It has only been in the latter part of the 2000s where I’ve comprehended what it means to leave my ‘story’ and to be placed in a far bigger story. I’ve learnt that many times, we are afraid to be in God’s Story because we have a wrong idea of the Father himself. You see when someone mentions ‘Jesus’, society immediately thinks of the World Youth Day’s staged by the Pope every 3 years, with the 2008 WYD being in Sydney, the 2005 WYD in Germany and the 2011 in Spain. Society would also think of St. Mary’s cathedral, not to mention ‘radical’ Hillsong who are always controversial in how they conduct their services. Nevertheless, the public’s perception of Christianity is one of disdain. Because they don’t understand what is going on, they believe that if you’re a Christian, you don’t have a normal life like the rest of the world. You don’t ‘have a good time’; you’re always following rules and regulations.
And it’s true, some Christians, just like everybody else, are bound by law. Bound by fear, bound by the sense of control, wanting to control the unforeseeable future...but what I can tell is that Christians do live great lives. They do have normal lives; I know I have had a lucky escape from the clutches of death, so if you would call it a second chance, then my life has been a miracle. But that’s not to say that there have been times during my life where I have been just utterly confused about whether I stay in God’s Story, or I jump back on the paddy-wagon and ride into the self fulfilling glory of the sun-set...my own story, that is OK for a while, but when the knots are untied, uncoiled, when everything in hanging bare, I realise that my glory is temporary. If I want to sing a song about my greatness and how my story is the one that matters and will continue to matter, the only person that will be fulfilled is me, for a while, because everyone else, if they just follow my example, would be focused on their own ‘me’ stories. The story’s main goal is to make me famous, and to make me count, but when all is said and done; what would I have to show for it? A clap; an applause? Those things are temporary, and will not go with me when I die. If I just live for me, I may end up with 3 ex-wives, 5 children who don’t talk to me, and a fractured family. Our lives were made so much more than to be worshipping and living a story about nothing greater than what I’m going to eat for breakfast, and what I’m going to do tonight, and how I’m going to manoeuvre the next guy out of the way so that I can get the glory.
I guess everyone has heard of the phrase that we should all look out for other people, but if there was no over-arching story that engulfs all of mankind, if there was no truth in our lives that didn’t change even if the polls did, if there was no God, if there was no purpose, if there was hatred, malice, sin, and destruction, then why do we look out for our fellow mankind? If there was no meaning in our stories that we live, why worry about the next guy, whether he can pay the mortgage or not? It’s his problem, and if everyone else gets hurt while I get the fame, then so be it...Everyone knows that we should not and will not live this way, that our lives were meant for the extra-ordinary. I guess that is why everyone wants a ‘Superman’, everyone wants a ‘Batman’, because everyone fantasises about their lives counting for that cause, the cause that when you look back at your life and you count your blessings and your failures, you can look back and think, ‘Gee, life was worth it!’ But I have learnt that you don’t need a Batman or a Superman for your story to be great. Batman isn’t God, nor is Superman. In my life, when I acknowledged that when Jesus came and died for every soul of humanity; that is what he did, died for every soul of humanity.
Hard to imagine, Jesus dying for Adolph Hitler, Jack the Ripper, Joseph Stalin, even all the great people like Alfred Nobel, Benjamin Franklin, William Shakespeare, Walt Disney...but it’s true, when Jesus hung on that cross, he died- so that everyone might live. But I thought that all the great people, the ones who are famous, do they need saving? Yeah, they do. I mean, I bet you that there are things that they have done, that were behind closed doors, that they may be ashamed about; that they may be hurting...no one is perfect. And because of that, because of us longing for the perfect life in the imperfect world, our stories fail. Our stories, the ones we carve, the ones we try to make great, will eventually crumble because of the sinful nature of us humans. Because we sinful men cannot be and shouldn’t be trying to mould the ‘perfect life’ because we will never get there.
God's story is the only one where we need to latch ourselves onto, and following from a post not too long ago, we need to be free from being pressured by ourselves, or maybe even by our friends and family, to make our story great. And God settled that. It tells us in Philippians 2: 5-8 that “...the attitude you should have is the one that Christ Jesus had; He always had the nature of God, but he did not think that by force he should try to remain equal with God. Instead of this, of his own free will he gave up all he had and took the nature of a servant. He became like a human being and appeared in human likeness. He was humble and walked the path of obedience all the way to death- his death on the cross...” Wow. Just read that verse before and close your eyes. Think a little bit. That is what true love is. That is what true forgiveness really means. Forgiving someone, for all the wrong doings, lets them ‘off’ the hook so to speak, but not without a cost. The cost may be for you to not trust your wife to the extent that you did, maybe because of an affair. A cost may be a fractured relationship with your brother, because you agree to forgive the debt owing to you. But God’s forgiveness is far beyond what you can imagine.
God forgave our debt, all our wrong doing. But not without a cost. Not without a price that was to be paid, Jesus Christ. Jesus faced death itself so that you and I might live. So that you and I may be free. Now I don’t know what your definition of freedom is. But the Macquarie Dictionary says this: “civil liberty, as opposed to subjection to an arbitrary or despotic government...political or national independence...a particular immunity or other privilege enjoyed, as by a city or corporation...” But this definition is in terms of physical freedom. But what about spiritual freedom? What does that look like? I’ll tell you. Not having to be bound by the fact that one needs to impress to be loved. That you are loved, no matter what you have done, by a God who spoke the cosmos into being, so big to do that, yet so concerned and so intricately involved in your life. The freedom to live life with no regrets, to live life in the never-ending story of Christ, to live life, as if the Son has set us free, then we are free indeed. I mean really, think about this phrase. If the Son has set us Free, if it is not any old god, not any old Lord, not any old Saviour, but the Son of the true Living God, if he paid the ultimate price, we are not bound by anything, not even death. We are truly free, in this life and the next.
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