Pixar's Inside Out

"He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away."
-Revelation 21:4
     I finally got the chance to watch the movie "Inside Out" by Pixar while on a plane to Korea. I was very impressed with how good the movie was. The plot was fairly simple, but still carried a lot of depth by presenting the story in a unique way. I would absolutely recommend that you watch it. Here's the point in the blog where I have to give fair warning: if you haven't seen "Inside Out", I'd recommend seeing it first before reading this post. There are no major spoilers here, but I am going to talk about parts of the movie that some could see as a spoiler.
     If you're reading this part, I assume you have seen the movie already, or have no interest in seeing it anyway. For those in the second category, I will give a brief description of the movie. The movie follows a young girl named Riley whose emotions are controlled by five characters- Joy, Sadness, Anger, Fear, and Disgust. Naturally, each of these characters can only induce the emotion that they are named after, i.e. Joy cannot induce sadness. Joy is the leader of the emotions, because each of the other emotions agree that they want Riley to be happy. They also push aside sadness often, because they feel that Sadness ruins Riley's emotional state.
     Later in the movie, Joy realizes that in order for Riley to truly cope with her situation (I won't spoil this part), she must experience sadness. The "core memories" that Riley has were only possible because she experienced something sad. The other emotions also realize that Riley must experience a balance of emotions, or she will experience catastrophe.
     After watching this movie, I thought about our emotions. In some sense, we all want joy to be the dominant presence in our lives. However, as the movie suggests, we cannot truly be happy all of the time. Thinking from a Christian point of view, shouldn't we always be joyful? Yes and no. We experience sadness because the world is corrupted by sin and death. It is completely fine for a Christian to express sadness in times of grief and sorrow. There's no need for us to suppress sadness. Even Jesus wept because the world is hurting.
     However, there will be a day where we can and will experience joy forever and ever. Revelation 21:4, written above, states that Jesus will wipe away every tear from our eyes. We will no longer mourn because Jesus will make all things new. No longer will we weep because of the death of a loved one. "There will be no more death". Christians should look forward to this day. This hope should be enough reason for us to be joyful in the here and now. Even when something sad happens now, we can experience joy knowing that Jesus will one day make everything right.
-Smart