Broken Chains, Safe Connection

Why do children willingly submit to pain for a game called Red Rover? Two teams grasp hands as unbroken lines facing each other.

Chains in a Game

Team A chooses a strong member of Team B and calls out in unison, “Red rover, red rover, send (insert name) right over!” The challenged player runs toward Team B, determined to break through a tightly clasped pair of hands. The Team B player who breaks through returns to Team B with one of the two separated Team A players in tow. A player who fails to break the chain must become part of it.

Young children can easily  break the chain. Older children become more determined to hold tight. I have seen teenagers taken to emergency rooms with broken arms because they were so committed to not breaking the connection.

This extreme commitment to a connection of hands is hardly justified for a party game.

A Serious Connection

But life-altering commitment to the connection with Christ is not only justified, but critical. Breaking this connection has lifelong and eternal consequences.

Why do teens who will risk a broken arm to cling on in a game of red rover loosen their grip of  faith and thoughtlessly break their connections with God, Christ, and religion. I don’t worry that we have fewer people in the Church; I worry that we have the Church in fewer people.

Those who walk away will still face challenges, struggles, and pain in their lives. But they are choosing to do this in the hardest way possible, without the healing and comforting powers of  God, the Savior, and the gospel. They choose to break again the bones that could be mended. In a 2021 article “Make Time for the Lord,” Russell M. Nelson has warned of the “inevitable heartbreak” that comes as people leave Christ’s covenant path.

The Eternal Connection

In Mere Christianity, Christian author C. S. Lewis wrote,

Money, poverty, war, prostitution, classes, slavery—the long and terrible story of man trying to find something other than God which will make him happy. . . . That is why it is just no good asking God to make us happy in our own way without bothering about religion. God cannot give us happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.”

Christ’s words are His contrast to this predicament: “Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest… My yoke is easy and my burden is light” (Matthew .11:28-29). Some walk away thinking to absorb with worldly pleasures the labor and heavy-laden part when they are really missing the light and easy part.

No matter what challenges are coming toward us, we can always find strength and joy when we are yoked to (joined with) Christ in a covenant relationship. We must keep the connection regardless of who or what attempts to break it.

Unlike red rover companions, when you are holding hands with Christ, His strength becomes yours. No one can ever break through unless you decide to let go. Stay connected to Christ; His is the eternal winning team. Never let go.