Living Like Rescued Men

On August 5, 2010, thirty-three miners were trapped 2,300 feet underground in the San José copper mine in Chile's Atacama Desert. For seventeen days, no one on the surface knew if they were alive. Then a drill bit broke through the rock, and a note came back wrapped around it: Estamos bien en el refugio, los 33 — We are fine in the shelter, all 33 of us.

From that moment, everything changed. Though still buried in darkness, the miners organized shifts, rationed food, exercised daily, and kept journals. They were still underground, but they were already living as rescued men. Their life, you might say, was hidden with the rescuers above.

For sixty-nine days they waited. And when the Fénix rescue capsule finally descended and brought them up one by one, each miner emerged into blinding Chilean sunlight to the cheers of a watching world.

Paul writes to the Colossians: "You have died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God. When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will appear with Him in glory." We are like those miners after the message broke through. The rescue is certain. The capsule is coming. We are still in the dark shaft of this broken world, but we are already living as rescued people — setting our minds on things above, because that is where our Deliverer sits, and that is where our true life waits to be revealed.