I Saw the Messiah…on Netflix
Some Christians believe that Jesus’s second coming will be the inauguration of a thousand-year reign of peace on earth. Others believe that it will be the crowning of a thousand-year peace reign on earth whilst still others believe that the reign of peace will be an unidentified period of years as the number thousand is employed symbolically rather that literally in the book of Revelation. But almost all Christians believe that Jesus will return to earth in glory in a so called “second coming”. It is fascinating to thing that even Islam holds that Issa or Jesus will return to judge. All believe that Jesus’s second coming will inaugurate the end of history as we know it, so Jesus’s second coming has to do with the end time doctrine or eschaton called eschatology.
In the gospels Jesus Himself talked about his second coming and depicted it as an undeniable reality that will light up the skies and leave nobody in doubt that it is happening. This makes his second coming in our minds very different from His first coming in a stable in Bethlehem, the one we celebrate yearly at Christmas time. Jesus’s first coming was subtle, and one can almost say gradual. He was relatively unknown and seemingly inactive ministry wise until the age of thirty when his public ministry and teachings started. This ministry was brief, about three years but He became well known and the movement started in his name spread like wildfire, is something many people across the world still identify with and remains influential.
The Netflix series Messiah explores imaginatively what might transpire if Jesus indeed comes again in our time. The opt for the eschatological stance of Jesus coming before and to inaugurate a reign of peace on earth. However they decided to depict his second coming not as a instant event where the whole world recognize Him all at once on the clouds. His second coming in this series are sketched similar to his first coming. He is born and grows up in an ordinary family in Iran. He is versed in both Islam and Judaism having had a parent from each religion. He also acknowledges the Christian church and seem to spend most of his time in and among Christian people living in a predominately Christian country.
The story line doesn’t come across as one wanting to correct any religion, nor does it attempt to give a authoritative interpretation of sacred scriptures. If viewed with this in mind it makes for stimulating thoughts about Jesus, how he is understood and what his relevance is for our world today. I guess there would be Christians, Jews and Muslims alike that would have problems with this story and the idea behind it. Some would even write it off as blasphemous. If you are one of those people, don’t read any further as my reflections wouldn’t be edifying to you.
I found the series gripping. Not only because it affirmed some convictions I have about Jesus but also because it made me question other notions I held dear. I like how the series reminded me that Jesus isn’t a blond, white guy but a middle eastern man. I would have preferred the lead actor to be a bit less attractive as well but at least he is undeniably middle eastern. The story starts of with him proclaiming freedom and deliverance for a group of war torn Muslim refugees and leading them up to the border of the Holy land Israel. The refugees are denied access, they suffer waiting at this border and their Messiah is taken to prison. His interrogator does his best to convince himself that this man is nothing but a terrorist against the cause of the Jews but struggles as his prisoner shows calm, intimate knowledge of his haunting past and knowledge of the Jewish world view (he even speaks Hebrew as fluently as he speaks Arabic). So on one hand this Messiah challenges the notion of God being on the side of his people Israel and their ideals for their own nation state. On the other hand it doesn’t depict him as one-sidedly pro-Palestinian either. I liked that. Also the fact that Jesus is hereby depicted as someone depicted as one with relevance and something to say to all religions and cultures not only the western-Christian one. As the lead character states later in the series; “I walk with all men”.
So the Messiah escapes from jail and goes to the United States, a peculiar small town called Dilley in a rural arid part of Texas to be more precise. He has already attracted the attention of a CIA agent, a workaholic woman whose dad also was an agent. He husband died and one gets the idea that she tries to redeem herself through her work. She makes it her personal mission to track down this Messiah and expose him for the terrorist she is convinced he is. She has much a similar view of him that the Israeli agent holds that interrogated the Messiah after his capture at the border.
Back to the town of Dilley. We meet a pastor of a small and struggling church. His church’s financial position is in dire straights. One sympathizes with the pastor. He seems faithful to the cause even in the light of financial ruin and his own family crumbling under the pressure-his daughter is a rebellious teenager and his wife, whose dad is a wealthy televangelist has a drinking problem and a crisis of faith. At breaking point as a solution to the financial woes, the pastor decides to burn down his church. He is conflicted but goes as far as taking a canister gas inside the church in order to set it alight. At that moment a ferocious hurricane sets in. He scrambles to get his wife and a few others into a hiding bunker. They search frantically for their daughter who decided to hitchhike her way to freedom that very evening without their knowledge. The next day the whole town seem to be destroyed by the hurricane but the church still stands. It becomes a beacon of hope to the community once more and attracts attention from all over on the media. His daughter survived unharmed because of the protection this Messiah man offered her. The pastor seem to have a revival of faith hope and his career. He becomes a make shift agent for the Messiah and they eventually head of to Washington D.C with a following presumably to gain more influence. People flock to them. Among others a mother with a daughter who has cancer and hopes that the Messiah can heal her.
Eventually the Messiah gets to meet the president of the United States secretly and privately. He advise him to withdraw all troops from the middle east. The president, a Christian man, is conflicted but eventually won over by Messiah. His decision to withdraw troops are met with horror from most in the echelons of power close to him and plans are set in motion to get rid of this, in their view, dangerous Messiah.
I loved how different character’s struggle with the identity of the Messiah is depicted. Some of the most sceptic ones are won over in the end and other early embracers become skeptics when the Messiah’s plans collide with their own agenda’s. The pastor for instance is revealed to be a man who is more interested in his own career and success than in plans of the Messiah and feels betrayed. Even though the Messiah gave his humble church his stamp of approval earlier on, he eventually goes through with his plan to burn the church down. Somebody sprayed the words: “False God” on the church as a sign of protest against the Messiah and as the church goes up in flames one is struck by the irony that it seems to be this pastor’s own devotion and plans rather than the Messiah that turned out to be the false God.I love how in many character’s story lines Jesus is depicted as one who isn’t at anybody’s beck and call. How He simply isn’t a predictable “do-gooder” that grants everybody’s wishes. In one scene, the Messiah is called upon to attend to a father and a son in one of the hurricane struck buildings. The son’s dog is trapped under rubble and suffering. The father has a gun in his hand ready to shoot the dog. The boy is obviously upset. The Messiah enters and everything is set up to make one expect that he will now free and heal the dog. He goes up to the dad and takes his gun. But then he shoots the dog, explaining gently to the boy that the dog was suffering and is better off this way thus affirming this father not as cruel but reasonable. Later the Messiah also agrees to meet the girl with cancer. She seems uplifted and full of life after the encounter. She goes home again and everybody seems happy but she does die of cancer in the end. The outcomes we wish for simply isn’t always the ones that is part of God’s plan, a plan way bigger and more complex than our minds can grasp. I think scenes like this depicted this truth convincingly. God could do the opposite of what we wish for and expect without compromising on his absolute love and goodness.
Maybe the message about the Messiah I liked best was what was revealed in the last episode. Without spoiling the plot, I can say that the Messiah comes to the fore here as the giver of life whose plans cannot be thawed even by the most powerful. Not even by death and destruction itself. His plans for the world as well as his plans for individuals he chose to belong to Him and serve his mission. He stays in control of the fate of the world and his essence seeps right to the core of those called by Him however skeptical and oppositional they might have started out. His truth is marching on.
Rarely has a series made me think as intensely about the Man I confess to hang my hopes and dreams on. I think this series even though it is purely fictional could lead to great conversations about Jesus, his meaning and relevance.
This morning I read that Netflix decided not to do a follow-up series of the Messiah as it wasn’t popular enough. How ironically appropriate I thought to myself…Gabriel J Snyman
December 16th 2020