Hamish, Shamish, Zephaniah, God, and Us - Zephaniah 3

I listened to a sermon by Peter Rollins this week, and he told a story that I’ve heard before, but he’s from Northern Ireland, so he has this great accent, and accents are lots of fun, so I’ll try to tell it in his voice.  (How’s that for a run-on sentence to start out a sermon?)

There was this guy named Shamish who was traveling by sea.  His boat sank, and he ended up on a deserted island.  He lived there all alone for twenty years, but his brother Hamish never gave up looking for him.  Hamish bought a plane and flew all over the ocean looking for his brother.  One day, he saw some buildings on a small island and decided to go down and take a look.  He was amazed when Shamish met him at the beach.

They hugged and cried and celebrated that Shamish was finally rescued.  But Hamish said, “Before I take you back, why don’t you show me around this place where you’ve been living for the past 20 years.”  

So Shamish took him to his “village” where there were three small buildings.  Hamish said, “What are these?”

Shamish said, “Well, this is my house.  It’s really quite comfortable, considering.”

Hamish looked pointed to another building, “Then, what’s this one?”

Shamish beamed with pride. “Ah, that’s my church.  I go there every Sunday for services, and I say prayers there on Tuesday and Wednesday nights.  It’s a wonderful, holy place.  I love it.”

Hamish nodded and pointed at the third building, “And what’s that one?”

“I don’t want to talk about that.”

“Oh, come on.”

“No, really, I don’t even want to discuss it.  Let’s go.”

“Come on now Shamish.  You’ve been living here for twenty years.  The least you can do is give me the full tour.”

“Oh, all right, that’s the church I used to go to.  Terrible place.  Just awful.”

Hide and Seek, Seek and Hide - Zephaniah 1-2

The first apocalyptic movie ever made was Deluge in 1933.  It showed a massive earthquake in California and a tsunami that went all the way around the world and destroyed New York.

Through the 1950’s only eleven apocalyptic movies had been made.  The most famous was based on H. G. Well’s novel, The War of the Worlds.  

  In the 1960’s we picked up the pace a little with thirteen apocalyptic movies as we started worrying about nuclear war.  We produced The Day the Earth Caught Fire and the dark comedy, Dr. Strangelove.

The 70’s brought us 23 apocalyptic movies, including several sequels of Planet of the Apes in which intelligent apes take over the world.  Also, there was a remake of Invasion of the Body Snatchers - as if one wasn’t enough.

In the 80’s we stepped it up with 30 apocalyptic movies, including the classic Aliens and Arnold Schwartzeneger’s first Terminator.  When said, “I’ll be back,” I guess he was right.  Who knew it would be as governor of California?

We were kind of slackers in the 90‘s.  We only made 29 apocalyptic movies, but we hit it big with computers sucking the life out of humanity in The Matrix and a meteor bound for earth in Armageddon.

But since 2000, we have seen an explosion of apocalyptic movies, a total of 76.  We’ve killed ourselves off through cold, heat, disease, computers, zombies, pollution, evil, divine judgment, and of course more aliens.

  More than ever before, we humans are aware that our lives may be violently disrupted by events beyond our control.  This is the essence of the apocalyptic genre - the sense that life cannot continue indefinitely as it is now, the sense that huge, cosmic changes may be coming soon.

Zephaniah is an apocalyptic prophet.  He is a preacher of dramatic, unstoppable change.