Yeah, I've Heard That Story Before...

Brad Sullivan

2 Christmas, Year A

Sunday, January 5, 2014

St. Mark’s, Bay City, TX

Jeremiah 31:7-14
Psalm 84
Ephesians 1:3-6,15-19a
Matthew 2:13-15,19-23

Last week, I watched two movies, a horror/thriller named “The Purge” and a sci-fi/action movie called Elysium.  They were basically the same movie.  A rather dystopian future, the haves vs. the have-nots, things going pretty well for the haves until the struggles of the have-nots spilled over into the lives of the haves.  In one of the movies, this story was told as a horror story.  In the other movie, this story was told as a sci-fi movie.  The plots were different, but the story was the same.

Now, as a horror movie, “The Purge” was like a lot of movies I’ve seen before, and I turned to Kristin at one point and said, “yeah, kinda bored now because I really like the premise, but at this point, I’ve seen this movie before; it’s like several other horror movies and thrillers that I’ve seen.”  We kept watching, though, and by the end, I realized that this other story, the story of the haves vs. the have-nots was really the story that was being told.  So, I enjoyed it and it was nice to see the story told in a different way.  Same with the Sci-fi movie, “Elysium”, as a sci-fi movie, I had seen it before, but it was a different way of seeing the overarching story of the struggle between the haves and the have-nots.

There are stories that are told and re-told over and over again, and it the stories are well told, we seem not to tire of them.  Most of the movies we see, we’ve seen before with different actors, a different plot, different script, and a different name, but the basic stories, we’ve seen and heard over and over again.  How many romantic comedies do we have to see to know the story?  A couple meets, they fall in love, they fight, and then they get back together in the end. 

Exposition, conflict, climax, resolution…creation, fall, judgment, redemption, re-creation:  this is the very basic story we see and hear in almost every story we see and hear, and we pretty much don’t tire of it.  That’s because God wrote this story into the very fabric of the world:  creation, fall, judgment, redemption, re-creation.  I guess we pretty well authored the “fall” part of the story, but then God took what we wrote and used it to end the story with redemption and re-creation.  This is the story of our lives, the story of the Gospel, God taking our stories and redeeming them into his Gospel story. 

In Matthew’s telling of the story of Jesus’ life, we see Jesus’ life mirroring somewhat the story of the creation of Israel.  Jesus started in Israel, the land of promise, then went to Egypt, and then made his way back to Israel.  This was the story of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and his sons who fled to Egypt during the famine, became a numerous people, and then journeyed back to Canaan, the land of promise, to become the nation of Israel.  Israel went through the waters of the Red Sea and then spent 40 years in the wilderness becoming faithful servants of God.  Jesus was baptized in the Jordan River and then spent 40 days in the wilderness being tempted by Satan, being strengthened to remain and fully become (in his humanity) the faithful servant of God that he was.

Matthew told the story of Jesus’ life through the lens of scripture, constantly quoting scripture and showing how Jesus’ life fulfilled scripture.  Have you known folks who can quote scripture?  Often people do this to teach or tell others how life is or how they should be.  There’s no Bible to thump, so they thump other people with their knowledge of scripture.  Sometimes folks quote scripture, however, because scripture has become the lens through which they view their lives.  The stories of scripture are our stories and they make sense of our lives.  Like Matthew telling the story of Jesus, our lives tend to make sense when we narrate them through the stories of scripture.  You don’t have to be able to quote scripture in order to do this.  Even if you can’t quote it, the story, the Gospel story over and over again, is your story, woven into your very being. 

Jesus is the story of all creation told in one human’s life.  Jesus is the Gospel story.  Most of us have heard this story over and over again, and we tend not to tire of it because Jesus is God’s story, woven into the fabric of creation, told and re-told over and over again throughout our history.  Jesus’ story is the story of our lives, woven into us even as we were being formed in the womb. 

Now, have you ever heard a story that ends prematurely?  Creation, and no fall.  Fall and no judgment.  Judgment without restoration and re-creation.  We tend not to like these stories as much.  Stories that end early leave part of the narrative of creation out of them.  They aren’t full stories.  We hate hearing or telling these partial, incomplete stories, and yet often, sadly, people live out these incomplete narratives. 

Imagine the prodigal son choosing not to go back to his father, too proud to turn around and admit he was wrong, or imagine that once he did go back, he simply told his dad he wanted more money, skipping redemption and re-creation and going straight back to fall.  That would make a lousy story, and yet it is the kind of story many people choose to live.  

Sometimes we don’t let this incomplete narrative be the story of our entire lives, but just the story of some relationships in our lives or just the story of some poor decisions in our lives.  Our pride, our arrogance, our fear, our hurt, etc. keeps us holding on to the one part of the narrative we can pretty well author for ourselves…the fall.  Now the fall may be terrible, we may be miserable and hate it, but it’s ours.  We wrote it.  We can keep writing it, and no one, by God, can take it away from us. 

Well, Jesus didn’t come here to take our hurts away from us.  Jesus didn’t come here to take our broken relationships and poor decisions away from us.  Jesus came here to redeem our hurts, to redeem our broken relationships and poor decisions.  Jesus came here to finish the story woven into the fabric of creation and to help us to finish our stories. 

Sometimes that means we’re going to have to take a journey.  If we’re going to allow God to finish our stories with the story of the Gospel, with redemption and re-creation, then we might first have to go to Egypt and make the long slow journey back.  Imagine if Israel had not spent 40 years in the wilderness becoming faithful and obedient to God, if God had said, “yeah, y’all are not really faithful to me at all, but go on in, have the promised land.”  That would have been a terrible story because they would not have been the light to the nations that God formed them to be.  The story would not have been complete.  Imagine if Joseph had not trusted in God to journey to Egypt with an infant / toddler.  That was likely no simple journey and relocation, and Joseph could have decided that he had just about had it with God’s interference in his life and that he was going to stay right where he was.  That probably wouldn’t have made for a very good story once Herod showed up. 

Living out the Gospel story in our lives and allowing God to redeem our stories means we may have to travel far out of our comfort in what we do.  Reconciling past hurts with people is no easy task, but then again, staying angry or hurt makes for a terrible story because it’s not the story of the Gospel.  Having a desire to serve other people, noticing the needs around us, is no easy task, like Joseph fleeing to Egypt, but then again, having a desire and an ability to help others and choosing not to makes for a terrible story because it’s not the story of the Gospel. 

Whatever is on your heart right now, service, or forgiveness, or a need for healing or to be healed, allow God to finish your story.  You know the basics of the narrative, you know where your story is leading…redemption and re-creation.  Now, you may have a long slog before you get there.  You may have to go to Egypt before coming back to the promised land, but trust in God on that journey.  Trust that Jesus has already made that journey, that he has lived and told your story, your basic story, because it is the story of the Gospel, woven into the fabric of creation.  Amen.