silly Pixar movies and deep longings of the soul

The deep longing started in me back in late middle school.  I was becoming more and more committed to following Jesus, and I was also a big reader.  My dad started giving me some of the books that had shaped his life, books from the Joshua series and Mike Yaconelli.  

One book that left a deep mark was Unveiled at Last by Bob Sjogren, which bore the subtitle "Discover God's Hidden Message from Genesis to Revelation."  It revealed God's heart for the world, and how He so much desired to see people from every tongue and tribe and nation come to know Him, much like the Perspectives class does.  

As an eighth grader, I was a pretty analytical guy. "I've only got one life to live.  And if I don't live it for God, it doesn't really count for anything.  And if I want to live for God, I should do all I can to tell people about Him and let them know who He is."  Seemed simple enough.  So from there to sum it up, it's basically been my heart cry that "I want to change the world for the Kingdom of Heaven."  

From there, I started to brainstorm this huge story-arc of my life, where I would get passionate about going to a certain place and doing certain amazing things.  But then as I went on I would find out about something else and decide "oh, this is it!  This is the thing I'm passionate about that I want to go for it and use to change the world!"  After getting passionate about a few different things, I started to instead see my life as a miniseries of adventures.

I wanna do it!  I wanna dream big dreams, go far and deep and wide!  

And God's been dealing with me on that a little bit.  Of course He would use the movie Up by Pixar, should have seen that coming, right? My roommate Chris is getting married soon, so he's been looking for any extra reasons possible to hang out with us.  Dollar theater Pixar movie was a great choice.

If you've seen Up, you'd know it's a surprisingly melancholy tale of love and loss and unfulfilled dreams.  Carl, the progatonist, falls in love with a young wild-eyed girl named Ellie.  Ellie and Carl start their very own young explorer's club.  Ellie shows him a big leather bound edition that has a front cover stating, "My Adventure Book."  She thumbs through the blank pages and speaks of the great and wonderful things she's going to do with her life to fill those pages.  Life fast-forwards quickly with a moving montage of clips.  Carl and Ellie get married, buy a house, fix it up, try and save up multiple times for an adventure, try and have a kid--seeking a doctor's help multiple times, and grow older until Ellie passes away peacefully, but in an untimely fashion.  They never had the big adventure that they wanted.

The movie goes on, and Carl finally sets off with a bumbling 9 year old boy scout and they have the adventure that Ellie had always dreamed and spoken of.  In a dramatic moment about 2/3 the way through the movie, Carl get's out the large volume, "My Adventure Book," to finally fill one of the old empty pages with the long awaited adventure.

When he reaches the final pages that he expects to be blank, a surprise awaits him.  Before Ellie passed, she DID fill all those blank pages that were waiting for lifetime adventures.  But instead of pictures of waterfalls in South America, the pages are full of Carl and Ellie.  Their wedding day, their first house, the times in life where they were the CLOSEST.  

At this point I was a wreck.  C'mon, how can a stupid computer animated cartoon get emotional like that?  After the movie, Chris and I were walking to the car and he lamented that he gets too emotional at silly things like that.  I confessed that I, too, was moved in a deep way.  At that point, we both decided to stop feeling wrong and unmanly about the movie, but let it speak to us.  We went home and worshiped God out of this openness.

With worship music in the background, I found myself on my knees with my face buried in the carpet, getting it wet with tears.  God brought back to mind the "My Adventure Book" from the movie.  I already have a "My Adventure Book," at least mentally.  I felt like He was saying to me, the most monumental and memorable things from your life are not when you accomplish the most, Lance, but when you and I are closest.

wwwwwwwwwWWWWhoooooaaa

Thank you, Jesus.  I love you.  Really, I do want to love you.  Draw me closer to you.

And here's the clip from the movie, what I could find of it on YouTube.  Except the book title is in Russian.... but just know that it spells out "My Adventure Book."