Puny God

My family and I went to see the Avengers movie this afternoon, and it really is as good as everyone is saying that it is. 

But here’s how my mind works. 

When Loki used his powers to attack and intimidate a crowd of people in Germany, forcing them to kneel, if not in worship, then at least in terror of his power, he shouted:

“Kneel! Is not this simpler? Is this not your natural state? It’s the unspoken truth of humanity that you crave subjugation… You were made to be ruled. In the end, you will always kneel.”

I was reminded of something I just recently read in the Ante-Nicene Fathers – specifically in The Epistle of Mathetes to Diognetus:

“This [messenger] He sent to them.  Was it then, as one might conceive, for the purpose of exercising tyranny, or of inspiring fear and terror?  By no means, but under the influence of clemency and meekness. As a king sends his son, who is also a king, so sent He Him; as God He sent Him; as a Savior He sent Him, and as seeking to persuade, not to compel us; for violence has no place in the character of God.  As calling us He sent Him, not as vengefully pursuing us; as loving us He sent Him, not as judging us. 

In the one we have a god (a “puny god” as the Hulk called him) who used his power to cause fear and terror, who desired to rule and to rule by the force of violence and fear, and in the other we have a God who desires to rule –but not through the compulsion of fear and tyranny. 

How powerful is God?  Powerful enough to get what he wants without resorting to the compulsion of fear and violence and terror?