The War is Over

I felt so sick this morning that I did something I've done less than a
dozen times in the last five years: I watched a movie.

For whatever reason, I'm not much of a movie-watcher. Whether going
to the theater or watching at home, I've probably seen about ten
flicks since I got married. But this morning, I was strangely in the
mood to sit and stare mindlessly at the boob tube. So I popped in
Matrix Revolutions.

As the humans did battle with the machines, I thought about how
convenient this conflict was for our consciences. It is easier to
fight an enemy when we don't have to think of it as human. Even our
fleshly adversaries, whether on the big screen or in real life, are
easier to hate when we associate them with outright evil.

At the end of the movie this morning, the machines are finally
vanquished and a teenager excitedly runs through the crowd yelling,
"the war is over!" The main characters bask, dumbfounded, in a peace
they've waited all their lives for but can't seem to figure out how to
respond to now that it is here.

I shed a tear. For as I have been reading in the Book of Revelation
at the very back of the Bible, there is a war, and it is against an
adversary that we can correctly associate with outright evil. And
someday, we will hear, "the war is over!" And just like in Matrix
Revolutions, the sun will come out and we will stand there,
dumbfounded, in a peace we've waited all our lives.

Someday, the war will be over. Evil will be vanquished, strife and
suffering will end, and there will be no more tears. Only unlike in
the movie, we will know exactly how to respond. For we will be in the
presence of the One who has secured that victory over evil, before
whom we will have the honor and privilege of basking for the rest of
eternity. Oh, how we long for that day.