Lately, I’ve been indulging in Fringe (2008-2013), a scifi conspiracy TV series created by J.J. Abrams—if you can get past the first few episodes, which are rather rough quality-wise, I think it’s a fantastic series. One of my favorite things about the story has been watching the evolution of the relationships between the three main characters, Olivia Dunham, Peter Bishop, and Walter Bishop. At the beginning of the series, Peter harbors incredible resentment toward his father Walter for the harm he feels Walter did to their family—obsessed with work, eventually committed to a mental institution, and driving Peter’s mother to commit suicide. But, ever so gradually, bit by bit, over the course of nearly two seasons, Peter’s animosity fades and affection buds and grows, until the moment when Peter at long last calls Walter “Dad” for the first time. Unfortunately, all of this hard-won relationship-building comes crashing down when Peter works out a devastating secret that Walter has been keeping from him his whole life. Peter bolts, and Walter is crushed by losing his son all over again.

Then the producers do something very interesting: Suspending the action for an episode, they tell a story-within-a-story. Olivia asks Walter and a colleague to look after her niece Ella for a day while she follows some leads to try and locate Peter. Bored with games, Ella asks Walter to tell her a story. Walter protests that he is no good at telling stories, but Ella persists, so he begins to spin a tale noir about a private investigator named Olivia, a scientist named Walter, and an enigmatic Peter, who has gone missing. Ella knows the names, of course, but what she doesn’t know, though the viewer does, is that Walter is plainly drawing on his recent life experiences to create the story: Although Walter’s tale is fictitious in almost all the particulars (“It’s just a story,” Walter repeats), the underpinning reality is very, very true.

I once was speaking with an author who had recently finished a book based on her childhood experiences with her sister. “Is the book true?” I asked. She looked almost at a loss: Of course it was true—it just wasn’t historical.

Stories are an important part of being human. We all tell stories, even if they aren’t as fanciful as those that make it into books and film—we tell each other the stories of our lives when we talk about that amazing vacation, that promotion we just missed at work, that look that someone gave. What’s more, we create for ourselves the story of our life each time we remember that thing that happened yesterday, or last month, or last year. Stories are the way we make sense of the series of details we experience, sifting significant from inconsequential and weaving together meaning. How we tell our stories cements our understanding of the underpinning reality of our lives, extracted from the raw facts of life. The stories we tell become the reality we believe, and the reality we believe is the life that we will live. What does life become if we get the story wrong?

The Israelites had a story. Today, we call it Exodus. It’s the story of how their lives were lost in the face of an approaching army and God rescued them, the story of how they had no value as slaves and God made them his chosen people. But, they would forget this story and live out of another story that told them they should hedge their bets with fertility gods, compromise with powerful neighbors to achieve stability, anoint a king to keep them on track—and instead of bringing safety, it all led to subjugation and exile. When the prophets were chastising the people for wandering away, they would call them back to the Lord, who brought them out of Egypt, reminding them of the story that tells them who they are, the true reality out of which they could truly live.

The church has a story, too. We proclaim it each Sunday: Christ has died; Christ is risen; Christ will come again. God absorbed our rebellion, he conquered our pain, and the disarray we see around us is not the final word. All too often, I, for one, seem to forget this story as soon as the words leave my lips. If the Great Author weaves all things together for good for those who love him, why do I invest so much energy in trying to maintain a tight grip of control on what’s happening around me? Living out of the story that says I have to look out for myself only results in frustration and hopelessness as I inevitably fail and the facts of my life spin out of my control.

How do I get the knowledge that God loves me, and all that entails, from my head down deep into my soul so that I can live out that true reality? Having wrestled with this question for most of my life, I have only recently come to appreciate the crucial role of story in shaping our understanding of reality, implanting truths about how the world works. Jesus often told stories to communicate a true understanding of reality; perhaps one of the ways God is forming us as his people is through the stories we tell each other in the community of faith. Instead of telling our stories haphazardly or interpreted through our pain, what if we framed the stories we tell each other from the perspective of God’s unfailing love?

A few weeks ago, Rob and Ken announced that Ken and Sarah were moving to Colorado Springs, where Ken would be taking on the lead pastor role at International Anglican Church. Since I arrived at Advent only in the last year, this is the first departure I’m experiencing here, but it is not the first departure for this young congregation, or the second, or the third. What’s the story we will tell from these details? Is Ken abandoning us? Are we afflicted by the transient nature of the young and mobile population of the city? Are we being punished for our failures to “get it right”? Or is God drawing this church plant toward congregational maturity by catalyzing the formation of lay leadership? Is God reminding us that we exist to bless others? Is God teaching us how he takes care of us when we are afraid we can’t take care of ourselves?

Same events, different story. Which story brings life?