Resources > Devotions The "That Guy or Gal" Moment : The NEXT Moment Posted by Rev. Jeff Dixon, Senior Equipping Minister, CCC Ministries on Jan 20, 2008, 16:08

The That Guy or Gal Moment

The Moment (part three)

Ephesians 5:1-2

Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children (2) and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God

Below are some of the main points in the study along with some additional notes. The film, Live Free or Die Hard was used in the Celebration Worship Experience. There are some notes and questions to think about as you explore the film beyond our use of it...

You Become “That Guy” By Watching and Following

(v.1) Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children

Watch what God does, and then you do it, like children who learn proper behavior from their parents.

Mostly what God does is love you.

Lots of people talk about God…but if that is not matched with an imitation of God it is more like gossip than truth

Because of that love you have access and He gives you an example to follow

You Become “That Guy” By Learning and Being

(v.2) and live a life of love, just as Christ loved us and gave himself up for us as a fragrant offering and sacrifice to God

Keep company with him and learn a life of love.

Observe how Christ loved us.

His love was not cautious but extravagant.

He didn't love in order to get something from us but to give everything of himself to us. Love like that.

Love explains why He came

Love explains how He endured

His hometown kicked Him out

His so called friends, turned on Him

Hucksters called God a hypocrite

Sinners called God guilty

Do termites have the stuff to mock and eagle?

Do tapeworms dare look at a swan and call it ugly?

How did Jesus endure this kind of treatment?

Why did He put up with it?

The reason….His love

Your goodness can’t win His love

Your badness can’t lose it

BUT you CAN resist it

We tend to do so honestly…we have been plutoed so often that we are jumpy, skittish, and hesitant

Because there was no one else to do it

He loved you…in a way you had never been loved

Thinking about the film....

Die Hard was the first in this series of movies, Live Free or Die Hard comes an amazing 20 years afer the original.

Twenty years later, battered by life, John can no longer be that panicky, brash cop, and Live Free shrewdly uses his history to advantage, establishing him as a dogged, world-weary old warrior who may still get mad and even desperate, but can't really get all that frightened any more.

McClane knows that his opponent (Timothy Olyphant, The Girl Next Door)—an arrogant, ruthless computer security expert twenty years his junior—is smarter than he is, and has the advantage of meticulous planning and surprise. But McClane has experience on his side; he's played underdog before, and when he rattles his opponent's chain, it isn't blustering bravado, but seasoned tactical provocation. This time, it's his unflappable calm that intimidates his brash young opponent, not the other way around.

Somebody needs to be frightened, though, or the sense of emotional urgency is lost. So Live Free gives McClane a sidekick: Matt Farrell (Justin Long, Accepted), a young hacker who, in addition to providing technical support to the digitally challenged McClane, freaks out a lot—and with good reason. He's not as engaging or sympathetic as Sandra Bullock in Speed, say, but he gets the job done.

McClane needs him, too. Professedly based on a Wired article by John Carlin called "A Farewell to Arms," which speculates on the possibility of a coming "I-war" or information war, Live Free drops McClane into a Crichton-esque techno-thriller about virtual terrorism, a hacker takedown of the infrastructure.

Die Hard is kind of like reading those Worst Case Scenario Survival Handbooks; even if you never actually plan to leap from a burning building, say, or take on a high-rise full of gun-wielding terrorists, there's something empowering about feeling that the thing could conceivably be done, if not necessarily by you, but at least by someone with sufficient nerve, skill and luck.

Of course, the flashback we used in celebration worship which was a quick joy ride through all four films was fun. Then the moment when John describes his take on what it means to be a hero was our jump off point.

If you have watched the film, here are a few questions to explore when the film ends....

1. When are the means justified or not justified by the ends? Given the gravity of the situation, are McClane's actions in the film always justified? If not, when and how does he cross the line, and why are his actions not justified?

2. What makes someone a hero? Is John McClane a hero? What about Matt and Lucy? Why or why not? What does McClane's bitter speech about what being a hero "gets you" have to say about heroism? What about his answer to Matt's question about why he does it ("Because there's no one else to do it right now")?