Seeking A Story

Seeking A Story

The wisdom we speak of is the mystery of God—his plan that was previously hidden, even though he made it for our ultimate glory before the world began.

1 Corinthians 2:7

“WHAT’S THE MEANING OF LIFE?”

“What’s my purpose?”

“Isn’t there more to life than this?”

Many people ask those questions. They ask those questions a lot. Maybe you’ve asked those questions.

Why?

I believe we’re all seeking a story. Intrinsically we know that life makes sense only if it has a story line, and that our lives matter only if they’re part of a bigger story.

Can you imagine watching a movie or reading a novel and realizing halfway in that it has no story line? There’s no plot, no sequence to the random scenes, nothing significant is going to happen. You’d be annoyed that your time was wasted, and you’d want your money back.

Some of us feel that way about our lives.

Maybe this is why we love stories—in movies, in novels, in a great David-versus-Goliath sporting event. Why are we so drawn to a great story? I think it’s because we sense that a great story is missing in our lives.

Your Story

It’s not that you don’t have a story. You do. It’s inescapable. We all choose story lines for our lives.

Maybe you choose the story of individualism. With Frank Sinatra’s “I Did It My Way” as your theme song, you’ve decided that no one will tell you what to do. You won’t live for others or seek to meet their expectations. You’re an individual.

Or maybe the story of consumerism is your pick. With “Whoever dies with the most toys wins” as your motto, you’re sure that if you get enough, you’ll be satisfied. What people seek to consume will vary, but the story line remains the same. It could be promotions, sexual conquests, bigger houses, nicer cars, more vacations, or a constant sense of fun and excitement. Whatever it is, you’re trying to get as much as you can.

It’s probably not as common as it used to be, but you might choose the story of nationalism. Your country’s flag is your symbol, your nation gives you your identity, you listen to lots of news, and you live and die with the Olympic standings.

A surprising number of people will take on the victim’s story. If that’s your story line, nothing ever goes right for you. You’ve been taken advantage of and walked over. Every relationship you’ve had has fallen apart, and it’s never been your fault.

Maybe you opt for the story of the American dream. You just want to be happily married, have a dog, and raise 2.5 kids who grow up to be successful. You don’t ask for much—just to live in a nice home and go on nice vacations.

Perhaps you choose the story of religion. You want to be a nice person. You try hard to do good deeds and not to sin. You want to earn the approval of God. But earning God’s approval is not the story God authored. In fact, that story line is kind of the opposite of what the Bible teaches Christianity is about.

Metanarrative

Here’s the problem: all of those stories are too small. Way too small. Choose one of those story lines, and you find yourself asking, “Is this all there is?” and “Isn’t there more to life than this?”

It’s like putting together a puzzle. You dump out the contents of the box and have what seems to be a bunch of random pieces. Pick one up and it will seem haphazard, even meaningless. Then you look at the box. You see the big picture, and it enables you to see how all the individual pieces fit together and are part of the whole.

We need a picture on the box to make sense of our lives.

Philosophers call it a metanarrative. Meta meaning “beyond”; narrative meaning “story.” The idea is that there are all kinds of stories weaving their way through history, and we each have our individual stories we add to the mix, but there has to be one big story that reaches beyond the individual stories and makes sense of them all. Without a metanarrative, history is unexplainable and our lives don’t make sense. We need that central story.

So what is God’s bigger story that we find ourselves in? We’ll get into it in more depth in our next section, but here’s a CliffsNotes version.

The story starts with God. God is love.^a And God has always lived in a perfect love relationship with himself. That may sound odd, but the Bible teaches that God is three distinct persons—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit—who live in such a tight-knit community of love that they exist as one. One God who has always existed in a perfect humble community of affection and intimacy and mutual submission and serving.

Then God decided to create. He made a universe, including the earth and people to live on it.

He made you.

Why?

So he could share his love. So he could bring others into his perfect, humble community of affection and intimacy and mutual submission and serving.

But there was a problem. The people God created rejected his love, the love they were made for, and refused to live in the perfect, humble, intimate, mutually submissive, and serving way he wanted.

It turns out God is so loving that he didn’t give up on people but continued to reach out in love to them and lead them toward his way of living.

But people are so rebellious that they continued to reject God’s love and rebel against his way of living.

So . . . God came himself, in human form. Not to punish people, as they deserved, but to show and to teach what a life and a community of love could look like.

The people responded by . . . killing God.

But God is so powerful that death could not hold him down. After dying, he came back to life.

And he is so loving that he counted his death as the punishment people deserved for their rebellion against him, his love, and his way of living.

God is still reaching out to people. He’s still making the offer that people can live in his love and learn how to live life his way and live in his kind of community.

When people accept that offer, they get to start experiencing that now, and after this life they will fully experience it when they join God in heaven.

People who accept the offer join God in his mission of inviting others to share in his love and in his way of doing life and community so that their stories can make sense too.

God is still creating. He promised he’s making a place for us to live with him, in his love and his kind of community, as he originally intended.^b One day he’s going to come again, this time to bring us to that place. And there your story—all of it: the pain, the joy, the mystery—will make perfect sense.

Now What?

• Read Galatians 4:3-7.
• A new, and very significant, chapter of God’s story started when Jesus came to our world to live among us. And he came so you could be adopted as his child! You were a part of God’s plan from the beginning. How do you see your life fitting into God’s story? What changes do you need to make so your life could better fit with God’s story line?
• Try praying with your imagination today. Imagine the life you’ve led was made into a movie. What parts would you be embarrassed about? Would it be boring? Would you be the kind of person people would want to root for? Next, ask God to show you what your “movie” could be like if you let him become the writer and director of it. What changes might he make? Will you let him actually make those changes?