So Great and Beautiful

(This post is part of a series of posts about The Chronicles of Narnia.)

After the utmost desperate battle to save Narnia from its enemies, its last king, Tirian, has ended up inside a little stable, along with Eustace and Jill, who had come from our world to help him. But instead of the dangers they expected to encounter there, they find instead Peter, Edmund, Lucy, Digory, and Polly, the other friends of Narnia, and all are dressed richly as kings and queens. Back in England, they had all been about to meet at a train station, some on the arriving train, some waiting on the platform, when suddenly there had been a terrible noise and jerk. Eustace and Jill had found themselves with Tirian. The rest were in the supposed stable, which had turned out to be a wide open, sunny country, not a dark hut.

Not long after, Aslan, the Christ-figure Lion, joins them, and then they watch as, through the stable door (standing incongruously in the middle of the wide country, yet opening to Narnia), he puts an end to Narnia and its world. They mourn its passing, and yet they cannot help but be glad. For one thing, they are in a beautiful land. For another, many friends that they had thought dead have now reappeared and have run past them, calling "Farther up and farther in!" Aslan himself utters the same cry, and dashes off westward. So the friends decide to follow.

After an exhilarating, marvel-filled run, they all arrive at a wonderful garden, where they joyously greet many of the people they have known through all of Narnia's centuries. Lucy is talking to one of them.

And then she forgot everything else, because Aslan himself was coming, leaping down from cliff to cliff like a living cataract of power and beauty.... Then Aslan turned to them and said:

"You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be."

Lucy said, "We're so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back to our own world so often."

"No fear of that," said Aslan. "Have you not guessed?"

Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose within them.

"There was a real railway accident," said Aslan softly.... "All of you are—as you used to call it in the Shadowlands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream has ended: this is the morning."

And as he spoke he no longer looked to them like a lion; but the things that began to happen after that were so great and beautiful that I cannot write them. And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they all lived happily ever after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page; now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on for ever: in which every chapter is better than the one before.

Lewis paints a most wonderful picture of what it is like to be in Heaven. This is only a part of it; the entire book needs to be read to experience it.

When I was 20, I read this book for the first time, and ever since then, I have had no fear of death. Why would I fear going on to things that are so great and beautiful that we are unable to imagine them or write about them? I want to read that story in which every chapter is better than the one before.

Thanks be to God that he has broken through my sinfulness with the good news of Jesus Christ, so that I can belong to him and go on after I die to read that wonderful story—to live with him forever! It is available to all of us if we turn to God and give ourselves to him. And the things that will happen to us will be so great and beautiful that no one can write them.

Refusing to See

(This post is part of a series of posts about The Chronicles of Narnia.)

The Last Battle tells how the country of Narnia falls, through treachery, to its enemies, the Calormenes. Before the end, belief in Aslan had been questioned by many in Narnia, most especially by the Dwarfs. In a desperate nighttime battle, one by one, King Tirian and his friends, including Eustace and Jill, are flung into a stable where unknown horrors await them. Before that point, a group of dwarfs had also been pushed into the stable, after they had shot their arrows at both the Narnians and the Calormenes.

When Tirian emerges through the door of the stable, he finds to his surprise that he is in a brightly lit world, with pleasant fruit trees. Tirian is now wearing beautiful comfortable clothes, and in the presence of almost all the people from our world who have ever come to Narnia: Peter, Edmund, Lucy, Digory, and Polly, as well as Eustace and Jill. They are all attired as kings and queens.

After some explanations of what has happened since they have been there, the group turns its attention to the Dwarfs who had previously been flung into the stable. The Dwarfs are seated in a little circle, paying no attention to the gorgeous surroundings. Tirian and his friends approach the Dwarfs.

"Look out!" said one of them in a surly voice. "Mind where you are going. Don't walk into our faces!"

"All right!" said Eustace indignantly. "We're not blind. We've got eyes in our heads."

"They must be darn good ones if you can see in here," said the same Dwarf whose name was Diggle.

"In where?" asked Edmund.

"Why you bone-head, in here of course," said Diggle. "In this pitch-black, poky, smelly little hole of a stable."

"Are you blind?" said Tirian.

"Ain't we all blind in the dark?" said Diggle.

"But it isn't dark, you stupid Dwarfs," said Lucy. "Can't you see? Look up! Look round! Can't you see the sky and the trees and the flowers? Can't you see me?"

"How in the name of Humbug can I see what ain't there? And how can I see you any more than you can see me in this pitch darkness?"

"But I can see you," said Lucy. "I'll prove I can see you. You've got a pipe in your mouth."

"Anyone that knows the smell of baccy could tell that," said Diggle.

"Oh, the poor things! This is dreadful," said Lucy. Then she had an idea. She stooped and picked some wild violets. "Listen, Dwarf," she said. "Even if your eyes are wrong, perhaps your nose is all right: can you smell that?" She leaned across and held the fresh, damp flowers to Diggle's nose. But she had to jump back quickly in order to avoid a blow from his hard little fist.

"None of that!" he shouted. "How dare you! What do you mean by shoving a lot of filthy stable-litter in my face? There was a thistle in it too...."

Lucy, Tirian and the others try a little longer to convince the Dwarfs that they are not in a black, dirty stable, but they have no success. The Dwarfs see everything wrong.

Then, suddenly, Aslan appears. After the friends have flung themselves at his feet and adored him, Lucy asks Aslan if he can help the Dwarfs. Aslan replies that he will show her how much—and how little—he can do. He provides a wondrous feast for the Dwarfs, but they think it is only garbage and dirty trough water that they have scrounged for in the stable. The Dwarfs say:

"Well, at any rate there's no Humbug here. We haven't let anyone take us in. The Dwarfs are for the Dwarfs."

"You see," said Aslan. "They will not let us help them."

How sad that is! As Lucy and the rest soon discovered, the Dwarfs were in the midst of Paradise—Aslan's own country. It was truly Heaven. No more sorrow was to be any more the lot of Tirian, Lucy, Eustace, and the rest. But the Dwarfs had refused to take part in that wonderful life.

Because the Dwarfs wanted to be sure that they were not fooled by anyone, to be sure that they did not believe anything foolish, they had denied to themselves the greatest blessing and happiness that anyone could ever wish for. All they had to do was open their eyes to Aslan and they would have had joy and life beyond imagining. But instead they kept their minds tightly barricaded against him, and they remained in the black, dirty, miserable stable.

So it often is in our world. Many of us do not want to believe what we used to believe as children. We feel we know better now that we think we are mature. We shut Christ out of our lives. In doing this, we have imprisoned ourselves in a dark, dirty, wretched hovel, when all we would have to do is give ourselves to Christ, and we would find ourselves in a land of beauty and abundance of joy.

Things Always Work According to Their Nature

(This post is part of a series of posts about The Chronicles of Narnia.)

Near the end of The Magician's Nephew, young Digory Kirke is told by Aslan, the lion who is Lewis's Christ figure, to go fetch an apple from a special tree, beyond Narnia's borders. Aslan wants Digory to bring the apple back to him so that he can plant it. The tree growing from this apple will protect Narnia from the Witch that Digory has inadvertently brought into Narnia.

When Digory gets to the garden, he sees a sign saying that no one must pick those apples for himself; they must be picked for another. But in that garden he finds the Witch, who has already picked one of the apples and eaten it. She tells Digory that it has given her everlasting life. The Witch urges Digory to eat an apple, too, and rule Narnia's world with him. The fruit smells enticingly good to him, but he refuses. But then the Witch suggests that he take an apple and return to his own world, without telling Aslan, and give the apple to his mother, who is sick and dying. The apple, she says, will cure his mother.

At this proposal Digory is torn. He certainly wants to heal his mother. He almost falls for the Witch's temptation. But when she makes the mean suggestion that Digory leave his friend Polly behind in Narnia so that she won't be able to tell on him, Digory realizes how evil the Witch is, and returns to Aslan with the apple.

When Digory is with Aslan again, he remembers once more how good and great Aslan is, and he is comforted. Aslan tells Digory and Polly that because the Witch ate the apple in the wrong way, by stealing it, the tree growing from it will be hateful to her and keep her out of Narnia.

"Oh I see," said Polly. "And I suppose because she took it in the wrong way it won't work with her. I mean it won't make her always young and all that?"

"Alas," said Aslan, shaking his head. "It will. Things always work according to their nature. She has won her heart's desire; she has unwearying strength and endless days like a goddess. But length of days with an evil heart is only length of misery and already she begins to know it. All get what they want; they do not always like it.... And the Witch tempted you to do another thing, my son, did she not?"

"Yes, Aslan. She wanted me to take an apple home to Mother."

"Understand, then, that it would have healed her; but not to your joy or hers. The day would have come when both you and she would have looked back and said it would have been better to die in that illness."

Something very similar actually happened in our world. There was a garden here, too, and a tree growing marvelous apples. An evil creature met a man and a woman and tempted them to eat one of those apples. The apple, this creature said, would give them the knowledge of good and evil.

Things always work according to their nature. Unlike Digory, Adam and Eve did eat that apple and they did gain the knowledge of good and evil. They got what they wanted; they did not like it. Their idyllic life in the garden, walking and talking with God, came to an end. They were cast out into the world where they had to fend for themselves, toiling to earn their living, living with sickness and sorrow. All of us, their descendants, sin to some extent, some more, some less. We are miserable because of it. Sinning makes us unhappy. All get what they want; they do not always like it.

Thanks be to God that he has provided Jesus Christ as a way to escape the consequences of our getting what we want! Jesus came into the world and took the punishment for our sins. All we have to do is acknowledge that he did it, confess that we have sinned, and ask him to be our Forgiver and Leader. Aslan is a marvelous picture that only begins to paint how loving Jesus is. When we turn to him, he responds with amazing love.

He Understands Our Sorrows

(This post is part of a series of posts about The Chronicles of Narnia.)

In the first book in The Chronicles of Narnia, the four Pevensie children find their way into Narnia from the house of a professor with whom they are staying. The sixth book, The Magician's Nephew, tells the story of how that same professor first discovered how to go to Narnia when he was a boy named Digory.

But before he got to Narnia, he and his friend Polly had visited another world. Because Digory had been arguing with Polly, and because he wanted to have his own way, he rang a bell in that world, which awoke a powerful witch-queen. That witch accompanied Digory and Polly back to their own world. Then, though they didn't know they were going there, she went with them to the brand new world of Narnia just as Aslan, the Lion who is C. S. Lewis's Christ figure, was creating it. There in Narnia the witch-queen runs off into the woods.

Digory's mother was sick and dying back in his own world. As he sees how rich the possibilities are in the new young world of Narnia, Digory decides to ask Aslan if he can have fruit from this new world. He hopes this fruit will be magic and revive his mother. But when he gets to where Aslan is conferring with the Talking Animal leaders about the evil that has entered the new world, Aslan does not answer Digory's request directly. Instead, he asks Digory to tell how he came to bring the witch into Narnia. Then he asks Digory another, unexpected question.

"Son of Adam," said Aslan. "Are you ready to undo the wrong that you have done to my sweet country of Narnia on the very day of its birth?"

"Well, I don't see what I can do," said Digory. "You see, the Queen ran away and—"

"I asked, are you ready?" said the Lion.

"Yes," said Digory. He had had for a second some wild idea of saying, "I'll try to help you if you'll promise to help about my Mother," but he realized in time that the Lion was not at all the sort of person one could try to make bargains with. But when he had said "Yes", he thought of his Mother, and he thought of the great hopes he had had, and how they were all dying away, and a lump came into his throat and tears in his eyes, and he blurted out:

"But please, please—won't you—can't you give me something that will cure Mother?"

Up till then he had been looking at the Lion's great front feet and the huge claws on them; now, in his despair, he looked up at its face. What he saw surprised him as much as anything in his whole life. For the tawny face was bent down near his own and (wonder of wonders) great shining tears stood in the Lion's eyes. They were such big, bright tears compared with Digory's own that for a moment he felt as if the Lion must really be sorrier about his Mother than he was himself.

We are so often like Digory. We have many sorrows in our lives. But sometimes when we take them to Jesus and ask him to fix the problems, we don't receive the answer we hope for. Instead, he asks us to do something else.

So often we think in those cases that God doesn't care. But we have forgotten to look into his face. His tears are bigger even than ours.

In The Magician's Nephew, when Digory rectifies the wrong he has done, he also receives the help he needs for his mother. Aslan is able to work both things out. And so it is for us with Christ. We can trust that he understands our sorrows. We can trust that even while he asks us to do what we need to do, he will heal our griefs in some way. He is sorrier about our sorrows than we are ourselves.