Tell the Story...

Bruce Feiler told a story in the New York Times last week...from his latest book.  Seems that children who know the family "story" are more secure, better adjusted, and more successful.  Two months after this initial research, the Twin Towers were destroyed.  Following up on the research proved again that children who knew the family story were better able to cope.  The researchers "Do You Know Scale" measures 20 questions like: Do you know where your grandparents grew up?  Do you know where your mom and dad went to high school?  Do you know where your parents met?  Do you know of something terrible that happened in your family?  Do you know the story of your birth?

Kids who see themselves as part of a larger story, part of a longer tradition, have better abilities to deal with real life (the researchers say it far more eloquently, of course).  This ability to answer 20 questions about your family is "the best single predictor of children's emotional health and happiness."

There are different family narratives, some positive, some negative.  The strongest families have an "oscillating" narrative--one that acknowledges problems as well as positives.  And all this got me thinking...

We, the family of faith, also have a narrative.  And that narrative places us in an even larger, more remarkable, family context.  Just like family stories get interpreted in different ways, so do the stories of the family of God. Sometimes the story gets told in all negative terms...all the terrible things people did and how God had to punish the people, ultimately sending and killing his Son to pay some price for the sin of the world.  Yuck.

Or, there's the all positive narrative.  Just become part of the family of God...believe-in-the-Lord-Jesus-Christ-as-your-personal-Lord-and-Savior and everything will be wonderful.  Of course, things are seldom all "wonderful," so the narrative then goes "well, clearly you didn't believe right, or hard enough, or do the right things."  The family of God struggles to live in an impossible standard, hiding the difficulties of life because they don't fit in the narrative. Yuck.

And there's the narrative I read.  The family of God does some things well, and some things not so well.  David is chosen by God and anointed King of Israel...but there's this adultery thing with another man's wife.  Not so good.  The Exodus story...powerful narrative of God hearing the cries of God's people and bringing them out of slavery.  But as soon as God's people escape the cruelty of the Pharaoh and find themselves in a new place, they begin to grouse and complain that God has brought them out "to die."  Things were definitely better in Egypt...making those bricks wasn't so bad.  At least they had food to eat.

It's pretty easy for us to read those stories and lament the shortsightedness of the people--failing, of course to see our own shortsighted behaviors in the present.  But the biblical narrative addresses that, too.  This incredible story, this narrative, tells us that our earliest ancestors grew up in a state of perfect relationship with God...a very brief state.  We didn't respond well to the opportunity to live that way, preferring the attempt to be gods over the ability to be with God.  But, we see through the whole story, that God never abandons us to our ridiculous ambitions.  God continues to teach and protect, guide and work toward reconciliation and redemption of the whole creation.

Do you know of something terrible that happened in your family?  Sure.  Exile, wilderness, crucifixion.  And through it all, God continues to teach and protect guide and work toward reconciliation and redemption of the whole creation.

Do you know the story of your birth?  The baptism that happens before we are able to respond to God in any way, the baptism that marks our sorry, sinful selves as beloved children of God.  The baptism that assures us, in spite of the brokenness that is so deep we cannot escape, that God will continue to teach and protect, guide and work toward reconciliation and redemption of the whole creation.  The baptism that sets us apart, not as special and above creation, but as children of the family of creation charged to tell God's story so that others can answer the questions.  It is in this hessed, this steadfast, unfailing love that God brings to the table, that "we live and move and have our being."  It is this narrative that, even for human families broken beyond repair, is the narrative that offers a meaningful, purposeful life, an ability to deal with all the challenges of simply being human, a connection to the overwhelming grace of a loving God.

So, let's play 20 questions...