We live in stories. Stories are the language of our world. Think about your favorite movies or shows. They draw you in. You begin to feel what the characters feel. Their pain becomes your pain. Their victory becomes your victory. We enter stories and make them part of our own experience.
What is your favorite story? Why?
Stories are the most potent form of communication we have. Stories speak to the mind, the body, and the emotions—our spirits. In a story, we can identify with situations we have never been in.
Everyone has a story (or many), and ALL people are storytellers.
STORIES HAVE THE POWER TO . . .
Attract our attention, draw us in, and carry us along. Stories move and shape us, causing us to consider new possibilities—a new future.
Spark our imagination. The people in stories come to life in our imaginations. Stories touch our minds and emotions and invite us into the narrative, often evoking a personal response (curiosity, fear, agreement, etc.).
Build true community. Story promotes community (a story is a shared experience), and community fosters storytelling (a good experience and story beg retelling).
Indirectly challenge worldview. It is less/non-threatening when new information conflicts beliefs, old perception, morals, values, God concept, attitudes (Nathan and David in 2 Samuel 12:1–7).
Provide context and help us remember structure, setting, vocabulary, and categories. The understanding of critical ideas, such as sin, holiness, and rebellion, is more real and relatable when seen in a story. Links experiences to facts.
On Sept 29th we will start an experience we call the Story of God that we will spend 4 Sundays walking through. This is a resource that is used to connect us into the overarching narrative of the Bible. We talk about this story in six movements - Creation, Rebellion, Promise, Redemption, Church, Restoration.
We will start from the beginning Creation and walk through this story to Restoration or New Creation. If you feel like you know the story or if you have never read the story, this is for you. It is an oral telling of the story. Each week Sept 29, Oct 6, 13, 20, we will spend our Sunday morning gathering time listening to the story and interacting with it. Asking questions, dealing with the tensions and hope.
Make plans to come and join us for this time and invite others to join you.
We will kick off the Story of God Sunday, Sept 29th at 10 am and then follow it up with a shared meal around 12:30.