No movie has touched my life more dramatically than Good Will Hunting. It appeared on the screen in a season of my life in which alcohol and anger were seeping from my own father wounds, and during a time when the direction of my life and the purpose of my story were clouded in self-doubt, insecurity and confusion. Today, I mourn with the rest of the world as we contemplate the legacy of Robin Williams, who despite assuring us all that "It is not your fault," has taken his own life. As is often the case in suicide, the true rationale for such a final, and drastic measure, passes on with the victim. Even when a reason is given, it fails to tell the entire story. In fact, my first months of ministry found me picking up the pieces with a family in the wake of suicide. Their own questions mirrored the same “why?” that seems to just hang in the air like a thick smoke inside my mind to this day.
 
   Statistically, my work with college students places me in direct contact with a demographic that is more likely to end their lives prematurely than nearly any other. I say “nearly”, because the reality is that suicides that occur among those 18-24 is actually eclipsed by only one other age group, those above 65. Of this shocking trend M. Robert Mullholland, Jr. writes:

“I believe one of the underlying realities behind the epidemic of suicide among adolescents and senior citizens is that we are a culture that values people primarily for what they do.” 

   Teenagers and the retired are most vulnerable to despair and lack of identity in such a culture, he argues. Robin Williams, at age 63, could certainly fit into this demographic. And while this may very well be a legitimate diagnosis of the problem, it is certainly not the only one. My contact with those who have attempted suicide leads me to believe that many considered suicide because, quite frankly, life has become unbearable. I see the connection in the two age groups to be more along the lines of their place in history. Those older than 65 have fought long enough and are ready to move on. The young adults simply look at the potential of another 60+ years of hell in front of them and opt out early. When I look at the world outside my window and the one unfolding on the screen in front of me, I sympathize with their conclusion. This is not cynical, nihilistic surrender, it is empathy instead of judgment, and it is refusing to call it daytime when it is night.

   My personal conviction is that those who are considering suicide do not need sermons (formal or informal) exhorting them to cheer up, look on the bright-side, or reminders that things are not so bad after all, or be told one more time how much they are loved and appreciated…no matter how well intentioned. What I want to suggest instead is that, especially as followers of Jesus Christ, we need to be willing to sit in the darkness with others and refuse to call it anything less. A girl who is rapped by her uncle, a boy who has struggled his whole life with homosexual urges, the child who grows up in the foster care system, the man whose drunk father beat him daily and the women whose parents were killed by a drunk driver. Their pain is real and their tragedy has marked every aspect of their story. 

   What I often fear drives some to take their lives is that the world around them doesn’t want to hear their story. Our culture is unkind to those who are broken messes. Those who feel all alone in their struggle often wake to find one day that the world around them really has moved on without them. Theirs is not a winning story of overcoming and unstoppable victory against all odds. To all of you who are considering suicide today I want to remind you that Jesus came for the sick who know they needed a doctor (Matt. 9:12). He had little patience for those who thought they were already healthy.

   Your stories of pain and abandonment and crushing loss are all living reminders that the world we live in is broken and in need of the rescue that only Jesus can give. And we need you. We need your bravery and your honesty. We need truth tellers who have stared at the darkness of their own lives and are not afraid of the darkness lurking in the stories of everyone they meet. Truly, if this can’t start among those who know they are unconditionally loved, things may be truly worse than any of us imagine. That is why we need you to stay among us. Not because things are not as bad as you think, but because you know how bad they really are. We need people who are not afraid to take off their masks and let the world know, as Frederick Beuchner suggests, that our secrets are what we share most in common. Robin, I wish we all still had time for you to talk to Sean. You will be greatly missed.

In his book Wild at Heart John Eldridge writes, “The history of man’s relationship with God is the story of how God calls him out, takes him on a journey and gives him his new name.” Like Abram, Sarai, Jacob, Gideon, Moses, Peter, and Paul God is helping his people understand their true story by hearing the name that he is speaking over their lives. Distinct from the name on our birth certificates, penned by a fallen mom and dad, God’s name for us is birthed from an eternal understanding of who we truly are, and who we are meant to be. In so many ways, it is a name far more real than any name we have ever been given. The difficult part of embracing the new name is not necessarily discovering it, but truly hearing it, owning it, and believing it. So often the reason for this is that God gives us a new name for his own glory and not our own. While a new name may grant us hope for the future, more than anything it is the means by which God is writing his own story. For this reason, the new name we are given by God is often formed through the wounds of our past. Indeed, as Eldridge writes later, “He will wound us in the very place where we have been wounded.” Gideon, alone, frightened and hiding in a wine press is called “mighty warrior.” A barren man and woman become a “father and mother of nations.” The persecutor of God’s church becomes one of its greatest missionaries. The disciple who rejects Jesus is called the dependable rock. God is not making mistakes; he is drawing attention to the magnitude of his transformative power. The same power that created the universe ex nihilo (out of nothing), the same power that raised Jesus form the dead, is the same power at work in the lives of millions as God comes to each of his children and transforms their stories of tragedy and failure into tales of epic redemption and victory. Why? So that the world will know his unspeakable grace and bend their knees in humble submission. Every story of transformation becomes a living, breathing example of the depths God is willing to stoop in order to rescue a life and how great is his ability to save. The redeemed are called ambassadors. We are story-tellers declaring the truths about the author and perfector of our faith who longs to finish your story the way he wrote it before the foundations of the earth. Give him the pen, listen for your new name, and let the watching world be in awe of what God is able to do with our tragic tales, perfectly suited for surprise endings. Everyone has a story. http://vimeo.com/13509635

Recently Pepper Schwartz, a sociologist at the University of Washington, wrote an op-ed on Americans’ fascination with the love-life, and recent wedding, of Jennifer Anniston. Regardless of whether or not you care for Jennifer Anniston, the principles of the article can apply equally to our obsession with Beyonce, Adele, Lebron James, or the stars of “Teen Mom” or “Jersey Shore.” In her piece, Schwartz notes that we live in a media culture today that so frequently brings the lives of celebrities into our living rooms, smart phones, and tablets, that they feel like friends to us. Furthermore, and this is the point that was most fascinating to me, Schwartz noted that because of the familiarity (however real or contrived it may be) that we feel with celebrities, we find ourselves living vicariously through them. When it comes to Anniston specifically, Schwartz says that women follow her love life because A) when Anniston gets dumped it helps women to feel better about their own heartbreaks arguing, “if Jennifer Anniston gets dumped, anyone can” and B) Women are watching to see if true love will stick this time for Anniston because, again, “if it can happen to her maybe it can happen to me.” Schwartz closes the article by stating that the "fairy tale ending" we hope to glimpse in the lives of celebrities “is a stand-in for the fairly tale ending we want for ourselves.” After reading the article, I couldn’t help but reflect back to my favorite book on preaching written by Frederick Buechner in 1977 entitled Telling the Truth: The Gospel as Tragedy, Comedy, and Fairy Tale. One of the main premises of the work is the way in which each of us, regardless of time, language, and culture is drawn to fairy tale: the ugly becoming beautiful; the poor becoming rich; the oppressed finding justice; the overlooked becoming the centerpiece. It is, in so many ways, written on our hearts. It is what we long for in every good movie, every good song, and every good novel. It is the ageless story of the cross, and it is the gospel. We are all searching for it, this good, seemingly impossible news, that despite all of our warts and wrinkles, we might be found accepted, loved and wanted. J.R.R Tolkien once wrote, “It is the mark of the good fairy-story, of the higher or more complete kind, that however wild its events, however fantastic or terrible the adventures, it can give to child or man that hears it, when the ‘turn’ comes, a catch of the breath, a beat and lifting of the heart, near to (or indeed accompanied by) tears, as keen as that given by any form of literary art.” Our culture is dying to experience the fairy-tale. Surrounded by counterfeits, many have settled for living the life the wished they had through others, rather than entering the fairy-tale God has already written. Jennifer Anniston’s marriage doesn’t have to work out to offer you hope. Lebron doesn’t have to win the championship game. The creator of the universe knows you by name, is more aware of your failings than you will ever know, and was willing to move heaven and earth to rescue you. No fairy-tale could ever compete with that truth. Hollywood could never write a better story.