Old Dragon Skins

Wednesday, February 4, 2009

"Old things have passed away. Behold, all things have become new!"

Because in this life- at times- we are still flawed, hopelessly broken, practically melting away in weakness, we can find it quite easy to forget our brand-spankin'-newness. The truth of our complete restoration, renovation, justification by The Great Maker of All Things New somehow, somewhere, gets dulled down a bit by the shabby and tattered old ways. And oh, they are so dull, those dreaded old ways, and drab- and boring- and smelly- and frayed- and faded- and lacking in that new shiny sparkle and yummy smell of new things.

Yesterday I had the great pleasure of reading Chapter 7 of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader from The Chronicles of Narnia by C.S. Lewis with my children huddled around me on our couch. In this chapter we find Eustace, cousin to Edmond and Lucy Pevensie, as a dragon. He had been forever a puffed-up, irritating, self-focused little boy, and since dropping into Narnia, his annoying and mean-spirited ways had magnified even more. Undoubtedly, this was due to the culture stress, not having any idea of what was going on around him. So unfamiliar was this wild world of seeming make-believe to Eustace, that when he looked at his own reflection in a pool of water after just turning into a full-fledged fire-breathing dragon, he did not know what to call himself! Lewis notes that he had not read the right sort of books.

So here he is, appearing on the outside as his soul has looked on the inside all along. Just like us, of course. And well, you just MUST read the account for yourself, but what happens is this. While a dragon, Eustace recognized how pathetic he really was. He was humbled and learned his lesson. He wanted to be a boy again, to be made new. And one night, Aslan himself, the great Lion, came to Eustace the Dragon and told him that he needed to "undress" or shed his skin. And many times, Eustace would tear a layer off, much like a snake sheds his skin, but he was always still a dragon underneath. Finally, Aslan did the work himself.

"The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off." And then he was new. He was a boy again. Aslan had to do that painful work, but then all of that scaly nasty stuff was gone and didn't need to be carried any longer.

What a relief! Do we live, do I live, with that light as a feather sensation, liberated from the old skin, the old ways, the days of breathing fire? Because that is the reality of my situation, and that of all believers. We've been rescued, saved, from being monsters. But the question at hand is, how can we remember that when we think, "Maybe the old things haven't passed away completely" and we smell smoke on our breath and notice very long, thick claws growing where our fingernails once grew. My only answer is one of knowing. John says, "And they will know the truth and the truth will set them free." We have to know and remember the major soul surgery that was performed on us and look in the pool and see the reflection of a person- not dragon- as proof. Lewis closes with his own answer in describing Eustace following his transformation. There were still "relapses." He could still be "very tiresome" on some days, but the fact was that "The cure had begun." We've received the antidote, the major work is done and we're out of the woods, and the remnants of old things will soon be long forgotten.