Nooma Today 017
Can we become so consumed with the past that we can't see the beauty of today?
G 2007 · 12 min · Family
How much time and energy do we spend wishing things were how they used to be? We often think about times in our past when things were different and want our lives to be like that again. Some of us have even come to believe that our best days may actually be behind us. But if we're in some way hung up on the past, what does that mean for our lives now? How are we and those around us affected if we're not fully present? If we're longing for the way things used to be, what does that really say about our understanding and appreciation of our lives today? Maybe we need to learn to embrace our past for what it is, in order to live our lives to the fullest, right here, right now.
Directed by Santino Stoner
Your Rating
Cast
-
Rob Bell Self
Make it a double feature
2h together
A close match in mood and era.
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★ 6.52005
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Nooma Tomato 022 · 2008Nooma Tomato 022
2008
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We all get consumed with ourselves; sometimes we're not even aware of it. We learn from a young age that life is about winning and impressing. We pick up that our worth and value come from how good, how smart, and how skilled we are. So, we twist things in our favor, making us look like we have it all together. Every day we have the choice to prop up these false ideas about ourselves or to let go of them. Jesus invites these parts of us to die, the parts of us that tell us our worth comes from the things we say and do. Maybe it's only when we let these things die, that we truly begin to live.
Nooma Dust 008 · 2005Nooma Dust 008
2005
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Believing in God is important, but what about God believing in us? Believing that we can actually be the kind of people we were meant to be. People of love, compassion, peace, forgiveness, and hope. People who try to do the right thing all of the time. Who act on the endless opportunities around us every day for good, beauty, and truth. It's easy for us to sometimes get down on ourselves. To feel "not good enough" or feel like we don't have what it takes. But maybe if we had more insight into the culture that Jesus grew up in and some of the radical things he did, we'd understand the faith that God has in all of us.
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Many of us have experienced situations where we've prayed and it felt like God wasn't listening. And yet other times we've prayed or known someone that prayed and the situation changed. Does God answer prayer? Sometimes, but not all the time? Or does God always answer prayer and it's just that sometimes God says no? Some of us are angry with God for not answering the prayers we've prayed for years. Why did he answer their prayer but not ours? What if there's more to prayer than just God listening and answering? Maybe if we understood how Jesus prayed, our concepts and expectations of prayer would change.
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2006
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Nooma Store 016 · 2007Nooma Store 016
2007
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Nooma Bullhorn 009 · 2006Nooma Bullhorn 009
2006
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God loves everyone, so a Christian should, too. In fact, Jesus said that the most important thing in life is to love God with everything we've got and love others the same way. But it's not always easy to love everyone around us, is it? Sometimes we strongly disagree with other people's political views, religious beliefs, behaviors, or something else, and it makes it hard to love them when we feel like we're right and they're very wrong. But Jesus doesn't separate loving God and loving others. So maybe the best way for us to show our love for God is actually by loving other people no matter how hard it sometimes is. Maybe it's the only way.
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Nooma Noise 005 · 2005Nooma Noise 005
2005
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Why is silence so hard to deal with? Why is it so much easier for us to live our lives with a lot of things going on all the time than to just be in silence? We're constantly surrounded with "voices" that are influencing us on how to think, feel, and behave. Movies, music, TV, Internet, cell phones, and a never-ending barrage of advertising. There's always something going on. Always noise in our lives. But maybe there's a connection between the amount of noise in our lives and our inability to hear God. If God sometimes feels distant to us, maybe it's not because he's not talking to us, but simply because we aren't really listening.
Nooma Rhythm 011 · 2006Nooma Rhythm 011
2006
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What does it mean to have a relationship with God? What does it look like? For a lot of us it's a hard thing to fully understand. If God is an infinite spirit with no shape or form, how can we possibly relate to that? And what about Jesus? He said he came to give everyone life in its fullest. He came to show us how to live. Maybe it's through trusting Jesus and living the kind of life he taught us to live—a life of truth, love, justice, compassion, forgiveness, and sacrifice—that we have a relationship with God. Maybe the way we live every day, every single choice we make, determines how in tune with God we are.
Nooma Flame 002 · 2005Nooma Flame 002
2005
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I love those shoes. Really? The same way I love my wife? What's up with the word "love"? It doesn't have much meaning when we use it so loosely. Maybe we don't really get it. Maybe we don't understand what real love is. What it involves to really love somebody. What it means to give yourself to someone else. We mistake things like friendship, commitment, or lust for love, but God wired us a certain way to experience all that love was really meant to be. Not to hold us back or to make us miss out on the best that life has to offer. God created love, and wants us to feel it all in the way it's meant to be felt.
Nooma Rain 001 · 2005Nooma Rain 001
2005
MovieFamily
Things don't always work out the way we want them to, or the way we think they will. Sometimes we don't even see it coming. We get hit with some form of pain out of nowhere leaving us feeling desperate and helpless. That's the way life is. Still, it makes us wonder how God can let these things happen to us. How God can just stand by and watch us suffer. Where is God when it really hurts? Maybe God is actually closer to us than we think. Maybe it's when we're in these situations, where everything seems to be falling apart, that God gets an opportunity to remind us of how much he really loves us.
Nooma Corner 023 · 2008Nooma Corner 023
2008
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Nooma Name 018 · 2007Nooma Name 018
2007
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Nooma Kickball 006 · 2005Nooma Kickball 006
2005
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If God really cares about us, why don't we have what we want? We always think we know what's missing from our lives in order to really make us happy, don't we? If only I had that car, or that job, or if only I could lose those 15 pounds, then I'd be happy. Really? How often do we want something only to find out that it wasn't that great after all? Sometimes we ask God for things and if he doesn't deliver right away, we start questioning whether God really understands or even cares. Do we really trust God? Do we trust that God is good and sees a bigger picture than we ever could? It's easy to want what's right in front of us, but maybe God knows what's better for us, and sometimes we just can't see it.
Nooma Breathe 014 · 2006Nooma Breathe 014
2006
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With everything that we've got going on every day, how many of us ever think about our breathing, about the meaning of breathing? Yet, for thousands of years, people have understood that our physical breath is a picture of a deeper spiritual reality. In the Bible, the word for "breath" is the same as the word for "spirit." There's an inherent dilemma at the core of what makes us human. We've all been created in the image of God and possess immense power and strength. And at the same time, our lives are incredibly vulnerable and fragile. Maybe if we had more insight into the meaning of breathing, we would better understand how God created us as human beings.
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