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    Epic: The Story God Is Telling
    Epic: The Story God Is Telling
    Epic: The Story God Is Telling
    Ebook103 pages1 hour

    Epic: The Story God Is Telling

    By John Eldredge

    4/5

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    About this ebook

    This dramatic retelling of the gospel illuminates the unique role we can play in the amazing story God is telling.

    Sure, good things happen, sometimes beautiful things. But tragic things happen too. What does it mean? We find ourselves in the middle of a story that is sometimes wonderful, sometimes awful, usually a confusing mixture of both, and we haven’t a clue how to make sense of it all. No wonder we keep losing heart.

    We need to know the rest of the story.

    For when we were born, we were born into the midst of a great story begun before the dawn of time. A story of adventure, of risk and loss, heroism . . . and betrayal. A story where good is warring against evil, danger lurks around every corner, and glorious deeds wait to be done. Think of all those stories you’ve ever loved. There’s a reason they stirred your heart. They’ve been trying to tell you about the true Epic ever since you were young.

    There is a larger story and you have a crucial role to play.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherThomas Nelson
    Release dateMar 11, 2007
    ISBN9781418566142
    Epic: The Story God Is Telling
    Author

    John Eldredge

    John Eldredge is a bestselling author, a counselor, and a teacher. He is also president of Wild at Heart, a ministry devoted to helping people discover the heart of God, recover their own hearts in God's love, and learn to live in God's kingdom. John and his wife, Stasi, live in Colorado Springs, Colorado.

    Read more from John Eldredge

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    Reviews for Epic

    4/5

    127 ratings11 reviews

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    • 5/5
      In approximately 100 pages John lays out the story of the world from before creation through the restoration of all things. This is a very moving book which causes you to see the larger story within which you live. John effectively shows how this story is woven into every other story we tell and how we long for the essential elements of this story to be true. This book contains compelling evidence of the claims of Christianity for those who may be struggling with doubt as well as motivational material for those who are struggling to live out the truths of the Gospel. I would highly recommend this book.
    • 4/5
      A wee book I wish I'd written :-) (And maybe one day I'll re-write LOL) This book uses some basic narrative thinking as a means to understanding our God given purpose and place in this world. John uses four 'acts' as a way to explain the pattern of God's story, and our lives within that story. While I think John articulates God's story well, part of his thesis is that God's story pattern is already written into our identity, meaning that our response to the great stories of our day is really a sign of God's purpose woven into our hearts. While I think John is entirely right, I think the book would have been better if it tackled the plot structures of story a little more precisely. John creates a 4 part narrative structure that may be convenient for him to get his ideas across, but that perhaps falls short of what is actually happening when we tell stories. His instincts are right, but there's much more to be said about our identity and purpose, and story. A narrative approach to our lives is very helpful, but it might take more than this book to get there.
    • 2/5
      This is an okay book, but it sounds just like all his other books to me. Good stuff, and true and good, but most of it kind of redundant.
    • 2/5
      I bought this for no other reason than the lengthy handwritten note written in ink to Dear Maggie: `May the annointed words within this book enlighten you and bless you as it has for me. Be blessed and may his Lord Jesus enlighten you with your life's purpose - and your life's story'. No pressure on first read there.
    • 4/5
      Epic is a great title for a book about the stories of heroes and our lives. Excellent!
    • 3/5
      A free gift I won. Interesting perspective on life. Nice quick read.
    • 5/5
      What is the greatest story ever told? What are the elements of great stories, great movies, great books, great plays? Why do these stories move us? Why do we perceive life as a story? Why do we want there to be a meaning to life? Why do we want to be heros and heroines? John Eldredge answers all these questions and many more in his book "Epic: The Story God Is Telling". He ties all human history to many contemporary popular stories like "Lord of the Rings", "The Chronicles of Narnia", "Titanic", "Star Wars", and "The Matrix. He covers the source of the human spirit and our inmost longings from the beginning to time to the far future. He explains the source of evil and suffering in the world and the ultimate destiny of mankind. What is that? "And they lived happily ever after."
    • 5/5
      One of the most inspiring things I've read. Nice and short and sweet.
    • 5/5
      Second only to the Bible, this book is FABULOUS! It so clearly tells, "The Story God is Telling", and I highly recommend it to everybody! It's so intriguing that I believe it appeals to atheists (to see if the "non-existant" God has a story worth knowing) all the way over to the very mature Christian.
    • 4/5
      I went back and forth on how much to rate this book. It is one I will consider keeping and might read again (which is one of my criteria for a 4-5 rating) and I did really enjoy it (also one of my criteria for a 4-5 rating) but I did start it once before, put it down, and take it back up again (though in this case it was because I had too many other books started at the time and I wanted to read it at a time I could focus on its message) and some of the stories he references as examples are not ones I've seen which can make it hard to follow.Eldredge claims that the stories that resonate the most with us have parallels to the Biblical story.I have loved reading as long as I can remember. I also like watching movies. So it follows that I like a good story. That's probably one reason that Eldredge's approach resonates with me. It might not be the same for others who aren't as into those pasttimes.
    • 4/5
      I have read a lot of "spiritual" books as I am an ordained minister and I find it really interesting as I read other reviews of books such as this one, Rob Bell, Mike Yaconelli, and the like of emergent authors and find that people come down on these authors as not being Scriptually sound just because they do not agree with what these authors have to say. This just isn't true and it is okay if someone doesn't agree with a point of view and prefers more Traditional books but to say these authors are wrong I think is wrong. Now of course this is not a review but I just had to vent that.Epic is a great book that shows the correlation of all of our media with the true story of God's creation. Every movie theme comes from Scripture. Good vs. Evil, wanting to be rescued, romance...it all originally came from Scripture. I would recommend this book to any one.

      1 person found this helpful

    Book preview

    Epic - John Eldredge

    Title Page with Thomas Nelson logo

    Copyright © 2004 by John Eldredge

    All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, scanning, or other—except for brief quotations in critical reviews or articles, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

    Published in Nashville, Tennessee, by Thomas Nelson, Inc.

    Published in association with Yates & Yates, LLP, Attorneys and Counselors, Orange, California.

    Bible translations used are referenced at the back of the book.

    Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

    Eldredge, John.

    Epic : the story God is telling and the role that is yours to play / John Eldredge.

    p. cm.

    ISBN 0-7852-6531-7

    1. Christian life I. Title.

    BV4501.3.E42 2004

    231.7—dc22

    2004014403

    04 05 06 07 08 WRZ 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

    Information about External Hyperlinks in this ebook

    Please note that footnotes in this ebook may contain hyperlinks to external websites as part of bibliographic citations. These hyperlinks have not been activated by the publisher, who cannot verify the accuracy of these links beyond the date of publication.

    CONTENTS

    PROLOGUE

    ACT ONE: Eternal Love

    ACT TWO: The Entrance of Evil

    ACT THREE: The Battle for the Heart

    ACT FOUR: The Kingdom Restored

    EPILOGUE: The Road Before Us

    PROLOGUE

    I wonder what sort of tale we’ve fallen into?

    —J. R. R. TOLKIEN, The Lord of the Rings

    It’s been quite a journey for Frodo and Sam when the little gardener wonders this. Ever since they left home they’ve encountered more wonders and more dangers than they could have possibly imagined. The battle on Weathertop. The flight to the ford. The beauty of Rivendell. The dark mines of Moria, where they lost their beloved Gandalf. Their fellowship has fallen apart; their friends are now far away on another part of the journey. Into the shadow of Mordor they’ve come, two little hobbits and their cooking gear on a journey to save the world.

    It’s at this point Sam says, I wonder what sort of tale we’ve fallen into? Sam could not have asked a better question.

    He assumes that there is a story; there is something larger going on. He also assumes that they have somehow tumbled into it, been swept up into it.

    What sort of tale have I fallen into? is a question that would help us all a great deal if we wondered it for ourselves.

    It just might be the most important question we ever ask.

    LIFE IS A STORY

    Life, you’ll notice, is a story.

    Life doesn’t come to us like a math problem. It comes to us the way that a story does, scene by scene. You wake up. What will happen next? You don’t get to know—you have to enter in, take the journey as it comes. The sun might be shining. There might be a tornado outside. Your friends might call and invite you to go sailing. You might lose your job.

    Life unfolds like a drama. Doesn’t it? Each day has a beginning and an end. There are all sorts of characters, all sorts of settings. A year goes by like a chapter from a novel. Sometimes it seems like a tragedy. Sometimes like a comedy. Most of it feels like a soap opera. Whatever happens, it’s a story through and through.

    All of life is a story, Madeleine L’Engle reminds us.

    This is helpful to know. When it comes to figuring out this life you’re living, you’d do well to know the rest of the story.

    You come home one night to find that your car has been totaled. Now, all you know is that you loaned it for a couple of hours to a friend or your teenage daughter, and now here it is, all smashed up. Isn’t the first thing out of your mouth, "What happened?"

    In other words, Tell me the story.

    Somebody has some explaining to do, and that can be done only in hearing the tale they have to tell. Careful now—you might jump to the wrong conclusion. Doesn’t it make a difference to know that she wasn’t speeding, that in fact the other car ran a red light? It changes the way you feel about the whole thing. Thank God, she’s all right.

    Truth be told, you need to know the rest of the story if you want to understand just about anything in life. Jokes are like that. There’s nothing to them at all if you walk in on the punch line. Then she said, ‘That’s not my dog!’ Everyone else is in stitches. What is so dang funny? I think I missed something.

    Love affairs, layoffs, the collapse of empires, your child’s day at school—none of it makes sense without a story.

    STORY IS HOW WE

    FIGURE THINGS OUT

    Bring two people together, and they will soon be telling stories. A child on her grandmother’s lap. Two men in a fishing boat. Strangers stuck another hour in an airport. Simply run into a friend. What do you want to know? How was your weekend? Fine is not a good answer. It’s just not satisfying. You heard something about a mariachi band, a fifth of tequila, and a cat. And you want to know more about that story.

    Look at our fixation with the news. Every morning and every evening, in every part of the globe, billions of people read a paper or tune in to the news. Why? Because we humans have this craving for meaning—for the rest of the story. We need to know what’s going on.

    Our boys are ambushed somewhere in Asia. What’s happening over there? A virus is rampaging on the Internet. What do we need to do to protect ourselves? Somehow we don’t feel as lost if we know what’s going on around us. We want to feel oriented to our world. When we turn on the news, we are tuning in to a world of stories. Not just facts—stories.

    Story is the language of the heart.

    After all, what’s the world’s favorite way to spend a Friday night? With a story—a book, a favorite show, a movie. Isn’t it true? Good grief! There’s a video store on every corner now. They’ve taken the place of neighborhood churches.

    It goes

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