Watched a handful of boys play a video game the other day. The lure of a kingdom grandiose and full of possibility held them spellbound, imaginations wide-awake, passionate longing spilling into the room.
We are all fueled by imagination, as pointed out in Albert Mohler’s interview with Andrew Peterson. And what is there like fantasy to awaken yearning for another Kingdom?
O see ye not yon narrow road
so thick beset with thorns and briers?
That is the path of Righteousness,
though after it but few inquires.
And see ye not yon braid, braid road
that lies across the lily leven?
That is the path of Wickedness,
though some call it the Road to Heaven.
And see ye not yon bonny road
that winds about you fernie brae?
That is the road to fair Elfland
where thou and I this night maun gae.
J. R. R. Tolkien, On Fairy Stories
Fantasy brings a “cleaning of the windows,” insists Tolkien. Much needed, given the pitch of my soul. This is a trick of faerie stories, the real kind, mined from a deep place. Lessons reach down, as they must, and I, “not wholly lost nor wholly changed, disgraced may be,” am grateful for it.
In the cold of winter’s howling and old dark-clad forests, there is abundant comfort from “None Greater: The Undomesticated Attributes of God.” Barrett’s book helps set sights higher, to Zion, the cosmic gathering, and the blood that speaks a better word. Whether stirred by Elfland or other, let yearning for the transcendent Triune God waken in you.
Embracing Tolkien’s reminder that we are sub-creators, refracted light, needle-felted gnomes peek out from bent-leafed shadows. Reminders, perhaps, of another Kingdom. Or whimsical fairies, with spring and the return of the fairy garden so near.
Leave a Reply