Narnia

The Chronicles of Narnia is a fantastic movie. I look forward to reading the book now. Yes, I'm uncultured. I have never read any of the Narnia books. I did recently purchase the big thick compilation book from Sam's, with stories presented in Lewis' preferred reading order, and I've read two pages of that.

(minor spoilers) God was really speaking to me throughout the entire film. In particular, the conversations between the witch and Edmund, the younger brother of the four siblings, stuck out to me. And when she confronted Aslan (the lion, or should that be The Lion?), several things became clear to me. Relative to the story, she had taken the facts and twisted them to suit her desires. Edmund didn't set out to be a traitor. A traitor is someone who deliberately betrays friends/Romans/countrymen in order to meet their own goals, however noble or low they might be. Edmund mentioned Thomas the Faun in passing, not realizing to whom he was speaking (ooh, how formal!) or the consequences of said speech. If he had known, I'm sure he would have kept his mouth shut. He was also trying to protect the fox in the second incident.

What other malevolent being do we know of that likes to twist our words, pervert the cause of our actions, and just generally wreak havoc? I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count. I'll wait while you guess. la la la (a little music to pass the time) Okay, just to be sure we're on the same page, the answer is: "satan". Like the witch in Narnia, satan twists everything we do around, instilling doubt and second-guessing within us. And he makes it seem like it's our very own thought.

And God spoke to me that all these things I hold against myself, none of it is an original thought of mine. It's all deception from Satan (it also helps that we talked about this in small group Thursday night, so I was questioning these things anyway). I do not—and cannot—deny that I have sinned in so many ways. But these things do not condemn or make me unworthy (that word appeared out of nowhere&mdashit's my trigger word for self-condemnation). Yes, they are wrong, but God forgives me of those things (I've asked, don't you know), and He does NOT condemn me. Why should I?