Driving through the Empire

"Ouch."

This is the final line of dialogue from The Empire Strikes Back. Now, I must warn you that there might be spoilers here if you haven't seen The Empire Strikes Back. And if you actually haven't seen the movie, go grab the nearest geek and asked to borrow his/her pre-1997 DVD of it. Or just wait until September when Lucas re-re-releases them on BluRay. You know that every fanboy and fangirl will buy their overpriced copy...and yes, I will too probably.

Sorry, back to what I was writing...yes, "ouch." These four letter pretty much sum up the entire movie. From the pain of war to seeing Lando wearing clothes straight out of Hahn's closet. Seriously, check it out in the final scenes, he's wearing Hahn Solo's outfit. Creepy.

The whole movie is about pain. The pain of losing, the pain of the past, the pain of getting your hand chopped off by a lightsaber while dangling very precariously off a ledge. The Empire Strikes Back is all about pain, loss and struggle. And it is all summed up in the word "ouch."

Now, many who saw Empire back in the day were struck at just how hopeless the ending of the movie seemed. Hahn was frozen in carbenite, Lando took off in the Millennium Falcon, and the Rebels were scattered all over the galaxy.

Yet, during this time of trial and struggle, Luke had Yoda walking him through his training as a Jedi. He had a teacher who taught him how to focus, how to concentrate, how to fight and how to escape. This training is what Luke leaned upon when he fought Darth Vader, whom he learned (*spoiler*) was his father.

Now, I'm not comparing Jesus to Yoda what soever. But, in order for Luke to be healthy, he needed a trainer, a teacher to walk with him (and sometimes on Luke's back hitting him) to endure and to understand and to learn. During a time of temptation, Yoda talked Luke through it.

When going through our own Empire Strikes Back, we have our teacher, savior and friend, Jesus, walking with us through it. He is talking with us through tough and dark times. We have one who is greater than Yoda, who died for us so that we might have life. And he teaches us what it means to be a follower of Jesus.

Remember this, yes, Empire Strikes Back is bleak, but there is The Return of the Jedi. We need to drive through the hurts, the pains, the struggles of our own life, of our own Empire in order to make it to The Return of the Jedi. Jesus will walk you through this and bring you safely to the other side.

Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for you are with me. Psalm 23:4