A story unlike any other

A biography is someone's life story, usually someone who was famous, infamous, nefarious, illustrious, prestigious, or fabulous for one reason or another.  We want to know the story behind the person, and hope they will give some insight to what made them the way they were.  You can read about the lives of  actors, astronauts, presidents, and popes.  They say there has been more than 16,000 books and articles written about Abraham Lincoln, showing that the more famous the person the more we want to know about them. 

What is it about stories of people's lives that draws us in? When we see how they overcame something from childhood, or how they worked hard and achieved, or struggled through great tragedy, it gives us hope that we might be able to do the same. We hope that by reading the stories of great men and women, we too can become great.  Most of these great people started from the bottom and reached the top through hard work and dedication.  But even after these people accomplished enough to have a book written about them, their stories end up on a bargain table at a sale.  

There is one biography that is different though. It starts with the story of someone who had everything, literal worlds at his fingertips, but left it all behind to become nothing.  This man gave up his greatness to become normal, laying aside the infinite to put on the finite.  The life of Christ contained in the gospels is different from every other story told.  The life of Christ doesn’t just give us inspiration for our own trials, but points the way to new and eternal life for our future. Every biography ends with a death, but the story of Christ ends with an empty tomb. 

We read biographies about people from humble beginnings who became great, but the best story ever told is about a great God who left his glory to become a man.  Others move from poverty to riches, only Christ left his riches to become poor, left his strength to become weak, and even lost his life in order that we might gain life in return. By all means read and be encouraged by the lives of others, but don’t forget that only the life of Christ can transform.  A biography tells us a story, but life of Christ is more than a story.  It’s a gospel, literally the good news that CS Lewis summarized this way. 

“The Son of God became a man to enable men to become sons of God.”

Now that is a story worth sharing!