It is an entirely normal human reaction that when we see a truth and become excited by it we feel the desire to tell others. This Something has illuminated our life, shown us a level or texture we haven’t before seen. Our joy bubbles over and we want to express it like Lucy when she found a magic land hidden in the wardrobe. There are those well meaning souls who respond by asking us to think logically, thick critically about what we are saying, understand how it can’t be so and therefore isn’t so, and that we should go with them back to the normal, the “real”.
Many times this wisdom is, actually, truly wise. We humans can get so wrapped up in our emotions that we think, “This makes me Feel Things, and so it must be true” and we become in danger of falling prey to a cult. As Christians we must look at everything through the lens of scripture and use discernment to test the spirits. We must be critical of what we believe and question the answers we are given as the Bereans did. But there are those among us who go beyond this simple cautionary group. They are like Edmund who deny and minimize despite what they know and have seen.
Possibly the worst betrayal in the books, the most heart wrenching, second only the White Witch slaughtering Aslan, is the moment when Edmund goes to Narnia and returns with Lucy only to deny that he had ever been there at all. It was just a goofy kids game, he says.
As a young Christian I encountered people like this; people who warned me not to get too excited, not too interested, not to delve into the scriptures too deeply or take them too literally. The mantra was always the same: “Don’t become so heavenly minded that you are no earthly good.” If ever there was a phrase that was immediate ice water on passion, that is it.
In our zeal to tell others what we have seen, we believe that if they just hear they will see. Unfortunately, most times the back of the wardrobe closes up until another day.
In chapter 3, “Edmund and the Wardrobe” here we see the conflict between the real and the Real, and what makes us Mystics.
Lucy adamantly tells her brothers and sister what she has seen and can’t understand why no one believes her. When we discover the things of the Spirit, when we walk into Christianity with open eyes and believe wholeheartedly every word the scriptures say, we cannot help but become mystics. There is a spirit world that the Bible tells us is the actual Real world with truth that is the genuine Truth. It is not the shadow but the object itself that casts the shadow. When we buy into that wholly there are those who begin to become concerned that we will upset the status quo. We are called to have the faith of a child…a child who when Papa says this is real, this is true, we immediately know that it is so. We trust the One in authority over us.
After a time, during which Edmund got in his sneers and jeers, Lucy “..was beginning to wonder herself whether Narnia and the Faun had been a dream.” This is where we find American Christianity today.
So much of modern American Christianity is based on the notion that we are in the world so we may as well be of it, at least enough to not offend the sensibilities of those we live around. I can’t count the number of times I’ve discussed Christianity with people only to hear, “Yeah, but that isn’t the way the world really works.” It may not be the way the world works but it surely should be the way we Christians work. If we don’t then we can’t be said to actually believe. Our lives have always been meant to be more than a mental assent to the historicity of Jesus of Nazareth, what He did, how He died, and that He rose. When people question, “Why aren’t there miracles anymore?” the answer given is the wholly unbiblical, “That was for that time, and not for now.”
Could the answer actually be because we don’t have the faith the size of the mustard seed? That we are loathe to follow Christ in obedience? That we are, in fact, lying to ourselves and manicly trying to serve two masters? That we aren’t being renewed daily in our spirits and thinking? That we are stopping the perfecting work of the Holy Spirit by living the way the world already does? That we have wound our identity around sports teams, fandoms, success, money and any other of a hundred tiny gods on a gilded wheel that we spin like a lazy susan when we are hungry for distraction, rather than the God of the universe?
We are pressured on all sides to not just forget, but to ignore what the scriptures tell us. And on every point, we are told to “calm down” on things that are in conflict with what the world would have us do, how the world would have us agree is best to live and think.
As a generalization, the Church in America has much in common with Edmund. We want the magic land and the Turkish Delight of the White Witch all at the same time. When we see the mystic Lucys in so much love with the savior, or feel ourselves coming to the dangerous moment of feeling the same, we check in with that patch of hot chocolate we still have hidden in our cheek and remember how sweet it was, how warmly we felt on the Witch’s sledge.
“Edmund was already feeling uncomfortable from having eaten too many sweets, and when he heard that the Lady he had made friends with was a dangerous witch he felt even more uncomfortable. But he still wanted to taste that Turkish Delight again more than he wanted anything else.”
This is the point at which we, as Christians have the most difficulty. We want to believe. We want to follow…but we want more of that Turkish Delight too. We gorged ourselves and we want more. And we will deny, minimize, and drag our feet on the path of the Truth so we can sneak in a little more. The more we want X we will accept/tolerate Y. We will deny the Truth…maybe not a lot, but certainly a little, to taste the Witch’s sweets again.
“You can’t always believe what Fauns say…”
And then the ultimate…
“Oh, yes, Lucy and I have been playing-pretending…”
It does not go well for us when we “pretend” to play at Christianity.
We are natural born mystics, established as such in the Garden. How much more when we have been “born again”?
According to a quick Google search, the definition of a mystic is: “a person who seeks by contemplation and self-surrender to obtain unity with or absorption into the Deity or the absolute, or who believes in the spiritual apprehension of truths that are beyond the intellect.”
We are meant to experience God in the same way the Pevensies experience Narnia and Aslan. There are those who will tell you otherwise, well meaning people in high positions, who say, “The only way we can experience God or hear from God is through the Bible.” We must take our experiences and make sure they are in agreement with and never in opposition to the bible, to be sure. This is a God, however, who says that He stands at the door and knocks, and whomever will open the door and welcome Him in, He will sit with him and eat with him. That is the language of relationship. That is the language of personal connection. We ignore Him and that desire for relationship and connection at our peril.
We are not alone. He longs to be with His people, those He has bought and redeemed with His own life.
In Eden, God walked with Adam in the garden.
After Eden, Enoch was known as a friend of God walking with Him literally.
With the Law fulfilled, the temple destroyed, and His Spirit within each of us do we really believe He has no interest in walking with His people now that all barriers are gone save physical? No interest in talking to them now?
We seek unity with Him.
We are mystics.
Finding Narnia 
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