Thawing A Frozen Life

The Disney movie, “Frozen”, has taken the world by storm. It is a beautiful story of love, grace, mercy, and reconciliation.

The Oscar winning song from the film, “Let It Go,” has been belted out by young and old and inspired many – young ladies, in particular – to let go of others' expectations and be themselves in a cold hard world. Despite the inspiring nature of the song, it has drawn some criticism from some, because the character who sings the song, Elsa, Queen of Arendelle, ends up living alone in isolation, thinking it is what is best to protect other people from herself. This leaves her living a life, at least for a period of time, which is truly cold, hard, and frozen. 

Something that strikes me is where the song occurs in the story – it's really pretty early for what we might hear and think of as the heart of the movie. Now as Elsa was singing, her icy creations became beautiful when she was no longer encumbered by others' expectations and attempts at control. The fact that this drove her into isolation is unfortunate, but thankfully there is Anna!

Anna, even after being “wounded” and seemingly betrayed, refused to give up on her sister, Elsa. She gives us a great example of love, forgiveness, and mercy. Her determination to go after and restore her sister is a great allusion to James 5.19-20: “My dear brothers and sisters, if someone among you wanders away from the truth and is brought back, you can be sure that whoever brings the sinner back will save that person from death and bring about the forgiveness of many sins.” I think Anna's pursuing of Elsa is a powerful example of how God relentlessly pursues us, even in our frozen waywardness.

The end scene where we see Anna's supposedly final act of love – sacrificing herself for her sister – is extraordinary. Finally we see in a Disney movie that true love isn’t revealed in a first kiss, but in selfless and merciful love. As Paul wrote, “When we were utterly helpless, Christ came at just the right time and died for us sinners. Now, most people would not be willing to die for an upright person, though someone might perhaps be willing to die for a person who is especially good. But God showed his great love for us by sending Christ to die for us while we were still sinners.” (Romans 5.6-8)

In the beginning of the film, “letting go” is about narcissistic independence, erroneously thinking that the only way Elsa could be herself is in lonely isolation. The ultimate message of the film, though, (at least in my opinion) is Anna’s willingness to “let go” of her life in order to save her sister. Anna is a Christ figure! Just like Jesus said in John 10.14-18, he is the good shepherd who willingly surrenders his life in order to save his own.

While the movie seems to focus on Elsa’s icy powers, the ultimate power in the story is Anna’s sacrificial love. She took on the “curse” from another, sacrificing her life, and because of that love, Elsa, and everyone in Arendelle, was saved! The winter ended, frozen hearts were thawed, and relationships restored. And if that wasn't enough, the one who caused the problems in the first place – Elsa – was able to use her gifts to bring joy to everyone. Powerful!

One last comment from Scripture: “Because of this decision we don’t evaluate people by what they have or how they look. We looked at the Messiah that way once and got it all wrong, as you know. We certainly don’t look at him that way anymore. Now we look inside, and what we see is that anyone united with the Messiah gets a fresh start, is created new. The old life is gone; a new life burgeons! Look at it! All this comes from the God who settled the relationship between us and him, and then called us to settle our relationships with each other. God put the world square with himself through the Messiah, giving the world a fresh start by offering forgiveness of sins. God has given us the task of telling everyone what he is doing. We’re Christ’s representatives. God uses us to persuade men and women to drop their differences and enter into God’s work of making things right between them. We’re speaking for Christ himself now: Become friends with God; he’s already a friend with you. How? you ask. In Christ. God put the wrong on him who never did anything wrong, so we could be put right with God.” (2 Corinthians 5.16-21)

May the love of God, and the love of others, help thaw our frozen lives so we can see new life burgeon all around us!