Wild But Alone

In this movie and book based on a true story, Chris McCandless is a recent college graduate who seeks truth and freedom by traveling and hitchhiking his way to Alaska. He donates his $24,000 savings to charity and heads out before anyone in his family knows what he has done. He gives up his earthly possessions in order to find peace, something he believes his parents lack because of their focus on money and exterior things. What sorts of things do you hold important? Does our culture encourage the attaining of possessions and appearances? Jesus tells us that the love of money is the root of all evil, and tells us about money demanding our worship above God. Read Matthew 6 to hear what Jesus says about how we treat our possessions.

Along the way Chris meets many people, holds many jobs, and lives in many different places. At first he drives his old beat-up car until it sustains damage beyond repair. After this, Chris walks and hitchhikes his way across the country. He stays with a hippy couple for a while, then moves on to a farm, lives on his own, and even meets up with an elderly man with completely different beliefs and lifestyle. The man, Ron, is brought out of his life of loneliness by Chris challenging him to try new things and live a little less safe than he is used to. Ron grows to care for Chris and asks if he can adopt him as a grandson. Do you have anyone in your life who gets you to try new things or meet new people? Are those things dangerous, or are they just out of your comfort zone that they seem strange? God calls us to live new lives, different from what the world tells us to live. He says we will even be persecuted for those things.

Chris tells Ron that he will see him when he gets back from Alaska, and with that Ron begrudgingly says goodbye to him. Chris makes his way to a remote place in Alaska with meager supplies and traverses a river to an abandoned bus transformed into a dwelling, where Chris decides to live until spring. He rations the small amount of food he has, hunts and scavenges for food and lasts for quite a long time, until spring when he discovers the river is much larger than when he crossed it in winter, when it was frozen over. Chris eventually starves to death, but in his journal he has kept track of the things he has done and learned along the way. In his last days he discovers that life and adventure are pointless unless they are shared with others. Do you live your life apart from other people? God calls us into communion and community with himself and with others. Read Hebrews 10, especially verses 24-25, where we are called to live and encourage each other to live this new life set apart from the world. This is where the Truth is that Chris was so desperately seeking.