The Invisible Man

Claude Rains was one of Hollywood's best actors. His spine chilling role as the original Invisible Man has remained unequalled.
As Christians, we believe in an invisible Christ, so how can we convince the world that Jesus exists?

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1 Peter 1:8 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy.

I love old movies, especially the black and white ones. The storylines have a lot of depth to them and the actors are incredible. What passes for movie entertainment these days is just an excuse for extroverts to do something outrageous. There’s no real acting, just gross stupidity.

Anyway, one of the best Hollywood actors in my opinion was Claude Rains. You’ll maybe remember him as Captain Renault in “Casablanca,” or King Herod in “The Greatest Story Ever Told,” or even Prince John in “The Adventures of Robin Hood.” He usually played the baddie in movies, but the three roles that I liked most are when Claude played Caesar in “Caesar and Cleopatra”, Job Skeffington in Mr. Skeffington, and, my all time favorite, as the Invisible Man.

If you’ve ever seen the original “Invisible Man,” you’ll know that most of the time you hear Claude Rain’s voice. It’s absolutely creepy and can still send shivers down my spine. He plays a scientist who discovers a formula for making himself invisible, but the side effect is that it drives him insane. He wants to rule the world and becomes a monster in the process. It’s like “Phantom of the Opera” and “Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” all rolled into one. The ending is marvelous, but I won’t spoil it for you!

When the apostle Peter writes about Christ being invisible, he is writing to a new generation of Christians who have never seen Jesus. He knows that his own time is running out and that he is amongst some of the last survivors who knew Jesus personally. His mission is to help this new wave of Christians understand that although they cannot see Jesus, they can feel His presence joyfully in their hearts. He refers to this as a glorious and inexpressible joy.

Peter’s words are also meant for us today. None of us have ever seen the Lord, but we feel His Presence within our souls. The world may not understand what this is like and refuse to believe us, but we know what we feel, and we place our faith on the certainty of that feeling being real.

We may not be able to convince everyone that Christ exists because some are always going to say that “seeing is believing.” But perhaps more people would accept His invisible presence if they could see His Holy influence over our lives. That is our mission; that is our ministry to a faithless world – to show it that Christ exists because our lives exhibit Christian faith, hope, and love.

Prayer: Lord Jesus, thank You for entering into our lives and for touching our hearts with Your Spirit. Help us to be vessels of Your love to our community and grant us the ability to let people truly see You through who we are and what we do in Your Name. Amen.