Never The End

I knew the time was coming and now it was here. I had hoped I would have greater inspiration; that beautiful words would just flow to encompass the whole story and give it the closure that it needed.

And then I would confidently and with contentment, type 'the end.'

But this was not the case.

I came to the last chapter of the book and instead of the words I wished appearing on the page, I found myself, with a jumbled up brain, constantly hitting backspace and an empty screen stared back at me.

Creating endings for my stories worries me and my latest book (now in the editing stage) is no exception.

How do you sum up a book in one or two glorious sentences? How do you ensure as your reader comes to the last page that the ending causes them to stop and think on all they have learned throughout the story and they close the book with great contentment? What magical sentence formula must I put together so the ending doesn't seem rushed, but flows together with the rest of the story?

I might not have the answer to these questions. But considering endings to stories caused me to think about a story I have heard my whole life, but the Author did not create an ending to this particular story because it continues to this day.

This is the story of Jesus Christ.

With the Easter celebration being this past weekend, we remember that the story was certainly not done at the cross or the empty tomb.

Jesus' story did not even come to an end when He ascended into Heaven. He gave His followers the Great Commission to continue His story and His Spirit working and moving in us to accomplish this task.

So, when we finish reading the book of John, we know that the gospel does not come to a close because the book of Acts is the next page where we learn that the spreading of the gospel, Jesus' good news story, never ends.

There is not a last page for this story and this book is never closed as the story of Jesus and His redemptive power continues to flow through our lives.