My pastor used the "Truman Show" as an illustration for his sermon Sunday morning. It was a good sermon, but I didn't really get the connection between the text and the illustration...

But there are other connections that I've been pondering.

In the movie, Truman Burbank is born and raised in an environment that isn't real - he lives on the set of a television show and doesn't know it.  Everything and everybody that surrounds him is there to convince him that his life is real.

It can be that way in our walk with God.  Nearly everybody who grows up in a church grows up believing that their church is the right church.  When you read literature and Bible studies, there is always a "slant" - preconceptions that color our views.

It isn't until Truman is an adult that he starts noticing that there are things that just don't fit.

This may also be true for our walk with God.  For some of us, it's the challenge by a friend to study - to be a Berean; compare what we believe against Scripture.  For others, it's seriously digging into the Bible for first time.  For still others, it's the process of coming to the understanding that there are other (valid) Christian beliefs out there.  For most of us, it's a combination.

When Truman "understands" that there is something wrong with his world, he goes exploring.  The "powers that be" don't like it much.  They try to stop him.

If you have been in a Christian "belief system" for your entire life, and if you are surrounded by friends and family that are part of that same belief system, expect them to not like it much.

Truman came to his "moment of truth" - he overcame a major fear in order to cross a lake to find out what was "out there".

It may mean leaving the church you grew up in, it may mean "sharpening iron" with friends and family.  It may be difficult, or maybe not.

There came a time when Truman was standing at the edge of the dome that was his home for his entire life.  He knew there was "truth" out there, but he didn't know what it would look like.

Again, this may be part of our walk with God - we don't know where this walk will take us, only that God is leading.

His hand was on the doorknob...would he step out "in faith", looking for truth?  Or would he return to the safety and comfort of all he had every known, knowing that some things were out of place?

You know that there are "holes" in the theology that you grew up with.  You stand half in and half out, undecided.

Do you stay in safety and comfort?

Or do you step out in faith, looking for truth?

.