Words by Luke Eldredge
Artwork by Wookie Jones

I met a real asshole, and I don’t tend to use that particular moniker. I don’t mind when people cut me off—maybe they have to poop real bad—and I don’t get ruffled by my neighbor moving my trash cans every week so he can park his truck behind my house. I can let it go. But this time it is just true. Emotionally distant doesn’t quite say it; rough around the edges has too much midwestern euphemism. The guy is just an asshole. 

But maybe he is simply rubbing me the wrong way: Every question is met with a cold and gruff reply; every comment is seeped in a deep cynicism about the world, even his body language is both aggressive and defensive simultaneously. When talking with him, he interjects at inappropriate times and too loudly with the unkind sharpness I’m just not here for.

But then I hear his story.

I don’t know why he shared it, but in a transitional moment when it was just him and me, he told me a little bit about what his life has been like:

“Parents divorced when I was a kid, then I was in an abusive situation until I could move out of the house. Because of that I work as a court liaison working with attorneys in cases of child abuse. I’ve seen some fucked up shit. I know that can make me hard to be around.”

It became really difficult to write him off as an asshole after hearing just a snapshot of his story. I can’t imagine what kind of tenderness and grace would have entered in if we’d had an hour and not 15 random minutes. Our brokenness and pain does not justify our sin or poor behavior, but on the receiving end, it does allow for love and understanding to enter the story. 

I don’t know if you’ve ever had this experience, but I bet you have. The “Of course” moment. After hearing your story...of course you are the way you are and you struggle with the things you do. (And I hope even more that you have had a moment of “Of course” for yourself.) To understand people, to love people well, you need to know their story.
Why you meet the person you meet, why you experience them the way you do, is in their story. 

Now, I’m not a determinist. I don’t believe that all events and actions are determined by causes external to human agency. I believe in free will and that people are responsible for their own actions.  

But the basis of all good relationships—friendship, a band of brothers or sisters, and certainly marriage—is knowing one another’s story. Yet, why do we know so few of the stories of those closest to us? Quite simply, we never ask.  

An essential key to wholehearted relationship is easily missed. Part of it is the knowledge and understanding of our own story (which is a lifelong journey that I don’t have room to get into here), and part of it is knowing how to listen to other people’s stories well. 

Why people are the way they are is found in their story. Why people struggle with their particular addictions, how people respond to what life throws at them, what people deeply believe about God, and how you experience them as people all find cause in their story. 

To love and live life with someone well requires you to know their story. To do so without knowing their story is almost impossible. Words that are meant to offer comfort might be playing right into the messages of harm a person has received over the course of their life, solidifying that message. Despite all good intentions, you might not even realize the damage being done. A friend’s unpredictable anger or another’s refusal to accept the promotion she is so qualified for will be perplexing to you until you understand their story. 

Everyone has a story. Everyone has heartbreak; everyone has deep desires that have shaped them into the man or woman that you meet today. To love someone well and to partner with God in their restoration and with God’s vision for their life requires you to understand that story. Without knowing someone’s story, interacting with them is to meet the sum of a life incomprehensible, to navigate without sextant or map.

And yet the kind of mutual understanding and intimacy achieved by those who know each other’s stories is rare. To share your story is a deeply vulnerable task that requires safety and trust. And handling someone’s heart in the vulnerability of his or her story is too easy to mishandle. It is painfully easy to partner with the assignments against people’s lives and add to the damage.

Listening to someone’s story is such a rare gift in this world. It sounds almost too simple, but knowing the stories of those you walk through life with is key to loving them well.