Tell Me Your Story

So today I gave my first chapel sermon here at HUF and it went pretty well, although I rushed it a little as I tend to do when speaking. But I think the lesson was well-received by the group. They told me they liked it anyway. I also had a cough and am getting a cold, so it wasn't my best sermon ever.

But here it is, I'm posting it really for my Mom, because I know she'll ask me to do it anyway. And I think of all the sermons I've done-this one is my favorite, even better than that sermon I did about superheroes.

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So you've just died.

You've kicked the can. You've taken your last breath. You've passed on from this world. You've already seen your whole life pass before your eyes. The fat lady has sung. Life is over and the hereafter has begun.

And so with that final breath, as Hamlet might say, you have shuffled off your mortal coil and await what dreams may come. You step out of your body, look down at a face that had once been yours and but no longer is, and you're a bit confused about what to do next.

That's when you see it: a long, dark tunnel that had not been there before. With little options to choose, you begin walking down this tunnel, to see a small light waiting for you at the end. As you creep down this tunnel, the light is getting brighter and brighter with every step. A bright, white light that is coming closer and closer.

As you near the light, you begin to hear singing. You hear singing that is both beautiful and frightening, both majestic and terrifying.

And then you reach the light at the end of the tunnel. A bright, glorious and blinding light that envelopes and consumes you. And when your eyes become used to the light, you find yourself somewhere else.

Within this light you see giant pillars rising up, as thick as mountains, supporting a ceiling thousands of feet away. You see golden clouds drifting between the great pillars, passing only to show visions of art and glory crafted by hands not human.

On the floor of this majestic hall, a hall so great and massive you could lose the Sistine Chapel and all the palaces of the world quite easily if you weren't careful, and between the pillars and beneath the clouds, stood a chorus of a million angels, singing their songs in a language you've never heard before, but somehow understand. They are each creatures of starry flames, thunderous voices and eclipsing eyes.

And all their eyes are on you.

And then, as you turn from the chorus of angels, you see Him. You see the source of the ethereal light, the light that is far superior to the thousand-foot pillars, to the strange songs, to the fiery choir. He is the source of light, the source of life. Sitting on a throne large than the earth, surrounded by beings of a hundred wings and a thousand faces, surrounded by kneeling saints and inferior crowns. He is the Being of glorious, untainted, pure light covered in robes made from bursting suns and interwoven stars. A circle of swirling galaxies revolve around His head, a head that is the very pinnacle of all existence. His face is too indescribable for meager words and mortal imagination to comprehend.

And He is looking at you.

He is looking at you with eyes as bright as the Milky Way and as deep as the chasm of space. He wears an expression of what appears to be curiosity, an expression that contains every emotion bestowed to man, and then some that weren't.

You cower beneath the Almighty's gaze with the sum of all fears, with a trembling of Old Testament proportions. You stand there without your clothes, without your riches, without your body. You are standing beneath His gaze naked and laid bare. Needless to say, if you still had pants, you'd have wet them.

And then something unexpected happens: a human steps out of the One and Only. He steps out from the sunny robes and shining face. It is a man of average height, with dark, Middle-Eastern skin, wearing white robes and bearing holes in his hands and feet.

He walks up to you, completely at peace in this terrifying place, with a small smile on his face and his fingers caressing the hole in his hand, as if absent-mindedly. He looks at you in the eye, and says in a voice that may or may not be familiar, "Tell me your story."

"Tell me your story."

Over Christmas break, I read a book called "A Million Miles in a Thousand Years" by Donald Miller, one of my favorite authors. In this book, I learned that we are all characters in an epic novel being written by God. This is a novel full of mystery, intrigue, adventure, action, horror, romance, heroic deeds, sacrifice, and true love. And we are all the main characters.

As John 1:1-5 says, "In the beginning was the Word, and the word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life, and that life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."

Jesus is the Word of God and we are the stories that have been written with but that one word.

God expects us to live exciting lives, lives that involve leaving home and seeing the world, that involve taking risks and taking leaps of faith, that involves defying the odds and facing our giants.

I think that when we get to stand before God, He won't stack your good deeds against your bad ones. Or immediately raise His thumb to approve your entrance to Heaven or point it down to send you elsewhere. I think He'll ask us to tell our stories, our life stories down to every detail. After all, He is God, and you are naked, so you have nowhere to hide anything. You tell Him your life.

And how disappointing would it be to have to tell the Creator that you did not explore the world he created for exploring, to tell Him that you came across an obstacle, but did not have the faith to overcome it, to tell Him that you fought with sin, but did not defeat it. To tell Him that you gave into sin, and did not put up much of a fight.

Everybody loves a happy ending, including God.

And how disappointing would it be to tell God that He did not have a major role in your life's story, or that He was not even a part of it at all, even though He was the one who wrought your introduction.

So while you are here in Florence, and gallivanting across Europe, live adventurously, take those once-in-a-lifetime chances, close your eyes and take that great leap of faith.

And while you are living adventurously, live adventurously with God, make Him the main character of your own story, make Him the prologue, climax, and epilogue, make Him the title of every chapter.

So there you are, standing in Presence of the Almighty, at the feet of the Creator, among the angels and the saints, standing before the Christ Jesus, and you've been asked to tell your story.

So what is your story going to be?