Crawling Up the Rock-Strewn Path Dragging My Armor
This is the image that best fits where I am in my life now. As I think on it, I am reminded of a scene from the 1986 Oscar-winning film The Mission where Robert DeNiro repeatedly drags his now-useless 18th-century armor up a rocky cliffside beside a majestic waterfall in the South America jungle in an act of penance.

Playing converted colonial slave hunter Rodrigo Mendoza, DeNiro's actions reflect what I now see as the all-too-human, horrified, and shame-riddled reaction to the realization of the depth of his own depravity. In Mendoza's case, the killing of his own brother in a fit of rage, a crime that was all too easy to commit due to his arrogant belief in his need to defend his "honor", was the catalyst which brought him to his knees.

As Mendoza bloodies himself on this arduous vertical ascent, starting over again and again each time he loses hold of his "baggage", the Jesuit priest Father Gabriel, played by Jeremy Irons, sits watching at the summit -- waiting for the penance to play itself out. Father Gabriel has become the spiritual mentor of Mendoza, intervening to prevent the man of violence from committing suicide in response to his fratricide. As the scene continues, another character asks Gabriel "How long must he carry that stupid thing?" "God knows", is the priest's only response.

Of course, Mendoza eventually lets go of his burden, collapses into submission, and begins his new life as a fellow servant with Gabriel in a mission to the Indian tribes in the jungle.

In evangelical Protestantism, we tend to neglect the value of this process, this mourning and self-degradation that comes so naturally in the wake of coming face-to-face with just how evil we truly are, outside of the atoning work of Christ crucified and resurrected. How that even then, we often are still not at the end of ourselves, as we try to make it right and atone for ourselves. This stunning and penetrating image of the both the necessity and ultimate futility of penance is revealing itself to me as a core reality through which I must navigate. In the Protestant church, acceptance of forgiveness and forgetfulness of how severely deficient we really are outside of Christ, all too often cheapens what redemption really is.

For me, I am still crawling along that rocky path. The rocks are all of the obstacles I continue to wrestle with on a daily basis. The fatigue. The temptations that flaunt themselves in front of my eyes no matter which way I turn. The difficulties of a life that simply won't go away just because I believe in Jesus Christ. The rocks stay. They are permanent, hard, jagged and cutting in places, smooth and slippery in others. They will draw blood and sweat and make a body sore. But they are also sure and solid, holding firm against the weight of our climbing and providing the traction to move forward.

I crawl because I continue to carry my own sack of heavy armor. My anger, resentment, lusts, and unforgiveness weigh me down and hinder my progress, causing stumbles and falls, bruises and cuts. Yet I continue to cling to them, either for fear of what will become of me should I lose them, or a prideful, stubborn insistence that I can conquer them through sheer will. Or perhaps negotiate a compromise that allows them to hang around and serve me, instead of me continuously serving them.

Consider Mendoza's sack of armor. In the quest to reach the summit above the waterfall, the weapons and protective articles are of no use whatsoever. They are extraordinarily heavy and bulky, creating substantially more opportunities for injury and delay and fail to provide defense against the perils of the journey. If the quest was to conquer, kill or defend against attack by sword and bow, then it would certainly be wise to bring them along, despite the hindrance they represent in the climb.

It's the same with my sack of armor. These things I carry are only intended to injure or protect myself from injury from similar weapons and attacks. However, if my journey is to be towards reconciliation and restoration, they are not only useless, but also injurious to me -- weighing me down as I seek to climb and dashing me against the rocks as I twist and reach for their comfort rather than maintaining my focus and balance on this cliffside sojourn.

It's so easy for others to say to me, "Just chuck it all and be done with it!", but such attitudes only serve to devalue the significance of the process and the permanence of impact, once the lesson is finally learned. Oh, that I had a Father Gabriel waiting patiently for me at the summit, surrending his own inclination to speed things up so that he could get on with his own agenda in the wise acknowledgement that only "God knows." Of course, it's the same old temptation, to long for the type of person that only Hollywood can create, instead of allowing the forging in myself of the type of person that only God in Christ can create.

What I am seeing is that it's not so important to focus on the baggage that I carry. Endless hours of therapy and attending recovery and support meetings have not produced the desired results. What's important is continue to stay on the path. Crawling, climbing, or leaping from crap to precipice like a mountain goat -- it doesn't matter. What matters is continuing to focus on getting to the summit, for sooner or later you realize that you don't get there at all until you stop clutching that heavy, hindering sack of armor and let it fall behind you into the abyss that was your former life.

May it be so!
- posted by The Drake @ 9:14 AM