This is the Way

May the 4th be with you! (or May the 7th, I guess.) In honor of Star Wars Day this past Sunday, I thought I’d share a devotion I wrote a little over four years ago after season 2 of the Disney+ show The Mandalorian was released. Hope you enjoy!

I am a big Star Wars fan, and like many other people, I have recently enjoyed watching The Mandalorian. You’ve undoubtedly seen Baby Yoda’s adorable face plastered on every piece of merchandise available from Disney or seen one of his many expressions featured in a meme, but you may not have seen this show or know anything about it. If that’s you, I’ll attempt to give a brief overview: The Mandalorian is all about a lone bounty hunter warrior who winds up with a small, mysterious, green “child.” The Mandalorian travels across the galaxy with the child (AKA Baby Yoda or Grogu) as his sidekick, trying to get some answers about the child, protect him from harm, and lead him to his own kind.

There are several themes present throughout the two seasons of this show that have been released, some of which are loyalty, devotion, and integrity. But after watching the season 2 finale (no spoilers in here, by the way), I started thinking about Mando’s relationship with the child. The Mandalorian, whose real name is Din Djarin, developed a strong bond with the child. Grogu saved him from harm on several occasions, and the Mandalorian did the same for the child. In fact, by Mandalorian creed, the child was in his care. Having been rescued and adopted by Mandalorians as a child himself, Djarin found himself becoming the rescuer and adopted father of Grogu. 

If you’re foreign to the galaxy far, far away of Star Wars and that made absolutely no sense to you, I hope what I’m about to say does. We have been adopted. And our Father is someone who is infinitely greater than a space-traveling mercenary. We have access to our Heavenly Father, the one who created the Heavens, the earth, and everything in them. God loves us, each and every one of us, and wants to adopt us. There is no one that is outside the reach of God’s love and is unable to be made His child. 

The Bible tells us to “Behold what manner of love the Father has bestowed on us, that we should be called children of God! Therefore the world does not know us, because it did not know Him” (1 John 3:1). And then Romans 8:15-17 says that we “did not receive the spirit of bondage again to fear, but you received the Spirit of adoption by whom we cry out, ‘Abba, Father.’ The Spirit Himself bears witness with our spirit that we are children of God, and if children, then heirs—heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if indeed we suffer with Him, that we may also be glorified together.”

If you are saved, you are adopted into the family of God. What an amazing gift! God doesn’t just save us, and He doesn’t just give us a home in Heaven; He gives us a place in His family, and He makes us His child. He “is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all that we ask or think…” (Ephesians 3:20). There is no greater gift than being a child of God, and there is no greater comfort than knowing that your Father is taking care of and watching over you. Take heart in the fact that, as Grogu was adopted by the Mandalorian, you have received a much greater adoption from the perfect creator of the universe. And if you haven’t received Christ, if you are not His child, cry out to God. Make today the day you become a part of the family of God and accept the love He freely gives and bestows to whoever will call upon His name (Romans 10:13).

John 6:37-38: All that the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will by no means cast out. For I have come down from heaven, not to do My own will, but the will of Him who sent Me.