Browncoats and sloth

(Today’s Spiritual Sci-Fi Friday is a guest post from an old friend and colleague of mine, Mike Van Boom. He’s a pastor of a great church up in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada and a fellow sci-fi geek like me.)

The Firefly universe is an interesting one. It paints a picture of a future for humanity in a distant solar system. There, the central government exerts dictates its authority over each populated system. Interestingly, a major project the government undertakes there is to eliminate sin in humankind. It dreams of eliminating evil impulses and aggressive behavior within humanity. So it settles a planet on which to work its great experiment. The Government then releases a drug designed to reduce the aggressive impulses of people.

What happened?

The drug worked for the most part. For 95% of the population, all will to fight or pursue violence ceased. Unfortunately, that meant that people stopped “fighting” altogether. They stopped coming to work. They stopped caring. They stopped fighting for life to the point where they even stopped breathing. They just laid down and died.

The other 5% of the population… Well let’s just say they became a living nightmare. All their aggressive tendencies were magnified to the point of a reckless horror.

Consider the lesson in this Science Fiction parable.

God created people with the ability to “fight,” and that “fight” is a requirement to go on living. The opposite you might say is sloth. Sloth is considered one of the seven deadly sins; and it points in the direction of surrender; the loss of ability to fight for what is important. The corresponding virtue is Diligence; Hard work; Effort.

God wants to raise His people to new life; and one aspect of that is the ability to fight; to work hard; to be diligent; and to persevere in the face of challenges. Ask God to do that work in you!

Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way to win the prize. Everyone who competes in games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. 1 Corinthians 9:24-25