Yoda, Miyagi, and Jesus?
Yoda, Miyagi, and Jesus? Is there a connection between them? It is widely known that the George Lucas based much of the Jedi lore/ideals on the samurai of Japan. The character of Miyagi in The Karate Kid series is from Okinawa Japan. Yet, Yoda and Miyagi would be in complete agreement with Jesus on at least one key outlook in how to be in life – we need to make a decision, we need to make a commitment.
In Star Wars Episode V – The Empire Strikes Back, Luke travels to Dagobah to learn from master Yoda. At one point while there, Luke’s X-Wing sinks into the swamp becoming completely submerged. Yoda tells Luke to use the Force to raise the ship. Luke states that we would try and then Yoda utters one of his few grammatically correct statements instead of the inverted speech that is his norm – “No. Try not. Do or do not. There is no try.”
In The Karate Kid, Daniel is about to begin his lessons with Mr. Miyagi when Mr. Miyagi asked him if he is ready. Daniel responds with a classic teenage answer “Yeah, I guess so.” Mr. Miyagi pauses, has Daniel kneel with him and then explains “Walk on road, walk right side safe. Walk left side safe. Walk middle, sooner or later get squish just like grape. Here karate same thing. Either you do karate do ‘yes’ or you do karate do ‘no’, you do karate do ‘guess so’, squish just like grape.”
In Chapter 5 of the Gospel of Matthew Jesus speaks about oaths and essentially forbids taking an oath. Instead, Jesus tells his followers “But let your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes’, and your ‘No’, ‘No.’ For whatever is more than these is from the evil one.” (v.37 NKJV) In Chapter 4 of Revelation, Jesus has a message to the church of Laodicea where he states “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.” (v. 15-16 NKJV)
We live in a time where people are reluctant to make a commitment or a choice. People are looking to always ‘have their cake and eat it too.” We don’t want to miss something or miss out on something. As a result, we tend to hedge our decisions – ‘maybe’, ‘we’ll see’, ‘it depends,’ etc., permeate our speech and decision process. Yet, pop culture (Yoda and Miyagi) agree with Jesus, we need to make decisions in life. We must commit (‘Do or do not’, ‘walk on right side, walk on left side,’ ‘Yes be Yes, No be No’).
I heard a preacher tell this story of an atheist that had a dream. In the dream there was a huge field. There has a large fence that went right down the middle of the field. It was big fence, big enough that a person could stand on it with both of their feet. It was a thick fence. On one side he saw what looked like Jesus with all these people. There were multitudes of people with Jesus. On the other side he saw who he knew was the devil, not pointy horns and pitch fork, but seductive. He knew this was the devil. With the devil were all these people as well. All of a sudden, in a blink of a moment the atheist, the one having the dream, leapt up onto the fence because he could not make a decision. Then, all of a sudden all of the people disappeared. The person he believed to be the devil comes up to him on the fence and says “There you are, I was looking for you.” The atheist replied “I didn’t choose him, and I definitely didn’t choose you.” The devil responded, “Sure you did. The fence is mine.” (Todd White was the preacher telling the story.)
We all need to make our choice, what most do not realize, ‘try’, ‘guess so’ and the like all come from the devil, because they are not “Yes” or “No”. There is only one choice to choose Jesus – “Yes”. Choosing anything else is a choice away from God. If you have not made a choice to follow Jesus, please check out our Find the Light page for more information. If you have made the choice, check out our Foundation in Jesus page for more information.