I just saw the movie Wind River yesterday. It is a movie that takes place on the Wind River Indian Reservation in Wyoming. The movie chronicles the efforts made to determine what happened leading up to the death of a young American Indian woman found dead in the snowy plains of the reservation. During the search, Cory, an employee of the Fish and Game department, uses his animal tracking expertise to try to “track” down the killer. During his search he interviews the victim’s brother who is struggling not only with the death of his sister, but also with the harsh realities of living with oppressive weather and isolation. He is asking Cory why he should even go on, to which Cory replies, “You have to fight to survive, otherwise( if )you surrender( you will die).
This poignant response really stuck with me! There are so many instances of people in captivity who fought with everything they had to stay alive rather than surrender to the abuse of their captors. I have several friends who are currently battling cancer and are fighting to survive and not surrender its ravages.
But I must admit that irony is not lost on me that in many cases, it is through surrender that we survive! In Luke 9 Jesus say”whoever desires to save his life will lose it but whoever loses his life for my sake will save it,” What does that possibly mean? It is surrendering our agenda for His. For those of us who are Christ followers it is when we surrender to the Lordship, care and compassion of Jesus Christ as Savior that we are able to survive the hardships of this life. We let Him lead rather than trying to do everything on our own. When we give in to our fears we become victims of our fear. However when we surrender/exchange our fears for his courage we survive.
The world is a very scary place right now : North Korea is testing nuclear weapons, Hurricane Harvey is wreaking havoc on Texas, and the recent civil unrest that took place in Charlottesville, just to name a few. It is unsettling to say the least. We want to survive but we don’t want to surrender to our “enemies ” or to our base emotions of anger and fear. But if we, in our own strength, try to fight the evil of the world we become discouraged and defeated. In John 16:33 Jesus says, In the world you will have tribulation, but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” . It is comforting to know that the one who created it all didn’t just abandon us and leave us on our own to figure things out! Rather God is ENCOURAGING us to ” call to Me and I will answer you and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know” (Jeremiah 33:3) So when we Surrender our way, for His way, we Survive, not only in this life but into eternity.