Last Time…
At that time, the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who, then, is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?”
He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And He said: “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the humble position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. And whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes Me.”
- Matthew 18:1-5
I don’t have any children, but I was a child once. I was Curious - what might it look like to return to her? To sit down with her and listen to her stories? To get our hands messy together digging in the dirt? To paint something terrifically imperfect and hang it on the fridge anyway?
To ask her, ‘Beloved, how did you do it?’
Grand Storytellers
One of my most cherished childhood memories is laying in bed with my grand-mama and listening to her Stories. She had the best Stories, always full of nonsense like talking animals and giant beanstalks and wolves with extraordinary lung capacity. The ones I enjoyed most, however, were the ones we would make up together as we went along, partnering together as grand Storytellers.
I see this gift in my mama as she now recounts these same timeless tales to her own grandchildren. Somewhere along the way, I inherited this Beautiful gift of Storytelling, though it had been packed away for some years. I wondered - what might it look like to dust it off and polish it up a bit?
As I gave my undivided attention to the little girl sitting at my feet, she started telling me a Story, and I began writing it down.
As she Grew Up, oh, the Stories she would tell! It was what drew Peter to her in the first place. Let us pretend that we are tucked in next to the Lost Boys in their great bed and Listen to Wendy’s Story:
‘Quiet, Tootles. [Mr. & Mrs. Darling] had three Descendants.’
‘What is Descendants?’
‘Well, you are one, Twin.’
‘Did you hear that, John? I am a Descendant!‘
‘Descendants are only Children,’ said John.
‘Oh dear, oh dear,’ sighed Wendy...
‘They flew away,’ Wendy continued, ‘to the Neverland, where the Lost Children are...”
‘O Wendy,” cried Tootles, ‘was one of the Lost Children called Tootles?’
‘Yes, he was.’
‘I am in a Story! Hurrah, I am in a Story, Nibs!’
Aim Embodied
I’ve recently been fascinated with the philosophy of Story. What is a Story? Why are Stories so powerful? What is it about the sacred and ancient Stories and myths of Humanity that have stood the test of time - surviving thousands of years of Human history - that makes them so special?
In much of the research I’ve done, a common thread that stands out is that Story involves Perception. Story serves as a lens through which we see ourselves and the world around us. It not only reflects our identity, but shapes it. The Story that we tell ourselves is the Story that we tell the world - that is, it reflects our reality, and we reflect the world that it reveals. It is both a mirror and a map, showing us how to navigate forward and to understand what forward even means.
In his book We Who Wrestle with God, Dr. Jordan B. Peterson suggests that Story is the foundation of Perception: “The world has to be filtered through the mechanism of Story to become comprehensible or even apprehensible; because the world is simply too complicated to attend to and navigate within the absence of Aim and Character (which are defining features of Story itself).”
Aim, he offers, involves attention and action, whereas ‘Character’ is a direct result of habitual pursuit of Aim, or ‘Aim embodied’. When we tell a Story, we are Characterizing our Aims, the found obstacles and opportunities on the path toward that Aim, and the consequences, good and bad, of pursuing it.
But why does all this matter?
Because as the beloved author Kate Bowler says,
“We live in a Beautiful & Terrible world, and there is no cure for being Human.”
No cure for being Human.
How Beautiful & Terrible it is to be here.
To be alive.
To be Human.
Recognizing this, it makes sense that we would cherish descriptions of how to Perceive our reality and how to exist and survive in our world perhaps more highly than we would value anything else.
We become engrossed in the Stories we act out as children - Stories we observe on the stage or screen, or read in the works of fiction, even as adults - because there is nothing we need to know more than how to construct, adjust, and improve the hierarchy of value within which the relevant facts of the world realize themselves. That is how we come to construct the world we occupy, existentially. That is how we make the reality we inhabit.
- Jordan B. Peterson
A Transcendent Story
As I immersed myself in the magic and mystery of the childhood classics I grew up with, I started paying attention to the ways these Stories became a part of my own at such an impressionable age. I started to discover and understand the Story that I had been telling myself and the world to this point. I began to know my Character - who she was, who she is, who she is becoming.
The phenomenon I was experiencing is wonderfully described by Dr. Terry Briley in his book, Delighting in the Lord: The Story of Israel and the Christian Faith: “As we grow into adulthood, our education and experiences can lead us to edit the Story of our childhood. We tend to see ourselves as taking charge of our Story, even as the past and the present continue to shape us in ways of which we are not fully aware. In any case, we generally understand how to respond when someone says, ‘Tell me your Story.’”
Briley outlines three levels in which to organize our Perception of reality through Story. The first level he identifies as ‘My Story.’ It’s the one where you are the main Character and the focus is on an individual journey apart from anyone else’s. Take an infant child’s Story - it is all about them, all the time. Every need is demanded upon and immediately attended to, at any hour of the day or night, and we don’t fault them for it.
As we Grow Up, however, ‘My Story’ begins to shift to ‘Our Story’ as we find a sense of Belonging in the world with our families, communities and relationships. But we also find brokenness there.
As a result, distortions in these Stories can range from the extremes of narcissism in viewing the world solely through a ‘My Story’ lens, to a destructively intense loyalty to the multiple versions of ‘Our Story’ that justifies division, hostility, and even violence against what can be seen as threats.
A third level of Story is presented. It is one in which ‘My Story’ lies within ‘Our Story’ - a Story within a Story - that holds space for both constructs and Transcends - or, goes beyond, crosses over - the destructive aspects of the first two levels. A Story that would not eliminate either identity, but bring them both to wholeness.
Briley asks his reader, ‘What might it mean to live into a Transcendent Story?’
The discovery of such a Story and the qualities that make it so - the Good, the True, and the Beautiful things - became my Character’s new Aim.
I’m Curious...
If you were to sit down with your childhood self, what Stories would they tell you?
What parts of your childhood - joys, talents, gifts, dreams - have you packed away or forgotten? What would it look like to “dust them off” now?
Who has been a Storyteller in your life? What kind of Stories did they tell, and what impact did they leave on you?
How do the Stories that you read, watch, or tell affect your Perception of yourself and the world?
What Story have you been telling yourself and the world about who you are? About who God is?
What would it look like to partner with God as grand Storytellers of a Transcendent Story?
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