Stronger

"Why do we fall down, Bruce? - So we can learn to pick ourselves back up again."

(From Batman Begins)

Bruce Wayne, a young boy of perhaps nine or ten years of age, has just experienced the greatest trauma of his brief life: the shock of unexpectedly falling fifty feet into an abandoned well, the searing pain of breaking the bones in his leg, and the nightmarish horror of finding himself alone in the dark as the air around him fills with a rising tornado of fluttering wings, his small helpless frame bombarded by a swarm of angry creatures of the night. Yes, just about every boy's nightmare.

But moments later, just when his pre-teen world has reached its darkest hour, suddenly there is rescue. Salvation. Something larger than the bats and stronger than the fear reaches down and lifts him out of the darkness.

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It is his father.

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Caught up suddenly out of impending doom into the strong, safe protection of his father's arm, little Bruce is carried back into the light. And though there are broken bones to be set, his father isn't going to be sidetracked by the obvious physical pain his son finds himself in - instead he goes straight to the core of the matter, straight to Bruce's heart. He steps in to deflect the "arrows" (The Sacred Romance, Eldredge and Curtis) of the Enemy away from the young boy's fragile heart; he steps in with wisdom and grace to turn a potentially debilitatingly negative experience into...a training exercise.

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"Why do we fall down, Bruce? -- So we can learn to pick ourselves back up again."

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Calamity averted. Hope restored. The heart strengthened. Courage regained. And the Enemy beaten at his own game. All because Bruce's father had a certain point-of-view, a paradigm of life, that made the explanation for what had befallen his unsuspecting son both quick and instinctive.

And, of course, because he didn't just think about the world in a certain way: he also had the courage and the determination to be willing to offer his perspective and the healing words that flowed from it, just at the moment they were most needed.

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Oh to have a Father like that!

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Or a brother...or a friend...anyone really.

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For many of you, 2010 was a year that could best be typified by "falling down". A year ago we wrote: "Dark and ominous things will happen in 2010. The hunt to destroy your heart and soul is only going to intensify..."

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And it did.

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But this is exactly why learning to walk The Warrior's Path is so crucial. Dark times will come, and what are we to do with them when they do? In Walking With God, John Eldredge, commenting on the horse riding accident that put both his arms in casts and re-arranged an entire season of his life, said these four golden words:

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"Don't waste your pain."

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When we are trolling through life with the mindset of a "civilian" - where living a happy little life and avoiding pain is our primary goal - then the dark times, the failures, the stumbles, the 'falling down' strike us as senseless, confusing, and disheartening. After falling down countless times, we are tempted to throw in the towel and find an easier path. "Someone is trying to tell me something," we sigh, and succumb.

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Yes, someone is trying to tell you something. But it isn't what you think. Because the Voices speaking to you aren't beginning from the basic assumption that life on this planet is all about the avoidance of pain. No. The Voices speaking to you both know that you have been born into a world that is at war. The Evil Power wants to destroy you. The Good Power (God) wants to train you, grow you up, prepare you for battle. The Good Power isn't usually behind the dark times, but He is in them, hoping that we will see them as opportunities to pick ourselves back up again.

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Welcome to 2011. Welcome to the New Year. Christmas, the season of Hope, now gives way to the season of new beginnings, fresh starts and clean slates. No matter what sort of blows we received in 2010, no matter how many times we 'fell down', no matter how scary the nightmare we may have been asked to walk through, now is the time to pick ourselves back up again.

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According to the Bible, God isn't interested in congratulating survivors...

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...He wants to celebrate overcomers. (see Rev. 2:7, 11, 17, 26; Rev. 3:5, 12, 21)

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"Why do we fall down, Bruce? - So that we can learn to pick ourselves back up again."

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Cast off the civilian mindset for 2011. Join us along the Warrior's Path and discover what a difference it makes to have the heart of a warrior. Dust off the disappointments of 2010, pick yourself up by the grace of God, and press on.

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And listen closely, because you do have a Father like Bruce Wayne's, and he is able to speak the words of encouragement that you need to hear.

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Stronger,

Derrick and David