The Ordinary World

I can’t prove it, but I think that when God was deciding that heat would rise and that minor keys would sound sad, he defined some rules for Story. These are things that make a Story different from any other assemblage of words and ideas. And when he set the rules of Story, he designed them to parallel the  life of his son, Jesus Christ. Now, every time I look closely at a movie I see things that reflect the One True Story.

Modern story structure identifies 12 steps. I thought it might be interesting to reflect on the Gospel through the lens of Story, starting with:

The Ordinary World

In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.

John 1:1

Every story has a beginning. At the movies we typically meet our hero going about his everyday life, doing his normal, everyday things, content in his Ordinary World. In some movies, the hero’s life is extremely glamorous, infinitely more thrilling than our own. Yet it’s his version of normal. Other times we are introduced to an ordinary Joe, comfortable in his natural habitat. Life has a rhythm, problems are few (or at least manageable), there’s no real conflict. If the storyteller keeps us in the ordinary world there is no story. Story requires forward momentum and conflict, and neither is happening right now. The purpose of step one is to show us things about our main character.

Think about your favorite movie. What is the main character doing when we first meet her? Is she getting her children ready for school? If so, then we assume this is going to be a story about a woman caring for her family. Depending on the setting, we might start making some assumptions: She’s probably middleclass, on the PTA, the sort who likes her coffee with caramel and whipped cream. And then, as soon as the kids are the bus, she straps on a gun. Oh, that’s new. With this new revelation our perspective of the character changes, as well as our expectations for the story.

John begins his gospel at the very, very beginning. He starts it so far back we cannot even wrap our minds around it, because he starts it in a moment before time. How do we know? Because John tells us “He was in the beginning with God.” After that, he says, “All things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made.” First, Jesus existed. Then, creation began.

In that first line we see Jesus in his ordinary world, and we learn a few things about him: He is God, and as the Word he has always been present. He was an active part of creation. In the first part of verse four John tells us, “In him was life.” God is not some impersonal force. He is life. The essence of what separates the inanimate from the animate dwells in his very being. He has life, personality, the ability to develop relationships.

Often in the first twenty minutes of the movie we will see the hero offer an act of kindness to someone or something that can’t help itself. Typically it’s a brief moment, designed to let us know, “Hey, this is a good guy. You might forget that over the course of the movie. But when no one was looking, he made that baby smile/rescued that dog/returned that lady’s purse.” The moment can be so quick we might forget about it later, though hopefully an impression is made.

The second part of verse four states, “and the life was the light of men.” Jesus had life within him, but he did not just keep it to himself. He has shared it with humanity. When God created the world, he made man and woman last. He could have stopped before going that far. He could have made humans as unaware as any of the other animals. But instead he chose to share life.

Obviously, there are many stories in the Bible. Jesus is not the only one who goes on a journey. In Ephesians 2 the Apostle Paul reminds us of our Ordinary World: “You were dead in your trespasses and sins.” There aren’t many worse places to start out from than dead. And it gets worse. Paul goes on to say that we were “following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air (Satan).” Dead and following Satan? Yikes.

And what were we like in our ordinary world? “We all once lived in the passions of our flesh,” Paul says, “carrying out the desires of the body and the mind, and were by nature children of wrath.” Wrathful children do not perform acts of kindness, like rescuing cats from trees. Wrathful children kick dogs. Consider the most disturbing post-apocalyptic movie you have ever seen. Zombies roam the streets, and Big Brother watches humanity’s every move. Emotions are outlawed, and innocents fight to the death. Paul says that life before Christ was worse than that.

Where are you in your story? The Ordinary World is a familiar place, and it can be difficult to leave it. Anything beyond our known borders is frightening, and what’s the rush? Won’t it (whatever “it” is) always be out there? We can feel held back by past mistakes, injuries, or loved ones.

Or have you left the Ordinary World behind? If so, it’s important that we remember where we came from. Paul spends so much time in Ephesians 2 reminding us of life in the Ordinary World so that he can emphasize, “Even when we were dead in our trespasses, [God] made us alive together with Christ -- by grace you have been saved.” We were dead. God made us alive. He built the bridge out of the Ordinary World and carried us across. No one can take credit for saving himself.

“For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not of your own doing; it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so no one may boast.”

Ephesians 2:8,9