Hunchback - Disobedience Delays Salvation

It's been ages since I blogged about Disney's version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame, and I don't think I'm anywhere near having blogged about it a dozen times, as I once suggested I could, so I would like to spend this evening's blog post exploring one moment in which Frollo's actions reflected the sort of behavior one might expect from God.

Judge Claude Frollo is the villain of the film. He mistreats the hunchback, Quasimodo, whose mother he killed, forcing Quasimodo to work in the bell tower of the cathedral, which Quasimodo is not allowed to leave. Dreaming of fun and freedom, Quasimodo sneaks out of the bell tower and almost immediately gets himself into trouble. He asks Frollo to help him, but Frollo takes his time, intending to teach Quasimodo a lesson, just as God does with us.

God gives us commandments for our protection. When we disobey them, we invariably fall into trouble, and we often ask God to help get us out of it. If He were to comply immediately, our poor choice would have few consequences for us, at least in the short-term, and we might not learn why it is so foolish to disobey God's commandments. However, when God lets us experience some of the consequences of our misbehavior, that allows valuable lessons to begin to sink in.

Now, what Frollo did was wrong because he clearly had the wrong motivations. His decision to not intervene sooner was more to "teach Quasimodo a lesson" than it was to help him learn that lesson. Frollo was vengeful and spiteful, whereas God's motivations are much more pure. While Frollo seemed to enjoy seeing Quasimodo suffer, God never does. God doesn't want us to suffer any more than we have to. But sometimes, when a little bit of suffering helps us learn wisdom that will help us avoid suffering in the future, God allows it.

If God were to immediately bail us out of the messes we get ourselves into, especially the ones He specifically warned us to avoid, we probably wouldn't take Him or His commandments very seriously. There need to be just and fair consequences for our actions so we can properly learn from them. Thankfully, God doesn't completely abandon us after we've made poor choices. He is willing to help us out of our predicaments once we've learned our lessons. We just shouldn't expect Him to step in and save us any time before then.