Wednesday's Word -- Rescue

This past Sunday, all the talks given during our church meetings focused on the theme of "rescue."  In a religious sense, "rescue" might make you think of the Savior rescuing and delivering us from sin.  In a secular sense, "rescue" might make you think of a firefighter or some other brave person taking a risk to bring another person to safety.

The word "rescue" does encompass all of these things, but being the curious word nerd that I am, I decided to take a closer look at the origins of the word.

When you use the word "rescue," you probably use it to mean "to free from danger."  If you rescue someone, you save that person's life.  As in, the fighfighter rescued the family from the burning house, just in the nick of time.  

But the word actually comes from the Latin excutere, meaning "to shake."  So you put the "re-" at the beginning, and you literally have "to shake off again."  I suppose a rescue does involve shaking off or ridding someone of something that is confining that person.  Shaking off the burning house.  Shaking off the desert island that holds the person captive.  Shaking off death itself.  

But this new understanding of the word has left me thinking about habits, thoughts, tendencies, possessions, fears and other such things that take hold of a person, resulting in confinement and danger of a sort.  The kind of baggage that weighs a person down.  The kinds of weight that begs for a shake.  The kind of shake that leaves you lighter and with a clearer perspective on life.  

James Christensen's painting, The Burden of a Responsible Man, makes the point:

I can relate.  While there are certain burdens that must be carried, I have been making a concerted effort to rid myself of some responsibilities as of late -- taking on fewer "voluntary" tasks, letting certain unessential things slide.  I've also been selling things I don't need and giving other things away.  My goal is to get rid of at least one thing every day.  I'm amazed at how much it lightens my outlook.  Who knew?  It's a rescue (shake, shake, shake) -- of sorts.  Maybe you need to be re-shaken (rescued) too?  You'll either need to jump up and down vigorously, or withstand a hard impact from a fast moving object.  I'd suggest the former.