I gave a homeless man $2 last week and thought my Jesus meter was climbing just fine, but then I watched Free Burma Rangers and quickly reevaluated what it means to sacrifice for a brother you don’t even know.
Dave Eubank spent 10 years as a U.S. Army Ranger, where he was recruited as a Special Forces soldier. While the bronze and brass of this title were elite, Dave felt that God had an even bigger plan for his life.
Not long after Dave’s search for where God would have him, a family friend, a missionary in Thailand, called Dave and said that they needed his military skills. Now. Dave and his new bride, Karen, moved to Burma (a small country bordering Thailand) where they began training Free Burma Rangers, men and women who took on military and medical training to protect their people from their terrorist governments.
Dave, Karen, and later their three children learned to call war zones home. Karen and the kids would craft programs for the local children, while Dave and his trained rangers would ward off Burmese soldiers. The original Free Burma Rangers formed a unit, and this unit became another unit, and eventually, Dave and his team had established over 70 units of Free Burma Rangers, scattered across the country, to protect the innocent villagers.
News spreads fast, and Dave and his family were later requested in Mosul, Iraq (the biblical Nineveh) to train Free Burma Rangers to protect their people from ISIS.
As can be expected, this documentary is packed with war violence, with everything from machine guns to tanks. The gory aftermath of victims’ injuries (including sexual injuries) is brutal, and the weeping and wailing of those standing over their dead loved ones is gut-wrenching—but it’s reality. Rape happens. Genocide happens. Slavery exists. Not occasionally. Not only in one or two countries. This stuff happens every day, all across the Middle East and Asia (even in the United States), and it’s time for us to play our part.
One of Dave’s Free Burma Rangers, Monkey, became the official cameraman. Monkey would dive into combat to video all of the raw, real war violence so that people like you and I would know what is going on. After all, if we now know what’s going on, we have to make a conscious decision whether or not to dismiss the reality, but at that point, ignorance can’t protect our “blind eyes.”
Granted, Dave doesn’t say that everyone has to have military experience or become an international missionary, but rather, he encourages us to “Trust God to show you how you can be useful.” Dave also says that “Forgiveness is a counter-warfare.” No doubt, we can all work on forgiveness, no matter where we live.
The Eubank family displays the bravest definition of discipleship. Dave’s willingness to rescue the least of these in Jesus’ name is a 2020 parallel to the disciples’ sacrifice in planting the original Church.
Though violence and heartache are heavy in this film, the undeniable power of Jesus’ calling on our lives, to serve others regardless of race, culture, or social favor, earns Free Burma Rangers Dove-approval for Ages 18+.
