Over the
last few weeks the Gospels have been parables, stories that Jesus uses to make
a point or to make several points. The
stories themselves may not be true, i.e. they happened detail for detail, but
the parables contain “truth.” I do not
want to speak to you today about any of the individual parables or stories but
to rather focus on God as the master story teller and the story that He has
unfolded for us since the creation of the world.
When we read
the great story about creation, especially today it invokes many feelings. There are those who have made science their
religion, it is science that gives us all the answers, the facts, if you
will. There are others who take the
story literally, when I say literally, I mean each and every word. They believe that religion or faith in
Scripture is the answer to all or the only answer. Then there are those who understand story
telling or dare I say the meaning of “myth.”
When we hear
the word “myth,” what do we think of?
Today it has come to mean a false story, fiction, or even a fable. The dictionary defines myth as, “a traditional story, especially one
concerning the early history of a people or explaining some natural or social
phenomenon, and typically involving supernatural beings or events.” A second definition is, “a widely held but false belief or idea.” What is the best way to describe that we
believe in myth or stories.
I am going
to give way some spoilers here but I think they will help with our
understanding of how myth or story telling is true and not false according to
the spirit of truth and not so much to the letter of the law or in the details. Some years
ago a great movie called, “The Life of Pi,” was released, a movie which did
real well and received great praise by fans and critics alike. The movie is a work of fiction. The movie tells a story of a young Indian boy
who becomes stranded at sea on a life boat along with a zebra, an orangutan, a
hyena, and a Bengal tiger. The hyena
kills the zebra and the orangutan and eventually the Bengal tiger kills the
hyena. It comes down to the boy and the
tiger, both survive. When the boy is
rescued he tells the insurance people of the boat that sank this story, the one
with the animals. The men do not believe
it and demand he tells the truth of what happened! So he tells them another story, one in which
he makes it to the life boat along with the cook, his mother, and two others
from the boat. The cook kills the two
others and the boy’s mom and eventually the boy kills the cook in order to
survive. This second story is the real
one and the one that the insurance agents will bring back home. At the end of the movie the Indian boy, now a
man, asks the journalist who has come to document his story which story does he
like better, the journalist tells him, “the one with the animals.” The Indian man responds, “so too with God.”
The story
with the animals is myth, it is not accurate to the letter, but it tells a
truth and a deep one at that. Another
example is J.R.R. Tolkien’s work the Lord of the Rings. Many if not almost everyone has either read
the books or saw the movies or both realize that his work is fantasy, it is
fiction, there is no middle earth or dwarves, elves, or orcs. But the story tells a truth, it tells a truth
about good and evil, of courage, perseverance, virtue, and even a parallel
salvation history to that of the bible.
There is a
scene in the movie, “The Hobbit,” when Gandalf the Wizard is trying to convince
Bilbo to go on the adventure with the other dwarves by telling him a story of
his great, great, great, grandfather Bullroarer Took who defeated the Goblin
armies that invaded the Shire.
Bullroarer Took was the largest Hobbit ever and rode a horse and took
off the chief Goblins head with one fell swoop sending it a hundred yards eventually
landing in a hole. The invasion was
ended and the game of golf invented all at once. Bilbo said to Gandalf, “I believe you made
that up.” Gandalf responds, “All good
stories deserve some embellishment.” The
story of Bullroarer took is true in the world of the Hobbit, but Gandalf added
some things but they didn’t mean that the entire story was false.
Another way
to explain this is that we are all story tellers; we love to tell stories, of
our families and friends, of the good old days.
We add to those stories, the traditions handed down in our families
become larger than life, the stories in their essence are true, but analogies
are added and even embellishment.
Could this
be the case with the Scriptures? We need
some clarification here. The Scriptures,
both Old and New Testament contain many different forms of writing, i.e.
poetry, songs and hymns, prophetic literature, e.g. Revelation, letters, books,
reflections, and literal recording of events.
One has to know what type of literature is set before them. You cannot read poetry as literal historical
events just as you cannot take literal historical records and read them as
poetry.
The Book of
Genesis is a story. How much of it is
historically accurate I cannot say, it could very well be the same story as the
“Life of Pi,” or even “The Lord of the Rings.”
Both stories tell a truth as does the Book of Genesis. The Truth in the Book of Genesis is that
there is a God, He created the world, we all come from the same parents, who
somewhere along the line fell to sin, they could not redeem themselves, they
would need God’s help, that’s it in a nut shell. Some want to believe that the story is
literal, but that can be disproven quite easily. When you look at the light of certain stars
in the night sky they are billions of miles away, that light would have taken
10,000 years to reach the earth, therefore the universe cannot be 6,000 years
old as some claim. On the other hand
some would have us believe that Genesis is a myth in the sense of a lie, that
it’s just a story someone made up and it’s a story to keep people in fear and
intellectual chains. They would also be
mistaken as the story God is telling is true in the sense of Truth, just as all
stories are.
I recommend that
you watch a video on Lewis and Tolkien debating myths and lies on youtube, its
acted out but it is done brilliantly, both men had great faith, Tolkien had a
great influence on Lewis converting to Christianity and one of their great
discussions was based on myths vs. lies, the meaning of storytelling.
We are all
story tellers, maybe not as good as Tolkien or Lewis, but nevertheless we
tell stories and we love hearing them, even Jesus told stories, almost all
the time, for Him it was mostly in parables.
God Himself is the greatest story teller; it’s still the greatest
selling book in all of history, the Bible.
I pray that you all will immerse yourselves in the greatest story ever
told, from beginning to end, that when you read the story you will recognize
the literature, but more importantly the “Truth” behind and in each every
story. But also to remember and this
is important, you are all characters in the story, the story would not be
complete without you.
FJ
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