I know it is rather shocking that I would randomly chose this movie after vowing I wouldn't or couldn't sit through it but I figured worse case scenario I was home alone and I could turn it off and throw the remote through the TV if needed. It was not that bad.. I cried, probably more that most people would but the movie itself was very good. I can see why it received some nasty Christian comments as it doesn't really fit in the mold they have made God or Jesus into and that is ok. I am not here to judge anyone else's thoughts or beliefs only mine.
The main part of this movie is a family who lost a child, a daughter to be exact. While the situation was completely different than mine it was completely the same. This family, the father actually looked away, and when he turned around found his whole life upside down. I looked away, I thought everything was fine, I wasn't there to protect her, I didn't teach her the things she needed to know... while it was completely different it was all the same. A terrible man snatched this little girl... A terrible God snatched my little girl.
Through out my journey I have gone through periods of extreme anger at God, my closets of friends and family know this. They have witnessed it. I go through anger at myself due to parental failure. I deal with the shame of deserving my kids to be taken away as a punishment by God for my past. So over and over this movie continued to hit home in how I dealt with the deaths of these two beautiful children in my life. I blamed myself for not being there, I blamed God for not stopping it. I judged others around me who I felt how can this person still be here yet they took my beautiful girl! How am I still here.. I don't belong here. Maybe I do and this is just hell.
So I sat through this movie as I watched the father's agony over losing his beautiful child and the blame he placed on himself and God and I cried. Ok I cried a lot. My take away from the movie was simple. Forgiveness. The key to all is forgiveness and release. It is time to lay my beautiful girl to rest in my heart. To bury the tragedy and the pain before it completely consumes the remaining time I have. While her earthly body is in a grave far from me I have carried her with me in my mind and my heart and more times than I care to admit it is the horror of that day that comes forth. Not her beautiful smile or her infectious laughter... just the horror. It is time to wrap her battered and broken body and lay it peacefully to be buried with love in my heart so that her beauty can shine through. To do this I have to forgive myself for not being the mom she needed. I can not change the past, it is set in stone but I can move on and try my best to live in a way she would have wanted.
So while the movie was hard to sit through.. it left me better than I was. To me that is a win.
Love and Peace,
Re
PS I don't think God has a beard.