They've chosen The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe as the skeleton on which to hang their teaching and this was my intended offering.
In the end I linked it in more tightly to ROLE MODELS (which the young people are being this week to the children they're woking with) and how I actually think Edmund is the best role model in the book because although he is tempted he repents and makes amends
In many ways I think Edmund IS the true hero of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe for it is he who overcomes the temptations offered by the queen : Hot chocolate, Turkish delight, the chance to be SOLE king over Narnia and perhaps most importantly for him over his sisters and his older brother Peter.
Like Adam and Eve in the stories you’ll explore today Edmund was faced with a temptation and succumbed.
Would it be better if God had made it impossible for Adam and Eve, Edmund, you and me to be tempted?
“Free will, though it makes evil possible, is also the only thing that makes possible any love or goodness or joy worth having.” Lewis, Mere Christianity, Book II, Ch. 3.
When Edmund has betrayed first a total stranger, Tumnus (who had risked his own life to protect Edmund’s sister) and then his brother and sisters, he KNOWS he has done wrong. As C S Lewis said in his book Mere Christianity
“It is after you have realized that there is a real Moral Law, and a Power behind the law, and that you have broken that law and put yourself wrong with that Power—it is after all this, and not a moment sooner, that Christianity begins to talk.” Lewis, Mere Christianity, Book I, Ch. 5.
Edmund goes through great trials of hardship and cruelty at the hands of the queen and still on his return he faces the toughest challenge yet. FACING UP to his family and apologising.
It is often the hardest thing to do but something that is IMPERATIVE to all Christians
Jesus urged people to put things right with others:
He talks of murder being a great sin but then implies that a far greater sin is not to make amends for something that you have done wrong WHATEVER it is:
“when you are offering your gift at the altar, if you remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there before the altar and go; first be reconciled to your brother or sister, and then come and offer your gift.” Matthew 5
As John says in his first letter:
Whoever says, "I am in the light," while hating a brother or sister, is still in the darkness. Whoever loves a brother or sister lives in the light, and in such a person there is no cause for stumbling. But whoever hates another believer is in the darkness, walks in the darkness, and does not know the way to go, because the darkness has brought on blindness.
We cannot be in a true loving relationship with God unless we endeavour to be in a loving relationship with those around us.
For as John says later
Those who say, "I love God," and hate their brothers or sisters, are liars; for those who do not love a brother or sister whom they have seen, cannot love God whom they have not seen.
In fact the very act of apologising for a wrong done can be the act of Christian witness that makes a massive difference in the life of someone else.
For someone to see a Christian apologise (perhaps when others wouldn’t have thought it necessary or when they could have “got away with it”) that is a moment that can open up the conversation with that person about WHY? It is in that humility of confessing to another that we show our true faith in a God who loves us so much that he forgives us when we confess our sins. A god who loves YOU so much that he sent his son to die for your sins so you could be forgiven
We are all tempted and we all sin
As St paul says:
Sin came into the world through one man, and his sin brought death with it. As a result, death has spread to the whole human race because everyone has sinned. …But God's grace is much greater, and so is his free gift to so many people through the grace of the one man, Jesus Christ. And there is a difference between God's gift and the sin of one man. After the one sin, came the judgment of "Guilty"; but after so many sins, comes the undeserved gift of "Not guilty!" Romans 5.12-16 paraphrased
Summarised even better in his letter to the people in Corinth:
For as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be made alive. 1 Corinthians 15:22
It is part of our humanity to sin but it is part of our Christianity to face up to that sin:
“It is after you have realized that there is a real Moral Law, and a Power behind the law, and that you have broken that law and put yourself wrong with that Power—it is after all this, and not a moment sooner, that Christianity begins to talk.” Lewis, Mere Christianity, Book I, Ch. 5.
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