•The Hero’s Journey – For the last three weeks we have been looking at the pattern Joseph Campbell describes in his book; “The Hero with a Thousand Faces.” We see this pattern, the hero’s journey, play out in the classic hero myths, as well as in modern books and film. I believe we also see it play out in our lives and in our faith. Thus far, we have worked through the first three phases (or nine parts of our journey): from the call to adventure, to a road of many trials, to a great crisis before finding the treasure the hero sought. Today we conclude our series and our journey by looking at the fourth phase which includes: (10) return, (11) new life, and (12) resolution. Let’s start by seeing how this plays out in our movie; “The Avengers.”

•The Hero’s Journey – our hero’s journey has taken us from the day to day life of our ordinary world (Status Quo). Called us into a world of adventure (A Call to Adventure) and even seen some help along the way (Assistance). The journey has taken us into a special or extraordinary world (Departure) and with it a number of tests and obstacles (A Road of Trials). Finally the journey has brought us to the place of our greatest fear or biggest challenge (Approach). That brings us to the third phase of our journey. This phase include three parts: Crisis, Treasure, and Result. Let’s see how Phase Three plays out in our film, “The Avengers.”

•Phase Two – that brings us to the second phase of our journey: departure. The hero’s journey moves the hero from the ordinary world; two another special (or extraordinary) world. The departure phase is the bridge to that other world and with it comes a road of trials and ultimately an approach towards the hero’s greatest fear or greatest challenge.

•The Journey – over the next several weeks we are going to work through this journey looking at some scenes from the film, “The Avengers”, from some of the hero stories of the Bible, and relating these back to the journey we all take. There are four major phases: (1) Call to Adventure, (2) Road of Trials, (3) Crisis, and (4) Return to the Ordinary World. Each of these has three parts. Today I want to look at the first phase which includes: (1) Status Quo, (2) A Call to Adventure, and (3) Assistance.

•Introduction – Today I want to talk about something very important: making disciples. The mission of the United Methodist Church is “to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.” This comes from one of the final instructions Jesus gave us while he was on earth. In Matthew 22:19 Jesus says, “Go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to obey everything that I’ve commanded you.” The question is, “how do we make disciples?”

•What is New Life? – Looking back I see there was something special going in the naming of New Life. In truth I tell you the idea of new life has become central to my theology and I believe needs to be central to the life of all Christians and all Churches. Therefore, let us look tonight at the question, “What is New Life?”

The Beginning – today we are going to explore the beginning of the Book of Genesis; which is, conveniently at the beginning of the Bible. In fact Genesis is a Latin transliteration of the Greek translation of the Hebrew name for this book; br’shîth which means “in the beginning of.” Which means we are going to explore the beginning of the beginning of – well “of” what we will get to later; just know that we are starting at the beginning. But before we go there a quick word about the nature of the passage we are about to read.

•Stories within Stories – we recently looked at this parable in our Lenten series, “The Storyteller” but as we conclude “Love Wins” I want to look at it again; this time from an eschatological perspective. Many of Jesus parables seems to focus on things to come; how life will be in the coming age and the Parable of the Prodigal Son is no different. It tells us a little about heaven, a little about hell, and a lot about the Good News.

•Welcome to our Church – in the first statement the unbelievers are separated from God. In the second they are resurrected and experience eternal wrath in hell. In the third they are condemned to eternal conscious punishment; in case you were afraid they weren’t going to really “feel it.” All this on a church website along with: “welcome to our church.” But there are also statements about God. God is sovereign, powerful, wise, all knowing, and good. In addition God has “redemptive purposes in mind” and desires to “call all people into fellowship with Himself.” God, who is powerful, wise and all knowing, who rules over all creation and who desires redemption and union with ALL PEOPLE will be content with billions of people suffering forever in hell? If you think about it, that seems paradoxical and it begs the question, “does God get what God wants?”