Exodus. Gods and Kings Review

Debbie and I went to see Exodus, the latest Hollywood movie claiming to take its inspiration from the Bible. As a Christian, I was under no delusion that the movie would be entirely accurate from a Biblical perspective. To say the movie was “historical fiction” is somewhat true, but I would characterize it as about 5% history, and 95% fiction.

My greatest disappointment with the movie is that it completely diminishes the glory and holiness of God. There are moments where the audience gets the supernatural nature of some of the events, but without any direct mention of God having done it. From my studies and knowledge of the Exodus in the Bible, I will list a few of the “errors” in the movie.

First is the timing. The movie claims this is about 1300 BC, during the time of Ramses the Great. I don’t think this is just an oversight, I believe it was intentional. There is no archeological evidence of the Hebrews or the Exodus at that point in the archeological record. The true exodus occurred about 200 years prior to that, where there is an overwhelming amount of evidence to confirm the Biblical account. The idea that Ramses was the pharaoh at the time of Moses was widely circulated around the early 1900’s, and completely discredited in the archaeological record.

The movie Moses vehemently denied being a Hebrew, or having any knowledge of it, even after being told the story of his birth and rescue. According to the account in the New Testament given by Stephen, Moses knew all along he was Hebrew, and took it to heart in his early development.

The major flaw that kept hitting me in the face was how the movie treated God. He was cast as a small, arrogant boy who came across to me as smart-alecky and rather heartless. The Bible Moses never saw God as a man, though he did get a glimpse of his back at one point in the Biblical account. The relationship and dialogue between the Bible Moses and God is completely missing throughout the movie. In the movie, God never directed Moses to do anything, but made Moses keep guessing what he was supposed to do. The movie Moses never had dialogue with pharaoh demanding to let the Hebrews go. This is the worst error I see in the movie. As a result, the audience gets the impression that God is vengeful on a seemingly unknowing victim. The true reason for the plagues is never given in the movie. It misses the entire point of the Exodus, that God will not be mocked, and that He will lead and protect His people.

The plagues were explained with naturalistic causes, though they did come across as supernatural in their scope and resulting devastation. Other deviations from the Bible were the movie Moses breaking his leg in a mudslide before he saw the burning bush – the Bible Moses set out the next day for Egypt; the destruction of half of pharaoh’s army before they ever reached the Red Sea; the depiction that movie Moses’ sister raised him, when in the Bible, his mother raised him; the fact that the Hebrews crossed on dry ground, while in the movie, they were in ankle to knee deep water most of the way; that movie Moses left his staff in Midian, and  took his sword to be “a general” of the Hebrews; Moses never used his staff for miracles (there was no turning it into a snake, causing the Nile to turn to blood, parting the sea, etc.). I’m sure I could nit pick some more points, but you get the idea.

I would not recommend this to anyone, and especially not for children. They will get a completely skewed view of who God is, what His nature is, and it will instill doubts about the accuracy of the Bible.

I’m trying out a new image uploader.

School is out for the summer and Grandma and Grandpa time has begun. I’ve been looking forward to this time of the year, having the boys at the house, one at a time. Frank and I can give them our undivided attention and spoil them as much as we can!  This Fall, all the boys will be going to school and it will be hard to have them over to the house for any length of time.

We started the summer by going to “Inner Space Caverns” over in Georgetown, right next to I-35.  We had not been there in about 20 years. It’s still a neat cave. The boys LOVED it–a REAL cave!!! Every turn brought new things to see, made special by our expert guide who was great with the little ones. Afterwards, we went to the house and Dave cooked steaks, OH MY! So good! THANK YOU Dave & Jen!

The next really BIG event on the calendar is a weekend at GREAT WOLF LODGE in Grapevine, TX!  We’ll be honoring J and his 9th birthday. It will be a special time PLUS, Uncle Jer will be with us!

Frank’s broken leg/ankle is healing nicely and he’s getting strength back. Swelling during the evening hours is a problem but nothing elevation and an ice bag can’t take care of.  I still nag him about being careful because I’m terrified of him re-injuring his leg and setting him back more. I still do the mowing with the lawn mower and Frank takes care of the tractor mowing.

Since we got some rain in June, everything is still nice and green. I am way behind in planting flowers or plants because of Frank’s accident. I am happy to be able to keep the grass around the house mowed.

Until next time,

dk

Yes, it’s been a long while. I just don’t spend much time at the computer pondering what to write in the blog. Life happens. We keep busy. We have the best intentions but the worst memory. Getting old. Here are a few landmarks over the past few months:

Labor Day 2012 – Traded Stormy for Ryder, a 2 year old paint gelding.
12-2-12 – Amigos of the Seas cruise out of Galveston, another “two thumbs up” experience!
1-1-13 – RABC changed my job and took my meager salary away. Much heart searching. I submitted to God’s will and decided to stay.
1-13-13 – Adventure of the Seas, out of San Juan with Jay & Michele. Definitely a different cruise experience. If it wasn’t for quality time with Jay & Michele and friends, it would have been a bust.
1-31-13 – RABC reinstated my salary. Assoc. Pr. fired.
FEB 2013 – joined Cove Saddle Club so we can use their arena.
3-8-13 – Surgery to remove gallbladder and repair hernia.
3-31-13 – Found a kitten by a burning brush pile, scorched but not harmed. Frank’s tender heart is bottle feeding and nurturing it. I guess more on this subject later.

Upcoming events:
4-14-13 – Girls cruise on Carnival Magic out of Galveston! FUN!!!
MAY/June 2013 – trip to KC.
July 2013 – OES Grand Chapter in Arlington, TX

Yes, I will try to keep up the blog with our current events. It helps to look back and see the record of what’s been going on. So much gets lost in the memory.

dk

We spent Easter Sunday at Jen and David’s home and had a wonderful day with family. David prepared an excellent dinner, much better than I could have done!!! Good to see Jer too.

We’ve been thinking of the time when Jen was riding Rascal through a field of bluebonnets at West Fort Hood and we finally found the photo. Hard to believe it was taken 25 years ago!

It’s another good year for bluebonnets throughout Texas. We’ve received a nice amount of rain this Spring.

d

Sammie turned 8 years old on Sunday, April 1st. We celebrated by going to Petsmart and getting some treats and new toys!

We put the birthday hat and bandana on her and she got extra special attention from all the folks at Petsmart!

It’s that time of the year to start planting! We went to Lowe’s and got more topsoil and peat moss and add to that a healthy dose of composted horse manure (I wonder where that came from) and got to working the soil. With daytime temps in the 80’s, I’m sure there is no danger of frost. We’ll be planting the seeds this weekend: peas, beans, cucumbers, radishes, and we planted some tomato plants we got earlier.

Farmville 2012

It’s been awhile since we’ve posted on here, so I thought I might bring some things up to date. We bought Holly, a 7 year old Quarterhorse mare, just over 14 hands tall, around the 4th of July weekend. About the same time, we took in Cochise, our neighbor’s horse as a pasture pal for Holly, and for me to work with to see if  I could break his habit of bucking.  Well, Cochise won the first round, bucking me off on July 17th (See the poem, “Be Ready For the Ride). I dislocated my elbow in the fall, but quickly recovered over the next two months. Meanwhile, we joined Clinton Anderson’s “No Worries Club” to get sizable discounts on his Downunder Horsemanship training materials and tools. I have been working both horses through the groundwork so far, and I must say it makes a world of difference in their attitude and respect toward humans.

Frank

Debbie and Jennifer are on their way back home – (aka “Right Under the X in TEXAS”). They may wish they had extended their peregrination in and around Hawaii. (okay, if you have to look it up, it means “journey, jaunt, expedition” – actually, a derivative of this word is quite common: Peregrine Falcon). It had already been 5 days of triple-digit heat in a row before they left for the milder tropical clime.  The aforementioned heat has not relented whilst they’ve been away. And last night, our friendly central Texas weatherman, Andy Anderson, predicted another 10-12 straight days before we might dip back to a chilly 99°. That would make, by my calculations, 26 straight 100°+ days without a drop of rain, or even decent clouds, for that matter. By the way, we also set a record with 15 days over 100° during the month of June.  I wonder what it was like leading up to and during the Dust Bowl days?

But, hey! I still love the heat more than the lack thereof. Winters are intolerable. One thing’s for sure: Having Debbie home will make me forget all about the weather! 

Frank