See, my youth group would take long bus rides, and sometimes we would stop at a mall to eat and have some free time. (Being on the adult side of youth ministry now, I think it is fairly safe to say it was free time for the adults more so than the youth. Who wants to be stuck in a bus full of kids? I'm pretty sure if buses full of kids had been invented, Dante would have made that circle of hell.) During one such trip, I went to Walden Books to find something to read because I was bored out my skull in the bus. I happened across a TPB of Daredevil. It was written by Kevin Smith (didn't know who he was) art by Joe Quesada (didn't know who he was) and foreward by Ben Affleck (kind of knew who he was ) Tangentaly, Kevin Smith was the one who put Ben Affleck forward to play Matt Murdock for the Daredevil movie, which while widely maligned, did a really good job of portraying Matt Murdock. It is at this point, 1998/1999, that I really started to get into comics, and one of the first ones I picked up was Daredevil.
But this isn't about Daredevil, it's about Echo.
See, Maya Lopez is a deaf girl being raised by the Kingpin (a notorious crime boss). Everyone thinks she's retarded, so she goes to a special school. While there, she sees someone play the piano, so she goes over and plays the same song, note for note. Turns out; not retarded. Awesome. She can perfectly mimic any physical action she sees. If you watch Heroes, Monica Dawson totally ripped her off.
So Maya becomes this crazy famous and awesome dancer/artist/performer who everyone loves because she is able to perfectly reproduce anything she has seen and she can even mix it all up. She doesn't just mimicry, it is reproduced knowledge. Saber vs. Conocer. While in New York for a show, Kingpin, her adopted father, tells her that Daredevil killed her dad, and supplies her with videotapes of him fighting. She then goes out and puts a heavy beat down on him. Seriously bad. But, with the Kingpin involved, things are never what they seem, and Daredevil is the good guy, so revelation
What I like about Echo so much, is her ability. The fact that she can do anything she sees done. And it isn't that she can just reproduce it perfectly, but she can take it, and modify or mix it up. She isn't locked into perfect repetition. She owns it and makes it her own.
What I like about Echo so much, is her ability. The fact that she can do anything she sees done. And it isn't that she can just reproduce it perfectly, but she can take it, and modify or mix it up. She isn't locked into perfect repetition. She owns it and makes it her own.
Maya Lopez isn't super strong, or fast. She is in shape, but she's normal. Pretty much perfectly normal.What makes her exceptional is her ability to learn, to see something done or modeled and then replicate it. And not just mimic it, but to really learn that skill and use it anyway she needs to. I think Jesus wants us to be like Maya. He walked around with his disciples for years, basically saying "Do what I do" and "do it this way". And that is still His cry for His people. "Do what I do", "do it this way"; but to many times the things we do are mimicry. We do them out of habit or forced repetition, they lack the true power of knowing. Even the title 'christians' implies the goal that Jesus pushed us towards, what he wanted of us.
So open up your eyes, see what He did and how He did it. Learn from Him.
Be an Echo.
