A Hidden Life, The Movie 

“…for the growing good of the world is partly dependent on unhistoric acts; and that things are not so ill with you and me as they might have been, is half owing to the number who lived faithfully a hidden life, and rest in unvisited tombs.”

– George Eliot

This is a movie that address the conflict we all experience at differing levels and degrees when doing the right thing, as we believe in our innermost being, opposing the world system, an evil society, wicked people, despots in authority, or a tyrannical government. The one thing that most threatens and will not be tolerated by evil people is a free man’s sincere uncompromising belief in truth. These lost souls consider themselves the arbiters of what is right and true for everyone else, but can not understand a pure devotion to absolute truth that is not subject to situations, rationalization, or compromise. When a State assumes complete control like Hitler’s Nazi, Communist Soviets, or China it does so by limiting rights until finally raising itself above God. Humanist Multiculturalism is also such a government as it rejects faith in God while asserting its own form of ethics and morals that are in practice neither ethical nor moral.

The clash between a Tyrant and a Free man presents the ultimate showdown and the seminal question – “Will God deliver the righteous from the wicked?” Because God is Sovereign His will is unknowable and His purposes beyond comprehension. Scripture says, “Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable his judgments, and his paths beyond tracing out!” (Romans 11:33) The secular man nevertheless argues and scoffs, asserting that his “freewill” proves there is no God. The Apostle Paul gives the most encouraging reasoned answer to this issue, but ends with a seeming paradox. “What, then, shall we say in response to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? … As it is written: ‘For your sake we face death all day long; we are considered as sheep to be slaughtered.’ ” (Romans 8:31,36) In Hebrews we see the same dichotomy, “…Women received back their dead, raised to life again. There were others who were tortured, refusing to be released so that they might gain an even better resurrection. Some faced jeers and flogging, and even chains and imprisonment. They were put to death by stoning; they were sawed in two; they were killed by the sword. They went about in sheepskins and goatskins, destitute, persecuted and mistreated—the world was not worthy of them. They wandered in deserts and mountains, living in caves and in holes in the ground.” (Hebrews 11:35-38) Whether the righteous are delivered or not in this life, God will be proved good, loving, and just. “But God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. God chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things—and the things that are not—to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.” (1 Corinthians 1:27-29) God’s purposes are not always demonstrated in physical space and time, but rather, when time is no more, before eternal God’s throne in heaven.

The movie has a stunning setting, great acting and is rated 7.4, but it is too long for my taste.