Today, my oldest son who is 10, stayed home sick from school. In typical sick-kid fashion, he spent half the day lying on the couch just watching cartoons — a 2 hour-long SpongeBob SquarePants marathon, to be exact.
In honor of St. Patrick’s Day, Nickelodeon cleverly featured back-to-back episodes of SpongeBob starring a character named (you guessed it)…Patrick. 😉
In case you’re not familiar, Patrick is SpongeBob’s trusty sidekick.
He’s a large, salmon-colored starfish, who is always there to lend a hand for any of SpongeBob’s crazy schemes — he is NOT, however, the brains of the operation…😂.
🤔 Come to think of it, neither is Sponge Bob, but that’s a whole ‘nother can of worms…😂.
Anyway, as if being less astute than SpongeBob wasn’t bad enough already, in a particular episode we watched today, Patrick’s brain completely stops working altogether. 😳
In order to save him, SpongeBob came up with a brilliant idea to “unplug” Patrick’s brain and then plug it back in 🙄…kind of like you do when you need to “reboot” your computer. 😂
Hmmm…who knew it also worked on brains…I can think of a handful of people I’d like to try that on…🤔🤭🤫…
But I digress…🤣
The good news is…SpongeBob’s idea worked!
Not only did Patrick get his brain back, he was even way smarter than before!
But this happy turn of events didn’t go smoothly for long. Before you know it, Patrick’s newfound intellectual prowess starts going to his head…literally.
He begins using all kinds of “highfalutin” words and condescending tones to criticize his friends for their supposed ignorance.
I’ll spare you the quirky details, but Patrick eventually comes to his senses and sets out on a mission to become his old self again — the sweet, humble, fun-loving (albeit slightly dense) guy he was before. ❤️
The only problem? Patrick’s new brain goes about trying to learn these virtues the same way you might try to learn math or science — cut to scenes of Patrick desperately scribbling equations on a chalkboard and scanning the pages of textbooks like, “The Physics of Fun.” 🤣
Of course, the hilarity of it all lies in the fact that this is obviously NOT the way to go about finding kindness, humility, or fun at all. Even kids can appreciate the irony in that.
Kindness and humility cannot be calculated in some sort of an equation. Just as having fun is not rocket science.
And simply put, neither is having faith.
We live in a society that values brains like Patrick’s…brains that “know” a lot. And we’re arguably a generation “knows” more than any other generation before us — and what we don’t know, we Google. 😉
For better or for worse, information is at our fingertips more than ever before.
But in our own quest for intellectual prowess, we are in danger of missing the bigger picture — and in danger of becoming people who “…are always learning but never able to come to a knowledge of the truth.” – II Timothy 3:7
The deep and meaningful things of life — things like truth, love, faith, and wisdom aren’t rocket science.
Just like Patrick was totally overthinking it, we sometimes fall into that trap as well.
But God has chosen to “make wise the simple” (Psalm 19:7) and Jesus promises that those who seek Him will find Him.
Seeking Him means spending time in His Word.
“So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.” (Romans 10:17)
It doesn’t take years of study to come to a knowledge of the truth. I think about the Ethiopian eunuch, the Philippian jailer, and the thief on the cross — none of them “knew it all” before believing…they took the first step in faith.
The Gospel of Christ is just as powerful today as it was during the first century. It convicts and cuts to the heart. It is living and active — alive and applicable as much today as it was 2000 years ago.
You don’t need to know anything more than they did in the first century to believe and be baptized.
Don’t overthink it — it’s not rocket science.
“Take the first step in faith. You don’t have to see the whole staircase…just take the first step.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.
Until next time…
-PWAP
