David:        Since we last met, we have been working on understanding the term backstory. Here’s the definition we found that we kind of like anyway. Backstory is the well that a writer draws upon for the current topic that he or she is now writing.

Karen:        So, when we ask ourselves how we came up with the concepts for the 36 stories in our three books, Tales of the Kingdom, Tales of the Resistance, and Tales of the Restoration, which we began to talk about in our previous podcast, we felt we were on the right track in our attempt to explain the backstory of some of the chapters.

David:        Yep, that’s what we’re trying to do and pull it off.

Intro:         Welcome to the Before We Go Podcast featuring Dr. David Mains and his wife, noted author Karen Mains. Here’s David and Karen Mains.

David:        In the previous podcast and to the best of our memory, we feel listeners in on some of the life experiences we’ve gone through that helped shape the narrative of those tales. These three books have been in the marketplace for over 50 years now and are being produced in other formats Karen. Episodic animation, for instance, that will extend their message to new generations.

Karen:        Well, it certainly has been a meaningful exercise for us, the authors, to try to remember where many of the themes of the stories came from and what personal life experiences generated those things.

David:        So, this visit, we have chosen to once again share some of the personal experiences that generated many of the concepts in these three books, which really attempt to make the theology of the king and the kingdom in story form, clearer and more attractive for children of all ages.

Karen:        I sort of suspect there’ll be enough information not only for this podcast, but maybe for one more.

David:        Okay, memories keep coming back, huh?

The first tale I’d like to talk about, Karen, is called The Faithless Ranger. That’s one of the early stories in the first book. There was a plain reality as we founded a church in the city of Chicago that not everybody stayed with the project. In fact, some of the people, strong people, never came.

Karen:        People would be in the inception and planning of them.

David:        Yeah, they were that way. They were all excited, but they never came. And the truth is we found out later that they actually kind of stepped out of the kingdom things as well. It was a very sad thing.

Faithless Ranger was one of the stories early on that said, “It’s because you thought this was a good thing, it doesn’t mean that you are stuck with us.” And that’s part of the story of kingdom things that you read about these in Scripture, as well. These people who have left the faith, they’re no longer interested in the kingdom that Jesus talked about. So that story, it has painful repercussions in terms of our own mind because we feel for these people.

The Faithless Ranger is a part of the kingdom. There is always the option to say, “You know what, I want out now. I’ve tasted enough of it, and I think I’m going a different way.” In fact, you remember in the Gospels Jesus saying, “Do you want to leave too” to his 12 disciples when he had given some hard saying?

And Peter has no idea. “You’re the one who has the words of life…” and so on. That’s a backstory for us. It was a personal thing. And every time I read those stories for one reason or another and I read the story of the Faithless Ranger. I know who I have in mind as far as some of those individuals who they were.

Another one, the major story that people talk about when they say, “I read the tales, and that story was very meaningful to me.” It’s called The Beggar Who Loved Bread. I don’t believe that you wrote that story with me in mind, but that was a very personal, intense story for me down through the years.

Karen:        No, I’m sure I didn’t take it. I didn’t even tell the theme of the story.

David:        Well, it’s the baker who’s very gifted. His reputation grows in the kingdom, and he just keeps getting better and better at his trade. But at the same time, he begins to be more and more involved in the beauty and the compliments and all the rest that go with his expertise.

Karen:        He got proud about his accomplishments and sort of panting himself in the back, maybe.

David:        Yeah, and he doesn’t relate, first of all, to the privilege he has of serving the king. In fact, he begins to say, “Get out of the bakery area here, you poor people, you’re going to bring fleas to my breads” and so on. He’s missed the privilege that he’s been given to be involved in something eternal.

Karen:        Feed the hungry who are starving and need his bread and another kind of thing. But he’s totally missed it.

David:        The reason I said I think you may have had me in mind when you wrote the story is that I enjoyed immensely the founding of the church in Chicago. Seeing God put his hand upon it and growing people talking about it.

Karen:        There was a lot of attention to what was happening in the church.

David:        It’s easy to have it twist and all of a sudden you have a new thing you’re pleasing, which is your own self-gratification. My workaholism was a problem. I gave myself to it totally. It was satisfying to me. But it was also idolatry in a sense.

You are worshiping what you have brought into being and it was a battle for me. So, when you read that story, the story was very meaningful to me and convicting.

Karen:        I wrote these stories after we had left the pastorate. But I was referring very often to people who were in that church. And at the time when you were really manifesting workaholism, you had a broadcast, you had a television show. The broadcast was daily, the television show was daily. You were leading pastors’ conferences all over the country and you just got caught up in it.

David:        I did. And it needed to be confessed and it needed to begin to turn in the direction. But it wasn’t easy. If you have a backstory and it’s a story that speaks directly to your heart and says, “I’m pointing my finger at you. This is about you.”

Karen:        David Mains or something you need to take care of and pay attention to.

David:        So, when people say back story, yeah, there’s a back story there. Baker who loved bread or the minister who loved the ministry.

So anyway, another one. This one I want to take more time with. The Orphan Exodus is in the second book. It’s a very powerful story. I’m going to ask you, Karen, a little bit to read part of the story anyway for us, but not quite yet. It’s about the surprise and delight of someone significant knowing your name and your backstory. How’s that?

Karen:        That’s excellent. Let’s give a little more information.

There’s the Enchanted City. That’s ruled by the evil enchanter. People live and work in the dark and they sleep during the day.

David:         So, if everything is backwards?

Karen:         Everything is backwards.

David:        That’s how you can say it to children. So, they all understand it and adults understand that as well.

Karen:        So, there are many orphans in the Enchanted City. Their parents have died. And when a child becomes an orphan, the Orphan Keeper then takes the child under his own command. And they work in the power centers that are under the city that keep the electricity, the lights, the going. And they’re just children and they’re very poorly treated. They’re not fed well. They’re not clothed well. So that’s the backstory to this chapter.

David:        And Karen, you’ll get to that in the story as I have you read part of it. There is the surprise and the delight when someone significant knows your name. I’d give the backstory in a sense from my own perspective.

During the years when I was a young minister, the person I admired more than anyone else was Billy Graham. In fact, if you could have said, “David, during your lifetime you’d meet all these different people. Who would you like to have met more than anybody else?” It would have been Billy Graham. But I never met him. It just was not a possibility.

Karen:        Well, when you were on the radio, when you had a national radio program.

David:        Well, they had a stage. I think it was Montreat, North Carolina.

Karen:         In Montreat, North Carolina.

David:         So, he probably knew who we were. But I had no verification of that. And it wasn’t personal in that sense. There was one time when Billy Graham said to me two words. It was at a broadcaster’s convention. I saw him down the hall. And I thought, “Well, I’ll go and just say hello and thank you.” Because I had written to him twice. Letters just thanking him for the beauty of his life.

Karen:         Of the thousands of letters, he’d seen.

David:         And he probably never saw it. In the world that had happened, I admired him greatly. And he was worthy of that admiration.

Karen:         Yeah, we feel that.

David:         And I walked over to him. And just as I walked up, I probably had a name tag. I don’t know. He said, “Oh, David.” Now, that was the only two words. And as soon as he said it, another guy came running over and said, “They need you, Mr. Graham.” And he was shuffled off. And that was it. All he ever said, “Oh, David.” But you know what it meant? It meant he knew who I was.

Karen:         He knew your name?

David:         Yeah, he knew my name. And that was very powerful.

Now, translating that to the Tales of the Kingdom. That’s a part of the story that we’re going to get into now, which is the orphan exodus. Because the king knows the names of the orphans. And that’s a very powerful scene in the story. Makes sense?

So that’s the backstory. And I can’t have you read the whole of the tale because it takes too long. But I’m going to pick up the story where the operator and the king are going in and they’re going to free the orphans. And you’ll notice at a certain point, he knows all those orphans’ names.

Karen:        Let me just describe Big Operator a bit. “Big operator ran the taxi resistance in the city that had been taken over by the evil enchanter. There was a resistance movement. It was the taxi drivers. And Big Operator was the one who was in charge of that resistance movement.”

Ok?

David:        Where you’re picking it up, it’s introducing this wicked hag who’s the one in charge of all these orphans.

Karen:        Okay.

“At that moment, a woman appeared at the inside entrance to the orphan pavilion. She was tall and beautiful in more glamorous clothes. Purple fitted pants with matching purple boots and a flowing red robe, which she swept from one side to another behind her. She cracked a cat nine tails in her hand. A golden headdress embossed with flames crowned her brilliant black hair. She wore bracelets and rings and ear loops and one glittering necklace draped over another and another.

Drummers had rolled the announcement of her appearing. Tatat-tatat-tadadada! Besides her stood two burners with glowing pokers. Keeper assistants bowed in the ranks, their whistles clattering on the paving stones. Torchbearers lit her path. With each step, the Orphan Keepers jewels glimmered and glistened in the reflected torchlight. Her severe beauty was chiseled by the heart edge of hatred. Her eyes flashed with sinister power over the orphans who had been entrusted to her keeping. There was nothing soft in all her body or in all her soul.

“I am the orphan keeper,” she entuned. “You will do my bidding. You will keep my commands. I have control over your lives and your destinies. I am the one who says ‘Yay’ or ‘Nay.’ You can never escape. You can never go where I say no.”

The children cowered. Even the older ones all knew this loveless woman had power to send them to the underworld to poison their food and call it night ailment to advance them or to cut off their rations. And it was she who ordered punishment for all if one orphan misbehaved.

“You are mine. You are all mine,” she shouted again lashing the air with the hand whip.

“Let my children go!” Everyone within the courtyard froze. The drum stopped in mid-road. Tatat-tatat-tadadada!

“Who dared disrupt the orphan keeper’s time schedule? Who dared interrupt her early night work duty harangue?”

The children shivered in the cold, miserable with hunger and now with dread.

“What torture would they suffer because of this unspeakable challenge?” The king had shouted the words. He faced the orphan keeper throwing back the hood of his common garment from his head as though she would recognize him once his face was fully revealed in the torchlight.

The children were stunned by such defiance. “Who was this man?”

The king’s hair glimmered with gold highlights and his loosened street robe felt to the paving stones and he stood strong and tall and broad-shouldered and handsome.

Big Operator’s jaw dropped. He had never beheld his king undisguised so young and so beautiful.

The orphan keeper cracked her cat o’ nine tails in the air. “I know you, you troublemaker. You! You, instigator. Who do you think you are, challenging my power? The enchanter has cast his spell over these children. “They are mine. I can do what I please with them.”

The king answered her not a word, but all could see he was as angry as she. He crossed the pavement and lifted his hands. A wind began to blow around and around. It caught the torches of the torchbearers and bound the flames in one windy firebrand. Up! Up! It shot into the night sky over the orphan pavilion blazing.

By its light all could see the king grab the hand from the Orphan Keeper’s grasp, lash the pokers from the burner’s hands, scatter the assistance with a crack, and then toss the instruments of torture to the sky.

A bolt of lightning flashed from nowhere striking with crack. Flames burst and a ball of fire fell to the ground, finally to be extinguished at the Orphan Keeper’s feet.

The ranks of the orphans gasp. The Assistant Keepers hid their prodding spoons, sticks, and shovels behind their backs, dropped them to the ground, or pushed them under carts. Then in the unlit dark all could see the warm radiance of the man standing in the middle of the courtyard, daring to defy the evil power of the Orphan Keeper herself.

The king signaled to Big Operator and together with a mighty thrust, they overturned the boiling vat of palace laundry. They ripped the wheels from the work carts, their muscles straining in a fury of indignation, and no one moved to stop them. The burner stood mesmerized. No warning signal was given to the Dagoda. The Orphan Keeper hissed as though the air was escaping from her lungs.

Many of the children dropped to their knees, clasping their hands together beneath their chins, scarcely daring to hope. Was this the one who could save them? Would their misery finally end with freedom close?

The king straightened himself again and stared the Orphan Keeper in the eyes. “You mistake yourself, Madam,” he said. His voice was tight with controlled wrath. “These children are not yours. They belong to me.”

With those words he motioned to Big Operator who stepped forward, wiping axle grease from his hands onto his overalls. He bent his knee and bowed. Though comrade to the king before, he was an obedient subject now.

“Is the taxi vanguard ready?” asked the king. “Yes, my lord. Ready and waiting.”

At that the orphan keeper screamed, staggering on her feet. “Shhh! You, you, you can’t take these children. They’re waves. They’re slaves. The wolves will tell them to shoot us. They do my bidding. They won’t come with you.”

“Pay no attention,” the king lifted his crossed arms and spread them in a circle above his head. More light diffused from his stretching embrace till it filled every corner of the grim courtyard. The orphan’s frozen feet began to warm. Their cold wet garments began to dry. Their wounds and sores began to heal in the gentle light. Their hearts began to mend.

“What you don’t understand, madame?” said the king, “is that every orphan answers when his name is called in love.”

Then the king began to call their names. Names unspoken for months, for years, names they themselves had all but forgotten. He called them in family groups. Brothers and sisters, brothers and brothers, sisters and sisters, according to age and position. He spoke their names with tenderness, with kindly affection, with cherished intimacy as though he had been practicing them for years.

“Kristen, Ned, James, Sarah and Susan. Javier, Carlos and Maria. Ann, Ted, John and Linda. You and Chet? Sharon and Robin. Jamal and Beza. Jason, Ruth and Kathy. Malimba.”

And each child remembered his or her name. And each child stepped from the ranks. They were more than a number, more than flesh for the meat grinder of the Enchanters’ labor machines. They each had a name chosen in love in a family history, in a king who was worthy of service.

Big Operator stood now at the street entrance to the pavilion. The beastly wolves lay silent in a stupor of sleep. He put two fingers to his mouth and blew a cabbie signal. And at this, his master’s strategy went into operation. The first taxi accelerated to curbside. The first ready orphan group climbed into the back and front seats. The driver honked and then hurried off toward the garbage dump as another cab pulled up to take another load, followed by another and another. And inside the king continued to speak the children’s names. And with each naming, the Orphan Keeper grew grayer, more haggard, leaking hot air. Her hair lost its luster. Her teeth grew black and straggly, until all could see her for her true self, a wicked hag who had gorged on the energy and youth and beauty of the children given to her keeping. A faker whose evil power was not her own. And no people in disguise as were all who gave themselves to do the will of the Enchanter.

Finally, she was nothing, but a pile of dust covered by filthy red and purple rags, her gold melted, and her jewels turned to trash. And Big Operator was joyful. His heart leaped with gladness. He knew the Enchanter would take revenge, but even if this was to be his final strategic rescue design ever, he had been at the sight of his king. As together, they emptied the pavilion of every last orphan. He closed his eyes and listened to the taxi vanguard, his taxi vanguard honking throughout all of Enchanted City. Hunk! Hunk! Here, there and everywhere. Hunk! Hunk! It sounded in his ears like a raucous chorus of jubilant rescue.

The king stood beside him ready to leave and to accompany the escapees into Great Park. The hand-class between them was firm and long. Their anger was gone, but strangely there was no exultation. Just a quiet sadness. Both knew what dire consequences their defiant acts would set into motion.

“Farewell,” said the king, and they embraced. The embrace of two mighty men. The orphan exodus was accomplished.

Big Operator watched the king disappear into the night, and though he knew it was just his imagination, it seemed as though a crowd of children stood all over the city, clapping their hands and shouting, “Bravo! Bravo!”

And when the last taxi had hurried away with the last load, on a whim, Big Operator bowed to the city, and the applause rose louder in his heart. For Big Operator had learned through the years of masterminding the taxied resistance that mighty deeds demand mighty risks, but that it is worth risking all for the sake of the king and his kingdom.

David:        Thank you. Well, the power of one’s name being spoken by someone in love. So-and-so knows my name. They’re nothing bigger in the whole world than the king knows my name.

Someday that will be true for all of us to stand in his presence, and he calls us by name and understands who we are. It’s beautiful. It’s captured in the story, Karen. Children respond, but children of all ages respond. Appreciate it. I don’t hear you read very often, so usually I end up reading the stories, and I end up stopping and saying, “Excuse me, I need to stop for a little while I come my composure once again, because it speaks to me in the heart.”

So, thank you. I think a lot of that, the Lord gives you little experiences. Billy Graham, “Oh, David.” Somehow for children of all ages to be able to understand that there is a king who knows their name and loves them in spite of all the difficulties they may experience.

Karen:        Who laid down his life?

David:        Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for reading in a different direction. I still have some back stories to tell about different stories. Totally different approach next time, but we’ll kind of come to the end of that after a while, but we realize that God’s always working. He’s drawing nearer today than he did maybe a couple days back.

Karen:        I’d be good for a listener to sort of consider the back stories of their own lives. Sometimes we know God has worked in our lives. We know He’s brought certain people into our lives, and we forget as we go on with busy days or as we get older, particularly as we get older, you know. It’s been a while. It’s been decades. But I think that might be a good exercise for people to drive. They have the time.

David:        Yeah, and just sit and quiet and say, “I’m sitting here and renew in my mind some of the areas where you’re drawn very close, and especially I’d appreciate it and need to recall those along with a lot of things that don’t need to be recalled.” Yeah. Again, it’s been a good visit. Thanks, sweetheart.

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