You are a Beloved Child of God-A Morning Prayer Reflection

Following the Gospel reading during Morning Prayer this morning, I offered up this reflection:

In the book The Magician’s Nephew by C.S. Lewis, the lion, Aslan, asks the boy Diggory to retrieve a silver apple from a garden far on the other side of the world.

It seems like a simple enough task, though if you know anything about Aslan, you know that nothing he asks of anyone is ever quite as simple as it seems.

But Diggory arrives at the garden without incident, grabs an apple and puts it in his pocket.  He does deal with a moment of temptation when he wonders what it would be like to take a bite of that apple, but the warning sign on the garden gate was pretty clear and, in the end, Diggory decides it’s not worth the risk.

This scene all plays out toward the end of the book and Diggory is a much, much wiser young man than he was in the beginning.

When he turns to leave, though, he finds himself facing the witch, Jadis.

Jadis has already taken a bite of the apple.  And Diggory can see that the warning on the front gate was one hundred percent correct.  Taking a bite of the apple had given her everything she desired.  She was stronger than before.  But it had also come with a heavy price.  She had changed.  She had always been evil, but now she would never know happiness. 

Indeed, we are looking at the creation, the origin story, of the infamous White Witch who would one day curse Narnia with an endless winter and rule over it as their heartless queen.

But that is all in the future and right now, she is fixated only on Diggory and tempting him.

Diggory knows that Jadis is evil.  He knows what tasting the apple has cost her.  And, as I said previously, he’s grown since the beginning of the book.  There is nothing Jadis should be able to tempt him with.

And that is exactly how it initially plays out.  Jadis tries to talk Diggory into eating the apple, tells him it will give him his heart’s desire and he says, “No, thank you.”

But then Jadis changes tactics.  She strikes where Diggory is most vulnerable.

His mother is dying.

Jadis knows this.

The apple will heal her.

Diggory knows this.

Who is the lion to you?

A simple question posed by the witch.

And one Diggory doesn’t have much of answer to.  Who is Aslan?  What does Diggory owe him?

Jadis presses further.

What kind of son are you, to deny your mother this?

And here it is—the true insidious nature of temptation, how evil works in all worlds, by placing in us the seed of doubt, that we are not who we think we are, that we are not who we hoped we were, that we are not what God created us to be.

Evil, whether it’s Jadis in the garden with Diggory, or the serpent questioning Eve about the fruit and the trees, “Did God say …?” or the Devil questioning Jesus, “If you are the Son of God …” –Evil says you are not a good son, you are not beloved by God, you are not the Son of God.

Because Evil knows that your faith in who you are is directly tied to your faith in God.  If you doubt one, you doubt the other.

There is evil in this world.

We all know that.

But sometimes, like in last week’s school shooting in Parkland, we are confronted by evil in such a way that strikes us where we are most vulnerable.

Evil worked not just in the massacre itself, but in the days that followed, planting seeds of doubt.

The world is hopeless.

There is no goodness.

Things will never change.

I am incapable of making change happen.

Doubt, insidious, horrifying doubt.

But doubt is always built on a foundation of lies.

The truth is the world is not hopeless.

The truth is there is amazing goodness in the world, from teachers and coaches who threw themselves in the path of the bullets to save children, to the teachers and coaches who come to work every day all across this country and throw themselves lovingly into a job that requires so many sacrifices.

The truth is things can change.

The truth is we are capable of making that change.

“Lord, make me an instrument of Thy peace,” we say in the prayer of Saint Francis.

The truth is we are beloved children of God.

And God is with us now more than ever.

In The Magician’s Nephew, Jadis winds up misplaying her cards with Diggory. 

Diggory has grown up.

He knows the man his mother would hope he’d grow to be, a man who keeps his promises, even to strange lions in mythical worlds … someone who never abandons his friends.

Diggory knows who he is.

And so, he leaves Jadis behind.

Know who you are.  Be confident in who you are.

I’ll say it again.

You are a beloved child of God.