Jamie Greening's Blog

At some point, you just have to go on the record so that in the future it will be known where you stood on important cultural, social, and yes political issues.

I want to go on the record as being absolutely opposed to the trend of referring to meat as protein on menus. It has crept up ever so slightly, but now seems to everywhere. ‘Choose your protein’ is not something that sounds appealing to me. To be fair, I often do not want meat, especially meat prepared by some place that might have less than sanitary prep areas, so I get the desire to not have beef, poultry, pork, or fish but don’t call meat protein. I know there are other types of proteins besides meat, but the word protein does not belong on a menu. Ever. I don’t know what focus group they are looking at, but yuck. And no, I do not want to add a ‘protein foam’ to my coffee. That sounds like the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard. What next, they will stop selling potatoes and now you must order a ‘starch’? Would you like to upsize that with more amino acids? I mean, when I get my enchilada plate number three, I can get beans and rice or no beans and rice, but I never order legumes and starch.

I want to go on the record as being against the United States taking any aggressive action toward Greenland, Denmark, or any other ally. I can’t believe I live in a time-period where this is even something we are talking about. We already have a military base there, we have historically had pretty much free rein in the region, and it belongs to people who by all appearances really like us. Please, please, someone talk some sense into our leaders and stop this. Just stop it.

I want to go on the record that the catch in the football game Saturday night in the Bills versus Broncos game was the worst call I’ve seen in a playoff game since the famous Dez Bryant catch that wasn’t against Green Bay many years ago. Fans will remember what I am talking about. I am not unhappy for the Broncos, as I am not a fan of either of the teams, but anyone with any sense at all knows the Bills were robbed. It doesn’t mean they would have won the game, but it certainly turned things around.

I want to go on the record that I shed no tears for Nicólas Maduro in Venezuela. He is a very bad man; we may have done that nation a great favor in arresting him. I also want to go on the record that we (The United States) has no business ‘owning’ or ‘controlling’ or ‘seizing’ the economic or political machinery of Venezuela. Prosecute Maduro for his crimes, but let Venezuela solve its own problems. Offer help, assistance, and advice, but coercing oil is not a good look for America.

I want to go on the record that I think the Supreme Court should rule in favor of states that have put limitations on accommodation for what are called trans-students. I know this puts me at odds with many who cite this as a civil right, but it is not a civil right. It is a healthcare and biology issue. If an adult wants to change his or her body I am all for the freedom to do so, and the rights that person has in society to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. Yet, children, whose bodies are still changing and raging with hormones and the confusion of adolescence, do not have enough experience or wisdom to make such monumental changes which will last with them for the rest of their lives. States make decisions for children about alcohol, tobacco, driving, military service, passenger safety, employment, right to sign a contract, and so many other things. This is not a hard one to understand the state having the right and responsibility to regulate. For the record, I am not opposed to a student behaving, dressing, or using identifying language anyway they want, but I am opposed to medical or surgical procedures in minors and I am against competition in sports. Title IX was a great achievement, and the trans-movement jeopardizes it.

I want to go on the record, thinking again of sports, that the super-conferences have ruined college football. It is not that any one conference is better than others, but that a conference is meaningless because all the teams don’t play each other, therefore, there is no sense of true strength, or even who is truly the best team. The NCAA should break up these super conferences for its own good. It will not, because right now the money is so vast, but the direction it is headed will end in ruination and the game will suffer. We need a true playoff for the conference champion, and then only conference champions should play each other. Problem solved.

I want to go on the record that while I think AI has great benefits for many fields of innovation and endeavor, such as science and medicine, the governments of this world need to act now, and very soon, to regulate and restrict its use as it relates to the creative arts (images and music) and of human likeness. By restrict, I mean imposing terrible penalties upon those who generate and spread deep fakes and slanderous lies. We are nearing a place where it is impossible to tell real from fake, and if we let people do this without consequences, then we will lose the most important glue that holds society together, and that is trust. When we can no longer trust our eyes and our ears, then society will implode.

I want to go on the record that I don’t think protesting accomplishes much at all. If you want to change things, vote, organize voters, inform voters, drive voters to the polls, register people for mail-in-ballots, and participate in the process of actually electing people who advocate for the things you believe in. Protesting is an enormous waste of time and often has the opposite effect you think it will have. Registering ‘outrage’ is silly. However, it is a constitutionally protected right, and pivotal to the founding of our nation. I’m looking at you, Boston Tea Party. I’d like to think we are mature enough as a society that officers who are doing their job and enforcing the law are safe even as protesters who think those enforced laws are unjust are likewise safe. I will further go on the record that I believe our government is pursuing a wholly unjustified ’round-up’ and is doing so in politically motivated locations. Anyone else notice how it is Minneapolis and not Houston where these things are going down?

This is always hit and miss. Last year, I had about six right, but I was wrong about the price of gasoline and wrong about Mike Johnson. I was right on the money though in predicting the fallout between Elon Musk and President Trump. That much ego can never peacefully coexist for long. But I was wrong about the Detroit Lions.

Now, let’s get the disclaimer done: I am no prophet nor the son of a prophet. I just like to play and think about things, and just because I predict something doesn’t mean I want it to happen. Often I see things coming which I dread.

Enough small talk, onto the predictions!

Business and Economy

Starbucks will counter-narrative their current malaise by purchasing a major company that is outside its sphere of expertise, perhaps entertainment or manufacturing.

Tesla will make a strong comeback in the United States as political backlash wanes. This is partly because Americans have a very short memory, but I think it will be more about the product itself being viewed as a proven EV.

The Dow Jones Average will rise significantly as manufacturing grows for most of the year, but after the summer there will be a huge pull back as A) interest rates rise B) we experience a labor shortage C) there will be some kind of an AI bubble that bursts.

Culture

Timothee Chalamet will not get an Oscar nomination for best actor, because Marty Supreme is a terrible movie no one should ever watch. Ever. I predict you will hate it so don’t waste your time or money.

Again, this year, making it three in a row, there will not be an SEC team in the College Football Championship Game.

Politics

This seems like a layup-but I predict the Democrats will win back control of the House and Senate.

Marjorie Taylor Greene will announce she is running for President of the United States.

President Trump will fire Pam Bondi and Kash Patel, probably in mid-October, in a desperate move to appease his base before the mid-terms.

No legal prosecutions will occur over the Epstein Cover-up, because significant leaders in both the Republican Party and Democratic Party are guilty pedophiles.

World

2025 is ending with all kinds of exciting global issues, so it doesn’t seem hard to predict the United States will invade some country — Venezuela? Greenland? Iran? Smart money is on Venezuela, which, for the record, would be a disaster.

Putin will closeout the war in Ukraine this year with a devastating escalation that may include assassinations or nuclear weapons.

I’ve been predicting this for a while, but I think this is the year Iran experiences regime change and the Islamic Fundamentalists loose power.

Science

2026 will be a kind of ‘miracle year’ in which AI driven discoveries produce treatment and cures for a range of diseases, such as cancer and auto-immune disorders.

On the flip side, there will be a movement for a global ‘treaty’ or ‘agreement’ on AI and its uses, which will include mandatory disclaimers for any ‘creative’ content as to whether AI is involved or not — such as this blog post — it would be required to disclaim what role AI played, which, is none. *Side note, I am personally considering such a claim for ever sermon I preach*

The year will experience record low temperatures and much more ice over North America and Europe.

Faith

The twenty-year trend away from faith in the United States seemingly began to reverse in 2025, and it will do so even more in 2026 as people, including social scientists, admit there is indeed a kind of revival occurring, especially among young people. The Holy Spirit is moving.

Immigration and response to ICE crackdowns will replace the LGBTQ debate as the greatest divisive issue among Christ-followers, and may lead to some strange alliances.

Thanks for reading. Regardless of predictions, my prayer for us all is peace, prosperity, and above all that we grow closer to the Lord in word and deed.

Yesterday I finished the four-part Advent series I’ve been preaching on The Beatitudes, and as I wrap up the Advent posts today, I find it striking how different the sermons are from these blog posts. They are different in tone but also in content, for the most part. A person could explore the depths of these eight lines for a very long time and never discover all that is inside them. Indeed, the whole of the Gospel might be there, as well as the entirety of theological reflection.

Matthew 5:9

The Seventh Beatitude is beautiful in its sentiment of peace.

Happy are those who work for peace, for they will be called God’s children.

The word usually translated as peacemaker only appears in this one place in the New Testament. It has a cognate in Colossians 1:20, which is about Jesus making peace between us and God, but in this kind of usage it found only here. I have rendered it rather clunkily, I know. That was to emphasis the compound nature of the word which is clunky, if I may say so, in Greek as well. It is the noun ‘peace’ shoved together with the verb ‘to do’ or ‘to make’ or ‘to work.’ Peace doers. Peace workers. Peace agents.

The only other interesting part of the translation here is the word for children which is the masculine plural and as in most languages of the world, the masculine plural in Greek is best translated as children rather than sons, unless of course it is only referencing known groups of exclusively males.

What do these peace doers receive for their efforts? They get a new name, that is what happens. I don’t think most of us who read this understand (I know that for most of my life I certainly didn’t) that ‘being called’ is nearly identical to ‘being named.’ The famous first line of Lewis’ the The Voyage of the Dawn Treader proves this point well enough: ‘There was a boy called Eustace Clarence Scrubb, and he almost deserved it.’ That was his name. He was called Eustace, he was named Eustace. And that was the joke.

Most Americans probably use the term ‘called’ as ‘they called him rude’ or perhaps nicknames, ‘they called him Stinky Sam.’ But the actual meaning is to name something. I wonder about the connection here between this idea of peace workers being given a new name and the enigmatic teaching in Revelation where Jesus gives new names (Revelation 2:17, 3;12, see also Isaiah 62:2).

This new name, though, doesn’t seem to be given by God to the peace doers. It seems to be what other people name them, and they name them God’s children. I put before you this is because we never look as much like God as when we diligently work toward reconciliation and peace among groups, between people, or within those whose darkest conflict and war is inside their own soul. People will start to say we look like God, we look like our Father, and they will call us by that name because of the family resemblance. Now, the serious Bible student will remember it was at Antioch that we were first called ‘Christians’ (Acts 11:26).

Fortunate are those people who do all they can to bring peace in the world, for they will be recognized by everyone as behaving just as God’s children should.

Matthew 5:10

There is a lot going on with this last Beatitude, but first let’s get to a working translation.

Happy are those persecuted for the cause of righteousness, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

First, the easy part. I end the section here, because of the inclusio of ‘kingdom of heaven.’ That phrase ends the First Beatitude and it ends the last one, bringing the section to a conclusion. That is simply the way ancient people denoted material that should be taken as a unit, with these little inclusios, the same word of phrase at the beginning and ending. I know there are verses 11 and 12 following that are often lumped in, and they are good, solid verses that have meaning and are important elongations on the idea of persecution, but they do not have the cadence, rhythm, or style of the other eight lines here and as such should not properly be included in The Beatitudes.

The verb, persecute, essential means to chase or drive away; perhaps it could be rendered as ‘hunt down.’ As a child of the south, thoughts of dogs in the night running through the woods chasing the scent of a raccoon leap to my mind. That is what happens to persecuted people, they are chased down, hunted, pursued like animals. They are driven from their homes, homelands, and families.

I have two thoughts on persecution and then I will turn toward righteousness.

It is an oddity of history that the first thing people who are persecuted do when they experience liberation from their attackers is find someone to immediately persecute. But notice Jesus does not say, ‘blessed are the persecuted, for they shall one day persecute others.’ Nope. Never. Not a good idea. If you ever find yourself persecuting anyone, you are in the wrong and not modeling Christlike behavior. Being made uncomfortable or even mocked for your beliefs is not persecution. It is an affront to people in parts of the world right now who are murdered, imprisoned, and driven out from their homes because of their faith in Jesus to equate that with someone saying something mean to you because of your Facebook post or because you go to church. These are not the same. The actual usage of the verb here is a verbal form that indicates evidence or lasting results. In other words, a literal translation is ‘happy are those who bear the wounds of being tortured.’

Now, I turn to righteousness. Righteousness equals justice here, and it is a key theme in the whole teaching of The Beatitudes, underlying everything. Take note how it is mentioned twice — in the Fourth Beatitude those people who are satisfied are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness (click here to re-read that excellent blog post).

Do not miss the point that our Lord qualifies the kind of persecution he is talking about. If we are persecuted because of our identity, or our success, or our accent, or because we are jerks, well, then that is probably not what our Lord is speaking of. But when the persecution is related to a group of people using the levers of power and of society in a legal or economic manner to silence the gospel, justice, or righteousness, we are arriving at the meaning Christ has: It is the murder of John the Baptist by the maniacal king, it is the torture of Christians in Ancient Rome, it is the Catholic suppression of Huguenots in France, it is the suppression of preaching in liberal leaning nations (click here for an interesting discussion of a recent Canadian governmental proposal) today by labeling it hate speech, and it is what Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is doing by bringing suit (click here) against a Roman Catholic charity feeding and clothing immigrants.

When I began working on these as translations and as meditation pieces for my own personal study, the whole point was to get them away from the religious jargon that often saps the power and blood out of meaning. I love great religious words, but sometimes their overfamiliarity sanitizes. This is never more true than this last one. And so, one final rendering to get your mind thinking:

Fortunate are people who bear the wounds of being chased down and hunted by the powerful oppressors of this world because of their dedication and work for righteousness and justice, because those very wounds will be symbols of honor and respect in the next world.

Quick reminder to start off with about our methodology this Advent season. Rather than lengthy translations of traditional Advent readings, I am dwelling on the rather non-seasonal lines from the Sermon on the Mount called The Beatitudes. Feel free to search the Pastor Greenbean Blog for previous Advent translations that fit this season or other Advent posts. There are over fifteen years of them.

Another note, remember, I am rendering the word ‘blessed’ as ‘happy’. I explained why two blog posts ago, so click here for a field trip.

Matthew 5:7

Happy are those who show mercy, for they will be shown mercy.

In my understanding, this is the only one of the eight which give exactly what is given. Notice how those who hunger are not given more hunger but are instead fed. Those who are mourning are comforted. The persecuted get the kingdom. But the merciful get the exact same thing they gave out: mercy. You get what yo give.

In church life we often use mercy and grace as synonyms of one another to speak about the kindness and compassion and forgiveness of God. However, these are not exactly the same thing. Grace is when I get what I do not deserve. Imagine an employee who is horrible at his work but nevertheless still gets a really nice Christmas bonus. That is a grace. He did not deserve it, but he got it anyway.

Mercy, on the other hand, is not getting exactly what you do deserve. Take that same employee who is not good at his job. He is so lousy that he should be at the least demoted and have a cut in pay, or perhaps it is even justified that he be terminated for his lousy performance and poor attitude. But, he is not. Instead he is retained for another year. That is mercy; he deserved to be fired yet was not.

The two concepts are often woven together with beauty and creative power in the Hebrew Bible. Take, for example, one of my favorite Psalms, 103, ‘The Lord is merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love. He will not always accuse, nor will he keep his anger forever. He does not deal with us according to our sins, nor repay us according to our iniquities’ (Psalm 103:8-10).

Jesus is telling us that people who show mercy like the Lord does will be treated with mercy, because we all need it. This particular Beatitude comes closest to affirming the doctrine of universal sinfulness because embedded within it is the assumption that every human being is in desperate need of mercy because every human being deserves punishment for what he or she has done.

Show mercy, get mercy. Don’t show mercy, don’t get mercy.

The question of mercy, though is always by whom is it shown? Does our Lord mean the merciful will get mercy from God, or does he mean other people? I can see an argument for both ways. Jesus is, I think, most obviously speaking of our relationship to The Lord, therefore merciful people get mercy from God. But I also see the second meaning as applicable in that the kind of people who show mercy to others will, when in need of it, be more likely to get it from others. Contrast that with the person who is always shouting about punishing other people who then is caught red-handed. That person will justly be labeled a hypocrite and prosecuted to the fullest extent.

Mercy is not very popular, at least it doesn’t seem that way to me. What is popular right now are words like accountability, retribution, and payback. I personally have seen the word accountability used as a bludgeon to keep people beat down in shame so that others may feel superior. It’s an ugly transaction to behold.

Showing mercy requires empathy. It also requires giving people the benefit of the doubt. Oh, and it most definitely means that we must not assume everyone is out to get us or that every action is a conspiracy. Mercy is about giving people a break, knowing that not everything requires the full measure of response.

Maybe we can render this one then, in a practical motif:

Happy are the people who give other people a break, because they themselves will be given a break when it matters most.

Matthew 5:8

Happy are those with clean hearts, for they will see God

There are two body parts mentioned in this beatitude: the heart and eyes. These two organs have a direct connection. If the heart is clean, then the eyes will see. Without a clean heart, spiritual vision is impossible. Christ-follower see with their heart, not their eyes.

The word for clean is one of those Greek New Testament words that is also an English word: catharsis (katharoi). When I preached on this a couple of weeks ago, with a different emphasis than here, I emphasized that cognate aspect of what catharsis means in our world in terms of purge or therapeutic healing. A cathartic cry after a long period of time holding in our feelings comes to mind, right?

Katharsis means clean or pure, but I think that clean is a better and a more theologically sound translation of this beatitude because pure in heart sounds like disposition or temperament. Perhaps too much of my East Texas background infects here, but when I hear pure in heart it sounds a lot like ‘sweet heart’ or ‘tender heart’. It would be easy to dismiss the idea of ‘pure in heart’ as something you are either born with or not born with. As if people with sweet dispositions and tender hearts do not lust, experience greed, or have racists tendencies. Indeed, if I may dwell there a moment, one of the reasons we tolerate racism in many people is because we excuse it with, ‘but she really has a sweet heart.’ I put before you that it doesn’t matter how sweet Granny might be in her Sunday school class or to all her grandchildren, if Granny is a racist her heart is not clean and she is not pure in heart.

Clean in heart has a completely different emphasis in that it lays upon each individual to keep their heart clean through the continuing actions of repentance, worship, devotion, and service. I know that I am a sinner, and my daily and constant action of repentance keeps the garbage out of my heart.

To keep my heart clean, I have to regularly take out the trash.

A clean heart doesn’t happen by accident. It is the product of diligence and of standing guard over it. A clean heart sieves through the lies of this world that would pollute it — lies like trust your heart, follow your heart, and listen to your heart. When left to its own the devices, the human heart is destructive, polluting the ecosystem of life. If you don’t believe me, listen to Jeremiah the prophet as he tells us what God says: ‘The heat is devious above all else; it is perverse — who can understand it. I the Lord test the mind and search the heart, to give according to their ways, according to the fruit of their doings’ (Jeremiah 17:9-10).

Only a transformed mind (Romans 12:1-2) empowered by the Holy Spirit can guard a heart and mold it into cleanliness before God. That is hard work. But the payoff is worth it. For the payoff, Jesus says, is that the clean hearted people of this world see God.

Now, exactly what does it mean to see God? I suppose there are three options, really. The first is that this is literal and Jesus is promising theophanies in this lifetime. A heart that is clean frees up the eyes to see God in some kind of physical manifestation in the here and now. The second option is Christ our Lord references the future when we are dwelling in the New Jerusalem and God is himself our Temple. Third, the point of seeing God is the ability to perceive the movement of God, see God at work, in the world right now. Not necessarily a physical manifestation but rather the Holy Spirit moving.

I dismiss the first option as being outside the bounds of normative experience. True, some people seem to have had an actual Theophany (biblically, Moses comes to mind but there seem to be non-biblical experiences as well) or a Christophany. But that is not normative and it certainly is not connected to the teachings about a clean heart.

I am then left with the second two, which I think are both true. I think we will see God, per the longing of Job:

For I know that my Redeemer lives, and that at the last he will stand upon the earth; and after my skin has been thus destroyed, then in my flesh I shall see God, whom I shall see on my side, and my eyes shall behold, and not another. My heart faints within me! — Job 19:25-27

I am certain, though, that a clean heart allows us to see where God is moving and working, present and active in the world today. A polluted heart filled with violence and hatred cannot see the movement of the Holy Spirit transforming people’s lives, changing the way people interact, and raising up another generation who will proclaim and serve. Yet, a clean heart does, because the eye is clear; removed of the film or the scales (Acts 9:18) that were upon them. A clean heart reveals godly motives, ambitions, hopes, and dreams.

A clean heart also sees where God is moving against the sin and treachery of this world. I think that is perhaps the keenest insight into the prophetic ministry of the Hebrew preachers of old. Jeremiah, Micah, and Amos could see wickedness around them and therefore they could see the displeasure of God and the coming hand of judgment. Seeing God is not always rainbows and lollipops, blessings and sweets; sometimes it is floods and kale, punishment and bitterness.

Maybe one more crack at an applicable rendering of the sixth beatitude would be a little wordier but perhaps clearer.

Fortunate are clean hearted people, because they will see the spiritual realities of God’s activity in this world and they will see his glory in the next.

The third Beatitude is, in my opinion, one of the most misunderstood teachings in all of the scriptures. In our parlance, meek is synonymous with weakness and the unfortunate habit of being a pushover. Meek people get steamrolled by powerful people because they have no gumption or bravery. Meekness is timidity, uncertain, and unsure. That is the way the world looks at it, anyway. I am not so certain that is what Our Lord was talking about.

Matthew 5:5

Happy are those who are gentle, for the land will be theirs.

Because of this misunderstanding about the Lord’s teachings, I opt instead for the word gentle. To be truthful, either word works, but my goal in these renderings is to shake us out of familiarity. It is the same word used in Matthew 11:29 where Jesus instructs those who are weary to come to him and learn from him, because he is ‘gentle and humble in heart.’

Jesus was no pushover, and he certainly wasn’t timid. But he was gentle, like a good shepherd who knows his sheep. A bruised reed, he will not break (Isaiah 42:3, Mt. 12:20). I am thinking now of the attributes of gentleness which include things like patience, serenity, kindness, tolerance, and a large amount of empathy. Gentle people encourage others rather crush and consume. It is about this time, as we reflect upon gentle, that we recognize gentleness is a fruit of the Spirit from Galatians 5.

Gentle people allow space for others to learn and grow at their own pace rather than bullying them into performing.

The more I personally reflect on these Beatitudes, the more shocked I become at what Jesus doesn’t promise. He doesn’t promise the gentle people will be treated gently. He doesn’t say, ‘Happy are the gentle, for they shall always feel good about themselves.’ Nope. Instead, he promised them land.

This promise of land is usually rendered as earth, which is fine. I have no problems with that. I love the idea that the earth will be handed over to the gentle souls of this world — the caring moms, the patient fathers, the nurturing school teachers, the caring nurses. These people are the ones who don’t want to rule and govern, and that probably makes them the most qualified to do so. How much better off would the world be if every politician and decision maker in the world were replaced by first grade teachers?

So, I am fine with that traditional understanding. But the word itself doesn’t have to mean earth, the word can mean land as in property or territory. Put your ear to the ground and you can hear in this Beatitude an echo of the Fifth Commandment: Honor your father and mother, so that the days maybe long in the land. What connects them is the promise of land. Perhaps also, our Lord is teaching us that honor is a part of gentleness. Gentle people honor others with their words, their actions, and their intentions. They do not dishonor them.

Now we may be somewhere new in this:

Happy are those people who honor others, for they shall inherit the promises of God.

Matthew 5:6

The Fourth Beatitude conjures memories of a conversation I had earlier this year with a medical professional. I had read, and maybe you have too, that doctors say if you wait until you are thirsty to drink water, you’re probably already too late and are dehydrated. The conventional wisdom goes that you should drink water to avoid getting thirsty and constantly avoid dehydration.

I challenged that, because it is illogical. Thirst is what my body does to signal me it is time to drink water. Thirst is not to be avoided, but rather it is to be celebrated as a reminder that my body is working just the way it should. I’m also kind-a so ‘over’ all the water pushers who would have us guzzling four gallons of water a day and then spending all our time in the bathroom. But I digress, back to Jesus, now:

Happy are those who are hungering and thirsting for righteousness, for they themselves will be fed.

Righteousness appears twice in The Beatitudes, here and at the end when people are persecuted because of righteousness. Interesting, no? It’s like when you realize the word ‘heaven’ appears twice in The Lord’s Prayer. It probably means something.

The metaphor of hunger and thirsting, regardless of my personal problems with the medical professions definition of dehydrated, is a metaphor we wall understand pretty well. It is about desire. People who desire righteousness is whom Jesus is talking about. But what is righteousness?

Biblically it is a theological term that indicates our standing before God. In this sense, Jesus, and Jesus alone is righteous and embodies righteousness because his perfection is what provides for atonement and the forgiveness of our sins; thereby we have a borrowed kind of righteousness from him, which we usually think of as grace. That is my best summary on the teaching of this from the Paul’s letter to the Romans.

Is that what Jesus means here in this Sermon on the Mount? ‘Happy are people who pursue my righteousness, who pursue me’? Perhaps, for I think there is truth in it. Those who pursue Jesus are certainly satisfied and fed, the images of bread and wine now come to mind.

Yet, leaving it here doesn’t seem right either. If we take Paul and his use of the idea away for a moment, Jesus is likely referring to people in this world who are hungering for righteousness in the normative sense of moral uprightness. A little help from Spanish might help us here, for the Spanish use the word ‘justica’ here. Those who hunger and thirst and desire for justice will be satisfied. In this way Jesus is thinking of Isaiah 2, when God’s justice flows out of Mt. Zion to right all the injustices of this world: When the child traffickers are locked up for good, when the people who take advantage of the elderly are dealt with, when all people are fed and clothed because greediness is condemned, when they will train for war no more, and when racism will finally be eradicated.

There is more than a tad bit of apocalyptic in Jesus’ words. These are people who recognize the brokenness in this world and hunger for it to be better now, but recognize it will not be until then.

These people eat the crumbs of what passes for justice now, but some day they will be fully fed and satisfied. I chose the word fed because the word Jesus uses is common for that of haying the animals. It was used at the feeding of the five thousand to describe how they were fed and satisfied.

It is also used in The Revelation to describe the ravens who gorge themselves on the flesh of crooked humanity. How is that for an apocalyptic view of justice?

Happy are those who desire justice, for they will feed upon the corpses of the corrupt.

For this year’s Advent translations I am working through The Beatitudes from Matthew 5. It is an admittedly shorter translation work than I normally give you this time of year, but it matches what I am working through on Sunday mornings very nicely. The content here will be different from what I am preaching as those are very thematic but here we on the Greenbean blog I will drop a treatment of two Beatitudes each week of Advent.

Before we get to any one verse here, we need to address the most important word, perhaps, in the beatitude and that is the Greek word ‘makarioi.’ Every line starts with that word, so let’s address it here before we dive into 5:3. In the simplest terms ‘makarioi’ means happy. That was common, every day usage. It can also mean fortunate, as in lucky. In fact, lucky is one of the ways some people like to render it.

Most English renderings go with ‘blessed’, which is usually pronounced ‘bless — ed’ rather than the way it is expected, ‘blest’. The word has taken on a life of its own in English liturgical readings that I am afraid it has lost any real meaning because it has been over spiritualized. It’s all rather weird. Because blessed is such spiritual word, it assists us in removing practical applications and meanings, which is unblessed, unfortunate, and unlucky. It makes me unhappy.

See what I did there? The best way to read these lines is Jesus reversing it all: happy are the unhappy, fortunate are the unfortunate, lucky are the unlucky. Blessed are the cursed. The losers are winners.

Those things being said, I will go with the rendering of ‘happy’ for makarioi, but know that is not by any stretch of the imagination iron clad.

Matthew 5:3

Happy are those who are poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

So many things to note here. 1) In Luke’s telling he just says ‘poor’ without the ‘in spirit.’ 2) Spirit here is not the Holy Spirit, but the word is the same word — pneuma. 3) Pneuma means spirit, but it also means wind and breath.

I invite you now to work with me. Poor in spirit could literally also be ‘weak in breath.’ As such, the language could simply mean out-of-breath. Tired. Panting, doubled-over gasping. Happy are those people who are tired. Then what?

Theirs is the kingdom of heaven. The word for heaven is ouranos, which means sky, the domain of the clouds. There is something in here which Jesus is telling us that happy people are those who work hard and are fatigued because they have achieved a different level of living, perhaps a different perspective on the world from above.

There is no future kingdom for the lazy people who don’t know what a hard day’s work is. The future belongs to those who are out-of-breath. Consider, then, this poetic rendering I have made for you:

When you are out of breath, it’s a good thing, because the realm of the clouds will be yours.

Matthew 5:4

Keeping with the translation of makarioi as happy, then, my rendering of the second beatitude is:

Happy are those who are mourning, for they will be comforted.

The big translation decision here is the word ‘comforted’. It comes from the same word group as a very familiar word to New Testament students, that of course is Paraclete, a name for the Holy Spirit prominent in the Gospel of John. In this instance, it is in a verbal form rather than noun but all of the same options come. Comfort is a great word, and ultimately I decided to stick with this traditional rendering because of the ties with Old Testament language such as ‘Comfort, comfort my people’ (Isaiah 40:1).

Yet, it can also mean encourage. Happy are those who mourn, for they will be encouraged. In this verbal sense it can also mean invited. Would you consider an invitation to be included as a remedy to mourning? I can think of several ways this works. Another meaning is exhorted, as in, ‘get back in there and keep at it.’

Regardless of what word we choose, the elixir from Jesus to mourning is of focusing on a preferred future rather than remaining stuck in the past. Comfort heals from the past, consolation provides guidance for the way forward, exhortation teaches about the responsibility to keep at it, and invitation is a request to join the future.

Let’s circle back to Paraclete for a moment. I don’t want to leave that thought just yet. Remember verse 3? I hope you do because we just covered that like, two minutes ago. But in that verse there is the phrase ‘poor in spirit’ and the word for spirit is ‘pneuma’. Clearly, Jesus means a human spirit and not the Holy Spirit. And here, in verse 4, our Lord clearly means the action of comfort and consolation given to someone or some group of people. I want to be clear on the plain reading, and at the same time invite you to FUNTIME! That Matthew has recorded these in this way and aligned the one after the other must be some kind of reference to the Third Person of the Trinity and his ministry among us. Surely so. It is such a delicious thought but there is no way in my mind to connect it all. But here is a shot; Paraclete is often understood as Advocate, as in the Holy Spirit advocates for us. Perhaps Jesus is referring to in a very nuanced way those who mourn will be advocated for in their grievance. Ah, that’s something to ponder.

Which takes us back to mourning and a big question: is it the same thing as grieving? If so, then comfort is as unique and individualized as the grieving process is.

Is this a universal beatitude? Stated in other ways, not everyone is a peacemaker or pure in heart or hungers for righteousness but everyone at some point will mourn. If it is not a universal beatitude, then to whom does it apply and why?

Tracking that grieving trail leads us to another insight. What is it that grieving, mourning people want? They do not want comfort, that is for sure. Indeed, most people are resistant to words or acts of comfort in the midst of their mourning. No, what is it that people who’ve suffered loss want? They want back what they lost, that is what they want. They want the person, the job, the community, the home, whatever was lost and they are mourning back into their lives.

Jesus doesn’t promise them any of that. He never promises a restoration. There is a splash of the cold water of reality along with an empathy which promises comfort.

Netflix has strongly pushed their new thriller: A House of Dynamite. This weekend, Mrs. Greenbean left me alone and unsurprised while she traveled with one of the sprouts. That meant Sunday night after all my work was completed, I had time to relax. How did I choose to spend my relaxation time?

Oh, of course. I decided to watch a movie about nuclear war. So relaxing.

I liked the movie overall, and rate it as an above average Netflix film, but you need to know that is a low bar. I mean, I remember Bird Box.

Kathryn Bigelow knows how to tell a story, and she moves AHOD along very well. There is no real violence on screen and zero sexual content. The only thing that gets in the way of this being a clean movie is the language. There is foul language throughout. To enjoy this movie, you have to have a certain taste for radar screens, situation rooms, and lots of beauty shots of Washington D.C. Most people seem to like it, for as I write this, it is pushing an upper 70s on Rotten Tomatoes, so, may people are feeling okay with the movie.

Without spoiling it — and basically following what you would get from any preview — the premise of AHOD is that a nuclear missile is headed toward the United States. The movie is the reaction to that situation.

I’ll build this review around my old trusted method — What I really liked, what was okay, and what was awful.

WHAT I LIKED

I liked the pacing. Bigelow builds the story around about forty minutes of action and then tells that same story from three different perspectives. The first is from the perspective of the field operations personnel, the nuts and bolts people doing the work. Then when that ends, it switches to the next level up, the leadership of our nation at intelligence, national security, and the military. The last vignette is that same forty minutes from the perspective of the President of the United States and those around him. This story telling methodology could be clunky and overwrought, but in was done just perfect in AHOD.

I also liked in this film the compete lack of politics. It would have been so easy and tempting to insert a political ideology into the characters, especially when so many of them would have been political in nature. However, that is not even something that comes out through any of this. These people could be republicans, democrats, or anything in between. Well done. Because in this kind of scenario, your views on taxation or immigration really doesn’t mean much.

I also liked the way the film portrays an undercurrent of something like, ‘once this trigger event starts, there is a cascading ordering of events that makes the next step inevitable.’ As a storyteller, I really appreciated that level energy.

WHAT WAS OKAY

The acting was okay. There are great actors in this movie, for sure but I was deeply annoyed by two accent issues. Rebecca Ferguson, who I really like, and Idris Elba, who I really like, both play Americans. Elba actually portrays POTUS. Each one of them fall into their British accent more than once. It was distracting and it made me wonder two things. Thing one — were no Americans available? Thing two — why not, when hearing that accent, did they not reshoot the image or edit it a little better.

But that aside, the acting was quite brilliant. I especially tip my hat to all those actors I had never seen or heard of before in the early scenes when things are just starting. They are portraying the various military personnel who monitor and watch. Those folks did great.

WHAT WAS AWFUL

Okay, all the cards on the table, nothing was that awful. But it was unfortunate that there were some threads of narrative that seemed to be developing, and then . . . nothing. There is a FEMA official who seems like something important is going to happen through her and . . . nothing. Same with a bomber wing flying out over the Pacific. It looks like a significant storyline but . . . nothing. There are about four or five of these hooks with no barb.

The second almost awful is the lack of range in the film. It is an almost two hour movie and I don’t remember laughing or chuckling even once. Yes, I know it is serious, but human beings are funny. The mounting pressure of the moment would have been intensified and made more stark had there been a clever use of humor, maybe once in each of the three vignettes.

One more thing in the ‘awful’ category that is not really awful but just off-putting. The first minute or so of the film is unnecessarily wordy. It has a prologue that is designed to sound like something from the real world that is informing the made up movie we are about watch, but it really isn’t. It is a primer to set us on edge before the action starts. The movie is good enough that doesn’t need this. Just roll the film.

SOME SUMMARY STATEMENTS

The feel of AHOD is at times like a Jack Ryan movie, or maybe the backdrop of a Mission Impossible film. It definitely has that vibe. I kept thinking of Dr. Strangelove but without the biting irony and sarcasm. There is a moment when Elba says to one of his advisors that the course of action being told to him is ‘insanity’ and I thought of that famous line, ‘You can’t fight in here, this is the war room.’ None of it makes any sense. Nuclear weapons don’t make sense. Neither does war.

If you check the chatter about AHOD, lots of folks seem to be puzzled by the ending. I was not. The ending made perfect sense to me in real time. I will not give it away, as I said, no spoilers, but if you’ve followed the way the movie is set up then the ending is really the one way it could end.

Speaking of the end, one of the things you walk away from is, how real is this? Could this happen. My take is, no way this could actually go down like this. It is thrilling and terrifying to think of, but there must be so many safeguards which would ruin an otherwise good film. If you’d like a deeper dive into the realism of the scenario, click here for a fun article from NPR that talks to national security experts.

He has sent me to bring good news to the oppressed, to bind up the broken-hearted, to proclaim liberty to the captives, and release to the prisoners.

Isaiah 61:1

These were the first thoughts I had when I saw the images and heard the news that a cease-fire had been agreed to between Hamas and Israel. The two-year war had come to an end. Finally, they can all go home.

I am very happy with these developments and proud of President Trump and the United States for being a big part of making it all happen. It seems to me he significantly leveraged the United States unique relationship with Israel along with an honest desire to end the suffering of the people in Gaza. We should celebrate this and be happy. Even if you are not a Trump supporter, Republican, or if you protested Israel or vehemently agreed with their prosecution of the war — regardless of your stance on things this is a huge deal that allows for things to get better.

From the beginning of this war, I have tried to look at it historically. One reality of history is Hamas brought this on themselves, and it is a culmination of generational hatred that goes back to the founding of the modern state of Israel. There is not time to repeat all the history here, but the way I read it, what we have seen for the last two years is primarily because the Palestinians refused to live side by side with Jews in 1948.

There was no way Hamas thought they could defeat Israel on October 7, 2023. Their hope, and their plan, was to initiate the tension with Israel and drag Iran, Hezbollah, Syria and other bad actors into the conflict into a regional war. It almost worked, but Israel withstood. One reason it withstood is Iran is incredibly weak now because it has overreached and its own population is near rebellion. Another reason it failed is because radical Islam is shrinking. People my age still stand in fear of damage that was done on September 11, 2001 and in many other terrorists activities for the last thirty years in places like Paris, the UK, and Copenhagen. And sure, they can still do some damage but they have no where near the power they had, say, in 2005, although I think they are in our head.

Hamas’ plan on October 7 was also to force something, anything, because Israel had been boxing them in, essentially putting all of Gaza in a giant open air prison. It caused desperation, and desperate people do desperate things.

Historically, as well, we must look at Israel. I strongly support Israel’s right to defend itself, yet we all turn in horror at the bombing of hospitals thinking of the terrible brutality, only to shake our heads that Israeli intelligence was right, and there were tunnels and supplies and weapons underneath those hospitals. Before the west, especially places like the United States, England, and France judge too harshly the Israelis, it must remember Dresden, Hamburg, Nagasaki, and Hiroshima where indiscriminate bombings of civilian populations devastated untold numbers. Egypt shares a border with Gaza and could have welcomed the refugees with open arms. They, in large, did not.

The very difficult truth is the Palestinians have made, right or wrong, themselves so odious to the international community no one wants them.

Nevertheless, history will judge Israel harshly for its zealous over-prosecution of the war, just as it has judged George W. Bush harshly for his zealous invasion of Iraq. It was too much of a response. Israel over-reacted, and many of its people know this to be true, which is why Israel herself is still divided. They wasted much of the goodwill the world felt toward them with the desire for revenge. Likewise, Hamas wasted a lot of the world’s sentiment that they were being ill-treated when, a year ago, it stubbornly refused to release hostages and end the war.

And that is what I hope ended with this cease fire, revenge. It is not until each side stops seeking revenge for wrongs or perceived wrongs that actual peace will be achieved. It is not until fathers love their living children more than they love their dead brothers or dead children, or until politicians decide to care about their nation’s future more than the slights of the past, not until the future becomes more important than the past will there actually be peace.

And now I think on peace. A good friend of mine texted me about this development, and my response was, ‘is it really peace, though?’ It feels more like surrender, because Hamas is not able to wage war, fight, or even plot. Actually, when I see video of the destruction that has happened in Gaza, it reminds me of the old Latinism from my college days.

‘Carthago delenda est’ – Carthage must be destroyed.

The Elder Cato.

Israel has sown salt and now calls it peace.

Without a doubt, Gaza is destroyed. Hamas is gone. What happens now? Can it last, or will a new generation of young, angry, Palestinians seek revenge? Will it last, or will Israel bring in the bulldozers and take what she has long coveted? Does the future hold a Trump Hotel and Casino on the shores of the Mediterranean as he famously celebrated with a gold statue AI video?

Things have changed, and right now they seem better. History, though, makes me cynical, for I remember Clinton and the Oslo Accords where Rabin, Arafat, and Clinton supposedly fixed all this in 1993. It was perhaps the most awkward handshake in history.

History never goes away. It doesn’t repeat itself either. Nor does it rhyme. What happens is that people forget history and they just keep making the same mistakes. History wants to teach us. Will we learn?

And it was fun.

Travel is one of my favorite things, but I had never visited Alaska before. That has now been corrected.

The first question everyone asks is, ‘Did you take a cruise?’ The answer is no. I know many people love cruises, but that is not my preferred experience. We tackled the great big state in a car! A rented Chevy Equinox, to be exact.

We traveled with another couple, friends from church who likewise had never been to Alaska. I highly recommend traveling with people you love and respect, because it is close quarters and when things go wrong, as they always do at some point (like Fairbanks!) you need people you trust. We’ve always been blessed with outstanding travel companions.

Itinerary

Anchorage: Talkeetna: Denali: Fairbanks: Seward: Girdwood

We spent fourteen days in Alaska, landing on a Monday evening and leaving two weeks later on a Monday morning. Everything starts in Anchorage, but the best advice we received from those who have gone before is ‘get out of Anchorage as fast as possible.’ We spent one full day recovering from the day of travel and walked around a bit but I can tell you, Anchorage is nothing to write home (or write a blog) about. I feel like the biggest adventure in Anchorage was finding a good breakfast — which we did — and ate delicious reindeer sausage and chinook salmon scrambled eggs at the 817 Diner.

On the morning of our second full day we went back to the airport by Uber (which is only about fifteen minutes away) and rented a car, and drove to Talkeetna, about two hours up the road. Correction, we stopped at Wal-Mart first.

Talkeetna is a vibey hippy kind of place where there are some neat shops and decent eateries, but we spent most of our time hiking trails. There were lots of great trails. On one of them we saw a bear, at a distance, on the edge of pond. We were all armed with bear spray, but never did we use it.

We spent three nights in Talkeetna in a wonderful AirBnb. The most surprising serendipity in Talkeetna was the Alaska Birch Syrup tasting room. Birch syrup tastes to me like ribbon cane syrup from my childhood. If you know, you know.

On Saturday morning we turned north and drove through the snow to Denali National Park. A beautiful drive, although as the snow fell and collected on he roadway, I began to wonder if we made the right decision to come in September (short answer: we did — so many fewer people to deal with and the only thing we really missed was the train ride, which we thought was a good swap for the dazzling colors of the fall foliage). In Denali we saw a bull moose, in the snow, scraping against a tree. Very cool. we also saw grizzly bears, a mom and two cubs, again, at a safe distance through binoculars.

What we did not see that day was Mt. Denali, or Mt. McKinley, or whatever the name is now. It was hiding in the weather.

We did not stay overnight near the National Park, as there were really no available accommodations. Instead, we pressed further north and drove to Fairbanks. The drive from Talkeetna to Denali was about 2.5 hrs and the drive from Denali to Fairbanks was about 2.5 hours and the drive inside the park was about 2 hours. It as a long day of driving at slow speeds.

The VRBO we reserved was a horrible, unsafe, deceptive bit of devilry so we bailed on that and sought refuge at a local hotel. Fairbanks is very north, very cold, and the people are very hard edged. The city has a terrible mental health, addiction, and homeless problem which is very noticeable, very disturbing. It is not a pretty town. However, we did do some fun things, like visit the North Pole – a real place just north of Fairbanks. We also drove out to Chena Springs, which is a natural sulphur hot bath. On the Sunday we were there I went to church at the First Baptist Church of Fairbanks, and though small in number, about seventeen folks I counted, it was a very hospitable and kind congregation. A high point of Fairbanks was the Museum of the North on the campus of The University of Alaska.

We did see the Aurora, but it was a rainy, cloudy night so they were just kind of a puke green glow.

On our second Tuesday, we left Fairbanks and drove back to Anchorage, about a six hour journey. Another long day, but we were able to see most of Mt. Denali that day as the sun shone just a bit. We only stayed in Anchorage long enough to sleep and eat what was maybe the worst meal we experienced: the dreaded IHOP breakfast. The man who seated us spoke a language known only to himself.

Wednesday morning, then, the second Wednesday, we drove around Turnagain Arm to Seward, which is located near Kenai Fyords National Park. I think if there were a place on our itinerary I would have liked more days, it was here. I loved it– the location, the marine wildlife, everything. The entire village is surrounded by amazing mountains. Our first day we walked the beach and watched salmon fishers snag what I think were Coho salmon. So many fish. Harbor seals and otters watched us as we watched them. The next day we sailed on a marine tour out into the National Park and saw a great many wildlife include eagles, dall’s porpoise, seal lions, seals, and mountain sheep. No whales, sadly, but we did see the Aialik Glacier up close and personal. The captain cut the engines and we could hear it calving, cratering off in large hunks crashing as peels of thunder into the cold gray sea. It felt as though we were at the end of the world, the very place where God drew the line.

The next day, as if it rival the others, our little party of four went on a white water rafting expedition with a tour guide. We did not get many pictures that day because we were so busy paddling! It was far from a lazy float, and more like a days labor, but oh my, the joy of the adventure. We saw so many bald eagles that I lost count.

Finally, we finished at Girdwood, a resort community in the mountains. Here we healed our sore muscles with an amazing Nordic spa experience at the Alyeska Resort. We also visited a wildlife conservatory for rescued animals where we saw all kinds of things, like a three legged porcupine. From Girdwood it was about an hour drive back to the airport, to return the filthy and well-used rental car and fly home.

People

We met many interesting people. More than I could include here. One was Shawna–in Fairbanks who told a riveting tale of her father being beaten up and severely injured by a moose attack in their driveway. I know it seems wrong, but the way she told it was actually hilarious, but ended in, ‘His shoulder has never been right since then.’ We also met a man in Fairbanks who had driven from California to the shores of THE ARTIC OCEAN sleeping mostly in his own tricked out truck. I was so jealous. What a man.

We also met Brandon, our river guide in Seward. He told us riveting tales of bear in the backcountry and fishing trips and drunken Czechoslovakians set loose in the Alaskan wild. He described ‘ice climbing’ frozen waterfalls and I have decided that is something I need to do.

Most of the people we met were not from Alaska. I think it was fewer than a handful of people who are from Alaska. Several people were from other countries, including a brilliant young scholar from Serbia. There were many people who were transplants from Minnesota and Washington State. The weather in September reminded me a lot of Western Washington.

Clothes And Weather

I think we hit the ideal ‘shoulder season’ for Alaska. Most of the restaurants were still open, shops were open, and all the tours were still for the most part available. It did rain just about every day we were there. I was glad I brought my Columbia Rain Coat and my puffy Eddie Bauer coat. My Tilley hat performed fantastic, and I wouldn’t have wanted to not have that rain protection on my head.

No one dresses nicely in Alaska, so jeans, t-shirts, heavy coats, and hats are a must. And gloves, especially in Fairbanks. My Merrell hiking shoes were fantastic, but they are bulky so I wore them on travel days, as we only use carry on suitcases and never check baggage. If you avail yourself of washing machines at hotels and AirBnB, then three jeans, five shirts, and a hoody or sweater should do. Bring one pair of shoes for non-hiking days.

Years ago I was all on board the Eddie Bauer bandwagon. Their products were durable and attractive. That sheen is gone, as the last three purchases I’ve made have been disappointing. I bought my puffy jacket three years ago for our trip to Iceland, and it has done nothing but shrink because feathers keep coming out of it. In Alaska, every day I wore it, I looked like a molting bird.

What I noticed was a lot of folks in Alaska wearing Patagonia outerwear. It is speedy, but seems to be worth it. I purchased a couple of items and will be field testing them over the next year.

I did hav to buy new gloves in Fairbanks because mine were insufficient. My fingers were freezing. How important are gloves in Fairbanks? The outfitter we visited had a wall from floor to ceiling that stretched out for at least fifty feet of nothing but gloves. I’ve never seen that many choices before in my entire life.

When I go again, I will get much better binoculars and maybe a digital camera. The iPhone camera is not sophisticated enough to get the kind of photos Alaska deserves. Plus, I saw several people with lenses that were the size of an umbrella and I think I might have committed the sin of envy in those moments.

Vehicles

One of the things I look at is vehicles people drive in places. For example, everyone in Lisbon I think drives a Toyota. In Alaska, there are few luxury vehicles, and there are many, many, older trucks — twenty, twenty-five-year-old trucks. Not a lot of newer vehicles in Alaska. People are functional, utilitarian, and not unimpressed by flashy. If a vehicle is sturdy and dependable, they tend to hold on to it. Very few electric vehicles, I think I only saw two cybertrucks in our twenty plus hours of driving around.

Food

Other than the unfortunate IHOP, we really never had a bad meal. Fairbanks was mostly brown food — deep fried deep fried and not a lot of seafood — although I had a delicious salmon at the swanky restaurant in Chena Springs. Elk and reindeer are very mild meats, and I enjoyed a delicious reindeer potato soup in Seward. Halibut, salmon, oysters, and cod were in abundance and delicious.

Was it fresh? You would think so, but one of the things we learned was that most Alaskan fish has worms, so none of it is fresh. It has to be frozen immediately, or smoked, or overcooked to kill the words. So, there really is no such thing as fresh Alaskan fish.

But there is so much of it and they really know how to prepare it.

The cost of the food is what as shocking. When we could, we we would buy from a grocery store, such as Safeway or the local IGA in Talkeetna, and even there it was really high. Meat wasn’t that much more expensive in the store, but everything else was exorbitant. At restaurants Mrs. Greenbean and I often split entrees and still it would be over $100 for two people.

Here are some notable restaurants you should visit if you go to Alaska. Orsos in Anchorage had a halibut dish which might be worth the flight up. The best breakfasts we had were The Cookie Jar in Fairbanks. Surprisingly the meal at the lodge in Chena Springs was very very good, as was the atmosphere, or maybe we were really, really hungry after soaking in sulphur hot springs for four hours.

Vying for top spot in our culinary adventures was a fantastic meal, and wonderful environment, was at Rays in Seward. We had the best seat in the house. But in truth, other than IHOP, we never had a bad meal. The food was all very delicious. Every restaurant seemed to carry a Philly cheesesteak, cheese curds, clam chowder, and salmon. I only saw oysters in Seward.

Change Anything?

No, I wouldn’t change anything for our fourteen day trip. However, if someone didn’t have that much time, say seven days or ten days, I think the journey to Fairbanks is something that could be eliminated. Talkeetna, too, though amazing and fun and quirky, offers trails and there are abundant trails in Girdwood, Seward, and just about everywhere in Alaska. Maybe three nights in Talkeetna with a day trip form there out to Denali and back.

I also think perhaps in hindsight that I could have saved some sore backs, although it would have increase costs, to have dropped off the rental car in Fairbanks and flown to Seward. But that is all hindsight. I wouldn’t change a thing about our fourteen days.

Juneau was on our list, but it was practically closed. If I ever go back, I will see Juneau, Kodiak Island, and Wrangler-Elias National Park for certain. That kind of an itinerary will require a lot of plane rides, but having just enjoyed this trip so much, I think I will be back, but I’ll bring more money.

Pictures

Here are some photos from our trip, although, I must say, pictures do not do it justice. The land is so vast, beautiful, bold, and there is a slight tinge of danger to every adventure.

KODAK Digital Still Camera KODAK Digital Still Camera

There are spoilers in this blog post, so if you are one of the three or four people who have not seen the new Superman movie and want to see it, then perhaps you shouldn’t read any farther. However, my spoilers aren’t any plot defying amazing twists you probably wouldn’t see coming because, there really aren’t any.

Let’s go old school in this review and start with what I liked and do what I didn’t like and then finish with what I absolutely hated. Oh, and bonus content.

What I Liked

I liked a lot of things, but the first thing I really liked was the acting. This cast is amazing. I am especially impressed with Rachel Brosnahan, who has made the leap from Mrs. Maisel extremely well. I knew she was great on the small screen, but to make the leap to a major summer movie and literally dominate in every scene she’s in, well, that is special. She has generational talent.

I also really liked Mr. Terrific, played by Edith Gathegi. In fact, the best scenes of the movie were when Lois and Mr. ‘I Am Annoyed With People’ Terrific are together. Quality, real quality. I want to see a movie where those two are the main characters and Superman just shows up for lunch.

I like the decision to start in the middle of Superman’s arc, and not rebuild the universe from scratch. I am not sure we even needed the prologue, just open with him falling to the ground, bleeding.

I like the ‘Justice Gang’, too. Them, along with the dog, made the whole thing feel so comic-booky that it elevated my enjoyment. Unlike so many other superhero things which run away from the comic book feel, this movie leans in. Good decision.

So, there is a lot in this movie I really liked. Now, for what I didn’t like.

What I Didn’t Like

The screenplay was atrocious. I mean, atrocious. There are moments of writing so bad I cringed. Let’s start at the beginning, for an example. Why is the robot telling the other robot out loud, ‘He likes to see the message from his parents. It soothes him.’ That is a perfect example of telling and not showing, and also of info dumping through weird dialogue that makes absolutely no sense situationally. In fact, almost everything those robots say is that way. It is lazy exposition. DC needs to HMU next time and I can help punch that thing up for them.

I didn’t like the special effects much. It was only a slight step above what you might get from Strange New Worlds on Paramount. At no point did I think the supposed ‘rift’ in the black whole pocket universe looked anything other than Microsoft Paint. And that ‘River of Anti-Protons’ or whatever looked like they swiped it from the old Mario Cart game on Nintendo 64.

I didn’t like the cursing. I never like cursing in these movies that are so clearly geared toward traditionally younger audiences. It is unnecessary. Before you label me as a prude here, even though I generally am against cursing, if it is narratively acceptable, if it fits the crowd and audience, okay I get it. But, Superman is where you take your nine-year-old.

I didn’t like the overall characterization of Superman’s Iowa parents. Hear me out — the actors were great, and the dialogue they gave and love and encouragement were very family friendly and I dig that a lot. But, and I am not being judgy, they are from Iowa not Arkansas. The slow cadence, the twang, and their dress looked more Appalachian than Midwest. Watch it again and listen to Clark Kent’s dialect — it sounds like Iowa. His Iowa parents, however, sound like they might be from rural Mississippi. I’m not dogging people from rural Mississippi at all. I am from very rural East Texas, and we have a definite drawl. I just don’t think James Gunn knows what Iowa sounds like so he played Deliverance. Gunn only knows city elites and hillbillies and it is one or the other for him, which is actually not the way it works.

What I Am Uncertain If I Liked Or Didn’t Like

There is a scene in which Superman comes to Lois Lane’s apartment in the midst of his existential crisis. Outside the window is a giant glowing space jellyfish or something and it looks amazing. But him, and Lois, are completely unconcerned. It was really hard to focus on this powerful relational moment and not think, ‘What is going on outside. Can I see just some of that battle up front? That looks amazing! Come on, man, there is a car chase scene here and you’re showing us two people talking at the coffee shop about their feelings!

But maybe that is the point. In this universe, something like that is just not unusual at all.

What I Hated

There is only one thing, and I will not beat it to death. I hated the timing. The release of this movie is so soon after the more recent Henry Cavil Superman movies that it makes the head spin. Let it cure a bit before you come out swinging.

BONUS COVERAGE: POLITICS AND RELIGION!

Before I ever saw this movie I read a lot of political chatter about it, claiming it was pro-immigrant or anti-Israel or pro-replacement theory or whatever. I have no doubt people making this movie had political baggage they were carrying, but honestly the conflict felt more like Ukraine V Russian than what is happening and has happened in Gaza. And who could be mad that Superman is keeping Russia out of Ukraine, huh? I mean, come on? Slava Ukraini!

Is Superman an undocumented immigrant. No, he is an alien. How exactly would an alien get documented? Is there a process for that in this universe? Besides, he lives as Clark Kent, decidedly not living as an immigrant. He was raised in Iowa. He never crossed a border, unless you count the ionosphere as a border. I felt this movie was more about adoption, which rings near to my heart. My father, the man who raised me, adopted me. I am instilled with the values he taught me — hard work, strong coffee, and then get back to work. I am not filled with the values of my biological father. Character and integrity is about choices, not genetics. But kudos to the makers of the movie, because they must have done something right to make everyone think they were hitting on their pet project. That is what good art does, it gets you thinking, which is something more than say, Jurassic World: Rebirth does even though it tried real hard.

I am far more interested in the religious overtones of the film. The last several versions of Superman have worked hard to paint him as a god figure surrounded by mere mortals. The Marvle universe has leaned hard into that as well, creating a virtual Greek pantheon of major and minor deities. At least in this DC Universe, for now, that is being eschewed. The most powerful moment, emotionally, is when Superman gives his, ‘I am a human’ speech to Lex Luthor. Superman doesn’t want to be god, he wants to be human.

And there it is, the meta narrative of all story-telling. Superman embodies the narrative timeline in this film of Jesus who is taken into custody willingly, and then descends into Hades, a pocket universe where souls are held captive by the digital devil Lex Luthor. He then escapes, and rescues those in bondage. It is one of my sincerest beliefs, and one of the reasons I love stories so much, that all stories are echoes of the One True Story — Jesus Christ, the God-man who was crucified, died, rose from the dead, and saves the world. You can’t tell the Superman story without Christian religious language. God Almighty should have gotten a writer’s credit and a tithe royalty should be split among the world’s Christian denominations.

Summary Judgment

I liked it. It was great summer movie popcorn fun. What more could you ask for?