What The Greatest Showman shows us about ourselves... and our intelligent designer

In the song "Come Alive," PJ Barnum is talking to his motley crew of “unique persons and curiosities."

“You stumble through your days, got your head hung low, your skies a shade of grays. Like a zombie in a maze, who is asleep inside, but you can shake awake. ‘Cuz your just a dead man walking, thinking that’s your only option.”

In The Greatest Showman, Barnum beckons his crew to “come alive, go and light your light, let it burn so bright.” This song marks a turning point in the movie and begins to capture the audience. Why? We see people coming out of hiding. People like General Tom Thumb. The bearded lady. When you see them appear in the movie, I bet most of you don't feel they belong behind closed doors. PJ Barnum pulls them out of the shadows and shows them, and the world, that they belong on a stage. We see them coming to life, and this new life springing forth makes our hearts sing. I think this song makes our heart sing because it stirs the deep longing in our souls to have life that is truly LIFE. God, the great designer, wired our hearts this way - to celebrate others coming alive and to desire full life for ourselves.

PJ Barnum has inspired America to find the stage-worthy in everyone and to celebrate what makes us unique. We are captivated with the life he brings out in his circus crew, and we long to see ourselves and those around us truly come alive in the same way. We find PJ Barnum captivating because we see in him a shadow of someone even greater than himself. I know someone who truly offers new life. This someone spoke and made something out of nothing. He breathed life into flesh and bones to make a living, moving being. He walked on the earth Himself. This someone is Jesus. And Jesus said He came that we may have life, and have life ABUNDANTLY.

Paul wrote many letters to newly formed churches that are part of the Bible we have today. He could have sung "Come Alive" to the Ephesians. In his letter named after them, he reminds them who they were and who they are now. “You were dead,” he says, “living in your sin and lawlessness, walking in the way of the world, just as we all were when we were controlled by the desires of our body and mind. But God gave us so much we didn’t deserve. He loved us with an incredible love we didn’t deserve. Even when we were dead, unable to make ourselves alive, God made us ALIVE together with his Son, Jesus. Jesus was dead - really and truly dead - when God made Him alive. And in the same way He made us alive, giving us life that is truly life.”*

This life that Paul talks about is the kingdom of God, the kingdom of heaven. This life is eternal life. It comes through Jesus and is available to us, in part, on earth. This eternal life will come in full when Jesus returns. And He will return. The book of Hebrews in the Bible tell us that Jesus came once to take on the sins of the world. And that He will come again to save those who are eagerly waiting for him. This second coming is something we can only begin to imagine. No tears, no pain, no sickness, no death. 100% freedom to be in the presence of God: happy, whole, without guilt or shame. If The Greatest Showman makes your heart sing like it does mine, it does so because it is whetting your appetite for the abundant life that Jesus has brought in part and will bring in full. As CS Lewis said, “If you find yourself with a desire that nothing in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that you were made for another world.”

Do you listen to this song and feel hope budding in your heart? Do you see the General and the bearded lady come alive and crave that same freedom for yourself? This craving is God stirring in you a desire for abundant life. He created you to have the desire, and He made a way to satisfy it. If you hear this song and your soul wonders “does God really want this kind of free, abundant life for me on earth?”... the answer is “Yes! God wants it for you and for me. For anyone who will come to Him believing He is the designer of life and the answer for everything our souls crave.” And, as PJ Barnum says, “once you see it, oh, you’ll never, ever be the same.”


*I'm paraphrasing Ephesians chapter 2, verses 1-6