I Don't Want to be a Bad Storyteller! Part 1: A Prequel to The Story

     As I mentioned in my last post I've done some traveling as of late, starting with Tegucigalpa, Honduras. There I got to work alongside my beautiful and fantastic girlfriend as she seeks to alleviate and change the poverty situation in so many lives in Honduras. Her efforts include tutoring and mentoring students as director of the Shine program that seeks to bring kids out of poverty through education. She also works with a group of soulful people in the Breaking Chains Homeless Ministry. This ministry provides a shelter for over 40 people that includes families and teenagers. While there, I got to be a part of taking this whole group of people three hours out of town to a beautiful beach (Many of whom had never been to the beach or out of Tegucigalpa), and celebrate Christmas with presents and wonderful food.

     I journeyed back to the States, and immediately turned around and went to Daytona Beach, Florida (Which has an inordinate amount of tattooing among its people, especially neck tattoos) to attend the National Conference on Youth Ministries. I heard many speakers, but the one that stuck out the most was Donald Miller. Many of you probably recognize his name from his bestseller "Blue Like Jazz." In his talk, he spoke a lot about the movie that was made over that book and his role in it, along with the art of storytelling.

    Storytelling is something that I have been working on getting better at for a few years now. It is an artform that I find riveting. Miller pointed out the elements of a story; which are setting, conflict, climax, and resolution.   Every story has a setting, a long part at the beginning which identifies the characters, what they want in the story, the atmosphere of the story, and the beginning details of the plot. Eventually, every story encounters a conflict, there's no escaping it. The real issue when the conflict arises is what the characters in the story do with the conflict.

    Some characters shy away when conflict comes, but the truly amazing characters push through the conflict to reach what they want. Can you imagine William Wallace in "Braveheart" just going home after the English kill his wife? Of course not! That would be the worst movie ever. What happens with the conflict decides whether the story is climatic or anti-climatic. And what part the characters of the story play in that climax. After the climax, the highest point of the story, comes the resolution. Now the resolution is the part of the story where everything comes together. This is where the couple rides off into the sunset, where the boxer wins the match, the good guys win, and everyone goes home happy.

   So, here we sit as people who are writing their story, everyday, one day at a time. The questions I've been asking are, What's my story? What's the story of Impact? What story can my sweet girlfriend write in Honduras? And how does the story of the Gospel fit into all of this? I don't know the answers to all of these, so I guess I'll keep exploring.