THE WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN

FINDING THE GOSPEL IN STRANGER THINGS

MICHAEL S. HEISER

The World Turned Upside Down: Finding the Gospel in Stranger Things

Copyright 2019 Michael S. Heiser

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TO THE MEMBERS OF MY TEENAGE PARTY:

SCOTT,

BRAD,

PAT,

TOM,

MARK,

AND RANDY

And Paul went in, as was his custom, and on three Sabbath days he reasoned with them from the Scriptures, explaining and proving that it was necessary for the Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead, and saying, “This Jesus, whom I proclaim to you, is the Christ.” And some of them were persuaded and joined Paul and Silas, as did a great many of the devout Greeks and not a few of the leading women. But the Jews were jealous, and taking some wicked men of the rabble, they formed a mob, set the city in an uproar, and attacked the house of Jason, seeking to bring them out to the crowd. And when they could not find them, they dragged Jason and some of the brothers before the city authorities, shouting, “These men who have turned the world upside down have come here also, and Jason has received them, and they are all acting against the decrees of Caesar, saying that there is another king, Jesus.”

ACTS 17:2–7

CONTENTS

Preface

Introduction

1 As Lost as Will Byers: The Need to Belong

2 The Vale of Shadows: Trapped in a Hostile World

3 From One Black Hole to Another: We Can’t Save Ourselves

4 Momma Wants to Talk: Help from Beyond

5 Nobody Is Normal: The Gift of Uniqueness

6 “No More”: The Cost of Sacrifice

7 Never the Same: Finding Hope amid Change

8 Not a Normal Family: Bound Together by Cause

9 We Keep Giving It What It Wants: The Battle Within

10 The Hive Mind: The Battle against the Unseen

11 I’ll Be Watching You: The Enduring Enemy

Epilogue

Subject Index

Scripture Index

PREFACE

The first season of Stranger Things premiered on July 15, 2016. There was no fanfare, no breathless anticipation generated by advance hype. Like other projects, the show was a Netflix™ experiment. Eight episodes later, it had exploded into an international sensation.

Stranger Things transports viewers back to 1983, more than a lifetime ago for many of the show’s most devoted fans. Ronald Reagan was the president of the United States. The Washington Redskins won the Super Bowl (yes, that actually happened). Return of the Jedi was the highest-grossing movie ...