Looking Forward to the Great Story

At the close of the final book in his “Chronicles of Narnia,” C. S. Lewis says that, although the end of all the stories had come, the “real story” was just beginning.  As for Lucy, Edmund, Susan, and Peter (the children who are the main characters throughout the Chronicles), Lewis says, “All their life in this world and all their adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page:  now at last they were beginning Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read:  in which every chapter is better than the one before.”

This analogy helps us get our thinking straight.  We only begin Chapter One of the “real story” when we arrive in Jesus' presence beyond the grave.  It seems we’re so often prone to think of our comings and goings this side of heaven as what’s most real, while the life to come is somehow vague and shadowy and remote.  But Lewis flips this assumption on its head:  today’s world is the “Shadowlands” and the life to come when we see Jesus Christ face to face is the place of abundant life and fullness of joy in every way—the world which is most truly and eternally real.

This Sunday we’ll continue the sermon series, “Homeward Bound:  Eternity in Perspective,” and we’ll be looking closely at John 3:14-18 about how Jesus pictures the everlasting joy of all who believe in him.  Any time is a good time for Christians to set their hope in heaven and fix their eyes on Jesus, but these days—with all our pandemic and political disruptions—it’s an excellent time to get our spiritual bearings as to what matters most!

About our future entry into the Perfect World which is to come, the Apostle Paul says, “For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face” (1 Corinthians 13:12).  The here-and-now is opaque and blurry, but heaven is a world of crystal clarity and total satisfaction in the company of Jesus.  Remember, “The things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal” (2 Corinthians 4:18).  Don’t cling to the temporary:  look to Jesus!