WARNING: If you have not yet seen Onward SPOILERS AHEAD!

In John 14:1-14, the Gospel passage from this past Sunday, we are given a glimpse into Jesus’ last conversation with his small company of disciples. He tells them, “If you really know me, you will know my Father as well. From now on, you do know him and have seen him.”

One of the disciples, Philip, doesn’t quite get what Jesus is trying to say. He isn’t sure who this father is that Jesus has been talking about. So he asks, “Lord, can you explain to us who the father is and that will be enough for us.”

It’s hard to know whether Jesus is hurt by this question or whether he is exasperated by Philip’s cluelessness. Maybe it’s a little of both. In any event, Jesus answers, “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father?”

What Jesus asks Philip reminded me of a question that Carissa asked me a few weeks ago after we had finished watching the Pixar movie Onward. The movie tells the story of a son who desperately wants to see his father. The son in question is a teenage elf named Ian Lightfoot (voiced by Tom Holland of Spiderman fame), who never had a chance to meet his father because he died of a terrible illness just before he was born.

We are introduced to Ian on his sixteenth birthday. We quickly learn that he is struggling as an awkward teen, trying to figure out who he is without the loving guidance of his father. At school he is a bit of a loner, unsure of himself and timid. During a chance encounter with one of his dad’s old college classmates, he learns that his dad was charismatic, gregarious and most of all bold. Ian wants to be all those things, but he feels lost without someone there to help him find his way.

Later on that day, Ian’s mom gives him a special gift. It is a gift that his dad, before he died, had prepared for Ian to open when he turned 16. It consisted of a staff, a gem and a spell. Together these promise to bring back Mr. Lightfoot for one whole day. So Ian, with some encouragement, nervously casts the spell and…it works! Well, sort of. It literally only works half way. Before the upper half of his father’s body is conjured the gem explodes, breaking the power of the spell so that all that is brought back are the legs. Everything from the waist up is missing, waiting to be formed.

And so Ian and his older brother Barley (voiced by Chris Pratt, Holland’s Marvel buddy) begin a grand and glorious quest to find another gem that will allow them to complete the magic and bring back the other half of their father. As they set out with great expectation, Ian writes a list of things he wants to do with his dad:

• Play catch
• Take a walk
• Heart to heart
• Laugh together
• Driving lesson
• Share my life with him

The whole story points towards the moment when Ian is able to complete the spell and finally meet his dad. At the same time, there is a ticking clock. The spell is only good for 24 hours. Even if they have the gem in hand, once the allotted time passes, Ian and Barley won’t be able to bring their dad back.

Will the brother be able to finish the quest in time to see their father?

Here comes the spoiler: Time runs out and Ian doesn’t get to see his dad. So far as it goes, the brothers do finally secure the gem, but there is only a brief window in which the father will be resurrected and Ian decides that Barley should be the one to talk to him (you’ll have to watch the movie to find out why).

You expect the whole film that Ian will eventually get to see his dad. But no, that’s not how it ends. And this would have been a monumental let down had it not been for the epiphany Ian has, which happens at the lowest point of the film — when all seemed to be lost. The time for the spell to work had almost completely run out. They couldn’t find the gem and had no where else to look. Ian had just harshly blamed Barley for screwing it all up, at which point he ends up going off by himself to sit with his dad on a ledge overlooking the ocean. He had given up all hope and all he could think of doing was to spend whatever time he had left with his father, even if it was with just his legs.

He opens up his notebook and looks at his list of things he wished he could do with his dad. Turns out he won’t be able to do any of them. Won’t be able to play catch with dad. Won’t be able to take a walk with dad. Won’t be able to have a heart to heart with dad. But as he continues down the list, something begins to dawn on him. We begin to see flashbacks of Ian with Barley. We are taken back to a hilarious moment in the film when Barley had been shrunk down to a 6-inch version of himself by a spell gone awry. And we see Barley giving Ian a crash course on how to drive on the freeway as they are escaping a hive of overly-belligerent fairies.

Driving lesson. Check.

Slowly Ian begins to realize something. As he reviews his list and looks back at who his brother has been for him, not just that day but throughout his whole life, he realizes: Barley has always been for him the father he never had. It is a powerful scene. What began as a story about one son wishing desperately to see his father turns out to really be a story about a son who has always known the father because of another son who has made the father known to him.

What Carissa asked me when the credits rolled was, “Wait, so Ian never gets to see his dad?”

Well, yes and no.

Ian doesn’t get to see his father in the way we expect, but of course, he does see his father in another way, a way we didn’t expect — that is, through his older brother, Barley. Barley acts as a kind of sacrament in the movie. A sacrament can be understood as a visible sign of an invisible grace. The invisible grace, in this case, is the father. The visible sign is Barley. Barley makes visible the father. In the Christian faith, all sacraments echo the Incarnation, in which the invisible Father is made known through the visible Son, the person of Christ. And so Barley becomes a kind of Christ figure. Not perfectly but in kind. A son who makes known his father, pointing us toward the true Son who makes known to us the truth of the Father.

This is precisely why Jesus asks Philip, “Don’t you know me, Philip, even after I have been among you such a long time? Anyone who has seen me has seen the Father. How can you say, “Show us the Father?”

Onward thus paints for us an illuminating picture of what it means for us to “see” God. It is not about a literal seeing of God in the physical, but neither is it a vague, sentimental seeing that is entirely abstract. It is a figurative seeing of God in the tangible experiences we have with those who embody the character of God through the work of the Spirit within them. In the trinitarian language we find in John’s Gospel, Jesus, the Son, makes known the Father through his earthly ministry. But when his earthly ministry comes to an end, he promises the Spirit who will live in and among those who believe in him. Through this Spirit the life of those who have put their faith in the Son are enabled to become “icons” of the Father. Like Barley they make known the Father. And we like Ian, if we have eyes to see, can come to the realization that we too have come to known the Father in a very real way.

As Christians, there are times when we play the part of Barley making known God in and through our lives (perhaps often unbeknownst to us). At other times we are like Ian, realizing that we have come to know God through the faithful witness of others (those we might call the communion of saints). The scene of Ian sitting on a ledge overlooking the ocean is a helpful reminder to us of the way this knowledge often comes to us. It provides a way of understanding what it means to say that we know God. That faith, belief, trust in God requires these kinds of “small” epiphanies — quiet moments of realization where the various experiences of our lives come together in such a way that we see something we had previously missed.

This is what I think Jesus means when he tells Philip, “Believe me when I say that I am in the Father and the Father is in me; or at least believe on the evidence of the works themselves.”

We often think of evidence in a forensic sense. Facts that can be verified through scientific methods of investigation. But the evidence I think Jesus alludes to is more like the “evidence” that enables Ian to see the truth about his brother. It is not evidence that can be placed under a microscope and probed to establish some kind of objective truth. It is not that kind of truth. But this doesn’t mean it is completely subjective. It is a truth that makes sense in a very robust way — in a way that shows truth to be personal, by revealing the truth about a person. This after all, is the truth that Jesus says he is when he says that he is the way, the truth, and the life. Jesus is the truth about God, the Son who makes known the true character of the Father.

To know this truth doesn’t require some extraordinary experience. It happens in very much the same way it happens for Ian — sitting there in that ordinary moment overlooking the sea with his longings and disappointments, the realization simply comes to him. And so it is with the life of faith. All that is needed is some space to reflect and there what finds us is that which we have somehow too easily overlooked. God has been there all along, if we only had eyes to see.

WARNING: If you have not yet seen Avengers: Endgame SPOILERS AHEAD!

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In our gospel passage this past Sunday we looked at a description that Jesus gives about the kind of death that Peter would die. Jesus tells him, “Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go” (John 21:18).

The words here are a bit cryptic, which makes interpreting what exactly Jesus is getting at hard to decipher. Having just seen Avengers: Endgame, I thought it might be fun (and illuminating) to explore what Jesus predicts about Peter’s future through the story arc of Tony Stark (aka Ironman).

When we first meet Mr. Stark (ten years ago in the first Iron Man movie), he is a genius engineer, womanizing playboy, and all around smart-ass — the epitome of a self-absorbed and self-determined individual. In other words, he did what he wanted and went where he wanted. Minutes into the film he is severely wounded in an attack by a terrorist group and held captive in a remote cave. In exchange for his freedom, Stark is forced to build a Jericho missile, a weapon of mass destruction that he himself designed for the U.S. military.

While in this cave, we find that a doctor named Yinsen has also been abducted to tend to Stark’s injuries as well as serve as his personal missile building assistant. Both realize that there is no way the terrorists are going to let them go and so they hatch an escape plan. Part of this plan involves building what turns out to be the first Iron Man suit. When they finally make their break things go awry and Yinsen ends up sacrificing his life in order to give Stark the time he needs to get away. It is this act of self-sacrifice on the part of a complete stranger that sets Tony Stark on a hero’s journey that will take more than a decade to complete.

To be sure, there is a charming narcissism that is part of what makes Tony Stark Tony Stark. Indeed his most quintessential (and iconic) line comes at the end of the first movie where he announces to the world, “I am Ironman.” This comes on the heels of being told that it is best to keep his true identity under wraps. But as we noted, he does what he wants and goes where he wants. Simply staying put as Tony Stark is just not as gratifying and glamorous as ascending to superhero stardom.

If you have seen the movie you will know that this self declaration, “I am Ironman,” becomes the climactic and crowning line of Avengers: Endgame. But this time it is spoken by a man who has not remained the same Tony Stark we knew once upon a time. He is no longer possessed by a narrow obsession with his own self-interest. Or rather, it might be better said that his self-interest has since been (en)lightened, no longer weighed down by the heavy tyranny of caring always and only for himself.

We see this set up in the early part of Endgame where we find that in the 5 years since the demigod Thanos snapped half of all life out of existence, Tony Stark has made a comfortable life for himself. Having married longtime love Pepper Potts, they now live a quiet life together in a peaceful lakeside mansion with their 5-year old daughter Morgan. In a way, this is a tremendous step forward for Tony Stark. That he is able to settle down with Pepper and become a father shows a certain kind of growth and maturity from him. But more will be asked of him when Captain America and company show up with a dangerous plan to try and reverse the Snap.

Will Tony safeguard his current idyllic life or will he risk it for what is yet tenuous and uncertain? Will he take the path of least resistance or will he embark on a rescue mission fraught with peril and possibly death? Or as Jesus puts it, will he choose to save his life or lose it?

This brings us to the decisive moment that all 22 movies in the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) have been driving towards. History is about to repeat itself, but with a vengeance. This time Thanos is hellbent on wiping every living creature out of existence, not just half. He has once again taken hold of what he needs to do it and just as he is about the snap his fingers he proclaims, “I am inevitable.”

And then comes the snap…

…but nothing happens.

What went wrong (or maybe what went right)?

Somehow Tony Stark has gained the upper hand (pun intended) and it is he who now possesses what is needed to snap Thanos out of existence. (Oh snap!) But he knows that the power released in doing so would more than likely cost him his life. With the fate of all the cosmos hanging in the balance, Tony Stark looks up at Thanos, says, “I am Ironman,” and with a snap of his fingers completes a story arc ten years in the making, taking him from egotistical megalomaniac to self-giving hero.

What Tony Stark goes through can offer us a way to interpret what Jesus says is in store for Peter. Peter, like Tony, is cocky and brash. But also like Tony, his story arc will take him from cocky and brash to humble and self-sacrificial. Who is it that will lead Peter by the hand and take him where he does not want to go? According to church history, Peter is crucified upside down. So many believe that the “someone else” who will lead him may be a soldier leading him to his crucifixion. This is certainly a legitimate interpretation. But what if we thought about it in another way? What if we looked at it in a more figurative way — that what leads Peter is something akin to conviction.

When we speak of being convicted, it is not quite the same as saying, “this is something I want to do.” To be convicted, it seems to me, is not the same as wanting to do something. But neither is it the same as doing something we don’t want to do. Conviction is a kind of unwanted wanting. It is unwanted in that it is something that often works in the opposite direction of our regular inclinations, but is nevertheless a wanting in that it compels us to act in line with a greater desire that issues from beyond us. This is the realm of what Scripture calls the will of God.

When Scripture talks about doing God’s will, it is not language that speaks on the same register as doing that which we want or that which makes us happy. But neither is it calling us to be miserable as if God only makes us do things we don’t want to do. It is speaking on the level of conviction. The journey that Tony Stark goes on moves him from a life driven by selfish desires towards a life drawn forward by conviction. The last thing Tony wants to do is leave the life he has made with Pepper and Morgan and yet he finds himself strangely compelled to open himself up to the very thing that will surely disrupt and possibly put an end to that life.

Where did such a conviction come from? One answer is that it came from Yinsen giving his life to set Tony free. Another finds its beginning in the invitation made to him to become a part of a new community (the Avengers Initiative). It is this community that offered him a way to see his life as part of a larger whole. In a way that is what God’s will consists of. In the Christian faith, this larger whole is defined by a people. Or more accurately, a people gathered around a story about a God who died to set us free. God’s will is what can be discerned within the confines of a community learning to live into this grand story given to us in Scripture. 

So back to what Jesus says to Peter. Could it be that the “someone else” Jesus references is none other than God? That for Peter and for all of us who have been made a part of Christ’s body, the Church, Christian discipleship is about the willingness to follow a God whose will it is to lead us into places where we don’t want to go; and yet find in being led to such places we are drawn out of our tendency toward self-absorption by a conviction shaped by Scripture, discerned in community. And like the story arc we have been following on screen with Tony Stark throughout the MCU, may we take heart that such convictions are not gained over night nor are they formed in a straight line. It is a bumpy ride filled with a mixture of failure and triumph lasting a lifetime. Of course, this is nowhere more evident than in the life of Peter. We know about his foibles. We read about his denials. But in the end, we also know that he becomes one who is able to die a good and honorable death. As the Gospel of John puts it, “a death that would glorify God” (John 21: 19). May our lives follow a similar story arc so that when the hour of our death comes may the same be true of us.