Are You a God?
Little-g gods want our devotion; once that devotion is given, death is the only possible outcome.
As a young child I would wake up at 3:00 AM, carefully remove the VHS cassette tape from the worn cardboard box, and watch Ghostbusters while my parents slept in their bedroom. I did this night after night for months. My parents had no clue. Well, they had no clue until a nosy neighbor narked me out. In hindsight he was more of a peeping-tom than concerned neighbor.
The concerned neighbor approached my dad and asked if everything was OK. My dad, not knowing why things wouldn’t be OK on our sleepy cul-de-sac brushed off the neighbor’s observation that the lights on the lower level of our split-level home. My parents had no clue that I would wake each night and watch Ghostbusters.
I know this movie. No, I really do. To this day, I can quote Ghostbusters and Ghostbusters II word for word just as I did when as a kid I would stand on the coffee table wearing my Egon Halloween costume with the worn-out plastic mask attached to my head and my Hasbro Proton Pack strapped to my back.
I haven’t watched nearly the number of movies my friends think I need to watch. Yes, I’ve watched all the Indiana Jones and Rocky franchises, but I have not watched Clerks. I’ve watched Top Gun but not The Matrix. Don’t blame me, movies are not my thing. So, don’t ask me for recommendations. I’m not your guy for that task. But if you wanted to learn everything there is to know about the Ghostbusters franchise, I’m your guy. And as a guy who nerds out on theology, the idea of combining two wings of my nerdiness is almost too much to handle.
The Ghostbusters ascended to the top of Dana Barrett’s apartment building. Winded, they were prepared to face down Gozer, a god from 6000 BC, who could assume any form it chose. And that form, the Ghostbusters found out, would be the destroyer against whom they would be forced to cross the streams.
Ray Stantz (played by Dan Akroyd) confronts the 6th-century BC god, Gozer the Gozarian who is hell-bent on destroying the world.
“Good evening. As a duly designated representative of the City, County, and State of New York, I order you to cease any and all supernatural activity and return forthwith to your place of origin or to the nearest convenient parallel dimension.”
Gozer responds. “Are you a god?”
“No.”
Ray’s negative response is one of modern cinema's most honest theological statements. “No,” he says. “I am not a god. I am a regular, middle-aged man living in a retrofitted NYC firehouse with three of my friends.”
“Then die.”
Gozer’s response of death for the lack of godly status is the same lie the world tells us. And because the status of god is what we are told will protect us from the world's ills, we try our damnedest to create god-like statuses for ourselves or affix ourselves to the gods we most want to emulate.
The gods we affix ourselves to are idols that destroy us as their god-like stature increases and our humanity decreases.
Look no further than the ancient Israelites who smelted gold to create a golden calf as they grew impatient waiting for Moses to return from his pilgrimage up Mount Sinai.
“When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered around Aaron, and said to him, ‘Come, make gods for us, who shall go before us; as for this Moses, the man who brought us up out of the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.’ 2 Aaron said to them, ‘Take off the gold rings that are on the ears of your wives, your sons, and your daughters, and bring them to me.’”[a]
Remember, prior to this scene, they had just been freed from their bondage in Egypt. God delivered them from the pains and trauma of slavery, and just a few days into their freedom, they were prepared to turn toward a new god over the Lord who sent Moses to rescue them.
Given the moment of doubt, the Israelites blinked and forgot what the Lord had done and was doing for them. Once the calf was created and they danced around the shinney statue, it is as though they died with the hopes of being reborn in the image of their newly smelted calf.
Little-g gods want our devotion; once that devotion is given, death is the only possible outcome.
Gozer wanted devotion or death, and for Gozer, devotion was death. Allegiance to the kingdom where the only outcome is death. Death for humanity and life for Gozer.
No matter the form, Marshmallow man or anything else, our idols take on, they will always destroy us.
The golden calf only offered death. There was nothing offered in return for the Israelites' devotion. Like Gozer, devotion led the death.
The idols or little-g gods we create for ourselves continually ask us if we are gods ourselves. There are two choices for us to respond to: “Yes” and then forming ourselves in the image of that god, or “No” and dying in service to the idol.
No matter how you slice it, whether it is Gozer, a golden calf, money, fame, or autobiographies we attempt to write for ourselves, the little-g gods in our lives all have the same response when we respond to their questions. Death.
But (and it’s a big “but” so you know it does not lie), there is an alternative.
God – the One who creates and orders the cosmos, the One who brought Israel to freedom through the Red Sea, the One who was born of Mary, the One who called His disciples by the water, the One who is the way, the truth, and the life – offers us an alternative to the death-dealing little-g gods of the world.
Jesus offers us life. Life through water, bread, and wine. New life that comes when we die to our ways, trading the money, fame, or accolades we chase after for the title of “beloved.”
Beloved child, precious and holy, bearing the image of our Creator.
Jesus offers us life, not death. Jesus offers us hope, not empty promises that lead to death.
Jesus shows us the way to God is not through the little-g gods of this or any other world. No, Jesus tells us that the way to God is through His faithfulness. The Grace of God is sufficient for us even as the world tells us otherwise, by putting a stop to the lies the little-g gods tell us.
So, when the world asks, “Are you a god?” and you reply, “No.” the voice of Christ calls out, “Come and follow me.”
[a] Exodus 32:1-2, NRSV