The Gospel of Reconciliation | Ms. Marvel

A Reconciled Life…

Paul’s message in 2 Cor. 5:14-21 exhorts us to be reconciled to God through Christ. It’s easy for me to truncate that reconciliation—to think of it only in terms of my guilt being taken away, and not to consider what kind of life flows from that reconciliation.

And he died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again. 

Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.

What is it like to live that new kind of life? How could you describe it?

From my own experience, I would describe a reconciled life with God as deeply satisfying. There are a bunch of things that go into that satisfaction. For example,

• The experience of walking in step with the Spirit (Gal. 5:16-25). We get a hint that this is a little bit like life with God in Eden (Gen. 3:8), which is just astounding to me.
  
• Living without the shame of unconfessed sin. I don’t think I can oversell how good it is to breathe easy in God’s presence, knowing that you have nothing to hide.

… As Described by Ms. Marvel

There’s another reason living reconciled with God is deeply satisfying. I think Disney’s Ms. Marvel (2022) illustrates it well.

On the surface, Ms. Marvel is a six-episode origin story for a comic book superhero. It’s got all the comic book window dressing: the hero’s powers, how they received powers and so on.

But Ms. Marvel is also a beautiful story about belonging and identity, and its message resonates deeply with the good news of reconciliation.

The main character, Kamala Khan, is 16. She’s Pakistani-American, and both of her parents immigrated to America from Pakistan.

When her story begins in episode 1, Kamala feels like an outsider, both at home (where her parents wish she were less American) and at school (where she isn’t American enough to fit in). More than anything, she wants to go to AvengerCon (a fictional convention for fans of the Avengers) and participate in a Captain Marvel cosplay contest.

At the beginning of her story, Kamala thinks she can fit in by pretending to be someone else, someone she deeply admires.

So she asks her parents for permission to go to AvengerCon. They’re suspicious—it seems like the sort of event that is contrary to their values—but finally they consent, on the condition that Kamala’s father goes with her. Her mother even creates matching Hulk costumes for father and daughter.

Kamala rejects the offer, though—and rejects her dad, telling him he’s embarrassing.

She disobeys her parents, sneaks out to AvengerCon and participates in the cosplay contest.

But she adds a personal touch to her Captain Marvel costume, her great-grandmother’s bangle. It activates her latent superpowers, making it clear that she is very much her own person with her own powers.

Kamala thinks she has to leave her family behind to become the person she wants to be, but it’s a family heirloom that reveals her hidden powers.

Skip to the end of the season, to the end of Kamala’s arc.

In the final showdown with the government agency that insists she’s a threat, she’s exhausted and nearly broken. But she sees her parents looking on, rejoicing in her strength, crying out to see her in pain, and she is not embarrassed. She receives strength from their love. She rallies.

Later, in a quiet moment, Kamala’s father tells her what her name means in Urdu: wonder or marvel. She has struggled for six episodes to know what superhero-name she should go by. After this conversation with her father, she knows. She is Ms. Marvel.

Kamala begins as an outsider, fitting in nowhere.

She finds her identity in belonging to her family. 

 

Their name for her becomes the symbol of her strength.  

 

Her family’s recognition of who she is ultimately enables her to be herself.

There are so many reasons why flourishing is not this simple in real life. No family is perfect, and your family’s vision of your identity may be wrong—outdated, inattentive, blind, distorted, disrespectful, despairing. Your family may try to keep you from flourishing and to control the person you become.

But there is someone who sees who you are meant to be and rejoices in it. Your identity may be hidden, but it’s hidden with Him (Col. 3:3). A day will come when He’ll give you a stone with a name engraved on it, and you’ll know it’s your own true name (Rev. 2:17).

In fact, your inescapable worth has only ever come from your identity, an identity that He has never lost sight of even when you have rejected it. He calls you by a name whose full significance He has always known. His recognition of who you are enables you to be truly yourself.

You bear His image. Be reconciled to Him.