Your Life Script

by Sherri Langton

All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players.

They have their exits and their entrances;

And one in his time plays many parts. . . .

This famous quote from Shakespeare's comedy As You Like It accurately describes us as human beings in the drama called life. If we are players on the world's stage, then each of us is following a script. The script is more than what we say and how we act; it is who we are.

Many authors contribute to our script: primarily parents, relatives, teachers, friends, and the culture. How well we make our entrances and exits in life is related to what these authors have written in us. Some people don't function well today because of years of negative writing. If this has happened to you, you need not despair: Your script can be rewritten by the master Playwright.

Positive scripting

Many owe a great debt to authors who have written positive things in their lives: parents who invested loving discipline, caring concern, and faithful nurture, who gave a pat on the back for a job well done and spent quality time with their kids; relatives who boosted self-esteem and instilled a healthy self-image; teachers who shaped minds and groomed talents; friends who stood by and told them the truth when they needed to hear it; the culture that offered opportunities for education and personal development, that inspired them to better themselves and their world.

With this kind of writing, a person's performance isn't flawless but more likely to succeed.

Negative scripting

For some, however, the scripting has been negative -- even tragic.

Parents have physically and verbally abused them, or neglected them; relatives have treated them harshly or ignored them completely; teachers have demeaned them and friends have taken advantage of them.

In addition to these, the culture has couched negative writing in positive messages:

"Buy this car and improve your image!"

"Get instant credit for that exotic trip you've always wanted to take. You deserve it!"

"Feel lucky? Visit one of the region's hottest gambling casinos."

"An after-work cocktail with your secretary isn't going to hurt. So what if you're late getting home? Everybody does it."

The problem with negative scripting is that is sets the stage for harmful episodes later: anger and bitterness, nightmares, depression, anxiety attacks, financial ruin, broken marriages. Even thoughts of suicide threaten to drop the final curtain prematurely.

Rewriting the script

What about a negative life script? Is it doomed to failure?

Thankfully, no.

If we let Him, God will erase the negative writing from our script and rewrite it. Nothing negative is absolute. It's up to us to repent of any sin and forsake it, to accept God's forgiveness, and to leave the past behind.

Paul, a biblical writer, had a mixed life script -- some good and some bad. His religious upbringing had taught him moral uprightness -- the good. But it also had written hatred in him for the followers of Jesus. Paul hunted them down, dragged them from their homes, and threw them in jail or killed them. He looked on approvingly while a Christian named Stephen was stoned to death.

Not long after Stephen's death, Paul was confronted by Jesus Christ. The power of Jesus' forgiveness transformed him. Jesus blotted out the heavy ink of sin and rewrote Paul's script. Instead of persecuting Christians, Paul spread the good news about Jesus and His resurrection from the dead.

For Paul, the secret of a rewritten script was in forgetting what had happened in the past and focusing on the future:

One thing I do: Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus (Philippians 3:13, 14, NIV).

Only by focusing on the future can we trust God to write a new script. Through the prophet Isaiah, God himself said:

Forget the former things; do not dwell on the past. See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland (Isaiah 43:18, 19, NIV).

Letters to others

Why is rewriting our script so important? First, to have a right relationship with God through Jesus Christ and second, to influence others.

No script is private. As with stage plays, the public views what has been written in our lives and is affected by how we act and what we say.

Our life script actually becomes a personal "letter" that other people read. In his work of starting churches, Paul had become significant to the Christians in Corinth. He believed that he had much to do with the script of their lives. In return, their lives had been letters to Paul affirming the work of Christ in their hearts:

The only letter I need is you yourselves! By looking at the good change in your hearts, everyone can see that we have done a good work among you. They can see that you are a letter from Christ, written by us. It is not written with pen and ink, but by the Spirit of the living God; not one carved on stone, but in human hearts (2 Corinthians 3:2, 3, TLB).

Conclusion

Who or what has written your life script? Abusive parents? Hurtful relatives or friends? Unfeeling teachers? An immoral culture?

More important, have you allowed God to rewrite your script? He is eager for others to "read" you and for you to "write" them!

Sherri Langton is associate editor of the Bible Advocate. This article is based on an article by Daniel Davila in the July 1981 issue of the Bible Advocate. For a free subscription, contact us at bibleadvocate@cog7.org

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