I remember being a kid and writing a story about becoming a baseball player. I never finished it, but I always I envisioned it would end with me playing right field for the Pittsburgh Pirates.
But no matter what kind of awesome ending I wrote, it would never compare to God’s story.
I’m currently reading “Disciple” by Bill Clem, with a group of guys from my church. What Clem makes very clear very quickly is that all of this is God’s story and he has created us to play a part in it.
The other thing Clem makes very clear is that the story includes a hero, Jesus, who has been at the heart of it all since the creation of the world.
Our world, however, has ingrained in us that life is our story and we are the central character.
There is a big problem with that.
First, if we are left to write our own story, it will be boring.
“God’s story is mind-blowing because it is a compelling real story in which we are all playing a part,” Clem writes. “Lives, as amazing as they are, can never be a crowing achievement when lived within their own frame.”
The second thing that crushes the idea that we are the authors is when our spouses leave us, our children die from cancer or we get a pink slip at work.
How many of us would write that into our stories? As a husband and father and employee, my story would end with my wife and I rocking on a porch of a cabin in Tennessee, with our children and grandchildren pulling up the driveway to visit us.
Will that be the end of my story? Maybe. But if I die in a car accident this afternoon or my kids are diagnosed with some debilitating disease next week, how can I claim I am still authoring my own story?
When we lay down our pen and paper, fall to our knees and recognize God’s authorship in our lives, we can view life’s most unexpected hardships much differently.
Will there still be pain and heartache? Of course. But if we trust scripture, we see that God’s story ends with victory for all those who have put their faith in him and his son, Jesus.
Ah, Jesus, sweet Jesus, the hero of God’s story and our lives. Why is Jesus the hero and not me? We need a savior who can redeem us and put us in the family of God, so when our lives come to an end on earth, they can continue in his presence in heaven.
And we can’t do that on our own. We can’t do enough good to outweigh our bad. We need a hero.
Please consider the awesomeness that comes with playing a part in God’s story and the sweeping feeling of having a real-life hero be the savior of your life.
