Hanging On Pegs

Why would I be born, ranked just below an angel, when I am honestly a mess.

 

But I see everything differently lately. I think about The Pevensie children and how they passed through a wardrobe to become other people in another world. They borrowed coats.

 

“Behind them were coats, hanging on pegs.”

“What about putting on some of these coats.”

"I am sure nobody would mind," said Susan. "It isn't as if we wanted to take them out of the house; we shan't take them even out of the wardrobe."

"I never thought of that, Su," said Peter. "Of course, now you put it that way, I see. No one could say you had bagged a coat as long as you leave it in the wardrobe where you found it. And I suppose this whole country is in the wardrobe."

 

This is how Lewis begins to set up his wonderful metaphor. And it is wonderful.

What chapter is this? 6.

Why does that matter?

“And God saw every thing that he had made, and, behold, it was very good. And the evening and the morning were the sixth day.” Genesis 1:31

C. S. Lewis knew exactly what he was doing. Chapter 6 of The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe follows the work of God on the sixth day. Genesis sets up our world on the sixth day and then, on that day, we find ourselves in that threshold of change; if ever there was a life-changing experience for you and for me, it was on that day.

We have completely forgotten that day. But when we stepped into The Wardrobe, we saw, hanging on pegs, the persons we would don for the adventure.

“What about putting on some of these coats?”

We did that. The character you now portray is the result of passing through the wardrobe and becoming who you think you are.

It is not any different than the account in Genesis.

Look around you now; “The whole country is in the wardrobe.”

This is the ultimate secret and yet, you already know it.

If ever you have any doubt about this, you only need to look for the lamppost.

What happens every time you meet a mentor or a stranger in the Wood of Life?

“I’ll see you back to the lamp-post,” they say. (A line taken directly from The Lion, The Watch and The Wardrobe.)

Everything is about getting back to the lamppost.

Even when one considers the name of the protagonist: Lucy. Her name means light.

And everyone will eventually discover the “tree of iron” with a “lantern set on the top thereof.”

When does one find the lamppost? When you least expect it; while in pursuit of The White Stag, which is that which provides you with desires of this world alone. Somehow, everyone gives chase to The White Stag.

It is a metaphor.

The White Stag is your education, your career, your accounts, your plans, your goals, dreams, desires and wishes. When you catch him, The White Stag will grant your wishes and he has been seen in these parts.

Look around. He is in your area even now. The White Stag is in your 401k. The White Stag is in your wallet. The White Stag is the job you hope to get.

The White Stag is what you will do and have done with any wealth you have ever had. He is your house, your car, your shoes and jewelry.

It is not wrong to chase The White Stag.

Many people will be chasing The White Stag with everything they’ve got when they come upon the strangest thing they’ve ever seen.

 

“I know not how it is, but this lamp on the post worketh upon me strangely. It runs in my mind that I have seen the like before; as it were in a dream, or in the dream of a dream.” — King Edmund

 

When the Pevensie children tumbled back to the very beginning, it occurred to them that the coats they’d worn would now be missing from The Wardrobe. They tried to explain why this happened and how this happened. But The Professor assured them:

“No,” he said, “I don’t think it will be any good trying to go back through the wardrobe door to get the coats. You won’t get into Narnia again by that route. Nor would the coats be much use by now if you did!”

 

“The problem in middle life, when the body has reached its climax of power and begins to decline, is to identify yourself not with the body, which is falling away, but with the consciousness of which it is a vehicle. This is something I learned from myths.” — Joseph Campbell, The Power of Myth

 

This is not about one myth or another. C. S. Lewis gives us another myth to consider and we love the story. We read it and we tend to think of it like Turkish Delight and we want more myth.

In the C. S. Lewis version, the nobles of Narnia had to get off of their noble beasts to consider the thick wood ahead, where a strange light was placed to somehow hold the last of their attention in Narnia. You will see it one day.

Even if you never read the book, you may have learned that it is a story about children who entered another world and grew up there, forgetting this world. But they came back here, the same way Dorothy came back home to Kansas.

But the hardest thing to believe is also the hardest thing to explain: you are presently in one of those mythical worlds; and it is very likely that you have forgotten who you really are.

“For he beholdeth himself, and goeth his way, and straightway forgetteth what manner of man he was.” James 1:24 KJV

If I could find my mother right now, among this thicker wood she has left behind, I would say to her, “You won’t get back to this world by the same route. Nor would your body be of much use to you now if you did.”

This does not mean my mother’s adventures here are done. Experience — no matter how brief or extended — has an infinite quality to it. There is an alwaysness to any character you will ever play.

You once donned the body you have on. It hung on pegs and you found it warm. It is not who you really are. You will one day remove that very body. It was borrowed on your birthday and you’ll return it on your deathday.

“What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye have of God, and ye are not your own?” — I Corinthians 6:19 KJV

You are not your own. This is the ultimate truth.

You have forgotten who you are. That is okay; I have forgotten who I am as well. It will be the strangest day, when we both walk into The Green Room to remove this strange wardrobe; if there is no mirror in there, wherein you might see me, you will find yourself very much alone.

~ SELAH