Postscript

Preachers play Monday morning quarterback too.  Sometimes we sit around thinking about things we really shouldn't have said, but other times there are things that sort of show up unbidden in between Sunday afternoon naps, or maybe even during them.
I preached on the text from Matthew called "Peter's Declaration," where Peter says that Jesus is, "The Messiah, the Son of the Living God," and Jesus tells them all to keep it a secret.  Oh yeah, and I talked quite a bit about Doctor Who.  Since I'm a big fan of Jesus, and also of the Doctor, there was just so much material to sort through, some of it inevitably had to be trimmed out.  My thoughts centered around the question of identity.  Lately, the story of the Doctor has really been hitting that hard.  As I watched the re-runs of the past few seasons, which BBC America was so kindly running pretty much 24-7 last week leading up the first episode featuring Peter Capaldi as the Doctor, I found myself getting more and more geeked up about Who in general, but also about the little wrinkles of thought that surrounded the issue of identity.
See, Timelords choose their name, the one they want to be called by random people.  Over the course of the 50 years of the show, you learn that many Gallifrean words do not translate into other languages.  Timelords are just special that way.  Therefore, rather than constantly trying to tell people a Gallifrean name, the Gallifreans who travel out into the universe, through space and time pick names that do, which are defined by function.  The Doctor, the Master, the Corsair, the Rani (a Hindi queen), are a few of the travelling Timelords you run into during the course of the show (notice none of them lack for self confidence).  Recently the writers of the show have turned to unraveling the meaning behind why the Doctor chose the Doctor as a moniker.  It's because he's the one who fixes things and saves people, and helps when there is need.  He has a Gallifrean name, they all do, like Rassalon, one of the important historical figures in the history of the Timelords, but that name is ultimately not as important as the self-selected, character-defining name.  It's sort of like the names taken by certain Native American Tribes, where someone's character is reflected in the name they are given as an adult, rather than being stuck with what their parents might have chosen to call them as a child (former Bubba here, calling that a really good idea).
And yet I wonder if maybe, when it comes to Jesus, we're not missing something really beautiful in our rush to define him by his function.  We are very quick to leap to the title: Messiah, Christ, Savior, Lamb of God, Son of Man, Son of the Living God, and so on and so forth.  Do we forget that his mother probably just called him Yeshua?  And what is the significance of that?
We Christians talk quite a bit about having a "relationship" with God in Christ, but having a relationship based on a functional role has certain limits.  I share certain very intimate details of my life with my physician, however, that relationship will always be a different sort of intimacy than what I share with my wife.  While there are times when God seems to function as a doctor of sorts, the images that seem to dominate are much more intimate than that.  We like to keep God at arms length, perhaps because we fear the sort of terrible vulnerability that might come from allowing an all powerful God into such close proximity.
The Doctor often comes across as being a very lonely creature, because he is the last of the Timelords, there is even one scene where he practically begs his mad antagonist, the Master to just give up the megalomania and they can go hang out, but of course megalomaniacs are not prone to take that sort of  invitation to chill.  The Doctor always has companions, but there are definite lines that must be drawn, as we have found out in recent seasons, for the protection of the humans.
The rather interesting thing about Jesus though is that he doesn't draw those lines very often.  Sure he warns the disciples that following him might be a bit troublesome at times, but still  he calls them and invites them into the same journey: to take up the cross.
The Doctor is mostly a single-handed save the day sort, but every once in a while, he calls on a little help from his friends, usually when the situation is most dire.  He is not averse to self-sacrifice but he is fiercely protective of his friends, which always sets up a sort of paternalistic dynamic.  He can't always protect them perfectly, but he would still have them around for adventures, but most of the time it's worth the risk, until it isn't and then the companions go away and "break his heart."
The Jesus model is a bit different, he invites us into the adventure for sure, but there is absolutely no guarantee that it's going to be safe.  He willingly, in fact, I would say specifically and purposefully, gives us the main role.  He knows that we're not super-heroic.  He knows all of our faults, and yet we are called nonetheless.
Faith is not designed for fictional relationships, or for lop-sided relationships with a functionary God.  Functionary gods are idols, you can go to them like you go to a doctor or an accountant: devotion and/or sacrifice for a certain set of metaphysical and/or supernatural services.  In order for that to work though, we have to be able to simplify those gods in a way that is not possible or desirable to do with an actual living breathing person.  However, if you make your gods two dimensional, how are you ever going to see the majority of humanity as anything else?
Sure you can have a relationship with a two dimensional being.  I feel like I have known the Doctor all my life, even though his face keeps changing.  It's not quite the same as having a relationship with a Living God though.  That's what we're shooting for, a real, living relationship with a real living God.  It's kind of dangerous actually.  That's probably why so many people prefer to find their glimpse of transcendence in a safer package.
The devotion that you can observe in crowds of people, for Star Trek, Doctor Who, Star Wars, Twilight, Harry Potter, pick your favorite fandom, would probably be much more constructively channeled into an actual relationship with God, but we, as the church, have failed rather tragically to adequately describe our journey together in those terms.  We make it about rules and doctrine, instead of about adventure.  We make it seem like something we do out of a sense of guilt rather than a rabid excitement.
I have to admit, I have rarely had the same feeling of anticipation and excitement about a worship service as I had about Saturday night's premiere of Doctor Who, and I feel like that's a question begging for an answer: why not?  Why do I not expect a real relationship with God to be as exciting as a TV show?
That's a question that I need to answer.  That's a question the Church needs to answer.  But I think we're a little afraid to even ask it, because it makes us look bad.  It admits that we're not really as super-spiritual as we might want others to think.  It admits that, maybe, the way things are and "always" have been is not really cutting the mustard.  It challenges us to change, it opens the door on a new adventure, but we're not sure we can trust it.
Following Jesus is not safe, or easy.  It's a practice that should and will consume your life.  If we make it anything less, we are not really following the Living God, we're following some sort of vague facsimile, and who really wants to do that?
I think churches need to be like the TARDIS (The Doctor's blue box: stands for Time And Relative Dimension In Space).  A sign of hope, and adventure, of help when you need it and always an invitation to a journey.  They need to be bigger on the inside, and they need to put us in touch with all of time, and space and creation.  They can each have their own personality, and sometimes that might be a little quirky.  They may not always take you where you want to go, but they will take you where you need to go, seriously, that's a thing that the TARDIS told the Doctor in an episode when she got to be a person.
Sometimes fiction tells the truth.