Safe?” said Mr. Beaver; “don’t you hear what Mrs. Beaver tells you? Who said anything about safe? ‘Course he isn’t safe. But he’s good. He’s the King, I tell you.” (C.S. Lewis, The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe)
I’ll admit it, I can be a bit of a scaredy cat. I’m not a fan of the dark, swimming in open water—even with land in sight, and despite the fact I’m a lifeguard—is not on my list of “fun things”, and fire kind-of petrifies me. (Okay, if you know my background, this one makes some sense. Three major fires by the time you’re eighteen will do that to a person. But I digress.) It all boils down to one thing: I want control.
I’m out of control in the dark because I can’t see. Open water hides things—animals, danger, other people—and is a lot more powerful than I am. And fire is a beast that can snatch control in a moment, and it is almost impossible to wrest control away from it. But the scariest thing for me? A relationship with God.
You see, I can’t control God. I can’t even pretend to control God, at least not without lying to myself. I can banish the dark with artificial light. Scuba gear and other things can reduce or remove many of the unknowns of open water. Fire can be contained. But God doesn’t bargain. I don’t have anything He doesn’t already possess. To fully live, I must rely on Him. And the only things God guarantees are that He will never leave us (Deuteronomy 31:6) and that He will use everything for our good and His glory, if we are His children (Romans 8:28).
These leave a whole lot of opportunities for things to go wrong, according to me. God could call me away from my family and home—and I got a bit homesick at college. He could allow me to spend my life writing, and never be published. I might never get married. And, as history has shown, I could even face persecution and death because I’m a Christian. These aren’t things a safe god would allow. But a god who loves me and is good? He might allow them.
None of these things, at first appearance, seem good. How can leaving family, working in vain, never sharing my life with someone, or being tortured and killed be good for me? The only possible answer is that my physical and emotional well-being aren’t God’s ultimate goal. His goal is to prepare me for an eternity with Him, an eternity where the health of my spirit is what matters most.
Have a thought or a question? Share in the comments below.
God Bless, and Keep magic in the mundane,
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