I'm so inspired by "Gabby" Giffords' recovery! After her near fatal gunshot wound to the head two weeks ago, she's leaving the hospital for rehab! The word "miracle" has become almost commonplace in news reports these days.
The Congresswoman's husband, astronaut Mark Kelly, describes her as the most determined fighter he's ever known. Clearly, God is the number one factor in her being alive today. And the medical team that treated her was amazing. But even they have made it clear that a lot of her recovery is up to her. All the bedside reports indicate that she's fighting to communicate, to stand, to show her love for her husband.
"Gabby" Giffords is a classic example of what I call defiant recovery. The stubborn refusal to stay down when you're knocked down.
And we all get knocked down sometimes. By a tragedy that dramatically rewrites the script of your life. By a temptation that you succumb to, leaving you spiritually defeated.
The easy thing is to stay down. To just lie there and say, "What's the use? Things will never be the same. I'll always be this way." It's the white flag of surrender.
Then there's the heroic response to being knocked down. The defiant decision that you will refuse to be defined by these painful events or this moral mess-up. You will fight back, whatever it takes, however long it takes.
It's the spirit of the beleaguered Apostle Paul who shouted in the midst of extreme distress, "In all these things, we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us" (Romans 8:37). I've been so inspired by that battle cry that I've made it my life verse! You deny tragedy and pain the victory when you use them to drive you to the deepest relationship with God you've ever had. When you fight off the instinctive pull of the pit of self-pity. When you ask God to use it to equip you with a new compassion that will make you a gift to other hurting people the rest of your life.
And then there are the hits that are from your own bad choices. Falling for sin. Again. The voice from hell tries to shame you into one failure becoming many failures. You begin believing it's over spiritually.
But defiant recovery is always the champion's choice. That defiance says with the prophet Micah, "Do not gloat over me, my enemy! Though I have fallen, I will rise. Though I sit in darkness, the Lord will be my light...He will bring me out into the light; I will see His righteousness. Then my enemy will see it and will be covered with shame" (Micah 7:8-10). That kind of spiritual comeback begins with defiant repentance - claiming the cleansing purchased on Jesus' Cross (1 John 1:6, 9), abandoning that sin and all that feeds it. Then taking revenge on Satan by helping his prisoners go free.
You don't have to stay down. Especially if you belong to the unsinkable Savior who blew the doors off His grave. You can be one of God's amazing comeback kids.