Life @ the End of the Spear

End of the Spear is a very moving film, documenting the story of Christian American families evangelizing to Indigenous tribe peoples in Ecuador (beginning in the mid 1900s).  In summary, several families were on a mission to make contact with the Waodani tribe on the Amazon basin, whom were known to be very violent.  Ultimately, all the men who reached the tribe's land were killed by spears, tragically.  The families of the men later traveled to the same land and met with the tribe and lived amongst them over time.  Clearly the cultural differences presented issues, but throughout the test of time, the tribe and the American families made peace and were able to communicate the word of God.

During the process of building peace and understanding each other, a comment was made to a tribe warrior after he asked why the men did not shoot or fight back when the tribe attacked them.  The comment was:

"They came to tell you God has a son.  He was speared but did not spear back. [pause] So the people spearing him would one day live well."

At the end of the film, a warrior confronts the son of one of the men who was killed and confesses to be the one who used the spear to kill the son's father.  After the flow of emotion and decision not to take revenge, the son [Steve] explains to the warrior that:

"No one took my father's life.  He gave it."   He then narrates, "My father lost his life at the end of a spear. And it was at the end of a spear that we found ours [lives]."

The story provides enormous insight and inspiration, proving that love wins while also exemplifying God's way of life [ie non-violence].  The tribesmen were so entrenched in a cycle of violence, that they deemed it necessary in order to survive, protect themselves, and grow as a people group.  Those entrenched cycles still exist today, but they [the cycles] don't even have to be removed from the rest of society [whereas the Waodani tribe was removed from civilization].  We have urban gang culture invading neighborhoods; we have discrimination against foreigners or minorities on the streets, offices, and institutions; we have genocide that gets ignored or denied among nations; and we have cyclical political wars all around the world, demanding a certain way of life from others to benefit our own countries.  

If our mindset is to vote to benefit ourselves, how would we expect these cycles to end for others?  By vote I refer to everything from the names we support on a ballot to the daily decisions of each individual [ie choose to eat fast food, choose to ignore the domestic violence down the street, choose to support local farmers, choose to watch American Idol, choose to visit inappropriate sites], because everything we do stands for something, every time we pay for something we're essentially saying "I support this brand, from the advertisements to the materials used to make it to the way it was made and the people who made it."

Check out the movie website here where you can link to different videos or reviews, including updates on the tribe's life today!

As a side note, it is discouraging to me that even with such a beautiful motion picture, critiques or opinionated discussions chose to focus on the fact that the lead actor is openly gay, rather than discuss the epic story of love, forgiveness, and transformation found in the film.  To me even mentioning the sexuality of any actor is irrelevant and only reinforces the fractures of our society.  Nevertheless, the film is worth watching.