I came across a fascinating article on Psychology Today with the title of “How Therapy Works: What it Means to ‘Process an Issue’.”
If you want, you can read the full article by clicking here.
As I read, I couldn’t help but think about it in terms of church, scripture, and sermons.
The author argues that we understand ourselves through narrative:
“First, processing an issue in therapy may mean working to place it inside a coherent life narrative. We experience our life as a story, of which we are both protagonists and narrators. And we make ourselves known to others in this manner, too. If someone wants to genuinely get to know you, giving them a list of facts and numbers describing you will not suffice. They will want to hear your story. For human beings, processing information involves organizing it in narrative form.”
Isn’t this what scripture and sermons are supposed to do?
Scripture is a narrative that seeks to challenge you to understand your world in a new way–as a part of the story of God.
Sermons, if they are well crafted, do this.
They explain how the scriptural narrative applies to you today–how you are a part of the
If you think about it: this is what good liturgy does as well.
For Christians, holiness isn’t embodied in a place. God isn’t a god of a place, but of an event. Holiness is remembering how God acted in time to save his people.
So, through services, you relive the scriptural events that bring these salvation moments into the present.
By celebrating Pascha (Easter), you remember the story of God trampling down death by death so that you can be reborn.
This, in turn, plays on the theme of Exodus, the story of God freeing his people so that they could be reborn as a new nation.
It’s about making you a part of the story, even if the historical event was thousands of years ago.
So, just as therapy seeks to place an issue into a coherent life narrative so that you can make sense of it, scripture, sermons, and church seek to place you into a coherent narrative where you live a new sort of life.
This is what makes church relevant.
This is what makes church transformative.
This is why it’s important to stay connected . . . otherwise you won’t be a part of the story!