What caught my attention in today’s viewing was 5 words uttered by the ultimate Jedi master himself, Yoda. Luke Skywalker is struggling with his Jedi training, and his X-wing star fighter has just sank into the murky Dagobah swamp, presumably lost to nature, stranding Luke on the dank, backwater planet for a long time to come. Luke cannot muster the Force power to lift his craft free, and despairs.
And then, one of the best, most awe-inspiring moments in film history occurs. Yoda closes his eyes and reaches out his 3-fingered claw. The swamp bubbles, the spacecraft lifts free of wet weeds and the cloudy pool, to soar overhead and land on the bank of swamp, space-ready once again.
Running his hand across the outside of his canopy, Luke exclaims, “I don’t believe it.”
And then, the quiet, throaty gurgle of Master Yoda:
“That is why you fail.”
It occurred to me that this character’s creator, George Lucas, had inadvertently hit upon a vast, broadly applicable truth in today’s society: That if we don’t believe a task can be done, we automatically disqualify our ability to do it. In essence, we don’t put “mind over matter.” But what is important is not the fact that something may or may not be possible to accomplish, but the satisfaction we find in trying and succeeding comes from all the times we tried and failed.
Thomas Edison tried 2000 ways to make a light bulb, and only one way worked. The success he experienced and the joy that followed would have been significantly more empty had he succeeded on the first try. Moreover, failure can actually lead to important discoveries in themselves, especially in the areas of physical sciences like chemistry, physics, aeronautics and material sciences. Some of the greatest discoveries or inventions were accidents. Inkjet printers, penicillin, and pacemakers are a few examples.
Even more profoundly, I heard a spiritual implication within our little green friend’s words. I heard God speak to my heart and say, “Your unbelief in Me is why you fail.”
As believers, our spiritual condition is one of salvation. not judgment. So when we sin, it’s not because God has given us over to our sinful nature. It’s because we’ve essentially decided to put aside our belief in God’s absolute, perfect provision for our needs and satisfaction, and decided to believe that something else can make us truly happy.
As Luke trusted in only his own mental strength to lift his X-wing, instead of opening himself fully to the force and allowing it to do the lifting, so also do we ask God only to “help” us in our tasks, instead of allowing the Holy Spirit to take the lead. So often we seek to control the things in our lives that only God has a right to control, and we start to place our belief in the power of our desires, our dreams, our comforts and luxuries. And we do it to accomplish our own ends, instead of trusting in His plans and Biblical guidance.
So the next time you watch The Empire Strikes Back, pay attention to the lessons Luke learns about how to be patient, and trust in the living Force, and not his own strength; and then remember that we should not place our ultimate trust in ourselves or material goods, or even our family or church, but in the Lord Himself, and His sovereign Grace.
