4400

For every applied force, there is an equal and opposite one (or something like that). For every original, there is a fake. For every good, there is bad. And so on and so forth.

Sorcery: any means or power used to acquire or do something, except by the power of God.Even if you believe in God.

That was my definition until I checked it out in the Cambridge dictionary. Turns out you have to have use of some non-Godly spiritual beings or evil power. So I guess that rules out the option of science. However freaky science gets, it’s probably always going to be acceptable, coz it’s not spiritual, it’s not sorcery. It’s just science, discovery of a lot of phenomena and theories and hypotheses that God knows about Himself.

So; 4400. You know the flow; 4400 people; disappeared from all over the face of the earth at different points in time from 1946 till 2003 or so; all of them are returned together in this big ball of light from the sky at one place; none of them have any memory of what happened while they were away; none of them have aged a day; and as revealed episode by episode, each is returned with a new ‘super-natural’ ability. Maia, (born 1936, disappeared at 8 yrs of age in 1946) is able to have visions of near and further future happenings. Sean (disappeared 2001 at age 17) has the power to heal, and kill, just by touching someone. Lily (disappeared 2002) is found pregnant on her return, and falls in love with Richard (disappeared 1958), who turns out to be the father of the baby. Lily is able to understand what the baby in her womb thinks and feels. And so on.

By the end of the third season, we learn that these people were abducted by humans from the future. Humanity in the future is dying as a consequence of human actions in the previous/present ages. By returning the 4400 with these abilities, each will play a part in preserving or destroying useful or irrelevant parts of the earth and its social systems respectively, thus sustaining a suitable environment for the future humanity. These future guys implanted funny images in Tess’ head (disappeared;- don’t remember when). She draws them and hangs them all over her room in a psychiatric hospital and like a queen ant, somehow has the ability to get all the patients and employees to work non-stop to construct the machine in her pictures and complete it ‘in time’. The machine is fixed in time but it doesn’t take her back to the future like she thought it would. It does nothing actually, except make her look like the schizophrenic patient who got a 4400 ability that she is. That’s until Dr Burkhoff, another patient at the hospital, immediately regains his sanity. Why the future would get a hospital to work like an ant colony to help one person? Because Dr Burkhoff is chosen to be the father of the 4400 technology. True to their hopes, he discovers that all the 4400 were injected with a chemical promicin while they were away. He even tested it on himself and developed his own abilites. So there it is. Anybody want to be able to fly? Want to have super-academic abilities? Do you want to know what your dog is saying when it barks? Or do you want to have a real year-long vacation in the Bahamas, just for a few minutes in your mind during coffee-break at work? Want to have therapy to resolve a few past issues by bringing to you those dead relatives you never forgave, or living people you can’t travel to meet? Do you want to make your enemies run mad? Want to impersonate people identically? Name it, and do not look any further. Just take a shot of Dr Burkhoff’s promicin, and after a few days of horrifying biological changes, body scars and wounds, nails falling off, skin tearing and all, you’ll be back to normal. Super-normal. (It didn’t get to the advertising stage in season 3 though). Jordan Collier (don’t remember when he disappeared), an entrepreneur, set up the 4400 center, where any one of ‘them’ who couldn’t start a new life with all the stigma and new environment (think of those who disappeared in 1950 from Africa) could reside. With all the gathered abilities, and get-togethers, the 4400 center became a new source of faith, hope and healing for people all over the world. The police were even scared it would become another cult.

When Ed and I were glued to the TV for days trying to finish the three seasons before school started again, we couldn’t help thinking about the Bible all the way. 1 Corinthians 12:1-11, gifts of the Holy Spirit. ‘…To one the Spirit gives the ability to give wise advice; to another he gives the gift of special knowledge,…special faith…power to heal the sick,…power to perform miracles,…the ability to prophesy,…the ability to know whether it is really the Spirit of God or another spirit that is speaking…the ability to speak in unknown languages…the ability to interprete what is being said.’
1 Corinthians 12:12-29, ‘…one Body (of Christ) with many parts.’ 8 year old Maia isn’t exactly spirit-filled, but can ‘prophesy’. Sean doesn’t even have to pray before he touches someone and drains the life out of them, or heals them. They all are different parts of the body of the 4400 that will save the world. Well, the future world at least. The climax was when we realized that Richard has this instinct ingrained in his head to protect his wife and child at all costs. He didn’t need angel Gabriel to appear to him first. When baby Isabella is born, she is able to do anything, even kill the guys who her parents were fleeing from. (Apparently some guys wanted to kill baby Isabella and her parents got warnings to flee. Talk about Joseph and Mary having to flee with Jesus from Herod.) When time became right, Isabella grew up in one day,(in five minutes actually), and was ready to learn all she could to do what she was supposed to do to, you know, like the 4400, save the world right? Wrong. The savior Isabella was actually implanted by the bad guys of the future to frustrate all the efforts of the 4400 and the good future-people who sent them. The next season will probably tell us if Tom the NTAC agent gets to ‘believe’ the ‘truth’ about her and go ahead to kill her. That’s if he manages to spread the gospel about her anyway and get NTAC and the 4400 leaders to believe it too and help him. And that’s if I get through to watching it all.

To cut the long story short, I believe in God, but do I have to consult the Spirit of God if I can get a promicin shot? After all, it’s not sorcery.