Beyond the Warts of Wicked

My daughter loves musicals, of all kinds. She heard about the musical Wicked and had listened to the soundtrack many times, but we never could really figure out the story and knew only that it was a takeoff on the Wizard of Oz. We attended a performance of it in Fort Lauderdale and greatly enjoyed the twist -- the idea that when the whole story is revealed it turns out that the "Wicked Witch" was arguably neither wicked nor a witch, but more likely misunderstood and framed. The serious theme hidden in this silly play is that: those characterized by hypocrisy and shallowness and/or downright stupidity all appear righteous to the public, while the one who stands alone and won't compromise the truth is made to look ... wicked.

It is a reminder to be discerning in all things. Christians especially are prone to take people at face value. If someone seems "nice" then that is the measure of their Christianity. This play reminds us that "niceness" and "people-pleasing" often mask selfish ambition, self-exaltation and sheer evil. The Bible says that Satan himself masquerades as an angel of light. The fruit of a life, the obedience to the Word of God, even at great cost to self and the risk of being misunderstood, is the measure of a person. Faith in Christ is the measure, shown by obedience to His Word. And often the obedient person is forced to not be so very "nice, " which confuses the simple Christian.

Don't get me wrong: there are many problems with this play. It certainly does not have a Christian worldview and children would not benefit from it. But those who have already acquired some foundation of biblical thinking, can view this production through their Christian lens and engage it in such a way as to gain from it, see Truths that glorify God and grieve over sins that are presented as sin.


The story follows two girls who meet at an Oz university: Galinda (known as Glinda in the original Oz movie) and Elphaba, (that scary green hag, who we find out was not moldy but was actually born with that emerald skin.) Galinda arrives at school, already having won the devotion of her classmates because of the quantity of her suitcases -- and the way she tosses her hair as she sits atop them. Elphaba is only at the school to help take care of her younger sister, who is confined to a wheelchair (born unable to walk because of milkflowers that her mother consumed during pregnancy in an attempt to prevent another green baby.)


Since Elphaba is not really considered a student, she has no room assignment -- and Galinda inadvertently offers to share her room. Rather than lose face and points with her friends by rescinding her accidental offer, Galinda vows to "rise above it" and go through with it. Intense feelings ensue, as revealed in the perky, upbeat "What Is This Feeling?" ( "What is this feeling/ so sudden and new,/I felt the moment I laid eyes on you? / Loathing. Unadulterated loathing...")

I loved this song. Intentionally or not, the piece shows the absurdity of the idea of love at first sight, that idea of Cupid drawing his bow and leaving the lovers uncontrollably attracted to each other. This tune perfectly mimics the format of a passionate love song -- except that it's all about clinging to and fanning intense feelings of hatred felt at first glimpse. Not even an unbeliever would think this song is actually prescribing "hate at first sight." Rather, it is poking fun at how immature that is -- and how misguided. And it naturally follows, if it is immature and misguided to let your emotions drive the train in hatred, it is immature and misguided to let your emotions drive the train in affection.

Anyway, in this case, these two who loathe each other do end up best friends. Of course, Galinda totally offends/amuses/disgusts Elphaba with her desire to remake her: "It's all about popular! /It's not about aptitude/ It's the way you're viewed/ So it's very shrewd to be/ Very very popular like me!"

Again, the play pokes fun at what Galinda sees as her strong point. She knows how to make people like her -- which can't be the what it's all about for those who love the Truth.

The plot advances as the schoolmistress discovers that Elphaba's unusual color is not her only oddity -- she seems to have some magical powers. (The magic in this play is easily recognizable as that of the fantasy/fairy tale genre, distinct from the occult-type rituals of Harry Potter.) In the schoolmistress' excitement, she gets the girl in to see the Wizard. Elphaba has a passion to do good with this magic and does begin to dream of winning approval (buying a bit into Galinda's advice.)

But it takes Elphaba no time at all to see that this wizard is nothing but a scheming phony, and she is enraged by this. She won't play their game, and disappears but Galinda cannot resist the draw of all this ... popularity.

Elphaba goes into hiding, and in one poignant song even questions whether her desire to do good was merely an attempt to get attention for herself. Here, she truly does appear wicked, as she allows her unrestrained frustration to boil over and wonders if any of her motives ever were pure, as she had thought they were. This is really an accurate picture of the sinful state of all men -- even our good deeds are tinged with sin. We just don't usually recognize that.

The powers-that-be scour Oz looking for her, terrified that she will spill the secret that the Wizard is powerless. All the while, they are spinning the story to discredit her, making her into the "Wicked Witch" with their wild lies. Incidentally, until this point in the story, Elphaba has never been referred to as a witch. Instead, this exotic green girl seems to be lumped with the magical fantasy creatures of Oz, like the talking goat-professor whose cause she takes up. The witch label comes only as a means to turn the people of Oz against her.

Those in power who are not just silly, self-exalters, but who are truly evil, decide to kill Elphaba's sister to draw Elphaba back to Munchkinland and trap her. (Thus, the accident involving a certain house from Kansas.) When Galinda finally sees the "nice" people as the murderers they are, she no longer wants to be part of their ploys and does all she can to do what is right. Granted, she is ignorant and guilty of glossing over falsehoods rather than seeking the Truth, but she is not truly evil.

I will not ruin the ending, except to say that Elphaba, seeing the corrupting influence of ambition and power (and experiencing it to some degree within her own self), makes a decision to escape from it, rather than to grasp it. The ending is unexpected and touching, and along the way, it is great fun to see the histories of the Oz characters tweaked and woven into this tale in unexpected ways.

When we got home from the show, Leah and I tried to tell all of the details to the boys, but they became lost or bored --I'm not sure which. So I won't belabor my point, which is this: We can take godly lessons from works that are quite secular by analyzing them with minds renewed by God and informed by the Bible. As Christians, we need to be able to recognize and relish themes of Truth, even when served to us by secular folks and with some very obvious "fishbones" to avoid swallowing.

The Goal of Creation

Teaching the five-year-olds about the story of Joseph reminds me of this closing sermon from John Piper's 2005 Conference on Suffering.

And they sang a new song, saying, “Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God from every tribe and language and people and nation” . . . Then I looked, and I heard around the throne . . . myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!”

The hosts of heaven focus their worship not simply on the Lamb, but on the “Lamb who was slain.” And they are still singing this song in Revelation 15:3. Therefore we can conclude that the centerpiece of worship in heaven for all eternity will be the display of the glory of the grace of God in the slaughtered Lamb. Angels and all the redeemed will sing of the suffering of the Lamb forever and ever. The suffering of the Son of God will never be forgotten. The greatest suffering that ever was will be at the center of our worship and our wonder forever and ever. This is not an afterthought of God. This is the plan from before the foundation of the world.

Everything else is subordinate to this plan. Everything else is put in place for the sake of this plan: the display of the greatness of the glory of the grace of God in the suffering of the Beloved is the goal of the creation and the continuing of the universe.

The Mystery of God Ordaining But Not Doing Sin

Do you see what this implies about sin and suffering in the universe? According to this divine plan, God permits sin to enter the world. God ordains that what he hates will come to pass. It is not sinful in God to will that there be sin. We do not need to fathom this mystery. We may content ourselves by saying over the sin of Adam and Eve what Joseph said over the sin of his brothers, when they sold him into slavery: “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good” (Genesis 50:20).

As for you, Adam and Eve, you meant evil against God as you rejected him as your Father and Treasure, but Oh what an infinite good he planned through your fall! The Seed of the woman will one day bruise the head of the great Serpent, and by his suffering he will display the greatness of the glory of the grace of God. You have not undone his plan. Just as Joseph was sold sinfully into slavery, you have sold yourselves for an apple. You have fallen, and now the stage is set for the perfect display of the greatness of the glory of the grace of God.

The Weight of Glory

We saw three exquisite sunsets in the Keys for our anniversary. The displays were beautiful, but they made me a little sad each time they ended. I found myself wistfully thinking, like a little kid: "Don't stop, and leave it all dark -- especially not after showing us THAT and making us love it so." I was thinking about that when I got back -- and when I was looking something else up I found this in The Weight of Glory by C.S. Lewis:
"...I was omitting one of [the] most curious characteristics [of spiritual longings.]. We usually notice it just as the moment of vision dies away, as the music ends, or as the landscape loses the celestial light. What we feel then has been well described by Keats as the "journey homeward to habitual self." You know what I mean. For a few minutes we have had the illusion of belonging to that world. Now we wake to find that it is no such thing. We have been mere spectators. Beauty has smiled, but not to welcome us; her face was turned in our direction, but not to see us. We have not been accepted welcomed or taken into the dance. We may go when we please, we may stay if we can: "Nobody marks us." A scientist may reply that since most of the things we call beautiful are inanimate, it is not very surprising that they take no notice of us. That, of course, is true. It is not the physical objects that I am speaking of, but that indescribable something of which they become for a moment messengers. And part of the bitterness which mixes with the sweetness of that message is due to the fact that it so seldom seems to be a message intended for us, but rather something we have overheard. By bitterness I mean pain, not resentment. We should hardly dare to ask that any notice be taken of ourselves. But we pine. The sense that in this universe we are treated as strangers, the longing to be acknowledged, to meet with response, to bridge some chasm that yawns between us and reality, is part of our inconsolable secret. And surely, from this point of view, the promise of glory, in the sense described, becomes highly relevant to our deep desire. For glory means good report with God, acceptance by God, response, acknowledgement, and welcome into the heart of things. The door on which we have been knocking all our lives will open at last... The promise of glory is the promise, almost incredible and only possible by the work of Christ, that some of us ... shall actually survive examination [by God], shall find approval, shall please God. To please God... to be a real ingredient in the divine happiness... to be loved by God, not merely pitied, but delighted in as an artist delights in his work or a father in a son. It seems impossible, a weight or burden of glory which our thoughts can hardly sustain. But so it is."

You're already dead

Nancy Wilson once explained wisely that there is something wrong with a wife and mother who thinks there is something wrong when she falls into bed exhausted after a hard day's work. She encouraged those who so think to understand that such is a good thing, a sign of diligence and hard work. I recently had a similar conversation with a man who wondered, "After a long day at work, and after seeking to sanctify my wife and my children, there's nothing left for me" he explained. "That's okay," I replied, "you're already dead. Or at least, you're supposed to be." What do we need? To stop worrying about what we need, to pick up our cross, and follow Him. What we need is to lose our lives. And then, and only then, will we find them. Only if we seek first the kingdom of God, and His righteousness, will all these things be added to us. Then we will finally escape the vanity, for it will be the Lord who builds our houses.

R.C. Sproul, Jr.