As a young girl of ten, I loved writing stories of romance and hard-fought love. Make no mistake: I knew nothing of such topics except from what I learned while watching television shows such as Dallas. (My parents had their strengths, but supervising my television viewing wasn’t one of them.) And in case you’ve never seen Dallas, let me assure you that ideas of love from its characters, like J.R. and Sue Ellen, weren’t exactly what you’d call healthy and wholesome. And it would be a couple of years before I fell in love with reading classic stories involving more age-appropriate sweethearts such as Anne and Gilbert, Laura and Almanzo, and Elizabeth and Mr. Darcy.
One late afternoon, my daddy noticed me writing furiously in my pink journal under an oak tree at our Oklahoma home. He walked over to me, knelt down, and asked,
“Whatcha writin’ about, honey?”
I didn’t even look up as I told him dreamy plot lines of fascinating people in far-off places.
After listening, he patted me on the back and said gently, “Wow, that sounds like an exciting story! You know, though, a lot of good writers write about the people and places they know.”
“Uh-huh,” I said, waving my hand flippantly in the air. I thought, What could I possibly write about as a country girl in Oklahoma!? Boring to the max.
In college, I put my love of writing on a shelf as my social life and schoolwork took center stage. At that time, I also met a good-lookin’ fella named David. A few years later, we married and had three beautiful babies together.
When those babies were young and David was across an ocean from me, the evenings were mighty lonely. Remembering how writing often felt like a friend, I picked it back up from the shelf and began exercising that muscle after the kids fell asleep. Taking my dad’s advice, I started writing more about what I knew – or at least what I was learning – about marriage, motherhood, military life, and friendship.
Why have I always loved writing? There are several reasons, but the one that stands out most is because I love stories. This love came from my dad, who used to tell bedtime stories to my sisters and me every night. As we snuggled under our Holly Hobbie bedspreads, he told us tales of growing up on the Oklahoma prairie with a large, loving family. He entertained us with stories of mischief involving his horse Smokey and his dog Queenie.
By sharing those stories with me, my dad anchored and comforted me within my own story.
There’s something about seeing our story within the Father’s that anchors and comforts us in the story we’re living today.
Whether you’re a writer or not, your life is a story. You may have chapters that you’d like to cut out and throw away. At the very least, you’d like to rewrite some pages. Perhaps parts of your story read like a tragedy or maybe even something that could’ve worked as a script for Dallas. I get that because parts of my story read that way as well. I have chapters I’d like to change where the choices of others hurt me terribly. I’ve also made choices that I’d like to go back and change as they’ve negatively affected others.
If this describes you, too, know that we’re both in good company. David from the Old Testament experienced terrifying plotlines because of the actions of others, like a king bent on trying to kill him (1 Samuel 18:11 – 1 Samuel 23). David himself made terrible choices that brought devastating consequences to others, too, like summoning a married woman to his bedroom and then having her husband killed (2 Samuel 11-12:23).
David repented for his sins and even though his life’s story held heaps of heartache, he said that the Lord “…has redeemed my soul out of every adversity…” (1 Kings 1:29).
You and I are no different: Our own broken and bewildering plotlines won’t end before reaching a redeeming conclusion, too.
Recently, a portion of Colossians spoke a fresh message to my heart. Here, Paul prays for the people of Colossae to be “…strengthened with all power, according to [God’s] glorious might, for all endurance and patience with joy; giving thanks to the Father, who has qualified you to share in the inheritance of the saints in light” (Colossians 1:11-12, emphasis mine).
You have inherited a good story because you are written into His story, and the story He is writing is very good. No matter that it includes broken relationships, broken hearts, and broken people. In God’s hands, no story is past redemption. We have that assurance because God sent His only Son, Jesus, to die on the cross so every wrong could be made right.
This is what I’ve come to know: No plot is too far gone, too hope-gone. If you can’t yet see the good in your story, take heart. Hope always dawns as God takes the most tangled mess of a tale and turns it into a tapestry of grace. May this truth about your story within the Father’s story anchor and comfort you today.
