Excerpts from a Book (pt. 1)

"The David/Goliath story is a great children's story because it conveys an important meaning. It's not an obvious meaning, but all children must learn it if they're going to make it in the world.

But once we've learned the story and assimilated the meaning that goes with it, the story isn't over and done with. Learning stories isn't the same as learning the multiplication tables. Once we've learned that three times four equals twelve, we've learned it and that's that. It's a fact that doesn't change. The data is stored in our memory for ready access. But stories don't stay put; they grow and deepen. The meaning doesn't exactly change, but it matures. Having learned the meaning of love, for instance, we don't for a moment suppose that we've passed that course and can now go on to other things, deciding perhaps to sign up next for computer science.

No. We keep on telling stories, the same old ones, over and over and over again, in away quite different from saying the multiplication tables over and over again. The stories keep releasing new insight in new situations. As we bring new experience and insight to the story, the story gathers that enrichment in and gives it back to us in fresh form.

And so it turns out that the David/Goliath story is as important for adults as it ever was for children. One of the great impoverishments of many adult lives is the absence of children's stories, whether read or told or listened to."

Leap Over a Wall: Earthy Spirituality for Everyday Christians - Eugene Peterson