Surrender
Then Mary said, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord. Let it be with me according to your word."
From the angel of the Lord to Johnny Depp in a single bound. I'm sitting watching Pirates of the Caribbean with my family, and I think, aside from being a really good time, this movie is spiritual. I knew it when I watched it last summer. There's faith, supplication, being true to oneself. (Okay, yeah, there's violence as a means to an end, and it is Disney, but I'm taken with it.) And there is the point where Will Turner, the hero, surrenders to his destiny and follows his heart, saving his friend Jack Sparrow.
Surrender. It's what we're called to do, like Mary. It is totally hard in a culture where we value being in control of our own destiny. Or we think we're in control of destiny. People will go on and on about surrendering to God's will, but I think few actually do.
I read a story in an Elizabeth Kubler-Ross book about surrender. A woman was driving in heavy traffic. She had to stop suddenly to avoid hitting the car in front of her which had stopped. She glanced into the mirror and saw a semi behind her that was obviously not going to stop in time to avoid hitting her. In a second, she glanced at her hands clutching the wheel, thought to herself, I am not going to die like this, all tensed up. This is how I've lived my life and I will not die like this. She relaxed, let go of the wheel and surrendered to the crash.
She walked away. Later, a doctor told her that relaxing was the best thing she could have done, that people sustain serious injuries from holding rigid positions during a crash.
And me--all I know is this. This year, after raging and grieving for months about losing my job, when I finally gave in and said, okay, God, there's nothing I can do about this, here I am, things got better.
Then Mary said, "Here am I, the servant of the Lord. Let it be with me according to your word."
From the angel of the Lord to Johnny Depp in a single bound. I'm sitting watching Pirates of the Caribbean with my family, and I think, aside from being a really good time, this movie is spiritual. I knew it when I watched it last summer. There's faith, supplication, being true to oneself. (Okay, yeah, there's violence as a means to an end, and it is Disney, but I'm taken with it.) And there is the point where Will Turner, the hero, surrenders to his destiny and follows his heart, saving his friend Jack Sparrow.
Surrender. It's what we're called to do, like Mary. It is totally hard in a culture where we value being in control of our own destiny. Or we think we're in control of destiny. People will go on and on about surrendering to God's will, but I think few actually do.
I read a story in an Elizabeth Kubler-Ross book about surrender. A woman was driving in heavy traffic. She had to stop suddenly to avoid hitting the car in front of her which had stopped. She glanced into the mirror and saw a semi behind her that was obviously not going to stop in time to avoid hitting her. In a second, she glanced at her hands clutching the wheel, thought to herself, I am not going to die like this, all tensed up. This is how I've lived my life and I will not die like this. She relaxed, let go of the wheel and surrendered to the crash.
She walked away. Later, a doctor told her that relaxing was the best thing she could have done, that people sustain serious injuries from holding rigid positions during a crash.
And me--all I know is this. This year, after raging and grieving for months about losing my job, when I finally gave in and said, okay, God, there's nothing I can do about this, here I am, things got better.
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