Have you ever faced difficulty or an obstacle in your life? I think that’s pretty much everyone. Wouldn’t it be nice to cruise past those? For them to not be in the way? For them not to matter? Beginning in 1985 it became virtually possible. Actually the person responsible, Kazuhisa Hashimoto, died on February 25, 2020. Mr. Hashimoto introduced one of the most memorable codes into the relatively new gamer lexcon and the world. Up up down down left right left right B A start or the “Konami Code”. Mr. Hashimoto was a leading edge video game developer who left a secret developer code in a Nintendo game, specifically, Gradius for the NES. It instantly gave power ups that you normally had to collect. It later became incorporated in many other games. At the time, in 1993, I didn’t realize that I was playing a first of its kind that would pave the way for a long list of similar games. That was the year that DOOM, the seminal first person shooter was released. Your mission as Doom Guy was to eliminate evil demons. It was also where the concept of a “god Mode” cheat was first conceived. DOOM included a handful of secret cheat codes that developers could use to test out the game without actually playing it. However, anyone could take advantage of these cheats if they knew the secret code. One of them was known as “IDDQD,” and by typing those five letters in the middle of a DOOM session, your health would be set to 100 percent and you’d become immune to all damage. So no obstacles. Back in the day, if you played in a dark room with headphones, it was a pretty creepy game, but when you were invincible, you waited for the scary sounds because they were a give away of position. A little later I liked to play Baldur’s Gate. I eventually got cheat codes for that game after a play through. It was fun and relaxing to move back through the game as an undefeatable hero. There were so many special, high level armor and weapons that you could no longer actually see the character, it just glowed. I just moved through the game, stress free, dominating all the challenges and problems I had had on the original play through. But the most relaxing times were when our nephew and I sat in a cold basement or our cold garage in comfy chairs under blankets creating a Carolina Panthers team where all the players weighed 400 lbs, ran like Usain Bolt and jumped like Michael Jordan. Oh, and they were all 7’2”. We spent hours naming players with funny names and organizing. Then we would play, seeing how many sacks and defensive touch downs we could get and how high we could run the score, laughing and laughing. No sweat, no stress, actually a stress reliever, no obstacles. Wouldn’t that be great if life was like that? The problem is that it’s not. Our lives, our world is filled with obstacles, hurdles, calamities, sickness, pain, problems and disappointments. Don’t you think that we sometimes treat our faith like it should be a Konami Code or the IDDQD and we are frustrated and angered when we’re not invincible. I think that Martin Luther would have been interested as a preacher to see these game modes as I think they are a pretty awesome illustration of a theology of glory. It’s also interesting that the name given to the invulnerability cheat was called god mode. Invulnerability, untouchability, step by step conquering without effort. In a theology of glory you have it all figured out. You will get there because of the things you have done and the path that you sayed on. You’ve got your morals right, your eyes on the prize and all of your actions are a part of the plan to earn YOUR salvation. It’s all about your ability and awesomeness. The thing is, it’s an illusion, escapism, a mental vacation from our own failings and humanity, and like me playing those games and using cheats, it’s a false sense of empowerment. In the video game world, that’s no big deal, but when we start to try to employ Wile E. Coyote tactics or cheat codes or magical thinking in our day to day lives, we can find ourselves smacking the floor of the valleys of life pretty hard like Mr. Coyote. Here’s the interesting irony. The developer, Jesus Christ, God in the flesh, did not use god mode. I wish you could see my punctuation, because god mode has a little g. I think Jesus employed God mode. That’s a big G. God’s mode employed something much different than a decking out with glowing artifacts and the +8 terrible swift lightning sword of vengeance to rain down death and destruction on the unjust and remain untouchable. Instead we see a relinquishing of power or as theologians would say a kenosis, which means an emptying. It says in Philippians chapter 2 that Jesus emptied himself and took the form of a servant and became truly human. Jesus left behind the power of divinity to walk with us and to suffer and die like us. As followers of Christ who are thankful for Jesus giving up his life on the cross, God wants us to be pushed, to be driven to be propelled by the Holy Spirit to empty ourselves and become servants. Jesus in his journey through life as he walked with us did not abide a theology of glory and force but he embraced a theology of the cross, giving of himself and of servanthood. If we stick to the video game metaphors, Jesaus journeyed as what gamers call dual class healer and tank. Jesus served and brought healing to those in need, his eyes and heart open to those around him, meeting spiritual and physical needs, teaching others to heal. Healer is kind of a give away for understanding gaming terms. Tank might be a little tougher. A tank wears defensive armor. In games, a lot of it. The tank’s job is to draw fire and take it. It takes courage and trust in your armor and teammates to tank. They are at the front, leading into battle confronting the adversary, the obstacle head on and remaining, abiding and steadfast. We are called to follow Christ’s example. Notice the passage from the second lesson and the articles that the believer is to put on. It’s referred to as the full armor of God, so there is nothing missing. The armor is the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, shoes make you ready to proclaim the gospel of peace, the Helm of salvation and the shield of faith. All of these are defenses. These things are not life’s Konami or cheat codes as they don’t make us all powerful or eradicate suffering or death, yet the full armor relieves us from the fear of death because we have the truth and the truth will make you free. We hear the truth proclaimed clearly in Romans 8. “If God is for us, who can ever be against us? Since he did not spare even his own Son but gave him up for us all, won’t he also give us everything else? Who dares accuse us whom God has chosen for his own? No one—for God himself has given us right standing with himself. Who then will condemn us? No one—for Christ Jesus died for us and was raised to life for us, and he is sitting in the place of honor at God’s right hand, pleading for us. Can anything ever separate us from Christ’s love? Does it mean he no longer loves us if we have trouble or calamity, or are persecuted, or hungry, or destitute, or in danger, or threatened with death? (As the Scriptures say, “For your sake we are killed every day; we are being slaughtered like sheep.]) No, despite all these things, overwhelming victory is ours through Christ, who loved us. And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God’s love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow—not even the powers of hell can separate us from God’s love. No power in the sky above or in the earth below—indeed, nothing in all creation will ever be able to separate us from the love of God that is revealed in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Also take notice of the shoes. We wear the armor and embrace the truth, a truth that propels us to share its joy and assurance. We are not to don our armor and remain solitary. The truth drives us to community. The one article that I haven’t mentioned is the sword of the Spirit. It’s the only weapon, and like Roman swords it would hang from the belt, and our belt is truth. It’s the only aggressive piece, and swords are pretty aggressive. But. notice what this sword is the sword of the Holy Spirit, the word of God. The fruits of the Spirit are not hostile or vengeful. They are love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These are the weapons we are to wield in a world that arms itself with hatred, and like the hymn says Christ fights by our side with these weapons. We need not cheat for victory is assured and we are not in this alone. Our community is fundamental. I read this in a Wikipedia article about the Spartan Hoplites. “They carried round shields fixed by a pair of straps to their left arms. Each shield protected the left side of the man holding it and the right side of the man next to him. Despite the heroic stories of the era, this was a form of warfare that leaned towards anonymous, disciplined fighting. The Spartans’ ex-king Demaratus told the Persians that, one-on-one, Spartans were no worse than other men. It was together they became something greater.” In our baptism we are fully dressed and armed, let us now join ranks, defending one another and follow Christ’s path to victory.
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