End of the Spear

"Call to action" hanky alert. Possibly, two hankies or more....

Elizabeth Elliott lived every woman's nightmare. Her husband was killed in another country, Ecuador to be exact, while Elizabeth and her young children were there being missionaries for God.

The story is the subject of the must-rent "adults-only" movie "End of the Spear".

Elizabeth went on to live many years after her husband's death and remarried two times before eventually dying just a few years ago. She made it her mission in life to talk to people about suffering and the GIFT that suffering is.

In a recent interview I listened to, she said (and I paraphrase) "The mountaintop is defined by the valleys."

As I thought about what she must have meant by the "valleys", I settled on the enormous pain she must have felt after her husband's death. The absolute anguish, the inconsolable children who were relying on her in a country not her own, the feelings of abandonment, the times much later in her life when she must have felt uninspired by God but kept telling others about the beauty of suffering.

And, I am continuously amazed by how she handled the ultimate betrayal of her husband's death at the hands of Waodani tribesman from the jungles of Ecuador.

Looking at it retrospectively, I'm sure she would have said she did the "Godly" thing at the time. But, from a human perspective, with small children to raise and a dead husband in the mid-1950's, she did one of the most amazing thing I've ever heard about:

She went into the jungle and searched for the very men who had killed her husband, so she could tell them the Good News of Christ.

It gives me chill-bumps just thinking about her bravery, her commitment, her tenacity in the face of such circumstances.

I am reminded, too, of Romans 5:3-5 "...we also rejoice in our sufferings, because we know that suffering produces perseverance; perseverance, character; and character, hope. And hope does not disappoint us, because God has poured out his love into our hearts by the Holy Spirit, whom he has given us."

Elizabeth Elliot had taken her suffering and persevered through a challenge most people would never accept. She developed an impeccable character and affected the lives of hundreds of thousands of people, including the tribesman who killed her husband, and had hope through the rest of her life that she would be home with her Father in Heaven in the end, reunited with Jim in a glorious realm.

It makes me think about my own life and my own sufferings. If I can use this time to learn to persevere, how will God use that?

If my perseverance leads me to develop a character people will admire, how much more will my hope in Christ be increased?

I'd like to think in the same position as Elizabeth Eliot, completely at the mercy of a hostile people for my very survival, I wouldn't tuck tail and run the other way. Honestly, I can't say I would even THINK to do what she did.

And, truly, I don't think most people would have blamed her for packing up the rest of her family and coming back home. But, in the end, I don't think the rest of her life would have been so full.

The choice between what seems difficult and what seems impossible is often the choice between handling grief on your own verses handling grief the way God would handle it.

When it comes your way (and it will), you can either wallow in it and be consumed by pity and anger and sadness or you can turn to God to comfort you and let Him deal with those feelings.

No body around you is going to blame you for being melancholy. Everyone will excuse your behavior if you "snap". People will pity you and your circumstances. But, eventually, all that support is going to fade into the woodwork. And, it will be back to you and God.

Grief is that impossible choice between two impossible decisions. It is the "darned if you do and darned if you don't" in life. And, if you choose not to face it, it won't magically disappear over time.

YOU will have to decide how you are going to handle your suffering: the hard way, by yourself, or the easier way, with God.

It won't be a "once and it's over" proposition, either. It will be a daily, sometimes minute-by-minute, series of events. But, over time, you'll learn that letting God do the heavy work is the best way to handle your grief.

And, if God has promised His comfort and a resulting hope from your suffering, you have a lot to look forward to.

So I wonder aloud: Is today the day you should channel your inner Elizabeth Elliot? Is today the day you are going to face your worst suffering, head-on, and let God do the humanly-impossible through you? Is today the day you are going to lay it all down for Him and let Him decide how to handle it?

Is today the day?