Story Part 2

How you start a story matters and makes a difference.  As I said in the previous post, you could start with your profession...family...home state...current residence...and depending on which road you begin to travel will guide and ground the conversation.  So, where does God's story begin?  It begins NOT...as might be assumed...with Adam and Eve eating an apple, but with God craft and creating all that is seen and unseen.  More importantly, everything is called, "Good".  The Hebrew word here is, "Tov."  We begin with goodness, God-ness, the blessedness of Tov in our lives.  We are formed and fashioned with a prayer for blessing...not brokenness.  In fact, scripture never even says the words, "original sin."  What we do hear is original blessing and goodness.  I am grateful to Brian McLaren who helps us see the overarching narrative of Scripture moves from Creation to Crisis (in Genesis 3) to Call (or what I also think of as community/being the people of God in Exodus) to Conversations part 1 with Judges and Ruth to Conversations part 2 with the prophets to Christ to Church to Consummation.

That framework helps me not only in terms of understanding the Biblical story, but also my own story.  I have a beginning in Iowa, moving as a teenage which produced some crisis to a call from God in late adolescence to ministry to conversations I had in seminaries...to conversations I had in church (which is where you learn how much you don't know!) to encountering Christ to moments when I have experienced glimpses of grace in the church to moments of completeness.  Again, this is not about following a linear timeline one to the next.  Sometimes crisis leads to re-creation.  Or conversations find conclusion/consummation and even crisis.  These seven words dance together.  Mingle and mix together.  Inform and inspire each other.

So, I invite you this week, what do each of those words inspire or connect to your story?  How do they connect to your life?  I hope you will do this and as you do you might find more than a trace of God's grace in your life.

Grace and peace ~ Wes