Last night at the Underrowers meeting (Underrowers is the name of the Campus Outreach student leadership team at Berry) our Campus Director, Rob, asked us how we felt about God writing a cosmic story and each of us having a specific part to play in it. A few different answers were given - some felt fearful that they wouldn't know what their part was or be able to fulfill it, others felt excited that they were unique in something so big. Still others felt a since of urgency, If I have a part to play, I need to be making the most of that part now. I didn't answer, at least not out loud, but it doesn't mean I wasn't feeling something. Something very big.
Actually, my initial reaction was I don't know how I feel about that, an answer I'm sure my therapist has had it up to HERE with hearing from me. In a matter of seconds, however, I went from I don't know, to good, I think? to totally and completely at peace, simultaneously set free and yet nestled tightly in the arms of confidence in the goodness of the Author.
If God has written a story of redemption beginning with the Trinity in eternity past and continuing on through created shalom, fallen shalom, and shalom restored, then this makes God an Author. The Author. How sweet of The Lord to give a picture of Himself through something a bibliophile lives and breathes for, namely that of story.
The author of a story (at least more times than not) knows the ending before he or she even begins writing. With that ending mind, every decision is intentional. Every character looks a certain way, speaks a certain way, even has a certain name for a reason, sometimes only realized after the story has been completely read. Other times the reason remains clouded to the readers but ever so purposeful and close to the author's heart. The author is not arbitrary; he has not only an ending in mind but also a zeitgeist he is creating within the book. In addition he is making smaller points on his way to The Point of his work.
Authors are invested in their characters - even the antagonists are there for a reason, and because they stem from the author's own intellect, (dare I say even his own soul?), they are a part of him, written into the story as a reflection of his creativity and desires and wisdom. The author may destroy the evil ones in his story and even the "good" ones, too. He has the power to kill and to make alive, and though he may do so with a heavy heart, longing that the character and all it's unique faculties and dynamics could live on forever, he knows that in light of the end and in light of the point he is trying to make, it can be no other way. It is best, even when the reader is angry about it.
I often read books simply because I am familiar with an author and his or her work. I've enjoyed the things they have written in the past, and thus can confidently choose to pick up their book next, even if the premise feels like I'm taking risk, reading outside of my normal litereary comfort zone. (Of course, that's one of the beautiful things about story - taking a risk, diving into a world full of unknowns and possibilities, but at the same time feeling safe, knowing that as the reader you can only go so far- at the end of the day you are still at home snuggled in bed, getting ready for lights out). In the story of redemption, we are in a unique place: we are both the characters God has intentionally written (He knows every hair on our head), and we are the reader, boldly placing our trust in the Author because we know His work, and we know it is good.
A perfect Author can write no other than a perfect story which means the part I have to play is also perfect. Not perfect in the sense that I have no faults or that my own meta story isn't full of hurt and heartbreak and ugliness, because it certainly is. But perfect in the sense that within the larger story I am bringing glory to my Creator and participating in the renewal of all things. I already know this to be the ending, an ending which of course is not an ending at all but a beginning. The Author is making all things new.
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