A Child's Game

"Bitter irony—to imagine that it is possible to persuade and to convince, whereas I am as certain as can be, that the part of the world still accessible to salvation belongs to the children, the heroes and the martyrs alone."

— Georges Bernanos, A Diary of My Times

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Dear Kate,

Everybody is talking about "Squid Game," ironically about the only topic one can rely on nowadays to feel true human solidarity.  We are in this together: in our breaking apart from each other, fighting for scarce resources, survival of the fittest.  Worldwide, the show seems to ignite the Marxist imagination of all ages, cultures and learning.  We are all in the Game, a collective struggle for personal survival.

I don't want to comment on the show itself, for I've watched only three scenes of it, the first three, all in my opinion lazily conceived and sloppily executed, giving me no reason to believe any "social commentary" to come after wouldn't be of the same depth.  Life is too short to swim with the fishes.  (I am sure it is entertaining, and there's nothing wrong with that.)

You have seen it before, haven't you, a supposedly microcosm of humanity, the upstairs-downstairs world of "Parasite," the train with many chambers but one ruinous fate in "Snowpiercer," a BTS meal of...guess what, the exactly same thing the rest of your life and the rest of the world are getting!  Life is a game that plays us, and some great forces make it an inevitable and inescapable one.

Yesterday in our church service we were asked to imagine what if Jesus is our mayor, our Premier, our Prime Minister, what would our world look like.  (Does Jesus ever propose to be any of these?)  Some answered we would see more affordable housing.  Some said more bike lanes.  I am sure the most progressive among us would dream about a world with all social justice issues justly addressed, no environment degradation justifiable, a world that we see to be just right, just the way we see it.

Well, that's exactly the reason why people betrayed Him to the cross back then: not only did He not deliver the rights, everything about Him was wrong, so wrong that they must shut Him up for good before people get on with His wrong ideas and worse behaviors.  There was a train ongoing, many threats much more urgent than less-than-ideal housing or less-than-sufficient bike lanes; people were oppressed and abused, their very identity and survival threatened to the core, and it's only reasonable for any proposed "ruler" to address some of these burning issues somewhat satisfactorily.  People were in a Game of clear and present danger, and they needed a game-changer.  Jesus wasn't it, both the killers and witnesses agreed.

"The kingdom of God is within you," Jesus claimed, suggested that He is already King, already ruler, among His kingdom subjects.  What would the world look like if Jesus is the ruler?  Before and among many things else, a kingdom subject should be able to see this "world" in the mirror.  And what she sees is not for the Game that she is in helplessly.  The evil spell, the rules of the Game have been broken, and there is no lord but the LORD to lord over her.  She is alive and free and flourishing, that's what she would see in a world where Jesus is King.

"Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven."  As for us adults, we would rather keep telling ourselves stories to justify our competing to death.

Yours, Alex