{"id":7162,"date":"2021-07-30T10:56:52","date_gmt":"2021-07-30T00:56:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/?p=7162"},"modified":"2021-07-30T10:56:54","modified_gmt":"2021-07-30T00:56:54","slug":"untold-but-not-unwritten","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/untold-but-not-unwritten\/","title":{"rendered":"Untold but not Unwritten"},"content":{"rendered":"
<\/div>\n

Untold but not Unwritten<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

By Bethany Kaldas<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

\u2018Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed.
And in Your book they all were written,
The days fashioned for me,
When\u00a0as yet there were\u00a0none of them<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>Psalm 139:16<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Reading\na story is a very different experience to being in one. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

When\nyou read a story, you can see all the threads connecting the different events,\nyou can see method behind apparent madness, you can often tell the destiny of a\ncharacter before it happens to them because you know how the author writes or\nthe genre of the book. If you\u2019re reading a romance, an unexpected knock at the\ndoor is intriguing, exciting\u2014if you\u2019re reading a horror story and know the\nauthor to be especially sadistic, the same event will raise your blood\npressure. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But if\nyou were a character in these tales, you\u2019d see things quite differently. Most\nof the events are fragmented, things come out of the blue and vanish again,\napparently without significance, and the story\u2019s end is always a mystery. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\ntend to be more like characters than readers when it comes to our own lives.\nEven when we do draw connections, try to find meaning in the mundane or the\nmiserable or the marvellous, it\u2019s all guesswork at best. We make decisions,\noften believing to be informed, but we\u2019ll never know all the factors that will\nimpact the results of our choices. We forge our destinies half-blind and a lot\nmore feeble than we\u2019d like to believe. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We can\nfight as hard as we can for clarity, but at the end of the day, we\u2019ll never\nknow the future until it becomes the present. Whether we like it or not, we\u2019re\ncharacters, not readers and not really authors, of our own stories, and that\nmeans we live with more questions than answers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Being\na Christian adds another layer of complexity to the questions we have. Ideally,\nwe\u2019d say that believing in God means that God is active in our lives. He\u2019s not\na reader, surely! When we get hit with plot twists and complications, He isn\u2019t\ngoing to sit idly by eating popcorn and watching in surprise. He\u2019ll be there.\nHe\u2019ll do something. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Then, when Mary came where Jesus was, and saw Him, she\u00a0fell down at His feet, saying to Him,\u00a0\u201cLord, if You had been here, my brother would not have died<\/em>.\u201d\u2019 <\/p>John 11:32<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Mary,\nthe sister of Lazarus and Martha, was a woman of faith. She believed that God\nwas with her and her family, and when her brother became ill, I\u2019m sure she had\nno doubt that Christ could save the day. Otherwise, she wouldn\u2019t have sent for\nHim to come to them when Lazarus got sick. And any normal person, upon hearing\nthat a dear friend was gravely ill, would rush to their side, especially if\nthere was something you could to help.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Now Jesus loved Martha and her sister and Lazarus. So, when He heard that he was sick,\u00a0He stayed two more days in the place where He was<\/em>.\u2019 <\/p>John 11:56<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Did\nyou see that? Jesus hears that Lazarus is sick, his sisters are scared, they\nneed Him to help\u2026and He waits. One might not think Jesus a very good friend,\nexcept the writer makes it clear that Christ loved these people, and it was\nbecause He loved them that He waited. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

We all\nknow how this story ends. We know Jesus raises Lazarus from the dead and that\nthis ends up being one of the most important miracles that He ever performs in\nHis ministry. But Mary and Martha didn\u2019t know that. They didn\u2019t know how their\nstory was going to end, and it\u2019s the not knowing that makes it so much harder\nto trust. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018Relying on God\u00a0has to begin all over again every day as if nothing had yet been done<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>C. S. Lewis<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The\ntruth is, although all of us are confident that God is not merely a reader,\nmost of us see Him as a character. A big, strong character, sure, but a\ncharacter nonetheless. We can\u2019t see the whole story, only the chapter we\u2019re in,\nand we seem to think that\u2019s all God can see too. Or at least, that\u2019s how we\nbehave much of the time.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018If you truly believe that it is actually God who has brought you to this place, then entrust Him with your cares and cast on Him all your concerns; and He will dispose your affairs as He wills<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>Sts Barsanuphius and John, Letters from the Desert<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Perhaps\nthat\u2019s why we seem to think we\u2019ve been abandoned when we feel alone, or that\nwe\u2019re being punished when things go wrong, or that we\u2019ve been forgotten when\nour prayers are met with silence and heartache. We don\u2019t admit it, but\nsometimes, when the plot has taken a nasty, unexpected turn, we feel God\nmust\u2019ve been just as surprised as we are\u2014or else, surely it wouldn\u2019t have\nhappened. We see God as the hero\u2014or maybe, sometimes, the villain\u2014of our story,\nbut not the author. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018You may fear that the Lord has passed you by, but it is not so: he who counts the stars, and calls them by their names, is in no danger of forgetting his own children. He knows your case as thoroughly as if you were the only creature he ever made, or the only saint he ever loved. Approach him and be at peace<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>Charles Spurgeon<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Every\nday of our lives, our stories are being told. We are living each page, each\nword, for the first time, completely unaware of what that next paragraph is\ngoing to say. But that doesn\u2019t mean it hasn\u2019t been written yet. Even the most\ncleverly written tales are not mysteries to their authors. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Even\nwhen you can\u2019t see where the story is going, He can. And unlike actual book\ncharacters, we don\u2019t have to worry about our author being some sadistic\npsychopath who just likes to watch people suffer for the sake of added drama.\nWe know who our author is. We know He wants the best for us. And unlike Mary\nand Martha when Lazarus died, we know how the story will end. He told us that the\nend of this story is only the beginning of a much bigger, much better one.\nSpoilers, the best kind. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018\u2026now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.<\/em>\u2019<\/p>C. S. Lewis, The Last Battle<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

\u2018And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes;\u00a0there shall be no more death,\u00a0nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away<\/em>.\u2019<\/p>Revelation 21:4<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

The\nkey is remembering that the happy ending is coming, no matter how rough the\ntale itself is, and that the author Himself is on this adventure with us. And\nif you can find it in you to trust Him, even in the rough passages, you\u2019ll\nstart to see Him more and more in every word.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2018When I trust deeply that today God is truly with me and holds me safe in a divine embrace, guiding every one of my steps I can let go of my anxious need to know how tomorrow will look, or what will happen next month or next year. I can be fully where I am and pay attention to the many signs of God’s love within me and around me<\/em>.’<\/p>Henri Nouwen<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Untold but not Unwritten By Bethany Kaldas \u2018Your eyes saw my substance, being yet unformed. And in Your book they all were written, The days fashioned for me, When\u00a0as yet there were\u00a0none of them.\u2019 Psalm 139:16 Reading a story is a very different experience to being in one. When you read a story, you can … Continue reading “Untold but not Unwritten”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":7163,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7162","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7162"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7164,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7162\/revisions\/7164"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7163"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7162"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7162"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.stmark.com.au\/Blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7162"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}