May 25th, 2001, Erik Weihenmayer became the first blind man to summit Mount Everest.

Six months later the twin towers fell in one of the greatest acts of terrorism on our country. Almost instinctively, NFL star Pat Tillman sacrificed his career and enlisted in the Army.

Erik and Pat have something in common. Both endured great trials, and both responded with sacrifice.

Pat chose his sacrifice, while Erik’s was thrust upon him. 

Even still, they had to respond the same way in order to live.

This is where the rubber hits the road. 

Whatever hand you are dealt, you have to choose it in order to get past it.

If your eye-sight is taken from you, you must lay it on the altar and sacrifice it, otherwise you’ll never be free.

If your dream career of professional football is taken from you, you must look at it and say, “You’re dead to me.”

Why?

Because if you don’t choose your sacrifice, it will be forced upon you, and it will ruin you.

Pat Tillman said, “Sports embodied many of the qualities I deem meaningful. However, these last few years, and especially after recent events, I've come to appreciate just how shallow and insignificant my role is... It's no longer important.”

Pat died to his dream, sacrificing all he had worked so hard to achieve, because he was captured by the meaning of life, and it required him to die in order to live.

Erik said, “Yeah, [God] takes things away,…but he gives other things back, and, in a strange way, those new things can be just as good or even better. I think you just have to look for the new things a little harder.”

What it means to be human is that we are limited, on a broken journey to the grave, frustrated by a lack of meaning and purpose. But there is a way forward; it’s just not what we expect.

We expect the meaning and purpose in our life to come from achievements, when in reality they come from an acceptance of what is, despite what may have been.

We must choose our sacrifice, otherwise it will ruin us.

“Die before you die, there is no chance after.” ~C. S. Lewis

Read this on the VDT.