The
Prison in our Mind – A Lesson from Narnia
I have to admit, that as an avid reader throughout
my life, I had never read all of the Narnia tales, by C.S. Lewis, from start to
finish until just recently. All of the tales in their entirety and put
together in one story is a masterpiece of spiritual and scriptural analogy
which has so many incredible and worthwhile gems regarding the Creation,
overcoming mortal challenges, staying true to the cause of righteousness, maintaining
one’s honor, discovering the divine within yourself, and enduring through
trials and receiving the growth which can only come from them.
The final book in this series, “The Last Battle” also
has so many important parallels and lessons about the last days, staying true
to truth and not succumbing to false prophets and clever deceptions of the
adversary, and being able to trust in the Lord to the bitter end, no matter
what darkness is raging around you. The
glorious ending to the story describes what we all are seeking and longing for!!!
(but that is another post all in itself,
which I will save for another time).
What I wanted to comment on today was a small
particular part of the story near the end.
There is a particular set of people (dwarfs
in the story – which may represent their spiritually diminished condition)
who will not believe anything whether good or bad. They
only believe and trust in themselves.
Even as the miraculous final events and terrible destruction are
happening around them they remain in denial, despite the main characters’
efforts to help them come into the Light of understanding.
Their situation and story can shed some important
light into the gift of agency, and why sometimes our efforts to help can fall
on deaf ears. And why even the Lord
sometimes cannot reach them because of His respect for that agency.
As the others are trying to help them understand
what is happening, the dwarfs reply, “How can you go on talking all that
rot? Your wonderful (Savior) didn’t come
and help you, did he? And now – even
now- when you’ve been beaten… just the same as the rest of us, you’re still at
your old game. Starting a new lie! Trying to make us believe…”
The Great Lion Aslan (who represents the Lord Jesus
Christ) then arrives on the scene.
Some of Aslan's followers plead with Him to help the
dwarfs, much in the way we may plead for our loved ones and friends who cannot
seem to see the truth.
Aslan replies, “Dearest, I will show you both what I can,
and what I cannot do.”
He then personally calls to the dwarfs, who because
of their spiritual blindness cannot see Him and still seem to think it is a
trick, “Hear that? Their trying to
frighten us. …Don’t take any
notice. They won’t take us in again!”
Aslan then miraculously and kindly provides a
multitude of bounteous blessings for them, but in their spiritually darkened
state, they cannot recognize the blessings for what they really are or from
Whom they have been provided. Instead
they complain and begin to fight amongst themselves, more concerned that others around
them may somehow have something better, and in the end they justify their
errant behavior with the claims, “Well, at any rate… we haven’t let anyone
take us in. The dwarfs are for the
dwarfs.” (Or in other words, we will live for ourselves and only for
ourselves).
Aslan then provides a remarkable explanation to His
loyal friends.
“You
see,” said Aslan. “They
will not let us help them. They have
chosen cunning instead of belief. Their
prison is only in their own minds, yet they are in that prison; and so afraid
of being taken in that they cannot be taken out. But come children, I have other work to do.”
I think there is a remarkable truth to be learned
from this exchange. And that is that
despite all our prayers and efforts, and even the loving call of the Lord
Himself, there are some who will not let themselves be open to help. They may, at least for the time being, be
past feeling.
That doesn’t mean that we shouldn’t keep praying for
them or trying to help them when we can, but it also means that sometimes we
need to trust them into the Lord’s care and His divine timing, and make sure we
are still moving on with the “other work” He has for us to do.
And probably the most important lesson we can and
should take from this exchange, would be in how we can apply its lesson to our own lives!
What parts of our own hearts are still sealed up
from the Lord?
What parts of our flawed logic and limited
understanding may be creating a prison in our own minds, which doesn’t allow us
to see the Lord’s hand and countless blessings in our lives?
Perhaps part of that limiting and blinding fear
comes from the fact that we worry what the Lord will think of us when we
actually do meet Him and we have to face all our follies and indiscretions and
imperfections before Him.
But if we are seeking to do our best and trying to improve, that fear is completely unfounded and untrue. For as the faithful Lucy from the Narnia stories declares to one of her worried
friends, “You’ll find it will be all right when you really do.”
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