What if this is all just a nice story?
1 Story + 3 Quick Things
One Short Story
“Can it really be true?”
That question tumbles through my mind more than I care to admit.
It crashed through my head when I read about the flooding in Texas.
It shook my soul a few weeks ago as I walked through the slums of Kenya, hearing stories of unimaginable tragedy.
It rattles my heart when I listen to friends going through deep, personal pain.
Can the story of Christianity really be true? I mean … just look at the world crashing down all around us!
There is a writer I love named Frederick Buechner. I was initially drawn to him because of an experience he had in seminary in which a professor told him that he could stay and become a mediocre preacher or leave and become an incredible writer. (I too left seminary to pursue writing. I’ve avoided becoming the former but am still in constant pursuit of the latter.)
But I think the reason I return to Buechner again and again is because he is just so honest.
Here is a line from an interview he did with PBS in 2003:
“What gets me back to church, I think, is thinking maybe this time that question "Is it true?" will be answered, not just in terms of somebody saying, "Yes, it's true," but something will happen in a sermon or maybe shuffling up to the Eucharist, or in the old lady who's sitting beside me with a Bible - maybe something will happen which will show me that it's true. So I go back thinking, maybe this time I'll be lucky.”
Is this really true?
Can any of this be real?
I mean seriously. Talking serpents? A talking donkey? Floating axe heads? Fish swallowing and regurgitating wayward prophets? Ghastly apparitions appearing from beyond the grave? People being healed? The blind seeing? The lame walking? The dead being raised?
The Son of God walking among us?
The hope that someday everything sad will come untrue?
That one day a King will return and set the world right?
That the Creator of the universe loves me and loves you and has a wonderful plan for our lives?
Can it really be true?
Are we actually expected to believe all of this?
Or is it just a good story?
On the days when these questions rattle through my head, there is a passage from a children’s book that I find helpful.
It’s a scene in the Silver Chair (the most underrated of the Chronicles of Narnia books IMO) in which the children and their pessimistic friend Puddleglum, finally find the prince they have been searching for.
Their journey has taken them deep underground, below Narnia, into the heart of the Witch’s lair. The Witch has kept the prince under a spell for years—he is only himself one hour out of every day. The children find him, start to untie him, but the Witch breaks in and catches them.
Rather than kill them, she simply lights a cozy fire, plucks her mandolin, and whispers to them in a soothing voice …
“There is no land called Narnia.”
“Yes, there is, though, Ma’am,” said Puddleglum. “You see, I happen to have lived there all my life.”
“Indeed?” said the Witch. “Tell me, I pray you, where that country is?”
“Up there,” said Puddleglum, stoutly, pointing overhead. “I—I don’t know exactly where.”
“How?” said the [Witch], with a kind, soft, musical laugh. “Is there a country up among the stones and mortar of the roof?”
“No,” said Puddleglum, struggling a little to get his breath. “It’s in Overworld.”
“And what, or where, pray is this… how do you call it… Overworld?”
“Oh, don’t be so silly,” said [one of the children]. “As if you didn’t know! It’s up above—up where you can see the sun and the stars.”
“You see?” said the Witch, turning to them all with a gentle smile. “What is this sun that you all speak of? Do you mean anything by the word? ... Your sun is a dream, and there is nothing in that dream that was not copied from the lamp. The lamp is the real thing; the sun is but a tale, a children’s story.”
“There never was any world but mine,” she said. “There never was any world but mine.
The alarming thing in the book is that the children actually begin to believe her. They come to think that perhaps all of this is just a dream.
But then good old, skeptical, wet-blanket, Puddleglum just stamps out the fire and says:
“One word, Ma’am,”
Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up all those things—trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan (a stand-in for Christ) himself. Suppose we have … I’m going to stand by the play-world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. So thank you kindly for our supper, but we’re leaving this court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland.”
And with that the spell was broken.
Can it really be true?
If you ever find yourself asking that question, take heart. You are in great company.
It’s a question asked by people like John the Baptist (the cousin of Jesus), Peter (the Rock), Thomas (who legend has it took the gospel all the way to India), and many, many others.
When that question comes, let us be like our Narnian friend Puddleglum, who echoed the father in Mark 9:24 who said:
“I believe. Help me with my unbelief.”
What this world might need most are people like me and you—willing to spend our lives searching for the one true, beautiful story.
Photo cred: Unsplash Rowan Freeman
Three Quick Things:
A Question to Consider: Where do you find comfort when doubts come?
A Quote to Ponder: “I have learned that faith means trusting in advance what will only make sense in reverse.” - Philip Yancey
A Book to Read: The Mythmakers: The Remarkable Fellowship of C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien by John Hendrix. This beautifully written and illustrated graphic novel tells the story of the friendship of these two famous two writers. It’s told from the perspective of a cartoon lion and wizard and dives deep into the lives of these two men, the stories that inspired them, and how they impacted each others’ lives, faith, and writing. It is as fun as it is enlightening!