Sermon Tone Analysis

Last week, we began for the very first time a brand new series only for the 5pm called “What It Again” based entirely upon the most popular and most influential Netflix series among youth and young adults.

Last week, we kicked off this series with Season 1 of 13 Reasons Why.

If you missed it, then I highly commend it to you on our Christ Journey App.

Simply download it from the App store on any device, open it, click on the Messages tab, and then click on 13 Reasons Why, Season 1.

Today, we will discuss Season 2 of 13 Reasons Why, which just aired last May.

Next week, we will continue with “Bloodline," and then "Stranger Things" on the following week, and then finally, the one and only, the man, the myth, and the legend himself, Andrew Ling will offer reflections on the series, “Lost in Space.”

We’re calling this series “Watch It Again,” because after we discuss these shows, I want to encourage all of you to watch these shows again - or for the first time - but this time, with the mind of Christ and ask yourself this question: How does the Good News of Jesus Christ intersect with the popular stories of our culture?

Stories help us talk about the difficult and intangible, those things unseen that we can’t touch or feel or hear.

Stories bring to life the very witness of our faith.

In fact, Jesus coupled a story with nearly every teaching that he gave.

For example, It’s one thing to teach directly that God saves the lost.

We believe that, but how often are we compelled by that?

It’s another thing entirely to say, “A shepherd left a flock of 99 to find the one missing sheep.”

That conveys an entirely different perspective on the same meaning.

This series is designed to help you talk about your faith using the visual novels of our culture.

The author of the great fiction classic, A River Runs Through It, Norman Maclean once wrote, “The nearest anyone can come to finding himself at any given age is to find a story that somehow tells him about himself.”

Great stories help us find the language to identify and express ourselves.

Have you ever read a great novel or watched a great film and afterward said, ‘I saw myself in that character.’

Perhaps in doing so, you found new words and new meaning to a season of life or a circumstance.

Stories can help connect us to the deeper undercurrents of our human experience.

Jesus knew this and used story as a means of transporting the listener to a greater depth of understanding.

Each one of these Netflix based series is giving meaning to someone’s life right now.

Perhaps you found meaning to your life’s circumstances from 13 Reasons Why, and the question we must ask as a church is: How does the Good News of Jesus Christ intersect with the popular stories of our culture?

For we believe that all truth is God’s truth, but not all truth is saving truth, so how may we as a church not respond with fear to the most influential stories of our culture, especially those that raise up difficult or even taboo issues, but instead, how might we engage these stories and help others identify their truth into God’s truth about us?

Because "Today is a day of Good News” 2 Kings 7:9, and we must share it with everyone.

We’re here at the 5pm so that our church can Help young adults and young families live for God’s Kingdom.

As we live toward this end, together, we believe that all of us here can be:

1. Known freely

2. Loved unconditionally

3. Successful ethically

4. Productive meaningfully

5. Fit holistically

6. Redeemed fully

7. Forgiven wholly

8. Sent Purposefully

Imagine your friends living into that kind of reality for their lives.

That, my friends, is what good news looks like.

And so the question I want to pose today to help us get there is: How does the Good News of Jesus Christ intersect with the second season of 13 Reasons Why?

After its debut on May 18, more than 6 million viewers watched on average 4 shows per day within its first 3 days of release.

Only the second seasons of “Stranger Things” and “Bright” garnered more Netflix viewers.

That’s astounding!

6 million viewers - 75% of whom were 34 years old or younger - watched 4 hours worth of television per day for three days in a row in the first 3 days of the second season release.

In total, more than 100 million people have tuned into both seasons.

Friends, these stats beckon us to understand this show’s influence.

Though it’s controversial and some argue that it sensationalizes suicide, you be the judge.

This is art, not a documentary, and it’s meant to be provocative.

We shouldn’t fear it, although, if it raises unhealthy thoughts and emotions within you, then by all means guard your heart.

I don't recommend this series for anyone who has experienced sexual trauma, abuse, or bullying, because the content concerning these issues is graphic.

In fact, I applaud those who have chosen to prioritize their own health over watching a television series.

You are more important than pop culture.

Thus who better to lead the conversation concerning the issues raised in this series than the church?

So, for those of you who have not seen the second season of 13 Reasons Why, then take a look at this preview:

PLAYTRAILER - 1:59.

In season two, five months after Hannah's suicide, Clay along with the other students mentioned on Hannah's tapes become embroiled in a civil legal battle between Hannah's parents and Liberty High School.

Alleging negligence on the part of the school, Hannah's mother pursues her perception of justice.

As the season unfolds, the viewer comes to learn that her lawsuit is seeking vengeance cloaked in justice in an effort to understand why Hannah committed suicide.

Hannah didn’t leave a note for her parents, only questions.

Her reluctance to acknowledge these circumstances eventually breaks up her marriage with Hannah's father… Just one more illustration from the show depicting how everybody pays when one person pursues vengeance.

This is the setting for Season 2.

Everybody wants justice, but nobody wants to pay for it.

Several students even begin a campaign called #justiceforHannah, but of all the students picketing, only Clay Jensen chooses to pay the cost to stop the bullying at Liberty High School.

Justice rights wrongs.

Atonement pays for wrongs to be made right.

Atonement is the ‘reparation of a wrong.’

Justicewithout atonement is vengeance.

This single idea connects every episode of 13 Reasons Why… From Hannah Baker to Hannah’s parents to Clay Jensen.

The reason why this single idea matters so much right now - so much that I am investing two weeks into our discussion about this show - is because among our society right now, Everybody wants justice, but nobody wants to pay for it.

Justicewithout atonement leads to vengeance.

Salvation is a free gift.

But Doing justice and showing mercy to another requires your time, your talents, and your treasures.

The myth behind vengeance is that it doesn’t cost you anything.

Eye for an eye.

You hurt me, I hurt you, we’re even.

But in reality, vengeance costs you everything that God promised to give you.

You can’t have vengeance and satisfaction… or vengeance and peace… or vengeance and joy.

Vengeance is incompatible with these qualities.

Rather vengeance only yields anger, anxiety, isolation and an insatiable appetite for more vengeance.

Vengeance is frontal, but it’s also subtle.

It flares up in traffic... when someone dings your car in the parking lot... when someone cuts you in the grocery line… when you catch wind of someone speaking ill about you… all kinds of subtle ways.

And when you give these little seemingly benign but important situations power, they become like toxic cancerous cells that mutate in your mind and heart leading to the death of your satisfaction.

When we choose empty vengeance and meet rage with rage - whether someone dinks our door or does something worse - then we play god when we seek our pound of flesh.

This is every human being, by the way, and the single idea connecting every episode of this show.

This is the human experience, and if you are living it, then the good news of Jesus says that you don’t have to.

The Apostle John, Jesus’ beloved disciple, wrote in his first letter to the early church, saying:

‘We have an advocate who pleads our case before the Father.

He is Jesus Christ, the one who is truly righteous.

He himself is the sacrifice that atones for our sins—and not only our sins but the sins of all the world.' 1 John 2:1-2

To describe the freedom verdict of the cross, John used courtroom imagery and the phrase ‘advocate who pleads our case,' which assumes something about our lives that very few of us want to admit: that we need justice done on our behalf and atonement for our ultimate debt of playing god.

I think this acknowledgement stops a lot of people at the door, especially within a highly sensitized blame-shifting culture, because it’s really hard to admit that we’ve been seeking vengeance and not justice, and living in the wrong.

At what point do we get honest?

You know, you don’t have to hit rock bottom to get honest with yourself about your circumstances.

Fear doesn’t make for a good driver.

Typically, fear wants to fit in and stay close to our perceived notions of power.

Fear is a survival instinct within all of us that keeps us living as gods and goddesses of our own lives and therefore keeps us separated from the actual source of all life itself… of all power… and all freedom.

The moment when you can get honest about your powerlessness and the debts you owe - not financial, but personal and spiritual - and turn from your insistence on controlling them to the Christ who has already atoned for them, then that is the moment you will find freedom and fear will stop being the primary voice in your ear.

The word ‘atone’ in the Greek is this great word ‘Hilasmos,’ which literally means to satisfy an angry party.

It is only used twice in the entire New Testament, both times in 1 John, and both times in reference to Christ’s atoning work on the cross.

John’s use of the word hilasmos gives us a particular insight into God’s character, and that is: God isn’t angry with you.

God loves you.

Jesus has hilasmos’ed - atoned - on your behalf, making way for you to come home to a God who loves you.