No doubt the recent release of the Oscar nominations is creating plenty of buzz in the workplace and at church gatherings. For people of faith there is a lot to cheer about this year. Six of the films nominated for “Best Picture” are on my annual “Top Ten” of films dealing with spiritual and human relationship themes that Presbyterian News Service just sent out. And then I got to see director Stephen Daldry's wonderful Extremely Close and Incredibly Close Up, and thus had to insert this and expel one of the films from the first list. To see which one, go to www.visualparables.net . (This might not get posted until Monday, Jan. 30)

 The Artist

Rated PG-13. Ecclesiastes 9:11-12; 1 Corinthians 13:4a
This blend of A Star is Born and Singing in the Rain is a delight to see, with no dialogue until the end. Set in the late 20s when sound is being introduced to motion pictures, it is story of a falling silent film actor and the rise of the young actress whom he helped break in to the profession. Themes of love, grace and the danger of pride are well developed.

 The Descendants

Rated R. Matthew 18:2; Psalm 24:1-2.

Grace, responsibility to the land, and family reconciliation—director Alexander Payne's film, set in Hawaii has all this and more. (See an earlier blog for more.)

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close
Rated PG-13. Matthew 5:4; Isaiah. 66:13.

This powerful film is not about 9/11 but about its aftermath, and in particular about a boy whose father was in the tower and struggles with a mixture of grief and guilt as he searches throughout the five borroughs of New York City to discover what a key that his father left will open. What seems at first like a father son film has a couple of surprises, especially in regard to his mother.

The Help
Rated PG-13. Psalm 146:7b-9; Proverbs 31:8.

This civil rights era story set in Jackson Mississippi affirms the importance of sisterhood and of the support of the church for the black maids and the white writer in exposing racism in the domestic workplace.

Hugo
Rated PG. Psalm 82:3-4; Isaiah 11:6d

An orphaned boy secretly living above the concourse of a Parisian train station during the 1930s discovers his purpose in life—to fix a complicated automaton left by his father and a broken man.

The Tree of Life
Rated PG-13. Job 38:4-7; Matthew 5:45b

Terence Malick's film can be seen as a visual meditation on the Job passage, which we see on the screen at the beginning of the film. Departing from the usual narrative structure, the film includes scenes of a family living in Texas in the Fifties, with the themes of law and grace of great beauty. The director even inserts the creation of the universe from the Big Bang through the dinosaurs, the family, and a reunion beyond this life.

War Horse.

Rated PG-13. Luke 2:13-14.

Steven Spielberg is up to his usual high form in that his war film shows the humanity of both the British and the German soldiers, drawn together at the climax by their love of the horse trapped and in pain between their lines.

All of the above will make for good viewing and discussion for church film groups, as well as provide some preaching material for pastors seeking to relate their sermons to the culture. And besides the seven briefly discussed above, other worthy nominees include My Week With Marilyn; Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy; The Iron Lady, and one which I wish could have been given more recognition, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows 2. I'm really looking forward to the Oscar Awards this year—and am somewhat glad that I don't have to pick “Best Picture,” torn as I am between so many good choices. What ones are you hoping to see honored on February 26?

Reviews of the above films are up, or in several cases, soon will be posted at visualparables.net.

A Gathering Voices post by Lynne M. Baab

Two of my college friends formed a musical group after they graduated. They spent a year travelling around, singing at churches and other venues, and they produced an LP record of their songs. I kept playing that record for many years after their little group disbanded.

Our turntable died, and the record got stored in a cabinet. Like most other people, we moved on to cassettes and CDs. A few years ago I asked a friend of my son, a sound engineer, to turn the songs on the record into digital files so I could play them again. He made me a disc, but I misplaced it until last week, when it reappeared while I was cleaning out a drawer. I’ve been playing it all week.

One of the songs speaks to me today even more than it spoke to me decades ago when I first heard it. And I loved the song even then.

I have chosen three words to be my theme words for 2012: listen, seek, follow. I want to strive to hear and follow God’s voice more closely in 2012. The song from my friends’ old album adds an additional dimension to this quest, rounding out a sense of purpose for why I might want to listen, seek and follow God. Listening, seeking and following contribute to making me know God better, and that’s actually what I want most of all. The song helps give language to that desire, using Trinitarian terms to describe our quest to know God. The song also links knowing God to belonging to God.

It’s amazing to me that my friend Denise Morey wrote the song when she was in her early 20s, and the song continues to speak today. Music has such power; music memories reside so deep inside us and music touches us so profoundly. I wish you could hear Denise sing the song, but I think the words speak even without the music. Denise has given permission for me to publish the words here.

Be Yours by Denise Morey

I want to know the Father

deeper than I’ve known before,

freedom from my selfish heartaches,

anxious thoughts, my heart so sore.

Peace like a river filling up my life now.

Open up the doors and show me how

to be me in you, be yours. Be Yours.

And I want to know the Son

deeper than I’ve ever known before.

I want to understand His dying for me

and then rising for me.

Joy like a river filling up my heart now.

Open up the doors and show me how

to die with you, then live. Be Yours.

And I want to know God’s Spirit

deeper than I’ve ever known before.

Understand the way He works in me

and feel his power grow.

Faith like a river welling up inside me now.

Open up the doors and show me how

He can change my ways

and He can guide my days. Be Yours.

A Gathering Voices post by Beth Pyles

To lead people, walk beside them ... As for the best leaders, the people do not notice their existence. The next best, the people honor and praise. The next, the people fear; and the next, the people hate ... When the best leader's work is done the people say, 'We did it ourselves!'— Lao-tsu

The quote from Lao-tsu reminds me of a similar conversation I often had with my then-husband, usually when we were dining in a nice restaurant.  Bob was speaking not of leaders, but of waiters, “you never see a good waiter.  It’s as if the water appears at your side by magic.  A good waiter knows how not to be noticed.”

Bob and Lao-tsu both speak to the servant model of leadership, a popular catch-phrase in the church.

But what does it mean to be a ‘servant leader’?  Many Christians point to Jesus’ washing of his disciples’ feet on the night of the Last Supper, and rightly so.  Jesus was giving his followers a show-and-tell lesson in servanthood from a leader’s perspective: nothing is so demeaning, that I would not do it for you and have you do it for others.  

But what about church leaders, and ministers in particular?  What does it look like to be a servant-leader in the middle of a committee meeting?  When listening to a congregant’s crisis?  When stuck behind a slow driver in the fast lane (who just might also be a congregant)?

Can it all be simply boiled down to the aphorism “lead by example”?  

I wish I knew. 

Most of the moments in my ministry that bring people closer together aren’t what I think of as leadership moments.  When I’m sitting with someone who has just said good-bye to a loved one or when I’m listening to someone’s troubles, or when we’re laughing in the kitchen together, I feel the unifying action of the Holy Spirit in our midst.  That doesn’t seem like leadership.  It feels like being present.

Perhaps being present, just the ordinary act of showing up is part of being a leader.  All I know for certain is that I am forgiven much when I just show up.

But back to Lao-tsu.  Being invisible feels counter-intuitive to being a good leader.  Don’t people have to see who or what they’re following?  And maybe that’s it – it’s the ‘what’ that matters; not the ‘who’.  I used to get quite irritated whenever someone offered an idea that they had gotten from me as if it were their own.  But I have come to realize that we all do this – take on board the thoughts of others and incorporate them into our own fabric, seldom realizing the origin of the thought from elsewhere.  

Maybe it’s akin to seed planting.  The garden spends little time wondering where the seeds came from.  The garden takes the seeds on and nurtures them into maturity.  It matters that I plant the seeds, but it does not matter that the garden know it.