Doom and gloom is everywhere. It is true, terribly true, that the Biden administration is spending us down the river at rates far more rapidly than his predecessor did. Socialism is a dreadfully dangerous and destructive practice. Who could have guessed that money for nothing and checks for free would prove to be a disincentive to work? It is more horrible than even the pundits know.
There are, however, two things that are far worse. The first is our relative indifference to the second. That is, that Christians, and the radio talkers and social media mavens who lead us, are up in arms, running about like Chicken Little over the President’s handling of the economy is shameful. For we have forgotten the real tragedy of our day. Today, nearly three thousand mothers will murder their own children. Tomorrow it will be the same. Under President Trump, every day three thousand babies were intentionally murdered, even when Republicans controlled both houses of Congress. Murder.
I believe in liberty. I long for limited government. I believe in fiscal wisdom, in hard money. But assaults on these things are so many rats in the feed bin while the sky is falling. Babies are being murdered while I type. Billboards advertise these services. Salesmen visit these offices, hoping to land an account. Landlords rent to these grisly customers. Policemen are standing guard at the door. Nurses are scrubbing implements of infanticide, and medical school graduates are putting on surgical gloves. Moms and dads have paid their cash, and wait. And Christians are listening to Fox News complain about the economy. Sadly, because the sky has been falling for forty-nine years, we no longer seem to notice. We are comfortable with murdered babies, at ease in the land of Moloch. I understand that we cannot look too closely at this horror. It is too terrible. But we need to look more closely, more often, more honestly, and with more repentance. We need to stop allowing ourselves to be distracted and outraged by the rats. The sky is falling, and the blood is rising.
Dunamis Fellowship and Sovereign Grace Fellowship continue our weekly Bible study at 7 eastern. Meeting Jesus consider our Lord’s ascension. All are welcome to attend. Come early (6:15) and we’ll feed you. You can also watch on Facebook Live, RC-Lisa Sproul. We hope you join us.
It is a common question among theologians, how sin impacts human thought. Does it remove from us any possibility of knowing? Are we doomed to epistemic darkness? Pride, however, is close kin to sin. I’m not certain there are any sins that don’t include within it some element of pride. So I ask, how does pride impact our thinking?
First, it encourages us to think too highly of ourselves. In understanding the impact of sin on the whole of our being, part and parcel of what we mean when affirming total depravity, we understand that we use our minds to excuse ourselves. God has given us the capacity for thought and we think up rationalizations for our sins. We excuse ourselves and create a self-image that is airbrushed by our pride.
Second, it encourages us to think too lowly of others. We use our minds to assess the character and behavior of others not in the interests of accuracy but in the interest of making us feel better about ourselves. We watch, observe, infer until we get to the point that we think we can safely say, “Yup, that person is no good, unlike me.”
The key is found in the inferring. Here we slip in speculation that our minds determine is actually information. We, in our pride, think we are insightful enough, educated enough to peer into the dark hearts of others and diagnose their sins. We conclude this one is a narcissist because a. we think we’re not only outstanding students of the symptoms and b. think we are outstanding pathologists of the behavior. To put it more clearly, we skew our perception of behavior, make our own self-serving assessment of motives, pronounce our subject guilty and then decide it is our God-given duty to herald this person’s guilt far as the curse is found.
The pride truly kicks in, however, when some people fail to embrace our judgment. Anyone responding to our pronouncement of the guilt of another with, “Well, first I’m not sure this is any of my business and second if it were it would be wise to hear the other side before I make any judgment” is a wicked enabler, an ostrich chewing sand, complicit in the crime or worst of all, one who, likely because of the patriarchy, refuses to believe victims. I understand that victims can be hurt when they are not immediately believed. I also understand that false accusers can act hurt when they are not immediately believed. Finally, I understand I can’t always tell the difference between the first and the second. Neither can you. We don’t know who the victim is until we know if a wrong was done.
Pride is what drives us to think we not only have to have a take on every accusation floating through the cyber-ether, but that we all have the wherewithal to reach a sound conclusion from afar. No call to be a voice for the voiceless, no insistence that we embrace the task of “raising awareness” should prod us into announcing conclusions we don’t have the evidence for. Embracing the silence in uncertainty may leave you with enemies on both sides of the courtroom. Rushing to judgment, however, displeases the Judge.
When I was a young man I came to understand the brilliance of my father. Like millions of others I learned at his feet. I watched him lay down careful arguments like so many dominoes destined to reach a predictable end. Which is why I spent so much time trying to coax him into entering the fray with every error I ran across in the church. His response demonstrated not just his knowledge, but his wisdom. He would explain to me, “The last thing anyone needs to do is to engage that particular fringe group. No matter how badly you might refute them, all you end up doing is increasing their visibility.” He knew both how to answer a fool according to his folly, and when not to.
I would argue that not only is it a foolish thing to answer obscure folly but also to answer widespread deep folly. Doing so, in both instances, grants credibility where it doesn’t belong. Some ideas, another wise man once said, deserve only to be hooted off the stage. Which is not always easy for us.
For one thing, when the earnest unbeliever makes his outrageous claim and we laugh it appears we are not playing nice. While nice isn’t a fruit of the Spirit it is understandable that others might think so. We are held by the Lord to a certain standard of behavior toward His enemies. Which is not at all the same thing as being held hostage by the standards of His enemies. I fear, however, that our commitment to being nice, to not hooting nonsense off the stage, is grounded in the fact that doing so gets us hooted out of polite company. We are cowed cowards. We’re willing to fight, politely, which just plays into their hands.
It is not a bold and heroic thing to stand up and say that while there may confused boys and confused girls there are still, in the end, only boys and girls. The reason it is not bold and heroic is not because they will not screech and gnash at us for saying so. It is not bold and heroic because everyone, everyone, even the screeching and gnashing, know good and well that there are only boys and girls. Just like every fawning, flattering, lickspittle subject of the slow streaking emperor knew good and well that he was altogether in his altogether. Their rage isn’t because you won’t believe the lie they believe. It is because you won’t affirm the lie they know is a lie.
My father once overheard a conversation on a train. At a table near his on the dining car one woman was telling another woman about her amazing time at an ashram, how she came to understand that she was God, and how that changed everything. Noticing my father’s interest in the conversation she welcomed him in, asking, “What do you think?” My father smiled, softening the blow, winsomely bursting the bubble and asked, stifling a laugh, “You don’t REALLY think you’re the almighty do you?” She laughed too, confessing, “No, no I don’t.” He had no need to present a compelling apologetic with footnotes and nuance that she could ignore. He simply had to acknowledge what everyone already knew, that she was just another creature.
Be careful. Don’t believe the lie that they believe the lie. And don’t give it credibility by treating it as credible.
