34: Hobbits & entering the Greater Story

hobbits story great

“It’s like in the great stories, Mr. Frodo. The ones that really mattered.” There are two stories that can rule our lives: the Me story (Ego-drama) and the God story (Theo-drama). The drama of Christianity is moving from one to the other, and this perilous! Journey with the hobbits as they leave the Shire and learn what it takes to enter the Great Story.

Excerpt from episode

“…I feel the drama of ‘entering the Great Story’ is the chief reason The Lord of the Rings speaks to our culture, and why we return to story again and again. It is really a story of how characters move away from a life centred around themselves, their own ego and will, and into a life fully given for others, surrendered for others. A life where they abandon their own will to surrender to a bigger will. Lord of the Rings is a story of moving from what Hans Ur Von Balthasar calls the Ego Drama of the self, into the Theo Drama of God’s story, pivoted around God and his purposes. We see this profoundly through the journey of the hobbits Frodo and Sam, Pippin and Merry. In the beginning, its all about the Shire, comforts, my will, the next party, the next pipe. It’s well and good as that’s where we start out life. By end of story, by end of trilogy, they are willing to give their lives for the bigger story, the bigger drama ay work that permeates all of Middle Earth and the history of Middle Earth…”

St Ignatius Prayer of Surrender (Suspice)

Here is the text for the prayer, and you can also download a hard copy here.

“Take, O Lord, and receive my entire freedom, my memory, my understanding and my whole will. All that I am and all that I possess, you have given me: I surrender it all to you to be used according to your will. Give me only your love and your grace; with these I will be rich enough and will desire nothing more. Amen.”

All soundtracks used this episode are from New Line Cinema’s The Lord of the Rings OST (Composed by Howard Shore): The Shire, The Rohirrim, Rivendell, The Tales that really Matter, Arwen and Aragorn