Knowing ( Warning! Spoiler Alert!)

Last night I watched the movie ‘Knowing’ for the first time. Everyone I talked to about the film warned me that it was a good movie with a horrible ending. But I watched it anyways, and I loved it!
I don’t want to over-explain the movie, but there are a few important details to- very loosely- explain.
The story involves two children who are linked by a 50 year-old paper written by a young girl and found in a time capsule. The paper has a strange series of numbers on it that is revealed to contain prophecies of every major disaster over the last 50 years. Both of these children have strange encounters with myserious men in black and hear whispering jibberish in their heads.
To make a long story short, the men in black that are whispering in their heads end up being angels who have come to take the two children before the world ends in fiery destruction.
The writer tries to base everything in the movie on faith and , loosely, on the Bible. Many of the movie’s events are tied to Ezekiels prophecy of the ‘wheel within a wheel’.
The story also reflects that of the rapture. At the end you find out that there are multiple people escorted from the earth before it’s destroyed in fire. The angels tell the children that they are being taken to help start ‘everything over’ which hints of a new heaven and a new earth. And for some strange reason the children are even given white rabbits as pets to take with them- which I believe signifies reproduction on the new earth.
The movie was in no way theologically correct: No mention was made of Jesus. It was not the saved who were escorted off the earth to start-over, but children. It was implied that everyone will go to ‘heaven’ after they die. It suggested that those saved from the earth’s fiery destruction will be engaged in being ‘fruitful and multiplying’. Etc…..
So I’m not implying that this film was Biblically sound, but there was an element to it that I found so beautiful! It was fanciful imagination and mystery: The angels were mysterious men who could project blinding light from their mouths. The children were escorted from the planet in beautiful revolving crystal-like space ships (the wheel within a wheel). The future was encoded in numbers foretold long ago. Everything worked for a purpose and to build up to an ultimate crescendo. It took amazing events to bring about forgiveness and faith in the main character’s heart. A seemingly mentally deranged woman was used as God’s messenger….etc….
But what I found to be most beautiful was the film’s final scene. It involved the two children being placed on the new earth. The scenery on this planet was breathtaking! They were placed in a field with magical-looking grass that was tossed wonderfully back and forth in a gentle breeze. The children were dressed in lovely white linens. As they looked up from the ground from which they were placed, they saw in front of them a huge tree with hints of white flowers budding all around it. As they layed their eyes on its splendor, they ran for it with wreckless abandon. This tree was very obviously the Tree of Life.
The reason I enjoyed this film so much, particularly this scene, was because we who are Christians can make things seem so dull and boring- so black and white with no shades of grey or vibrant color. We tend to have everything neatly packed into categories of theology and religion, which often causes us to never look out of the box we have created for God and ourselves.
Now don’t get me wrong. As Christians, it is VERY important what we believe. Theology is at the very root of who we are and what we do. But the Bible is filled with such beautiful metaphor and imagery and we act sometimes as if we have everything figured out and that there will be no surprises along the way. But I think when we see Jesus face to face, we will be surprised at how narrow our minds were and how big and beautiful God and his creation has been all along!
Yes we should read the Bible for the truth that it contains. Yes their is a central message and mission of the Word of God. But we must realize that God is SO HUGE and our miniscule finite human minds will never have Him completely figured out or tamed. God has revealed Himself to us, but there is SO much mystery within Him. And for us to make Him boring and into a system of ’1+1=2′ is a big mistake.
Set your feet in a firm foundation. Embrace beauty. Ponder mystery. And fantasize about the God who is too big for your mind and the world to come because it will be wonderful!