Have I Got a Story for You...

Stories are so important. I guess I’m thinking along those lines because I miss getting to hear the stories of my family. My parents died 11 and 21 years ago; my grandparents much long ago than that. Our last link with the generations that went before us, my Great-Aunt Annie Sue, died in October at nearly 104.

Stories connect us to one another. We learn about ourselves as we hear them, not only about events in our lives and in our families, but about how we see the world, how we interact with others, about our sense of purpose, and other things.

I have a friend, Lou Ann Homan, who is a great storyteller. She keeps her community and family connected through her stories. She tells stories from the past that connect us with those who lived then. She tells stories from her family’s life that bring us in touch with a young family’s experience. She tells stories from life today that help us pay closer attention to the world and people around us.

I have said that stories “people our imagination.” The characters and situations from the stories—whether factually based or fictional—allow us to see them in action as though on a stage. We can try on different characters and roles, as though they are costumes. We experience responses from a somewhat safer distance. This can help us be more reflective, so that when we actually encounter something like it in our lives, we will have made preparations and maybe even some decisions about how we want to respond.

Our Director of Christian Education became concerned that while our children, and we adults, may learn particular stories they and we don’t really have a sense of them as a part of a much larger story. She is providing lessons each week that include “the connective” tissues. We are learning in our community life to talk about the “so what” of why we do what we do, or what we are trying to do. All this is to help us become more deeply aware of God’s story and of our part in it.

Now, have I got a story for you…

Joel 1:2-3

Hear this, O elders, give ear, all inhabitants of the land! Has such a thing happened in your days, or in the days of your ancestors? ³Tell your children of it, and let your children tell their children, and their children another generation.