Hey, Friend!
Do you ever watch fairy-tale movies? The ones with a beautiful girl who is courageous and good and finally overcomes incredible odds and adversity and marries the prince/handsome rich guy?
I do. I like those kind of films. Happy endings are my jam.
What’s hard to do is come back to reality and try to reset my mind to cope with my very unmagical, daily grind involving dust, dirty diapers, lint, and bickering children who must be fed. Often.
“Happy endings are for fairy-tales,” the cynic in your mind may mutter. “Life is hard and then you die.” (This is an actual quote from one of my parents.)
But.
According to the Bible, I am told that no one can even imagine the wonderful things that are being prepared for us (1 Corinthians 2:9), that this world is merely a prelude to a New Heavens and Earth (Isaiah 65:17, Revelation 21:1), and that our King is actually preparing a grand (re)entrance into our world (Titus 2:13, Hebrews 9:28) – just like the crescendo of any fairy-tale ending.
The truth is: we ARE living in a sort of fairy-tale.
Our hope in this life is anchored in a tale of epic love, betrayal, loss, redemption, and (ultimately) victory. We have been promised that happy ending, and what’s important in the meantime is how we maintain our perspective and courage as we wait and hope for the return of our King and the righting of all that is wrong.
(I recommend reading the Jesus Storybook Bible, by Sally Lloyd Jones, for a comprehensive view of this better-than-fairy-tale story, if you haven’t already.)
As I explained to my children the other day after watching one such fairy-tale film together, it’s as if this present world is set at the end of the movie, immediately before the happy ending.
The curse is broken, the spell is lifted, the evil is defeated – but it’s in those few seconds where all the darkness and sadness still hold that we live for now.
We are in the space just before the turn of events, where the hope appears crushed and the grief feels crushing. Bewildered, aching, it breaks our hearts and feels so wrong.
We are in that slice of time where we don’t see the truth yet.
But that doesn’t make it less true.
If we can be patient and hopeful, knowing that in just a little bit, the sun will rise and the light will break out. The wrong will be set right, and all that was hopeless and grim will be transformed and renewed. We will experience the delight and sheer joy that comes from living this glorious happy ending:
Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the old heaven and the old earth had disappeared. And the sea was also gone. And I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven like a bride beautifully dressed for her husband.
I heard a loud shout from the throne, saying, “Look, God’s home is now among his people! He will live with them, and they will be his people. God himself will be with them. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there will be no more death or sorrow or crying or pain. All these things are gone forever.”
And the one sitting on the throne said, “Look, I am making everything new!” And then he said to me, “Write this down, for what I tell you is trustworthy and true.”
(Revelation 21:1-5, NLT)
That hope is something worth holding on to, tight, no matter what the cynics may say or the darkness around may seem like.
And that, to me, is better than any fairy-tale ending I could ever imagine.