Devotion 346 - story

We have told her the story a hundred times in her three years with us.

The story of getting on the plane.

The story of waiting in the little room with the red wall.  The story of seeing her for the first time in an image on our computer.  The story of love, of journey, of hope, of fear.

For well over three years, I have thought of it as our story. 

Then we heard her tell it, and it became unmistakably hers.

Someone once said, “A human being is nothing but a story with skin around it.”  It makes us pause and wonder.  Where does our story begin? What is the theme of our story?  Are we the hero, or possibly the villain?

Does our story keep our attention, or have we settled to be along for the ride of chapter after chapter of sleep, work and repeat? And the most compelling of all of questions, does our story have a happy ending?

Our daughter sat down among her kindergarten friends headed to their first field trip.  She sat as if the world was her oyster.  She has been in school for exactly one week.  

Every day I ask what she learned and who she played with. Every day, her responses read like a Paris fashion week.  “I played with the girl in the blue dress and the boy with the orange shirt.” At five, evidently names and occupations are not required.  I could learn from that.

Ava sat between two little girls.  Introductions suddenly became important.  Ava gave her name and then told her story.  She said she had been born in China and then, “finally”, as she emphasized her mom, dad, and her entire family came for her and brought her home.  She had a captive audience.  Both girls were wowed and responded with a “That is so cool,” approval.

My husband called me in tears and told me this tale.  He had been blessed to be the driver and the audience for the story.  Somehow we didn’t know this would be part of the story she would tell.  She was a wee girl of two when she came home to us.  But it is hers and hers alone.

All of us have a beginning and all of us will have an end.  The middle is the sum total of thousands and thousands of decisions, millions of mercies and even more grace. There are days when life feels random and there are many more days when life feels like ritual, but I am convinced it is the attitude with which we write that makes the difference.

Do we embrace our days with gratitude or do we look at life as something that happens to us instead of through us? Do we believe God has authored the Book?  Are we satisfied with a happy ending?  Or is our true mission eternal good?

There is something extraordinary in the telling of a story.  As I prepared for a garage sale, I fingered a dozen things my mother had gifted me.  Gone now for more than a dozen years, her story, parts and pieces are written in my heart.

My husband has his own story but then there is that crazy thing between us called a love story that bridges the two of us.  We can write a page of two just one of us, but then we come together and the story gains strength and meaning and truth and testimony.

My children.  Each one has a wild individuality.  I pray each and every day their stories honor God, each choice reflects their salvation and every chapter is sealed with passion for the glory that awaits them.  But as much as I would like, I cannot write it.  They were only lent to me, for a few pages, the rest is theirs.

Far too often I close books that pain me.  I have trouble casting myself as the one who surrenders instead of the Conqueror. This is unmistakably the economy of God.

Truly our story is meant to tell the greatest story.  Our ending was fashioned as the beginning.  When we reach the very end of ourselves that is where He begins.

We lend the pen to the Creator and we withhold nothing.  Only then can the creation begin to live as He intended and our story read with His redemption.

Let us fix our eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy set before him endured the cross, scorning its shame, and sat down at the right hand of the throne of God.

Hebrews 12:2

 There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you. 

Maya Angelou