Bravo!

     "Bravo!  Bravo!"  Wait.....what?  We had attended the symphony before but somehow had missed hearing this.  Scattered throughout the auditorium though, amidst the applause and accompanied by the standing ovation, "Bravo!  Bravo!"  We couldn't help but chuckle as we left the event.  It just wasn't what we were used to hearing at the end of a performance!
     But let me back up just a bit.  And then I may just fast forward.  Kinda the way I drive too.  Anyway, last week I was given two free tickets to the local symphony.  Having attended once before and being absolutely blown away, I jumped at the chance to go again.  Especially free!  But after a crazy week, spending Saturday night at the symphony was a relief topped off with some guilt for not being at the side of someone who had needed our extra help a good portion of the week.  But we tried to relax and enjoy. 
     We are a musical family of sorts.  Nothing like the Osmonds or the Jacksons (sorry.....I'm old and don't know if there are any more current musical families at the moment) but we all love music and have sang some pretty mean harmonies in the car.  Some of us are more knowledgeable than others about the mechanics and technical aspects of music but we all can enjoy a good concert.  Expecting to do just that, I and my chosen 'date' settled in our seats that night to enjoy the music and relax.
     While enjoyment and relaxation were definitely a part of the evening, we are also people watchers and we found ourselves doing just that.  This crowd was a bit different though.  As the first half was music previously never heard before, written by a composer who attended the event even, it was written to depict the time right after WWII.  And I can easily say that it was not at all what we expected.  The audience was dotted with older men but we didn't put the whole thing together at first.  We just watched them. 
     At one point during the concert, WWII Veterans were asked to stand up.  I was amazed at the number of men (and at least one woman) who stood up.  Yes they stood slowly.  Some had help getting up.  And included was the elderly gentleman we had seen exit and return....twice.  His seat was near the front and his leaving the auditorium involved him actually being in the spotlight as he would slowly climb the steps near his seat.  "Poor man!" I thought!  "How embarrassing!" "But when I get to be that age, I won't care who sees me leave to go to the restroom either".  Yeah, that's the thought I concluded with.
     Now it's time to do that fast forward thing......to yesterday.  When I came home from work, the movie "Unbroken" was on.  I asked what it was about and was told, in brief, it was about an Olympic runner who was in WWII and didn't get to run because the Olympics were in Japan and cancelled.  Instead, he was in a Japanese prison camp and treated horribly.
     Thanks to modern technology, I quickly researched this man.  Louis Zamperini.  And then I cried.  Normally not wanting to watch anything dark or even remotely sad, I sat glued to the screen, crying as I watched for the deeper meaning of the whole thing.
     Mr. Zamperini, and others, remained 'unbroken' during a series of events that most of us would have given up near the start.  As I watched the movie, I would look back at his picture on my phone.  The light that shown in his eyes in his 90s was amazing.  Beatings that were so inhumane.......yet he remained unbroken.  I literally would watch the movie and then look back at his picture on my phone and cry.
     As I read on about Mr. Zamperini, something touched my heart deep inside.  After the war was over he suffered, as many do, with PTSD.  He drank to forget his past and had nightmares about what he wanted to do to those who tortured him.  Then his wife asked him to attend a Billy Graham Crusade.  His life changed forever when he met Jesus Christ.  The anger was gone.  It was replaced by forgiveness.  He received forgiveness from the Lord.  He gave forgiveness to those who had treated him so horribly.
     At almost 81 years of age, in 1998, Mr. Zamperini ran a leg in the Olympic Torch relay in Nagano, Japan not far from where he had been held as a POW.  He attempted to meet with the most brutal of his captors from the war but his tormentor refused to see him.  As I read this and watched perhaps the most brutal torment scene of the movie, I couldn't help but think how Jesus forgives us.  No matter what we do, He forgives.  And I thought about how, as Mr. Zamperini's character in the movie looked directly into the eyes of his torturer,  he didn't give up.  He faced him.
     The courage of Louis Zamperini.  The unbrokeness.  The determination.  The faith.  The forgiveness.  That's where the bravo belongs.  Yes the symphony was good.  Really, really good!  And hours of hard work went into that performance.  But Louis Zamperini and others like him who fought the fight for our freedom.  Who teach us to forgive.  That's where the bravo belongs.