Brenda (24:24.469)
Well, you know, Jesus is always the point of the story. Alex, we know that. He's our model and he's our motivation for storytelling. Jesus was in fact a brilliant storyteller himself. But I just think about in our world and in the midst of so many hero stories, Jesus didn't come to tell us a different story, but he came to give us a better story.
Alex (24:51.427)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (24:52.097)
and he left heaven and made himself completely vulnerable. And he chose to fully expose himself that we could have intimacy with the Father. And by him coming to earth, leaving heaven and exposing himself, he's able to empathize in our weaknesses. And when we have truly received his comfort, then we can comfort others with the comfort we have received.
And so I think it's just this beautiful model and motivation and this understanding of all of this story work really just takes us more into walking with Jesus deeply, more intimately.
Alex (25:30.883)
Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah, I love that.
So we wanna kinda walk people through how to tell their story, and we're gonna start with the grand narrative. We have a handout for this to help kinda keep it organized in people's minds, but we told the grand narrative story in previous podcast. Today, what we wanna do is we wanna use some orienting questions and ideas to help people understand what each part of the story is doing, what it's telling, and then we wanna connect that
our own personal story. So we like to start as we said before with the prologue because there's a story before the story and the prologue...
Brenda (26:13.065)
I need to also, hey, just really quickly, I do want to say is I want to give a shout out to my professor, Dr. Kellerman, because he's actually the one, the first person I ever heard use Prologue. And I thought it was so genius. Yeah. And so I know that has always just stuck with me. So I just wanted to say thank you, Dr. Kellerman.
Alex (26:21.667)
Oh yeah, I'm glad you said that. Uh huh.
Alex (26:29.574)
Yes, thank you Dr. Kelley for the idea of prologue that creation doesn't actually, even Genesis 1 doesn't begin at creation, but it says in the beginning God, that God already existed. And so what the prologue does is it orients us to what is truth, who's in charge, who gets to tell the story of the whole world, and what is the story that he is telling.
Alex (26:59.528)
to look at our own story and ask the question like what was in place before we came into being? What truth so to speak? What authorities were speaking into our story before we were even born? And that's often the things that have shaped us that we may not even realize. And then in creation we're asking specifically who am I? And this is more things that we know about ourselves,
Alex (27:29.888)
what are the people, the experiences, the events that shaped us as a person, what's our personality, what are characteristics of our culture, our family of origin, and what are some of our core desires. So we're looking at how we were formed. This is our formation era and so many different things can be talked about here, even just the way our bodies function in creation. Then in the
Alex (27:59.668)
Sin and suffering we ask the question why do I suffer that becomes just an orienting question and we're really struggling with You know, what is the sin or what is the impact of sin and suffering on us? And then how do we experience sin and suffering in the world? how has How what are some like life dominating sin or suffering struggles that we struggle with and We see just the affliction of our story and then in redemption because we all are
experiencing that affliction in redemption we're asking the question who's gonna rescue me and I like to say like who or what am I looking to for refuge and rescue and for all of us even those of us who know Christ we have looked to other things for refuge and rescue besides him we're all looking for salvation we all want a hero or we want to be the hero of the story when only he
Brenda (28:54.073)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (28:59.388)
who we're looking to for that salvation. And then in restoration, we're kinda asking a question about like our final hope or overall, like what is driving us? What is keeping us going is what I like to say. And we call that like our aspiration. Like what are we moving towards? What keeps us going on a daily basis? Where do we see this story going and what are we really living for?
eras of the story, we actually want to try two different things today to flesh it out. One, Brenda, you're gonna give the way that you could give your like your own big picture testimony. The grand narrative is a great way to be able to share your testimony pretty shortly, pretty succinctly as you follow that structure. And then I'm gonna show how you can take a particular area of sin or
that one story, that one testimony through the grand narrative. So one's gonna be a big picture story and one's gonna be a very particular story. And I think people will be able to hear that as we tell it.
Brenda (30:12.002)
Yeah, mine is going to basically be the story of how I came to Christ.
and then you'll focus on a story having come to Christ, but still a struggle within the story. So, I'm going to give a very high level flyover. This is, I'm going to say, my two to three, or my three minute testimony, right? And depending on the context of who I'm talking to, I could go deeper into certain parts of it that are relevant. But my prologue is, is that my mother was born and raised in Germany and had a very strict Catholic upbringing. And remember prologue
Alex (30:29.186)
Hmm?
Brenda (30:46.559)
the orientation to truth the story before the story I should have said that and my father was raised in an agnostic home And so I think my mother, you know had this very strict sense of who God was that he was much more Demanding God my dad had no really sense of God except maybe he set the world in motion and so my parents met And this would be get into my creation story of who am I?
on a tour with the military and my mother came back to the states with him. She was 21 years old and when she came she actually left the church and interestingly enough though she still had a really strong sense of, I think, her spiritual roots and they didn't want to be Catholic, they didn't know what to be and so I think they landed somewhere in the middle and decided to have my sister and I both baptized as infants in the Lutheran Church and dedicated to God.
Alex (31:44.024)
Hmm. Hmm-hmm.
Brenda (31:45.979)
which as I was writing this, I was really thinking about just, you know, even as a young child, even though I wasn't raised in a Christian home, but just, I don't know, just that act of dedicating us to the Lord. That's kind of powerful to me now looking back. While my parents were wonderful in many ways, there was no instruction in the faith. We didn't go to church as a family. I wasn't raised in church. And I would basically describe that my views or my religious upbringing was very much God and country, with my mother being very pro-God.
and my dad being military pro-country and so we saluted the flag and we said Amen. So you know, so the fall part of my story is really like how I came to Christ maybe the area or what God was working through to open my eyes to His love and His grace. There was an incident that led me to faith. My freshman year of college which resulted in sin and misery and death and
Alex (32:22.249)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (32:43.581)
I just remained under a burden of guilt and shame and contemplation to the point that I even contemplated ending my life. This is kind of one of these areas that I will say I'm being transparent but not vulnerable because this is not necessarily the forum that I would want to share the details of my fall story. But I certainly have shared it one-on-one with people and smaller groups where I felt like it was appropriate to do so.
Alex (32:56.77)
Hmm.
Brenda (33:13.875)
part of my story, you know, this is probably true of many of us, that God used or took the lowest part of my life, the worst part of my story, to shine His amazing grace and love into my heart. And a fellow co-worker and student where I went to school one day shared the forgiveness of Christ with me and that if I didn't want my life, God wanted it and he could take it and he would use it.
That's when I surrendered my life to Christ. I accepted his forgiveness. Yeah, I mean, I always, there was a song by Kathy Tricoli, it was called Stubborn Love. And I remember after I got saved, I would listen to it and cry and cry, it's your stubborn love, it never lets go of me. Anyhow, the song goes on, but it was just, I just remember listening to that because I really could just see God's stubborn love really throughout my life, going back to my infant dedication to the Lord, you know.
Alex (33:54.288)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (34:13.475)
part of my story would be, you know, this idea of like the aspiration, the hope, and for me personally, the very thing that was lost in the sin part of my story as an unbeliever is the very thing I know will be fully restored when I am with Jesus, and all of that will be made right, and I will get to see the rightness of that. So, you know, just a simple short way to share my testimony, but I hope that maybe it will give some structure for somebody else if
Alex (34:33.366)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (34:43.976)
I don't really know how to share my testimony. I think this is a great way to do that.
Alex (34:49.017)
Mm-hmm. Yeah, and I would just say with both of these examples
the magic in this is not listening to us do it, it's in doing it yourself. Like you really can't assimilate this information about the Grand Narrative fully until you have written some of these for yourself. And then the beauty of it to me is once you do it, like once you, I call it seeing it, like once I can see the Grand Narrative in my own story and I'm able to write it
Brenda (35:00.066)
Yep.
Alex (35:23.568)
wrote what I'm about to do and I don't know how long yours took you Brenda but I mean maybe tops 10 minutes but maybe five minutes like once you begin to think in this way because you've practiced with the grand narrative and you can see the structure and you kind of feel the rhythm of it you'll not only be able to tell multiple stories of your own life through this grid you'll be able to hear it when other people are talking and I think that's what gets people the most excited is because they've interacted with their story and
Brenda (35:30.242)
Yeah.
Brenda (35:35.148)
Yeah.
Alex (35:53.928)
either because they're watching a Disney movie and they see the grand narrative unfold even in a Disney movie or they're listening to a friend talk and they go oh my gosh they're stuck in their redemption story they're looking for another hero and they're not you know when like they get really excited of how practical this can be so I would just encourage people if it's if it's like oh yeah that's easy for Brenda and Alex it's only easy for Brenda and Alex because we've done it over and over and over again and we've engaged our own
Brenda (36:07.072)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (36:11.627)
Yeah.
Brenda (36:19.421)
Right.
Alex (36:23.408)
ourselves use the structure.
Brenda (36:25.993)
Yep, yep, yes, thank you for pointing that out. Okay, so we're gonna use a struggle in your life now to show how this framework is helpful to, I think one, for self-counsel Alex, this is a great self-counseling tool to understand more.
Alex (36:40.769)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (36:44.477)
about your struggle and where God is in it. And then, and even to your point to see like, how far have I come? How far do I have to go? Like, where has God been in the story? Where is He leading me in this story? And then also, it's a great way or structure to be able to share a struggle with somebody else, and maybe even to connect with somebody else's story in this way. So, we said that when you are starting, when you're using a struggle,
Alex (37:05.774)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (37:09.186)
Hmm.
Brenda (37:14.351)
a lot of times it's helpful to start with the fall part of the story instead of with the prologue. So that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna start with the fall part of your story, then we'll go back to prologue and work through.
Alex (37:17.489)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (37:27.362)
The fall part of the story is the affliction. So we're asking, where's the affliction? Why do I suffer? What are the dominant lies that you fight against about God or yourself? In your case, we're looking for a dominating sin struggle and the impact that has had on you. So can you share that with us?
Alex (37:29.776)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (37:44.611)
So first of all, we have already unpacked.
the struggle of mine in the perfectionism podcast. So this is gonna be a familiar story and that's actually why I chose it. Not because I love to hash this out and tell it again, but because I thought it would be helpful for us to share a story that we talked about outside of the grand narrative format and then bring it into the grand narrative format and be able to hear the same material but presented with this structure. So this is one of many SIN struggles,
Brenda (37:48.985)
Hehehehehehe
Brenda (37:57.569)
Hehehehehehe
Brenda (38:08.077)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (38:13.186)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (38:17.48)
a life-dominating one that I have with perfectionism, self-righteousness, being critical, being angry and resentful for most of my life, just all the little tentacles that come out from perfectionism. I like to say that I didn't always think I had to be the best at everything but I did believe I had to do it all and so I drove myself very hard to do it all. And a lot of this goes back
and creation story that I look back now and realize like I internalized a belief. I don't think I was conscious of this then but now that I look back I realize I internalized a belief that my mom gave up a lot to have me and so I wanted to pay her back. I wanted to get do all the things that she didn't get to do and that drove me in this constant cycle of do-do-do.
Brenda (38:58.218)
Yeah.
Brenda (39:06.765)
Hmm.
Brenda (39:15.95)
I like what you just pointed out there that oftentimes these things are not conscious at the moment but looking back. What is that I heard somebody say? Life is lived forward but only understood looking backwards.
Alex (39:28.335)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (39:29.169)
And so it's as you look back, you begin to see like, oh, the prologue, like what was my truth orientation? Because this goes back to my mom and what was happening in her life before I ever came along. So can you tell us a little bit more about the story with your mom and your prologue?
Alex (39:46.014)
Yeah, so my mom was 17 and in high school when she, and definitely on her way to college, very smart, very driven, and she became pregnant with me. And so she chose to keep me to get married. And so she got pregnant, she got married, she graduated from high school, and she stayed in her small town to raise me. And so much of just that part of my story has shaped just the way that I came into the world.
in the way that I think saw my world. And that's what that prologue is.
Brenda (40:20.397)
Hmm. Mm-hmm. And I like that, you know, we talk about sometimes this idea of prologue, what is the truth, or like the...
counseling category we say is orientation can be hard to understand. Why is the story before my story the truth that my truth if you will the truth I live out of but I think that's the connection we're trying to make is like there is a truth that you're that you're born into that started before and it's and it's never perfect and that's why we all have to go back to the perfect story of God's truth and the truth and his story actually being the story we all have to go back to. There's
Alex (40:46.059)
Mm-hmm. Yep.
Alex (40:58.111)
Hmm.
Brenda (40:59.483)
because all of us are born into stories that are not wholly or fully true, even though they may have good components to them. So that brings you to the point now in the creation part of your story, the formation, and tell us a little bit about your growing up in your family and some of the views and beliefs that you actually took away from your family.
Alex (41:12.166)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (41:21.918)
And so these overlap a little bit. When I have people writing their grand narrative, they'll often ask me like, does this belong in prologue or creation? And sometimes it's a little bit of both because prologue is what shaped your thinking, but your creation is what shaped you, so they do overlap. So like you, Brenda, I was actually raised in a very German-influenced culture in South Central Pennsylvania, which is very focused on hard work, discipline, all of those things. So that's the air that I breathe.
Brenda (41:37.805)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (41:49.27)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (41:52.012)
And then one of the things that my mom used to say to me completely out of love was don't do it the way I do it, you do it right. I mean, she wanted to spare me the pain that she experienced of being pregnant at 17. And so I think that combined with being a firstborn, just a firstborn, highly verbal female, and led me into this life of perfectionism, like all those things.
Brenda (42:00.504)
Mmm.
Brenda (42:12.717)
Hehehe
Alex (42:21.712)
culture centered on hard work and discipline. Don't do it the way I do it, you do it right. And then being a first born female, I just kind of came into the world, I think primed in some ways. And then probably that shaped my personality and became my personality of being what I call an over producer.
Brenda (42:45.017)
I was even thinking, Alex, that part of our creation story is the time and history and culture we come into. And I'm just thinking about the time that even you were born, the stigma of an unplanned pregnancy, right, for your mom and even for you. You've got this really young mama. You're a teenager and, you know, your mom is super young and all the things that just come with that culturally that could also make it really hard.
Alex (42:56.639)
Yes.
Alex (43:08.682)
Yeah, and even if we're going to add this, the honest truth is my mom became a Christian when I was about five and put me in a Christian school in second grade. And so now I'm not just in a German culture of hard work. I'm in a Christian culture that's very focused on behavior. Very. We joined a very conservative Baptist Church and a very conservative Christian school. And so, yes, even the Christian culture itself, I think, shaped this perfectionism.
Brenda (43:24.601)
Mm-hmm. Mm.
Alex (43:38.716)
you have to do it right. And as much good and so much beauty as I experienced there, it did shape my sin struggle. There's no doubt about it.
Brenda (43:49.125)
Yeah, the influences on the heart are real. They are really real. And I just need to stop here and say I'm so thankful for the sacrifice your mom made and the commitment that she had because you're a gift to the church and to the world and to my life. And I'm just so thankful, you know, just that she bore that shame and that guilt to have you. So anyway, that's just a part of her story and the beauty of what God did in her story. But it's also your story too. So
Alex (43:52.296)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (43:59.256)
Hmm.
Mm-hmm. Ha ha ha.
Alex (44:06.649)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (44:18.299)
move now to the redemption piece and we call this counseling category that salvation piece that place of like who will rescue me and Alice we talk about you know how we try to either find pseudo saviors and other things or even how we try to prop ourselves up as you know the Savior our own Savior in the bootstrapping so what was it like for you
How did you deal with the perfectionism and how did Christ become the real hero of your story?
Alex (44:58.482)
Yeah, I mean I'm a very fortunate one in the sense that I really don't remember much of my life without Christ. My mom did share the gospel with me. I think I was about five years old, but and almost because of this sense that I was bad or wrong, I had no trouble accepting the part of the gospel that said you're a sinner and you need a savior. Like even very young, that's what I distinctly remember when my mom, I know where we were.
Brenda (45:21.889)
Hehehehe
Alex (45:27.69)
I know what she said and I had no trouble believing I needed somebody to help me. And yet, even though I became a Christian at a young age, I think I still found a lot of refuge in getting it right and achievement and getting the affirmation I got from that achieving and so I drove myself very hard. I share this part of my story and I can honestly tell you, like it's hard for me to say this, it feels like it could be a really prideful thing but it is very hard for me to admit
Brenda (45:28.237)
Hmm.
Brenda (45:32.639)
Hmm.
Brenda (45:46.659)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (45:57.884)
in both high school and college. My senior year of both, I was voted best all around. And it's just, to me, it's such a testimony of how hard I drove myself. And I had to find out the hard way that all of that overproduction was taking its toll on my body, and my soul, and my relationships. And I had to, I continue to have to still remember
do and that only and this was this was probably a turning point for me. I really believed that I had to do it right and to get to this phrase that Jesus lived the perfect life for me like that was the precise application of the gospel that I had to continue to remind myself of and continue to have to remind
Brenda (46:43.469)
Hmm.
Alex (46:57.604)
for me. I don't have to do it. And so I think what's beautiful about the salvation part of our story, even when we see the places where we've chased substitute Saviors, is that those substitute Saviors lead us to so much destruction and we have to taste that destruction. It's just part of our human experience. We have to taste our destruction to really know the beauty of Christ.
Brenda (47:14.878)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (47:21.689)
Mm-hmm. Yes, we do.
I would really encourage anybody who struggles in this area of perfectionism to listen to our Perfectionism podcast. We can link that in our show notes for this one because you really talk more deeply about this issue and really how to allow Christ or believe or come to live out of Christ's perfection on your behalf. So the final part of the story on God's grand narrative is restoration.
category for counseling is aspiration or this idea of hope. Where do I place my hope? We can look at our longings, our regrets and disappointments to see what we are hoping for, where we are hopeless or lacking hope oftentimes. But for you Alex, we talk about you know, what keeps us going? What are we living for? Where do we see the story moving? And what's that been like for you?
Alex (47:57.259)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (48:06.562)
Hmm.
Mm-hmm.
Alex (48:20.922)
I think that any perfectionist will know that we long for the day when we can lay ourselves down. We ourselves are our own burden. And so to look forward to the day when we see the perfection of Jesus, the beauty of Jesus, and can lay down this sense of self, this sense of shame that comes with self that drives us, and fully enter into the rest that He's prepared for us like that.
going to be a rest to really be enjoyed and so that's the hope or the aspiration that continues to remind me of the preciousness of Jesus but also how to restructure even the day-to-day life here is that I don't have to live out of it. I can begin to taste that rest now.
Brenda (49:13.169)
Mm-hmm. And that brings us back to the now and not yet, right? And I also just think about when we look to substitute God's, to do what only God can do for us, it's not only, it is destructive and the word that comes to my mind is exhaustion. It's exhausting. It's exhausting to try to be God or Jesus. Just is. So, rest. Yes, eternal rest. And that's such a beautiful, beautiful word.
Alex (49:16.375)
Mm-hmm.
Alex (49:30.614)
Mm-hmm.
Yes. Yeah.
Alex (49:42.156)
Mm-hmm.
Brenda (49:43.165)
Well, I certainly hope Alex that this has been a helpful episode. We're going to post in our show notes a link to some of the handouts we have for the series. I think, in fact, maybe these will make more sense if you can even follow an outline or look at the questions. Might be helpful or go back after listening and go through those. And again, we just want to
listen to this for yourself, but to actually take up your own story, your testimony, and or a struggle in your life and walk through this and begin to see how the Holy Spirit ministers to your own heart as you sit with the wonderful counselor, as you begin to map your story onto his story and how much beauty there is in both your testimony but also in the continual struggles as he meets you in those.
Brenda (50:42.037)
I don't know, just in terms of wrap up, is there anything that we want to just say to wrap things up?
Alex (50:48.144)
Um...
Maybe just we'll hit the high points that good counselors know their own stories and know how that fits into God's story and that knowing our stories helps us to listen well to other people and it helps to build our faith. And then knowing these key questions of the grand narrative can become a framework for us to be able to tell our story well and to listen well to others. And so again, we just challenge people to not just listen but to actually interact with these questions and take the pencil and the paper.
and make yourself write it down it'll bear fruit.
Brenda (51:23.017)
Yeah, that's great, Alex. Well, thanks so much. This has been fun. I know we've got some more to come to unpack this and we're looking forward to doing that in future episodes.