The Code Breaker, by Phil Ware

The fury over The Da Vinci Code has been going on now for several
months. The frenzy reached its most fanatical flurry with the release
of the movie this past weekend.

Christians and churches have many different responses to the release of
the movie and to the impact of this incredibly popular book. Some have
protested and advocated boycotts of the book and movie. Some have
protested publicly or through email and letters. Others have structured
classes and curriculum to refute the many different inaccuracies and
blatant attacks on the Gospels, the divinity of Jesus, and the
reliability of the Scriptures.

Today and tomorrow, Heartlight will have several links to resources for
you on this matter. However, my concern is not so much getting accurate
information into the hands of Christians -- Rubel's article tomorrow
will focus more on that -- but my chief concern is that Christians live
up to their own standards.

For those of us who are a bit older, a clean and "logical" presentation
of fact matters greatly. However, for the emerging generation, more
important than the facts of the argument are the facts demonstrated in
the lives of the proponents of these arguments. In other words, there
is no truth unless it is lived truth. Put in cornbread English, they
want us to walk the walk and not just talk the talk.

Talk is cheap. Those who see themselves on the outside of the church
today have already been bombarded with religious talk. They have seen
Christians get all stirred up about all sorts of things and make a big


commotion about a bunch of different issues. In fact, this younger
generation is pretty much turned off by the facts proposed by the
religious right, evangelicals, and televangelists and view Christianity
-- not Jesus, but the organized religious movements they see as
Christianity -- as irrelevant and out of touch. To them, the code wars
are just more yada yada yada language ... the religious noise they can
easily tune out and ignore.

I'm not saying facts don't matter. I'm not suggesting that truth is
determined by the current drift of culture. Truth is truth. We do need
to know the truth and the way so many obvious distortions of the truth
can be swallowed is a reminder of how much we need to recommit
ourselves to the truth.

However, I am saying that all our classes on The Da Vinci code won't
matter very much to those outside our church walls. The truth of the
code wars is irrelevant to most of them. They want to see if we are
serious about the real Jesus -- his message, his lifestyle, his
compassion, his character, and his involvement in the lives of
non-religious people who were on the fringes and margins of religious
society and power in his day.

Most of us need to get back to the Gospels -- Matthew, Mark, Luke, and
John -- so we can live as Jesus' presence in our time. Our goal must
first be the Jesus lifestyle rather than a set of facts to refute Dan
Brown's fast and loose use of historical and non-historical
information.

In the Gospel of John, Jesus calls us to the truth -- authentic, real
life as he lived it -- in our life before God.

In Matthew, Jesus reminds us again and again that our righteousness has
to be displayed in real life, in obedience, and in concern for the
"least of these" rather than fighting over words we don't ever get
around to obeying.

In Mark, Jesus demonstrates the power of God to redeem lives and care
for the broken.

In Luke, Jesus makes clear that the Gospel is for all folks, even the
most disenfranchised and forgotten.

The real code breaker, the real power to defeat the cynical and
anti-Christian impact of both the book and the movie, is for us as
God's people to decide to put into practice the truth we already know.
We've got to shift the understanding of our culture about church away
from buildings, politics, and powerful church hierarchies. To make a
difference, we've got to leave our church buildings and enter our world
as caring participants and not as cultural opponents -- just like Jesus
did. If we are to have a counter-cultural impact, we've got to live as
counter-culture community in the world we're trying to reach. This call
to incarnational style of ministry isn't optional, new, or a fad. It is
rooted in the very work that God did in Jesus. (John 1:1-18)

So Dan Brown and The Da Vinci Code have given us a wake up call. A call
to know the facts of the Gospel better and a call to live the truth
more fully in our daily lives in the real world around us. Let's answer
that call and break the code and demonstrate the truth.