by James Ross Kelly
The Sunset Limited (2011), is brought to us by a trinity of American artists. Author, Cormac McCarthy (No Country for Old Men (2007)), Director /Actor, Tommy Lee Jones, and Samuel L. Jackson in perhaps his most powerful role. The HBO Films presentation (now streaming on Amazon Prime and DVD) possibly, eclipses Beckets Waiting for Godot because of this films accessibility, and honest post-modern take on the eternal conundrum. McCarthy’s drama for Television Cinema was originally a play first produced in Chicago and then New York.
Throughout the film, we have ourselves shoe horned into a small ghetto apartment with an academic atheist and a blue collar black believer in Jesus Christ. White, the atheist has attempted suicide by throwing himself in front of a train. Black, the believer, has saved him. The film opens with the two of them across a table from each other. A Bible…
Lord Jesus, give me a deeper repentance, a horror of sin, a dread of its approach. Help me chastely to flee it and jealously to resolve that my heart shall be Thine alone. Give me a deeper trust, that I may lose myself to find myself in Thee, the ground of my rest, the spring of my being. Give me a deeper knowledge of Thyself as saviour, master, lord, and king. Give me deeper power in private prayer, more sweetness in Thy Word, more steadfast grip on its truth. Give me deeper holiness in speech, thought, action, and let me not seek moral virtue apart from Thee. Plough deep in me, great Lord, heavenly husbandman, that my being may be a tilled field, the roots of grace spreading far and wide, until Thou alone art seen in me, Thy beauty golden like summer harvest, Thy fruitfulness as autumn plenty. I have no master but Thee, no law but Thy will, no delight but Thyself, no wealth but that Thou givest, no good but that Thou blessest, no peace but that Thou bestowest. I am nothing but that Thou makest me. I have nothing but that I receive from Thee. I can be nothing but that grace adorns me. Quarry me deep, dear Lord, and then fill me to overflowing with living water.
St. Peter for a few seconds walks on the water; and the day will come when there will be a re-made universe, infinitely obedient to the will of glorified and obedient men, when we can do all things, when we shall be those gods that we are described as being in Scripture. To be sure, it feels wintry enough still: but often in the very early spring it feels like that. Two thousand years are only a day or two by this scale. A man really ought to say, “The Resurrection happened two thousand years ago” in the same spirit in which he says, “I saw a crocus yesterday.” Because we know what is coming behind the crocus. The spring comes slowly down this way; but the great thing is that the corner has been turned.
