The Da Vinci Con
Making the most of it
TCF Sermon
May 14, 2006
Last week, Jim Garrett equipped us to crack the code. The code, as in the Da Vinci Code, turns out to be the Da Vinci Con. If you were wondering what’s actually true in this book, as well as in the movie that’s going to be released this coming Friday, May 19, we could look at the response of one Bible scholar who’s been asked that question several times in the last few years, as this book has gained momentum and popularity.
He said:
People often ask, "How much of The Da Vinci Code is true?" I wearily answer that Paris is in France, London is in England, and Leonardo da Vinci painted pictures.
Other than that….
Well, the reality might not be quite that bad. For example, in the story, the author also presents the French as sort of snooty, the Louvre as a museum with many priceless objects of art, and England as a place where there’s lots of fog.
It reminds me of what our missionary Randy Harrison used to say. Now let me preface this by saying that the Harrisons spent about a dozen years in France as missionaries, before going to their current post, another French-speaking nation, Burkina Faso. They have a deep love for the French people. But he used to say that many people think the French are rude. He said, “it’s not that the French are rude, they just hate you.”
Back to the facts in the Da Vinci Code. Most objective people, having done the research and investigated the history, know that this is a book full of factual errors. It’s so full of errors that there’s scarcely an historian alive who would affirm that many of the so-called facts in this book are true.
And that’s not just Christians, either. I got the title of this morning’s message from, of all places, a New York Times article about the book, where they called the book The Da Vinci Con.
Now, I don’t know if you realize this or not, but the New York Times is hardly a defender of our faith.
Another article I read said:
When it comes to the facts presented in the novel, the jury is not out -- they never even made it to court, at least not in the world of academic scholarship.
This same article quotes an authority on historical theology named John Thompson, who says looking for errors in the Da Vinci Code is like “shooting fish in a barrel.” So that’s what Jim got to do in last week’s message, and he left a lot of dead fish for us to ponder.
Thompson said, "Some pages have so many errors you don’t know where to start. You get compounded errors. It is wrong in so many layers it leaves one speechless."
Of course the problem isn’t that academics are being fooled by the novel - it’s that less informed readers are. The vast majority of readers apparently lack the tools or the desire to separate fact from fiction.
That is why Christians must be prepared to answer clearly in responding to the errors in this book. Hopefully we were equipped to do that with last week’s message.
Now, normally errors wouldn’t be a huge problem for a novel, or any fictional story in any form, such as a movie or television program. After all – it’s supposed to be pretend.
Except with the Da Vinci Code, there’s one big problem, as Jim noted last week. The first page of the book says that the book is based on fact. The by-now very wealthy author of the book, Dan Brown, is either the consummate marketer, or a very deceived man.
He’s the consummate marketer if he realizes that controversy sells, and he has been generating controversy for the sake of controversy, knowing that by getting people talking about the story, he’ll sell more books.
In an interview with Matt Lauer on NBC’s Today Show, Brown was asked "How much of this is based on reality in terms of things that actually occurred?" Brown’s reply was unequivocal: "Absolutely all of it."
If that’s a purposeful strategy on his part, it’s a very successful one. The book has sold more than 40 million copies, making it one of the most widely read books of all time. The movie being released this week will only fuel the sales of the book, in addition to exposing a lot of non-readers to the story and its falsehoods.
After all, two of our favorite good guys, star Tom Hanks, and director Ron Howard, are the big names associated with this movie. For goodness sakes, Ron as a little boy was Opie Taylor on the Andy Griffith Show. And as a teenager, he was Richie Cunningham on Happy Days! He’s hard not to like.
The main attacker of Christianity in the story, a character named Teabing, is played in the movie by the same actor who played another popular good-guy, Gandalf, in the Lord of the Rings trilogy of movies.
Why is it a problem that we have these celebrities, even in the context of a movie, making these claims about our faith?
Richard Corliss, TIME magazine cultural critic once said, "celebrity is possibly the most vital shaping force in society…Celebrities have become, in recent decades, the chief agents of moral change in the US."
Now, isn’t that a scary thought? Add to that an exciting, intriguing mystery and storyline, and I can hear the cha-ching of the box office now. It begs the question for each of us as followers of Jesus Christ. How do we respond?
But, with what we’ve just looked at, these are some of the reasons that one of the potential responses to this cultural phenomenon, cannot be to just ignore this book or this movie. We won’t be able to – it’s already all around us, and will be moreso in the days and weeks to come.
So, in the hopes that Jim’s clear presentation of the truth last week has inoculated all of us against the danger of the errors in this story, this week, we’re going to pause and look at how we can respond to this, and by extension, other cultural phenomena that challenge the truth of our faith in some way.
The apostle Paul told the Colossians several things that I think are appropriate for us to look at this morning.
Colossians 4:2-6 (NIV) 2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, for which I am in chains. 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should. 5 Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity. 6 Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
As I read this passage of scripture, I thought, since we know that God so loved the world, since we know that He desires that none would perish and all would come to a knowledge of Him, and since we know that we’re a significant part of His plan to bring the lost into His Kingdom, perhaps, in a way we would have never imagined, God has opened a door for his message in the conversations that this book and this movie will bring about.
Do you think God was surprised in any way that this book was written? Do you think He was surprised in any way that it became so popular? Do you think He was taken aback by the influence it seems to have? No, of course not.
Paul asked the Colossians to pray for him, that God would open doors that He might share the message of the gospel. When was the last time you heard so much talk of Jesus in our secular culture?
So, we can see this as a challenge….and it is that, in many ways. But, as Jim Garrett likes to say, God’s not asleep. It’s unlikely that there are many other things that could so penetrate our culture with questions about the real Jesus. So, one way we can respond to this book and this movie and its amazing popularity, is to see this as an open door, as an opportunity.
The apostle Paul talked about opportunities here, too. In verse 5, Paul encouraged the Colossians to:
Be wise in the way you act toward outsiders; make the most of every opportunity.
Now, if that’s not a clear admonition for us in the wake of the Da Vinci Con, I don’t know what is. Among ourselves, among fellow believers in Christ, joking that this is a foolish book, full of ridiculous errors, is one thing.
But we must realize that there are intelligent people, probably many people we love and care about…in our families, in our neighborhoods, in our workplaces, who have either had their faith shaken seriously by this, if they had faith to begin with, or others who have been challenged to ask some serious questions about assumptions they might have had about the Bible and about Jesus.
So, Paul tells us to “be wise” in the way we act toward outsiders. That’s those outside the church, meaning unbelievers. That means we probably don’t want to laugh when someone tells us they really wonder if the so-called facts in the book are true. Maybe we should all learn to keep a straight face when someone tells us that Mary Magdelene had Jesus’ love child.
Additionally, we probably need to hold our tongue, at
least initially, when someone tells us they learned from the book that everything we’ve ever been told about Jesus is false.
Being wise means not only being sensitive in our response, but even being sensitive in our anger. I read several articles which noted that this was the initial reaction that some had to the attack on the Christian faith in this book.
One writer wrote:
I have to confess, when I heard (my friend’s) diatribe, my first impulse wasn’t one of love. I was angry. I don’t know why. My faith had been challenged before. But this felt different. Hearing the ludicrous theories about Jesus’ identity evoked a visceral response. How could he be so gullible? i repressed my irritation but was in no mood for nuance. My reaction wasn’t exactly politic. "That’s absolute garbage," I interrupted. Brent countered with more "facts" from the novel. I launched into church history 101. Stalemate.
What went wrong in this encounter, and what can we learn from it, especially as related to Paul’s admonition to be wise? This writer noted that his first mistake was talking instead of listening. How can we expect someone to listen to us, when we don’t listen to them? Remember, this is not about winning a debate.
Letting people talk doesn’t necessarily validate their ideas, but it does mean we validate them, showing them that we think they have worth.
Paul’s words imply that believers are to be cautious and tactful so as to avoid needlessly antagonizing or alienating their pagan neighbors. Zondervan NIV Commentary
Sometimes the plain truth seems antagonizing or alienating all by itself. We don’t need to add to the offense. Let me also add that it might not be wise to call them “pagan neighbors” to their faces.
In the same verse in the passage to the Colossians, Paul tells us to: “make the most of every opportunity.” The KJV calls this “redeeming the time.”
The verb in the statement “make the most of every opportunity” is a market word that means “to buy out” or “purchase completely.” So Christians, as an expression of practical wisdom, must buy up, and make the most of every opportunity for witnessing to the faith. “Opportunity” denotes either a specific point of time or a significant time, God’s time. This latter meaning appears to be the preferred sense in the present passage. Zondervan NIV Commentary
“Making the most of an opportunity.” We’ve heard that phrase in many other contexts. But it’s a truly biblical idea. It means we’re to buy it now, while there’s still the chance to make the largest profit from it. There’s no time like the present to address the claims of Jesus. While people are talking about it. While it’s in the news.
There may be people with whom this might be the only opportunity we ever have to engage them in a conversation about who Jesus is. Paul continues this thought in the next verse, where he writes:
Let your conversation be always full of grace, seasoned with salt, so that you may know how to answer everyone.
Let’s look at a few things related to this verse. First, there’s the reality of how our conversation goes with unbelievers. The words “full of grace” are the first hint of what Paul’s encouraging us to do. Now, of course, in the New Testament, grace usually refers to the undeserved favor of God toward us. Thought of in that context, perhaps our foolish, unbelieving, pagan friends might need some of that undeserved favor from us. We can start by not calling them foolish, or unbelieving, or pagan.
But if grace implies extending favor toward someone, whether or not they’ve earned it, don’t you think that a conversation about the Da Vinci Code story might be a perfect example of where we might need to extend grace to someone?
Barb and I were talking about this a few weeks ago. She’s a voracious reader of all kinds of stuff. When the book came out a few years ago, she decided to see what all the fuss was about. She got to the middle of the book and quit reading it when the story became very insulting to her intelligence, let alone her faith.
We were talking about how we might respond to someone who took seriously some of the claims of the story about Jesus and the Bible. She said she’d have a hard time not laughing at someone who told her they really believed this stuff. In some contexts, I too, might have a similar response. It reminded me of this passage.
Our conversation needs to be always full of grace. Giving people the benefit of the doubt. Extending to them the favor of not immediately dismissing their questions, or their opinions, but rather, engaging their thoughts. Admittedly, that can be a challenge. But as followers of Jesus, we must be willing to extend grace to those who make foolish claims, foolish remarks.
Now, the other meaning of grace, the more classical meaning in the Greek, as opposed to the usual New Testament understanding of grace, also applies here.
One commentary notes: Grace in vs 6, which usually denotes divine favor, here is used (in the more “secular”) sense of pleasantness, attractiveness, charm or winsomeness.
It can mean something as simple as being pleasant. A disposition to be generous or helpful; goodwill. Grace, of course, is the root of the word gracious,
which means having or showing kindness, courtesy, compassion, humility.
One definition is “indulgent or polite to supposed inferiors.” Now, of course, I don’t want to imply that we’re better than anyone else. But if someone is presenting Da Vinci Code ideas as truth, they’re at the very least espousing clearly inferior ideas, compared to the truth of the Word of God.
But if we’re gracious in our conversations with unbelievers, don’t you think we’re likely to be heard a little bit better? How about this as a gracious strategy? Admit you actually liked the book or the movie, if of course, that’s true. Admit you found it fascinating, and quite gripping. Can you imagine how disarming that would be - how that admission might open doors to conversation about the truth?
The second part of this verse says that along with the graciousness of our conversation, it should be “seasoned with salt.” Jesus said we’re to be the salt of the earth.
Salt can lose its flavor. When it gets wet and then dries, nothing is left but a tasteless residue. Many Christians blend into the world and avoid the cost of standing up for Christ. But Jesus says if Christians lose their distinctive saltiness, they become worthless. Just as salt flavors and preserves food, we are to preserve the good in the world, help keep it from spoiling, and bring new flavor to life. This requires careful planning, willing sacrifice, and unswerving commitment to Christ’s kingdom. Being "salty" is not easy, but if a Christian fails in this function, he or she fails to represent Christ in the world. How salty are you? —Life Application Bible Notes
Another commentary notes:
The point is that disciples who do not live like disciples are worth as much as unsalty salt: nothing. —Bible Background Commentary
So, while we are to engage in gracious conversation, it’s just as important that we’re salty. Salt makes a difference in the taste of the food we eat. In New Testament times it was used as a preservative. How can our gracious conversation make a difference in the lives of the people with whom we communicate? How can our saltiness preserve the truth of the gospel? These are the kinds of things we should be after.
The last part of verse 6 says: so that you may know how to answer everyone. This implies that what we know is important. We get to what we know by asking questions, studying, reading, consulting with others who know the truth. Listening to sermons such as Jim Garrett’s last week’s.
Reading resources that are available. There’s absolutely no excuse for any follower of Christ, interested in understanding the factual errors in the Da Vinci Code, to say about an encounter with a person who accepts the story as true – “I didn’t know what to say.”
This book has not only created an incredible amount of interest in the secular world, but it has created a whole industry of Da Vinci debunkers in the church.
There are more than a dozen books I found, refuting the historical errors. If you don’t want to buy a book, there are dozens of pretty good web pages that will outline the basics for you. It won’t take much effort – just a little, to be informed. We need to be informed, as Paul said, “so that we will know how to answer everyone.”
Of course, there are other possible responses to this cultural phenomenon as well. You might say, I don’t want a penny of my money to go into the pockets of those who are attacking my faith. That’s a legitimate response, and I understand that one. I must tell you, I had to grit my teeth to walk into WalMart and spend $5 of my hard-earned money on this book.
You might take the same approach with the upcoming movie. Why enrich Hollywood so they can undermine our faith? Why make movie executives think there are more who support this kind of movie? After all, the movie box office is a ballot box. We vote with our dollars when we see a movie. We say to Hollywood, we vote for this kind of film. We want to see more of this.
That’s why, if I see the movie at some point, I’ll probably wait until the DVD comes out, and just rent it. And I won’t rent it when it first comes out, but I’ll wait until it’s in the older titles that are just 99 cents.
But let’s consider the flip side of this argument for a moment. How much credibility would Jim Garrett have had with you when he preached last week, if he had said something like, “I understand the book says this, or says that?”
You’d think – what do you mean you understand - you mean you didn’t read it?
How much credibility would I have with you today, when I tell you this book and the story it presents, are an attack on our faith based on foolishness and a large volume of historical errors, if you know I never read it.
Now, I don’t think we should all rush out and buy the book or see the movie. But remember that we can disarm someone’s initial questioning response. Because what do people often ask you if you say you don’t like something? “Well, have you tried it?”
And they’re just as likely to ask you about the Da Vinci Code: “Well, have you read it? Have you seen the movie?”
So, this is a harder question for us. To engage fully in dialogue with a seeker, one who has genuine questions about the story, or one whose faith has been shaken in some way by the story, do we need to have read the book ourselves, or to have seen the movie ourselves?
In some cases, yes. In other cases, maybe not. I’m just noting that a legitimate response is to learn as much as you can. It’s clear that the apostle Paul read the philosophers and poets of his day.
But maybe that doesn’t require buying the book or seeing the movie in all cases. The last thing I want to do is promote this phenomenon. But we must be wise in our response. Some of you may have a person, or persons in your lives, that requires you to have a full understanding, to be able to engage them about the questions this book raises. Some of you may not – what you’ve heard last week, and this week, what you can learn on your own from other resources, may be enough to go on.
Another potential response I heard was: you should go to the movies this weekend. But just go see some other movie.
Again, the box office is a ballot box. If we vote for another kind of movie, we send a message about the kind of movie we chose not to see, as well as the kind of movie we do want to see. Of course, we could also send a message about this phenomenon by publicly boycotting the film.
We could picket theaters, with signs like my sermon title: The Da Vinci Con.
We could have signs that say Dan Brown is a fraud. We could have signs that suggest that Opie needs a spanking from his paw, for directing this movie.
But a big problem with this approach is that any publicity is good publicity. Remember the Last Temptation of Christ? Another movie that undermined the truths of our faith. By taking the boycott and protest approach, that movie gained more publicity than it would have otherwise, and probably stayed in the public consciousness longer, too. I think this approach is often fruitless in accomplishing what we want to accomplish, and in fact can backfire on us.
Of course, there are already some groups calling for an active protest and boycott of the Da Vinci movie. And for some, this may be a legitimate response, but my personal opinion is that it just isn’t particularly effective.
But, you know, there’s one response we can all agree on, and it’s a response to the culture that Paul referenced three times, in the passage of scripture we’ve looked at this morning. In verses 2, 3 and 4 of Colossians chapter 4, Paul says to pray.
2 Devote yourselves to prayer, being watchful and thankful. 3 And pray for us, too, that God may open a door for our message, so that we may proclaim the mystery of Christ, 4 Pray that I may proclaim it clearly, as I should.
Most of us do pray. But do we do what Paul admonishes here? Do we devote ourselves to prayer, especially in the context of cultural phenomena like this whole Da Vinci Con? And in that devotion to prayer, are we watchful and thankful? And in that devotion to prayer, are we praying that God would open a door to the message of the gospel? Are we also praying that we would present this message clearly?
If you’ve been listening this morning, you’ve probably figured out that the approach I would prefer would not be boycotts. It’s not active protests. It would be engagement of our culture….recognizing the reality of what’s out there, and seeking to be a gracious, salty influence.
But without devotion to prayer, without asking God to make an open door for the good news, without praying what Gordon mentioned in prayer last Sunday as the elders prayed for the service, that what the enemy intended as evil, God would turn to good, without these things, any engagement of our culture, any dialogue with our friends and family, will prove absolutely fruitless.
You may remember the sermon last year on Hollywood as a mission field. This morning, let’s remember that the Holy Spirit can work, and is working, in the entertainment industry. But let’s not take that for granted, and let’s continue to ask God to change the hearts of people in this business.
As a reminder to pray, I have these stickers you can put on your TV remote, to remind you to pray for Hollywood, to pray for Ron Howard, to pray for Dan Brown, to pray for Tom Hanks, to pray for these cultural influencers. And to pray for all those who see the movie or read the book.
As Karen Covell, director of the Hollywood Prayer Network, which produces these stickers, writes:
"while it’s hard to prove the effects of prayer on others, there’s one person on whom prayer always works…the person doing the praying. Prayer gets us in the right frame of mind. It puts things in perspective. Most importantly, it takes our struggles and doubts and worries out of our frustrated, feeble hands, and puts them in their proper place – in God’s tender, resilient and purposeful hands."
So, however God leads you to respond to this:
See the movie or don’t. Read the book or don’t. Actively engage in dialogue with a friend, or don’t. Boycott and/or protest the movie, or don’t. We can all pray – we can, as Paul said, devote ourselves to prayer, and pray that however we would personally choose to respond, that God would use this movie, this book, and indeed all future challenges to our faith from our culture, as open doors to the good news of Jesus, the truth of His love for us.
