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…a film by Christian Vision SA, courtesy of CV Resources
The Lifesaver is a short film inspired by the true story of an ex-convict, Vuyo Puza.
The movie opens with young Vuyo witnessing a lifeguard saving a drowning man. This encounter gives birth to his dream of becoming a lifesaver himself. However, his dream is sabotaged by Vuyo himself in his teenage years when he chooses a life of crime. During an armed robbery attack in a gas station, he gets apprehended and incarcerated.
Now in prison, Vuyo’s life is in need of a lifesaver but he appears too far gone. He has given up on God but God has not given up on him as his father reminds him.
“What God? The God that doesn’t care. God abandoned me a long time ago,” Vuyo says bitterly.
“You abandoned God, Vuyo. You chose this life,” his father tells him.
Isn’t it true that when we make the wrong decision while exercising our God-given will, we turn around to blame God for the consequences of our own choices? We feel abandoned whereas we are the ones abandoning God.
“God is not a dictator,” Vuyo’s father says. He then asks Vuyo to save himself. Unfortunately, a drowning man cannot save himself – he needs a lifesaver – and Vuyo has rejected his lifesaver.
Vuyo’s father dies while Vuyo is still in prison. He is now left with memories of how he taunted his father about his faith.
Alone and heartbroken about his father’s death, an echo of his father’s words reaches his cell room. Only this time it isn’t his father recounting the story of the skinny cows eating up the fat cows. It is a visiting pastor. Where Vuyo refused to listen to his father’s voice calling him back to God, this time he is broken enough to listen to the pastor.
Vuyo rediscovers his life of faith after this encounter. He exhorts us. “All those years, I never had peace. But when I gave it all to Jesus, when I asked Him to save me from myself, I found real peace.”
The beautiful message in this movie is that God can take a thoroughly messed up life and turn it around.
Vuyo starts as a common criminal, but in the end, he is an evangelist. He starts in darkness but ends in the light, shining the light, preaching the gospel of Christ. This former hater of God boldly proclaims, “I stand on the mountain top to say that God is great in my life.”
Vuyo’s story, shows that despite the darkness within us, we can accept the light of God and be saved. It also inspires us to evangelize to the many souls waiting to be saved.
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