Fight, Dream, Hope, Love, Les Miserables

One Christmas morning after we gathered in the living room by our Christmas tree my brother announced that we were going to see the movie Les Miserables.  I was not aware of this and was not overly thrilled to go to the movies on Christmas day and the first day of the movie being released.  It meant lots of crowds and I wasn't sure if mom was up to an outing of that type yet.

I really do not enjoying going out to see movies.  I find most of them repetitive, stupid, and boring.  To me it is a waste of time and money to go and see 95% of the movies in theaters today.  I had seen the advertisements for Les Miserables, but had paid little attention to them.  I knew it had been a Broadway show, but that was about it.

The theater was packed, and we were not able to sit together, but we got there on time and got seated before the movie started.  The movie opens and the sky is a dark grey and it raining, and there are thousands of chained mean toiling in this awful weather and within moments the singing begins.  I was hooked from that moment on.  The story, the music, the acting, all excellent.  The singing, very well done.

Les Miserables was written as a novel by a man named Victor Hugo in 1832.  The plot of the novel is over a 20 year time span and records the unstable French society at the time.  Things were bad in France at that time and even worse for those who were poor.  It was a time of epidemic disease, hunger, economic instability, labor conflicts, and political unrest.  In many ways it sounds like our world today. It's interesting that society does not change as much as we wish it would.

The heart of the novel, then later stage musical, and then film, is the character Jean Valjean.   He was jailed for stealing bread to save his sister's son who was starving to death and was sent to prison for his crime and later marked as a dangerous man when paroled.  He was treated with disdain after his slave imprisonment.  He could not find work or lodging and hated the world and everyone it in.  Then one day he stumbles across someone who looks beyond his appearance, and past and helps him.  As soon as he can he steals from the one who had helped him.  He is captured and will be thrown back into prison for breaking is parole and for theft.  Then something happens that Jean Valjean has never experienced before.  Forgiveness.  The man forgives him and gives him more of his valuables.  Jean Valjean is so moved by this man's act of forgiveness, that he decides to forgive as well and seeks redemption and becomes charitable to others.

I was not surprised to learn that the movie Les Miserables set a record of having the most tickets sold on opening day.  It is a great story of the human condition and heart that is played out over and over again in our world.  The location, details, and time frame may be different, but the overall situation is the same, forgiveness, redemption, and charity, they are all a part of what makes the human experience bearable and wonderful.  We all have the capacity for all three.  We must decide to forgive, to redeem, and to be charitable.  We also have to allow ourselves be forgiven, redeemed, and accept charity.  Seldom is there anything that is one-sided.  We have to be able to receive as much as we are able to give.

The movie logo says it all, fight, dream, hope, and love.  We know from Jesus' teaching the greatest of all of these is love.

Movie Trailer Link - click on it to see movie Trailer
http://youtu.be/VEUoMC5gm6A

Bible Verses

1 Corinthians 13

New International Version (NIV)

⁴ Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵ It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶ Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷ It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.
⁸ Love never fails.

¹³ And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love.

Hold On to God's Promises

In my last entry I talked about Abraham and how God and given him something to do that made no sense to him at all and he stepped out on faith. In this entry I would like to talk a little more about Abraham and how we all can learn and be blessed by what we know about his life.
My mother has been going through a very difficult health crisis for almost two years now. At times she is very discouraged. She thinks she is not getting better, when in fact she is. Her progress has been very slow and she has had so many setbacks that it is hard to remember them all. With each setback she has had to start all over again. I can understand why she feels discouraged and down hearted. She has to keep a positive attitude and be thankful the progress she is making. It's hard to do when you are in a lot of pain, but it is an important part of the healing process.
Abraham had lived a long time his faith had been tested and he had made mistakes, but he did not allow his lack of faith in a moment wipe away all that he knew was true about God. God had promised that he would be a father of a great nation and at 99 years old he had not yet had a child with his wife Sarah who was just a few years younger than he was. How would you feel if you were given a promise and 40 to 50 years went by and that promise had not yet come to pass? Well in Romans 8: 14 - 20 it states "Against all hope, Abraham in hope believed and so became the father of many nations, just as it had been said to him, 'So shall your offspring be.' Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead—since he was about a hundred years old—and that Sarah's womb was also dead. Yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God."(NIV)
Wow! And again I say, "Wow!" Abraham had the kind of faith and hope that gets you through a storm. I mean, no child and he and his wife were in their nineties. At that point in your life do you even want children any more? I can't say, I'm not that old and if I live to be that old, it is my hope that I will have hope like Abraham. We all need that kind of hope. If you know his story then you will also know that he and Sarah did in fact have a child. It was truly amazing.
Why did God wait so long before he fulfilled His promise to Abraham? I don't know, but would we know about it all these years later if He had not waited? What makes Abraham and Sarah's story to special is that is is so unlike so many others. There is no doubt that God stepped in and made it happen. Women just don't have children that late in their lives.
So if you think you are too old for something, don't have enough information or talent, don't lose hope, have faith and step out in wisdom and in faith and you may receive all the promises that God has given you. My mother is learning to focus in on the positives in her life and it builds up her faith and hope, you can do the same.