Normalizing Imperfect Stories

What I love about cheesy Hallmark movies is that they are completely predictable. The pattern of each story is pretty much the same. In my own life, things seldom seem to go as planned. So it can feel good to spend a couple of hours in a world with no surprises, and a guaranteed happy ending.

We love happy endings in stories told by nonprofit organizations or ministries, too. It feels great to read a story like, “This person was hungry, and you gave money to feed him, and now he is not hungry anymore,” or “This person was struggling, and you prayed for her, and she’s found freedom.”

But most real life stories are more complex than Hallmark movies. For one thing, they may not always follow a linear pattern. That is, in the real world, events might not flow in a smooth direction from challenge to success. Sometimes, for example, a person may leave a challenging situation only return to it again and again. A person may start using drugs again, or go back into the sex industry, or go back to living on the street. People are complex, and circumstances are complex.

There may eventually be a true happy ending. But we may never get to see it. Sometimes we find ourselves only living in the middle part of the story.

These stories are a lot more challenging to tell. How can cross-cultural workers share stories when it might look like “nothing” is happening? How can cross-cultural workers share stories when it looks like they’re in a season of taking one step forward, and two steps back?

I’m still thinking about this, and figuring out how to tell better stories about complex things and slow seasons and imperfect endings. This particular blog post is only the beginning of a conversation. I’d love for us to begin to change our expectations, so that we don’t always need a happy ending to feel as though ministry has been effective, or as though our dollars have made an impact. That’s all I’ve got so far, but it’s a place to start!