COLUMN: Grey Matters – The art of storytelling

“Let the redeemed of the Lord tell their story, those he redeemed from the hand of the foe.” -Psalm 107:2

Do you know a good storyteller? Steinbach city councillor Jac Siemens is such a person. To make a point he often draws from civic or personal history. He enlivens the stories he tells, and we are the better for it. Stories sometimes get a reputation as something just for kids, but the truth is they are good for all of us.

Christianity is, at its heart, a story-shaped faith. This is also true for each significant group and culture in the world, including Mennonites. What kind of people would we be if not for our stories?

The Bible often gets mistaken as a history book or rule book, but from Genesis to Revelation it is the genre of narrative that is the most common form used. God reveals Himself not primarily through abstract ideas but through the stories of creation, covenant, redemption, and restoration. Jesus often taught through short stories (parables), inviting listeners to discover truth through narrative and what we see around us.

Storytelling should inspire us! Ephesians 2:10 says, “For we are God’s handiwork, created in Christ Jesus to do good works…”. If we are created to do good works, that should mean we also have good stories to tell others. In his novels Fyodor Dostoevsky often focused on how true life is built on real experiences of depth. For example, in his short story White Nights the narrator confesses that he lives in total isolation, and dwells on his memories not as actual lived events, but as phantoms he revisits and embellishes in his mind. He views himself as a creature of an “intermediate sort” rather than a fully realized human participant in society. The definitive question he eventually asks himself is: “But how could you live and have no story to tell?”.

For storytelling that inspires, here are three ‘E’ words we may need to allow us to do this well. It is OK to enliven, to echo and to not know the ending.

To enliven means to give life, action or spirit to the story. When I worked at Mennonite Heritage Village (MHV), I learned many inspiring stories, but I also realized a secret. Our world does not lack good stories, but good storytellers. Inspiring stories should be told with heart. While it might not be OK to exaggerate, it is OK to animate our stories!

To echo means that it is OK to repeat the same stories, maybe even adding another detail along the way or playing off a different story or current event. Stories help us remember who we are. The biblical story reminds us that we are created in God’s image, loved despite our failures, redeemed through Christ, and called into a community of faith. Therefore, not only is it OK to repeat stories, but it is pertinent. Our holiday traditions of Christmas and Easter are times we enjoy repeating our central stories. When I was a teenager, I would wonder why my parents would tell stories that I had already heard. It turns out, we need to hear our family stories again and again, like familiar melodies, so they echo through our lives and into the lives of our children.

To not know the ending doesn’t mean we shouldn’t tell the story yet. For a good joke we need to know the punchline, but for an inspiring story sometimes we just need to know that the person is enduring and not write it off.

Sometimes we forget that we are still in the middle of our story and need to hold it with more grace, more patience, more hope! In one of George McDonald’s books there is a woman who met a sudden sorrow: ‘I wish I’d never been made!’ she exclaims petulantly and bitterly: to which her friend quietly replies, ‘My dear, you’re not made yet. You’re only being made – and this is the Maker’s process.’” Leave room for the Maker. Or as Paul calls God, ‘the author and finisher of our faith’!

Gary Dyck is a chaplain and spiritual care provider at a hospital and personal care home in the Southeast.