The first time I watched an episode of 24 was sometime about 4 years ago. I got the first season from the library, and I didn't like it much, but like any show, it can grow on you, and it did. The story pulled me in like a stay-at-home mom gets hooked on a soap opera, and many of my friends who loved the show began 'dropping out', saying that the show was becoming too repetitive. True, each season is a day full of terrorist threats and political sub-plots, but I have, and will, always be a die-hard 24 fan. My heart goes out to Jack Bauer, and in a very heterosexual way. He became one of my heroes, and he still is today. I know he has problems just like the rest of us, but sometimes, above my attempts to love each and every person like Jesus does, I just can't help but care about certain people and have such intense compassion for them that it is as if someone else has placed those feelings in my heart.
Even though Jack has 'slept' with so many different women, been addicted to drugs, killed people he didn't have to, had terrible alcohol problems, and exercised more contempt in his heart than a dozen men put together, he is just as lost without the LORD as I am. He is my number one cultural hero because he never seizes standing up not just for what he believes in, but for the truth. He always starts by working with CTU (Counter Terrorist Unit) to save America from nuclear threats and the like, but what's different with Jack than any other character, what makes him the star of the show, is that there always comes a fork in the road. He can either succumb to the demands of the president, the terrorists, or even fellow CTU agents, but he cares to much about what truly is the greater good. And that isn't always what's 'best for this country' (which really means 'most comfortable for this country). It's always the truth. He constantly goes outside of protocol, goes rogue, has been tortured nearly to death countless times, and even killed once or twice, because he believes that the truth must be told every time, no exceptions. And there is nothing more important than the truth.
I watched the last two episodes of season eight tonight, and boy, were they good. This one probably had the best ending yet. However, to my great displeasure, those two episodes may very well have been the last two I will ever see. I won't speak too soon, since all I have heard are rumors arguing two different things, but for a kid who has seen every single episode of 24 ever made, it was like a brief moment of history in my life, captured in the last moments of the last episode. I won't give anything away if you are looking forward to the finale, but I will tell you that I was very impressed. I'll face it, my friends are right, the story is made by some very rushed writers, and the story is not too different from season to season, but seeing what happened between two p.m. and four p.m. meant the world to me. I even came close to tears, which I can assure you is rare.
Former president Charles Logan says in the middle of the last episode, about Jack Bauer, that he will 'never be stopped'. That he 'will crawl his way out of the darkest hole' and that he will 'come after you and find you if he has been exiled to the ends of the earth'. Yes, Jack is a bloodthirsty killer at times, and he desires fruitless things like revenge, but there is something about him that guys like me desire. I think that in some ways, all men are required to be extremely violent. This doesn't necessarily mean killing everyone that gets in your way so that you can implicate a corrupt government, but seeing a man be more violent than any other man is, in some ways, very motivating. Don't we all want to save the world, or at least the damsel in distress, or slay the dragon? The part many people don't realize is that everything we desire most deeply is also the most difficult to achieve. Life is not supposed to be easy, and if it is, maybe it's time for us to ink our pens and start listening for the voice of God, and if he is silent, then we must do his will wherever we are, stopping at nothing to implicate Satan and let everyone at least get a chance at the truth.
It all comes back to the individual stories we are writing right now, even as I am writing this and you are reading it. Don Miller says that in every good story, the protagonist wants something and overcomes an obstacle, or many, to get to what they want. I think he's right, and that's why we like books and movies so much. It's really just that we like story. We like good stories, where amazing things happen, that we could never imagine happening in our lives, and we like stories where a character endures incredible pain and suffering, against all odds and achieves something they wanted.
Even though 24 is over now, my heart will still go out to Jack Bauer. And yes, I am talking about Jack Bauer, not Keifer Sutherland. I think we all know by now that's just a cover-up for his real identity. I pray that he will find the most important truth, more important than any truth he has previously killed people and been tortured for, and project it for all the days of his life, both on-camera and off. I pray that he finds his Father, and listens to what he has to say.
You have insight and wisdom beyond your years. And yes, I am reading this bleary eyed at 8 am while you are cozy in your bed. Why go to the second to the last Outdoor Ed class when you have to stay up and find out what happens to Jack? If it results in this sort of soul searching, then it's completely worth it.
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