"Tell me I've been a good man!" Desperate words from an aged man who wonders if his life has been worth the sacrifice. It is a scene from director Steven Spielberg's award-winning movie, "Saving Private Ryan." Rescuing this young army private during the waning days of World War II was the objective for a weary squad of soldiers. To them, Private Ryan was nothing special. They did not even know him. But because he had already lost three brothers in the war, their orders were to scour the battlefields of France until they found Ryan and then, send him home safely.
Throughout the film, squad members openly questioned the sanity of their mission, often wondering aloud why Ryan's life seemed more important than their own. Those concerns were prophetic. During the search and rescue, the entire squad is lost, but not before finding Ryan. As the last battle scene ends, young Private Ryan cradles the head of the last surviving member of the rescue squad. With his dying breath, the wounded captain pulls Ryan close and whispers, "Earn this!" The final scene is fifty years later as an aged Ryan weeps over the grave of the captain. He turns to his wife and says, "Tell me I've been a good man!" His request was, in fact, a haunting question. "Have I earned it? Have I earned the sacrifice of these brave men?"
I remember reflecting on the scene, wondering how he could have earned it. What great accomplishments would equal the sacrifice of one human life for another? In that reflection time, I began to thank God for the sacrifice of our Lord Jesus Christ and the fact that "by grace (we) are saved through faith . . . (Ephesians 2:8-9). Salvation, by biblical standards, is a gift from God given to anyone who will repent of sin, trust, and obey Him. Jesus died on the cross because He knew that we could never earn our way into heaven. He never once questioned our worth nor did He ever resent the sacrifice that He was required to make for our deliverance. In fact, in the New Testament book of Titus, chapter three verses four through seven, Paul writes that, “. . . when the kindness and love of God our Savior appeared, He saved us, not because of righteous things we had done, but because of His mercy, He saved us. . . .so that having been justified by His grace, we might become heirs having the hope of eternal life." That means that we who surrender our lives to Jesus Christ never have to worry about being good enough. We never have to wonder if we have earned it because it is HIS goodness alone that gets us into heaven. That is an important message at a time when our culture is degenerating and far too many professing Christians are compromising the truths of God’s word. Every other train of religious thought in the world seems to be about scales and balance. Will our virtuous deeds outweigh our bad deeds? As followers of Christ, we never have to worry about such things because it is HIS goodness that gets us into heaven. And it should be His love, His sacrifice that motivates us to follow Him closely, obey Him faithfully, and live a life that honors Him. Read the New Testament book of Romans, chapters 5-6 and the New Testament book of Ephesians chapter 2, verses 8-10
