December 17, 2025Choosing Sides

In storytelling, there is always an antagonist – the villain – and a protagonist – the hero. This is the basic formula for stories, but it’s not a formula that some clever creative dreamed up. It’s based on reality. Art imitates life.

We see this principle played out daily in our own life stories when we overcome the big and little obstacles we face. Human beings are designed to be pretty darn resourceful … we can conquer a sink full of dirty dishes or push through physical barriers to send rockets into space.

We’re rather proud of that and we tend towards feeling a bit smug and invincible … until we meet a real villain, like cancer or a hurricane or some invisible germ that brings us to our knees.

When that happens, we shake our fists at heaven and demand answers! But no answer will be coming, because we’re the antagonist!

And that’s what Christmas is all about.

There is an invisible side of reality that is more real than the visible physical side where we live. We all instinctively know it exists, and that at some point our physical life will end and we will enter the other side. It’s mysterious and vague and terrifying all at once, and we tend to respond to it in extreme ways.

Some of us just avoid the subject altogether. If it turns up, we hush it up immediately like it was some crude vulgarity blurted out in polite company. And that is very foolish.

Others will embrace it, romanticize it, and get it totally out of context. They will use their imagination and flawed logic to fill in the unknown blanks. And that is very dangerous.

In this invisible realm a rebellious entity gathered an army of corrupt angels and challenged the authority of their Creator. That entity – Lucifer, known as Satan – was exiled from heaven and cast down to earth.

When God created humans, we lived in perfect relationship and harmony with Him. Created in His image, we were free to be in relationship with Him and each other, free to be about the task of managing our perfect, pristine earth.

But Satan, still wanting to sit on God’s throne, went to the humans and challenged God’s instructions. We all know the story … we removed ourselves out from under God’s authority, and submitted ourselves to Satan’s authority.

That’s how wars are won and lost … one side conquers and takes over territory from the opposing side. Satan became our ruler. The physical earth is now his kingdom and we are his subjects.

We are now the enemies of our God and Creator ... we are the antagonists!