In a couple of days time Robert Harris' new novel 'Conclave' will be delivered to my Kindle. Many of Harris' books are a brilliant mix of historical fact and total fiction cleverly woven together into a gripping story. So I'm not reading 'Conclave' in order to get a real insight into the goings on that lead to the election of a Pope - I'm reading it because I love a good story.Many of us love a good story. But I wonder how good we are at telling them?
Two Sunday's ago, as we continued our series 'Promises Kept & Promises Broken' - studies in Joshua and Judges, we looked at the story of the two spies who were hidden by Rahab in Joshua 2:1-24.
Rahab protects the spies by spinning a story of how they're no longer there - but this is not the story that I'm interested in here. What is clear as this story unfolds is that Rahab, and everyone else too, has heard the stories of what God had done at the Red Sea and to Sihon and Og (verse 10). And as a result of hearing these stories their 'courage failed' and leads Rahab to make the confession, 'the Lord your God is God in heaven above and on the earth below'.
The power of a story.
If you've been following the Read Scripture Bible reading plan, over the last week we've read Psalm 105 and 106 - which talk about 'making known among the nations what God has done', and 'proclaiming the mighty acts of God'.
But this isn't just about us knowing the stories of the Bible and being able to tell them, this is about being able to tell our story - what God is doing in our lives now.
Whilst people may be able to argue with you about the amount of killing in the book of Joshua or whether the resurrection really happened - they won't be able to argue with your story. And there is power in a story.
