God promised Abraham a son,
But Sarah laughed and said, "It can't be done;
I am too old," she said; "it is impossible,"
But in due time a son was born.
The Red Sea lay right in their path,
And Pharoah's army pressed them from behind;
They were so desperate, they had no place to run,
One step by faith, the seas did part!
God said to Noah, "Go build an ark;
All living things are soon to be destroyed."
The people laughed and said,
"It's not been done before,"
But those inside the ark survived.
So stagger not through unbelief,
Be strong in faith, give God the praise.
It looks uncrossable, with God it's possible,
Have patience, then in God it's done.
A similar thing happened to Eustace in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. He became a dragon easily enough through his own lust, but it was not so easy to un-dragonify. He was told to peel off his skin but however many layers he removed he was still a dragon. His attempts at least demonstrated his intent and I think that is what God looks for when He tests us with impossible tasks. For "intent" in this context you can read that much misunderstood word "faith". And so, later on, the Book says that God tested Abraham in telling him to sacrifice his son, his only son, the son of the promise.
[Eustace] "Well, exactly the same thing happened again. And I thought to myself, oh dear, how ever many skins have I got to take off? For I was longing to bathe my leg. So I scratched away for the third time and got off a third skin, just like the two others, and stepped out of it. But as soon as I looked at myself in the water I knew it had been no good.
"Then the lion said - but I don't know if it spoke - "You will have to let me undress you." I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it.
"The very first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know - if you've ever picked the scab off a sore place. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away."
"I know exactly what you mean," said Edmund.
"Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off - just as I thought I'd done it myself the other three times, only they hadn't hurt - and there it was lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he caught hold of me - I didn't like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I'd no skin on - and threw me into the water. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I'd turned into a boy again. You'd think me simply phoney if I told you how I felt about my own arms. I know they've no muscle and are pretty mouldy compared with Caspian's, but I was so glad to see them.
"After a bit the lion took me out and dressed me -"
"Dressed you. With his paws?"
"Well, I don't exactly remember that bit. But he did somehow or other: in new clothes - the same I've got on now, as a matter of fact. And then suddenly I was back here. Which is what makes me think it must have been a dream."
"No. It wasn't a dream," said Edmund.
It wasn't easy to rehearse the past... Back then whilst praying for a particular need in a 14 year old here, I had the very strong impression that "I should not be afraid to get involved in his life". The boy had never known a natural father and perhaps as a result had certain tendencies that rubbed others up the wrong way, like always wanting to justify himself. When I talked with other adults here and particularly with his mother and sister they all seemed to confirm that I had "heard God" and so I began to gently encourage, teach, love and discipline him, always openly and with his mother's knowledge. But what started well soon came to grief - I think he did not appreciate my endeavors and, blood being thicker, I suppose his mother heeded him rather than me. I was counselled to cease all communication with him because "it was not working". I could not, indeed still do not, agree that temporary failure meant I had been deceived, and it became a hard thing for me to accept how things had turned out. But I began to see that the task I believed I had been set was humanly impossible, and eventually I realised that, wonder of wonders, I could in fact continue to be involved in his life indirectly through prayer. Like Orual enabled Psyche to carry out her impossible tasks in Till we have Faces. And so I distanced myself in person but set myself to repeatedly petition our Heavenly Father to be a father for him where I and his natural father had failed.
Whether my prayers have made any difference I may, of course, never know, and indeed I should not need to know. Although one part of me would like to.
Having dug up the past and re-stated my position I thought there might be some negative comments afterwards from those involved, but strangely there were none apart from one or two perfunctory "thanks for sharing". Does this mean the matter, which seemed big at the time, no longer concerns anyone other than myself? It concerns me now, by the way, because upon it hangs, to a large degree, my ability to hear from God. Or maybe we have moved on and it is no longer an issue. Or is it that no-one wants to open a wound - better to leave dead dogs lie. Or maybe everyone else reckons I had lost the plot back then and my speaking about it again was "just Michael again" so let's humour him?
And why do I post this personal struggle? In my very first blog post I noted that "writing an honest blog is a bit like undressing in front of the world". It is easier for me to write because I get so tongue-tied when speaking: even with writing I edit and re-edit something like this many times before I am happy enough to post it, and even then my style and logic is sadly lacking. The boy is a young man now and is making his own life-decisions. As for myself, I have learnt to never again get too closely involved with anyone outside of my own immediate family: once bitten twice shy.
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