Band of Brothers: Crossroads with Paul McDonald and Wailer Giles
Coming up on the Men at the Movies podcast, we discuss episode 5 from the Band of Brothers series, Crossroads. While the battle scenes are great and exciting, what happens when Winters gets promoted away from the men he’s been with for years? He finds himself stuck behind a desk in some lonely house, typing reports and completing inventories. But he endures the tedium and suffering with excellence and honor, and through that experience, becomes the leader Easy Company will need as they head off to Bastogne. Join me as we discover God’s truth in this story.
Quotes
We see a tragedy because Winters is assigned to tedium, and not inspiring men’s hearts with courage by example.
His job is measured by paper, but he is doing his duty regardless. He doesn’t do anything halfway, even when it feels like minutia.
In order to become who we’re meant to be, we have to go through this period of tedium, monotony, and loneliness.
There are places we have to go through and endure in isolation.
Jesus could’ve chosen battle, but he chose to suffer because battle wouldn’t bring restoration.
If Jesus had to be made perfect through suffering, why do we think we’ll be any different?
In order to understand what it means to lead, Winters had to endure a season where he wasn’t leading, he was typing.
The moments where we feel alone and isolated, there is deep work going on if we’re open to it.
Because I know who I am, I can fight the battle in front of me.
Themes
Humility as a leader
How does Winters shift from being a battlefield commander to becoming the battalion S3?
It is easy to lead with things we love to do, but how will we lead from the rear?
His heart came alive by leading on the battlefield, but now he’s writing reports and taking inventories.
He is removed from the men he cares about and placed in a separate office.
His job is no longer measured by victories, but by paper.
He feels an ache because he’s separated from what he would really love to do, but he’s doing his duty with excellence.
The loneliness, the tedium, the suffering has a purpose. Being S3 gave Winters a greater understanding of what it took to lead and care for the men under his command.
How do we suffer well, even when there’s a sense of loneliness and lack of purpose?
Resources
“That a good man may have his back to the wall is no more than we knew already, but that God could have His back to the wall is a boast for all insurgents forever. Christianity is the only religion on earth that has felt that omnipotence made God incomplete. Christianity alone felt that God, to be wholly God, must have been a rebel as well as a king. Alone of all creeds, Christianity has added courage to the virtues of the Creator. For the only courage worth calling courage must necessarily mean that the soul passes a breaking point -- and does not break. In this indeed I approach a matter more dark and awful than it is easy to discuss; and I apologize in advance if any of my phrases fall wrong or seem irreverent touching a matter which the greatest saints and thinkers have justly feared to approach. But in the terrific tale of the Passion there is a distinct emotional suggestion that the author of all things (in some unthinkable way) went not only through agony, but through doubt. It is written, "Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God." No; but the Lord thy God may tempt Himself; and it seems as if this was what happened in Gethsemane. In a garden Satan tempted man: and in a garden God tempted God. He passed in some superhuman manner through our human horror of pessimism. When the world shook and the sun was wiped out of heaven, it was not at the crucifixion, but at the cry from the cross: the cry which confessed that God was forsaken of God. And now let the revolutionists choose a creed from all the creeds and a god from all the gods of the world, carefully weighing all the gods of inevitable recurrence and of unalterable power. They will not find another god who has himself been in revolt. Nay (the matter grows too difficult for human speech), but let the atheists themselves choose a god. They will find only one divinity who ever uttered their isolation; only one religion in which God seemed for an instant to be an atheist.” - from Orthodoxy by G.K. Chesteron
“Salvation marks God’s action in Jesus Christ whereby we’re accepted just the way we are, and by which we’re in the process of being made whole, repaired of the ravages of sin and restored to our original splendor.” - From “Restored to our Original Splendor (Heb 2:1-18)” in The Message Devotional Bible
“It makes good sense that the God who got everything started and keeps everything goin now completes the work by making the Salvation Pioneer perfect through suffering.” - Hebrews 2:10 (MSG)
Questions
What does humility mean to you?
What jobs have you loved to do? How did they make you feel? How did you succeed in that role?
When have you been promoted from a job you loved to a job of tedium and monotony?
When have you placed something you loved in the hands of someone else?
What does letting go feel like?
Where do you feel isolated and alone?
Where do you feel like life in tedious? How can this time be preparing you for the future?
What does it mean to suffer well?
Where can you ask God to use your pain?
More info
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Edited and mixed by Grayson Foster
Logo and episode templates by Ian Johnston
Audio quotes performed by Britt Mooney, Paul McDonald, and Tim Willard, taken from Epic (written by John Eldredge) and Song of Albion (written by Stephen Lawhead).
Southerly Change performed by Zane Dickinson, used under license from Shutterstock.
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