“What if it’s a necessary lie?” – Ravonna
Episode six of season one of Loki was a good one and if you keep reading there may be some spoilers. You’ve been warned.
Are we free or are we being manipulated? That is the deeper question being asked in this episode. The TVA is a lie. People have been snatched from their realities, brainwashed to believe it is their job, and has always been their job to prune extra branches of the time line so that chaos does not erupt.
In some ways this is what humans do. We seek to keep chaos at bay by trimming any branch of thought that makes us feel uncomfortable. We seek to find meaning and purpose, control.
Humans look for patterns to make sense of things. According to Shermer, author or How We Believe, he defines it as
Patternicity – Finding meaningful pattens in meaningless noise
Everyone in Loki is looking for patterns, especially Ravonna who says of the TVA,
“What if it’s a necessary lie?” – Ravonna
There are some who say this of religion. We need religion to make sense of things.
Religion is what man built to reach God. God sent Jesus to show us it’s not about clever patterns, thought God has left his footprints in all of creation down to the cell of a slug. God isn’t hiding, we don’t need patterns to find Him. He is before us everyday.
I don’t believe in God because I’ve seen a pattern in the chaos, but because my life has irrevocably been changed by Jesus. His love for me has changed me.
In the Martix, Neo is offered two pills, the red one and the blue one. The red pill allows you to see life as it really is and live freely, the blue pill puts you into a state of bliss and slavery.
The One Who Remains offers a similar choice to Loki and Sylvie. “Kill me and something worse comes. Let me live and things continue as they are and the Loki can prune the timeline.”
Long before Loki and The Matrix and I knew anything about Plato’s cave, I met Jesus. I wasn’t studying patterns or on some great quest, I simply believed. This is not to say I don’t have doubts or I’m not tempted to take the blue pill and retreat back into ignorant bliss, but faith was my red pill, my eye opening experience to what God has done for me and in me and through me.
If I look at my timeline, I don’t see patterns but events, events that have led me to where I am now, and I would not prune one of them good or bad.
My faith isn’t a necessary lie, it’s a necessary truth that forms me shapes me and is the foundation for everything else.
I don’t expect you to read this and change your mind about God. Many of you reading this have already made up your mind, but for the few who may be sitting on the fence, still looking for patterns, I hope faith finds you as it found me and opens your heart and mind to the reality of God’s love.