Life, if you'll notice, is a story. It comes to us the way a story does, scene by scene. You don't get to know it in advance - you have to enter, take the journey as it unfolds. It might be raining. There's a traffic jam. Your friends might call you out to chill. You might lose your job.
Life unfolds like drama. Each day has its own beginning and an end. There's all sorts of characters, all sort of settings. When one chapter closes, another begins. Sometimes, it feels like an adventure. Sometimes, a tragedy. Other times, a comedy or soap opera.
When it comes to figuring out this life you're living, you would do well to know the rest of the story. If you want to get to know someone, you need to know their story. Their life is a story. It, too unfolds in a series of scences over the course of time. Why is Grandpa so grumpy over us watching Japanese love dramas? Well, he's a P.O.W during the Japanese Occupation and while he was there, he saw some things he has never been able to forget.
I expect all of us, at one time or another, in an attempt to understand our lives or discover what we ought to do with ours, have gone to someone else with our stories. "Tell me what happened. Tell me your story and I'll try to help you make sense of it."
We humans share these lingering questions: "Who am I really? Why am I here? Where will I find life? What does God want of me? Where does it come from? This quest. This thirst. The need to solve life's mysteries with the simplest of questions. What is the soul? Why do we dream? Perhaps we are better off not looking at all. Not doubting. Not yearning. But there's not human nature... not the human heart. The answers to these questions seem to arrive only when we know the rest of the story. As Neo said in Matrix Reloaded," I just wish I knew what I'm supposed to do." If life is a story, what is the plot? What's your role to play? It would really be good, wouldn't it? What's this all about?
In most train stations and shopping malls, you can find a huge map with a big red star indicating 'You are here'. The maps offer vistors an orientation of their, more often than not, unfamiliar surroundings. Ahhh... so this is where you're in that picture. Hopefully you now know where to go. You have your bearings.
Doesn't it sound like something in our lives? "This is the story in which you found yourself in. Here's how it got started. Here's where it went wrong. Here's what will happen next. Now this - this is the role you've been given. If you want yo fulfil your destiny, this is what you must do. These are your cues. And here's how things are going to turn out in the end."
We can... we can discover the Story. Maybe not with perfect clarity and details... but some clarity would worth something... at least better than having nothing at all. What exactly are you clear on these days? How about your life - why have things gone the way they have? And do you know what you ought to do next, with a deep conviction and confidence that it will work out? Neither do I. I would love to wake up each morning knowing exactly who I am and where God's taking me. Zeroed in on all my relationships and undaunted in my calling. It's wonderful when I do see. But for most of us, life seems more like driving along a highway with a grimy windshield. I can sort of make out the shapes ahead and I think the light's green. You may know your destination but accidents do happen when fate deals you a bad card. Then one fine day, you realise not all things are within your control, just because you kept to the rules of the game. You can still be penalised for things you didn't commit.
We all share the same dilemma - we long for life and we're not sure where to find it. Our days spent on this earth come to us as a riddle, and answers aren't readily available. We must journey to find the life we prize. And the guide we have been given is the desire set deep within. The greatest life tragedy is to simply give up the search. To lose heart is to lose everything. There is a desire within each of us, in the deep centre of ourselves we call our heart. We are born with it, it is never satisfied, and it never dies. We're often unaware of it, but it is always awake... Our true identity, our reason for being, is to be found in this desire.
The clue to who we really are and why we're here comes to us through our heart's desire.
