In Defense of Eeyore

Some years ago, when I was still teaching, our principal began a faculty meeting with this challenge.

“You can either be an Eeyore or a Tigger,” she told us, the implication being that we were all Eeyores.

In her defense, teachers do complain a lot.

In our defense, we teachers have a lot that needs complaining about.

Last week, I watched the movie Christopher Robin.  In the movie, a grown-up Christopher Robin returns to the Hundred Acre Wood to find his friends Pooh, Piglet, Tigger and all the rest, are missing, potentially taken by or hiding from the dreaded Heffalump.

Eeyore is the first of Christopher Robin’s friends to appear.  Christopher Robin finds him floating on his back down the creek, headed for the waterfall. 

Now here’s the thing about Eeyore—he is a creature born of imagination, a talking, stuffed donkey who is constantly misplacing his tail.  And yet, out of all the fantastical creatures of the Hundred Acre Wood, it is Eeyore who is the realist.

And I don’t mean the most real.

I mean he sees the world as it really is.  Some may call him a pessimist, but honestly, don’t we all live in a world where pessimism is a logical response?

As Eeyore is floating toward what he perceives is his doom, he doesn’t complain, he doesn’t whine, he accepts his fate as the logical outcome of his day.

“Woke up,” he says.  “Windy.  House blew down.  Fell in the river.  Can’t swim.  Just another Windsday morning for me.”  That’s Windsday with a “wind.”

Eeyore sees the world as it is which is why it’s so disheartening when he doesn’t recognize Christopher Robin.  It’s expected.  Afterall, Christopher Robin is no longer a boy, but a middle-aged man, but Eeyore’s misidentification is more than that.

Eeyore doesn’t see a grown man, even. 

He sees a Heffalump.

Even after Christopher Robin saves him, Eeyore still only sees a Heffalump.  And when Christopher Robin locates the rest of the gang, he can’t convince them either.  None of them see Christopher Robin.  They only see the Heffalump.

Christopher Robin realizes there is only thing he can do to convince them he is who he says he is.  So he grabs Eeyore and tells him, “You’ll be my witness,” and, while the others are cowering in a log, he heads off into the trees to defeat the Heffalump.

Christopher Robin sets Eeyore down and draws his sword—his umbrella—and begins attacking the Heffalump—the air—all the while shouting to Eeyore, “Do you see it?”

At first Eeyore is skeptical, but the more Christopher Robin throws himself into the role as savior of the Hundred Acre Wood, Eeyore begins to believe.  His eyes grow wide and then he says, “Christopher Robin, it’s you—playing again.”

“Do you see it, Eeyore?” Christopher Robin asks.

And he does.  It is Eeyore who ultimately sells the performance of Christopher Robin defeating the Heffalump to the others.

Christopher Robin chose Eeyore as his witness.

He chose the pessimist, perhaps the one least likely to believe.  But he chose the one who sees the world as it really is.  It is Eeyore’s witness that allows the others to see Christopher Robin as he truly is.

Christopher Robin returning to his childhood home, unrecognized and unwelcomed, reminds me of today’s Gospel reading.  In Luke 4:16-30, Jesus returns to his hometown, Nazareth, and is promptly driven right back out.  It was probably the welcome he expected, but it was not the welcome we expected. 

When he arrives at the synagogue, he is greeted with confusion, bewilderment and scorn: “Is this not Joseph’s son?” they ask.

Is there anyone in the history of the universe more mis-identified than Jesus?

We’re still—today—arguing over who Jesus is.

But like Christopher Robin, Jesus returns home and instead of being welcomed as a savior, he is seen as something dangerous.  Jesus is the villain.  He’s a Heffalump. 

And, what’s worse is that Jesus doesn’t even get the happy ending that Christopher Robin does.  He isn’t welcomed by his people—eventually.  In fact, the same people he is so desperate to save, are the ones that wind up crucifying him.

And even after he dies, after he rises from the dead, he still has to prove himself.  He still has to convince people—his own friends even, his disciples—that he is who he says he is.

And yep, I’m talking about the Eeyore of the group—Thomas. 

I often think that Thomas gets a bad rap—the infamous Doubting Thomas—when really, he is the most honest of the group.  He is the most straightforward.  He wants proof.  You say Jesus rose from the dead.  I want to see him.  I want to see his wounds.  I want to touch his wounds.

If Jesus had died in today’s world, Thomas would be asking Jesus to take a DNA test through ancestry.com. 

Thomas is only demanding what everyone else will demand—proof of the impossible.

Surely, Thomas was not the first to have doubts and we know that he was most definitely not the last.

Thomas is simply telling it like it is.  People are going to want proof.  He wants proof.

And Jesus gives him that proof.

But then Jesus sadly, I think, explains that the rest of humanity will have to find a way to believe without proof.  “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”

We are called blessed.  But wouldn’t we do anything to trade places with Thomas, to have that kind of certainty, to have touched Jesus?

Thomas is the blessed one.

I wonder—who among the disciples had the most credibility after the resurrection?  Who was the disciple that everyone—that strangers and acquaintances—would most believe?  Jesus appeared to Mary first and her word would have carried weight with some, but the fact she was a woman would have cost her with others.

And Peter and John.  Everyone knew how much they loved Jesus.  Wouldn’t they say or do anything to keep him alive?  And didn’t Peter have something to prove after his denial?  There was no way he was able to keep that a secret.

But then there was Thomas, the skeptic.  I wonder how many people went to Thomas for confirmation, how many trusted Thomas more than the others.

And what would Thomas be able to tell them?

“I touched him,” he would have said.

And people would have listened.

We need to not be so quick to judge the Eeyores and the Thomases of the world.

Everyone in this world has a purpose.

Christopher Robin took Eeyore with him to fight the Heffalump because he knew Eeyore would see and he knew the others would believe Eeyore.

And if Eeyore is special, if Eeyore has purpose, then everyone is, then everyone has.

And most importantly, everyone in this world is capable of being a witness.

Amen.