Great Strength Can be found in not yet

I had the day off yesterday. It was a holiday. I was also under the weather. When you're under the weather on a holiday, is it a holiday or a sick day?

I'm off on a tangent already; totally not the point of this article....

The point is I had a free day. And I used the free day to watch, for the very first time, Gladiator. I know, trust me, I have already endlessly heard the shame in this 24-year theatrical gap in my life.

I think some gaps are meant to be, though. This movie is packed with themes that would have meant little to me 24 years ago, plot lines that would have totally escaped me. One of them being the relationship between Maximus and Juba, two enslaved gladiators.

I loved how these two men wrestled with their spirituality. Together. Juba reflecting out loud on the hope that his long lost ancestors were watching over him and would see to it that he'd once again get to see his family that was still alive, while Maximus reflected on the hope that his family was waiting for him in the afterlife.

These two men, beautifully held together by a belief in "not yet."

I suppose that resonated with me on two levels.

One, the sweet vulnerability between these two men, who could openly share their deepest pains and their deepest desires. And wrestle together, out loud, with the questions they shared around that vulnerability.

There's a scene where Maximus talks about seeing his wife and son again, both who'd been murdered by the folks who currently held him captive. Maximus said, "I will see them again." And in a vulnerable response, Juba says, "but not yet."

It was a very human mix of statement and question. Not yet. It was a very human mix of I want to believe you but also, can I believe you? Two men, wrestling out loud. Together.

I've come to know, much later than that scene 24 years ago, that I long for that kind of vulnerability. I've worked toward it. I've come to know that many of us long for it, and that we are wired to need people in our lives with whom we can wrestle out loud with these sorts of vulnerable questions in our lives.

It was in this connection, in this relationship, that these two men found strength in "not yet."

I found that beautiful, really. I reflected on the days that "not yet" didn't offer me much peace. In fact, it was often torture. It often felt like a betrayal on God's part. Why not yet, God?

These days I get it though. My own spiritual wrestling has led me to a relationship with God that fully trusts his not yets. All of them. I fully trust that there are things in my life that I long for now, things that are not yet in sight, I know they are on their way.

I know they are, just not yet.

At the end of the movie, when Maximus dies after winning freedom for Rome and for Juba and all the gladiators, Juba, in this sad scene, buries the figurines of Maximus' family. And he says, "Now we are free. I will see you again... but not yet...not yet."

Juba had such deep questions around that 'not yet' the first time he and Maximus wrestled with that statement of faith. But now, in a difficult moment, he finds such sweet assurance in it.

It's the kind of sweet assurance often only found when wrestling and struggling together. Life's answers are not always clear, but they are often made most clear in our connections with the people closest to us. People willing to entertain our doubts and questions while together arriving at answers.

People who offer us and create space for - vulnerability.

I have goosebumps, really, thinking about it. How the question 'not yet' became the beautiful closing scene answer.

"But not yet...not yet."

In the end, it was a beautiful day off, sick or not. Maybe one I should have taken 24 years ago.

I think not, though. 24 years ago I wasn't ready for this movie. It wasn't my time for it.

Not yet....