In ROTJ, as the rest of their group prepares for the next day’s assault on the Imperial bunker, Luke and Leia are off by themselves. Luke is trying to explain the Skywalker family situation to her and why Luke is compelled to go to Vader.
Luke tells her, “because there is good in him. I’ve felt it. He won’t turn me over to the Emperor. I can save him. I can turn him back to the good side. I have to try.”
Knowing that it might cost Luke his life, he is willing to go and attempt to turn his father, Anakin Skywalker, from his evil ways and “back to the good side.”
Luke’s love for his father enabled him to face his fear of death and be at peace with it if it meant he could save his father.
We as believers are called to that same level of love and willingness to go into potentially difficult or dangerous situations to bring people the Gospel, to bring them back to the good side through a saving relationship with God through Jesus Christ.
Psalm 23:4 tells us, “Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.”
Walking into that Imperial bunker to turn himself in, Luke must have felt he was walking in the valley of the shadow of death.
Luke lived out Matthew 28:19-20 by sharing with Vader that he was not too far gone and could be redeemed.
How would it look in our lives if we were to “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that [Jesus] have commanded you?”
Know that Jesus will be with us always, to the end of the age.
