Threshold

"You would not have called to me unless I had been calling to you," said the lion. 

~ C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair

The Silver Chair is not my favorite of the Chronicles of Narnia. In fact, the first time I read it, I came close to hating it. It felt like a very different book from what I had read previously. I loved the Pevensies, and they were nowhere to be found except in passing. I had a hard time following the plot and figuring out where the three heroes were, especially when they are Underland. Puddleglum was odd, Eustace was a bit useless, and Jill had an appalling memory. And then when they found Rillian, everything got a bit weird. My initial skepticism of this particular chronicle was not helped in the slightest by the BBC film. I'm hoping the new one will be a vast improvement.

Contrast this with my feelings on The Horse and His Boy. I can make a very good case for this being my favorite of the series, despite it falling under many of the same categories as The Silver Chair. It still feels like a very different book, because you start in Calormen and take forever to actually reach Narnia. The Pevensies are there, but in the height of their reign. The heroes are a boy with questionable judgment, a Calormene girl, and horses. If anything, this book should be last on my list. After all, C.S. Lewis basically wrote fan fiction about his own universe. (Actually, maybe that's why I like it so much. I love exploring the construct of a universe. Anyway.)

As with many things, however, I have grown to appreciate The Silver Chair more as I have grown. 

That's not what this post is about.

This post is about that quote up there, the one at the beginning. Narnia is, of course, largely allegorical, with Aslan (the lion) standing in for Jesus Christ. (Lewis, interestingly, denied that his stories were allegorical in nature, instead referring to them as 'supposals.' Suppose a world such as Narnia existed, where animals can talk and nature is much more important. How would God redeem such a world?) The Emperor Over the Sea is God the Father, who has a very hands-off role in the Chronicles, and the role of the Holy Spirit is usually filled by Aslan. 

Now, it's entirely possible to read too much into the parallels of faith between this world and Narnia. There are a few things I would be hesitant to embrace should they be taken to their natural conclusions, chief of which (for me) is the role of the young Calormene soldier in The Last Battle who faithfully serves the false god Tash but still ends up in True Narnia. There is a disturbing spirit of universalism in this passage, whether Lewis intended it that way or not. 

I'm getting off track again. 

I want to analyze just this one line, keeping in mind that it may not translate to Christianity at all.

But I'm pretty sure it does.

I want to start with the ways it bothers me, just because I think I'll end up on the other side of this fence.

I think part of my issue is related to why I loathe the silent drama that churches like to put on to "Everything" by Lifehouse. You know the one.  Partly, it's because I don't like the whole mime thing. It creeps me out. Also, it's too long. But mostly, it's because they always portray it as the young girl straining and straining to get to Jesus, and Jesus takes too darn long to bust some heads and get to her. I understand the whole get-distracted-by-the-world thing and the turning-your-eyes-from-Jesus thing. But in the depths of my despair, when I cry out earnestly for God to rescue me, unless I'm in Hell, Jesus is going to answer me, and not with a 'yeah, this song is really long so give me two more minutes.'

So I'm bothered by the implication that we aren't crying out for God on our own.

But that's where my old nature and lack of understanding come in. Because this is really a moot point. It's not even a chicken and egg situation. Before everything, God. Did he want the Fall to happen? No. Did he know it would? Yes, so he planned accordingly. Could he have prevented it? Undoubtedly. But only by creating beings without free will, and what's the point of creating something that can't think for itself?

Ooo, my Arminian side is showing. Don't worry, Calvin is lurking right around the corner. But not Hyper Calvin. That guy's crazy. (And let's not get on the subject of angels. For now.)

So, God knew we were going to choose evil. It's what we do. And he knew it would separate us from him. So he built in a way to draw us back to himself. Because his desire from the beginning was fellowship with us.

From the beginning, he was calling to us. Peter (the apostle, not the king) said it best. He tells us that God doesn't want anyone to perish, but for all to desire and pursue a relationship with God.

The interesting thing in The Silver Chair is that Aslan does not rescue Eustace and Jill right away when they start calling to him. They first have to make their way to the door in the garden. And here's where the parallels could get incredibly deep and technical, but I see it very simply.

A lot of people call on God. There's a reason "no atheists in foxholes" is a saying you often hear. God doesn't want anyone to perish, and calling on God is important, yes. But just believing in a vague notion of a supreme being and asking for its help when you're in a jam isn't enough. When we call on God, he shows us how to get to him, and it's not always easy, but it is very clear. There is one path, one door - and until we take the steps of repentance and faith, we won't be in fellowship with God.

I feel like I'm dancing around a point here, and I may have lost the plot a bit. Let's go back to what bothered me. I was bothered by the implication that man doesn't cry out for God on our own.

But the truth is, we don't. If there weren't evidence of God in this world, what would we appeal to? Would we appeal to nature? That quickly reveals itself to be fickle and unreliable. Would we appeal to man? I've seen a lot of people appealing to the better nature of man, and guess what? That, too, fails. We have nothing good in this world except what comes from God.

The only thing we can appeal to that will never change, that is True and Just and on whom we can rely, is God. And we can appeal to him because he so desperately wants us that he's been revealing himself to us for all of time.

We just have to answer his call.