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Introduction

This is not a book on theology.

Such books, as noble and enlightening as they are, weigh down shelves in libraries all across the world. This is not an extended biblical exegesis or heavily footnoted academic treatise. Nor is this book a spiritual autobiography or written meditation on some aspect of the Christian life. Rather, this book tells a story—a story that can completely alter the course of your life and transform it forever.

Stories hold a central place in human culture. In fact, the power of story is prevalent in humanity. From the simple cave paintings of our earliest ancestors, through the oral tradition of storytellers, bards, and keepers of lore, to the great masterpieces of literature and poetry, and even down to the visual storytelling of Hollywood, stories shape our understanding of ourselves and our world. They help to define our identity, give us a sense of a shared experience, and point us to a particular place in the future.

When I was a child, my mother used to spend time reading to me. I treasured those moments as the stories came alive at the sound of her voice. I remember The 500 Hats of Bartholomew Cubbins by Dr. Seuss as one of my favorites. Each time my mom finished the tale, I would immediately ask her to read it again. When I grew older and could read on my own, I spent hours each day with my nose in a book. When I finally discovered J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy at the ripe old age of nine, I was hooked. I reread Tolkien’s books each year for the next ten years. I lost myself each time in the rhythm of Tolkien’s prose, in the epic scope of the story, and in the heroism of the characters who struggled against the forces of darkness and evil. This story had a profound effect on my development as an adolescent, shaping my understanding of heroism, of the necessity of sacrificial love, and of the critical importance of the bonds of affection between friends.

Yet no story contains the sheer power to heal and transform found in the story you will encounter in this book. Why? Because the person at the center of this story is Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who through his life, death, and resurrection broke the chains of sin and death, and who, at this very moment, offers each of us meaning and fulfillment in this life and eternal joy in the next.

This is a story of cosmic proportions—of love versus hatred, of ancient prophecies fulfilled, of an apocalyptic showdown between the forces of God and the minions of the Enemy woven into the very fabric of creation. It is the story of the tenacious love of a Father who wills that his children not be abandoned to the consequences of their abuse of freedom. It is the ultimate triumph of meaning over the self-consuming abyss of nothingness. It is, in short, the story of salvation.

This is not an abstract story of a God who is far removed from the struggles and realities of life in the twenty-first century. Instead, “the Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (John 1:14), the one whom the prophets called “Emmanuel,” literally “God with us.” According to Scripture and the unbroken Tradition of the apostles, the Second Person of the Trinity left the glory of heaven to live in the midst of human uncertainty and brokenness, becoming one of us in the Person of Jesus Christ, who is both fully divine and fully human. Jesus experienced the joys and sorrows of this life from the inside, within a human context. He wept, laughed, celebrated, and suffered—dying a bitter and all-too-human death on the cross. This is what the author of the Letter to the Hebrews referred to when he wrote that “we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses” (4:15).

The humanity of Jesus is not an incidental or accidental part of the story. Rather, it is the entire point of the story! In his divinity, Jesus reveals the Father to us—a critical act of love. In his humanity, however, Jesus reveals to us what it means to be authentically human. The answers to the questions that we spend our lives wrestling with (or running away from) are found in the Person of Jesus Christ. In fact, this story of salvation confronts each one of us with the reality of our ultimate identity (Who am I?), our ultimate purpose (Why am I here?), and our ultimate destiny (What happens when I die?).

The humanity we share in common with Christ means that we cannot encounter this story of salvation from the outside looking in. Whether we like it or not, we are already players in this drama. When Jesus suffered and died on the cross, he didn’t just suffer and die for sin in an abstract sense. He suffered and died for the sins that you and I have personally committed. When Jesus gave himself up to death, it wasn’t for an anonymous “humanity,” it was a concrete act of love for you and me. And when Jesus rose from the dead, offering the divine life to those who followed him, it wasn’t merely to a collective body of believers. It was an invitation to you and me.

This is the good news of salvation, what the early Church called the euangelion (literally, “good message”), which in turn was translated into Old English as gōd-spell (“gospel” in modern English). Of this gospel, Paul wrote, “It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes” (Romans 1:16), and it is this gospel, this story of salvation, which you will encounter in these pages.

Why This Book?

There is a desperate need for men and women within the Church to experience the life-changing power of the Gospel—to know the Person of Jesus Christ, not as a glorified abstraction or an edifying idea, but as the foundational relationship in their lives. We need to live lives radically transformed, released from the power of sin and rooted in the freedom of God’s kingdom. Over the past twenty years of speaking and offering workshops and retreats in parishes all across North America, I have encountered thousands of people, many of them cradle Catholics, who hunger for something more in their lives—who long to be healed and set free by an intimate and loving God from the wounds (mental, physical, and spiritual), suffering, and existential fallout that come from living in this world. Some of them would be considered “good” and faithful Catholics, some of them are even daily communicants, yet they struggle with a God who seems distant and a relationship with him that bears little or no fruit.

To be clear, this urgent need for a new emphasis on proclaiming the gospel of Christ (what St. John Paul II called the New Evangelization) didn’t arise out of some deficiency in the Church’s teaching or sacramental life. Jesus Christ stood at the heart of the apostles’ preaching, and it is this very same Jesus who lives at the center of the Church today. In addition, the whole of the Great Story of Salvation is “written” across the Church’s sacred art and architecture, in our liturgies and devotional life, and in the writings of the saints.

If we take an honest look at ourselves over the past fifty years or so, however, we have to admit that on a cultural and lived level (what the theologians would call the level of praxis), we have not been so successful at telling all of the Great Story in a way that wins people’s hearts and minds. As a result, generations of baptized Catholics have grown up ignorant of the power of the gospel to change them. They are largely illiterate—unable to “read” the whole of the Great Story from within the Christian community.

If you hunger for healing, then this book is for you.

If you long for peace with yourself and in your relationships with others, then this book is for you.

If you are searching for fulfillment, lasting transformation, and freedom from a nagging restlessness that keeps you constantly dissatisfied, but you have no idea how to experience these things, then this book is for you.

Here you will be invited to encounter the gospel of Jesus Christ in a radical new way. Maybe you have heard these biblical stories since your childhood. Maybe they are completely new to you. Whatever your experience, I pray you will meet Jesus in a profound and personal way as you read this book. May the God who fashioned you for love give you the grace to open your heart to the transforming power of this gospel.