Luke Skywalker was my childhood hero. For several years, I followed him only through repeated viewings of A New Hope and Return of the Jedi … I was too scared of Empire. By the time I worked up the courage to watch it again, I was finally old enough to appreciate it and it quickly became my favorite. Everything about it worked for me, most of all Luke and Yoda. I put myself in Luke’s shoes and saw the story through his eyes, so when Yoda said to him, “Do or do not, there is no try,” he also said it to me.

Stories and church were my life, so inevitably, my spirituality and favorite movies merged together, and I weaved Luke’s journey into my own “chosen one” narrative. Like most evangelical Christian kids and teens, I heard repeatedly that God had a specific plan for my life … a destiny just for me. All I had to do was trust God, have faith, stay on the straight and narrow, and through me God would change the world. Yes, we are all changing the world everyday, but I took it to near-messianic levels — God would change the ENTIRE world, through me.

We all start as the protagonist of our own stories, often using fiction for inspiration as we build out our egos. We have numerous blockbuster “chosen one” tales about growing up, finding your place in the world and fulfilling your destiny, but we don’t have many about what happens next. Our heroes reach victory and remain locked that way in our imaginations, free of failure. Sure, we let them fail on the way to ultimate victory, but we don’t often let them fail after the fact. We don’t want to watch them wrestle with the unraveling of their climactic happy ending. We want them to finally win and then keep winning forever, because we want to win and win forever. These stories inspire us as children, but in adulthood, they can sustain our microwave, short-run eschatologies: the carrot on the stick, forever out of reach, always promising that any day now we will fulfill our potential and be satisfied. We have many heroes to help us grow up, but few to help us grow old.

In 2017, The Last Jedi became the second Star Wars movie to make me cry. I’d hit a run of paradigm-shifting disappointments and realized my youthful idealism had led me to conclusions that were killing me. Still, on a faith level, there were signs of hope. It was dawning on me that Jesus makes a lot more sense on the other side of failure. You have to lose your life to find it, after all. Trying to fulfill a destiny had left me tired, but the implications of incarnation were sowing the seeds of revival. I had tried to escape being human — a reverse-Jesus, if you will — but I was unlearning what I had learned.

I absolutely resonated with old, cranky, disillusioned Luke Skywalker struggling to set aside his expectations and de-center himself as the focal point of his universe, learning to embrace his failures as an opportunity, not just for personal growth, but to help others. When Yoda showed up (as a Frank Oz-controlled puppet, no less) to teach Luke the moral of the story in front of the burning Jedi temple, the fictional voices of my past had come back to speak to my present.

“Pass on what you have learned … strength, mastery … but also weakness, folly, failure also. Yes, failure most of all.”

As much as I love Star Wars, I only expect these movies to give me a hit of fun nostalgia. I don’t expect them to take me to church the way The Last Jedi did. Sure, so much of my experience with it was based on my life at the time, but isn’t that how our favorite stories work? I loved the whole movie, but I still think about that one scene. As always, I see the story through Luke’s eyes, so when Yoda says to him, “The greatest teacher, failure is,” he is also saying it to me.

- T.S. Eliot

“Welcome, child,” he said.

“Aslan,” said Lucy, “you’re bigger.”

“That is because you are older, little one,” answered he.

“Not because you are?”

“I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger.”

- C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian

In my mind, Jesus dies over and over.

His first death is recorded in scripture. Everyone Jesus walked with believed He would be a war hero. He would free the Jews from the oppressive Romans. He never confirmed this, but they all wanted it so badly they believed it anyway. When He allowed Himself to be arrested, He shocked the people who praised Him as a conquering king just days earlier. When He died on that cross, their expectations died with Him. What else could they do but collapse into their own disappointment? He was not who they thought He was.

When He came back three days later, He still wasn’t who they thought He was. He was something different. He was someone better. Jesus rose again, but their idea of Him did not.

He knew He would never meet our expectations. We were always going to be disappointed, and out of that disappointment, we were always going to turn on Him. He let us murder Him so we could discover who He is and face who we are.

He disappoints me again and again.

I was four when I first met Him. I was baptized in my parents’ bathtub and I knew He loved me. After a few years, I’d internalized the gospel of prosperity and made Him my savior-genie. Eventually, I realized my parents were not going to be billionaires. He climbed onto the cross of my expectations and died right in front of me. I thought He was gone, but He came back as someone better.

When I was a teenager, I no longer believed He would wave magic wands and give me everything I wanted, so I subscribed to the gospel of work ethic, chugging away at school and church to win His approval. When I burned out, He spoke the word, “grace,” climbed onto the cross of my expectations, and died right in front of me. I thought he was gone, but He came back as someone better.

In my twenties, I lived by the gospel of destiny. With my lips, I said I wanted to love others, but in my heart, I wanted to be famous, and I tried to convince Him that I needed to be seen by multitudes in order to love. He said, “You are unique, but you are not special,” then He climbed onto the cross of my expectations and died right in front of me.

Whenever He dies, I wait for Him to return, and I tremble. This isn’t easy. You see, every time He dies and resurrects, He always asks me to die too. Every time He is crucified, He comes back and tells me I built a false self around my evil expectations of Him. He comes back, shows me the holes I tore in His hands and says, “Now it’s your turn.”

As much as I would love for this cup to pass from me, I can’t keep living in this world I created … a world where He is chained to my desires and I understand everything about Him … a world where I am god. I often pay lip-service to infinity, but unless I wrestle with things I can never understand, I will not feel the reality that He is beyond me. I will sing that He is greater, I will think I believe it, but I will not live it.

When I receive an expanded view of Him, I must not call it permanent. Eventually, that view will grow old, shrink around me, and suffocate me. Yesterday’s horizon will become tomorrow’s Calvary, where we will both take up our crosses and be crucified yet again.

I will never “arrive.” Any hope of “arriving” is incompatible with an infinitely knowable God. To fake an arrival is to choose stagnation over exploration, law over relationship, death over life. I am a smaller infinity, only satisfied when I am in motion, exploring and loving the Infinity.

But this adventure requires a constant cycle of deaths: first His, then mine. It’s always difficult, but He always leads the way. Every time we do this, He comes back better than I remember or dream He could be, then He brings me back, better than I ever thought I could be. We are a pair of phoenixes, He and I, rising from the ashes, circling ever upward.

Maybe god talks to me more than God does.

I think God speaks to me, but I also think I’m full of myself. I’ve done many things because I thought God told me to. I’ve pursued goals because I was convinced God pre-destined them for me. Maybe I internalized my own desires deep in my subconscious until it felt like they were coming from another place.

If I feel like my desires originate elsewhere, I can attribute them to “God.” Then, when someone doesn’t give me what I want, when someone wrongs me, when someone stands in my way … any anger, sadness and frustration is justified because, hey, I’m not the one pushing this, I’m just doing what “God” told me to do.

God allows all of us to live together, bump into each other, and wage war with our agendas. God can’t be on board with everyone at once. If on a particularly sunny day you find your goals and God’s aligning, treasure it. You won’t win that lottery every time. No one does.

That’s uncertainty. Uncertainty demands a coping mechanism, and I don’t know a better coping mechanism than creating your own god. If you want to insulate yourself from the wildness of God’s favor, take everything you favor, stitch it together with mental thread and emotional staples, and call it god. Now you have a god who plays by your rules. You can control that god. Do you feel like you’ve done the right thing? This god is obligated to reward you. Do you have a selfish dream? It’s not selfish! Your god gave it to you.

If a time comes when your god fails you, then accept he isn’t real … or … double-down, grab the duct tape, and keep constructing him.

Meanwhile, everyone else is busy with their own build-a-god projects. We can all sing How great is our God together, but aren’t we all singing about different gods?

I need to destroy their gods. I must defend my god.

If the god of another doesn’t agree with mine, then maybe the god I pray to doesn’t exist … or … maybe they have a false god and, you know, they’ll eventually learn how wrong they are … because … because their goals conflict with mine, and mine aren’t wrong, because guys, god gave me those goals and dreams, and for theirs to be realized, mine would have to die, and they won’t, because god says I’m special, so run for cover, because my god is going to obliterate yours.

The god I make is evil. He is armor. He is a wall. He is a fortress from which I launch mental artillery on other people and their gods. I do not discriminate. I take them down one-by-one. Every group, every denomination, every acquaintance, every friend, every foe, every family member — I destroy them all. Their gods crumble before me …

“Your god is smoke and mirrors. Your god is dead.”

“Your god is whatever’s easiest for you. Your god is dead.”

“Your god takes advantage of others. Your god is dead.”

“Your god takes advantage of me. Your god is dead.”

“Your god makes me uncomfortable. Your god is dead.”

“Your god is not my god. Your god is dead.”

“Your god is dead.”

… and after each kill, I pray …

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you that I am not like them.”

“god, I thank you.”

I see my work. I call it good. I rest.

Then, to my horror, I realize there’s nothing left. I turn to god.

“Where’s my reward?” I ask.

“What reward?”

“I was faithful to you. I did what you demanded of me.”

“You did?”

“Yes, of course I did! This can’t be it. Is that it?”

“What do you mean?”

“Where’s the reward you promised me? You owe me!”

“I made you no promises. Why would I owe you anything?”

I lunge toward him and my fingers tighten around his neck.

“Seriously? Who do you think I did this for?”

“Who do you think you did this for?”

“I did it for you!”

“Did you?”

My fingers tighten.

“Give me my inheritance!” I demand. “You can’t create me, put me through all of this, then deny me what’s mine.”

“But I am always with you, and everything you have is mine.”

My fingers tighten.

“What are you talking about?”

“Don’t you remember? Don’t you recognize me?” he asks. “I am your image-bearer. You formed me from the dust of the ground and breathed into my nostrils the breath of life.”

My fingers tighten.

“I don’t … I don’t understand.”

“My thoughts are your thoughts, and my ways are your ways,” he tells me. “I can do nothing by myself. I can only do what I see you doing. Whatever you do, I do also. Anyone who has seen me has seen you. The words I say I do not speak with my own authority. Rather, it is you, living in me, doing your work …”

My fingers tighten.

“… in you I live … and move … and have my being.”

god crumbles in my hands and falls to the earth below, dust to dust.

The woodworker measures and marks the wood, chisels and planes it down, marks it with a compass, and carves it until it looks a bit like a human — lovely, maybe — in order to put it in a house. To take it back a bit further, perhaps he cuts down cedars or he carefully selects the cypress or oak himself, watches it, nurtures it until it is ready for his purpose. Perhaps he plants a pine; with sun and rain, it grows tall. When it’s time to harvest, he uses some of the wood for fuel to stay warm, some to heat the oven and bake bread, and some to craft a god. Then the woodworker bows down and worships before the image he just made. Do you see the irony? He sits around, warming himself and roasting dinner with wood from the same tree from which he crafted a god to which he bows and worships and prays — one time saying, “I am warmed by the wood fire”; another time saying, “O dear god, save me.”

So we see again how it is that they’re blind — their eyes shut to the truth in front of them, their hearts and minds refusing to think and really understand what’s going on. So without stopping to think about it, the fool says, “Gosh, I used half of the wood to build a fire, and baked the bread and roasted the meat over its hot coals. After I eat, I think I’ll use the rest of it to make a repulsive god. Maybe I’ll bow down to this leftover lumber.” A fool like this is feeding on ashes — his addled mind and deceived heart lead him nowhere. He can’t figure out how to save himself, much less see the error of his ways and say, “Is this idol in my right hand just a lie?”

Isaiah 44:13–19 (The Voice)