Living The Story
Little children ask challenging questions about God and the Bible.
Years ago, on our way to the store, my daughter and I were singing a hymn. I was driving. She was behind me in her booster seat. The song referenced Satan's place in God's story. So she asked about him. Who was he?
One of my favorite C.S. Lewis stories is Paralandra – a Garden of Eden fairytale for an older audience.
On a pure and untainted planet, an evil character is introduced who wants to “help” an innocent female character become willful, self-aware, and awakened.
There is a scene when the reader is shown the true nature of evil in that character. As if a curtain is pulled back for the reader to peek behind, we witness his private delight in maiming frogs, one after another. Behind him is a trail of destruction.
With that scene Lewis succeeded at helping me understand Satan – as well as the true nature of my own dark tendencies.
On our drive to the store I told my daughter the cosmic story of God the creator, creating things He loved, delighted in, and recognized as good and beautiful. And that Satan, even though he was also God’s creation, thought he knew better than God – choosing to ruin the beauty and goodness of God’s creation.
Then I summarized for her:
God is the Great Creator. He made us to be like Him. Being His children means that He made us to make things good and beautiful.
The Bible calls Satan a destroyer. He ruins what God made to be beautiful. Satan breaks things.
Looking back at her in the rear-view mirror, I asked a question requiring her to place herself in that cosmic story: Whose side do you want to be on?
Her answer surprised me. She told me sometimes she was one and sometimes the other. And that she wanted to be on God’s side.
Even at her age she understood – making things good and beautiful is what God’s children do. To destroy, divide, or ruin what God made good and beautiful… suggests the opposite.
That question remains a litmus test in our home. One we should use more often than we do.
Young children, older children, and we – their spiritual mothers and fathers – don’t need deep theories to find the boundary between good and evil. We just need to understand our place in His story.
Creating true beauty – or destroying true beauty.
Love God with everything you've got!
Talk about Him and His ways with your children –
in each of your daily routines – in and around your home.
Plant His way in your persons and your homes.
– Deuteronomy 6:4-9 [paraphrased]