The Wonder of Heaven

In the last book of C. S. Lewis’s children’s series, “The Chronicles of Narnia,” the main characters pass through a door from this world into Aslan’s Country.  In the new creation, the children marvel how all the hills, rivers, and fields have a familiar look—and yet are so very different:  so much bigger and brighter, so colorful, and more real than the shadowlands of the old world.  Jewel the unicorn puts this feeling into words:  we’re home at last, where we belong.

Beaming, the unicorn repeats Aslan’s invitation, “Come further up, come further in!”  So the children, a dwarf, the dogs, a donkey, and the array of redeemed creatures dash ahead, giddy with delight.  Before they know it, they’re running over a pond and up a waterfall (yes, up).  Jewel’s voice can barely be heard above the thundering waters as he cries again, “Don’t stop.  Further up and further in!”

Amid this tireless sprint-flight the children suddenly realize, and Lucy says it, “Have you noticed one can’t feel afraid, even if one wants to?”  As they swim-dash over the top of the waterfall into a beautiful green valley, Jewel shouts, “Further up and further in!”  They all run faster, faster, the jubilant pack of dogs now out front.

Eventually they come to great golden gates and are met by gallant Reepicheep the mouse, who says, “Welcome, in the Lion’s name.  Come further up and further in.”  So they enter the garden with all its delicious smells and flowers and fruits.  Faun Tumnus explains to Lucy, “The further up and further in you go, the bigger everything gets.”  And so the garden becomes a whole new world.

Finally, Aslan appears—forgiving, blessing… yet telling the child­ren, “You do not yet look so happy as I mean you to be.”  Lucy replies, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan.  You have sent us back into our own world so often.”  But he insists, “No fear of that…  The dream is ended:  this is the morning.”  And so begins “Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read:  which goes on forever:  in which every chapter is better than the one before.”