We are all strangers in a strange land, longing for home, but not quite knowing what or where home is. We glimpse it sometimes in our dreams, or as we turn a corner, and suddenly there is a strange, sweet familiarity that vanishes almost as soon as it comes… –Madeleine L’Engle, from The Rock That Is Higher
Story captures our hearts and feeds our imaginations. It reminds us who we are and where we came from. Story gives meaning and direction to our lives as we learn to see it as an affirmation of God’s love and truth–an acknowledgment of our longing for a rock in the midst of life’s wilderness.
Drawing upon her own experiences, well-known tales in literature, and selected narratives from Scripture, Madeleine L’Engle gently leads the way into the glorious world of story in The Rock That Is Higher. Here she acknowledges universal human longings and considers how literature, Scripture, personal stories, and life experiences all point us toward our true home.
This is a fantastic book, full of much of the same ideas about story and myth and faith that [a:J.R.R. Tolkien|656983|J.R.R. Tolkien|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1434625177p2/656983.jpg] and [a:C.S. Lewis|1069006|C.S. Lewis|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1367519078p2/1069006.jpg] speak of. And while it's similar in thought and premise, it is still fresh and interesting; a delving into the different faucets of what story can be to us rather than a reiteration of things that have been said before. The simplest lesson I draw from this book is about Christian myth. That sometimes the stories we tell are not in Scripture, may not be factual, but like other myths they can contain what [a:J.R.R. Tolkien|656983|J.R.R. Tolkien|https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1434625177p2/656983.jpg] calls a "splintered fragment of the true light".
