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Why do Christians believe that Jesus had to die?
Students will:
STARTER 1. Ask the class to vote in a series of either / or scenarios. For the burning building scenarios you might like to allow some discussion before the students cast their votes. For the imaginary button scenarios, voting first and discussing afterwards may be more interesting. • You are in a burning building, with two unconscious people: a baby and an elderly man. You are only able to carry one to safety, and there will not be time to return to the building for a second trip. Who do you save? • Same situation as above, but the elderly man is your grandfather, and the baby is unrelated and unknown to you. Who do you save? • Same situation as above, but the choice is between a minor celebrity who became famous in a reality television programme, and a young MP who is tipped as a potential future Prime Minister. Who do you save? • Ask the students to imagine a button in front of them. They will receive a million pounds for their personal use if they press the button. But pressing the button will cause an unknown stranger living on the other side of the world to be brutally murdered. Will they press the button and take the money, or let the stranger live? • Same scenario as above, but this time the stranger's death will be painless. Will they press the button? • Same scenario as above, but this time the person who dies if they press the button is one of their friends. Will they press the button? Ask the students what factors they considered in making their decisions. How did they decide who should live and who should die in the burning building scenarios. How did they weigh the conflicting demands of personal interest and the life of a third party in the imaginary button scenarios? Explain that in this lesson you are going to be looking at a film clip where three people are trying to decide whether somebody should live or die, and looking at what Christians believe about Jesus' death. MAIN ACTIVITIES 2. Introduce the first clip from the film Stranger Than Fiction (Sony, 2006, certificate 12). Click below to buy the DVD online: Buy the DVD from Amazon.co.uk Explain that Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) has been troubled for some time by hearing a woman's voice in his head, describing his day to day life. With the help of Literature Professor Jules Hilbert (Dustin Hoffman) Harold has discovered that the woman is author Karen Eiffel (Emma Thompson), and that he is a character in the book that she is writing. Unfortunately, this particular author has a habit of killing off her main characters, and it appears that she plans to do the same to Harold. In this scene, he goes to see Professor Hilbert for the first time since meeting up with Karen. Ask the students to pay particular attention to the conclusion that Professor Hilbert comes to, and the advice that he gives Harold. Start time: 1.19.06 (beginning of chapter 21 of the DVD) End time: 1.25.42 Clip length: Six minutes and 36 seconds The clip starts with Jules asking 'Did you find her?' It ends with the bus pulling in to the depot, with Harold still reading the manuscript. For a slightly shorter clip, stop the film at 1.24.33, after Jules says '...but the story lives on forever'. Remind the students that in the clip Professor Hilbert tells Harold that he has to die. What reasons did he give for his conclusion? Do the students think that this was a reasonable thing for him to ask Harold to do? What circumstances might make it worth Harold willingly going through with the literary death laid out for him, rather than trying to avoid it? Ask the students to read Luke 22:39-46. Ask them to identify similarities and differences in the way that Jesus and Harold each face the knowledge of their own imminent planned death. Draw out that Jesus prays for God to find another way of saving the world if there is one, but also accepts God's will over his own – he willingly chooses to die if that is the only way for God's plan to be fulfilled. It might be worth noting that if you continued the film clip for a further minute and 21 seconds, Harold finishes reading the manuscript himself and tells Karen that the book is beautiful and that she should finish it – in other words, he agrees with Professor Hilbert's assessment that he has to die. 3. Some students might struggle with why anyone would think that Jesus' death would make any difference for anybody else. Explain that the concept of sacrificial atonement is one that Jesus and other Jews at the time would have been very familiar with. The Old Testament required the people of Israel to offer sacrifices for sin. They would bring an animal without any defects to the priest, and the animal would be killed as an offering for sin. The Israelites had broken their covenant with God by disobeying his laws, but God accepted the sacrifice of an animal as a substitute for the people who had sinned. These sacrifices needed to happen day after day, year after year, because no matter how remorseful the people felt they continued to sin. This practice is where the modern phrase 'scapegoat' comes from, as the unfortunate goat paid the price for the sins of the people. If you want to direct students to Old Testament writing on the subject of sacrifice, you could refer them to the early chapters of the book of Leviticus, particularly the first seven chapters. Christians believe that this pattern of sacrifice for sin meets its fulfillment in the death of Jesus. Split the class into small groups and ask each to read Hebrews 10:1-18. Explain that this passage is a summary of what Christians believe about the Old Testament sacrificial system. You might want to point out that the phrase 'the law' is used here to describe this system of sacrificial atonement for sins. Ask the students to answer the following questions: • What evidence does the writer give to suggest that the Old Testament sacrifices don't work? (verse 2 - if they did work, they wouldn't need to be repeated again and again.) • What does verse 3 say the purpose of the sacrifices really is? (A reminder of sins – in other words, something to make the people realise their need for a cleansing that the sacrifices cannot actually provide) • What sacrifice does the writer say does work? (Jesus' sacrifice – verses 10 and 12) Once the groups have finished, ask them to feed their answers back to the whole class, so that you can make sure that they have correctly understood this part of the lesson. Ask the students for their view on this critique of Old Testament animal sacrifice. What are the significant differences between a Christian and a Jewish understanding of sacrificial atonement? 4. Point out that, unlike the animals used in Old Testament sacrifices, Christians believe that Jesus was fully aware of what was going to happen to him, and accepted that his death was necessary in order to save the world. Introduce the second clip from Stranger Than Fiction. Remind the students that Harold has finished reading the manuscript, and has told Karen to finish typing the book – and condemning him to his death. Ask the students to pay particular attention to the discussion between Professor Hilbert and Karen Eiffel about what she did which comes at the end of the clip. Start time: 1.31.14 (beginning of chapter 25 of the DVD) End time: 1.39.04 Clip length: Seven minutes and 50 seconds The clip starts with Harold standing looking out of his partially demolished apartment window. It continues with several people (including Harold) getting up. The first line is the narrator's voice-over saying 'Much had changed for Harold over the past few weeks'. It ends with Karen saying '...Isn't that the type of man you want to keep alive'. If you want a shorter clip, you could start at the beginning of chapter 26 (1.34.21; beginning with a white screen which fades into a shot of Professor Hilbert's office. Someone knocks and Professor Hilbert says 'Come in'.) Remind the students of Karen Eiffel's comment: 'But if the man does know he's about to die and dies anyway, dies willingly knowing he could stop it; isn't that the type of man you want to keep alive?' and remind them of Professor Hilbert's previous remarks about why Harold had to die. Who is right? Why? Make sure the students understand Karen's line of thought: the very fact that Harold is willing to be killed in order to save the boy's life is the proof that he should not be killed in her book. Give out copies of the worksheet, and ask students to look up the Bible passages and to complete the table on the worksheet. This will enable them to explore the parallels between Harold, Jesus' death and resurrection, and the Old Testament concept of sacrificial atonement. SUMMARY / ASSESSMENT OF LEARNING 5. Ask the students to write a continuation of the discussion between Karen Eiffel and Jules Hilbert. Karen continues to explain why she decided to spare Harold's life, and either or both characters compares her actions with God's act of letting Jesus die, and then raising him from the dead.
A copy of Stranger Than Fiction and the means to play it Bibles Worksheets
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