A Thought

I read a quote tonight in the novel, Coming Attractions by Robin Jones Gunn. It sounds like a bad romance novel, but its not. She is one of my favorite Christian Fiction writers. Infinitely better than others in the similar genre who's initials are KK (not to offend, its just facts). It has got me thinking. I have yet to decide the fullness or emptiness of my agreement with the argument made, but I believe I like the general idea. I thought I would share it for you all to consider.

(Setting: A conversation between Katie, the main character, and Eli while driving in a car on measuring success in a relationship. I have extracted most of Katie's responses since she is the narrator and is rather subjective. What Eli is saying is the interesting part. ) 

Eli settled deeper into the passenger seat. "I'm not big on measuring things by success...I don't think many of us know how to accurately measure success," Eli said. "That's because God's ways aren't our ways, and His thoughts aren't our thoughts. So much of the kingdom of God is measured on a different scale than the one the world uses to measure value...'"

 "Love starts in the heart," Eli said. "Not just in the head. All love engages emotions...So if I love God, and I mean really love God with abandon, then I must come to love myself, my life. I need to love my story at the heart level. That's what I believe life is for all of us. A story being written by God. He is the Author and Finisher of our faith. When I start to love my story, with all its messed up twists and turns, then I can love other people who are living out their own stories with all their messed up twists and turns." 

Katie jumped in. "I've been learning to make peace with my story this past year too. Or, I guess I should say, the God is writing in my life. I have my share of messed up twists and turns."

"We all do. If we didn't, why would we need a Savior? Why would we need God's grace? And in my story, why would I need the power of forgiveness if I could simply work out my anger on my own?...Some things will never be brought to justice. At least not on a human level. That's why I said I don't hold out a case against him (man who wronged his family) anymore. If there's going to be justice, it will be measured out by God, not by me...I don't know that guy's story...if I'm going around saying I love God, then I have to trust him and believe that everything in my life first passed through his fingers. Nothing happens outside of his control. He alone will bring all things to justice one day. All I'm supposed to do is love my own story so that I can love that guy's story too."

Now there are a couple of reasons why this particular passage struck me.

One is the metaphor of my life as a story. I am a story person. I write them. I read them. I watch them. I critique them. I imagine them. Stories are a centerpiece of my life. Some of biggest revelations about the Bible have been when I sit down and think of it as one huge story.  My life as a story being written and the reference to God being "the Author and Finisher of our faith" is not a foreign concept to me, it has been in my head for a few years, but hearing it from other sources is always encouraging.

There is a movie called, The Brothers Bloom(2008).

Not a great cinematic work, in fact, I barely remember it, but what I do remember is that throughout the movie they use the terminology of story writing in reference to the cons that one brother writes. By the end of the movie this metaphor is used as a reference to their whole lives. One of, if not the last line of the film, Rachel Wiez's character tells Adrian Brody's that they are going to live like they're a part of the greatest story ever told. (Paraphrase). I remember that.

That may have been one of the first times I started to see my life as a story. It is an interesting thought.

However, the second part of Eli's (from the book excerpt) analysis is the part I think we, or at least me, being the self-centered beings we are, often forget.

Everyone around us is also in the middle of a story as well. Their story.

I think we walk around wanting everyone around us to be in the comfortable resolution part of their stories, because that makes it easy on us when we're in the middle of the action. But it doesn't work that way.

What if we encounter people in their rough spots? Or their complicated subplots? Think about a normal day in your life. Since you are the main character of your story you normally have a pretty good handle of what is going on with you. You know things like you went to the gym before work, and that at work your department is being downsized, and that when you're at the store you aren't putting something back because you don't want, you're putting it back because you only have $47 in your account, and that when you went home your kids had surprised you by making dinner. But think about the person on the treadmill next to you at the gym. They only knew that you were running on a treadmill at 6:30 in the morning. If they were nosy maybe they looked at how fast you were going. They didn't know that you're running to relive stress of the possibility of losing your job. In the same way you didn't know that they had recently gotten married and their shockingly sunny and kind of annoying attitude is as a result.

Two vastly different stories were being told on the two different treadmills, but at that intersection all they knew was that the other person wanted to workout badly enough to go at 6:30 in the morning.

Remembering that really puts a different perspective on how you treat people.

The second thing that jumped out at me comes from the section on Grace and Forgiveness and leaving the justice to God.

Currently I am in the process of re-watching the show "Burn Notice"(2007). Yes re-watching, because my first time through, I watched somewhat scattered-ly and was a little lost on the overarching story (case in point on the importance of stories to me).

As a result of this when I read the line in the book that says, "...some things will never be brought to justice. At least not on a human level.",  I thought of Burn Notice because the premise of nearly every show consists of Michael, Sam and Fiona (and in season 4 Jesse) trying to get justice for the wronged citizens of Miami. The ones that "the system" can no longer help.

Now one could argue that they are simply taking the gifts they've been given ( like the ability to adopt personas, smooth talk, create impromptu shape charges, and wield heavy artillery) and using them to help. This is true. But it was the idea behind the show that got me. This is a show about humans helping humans get justice. This show is an example of humans taking something that is God and giving it to human ability.

My mom once said that superheros comics and movies were so insanely popular because people want something to worship. People see the frailty of themselves so they create things that eliminate that weakness and then, in many cases, worship it. I see this as the same idea. Humans want justice, and fairness, but they don't want God.

Enter gun toting crusaders like Michael Weston, or the A-Team, or even all the way back to Robin Hood. They all come from the same genre and the same desire for God, without God.

I will have to do another post sometime, (as this post is three times as long as I expected) to elaborate on the idea of taking an attribute of God and worshiping it. I have done a lot of thinking about it and have piles of illustrations from the media I have watched/read/listened to over the years.

But for now, I will continue to think about my encounters with people as intersections. Brief scenes together in our own beautifully written, though sometimes insanely hard, stories.