Devotion #6: Who Doesn’t Love a Good Story?
One of my favorite activities at home is watching a good movie. I love making a giant bowl of microwave popcorn, finding a comfy spot on the couch, stretching out, and getting lost in the charm of make-believe. I do not know about you, but when I watch a movie, I am eager to immerse myself in the setting and characters. I actively look for someone to identify with so I can wrestle with the choices they face as if they were my own to make.
I suppose what I enjoy most is simply a really great story. My favorite stories are those that depict transformation - where a person must journey through great struggle to shed their former way of life and become a new version of themselves in order to achieve the impossible feat they so desperately desire. Even now, writing about it, I am excited at the idea of finding another good movie to watch. I wonder what it is about these types of tales that bring me so much delight.
As I think about it, perhaps the reason I enjoy such a classic story arc is due to my own experience of transformation and victory in the grace and mercy of Christ.
In his letter to the Romans, the Apostle Paul wrote about a transformation far greater than any fictional story. He said, “For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his. We know that our old self was crucified with him in order that the body of sin might be brought to nothing, so that we would no longer be enslaved to sin” (Romans 6:5-6). This is the story of every believer in Christ - a story of real, true transformation!
Just as movie characters must face struggles to change and overcome, so must we. However, in Christ, our transformation is not the result of our own effort or willpower. Rather, it is through the power of God at work in us. As Paul put it, “We know that our old self was crucified with him.” That is the climax of our own stories. It is that moment when we realize our old way of life, ruled by sin and death, has been crucified with Jesus, never to live again.
Paul continues in Romans 6:8-9, “Now if we have died with Christ, we believe that we will also live with him. We know that Christ, being raised from the dead, will never die again; death no longer has dominion over him.” Christ’s victory over death is our victory! Just as in those heroic tales where the protagonist rises against impossible odds, in Christ, you and I rise from the old life of sin into the new life of Jesus and His righteousness. In Christ, our struggle has already been won on the cross.
That is great news. In Christ, we do not just learn from a character’s journey; we get to experience our own personal transformation. We no longer have to live as slaves to sin because we are free to live for God, empowered by the Holy Spirit. Romans 6:11 continues, “So you also must consider yourselves dead to sin and alive to God in Christ Jesus.”
Like a great story with a victorious ending, we are part of an ongoing narrative of redemption. We are being transformed by God’s grace, and with every turn of the page, every opening of the next act, we transform even more into the image of Christ.