Lessons from Narnia

As I mentioned in an earlier post, our family is reading The Chronicles of Narnia. We have made it to the middle of the fifth book and honestly, I'm waiting for AC's interest to wain. She has started moving around a lot while we read, which I usually take to be a product of boredom. Also, I often wonder how much she is actually understanding about the book. The vocabulary is advanced and much of the phrasing is one of an earlier time. Add to that the symbolism and I sometimes think that Matthew and I may be enjoying it more than her. But, apparently, I have underestimated her.

We had reached the part in the book where the character, Eustace, has become a dragon and realizes how badly he has been behaving towards the others. He has treated them with arrogance and contempt and has seen their actions through the ugliness of his eyes, not through the purity of their intent. After becoming a dragon, he begins to change his ways and is more helpful and thoughtful than originally. One night,while lying away from the others, Aslan comes to him and he immediately feels fear and distaste towards Aslan. (For those of you not familiar with the story, Aslan is the embodiment of Jesus)

This is a crucial part of the story, one I was not sure AC would understand, so I stopped to take a moment to explain, but before I could even begin, she exclaimed, "Oh, he's like Kylie! He's a good person, but he hasn't ever been told about Jesus! So, he's scared?" (Kylie is a little girl who was in Anna Cate's class last year whose father was Native American and still follows the spiritual religion of his tribe)

Yes! Exactly! What a big cognitive leap to make for a six-year-old! I was so proud that she was able to not only understand the symbolism, but apply it to real life.

I'm also glad that she sees that believing in Jesus and being a "good" person is not the same thing. I hope she sees that making the right choices should be a byproduct of her faith, but that not all Christians are "good" and not all nonbelievers are "bad".

Thank you, C.S.Lewis, for a wonderfully adventurous tale and the lessons we are learning from it.