I guess it all comes down to what you’re passionate about. It may be music, it may be writing, just like me. Or it may be drawing, learning about science, accountancy, taxation, not to mention being a culinary chef, an actor or a sportsman. Whatever you do, I believe that you should do it all, with all your might, and do it knowing that it will fade away in the end. Do it knowing what comes first. Do it knowing that, if you had to make a choice to either take a job promotion that would probably require you to work longer hours, or to have a family holiday, that will set you on the back foot at work for a little bit, but would give you quality time with your family; you’ll know what to do. Many people do make the wrong choices in life. And this can lead to a lot of things, misunderstandings between families and friends, family breakdown, divorce, extra-marital affairs, not to mention fractured parent-son/daughter relationships, as well as unrealistic demands from bosses. Sometimes we need to know that we are not Superman and we cannot be a dad/mum, raise the kids, pay the mortgage, catch up with friends, not to mention maintain such a good career and meet deadlines for that to all at once. Some things we need to say ‘no’ too.
I know it’s hard to, but people judge you about how you spend your time, simple as that. If you’re working back late a lot, it is safely said that you worship your job. But this is where the never-ending story of God comes into the equation. Sometimes stories can be ‘fiction’ and we’re not hungry for that as a nation. We can tell truth from what isn’t. We watch Hollywood long enough for us to decipher, there are certain things that can that happen in real life, and there are things that are just ‘Hollywoodized’. In my life, I have realised that in every single movie, every single book, every single story ever written, there is some kind of moral at the end of it. That is why we’re so fanatical about the stories. Because we know that stories are a window into a person’s soul.
We know that stories reveal to us aspects of ourselves that we need to change. As much as we’re humans that love to stick to the ‘devil you know than the devil you don’t’ we want a life that counts. We want a life that is more than ‘get a good education, get a good career, raise the family, retire and die’. We know that stories are a way of revaluating our lives, even if it is for a split second before we go back into this mundane existence again. And why do we go back, eventually to our mundane existence after we chew on the stick of a story? We want something that lasts for more than a story has to offer. Always, after the movie, after the song, after the book, as much as it presents ideals that should be, it’s ‘back to reality’, as we cannot possibly make stuff happen in society that is apparent in such novels, films and songs, either because they are too far-fetched, or 'I’m just not ready'. We judge ourselves, all the time, and no better place to do it than to do it whilst reading a story.
But as I have learnt from Restoring Broken Things, written by one of my favourite Christian music artists, Steven Curtis Chapman and his pastor Scotty Smith, God’s Story is unlike any other story we have ever encountered or ever will. God’s story is bizarre, everyone knows this. And sometimes fact can be like that, strange, and this is why Hollywood was created. Why do we believe Hollywood, which we know is fiction, but yet not facts, because they are bizarre? Jesus turned this world upside down. He started to proclaim ‘Blessed are the poor, blessed are the meek, blessed are the unrighteous...’ Bizarre? Sometimes we were meant for the wacky, the weird, in order for us to sit down and think, ‘Gee, if this was true, no matter how far-fetched or just plain mind-boggling it is, just imagine the complexity of everything that I’ve come across. Surely then how much more power, authority and love that God has for his creation, for me...’ According to Chapman and Smith, we are not spectators in the story of God. If you see a movie or read a book, you can only go so far into immersing yourselves with the characters, because you know that they are make-believe.
Instead, as Chapman says in his book; “...God’s Story is ‘taking us with it’ into Jesus’ commitment to demolish all systemic evil, injustice, and oppression. God’s Story condemns all forms of corruption and abuse, and zealously advocates for the marginalized and neglected members of society, such as the poor, widows, and orphans...indeed, story must not become for us just another metaphor for personal fulfilment. Anne Lamott writes, ‘A human life is like a single letter of the alphabet. It can be meaningless. Or it can be a part of a great meaning.’ God delights to make words, sentences, and paragraphs of grace through the broken and rebellious letters written into a ‘grander narrative’. As followers of Jesus, we’ve been placed not just in a big story, but also in a much better story than our lives demonstrate. We’ve got a long history of hypocrisy and inconsistency, which the Bible itself chronicles. God is telling an authentic, non-spin story of selfish, broken people; who are in the process of being made new by Jesus. That’s why Jesus has the lead role in God’s Story. But He’s not the only character. He’s making us characters too. We are carriers of God’s Story- targets for hope who’ll serve as agents of hope, and candidates of mercy who’ll live as conduits of mercy. Jesus is bringing restoration to broken individuals as a means of bringing healing to other individuals, families, communities, and, ultimately, to the whole universe. The Bible tells a story of personal, not privatized blessing. God’s Story is not a metaphor for self-actualisation or a vehicle of personal validation. It’s to be the means by which narcissists become servant neighbours, materialists become material witnesses to the outrageous generosity of Jesus, and the conceited develop an astonishing concern for the least and lost in society...we are made to live in God’s Story, for God’s glory, with God’s joy. It’s only within God’s Story that our stories find their true meaning and destiny. This is the story that we have in common with God’s people of every generation. Think about it: though we spend much of our life relegating God to bit parts in our little autobiographies of self-fulfilment, God generously ‘enfolds’ us into His cosmic Story of transforming love! Could any of us possibly want or hope for more out of life? We are called into a story that enfolds our own stories in a grander narrative- a story that is going somewhere, a story that is taking us with it. There really is a Great Story that goes on forever, in which each chapter gets better than the one before. We dwindle or we grow. Which will you choose?...”
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