Three feasts and Ungit

This post is sort of a continuation of an earlier one.

Three Castles

A few miles from us there is a castle called Three Castles. The name is thought to be because this is the last remaining one of three: a second is visible on a historic map, the third is a mystery.

Three Lakes

A few more miles and in the Wicklow Mountains is Three Lakes which, we are told, is a lake, although in fact there is a second smaller lake close by. But not three.

Denomination: a religious group that has slightly different beliefs from other groups that share the same religion. On that basis the church I go to, and a few others worldwide that are loosely connected, constitute a denomination. Except that they claim they are not denominational. The same argument might apply to the church my parents took me to as a child. And both claim to be the bees knees when it comes to doctrine - although at least one must be wrong.

What is 'different' about the church I go to is that it is "third feast" (as opposed to "third wave") as in the three feast periods mentioned in the Old Testament which loosely equate to the initial salvation experience (Passover), baptism in the Spirit (Pentecost) and going on to perfection (Tabernacles). This is of course a very simplistic summary. Perfection is not a new idea - John Wesley and all Methodists who adhere to his doctrine advocate it. Exactly what is meant by perfection is another thing. Some have claimed that, on reaching "perfection" they would in this life live forever, although I have not yet noticed anyone doing this. And anyway there is something decidedly fishy about claiming oneself is perfect.

It's not that I disagree with the third feast idea. For one thing it sets a vision of holiness (perfection) to which one can at least aspire even if without divine help it is humanly impossible. But I've heard this preaching for around 40 years and do not see a corresponding amount of progress. Not in my life anyway. Whilst a believer can and doubtless should experience the first two, the third remains obstinately in the future. And yet I want to go on, to become better, I want it to have been true that I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.

Long ago, when we were living in London, I remember there was teaching in our group on likening our Christian journey to the children of Israel travelling from Egypt (code-name for the world system) to the promised land. This teaching continued over many weeks and then one day the preacher reckoned we were actually entering the promised land. But nothing that I noticed had changed, and it left me anticlimactic, like, what next? It also taught me not to trust preachers.

Presently the little door on my right opened and a woman, a peasant, came in... She looked as if she had cried all night, and in her hands she held a live pigeon. One of the lesser priests came forward at once, took the tiny offering from her, slit it open with his stone knife, splashed the little shower of blood over Ungit... The peasant woman sank down on her face at Ungit's feet. She lay there a very long time, so shaking that anyone could tell how bitterly she wept. But the weeping ceased. She rose up on her knees and put back her hair from her face and took a long breath... 

"Has Ungit comforted you, child?" I asked. 

"Oh yes, Queen," said the woman, her face almost brightening, "Oh yes. Ungit has given me great comfort. There's no goddess like Ungit." 

"Do you always pray to that Ungit," said I (nodding toward the shapeless stone), "and not to that?" Here I nodded towards our new image, standing tall and straight in her robes and (whatever the Fox might say of it) the loveliest thing our land has ever seen. 

"Oh, always this, Queen," said she. "That other, the Greek Ungit, she wouldn't understand my speech. She's only for nobles and learned men. There's no comfort in her." 

Lewis's Till we have Faces is his most pertinent fiction. If you, his reader, do not immediately identify with Orual's introversion then you're made of sterner stuff than I am. As usual in his fiction, Lewis wisely leaves it to the reader to elaborate. We cannot tell if the comfort this peasant woman gained was real or just a product of her sub-conscience but, either way, the new fangled, painted, Greek image of Ungit didn't do the trick. And maybe new fangled teaching isn't working for me apart from some small admiration for its colourful paintwork. I'll be denounced heretical for this admission no doubt. Perhaps my problem is unbelief, of which the Bible has many negative things to say. But I have tried to believe - help thou my unbelief.

Save me, O God! For the waters have come up to my neck. I sink in deep mire, where there is no foothold; I have come into deep waters, and the flood sweeps over me. I am weary with my crying out; my throat is parched. My eyes grow dim with waiting for my God.