Stories Pt. 1: The Story

 The sun is rising, birds are singing, and everything is exploding to life in every color imaginable! Happy May morning, my friends, and welcome to another ramble with Rachael! 

There is just something about stories that draws us in, isn't there? There's something about a twist of words, a turn of the plot, that makes us turn the page and delve deeper into mysteries previously unheard of. There's something wild and majestic in a story, something that is beyond us to understand.

Yet it is something that draws us irresistibly. 

The books among my favorites are not so because they have only a splash of romance (Fawkes), a daringly dangerous quest (Lord of the Rings), swordplay (The Knights of Arrethtrae), or harrowing intrigue (The Book of the Wars). Yes, those things only make me love them more, but that's not why I go back and read them again. And again. And again.

It's the ache I have when I finish reading them that puts them among my favorites.

Do you know what I'm talking about? 

It's that overwhelming feeling of emotion that rises in your chest, forces its way up your throat to your eyeballs, and makes you look rather silly if anyone else is there to see your tears. It's that moment when you get this lump in your throat and you ask yourself, Why am I bawling like a child?

Maybe this has happened to you... or you didn't know such people existed. Either way, I know I'm not alone in this. 

In Andrew Peterson's book Adorning the Dark (which you ALL should read!) he describes this foreign feeling as homesickness. It's the desire for a home not found in this world, something far beyond our human reach. In my not too extensive research, I have to find that I agree with him. 

I am hopelessly homesick.

I have asked myself so many times why I keep going back to the books. Why I ended up crying at the end of LotR and couldn't explain it to my mum. Why I bawled my eyes out when I finished The Wingfeather Saga and wished that such healing existed as came to pass in those books. 

My friends, such healing exists. In fact, it's already started!

John 3:16 may be as familiar to you as your own name. If it is, read it over again; if it isn't, read it extra slow. 

"For God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life."

God sent His Son to redeem us from the curse of sin. Instead of forcing us to pay the debt for our sin, a debt we never could have paid, Jesus gave Himself as the perfect sacrifice so that we could draw near to God. Isn't that the most wonderful news ever? 

But we know that this world is not perfect. Jesus paid the price, but things are not yet restored to perfection.

That's where the homesickness comes in. It's longing for the day when Jesus will return and every wrong will cease to be. 

It seems so far away, but I think it'll be sooner than we think.

Can you wait? I know I can't!

So pick up the book that makes your heart ache. Disappear to a world where wrongs are righted and healing runs wild. But don't stay in that world. Come back with the reminder that healing is here, and it's here to stay.

And look forward to the day when it will be complete.

Tally ho!

Rachael Anne