Another Crazy Video Game Story
By Johnny Angel
A few weeks ago I wrote some thoughts that I had about some video
games. Since then, God has given me some more ideas that I would
like to share.
Before I mentioned that I was finding some old Nintendo games at a
marked down price. But I hadn't found the one game that I really, really
wanted. It was a ninja game called Double Dragon. A few days after I
wrote about video games, I found Double Dragon for the Nintendo.
When I was in third or fourth grade, this game came out at the local
arcade. The arcade was inside the Mr. Gattis pizza. I would stand in
line waiting to play this game and then get to play it myself.
The story line goes something like this. Your girlfriend is standing
outside your apartment. A gang walks up and kidnaps her. Then you
have to fight all of them to finally rescue her. Along the way, you run
into anyone and everyone who has been accepted by this gang.
There are giants who always show up when you are about out of
energy. There are also ninja masters that you have to encounter.
For a while, all my friends were buying this game for the Nintendo or
Sega. They were getting to play it at home, and I wasn't. All I had was
an Atari video game system. One day I found out that Atari was
releasing the game for my video game system. My parents put it on
order quickly, and I was able to play it at home.
The Atari version was almost identical to the arcade version as was the
Sega version. But the Nintendo version was different. It was a similar
story line with a few twists. Since then, there has been a hand held
version. Sega has released it for their hand held system also.
So what does this have to do with God?
One thing I saw is that there are many different forms of Double Dragon
as I have mentioned. They weren't all identical, but they got the job
done. It was still a ninja game where you were trying to save your
girlfriend from a gang who kidnapped her. There are many different
denominations of churches. They all do things a little bit differently.
But as long as they are preaching that Jesus is the only way to go to
heaven, they are all accomplishing the same task. They are all leading
people to Christ.
Another parallel is that in life we will face situations that seem like giants
and ninja warriors. We will have to fight to do what is right. We will
have to stand up for our faith. Also, each scheme that the devil uses
against us will be like one of the different opponents in the game. To
win any video game, you have to keep trying until you learn the
opponents moves so you can defeat him. We must stay on top of
things through our daily prayer life so we will know the devil's schemes
and be able to resist temptation.
Double Dragon is a game that you can't just beat overnight. It takes
lots of practice. Most video games are this way. In the same way, our
walk with the Lord is not just something that happens all at one
moment. Once we allow Him to save us, He is always there with us.
We may make mistakes. But we can get back up and try again just as
we start a game over and over until we beat it.
I realize that this is a different way of looking at things. But I am
convinced that God can speak to us through all parts of our lives. As
we draw closer to God in our daily prayer life, we will be more aware of
Him everywhere we go.
N Prayer,
Johnny <*}}}><