I love them more now than I did when I was a child.
There's great value in them.
They are necessary to life.
Physicist Albert Einstein said, "Imagination is more important than knowledge."
Writer Jane Yolen writes in the book Touch Magic: Fantasy, Faerie & Folklore in the Literature of Childhood, "the talking beasts, the ballet of birch and oak, the riders of the wind are another way of presenting the real world. And the reader . . . who learns to use eyes and ears and mind and heart in this manner can never again look at the world in a one-dimensional way.
"Life Actual (the one we see with our eyes) tells us that the world is not perfectly ordered . . . Endings are as often unhappy as happy. Issues are seldom clear-cut. Judgment is as capricious as justice. Babies starve . . . Mothers die . . . Families are torn asunder . . . That is Life Actual.
"But Life in Truth (what we get in fairy tales) tells us something else. It tells us of the world as it should be. It holds certain values to be important. It makes issues clear. It is, if you will, a fiction based on great opposites, the clashing of opposing forces, question and answer, speech and echo . . . And so the fantasy tale, the 'I that is not I,' becomes a rehearsal for the reader for life as it should be lived."
This applies wholly to the spiritual realm. Story helps us see the truth of what we are experiencing.
Truth is found in the unseen realm.
Jesus knows this. He often taught using story. We call His stories parables.
In the Old Testament story was also used, often by the prophets. God used word pictures, physical illustrations of spiritual truths. The story sucks us in so we are ready to hear truth. Think of great movies -- the ones that bring you to tears or laughter -- your heart feels because you can relate. That is the level we find ourselves at when we get immersed in a good story. That level is where spiritual change can occur in us. God has to get past the surface like a storyteller. For a story to be successful, to ring true, to affect us, it has to hit the heart.
"What was from the beginning, what we have heard, what we have seen with our eyes, what we beheld and our hands handled, concerning the Word of Life -- and the life was manifested, and we have seen and bear witness and proclaim to you also, that you also may have fellowship with us; and indeed our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ." 1 John 1:1-3
"And the earth was formless and void, and darkness was over the surface of the deep and the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters. Then God said, 'Let there be light' and there was light." Genesis 1:2-3
"In the beginning was the Word and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God.All things came into being by Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being." John 1:1-3
"By faith we understand that the worlds were prepared by the word of God, so that what is seen was not made out of things which are visible." Hebrews 11:3
Your life is a story to those watching.
What is it teaching them?