Trickery, bribery, lies… the Bible has it all! You probably expected me to say that the movie had it all! 😉 And it does!

One of the questions that rolled around in my head and heart this week was: Does the ends justify the means? Normally my answer would be no… but after I watched The Grand Seduction again (I watched it about 5 years ago) and connected it to some Biblical passages, I wasn’t so sure that the answer was as cut and dried as that.

The Grand Seduction is a movie about a dying Newfoundland fishing village that in order to survive, must convince a young doctor to take up residence. They need a doctor to land a contract to secure a factory in order to save the harbour from financial ruin. They only have one week to convince the doctor to stay… and use a variety of methods… ranging from wiretapping his phone, to faking an interest in cricket, to making sure the restaurant has his favourite food, even offering him cocaine! None of these methods are genuine, what is genuine is their desperation. This is a last-ditch effort to save their harbour from a purposeless existence after the collapse of the fishery.

The two themes then that arose for me were trickery and purpose. Trickery is often employed by oppressed people, who have no or few alternatives. And no access to power. When I googled, ‘trickery in the bible,’ there were quite a few instances of women employing trickery, this could be evidence of their lower status and lack of access to power.

For instance, in Genesis 27, we have the story of how Jacob, with the help of his mother Rebekah, deceives his father Isaac to receive the blessing intended for his older brother, Esau. Isaac, now old and nearly blind, decides to bless Esau before he dies. He asks Esau to hunt some game and prepare a meal, after which he will bless him. Rebekah overhears this and devises a plan for Jacob to receive the blessing instead.

She instructs Jacob to fetch two young goats, which she prepares to taste like Esau’s favorite dish. She then dresses Jacob in Esau’s clothes and covers his hands and neck with goatskins to mimic Esau’s hairy skin. Jacob approaches Isaac, pretending to be Esau. Although Isaac is suspicious because the voice sounds like Jacob’s, he is ultimately convinced by the hairy hands and Esau’s clothes. Isaac blesses Jacob, giving him the inheritance and authority meant for Esau. When Esau returns and discovers the deception, he is heartbroken and begs for a blessing from his father. Isaac gives him a lesser blessing, foretelling that Esau will live by the sword and serve his brother, though he will eventually break free. Esau vows to kill Jacob for stealing his blessing. Rebekah, fearing for Jacob’s life, advises him to flee to her brother Laban in Haran until Esau’s anger subsides. Isaac sends Jacob away, blessing him again before he departs.

I don’t pretend to understand the reasoning behind Rebekkah’s deception, although it is thought that Jacob was her favourite child, but she had no overt power to affect change, so had to use covert power. For whatever reason, she thought that Jacob was the best person to inherit Isaac’s blessing… in those times, the majority of his assets. Perhaps she thought Jacob was the best one to help the entire family survive and thrive.

Later on in Exodus 1:15-22: The descendants of Jacob are enslaved, but Pharoah is afraid that their numbers are increasing to a degree that they are a threat to the Egyptians. He orders the Hebrew midwives, Shiphrah and Puah, to kill any male Hebrew babies at birth but let the female babies live. However, the midwives stand in awe of their God and choose to disobey the king’s command, allowing the boys to live.

When questioned by Pharaoh, they explain that Hebrew women give birth quickly, before the midwives can arrive. God blesses the midwives for their faithfulness, and the Hebrew population continues to grow stronger.

In response, Pharaoh orders all his people to throw any newborn Hebrew boys into the Nile River, while allowing the girls to live. This is the story of Moses… who was placed in a basket in the water, rescued by Pharoah’s sister and raised by his birth mother.

Oppressed people, doing what is necessary to survive. Not unlike the story of the people of Tickle Cove. The story of Tickle Cove is the story of many fishing and rural communities. Decisions made at a distance having a great impact on communities.

Desperate people do desperate things to survive. We see it at the food bank… we see it as we drive or walk by the encampments, and we see it as we pass people panhandling for money or food. We might think that panhandling or taking a piece of clothing from the Food Bank and then selling it is immoral… but is it? Or is the greater immorality people being hungry and homeless in a rich country? Do we really know what lengths we would go to make sure our children were safe and fed? Would we steal, cheat and lie? I can guarantee you that I would.

Now, before you think that this kind of behaviour is limited to the Old Testament or Hebrew Bible, let’s take a look at a couple of cases of desperation in the Second Testament.

Here’s a couple of big ones: Judas betrayal of Jesus in Matthew 26 Again, while we can’t know for sure why Judas betrayed Jesus, I can only surmise that fear and desperation played a part. What else could induce him to hand him over to the chief priests in exchange for 30 pieces of silver. And betraying him with a kiss… a symbol of love.

And then we have Peter…  After Jesus is arrested, Peter follows Him to the high priest’s courtyard. When confronted, Peter denies knowing Jesus three times to protect himself from potential arrest or persecution. Fear and desperation… makes people do things they wouldn’t normally do.

The other thing that is threaded through this movie is that the people of Tickle Cove, population 121, come together for a common purpose and work single minded towards that.

One of the scenes that I love is that the three key people are negotiating with the factory executives and they have told them that the town has 200 people in it, when it only has 121. Eighty eight of them are crowded into the pub and one of the executives wonders where the rest of them are… and is told that they are playing bingo down at the church… he wants to go meet them. So, as the executive are led on a roundabout way to the church, the rest of the people in the pub are making a mad dash to the church while slipping on hoodies or taking off jackets and as the tension mounts and the factory executive arrive, and the church doors swing open, to the sound of someone yelling BINGO!  Once again, the people of Tickle Cove have fooled the city slickers!

They are united in their purpose. All of them.

You see, trickery, bribery and lies were not who they were at heart… their ‘seduction’ of the doctor into agreeing to stay were the methods of a desperate people. People who wanted more than a meaningless existence of taking government money. And their seduction of him and the factory owners gave them a common purpose, it brought them together, it gave them a reason to get up in the morning and it gave them hope!

What is our purpose, what is our reason to gather together, what is our hope? I think it’s in the last line of our Core Values Statement: Building a Community of Love and Justice.

Now, none of us are oppressed or desperate, so we don’t need to use trickery, lies or bribery to achieve our purpose, but we do need each one of you. When we practice and imagine everything we do though a lens of a community of love and justice, I think something quite amazing will take place. We will be seduced into the kind of community that God and Jesus imagined. Your challenge, your task this week is to send me pictures of places where you see love and justice.

Thanks be to God for the challenge and the opportunity of following Jesus. Amen.  

Genesis 27
Exodus 1
Matthew 26
August 11, 2024
Reel Theology – The Grand Seduction
St. James
Rev. Catherine MacDonald