This will probably end up being one of those late night, deep thought blog posts, but that's just fine with me.
I've been thinking a lot of... me. Not in a selfish kind of way, but in
a deep, big picture kind of way, like we all do from time to time. Who was I meant to be? What does God want from me? Who was I created to be; what was I created to do?
In my heart, I think I've known all along, and it's taken until now to really realize it.
Looking back from when I was young, I was always in love with a good movie or a good book. I remember, as a kid, sitting in my room for hours and drawing pictures that would fit together as a story. Because I didn't even know how to write yet, I could only draw the pictures, run to my mom when I was done, sit down in the big red recliner that used to sit in our living room, and tell her the story that was happening on each picture. Sometimes, these would involve super heroes battling super villains. Sometimes, it'd be about a little boy getting lost in the woods and meeting a monster. Most of the time, I'd involve a sword to some capacity. Little boys love swords.
When I was a bit older, and I learned how to write, I did that a lot. Although I can't be sure if many of them have survived to this day, I wrote storybook after storybook growing up. I had so many ideas and stories in my head that I couldn't get them on paper fast enough. Stories about dragons who acted like people. Stories about a kid who learned magical powers and suddenly found himself battling an old witch on top of a castle. Stories about three friends who journey into a deep cave and find a secret treasure hidden at the bottom. All of these were actual story books I wrote, and all of them, I know, before the age of eight years.
Then, I remember the video camera. An old Song with a big red button on the back that used High-8 tapes. My mom would set it on a desk or a box or something and, as long as I didn't touch it, I was allowed to make movies in front of it. I did this all the time. Finally, a way to tell my stories on screen, like they did at the movies and on television. I made hours and hours worth of movies with that old camera. Movies, sometimes, based on the stories I wrote when I was a kid. One I remember in particular was a claymation movie about a guy who was abducted by aliens for a dinner party. Another was about a Racoon and Parrot who met a giant in a big blue sandcastle. You can't make this stuff up! Well, I did. And it was the greatest. Sadly, I know a lot of these didn't survive. I put them all on one video tape, which was destroyed a few years back, on accident. I will never forget a lot of the movies I put on that tape. No one else will ever see them, but I will remember. They're sort of like dreams now... ones I remember well, but no one else has or w
ill experience.
When we moved, we got our first computer. It was an old HP with a Windows XP operating system, which was new at the time. I remember one of the first things I did on it - my dad showed me how to open Microsoft Word, and I wrote stories. I still have one I wrote when I was nine years old... almost ten years ago. 'The Knight's Castle,' I called it. About a brave knight named Sir Doug whose beloved, Princess Kate, was kidnapped by an evil wizard and locked in a tower far across a desert filled with a gang of Eagles, a dragon, and a six-headed lizard. I loved writing that story so much, I went on to wr
ite six sequels. I kid you not - six. Some how, the plot eventually went on to include lightning swords, phantoms, robots, time-travel, theives, and all sorts of nonsense, but I remember the last 'Knights Castle' story well. I called it 'The Final Showdown.'
Sir Doug stood in the middle of the Death Desert facing the sorcerer that had kidnapped Princess Kate in my first 'book.' Princess Kate sits tied beneath a palm tree as Doug and the bad guy (I can't remember his name...) stood, swords drawn, ready to battle. As their swords clashed, I remember the scene playing out in my head. A brave youth, that looked a lot like myself, battling some faceless evil all for the princess I had fought so hard for. Doug eventually defeated the sorcerer, The Princess and he were married, and the kingdom was their's. I remember ending it saying something like '...and they lived happily ever after, for many years together, reigning over the kingdom as the best rulers ever seen,
as every one of their dreams came true.'
Something about that strikes a chord with me. I made that story. I don't think anyone has ever read those rather pathetic stories, and I'm not so sure anyone ever will, but the fact that that tale did not exist until I brought it into being, even as a nine year old, is an astounding thing. The movies I made a kid - even as a preteen and early into my teenage years - all meant something. Whether it was my cheesy little scary movies about the guy with the clown mask that haunted my house, or the more epic tales of the group of friends who went off to bring a magic book back home to the Wizard it belonged to (battling a troll and traveling along a mile-high wall along the way), or the movies where an army soldier fought off a vicious swa
mp monster. There was always a story to be told, wasn't there? Growing up I didn't play any sports. I didn't play and instruments (well, piano and the guitar for a while, which I thoroughly loved and still do from time to time, piano especially). I was a writer. A little movie maker. I was a story teller.
Now, as I sit here, I look at my recent months - years, even - and think about one very painful question... 'Where did all the stories go?'
It was my dream to, someday, be a REAL author. It was my dream to someday be a REAL filmmaker. It was my dream to be a REAL story teller. Where did all that go?
Here I am now, working my first job at the court house as a poll worker. I'm in college now, learning how to write about cause and effect rather than Castles and Dragons. I'm making videos still, but about current events and song parodies to put up on Youtube so maybe someone can get a laugh out of them and subscribe to my channel, thus fulfilling some vain hole in my heart. Here I am now with no dreams. Did they disappear? Why does looking back and feeling nostalgia hurt so bad? Is it because we've lost a dream? Is is it because the future is here, now, and it's not as great as we had hoped it would be?
I don't believe the dream is gone, though.
Looking now, questioning now, I do, absolutely, without a d
oubt, believe that is God's purpose for me. It's not very specific, no, but I'm not worried about specifics. I believe I was created to be something great. I know that I was created to be a part of a bigger story, but something in me says that's not enough, believe it or not. Something inside of me says I was meant to create in the way I was created.
It wasn't too long ago that the words of a very wise friend and mentor of mine was giving me some major encouragement in a time of trouble for me. With the stress of college, family, girls, my job, my future pressing down on me at once, he shared with me something I won't forget.
He called me a story-teller. He told me I was a story-tell
er; a vision-caster that would do great things.
It wasn't until a few days later I was praying, and I was asking God to, you know, show me what to do, where to go. 'Point out the road for me to take, O Lord - show me the path to follow' as Psalms says. Those words entered my mind again. 'Story teller.' A story.
Since then, it's become abundantly clear. Looking at my past as a child, as a pre-teen, as a teen, and into now, it is obviously clear - God created me to be a story teller.
Nothing grabs my heart like a good story. Whether the epic fantasy of Lord of the Rings, the simple magic of Beauty and the Beast, the romance and grandeur of Titanic, the good vs. evil tale of Harry Potter, the horror of Stephen King or the beauty and brilliance of CS Lewis... the stories that always captured my heart were the ones I never forgot.
"It's like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones
that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn't want to know the end. Because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end... it's only a passing thing, this shadow. Even darkness must pass.... A new day will come.
And when the sun shines, it will shine out the cl
earer. Those were the stories that stayed with you... that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr. Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something..." Samwise Gamgee, Lord of the Rings
I look at myself now, and what I've created lately. D
ozens of unfinished stories - hundreds of pages worth of unfinished novels - sitting on my computer. Videos I never finished, some videos I never even started. Where am I? In the darkness, maybe. Why though?
Like these stories, I know there is an Enemy ready to halt whatever I might have done otherwise. I was created to be a creator; able to do amazing things. Capable of changing the world. I must be stopped, right?
I won't let that happen anymore.
"I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn't. They kept going. Because they were holding on to something..." said Sam in that quote. What am I hanging on to? The hope and the future God promised me and you in his word. The plans He has for us. The masterpiece He created us to be, and the masterpieces He intends for us to create.
Whether I ever create an award winning film, whether I ever write a revolutionary novel, whether I ever write a script, whether I sell a single book or what-have-you, I know one thing for certain: I am a story teller. I was created to tell stories.
I may never make a feature-length film. I may never write another novel-length book. But as long as I'm doing what God wants me to do, in some capacity, then I'm okay with that. I'm a story teller, and a creator. Just like my God is a story teller and a creator.
And that is an exciting thought.
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