I appreciate that the title may sound a little presumptuous, but hear me out.

Cate Blanchett is one of the world’s finest actors…and she hails from Melbourne!

The first movie I recall watching that starred Cate Blanchett was Elizabeth. My wife and I were living in London at the time, the very city where Queen Elizabeth 1 had lived, reigned and died. I already loved historical movies, but watching the film while immersed in Elizabeth’s city brought about a visceral connection. It’s a great movie.

As we enjoyed Elizabeth, Susan commented, ‘Murray, I went to school with Cate.’

I looked at Susan, and with my eyes pressed for more information. 

Susan, typically downplaying such things, added only a few words,

“We weren’t friends. Cate was a few years ahead of me.” 

That was it. That’s all Susan said. I suspect there was a little more to it, after all, Susan had clear memories of Cate being at the same school with her. But today I learnt something new about Cate Blanchett, albeit from the newspaper and it’s about those school years.

At the age of 10, Cate’s father suffered a heart attack and died. To lose a parent at any age is difficult, but at such a young age, one can only imagine the pain, grief, and disorientation created by such a sudden loss. 

Speaking with a journalist while filming a new movie near her old suburban home and school, Cate reflected on how her Dad’s death caused her to turn away from both Church and God.

 “As a child I wanted a religion. I wanted the strong hand of God to put a hand on my childish shoulders to say, ‘Your father is with me. He’s having fun. You’ll see him in 60 years. 

“But that didn’t happen. And so as a ten-year-old I fled from the church and moved down to the river and spent my childhood propelled into nature”. 

“If I’d stayed inside the Methodist church I’d have a lot of bad guitar playing, but instead I rode my bike, thinking I was Nancy Drew, down by the Yarra River. I remember that as profoundly as I remember the hymns”. 

She was asked whether she left religion because it didn’t give her what she wanted,

“It was not so much about what I wanted…more what I was hoping for. Also, I was ten. 

“But religion contains a sense of hope and also a sense of community. And, in a way, that desire for something greater than myself never left me”. 

First of all, I agree with Blanchett’s fears of bad guitar playing. As a former classical musician, many a time have I cringed and groaned at the sounds wafting over a congregation. But fear not, it is also possible to find excellent guitar playing in churches today.

Music aside, I am reminded of something Timothy Keller wrote years ago as he borrowed from C.S Lewis,

“Horrendous, inexplicable suffering, though it cannot disprove God, is nonetheless a problem for the believer in the Bible. However, it is perhaps an even greater problem for nonbelievers. C. S. Lewis described how he had originally rejected the idea of God because of the cruelty of life. Then he came to realize that evil was even more problematic for his new atheism. In the end, he realized that suffering provided a better argument for God’s existence than one against it…

My argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of “just” and “unjust”?… What was I comparing this universe with when I called it unjust?… Of course I could have given up my idea of justice by saying it was nothing but a private idea of my own. But if I did that, then my argument against God collapsed too— for the argument depended on saying that the world was really unjust, not simply that it did not happen to please my private fancies…. Consequently atheism turns out to be too simple.”

Let’s take as an example,  John Lennon’s ‘Imagine’. Imagine doesn’t articulate the highest intellectual efforts to sustain unbelief in God but it does represent popular sentiment. Indeed, Imagine has become something of an international anthem in recent years. For a moment, let’s play out the song’s logic of imagining a world without God, without religion, and without heaven and hell:

Imagine there is no ultimate meaning or goal toward which our lives are headed.

Imagine there is no overarching design and no inherent significance. 

Imagine if our lives were reduced to the potluck outcome of billions of years of impersonal atoms and molecules running around hitting and missing, making and destroying.

Imagine a world where the reality of conscience and moral choice has no grounding in a purpose beyond that of group survival in the evolutionary race to the top.

Imagine human affections are ultimately an illusion, a cruel joke orchestrated by the impersonal rules of physics.

Imagine all the people living for today, for tomorrow is the end.

This view offers no consolation to a gravely ill person. Nothing to help grieving families who have just witnessed a loved one being ripped from their lives.

It offers no hope to someone who is a victim of injustice, for there is no judgment and vindication to come.

In fact, the song collapses in on its own irrationality, like a sandcastle overrun by the incoming tide.  Lennon imagines ‘living life in peace’, and there being no “greed or hunger”. We affirm this sentiment but peace requires a common purpose between people and demands reason and design in the world beyond us. A universe without God does not allow for the idea of universal peace.

As Cate Blanchett shares her personal testimony from God to nonGod, she admits, 

“desire for something greater than myself never left me”.

It is as though a Divinely given conscience keeps poking and prodding at us despite our cognitive and emotional rescripting of life. 

None of us comprehend all of the events we experience or see in this life. To have that kind of knowledge is to be omniscient, and not the brightest or most prophetic have the kind of understanding. But Easter reminds us that there is One who has gone before us and for us. Hope is not defined by my ability to create or sustain it, but by trusting the one who can gift it. Even faith, fragile and compounded by tragic loss, is given assurance through the Easter event.

As a father, I appreciate the limited capacity of my children to grasp concepts both significant and small. It’s not that a child is necessarily wrong, but like adults, our beliefs and commitments are trialled and formed by many kinds of circumstances, inquiries and tests. This is one reason why the message of Easter is so compelling and continues to offer consolation. The death and resurrection of Jesus Christ took place inside history and is thus subject to our scrutiny, but it also punches through time and into eternity and therefore offer timeless hope and assurance.

Last Sunday I preached on Hebrews 5:1-10. The text provides one of the wonderful explanations of why and how Jesus today serves as our faithful representative before God in heaven. There is a tangible and sustainable connection point between our world and heaven, between humanity and God; the God Man Jesus Christ. 

The text explains, 

“During the days of Jesus’ life on earth, he offered up prayers and petitions with fervent cries and tears to the one who could save him from death, and he was heard because of his reverent submission. Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered and, once made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him”.

Never think the cross was easy for Jesus. We should never conclude that suffering didn’t impact Jesus. He is utter love and light and goodness. He did not deserve to suffer even a scratch. And yet he committed himself to his father’s will to endure the greatest evil ever perpetrated. 

No story ends before it begins. No movie is shown at the cinema before it is first written, shot, and produced. In the moment by moment, God is valuing the world and each person who lives. More than that, God didn’t press fast forward to the end of the story, but his Son pressed in every moment and every day, for it is through his suffering and atoning death that God brings about forgiveness and life. Not only does Easter declare an ultimate hope over tragedy but Easter proves that we have an empathetic High Priest in Jesus. 

Cate Blanchett’s impulse as a 10-year-old is relatable for many, and so is her constant companion who reminds her that there must be something more, something better.  Several members of my church have suffered loss in recent months, the death of a parent or child. Death is horrible. Death is, to quote the Bible, the last enemy.

Easter is for the unbeliever, it is for the doubter and for the lifelong transgressor. Easter is for those who know death and suffering.  This confidence lies outside ourselves in the only one who can claim to outdo death. As these beautiful words from Hebrews 4 tell us, 

“Therefore, since we have a great high priest who has ascended into heaven, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold firmly to the faith we profess. 15 For we do not have a high priest who is unable to empathize with our weaknesses, but we have one who has been tempted in every way, just as we are—yet he did not sin. 16 Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.”