Zombie Apocalypse Revisited

The latest zombie-laden season of Walking Dead is off to a violent and bloody start. One of my kids still watches it, and gave me the details of someone from the original cast, season one, that is now off the show—killed off. I don’t bother watching it anymore. I saved recorded episodes thinking I may want to catch up; there are thirty or so saved now and I still haven’t felt like going back to it.

If you’ve never watched “Walking Dead,” it’s definitely not an off-the-shelf Zombie show. It is a custom-tailored adventure show about a band of people simply trying to live another day, against all odds and a lot of zombies who would like to see them become zombies. There are some social lessons we can glean from “Walking Dead,” too. But at one time my real reason was to see all the “What-Not-To-Do” moments. And there was the action, the tension, the resolve. . . As with all fiction—actually with non-fiction and life, too—there are the good guys and the bad guys. In “Walking Dead” the good guys are only relatively good compared to the bad guys, but the good guy leader seemed to pop out on top even when he’s seemingly failed. And there were the zombies, whether a metaphor for the slumbering population masses or just fantasy, they provided the dual-to-the-death moments. But something is changing in the latest season, however. It appears a new guy in town may be worse than the zombies. He is now the primary pseudo hero, and he’s a bad character. In one scene, described to me, this guy does one of those child’s games to pick the person he’s going to bludgeon to death. “Eeny, meeny, miny, moe” who’s gonna die today?” sort of thing. It’s one of the original cast members, whose presence has been welcome throughout the many series that we now mourn.

Where previously in “Walking Dead” there was a sense of grasping for hope, experiencing despair, then a renewed hope is found. The newest season, unfortunately, leaves me thinking there is no hope. Without hope, what have we left?

It’s pretty easy to stop watching “Walking Dead,” evan after having watched the first four seasons. But the reality of living in a desperate world, living as Twenty-First Century Earthlings, is that I’m not just in an audience and can get up and walk out. We tried that during the Great Sixties when we smoked a little dope and dropped out. Well, maybe we smoked a lot of dope, and some tried other recreational drug therapies. At any rate, we don’t have the luxury of burying our heads in the sand. Like Henny Penny said, the sky is indeed falling and it’s falling on us. There is no hope. There was no hope for America under the leadership of President Obama. There is no hope for America under the leadership of President-elect Trump. There is no hope for America apart from a true Hero, a true Savior. For that Hero to arise, America needs to wake up and get things right with our Creator. For there is no hope for those who’ve disavowed our Creator, our G-d, and His Only Son Y’shua, Jesus. The only hope left for America in the days of the walking dead is to return to America’s Christian Roots. Else we shall mourn its death.

But we do not want you to be uninformed, brothers, about those who are asleep, that you may not grieve as others do who have no hope. (1 Thessalonians 4:13)

Regardless of the outward situation, regardless of the hopelessness we may feel in America, whether we support a third term for President Obama or a chance with Presidet-elect Trump, we who are in a relationship with Messiah Y’shua, Christ Jesus, have hope of eternal blessing and eternal life after this Earthly, mortal life. And if this wondrous nation, this once-freedom loving nation of America will humble itself and reaffirm its relation with the One True G-d, it will once again be a Great Nation worthy of G-d’s protection and blessing.

Matthew Henry Commentary:
Hebrews 4:13-18 Here is comfort for the relations and friends of those who die in the Lord. Grief for the death of friends is lawful; we may weep for our own loss, though it may be their gain. Christianity does not forbid, and grace does not do away, our natural affections. Yet we must not be excessive in our sorrows; this is too much like those who have no hope of a better life. Death is an unknown thing, and we know little about the state after death; yet the doctrines of the resurrection and the second coming of Christ, are a remedy against the fear of death, and undue sorrow for the death of our Christian friends; and of these doctrines we have full assurance. It will be some happiness that all the saints shall meet, and remain together for ever; but the principal happiness of heaven is to be with the Lord, to see him, live with him, and enjoy him for ever. We should support one another in times sorrow; not deaden one another’s spirits, or weaken one another’s hands. And this may be done by the many lessons to be learned from the resurrection of the dead, and the second coming of Christ. What! comfort a man by telling him he is going to appear before the judgment-seat of God! Who can feel comfort from those words? That man alone with whose spirit the Spirit of God bears witness that his sins are blotted out, and the thoughts of whose heart are purified by the Holy Spirit, so that he can love God, and worthily magnify his name. We are not in a safe state unless it is thus with us, or we are desiring to be so.

Lord Bless, Keep, Shine. . .

[Wikipedia on “Walking Dead”]

The Daily Post Writing Prompt — Bespoke