“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation, and go to the grave with the song still in them.”
– Henry David Thoreau, Walden
What does it mean to you to live a life of quiet desperation? Some think it is absurd to cling to faith, that it is only an illusion, and that there is no meaning in living. Others maintain that the real futility is in living a life without meaning, of choosing despair over hope, of making sure that your song is boldly sung each day and not kept within you.
Samantha (Sam) Crawford, the character in the movie Unconditional, lived a great life full of excitement and happiness. But when her circumstances take a tragic twist, she comes to a dead-end and loses her faith and her passion for living. The song in her heart died. About to give up, she encounters two children who lead her to a reunion with her long-lost childhood friend, Joe. Despite his crippling kidney disease ‘Papa Joe’ as the children call him, lives for a higher purpose. Joe had encountered his own share of grief, enduring a prison sentence brought on by his own poor choice. But Joe chose to respond to his redemption by bringing redemption to others. He reaches out to the children in the low-income neighborhood where he lives, teaching and encouraging them. Inspired by Joe Bradford’s true story, Unconditional speaks to how the power of God’s redemptive love for us is magnified when it is shared unconditionally with others.
Real life doesn’t always present such stark contrasts. Truthfully, we often live somewhere in between. We say we live by faith but we persistently walk by sight. I wonder how often others might observe our actions and ambitions and conclude that we live with a ‘quiet desperation’, clinging to everything that doesn’t satisfy while the song of true joy is kept hidden within us.
How we respond to tragic twists in our circumstances is determined by how we choose to respond to God’s redemptive love poured into our own lives…today. Don’t live a life of quiet desperation. Let the song of his unconditional love flow from your heart today. Whatever choices have marked your life up until now, today is a new day. Choose well.
“Live. Breathe. Find a way to believe. Never give up on hope. Life’s not a dead-end if it takes you somewhere you need to go. Talk to God and find his love. It’s the most powerful thing on earth. There is enough love to go around. All you need to do is share it.” (Excerpts from Unconditional)
