Hooray for Puddleglum!

Monday, September 29, 2008

I've read the most fantastic speech tonight. The boys and I are in Chapter 12 of Lewis's Silver Chair, and the Marsh-wiggle has just given a speech that I can't help crying "hooray" to!
He speaks to an evil enchantress:

"One word. All you've been saying is quite right, I shouldn't wonder...I won't deny anything you've said. But there's one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things--trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that's a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We're just babies making up a game, if you're right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That's why I'm going to stand by the play-world. I'm on Aslan's side even if there isn't any Aslan to lead it. I'm going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn't any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we're leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for the Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that's a small loss if the world's as dull a place as you say!"

"Oh hurray! Good old Puddleglum!" cried Scrubb and Jill.

I sometimes dream of ridiculous, far-fetched things too. In the moments when i choose to resist this dark world's vile enchantments i remember and believe in things like true unity and sacrificial love, the kind of commitment that would lay down it's own life before betraying a friend. I believe in things like love deep enough to drive out fear; love so large it can cover another's sin and shame and heal brokenness. I even believe in forgiveness that actually sticks. And perhaps the enchantress is right. Perhaps we only imagine these things. Maybe they're not really possible. It certainly would seem so...I have spent many years believing in them and have suffered many an unjust wound when love wasn't what it promised...what I believed it could be. But Puddleglum is right too. Even if I only imagine the kind of things I think Jesus died for, the imagination is a good deal better than the world we've created here and seems a great deal more important. The kinds of relationships we're bound to keep in this place aren't worth living or dying for, but that other sort of love? ...that sort of love would be worth everything...even if it meant living for only a very short time in this dark place.

I shall be on Aslan's side even if there is no Aslan. I shall live like a Narnian even if there is no Narnia. I shall spend my life looking for Overland even if that means my life shall be short!

And I shall do my best to wear with grace the scars that come from living so. :-)

Tonight I asked Steve for some advice. I have to face a tough situation tomorrow. His advice was gold.
"Remember who you are. You're the girl who wants to give kindness for unkindness and love at all costs."
He's a genius. I told him to remind me who I am more often. Sometimes this world's poison muddles my thinking too. But I'm a Narnian, it's true.

Remember who you are.