The Story’s Happy Ending

When I worked in school, Michael Morpurgo was one author that children liked to read and teachers liked to promote. In a 2017 interview he said:

‘Wherever my story takes me, however dark and difficult the theme, there is always some hope and redemption, not because readers like happy endings, but because I am an optimist at heart. I know the sun will rise in the morning, that there is a light at the end of every tunnel.’

I was chatting Frank, an older Christian friend who’s not enjoyed good health for many years. Last week he was told that he’s to have ten sessions of chemotherapy in three-weekly cycles.

Frank wasn’t anxious, pessimistic or stoically determined; he was bright and cheerful. ‘They’re saying I’ve got thirty more weeks to live. That’s good! If I don’t make it, I know where I’m going, and I’m looking forward to it!’

Focusing on the light not the dark tunnel, Frank’s story will have a happy ending whatever the outcome.

Andrew Ollerton, giving an overview of the Bible’s storyline, says that ‘…epic stories, from Rapunzel to Mary Poppins, James Bond to Harry Potter, all share a basic plotline…’

He outlines it: Setting the scene… Introducing the cast… Low point/ crisis… Turning point… High point/ happy ending…

‘… the Christian story, the Bible. Its plotline is the original or archetypal story and the likes of Tolkien, Fleming, Rowling and Disney have been drawing inspiration from it ever since…’

Yesterday’s ‘Songs of Praise’ told Paul’s story. Taken into care as a child, involved in crime from a young age, struggling with addiction, he spent most of his life in and out of prison.

Later in life Paul found faith and, with help and support, prejudices, addictions and the life of crime were turned round. He’s living out the happy ending that Michael Morpugo and Andrew Ollerton describe.

I continue to discover this ‘happy ending’ narrative and reality in my Bible, and in the lives of those who seek to live by it.