Wonder

Over the Christmas hols I’ve been re-reading The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. It is the same beloved copy I’ve owned since childhood, now yellowed with age and dangerously close to falling apart, but I took the risk of turning the pages again after buying a card at a Narnia themed craft fair. I chose one with a lamp-post on the front and left feeling very satisfied with my purchase. ( I will assume that you know how a lamp-post features in the book). The card then flew its way overseas, dropped eventually through a letterbox amidst Christmas cards, to be read at a very precise, ordained moment in time for a God intended purpose. It now has a quiet, miraculous tale all of its own, as it sits somewhere in my friend’s home far away. 

God takes a piece of creatively folded paper, sends it across multiple time zones and connects lives with words and the Narnian lamp-post to create wonder…sheer wonder at the potential for all things ordinary to become extraordinary in the hands of God. 

Whether we are stepping into 2020 hesitantly or enthusiastically, with optimism or melancholy, full of hope or dread, or a mixture of all of it, life will be full of ordinary things and ordinary moments charged with possibility. 

‘Open my eyes so I can see what you show me of your miracle-wonders.’ Psalm 119:18 (MSG)

There are miracle-wonders to be awed by if we have the willingness to be prayerfully attentive to the flow of the Holy Spirit, who shows up with impeccable timing to colour the prosaic with new layers of meaning and beauty that didn’t exist before. 

That walk in the park turns into invigorating worship, those radio song lyrics are suddenly prophetic, that actor’s line makes your breath hang suspended in your throat without warning. A text message, a conversation, a meal, a kiss on the cheek, a book, clouds, sunlight, rain, the list is endless! Christmas is God showing up in the ordinary and changing everything and it’s not just a seasonal event. 

C S Lewis chose a plain wardrobe for his story. He chose an empty room with dead bluebottles on the window sill and a wardrobe. 

‘…they looked into a room that was quite empty except for one big wardrobe. “Nothing there,” said Peter and they all trooped out again - all except Lucy.’  (The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe) 

Lucy hesitated, simply having an urge to try the wardrobe door. She followed her curiosity that ordinary morning, only to discover a miracle and experience an adventure like no other. 

Holy curiosity quickens to wonder. 

May this year be full of curiosity and wonder. Wonder at the sheer glory of God who walks closely with us in our normal rhythms and abides deeply with us in our unexpected dissonance. 

May we be like the blind men of Matthew 20 who on crying out to Jesus were asked by him, ‘What do you want from me?’ and they said, ‘Master, we want our eyes opened. We want to see!’ 

 And on seeing we will let everyone know that God is blazingly alive among us. (Matthew 15:31 MSG) 

God's Giant Box Of Felt Tip Pens

I read The Silver Chair again recently, the sixth book in C S Lewis’ Narnia series, so when I spied the Narnia colouring book in a basket at home, I popped it into my suitcase, along with a tin of felt tip pens, to bring on holiday.

While flicking through the pages one evening, I decided on a quote from the book I had just finished.  

'You would not have called to me, unless I had been calling to you.'

Aslan

The Silver Chair, C S Lewis

I began to fill in the letters and shapes with my pens - grey lettering with dark highlights, light blue for the myriad cloud-like shapes floating all over the double paged outline.

As I coloured, I wondered if it could help me pray. Might the rhythm of pen on paper ease away distractions, helping create space for focus in the same way as walking often does, the simple rhythm of placing one foot in front of the other - actions connecting the physical to the spiritual.

And in the space, a thought flowed from an unseen pen held by an unseen hand.

I could pray for God to colour in the shapes of people’s lives.

We all have blank spaces within us that are waiting to be brought to life by our artist God. Vast empty plains and small overlooked corners that exist without the joy of His colour. He has an immense palette of shades and hues that He uses to fill in the outline of us that he has already drawn.

He makes us in his image but God is not just a black and white outline. He may be like that in our own profoundly inadequate idea of him but it is not the truth. God is the fullest spectrum of light, emitting an array of colour beyond the imagination and he is making us to be more like himself in order to be a living exhibition of his glory!

There is simply no room for comparison and envy in such a truth. Each one of us, living in submission to being saturated by the colour of grace and love, can truly only respond with gratitude and worship. There is freedom to be found in knowing that God takes great pleasure in his work, that he deftly tints and highlights, blends and shades with perfect understanding of his craft in order to produce living artwork worthy of being given a place in his house.

It is a tremendous privilege to be chosen by him to personally receive the fullness of such masterful creativity within ourselves. It is also an honour to be a living extension of the work, to be visual representations of God’s extraordinary colour in the world around us.

Prayer is one way of joining him in his creative work in the lives of others. We are  invited to participate in this immense and beautiful imaginative work, a work that Jesus began during his ministry and that he continues today. It is the Kingdom work of pervading lives, places and moments with the colours of eternity, his will being done on earth as it is in heaven.  As the Narnia quotation reminds us, we call to God because he has already called to us.

The outline in my Narnia colouring book isn’t complete yet. It still needs work and time. It serves as a reminder that God’s work, in us and in the world, is ongoing. When I next pick up my pens, I hope that I remember to pray for his colour to fill the empty spaces. I hope that I remember to consider the depth and breadth of God’s work. It is on display continually everywhere and in everyone if we have eyes to see it and the willingness to accept the invitation to join with him in his work.

A thought that begins with a book club and ends in tears.

It was my first book club experience.  Normally if I talk about a book that I’m reading, extolling the wonders of the written word, people’s eyes glaze over - it’s a very one sided conversation. Not so at book club, sitting on squashy leather sofas in a café in Belfast, waitress on hand to supply tea, coffee, and caramel squares, whatever a book club attendee may require for his or her comfort.