If you learn how to write a story, they talk about writing a plot, and they have a plot diagram.
And the plot diagram, it looks pretty simple.
It has a pattern that kind of looks like this, okay?
And what they say is, to start, you need to have what's called an exposition.
Or you could call it a prologue, or the setting.
These are kind of different things.
To expose something that makes it obvious or reveals something,
the exposition, what it does is it places the story with a setting, characters,
and some kind of a promise or some kind of a plot, something that they're going to be doing, okay?
Now, the Bible, of course, does this in what? Genesis 1 through 3.
Actually, it's really more just like Genesis 1 through 2, kind of.
But this is where we get the setting.
We have the setting of the whole world, the whole universe being created.
We have God, we have the characters.
We have man, we have Adam and Eve, all created at the very beginning, giving us a clear exposition.
But then the second part of good literature is you have to have here conflict, okay?
Some kind of a conflict, which is introduced in Genesis chapter number 3.
Sin is introduced into the world, is it not? A great conflict.
Then they say what happens next in a good story, in a good plot, is you have what's called rising action.
Which one's following which? The Bible's not following this.
This is just telling you what the Bible did, okay?
But what's the rising action? This is the Old Testament.
And here we are made a promise, okay, at the conflict and the beginning and the setting.
What was that promise? The seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent, okay?
And it was going to bite the heel of one and crush the head of the other, okay?
So all of that's created. We have a setting, the world.
We have the characters, God and man, the devil.
And then we have a promise that's given of what?
That the seed of the woman is going to defeat the seed of the serpent, okay?
So the Old Testament leads to what? The coming seed, the seed of the woman.
What is the climax? It's none other than the gospel of Jesus Christ.
What is the following action? It's the New Testament.
And what is the resolution? The return of Christ.
Where he's ultimately going to what? Destroy the serpent.
And we are reconciled back to God. This is exactly how the Bible is written from an overview.
And also, happy ending.
Now, I could just sit here and list story after story after story after story that follow this exact model.
You go watch a movie, here it is.
Now you watch a crappy movie and they don't do this very well.
You watch a great movie, exactly like this.
And honestly, I need to preach a whole different sermon.
Maybe I'll do it pretty soon since I'm talking about this.
But what the devil does is he takes all of the good elements of the Bible like this and creates a story and then perverts it.
But if you understand Hollywood, all of the really good stories are the exact same as the Bible.
It's very eerie.