Good Ol' Puddleglum!

We listen to audiobooks. It's a simple way to get lots of stories in the kids even if they're doing other things - riding in the car, eating breakfast, whatever. In my short teaching career,  I was a big proponent of reading aloud, and I thought I would hold on to this when my own kids came. My husband and I read aloud to one another often, even on our honeymoon. While pregnant with my first, I read aloud to him in utero! While they were small, they would sit for long periods of time (OK, not all of them...) and listen to book after book. Then they got old enough for chapter books - WHAT, no pictures??? Yes, that was the end of Mom reading aloud. I just couldn't stand to interrupt a great story to say stupid things like, "Why did you chew on that?", "Stop touching/hitting/pinching!", or "Could somebody get me a piece of chocolate?" So I make them do an alone reading time - mandatory 35 minutes - 30 minutes of reading and 5 left over for going to the bathroom or other such foolishness. AND we listen to audiobooks. Lots of good stuff that they don't willingly read on their own. It's no work to get your elementary school age son to read Captain Underpants, oh no! They're dying to read trashy stuff like that, but they don't make it very far in the classics, with the older style language. At least MY boys don't. But they will happily listen to almost any story I throw on the CD player! So I throw on the good stuff. 

Recently, we were hearing the Silver Chair by C. S. Lewis. I bought ALL the Chronicles of Narnia audiobooks from Focus on the Family - a very worthy investment! No regrets! You can also get them from the local library - free! We listened to the third CD over several times. Puddleglum is just amazing! Not like many people you may know, but certainly all of us know at least one pessimistic Christian like old Puddleglum. In the story, the characters have almost given in to a spell-induced deception that Aslan and Narnia are all just a fairytale. In the pinch, at the darkest moment, Puddleglum comes through with the spell-breaking declaration you find here:

"With his last strength of will, Puddleglum steps into the fire, and the smell of his burning flesh weakens the spell. Then he replies to the witch:

'One word, Ma’am. One word. . . . Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things, trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one.'

This, he says, is “a funny thing.”

. . . We’re just babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That’s why I’m going to stand by the play world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we’re leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that’s a small loss if the world’s as dull a place as you say.'"

Now more than ever, I can identify with old Puddleglum! I'm reminded of how Paul describes Abraham in Hebrews 11:13-16 when he says that, "Instead, they were longing for a better country—a heavenly one." The Christian life that we lead, the Biblical code that we follow, and the hope that we have in Christ may seem like a play world to others, but we must press on and live like "Narnians" and spend our lives looking for "Overland".

More great resources on Narnia, if you're a fan like me:  Narnia and the Bible a website,  Live Like a Narnian blog, and "Green Dust" article in World Magazine