THERE IS A BETTER WAY
Stellar!
Christopher Nolan is known for his cerebral, psychologically demanding thrillers, and the 2014 epic film ‘Interstellar’ is no different. Set in a dystopian future where global crop failures and strange dust storms threaten to undermine humanity’s survival, the movie follows a team of astronauts who travel through a wormhole near Saturn in search of a new home for humanity. And they do find a way, albeit at the dire cost of time.
The illusive relationship between time and space is extensively explored in this awe-inspiring piece. At the beginning of the movie, an astronaut turned farmer Joseph Cooper has a 10-year old daughter named Murphy on Earth. Nearing the end of the two-hour-forty-nine-minute masterpiece, Cooper, now in space, can see through the bookcases of Murphy’s old room on Earth and weakly interact with its gravity. What results is a strange pattern made from dust that inexplicably appears in Murphy’s bedroom floor earlier in the movie (before Cooper set off on his search), an anomaly she attributes then to a ghost. Cooper happens to be that ‘ghost’, but we (and Cooper for that matter) do not know until the dying minutes of the movie. Realizing he is the ghost, Cooper finds a way through the rent in time and space to communicate with Murphy using Morse code. He does this by manipulating the second-hand of her wristwatch, thus transmitting critical data he and his team had gleaned from their search to her. Cooper awakens later on a space habitat orbiting Saturn, where he reunites with an elderly Murphy. Using the data transmitted by her father, the younger Murphy is able to help facilitate humanity’s exodus and survival. Now, literally on her deathbed, Murphy urges Cooper (who has not aged much since the movie/ journey began) to return to their planet. And he does, in one of the most touching scenes to ever hit our screens. The End.
Well, not quite. I certainly do an abysmal job catapulting you to the heavens with this futile attempt at summarizing a movie whose place is literally among the stars, but I believe I have made one point clear—that there is a better way. The way, for the Coopers, came with the grave sacrifice of time and space, of memories, of presence . . . but they sure did find a way to save the ‘bigger picture’ of a dying race in the end. Where there is a will, there certainly is a way. But at what cost?
Brace for impact!
Nearly two thousand years ago, a thirty-three year old man suffered an excruciating fate on a hill called Calvary. His was a fate he had chosen, much like Cooper’s—a necessary step he reckoned needed to be taken to save humanity. No mean step, it would most certainly be a giant leap for mankind. His place was beyond the stars, among the seraphs. Yet He left it all behind for our sake. He humbled himself, and clothed himself with humus much like us. He walked on our very earth, one step at a time, and at the right time, climbed the tree at Calvary to set us free from sin. At thirty-three! ‘He could have saved us in a second’, instead, he took his time. And when the time was right, and his life’s blood kissed our ailing earth, it (the earth) convulsed into tectonic ripples of liberation, the temple’s curtains renting into two. Now there would be no time nor space separating us from Life itself! (Jesus is the source of life itself) It was finished! Mankind’s struggles were over! What is man, that thou art mindful of him? And the son of man, that thou visitest him? Heaven on earth— our ‘new planet’ had just been reborn! Now, whosoever will may come!
At the middle of time stands the daunting wonder of the cross—a rent through time and space, through which God himself communicates his undying love for us mere mortals and offers us a certain exodus to safety home. He offers us a better way out of our dying world of sin. But there is nearly no time.
There is a better way—the way—Jesus. And all we need to do to go that way is to believe in him. Can you even believe that?
Where there’s a will, there’s certainly a way. Will you go that way? Or suffer the cost?
John A. Turkson
‘Still the kid awestruck by Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross. Apparently, he loved me that much!’
