Synopsis: A young CIA agent is tasked with looking after a fugitive in a safe house. But when the safe house is attacked, he finds himself on the run with his charge.
Here are some gospel lessons I’ve learned from the movie “Safe House”
1. We can’t trust the law.
Romans 7:5 5 For when we were in the realm of the flesh, the sinful passions aroused by the law were at work in us, so that we bore fruit for death.
Look around you? What does the law do to the man.
In the movie, the CIA was supposed to protect the nation instead we see the corruption inside the organization.
It happens everywhere. A police body is created. Then we create a police body to police the police. Then we create also an ombudsman to police those who police the police. Why is that? Because the law exposes our sin and our flaws.
2. The law provokes SIN.
7 What shall we say, then? Is the law sinful? Certainly not! Nevertheless, I would not have known what sin was had it not been for the law. For I would not have known what coveting really was if the law had not said, “You shall not covet.” 8 But sin, seizing the opportunity afforded by the commandment, produced in me every kind of coveting. For apart from the law, sin was dead.
The law is not sinful and please don’t misinterpret this verse as a license to sin because Paul was clear. It is wrong when we look to the law for life, identity, security.
The law defines sin and also provokes sin. When confronted by the law, sin takes the character of rebellion to prove that we are independent. Nobody tells me what I should and could do!!!
In his commentary on Galatians, Martin Luther describes the Law as a divinely sent Hercules to attack and kill the monster of self-righteousness and to show us everyday just how desperately we need God’s grace:
The law exists to crush any sense that we can “get it done.” The law shows non-Christian’s and Christian’s the same thing: how we can’t cut it on our own and how much we both need Jesus.
The law offends us because it tells us what to do–and we hate anyone telling us what to do, most of the time. But, ironically, grace offends us even more because it tells us that there’s nothing we can do, that everything has already been done. And if there’s something we hate more than being told what to do, it’s being told that we can’t do anything, that we can’t earn anything–that we’re helpless, weak, and needy.
The law reveals sin but is powerless to remove sin. It points to righteousness but can’t produce it. It shows us what godliness is, but it cannot make us godly.
As Martin Luther said, “Sin is not canceled by lawful living, for no person is able to live up to the Law. Nothing can take away sin except the grace of God.”
3. The law guides but it never gives life. Only Jesus gives life.
Romans 7:25 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me (redeems me) through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful naturea slave to the law of sin.
So the moral of the movie – we really want to change whether as a nation or individually, we can’t do it on our own. We first need to experience the grace and love of God.
As Spurgeon wrote, “When I thought God was hard, I found it easy to sin; but when I found God so kind, so good, so overflowing with compassion, I smote upon my breast to think that I could ever have rebelled against One who loved me so, and sought my good.” Indeed, it is “the kindness of the Lord that leads to repentance” (Romans 2:4).
Recommendation: 4 out of 5 stars
It is a great movie to watch. I would not recommend your kids ages 12 and below to watch it because of violence and slight sexy and kissing scenes in the beginning.