Living in the Shadowlands

Part of every misery is, so to speak, the misery’s shadow or reflection: the fact that you don’t merely suffer but have to keep on thinking about the fact that you suffer. I not only live each endless day in grief, but live each day thinking about living each day in grief.  C.S. Lewis

As I was praying for the Pelt family early this morning, God brought to mind something that Jason had said.  He referred to the home they are in now as “not their own” (I’m paraphrasing here).  Arguably, if I asked Jason, he would tell me that the house that burned down was also not their own.  Jason and Tracee are well aware that their home is in Heaven, and that their time here on earth is temporary.  That’s why they can say through tears, that the stuff that burned up in the fire was only that – “stuff.” 

That brought to mind the C.S. Lewis quote above.  If you have ever read Shadowlands, you will be familiar with what Lewis is describing.  This life, my home, the Pelt’s house (even their current one) are but shadows of some future existence – something infinitely and indescribably better.   Just as Jason and Tracee can live in a house with mismatched furniture, donated clothes, and bare walls, we too can look forward to the day when we will move into our “new home.”  

Paul, writing in 1 Corinthians 13, concludes his discussion of love by telling us that even these things are but “shadows,” where we see dimly:     ”12For now we see in a mirror dimly, but then face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I have been fully known.” (1 Cor 13:12).    The house that burned is merely a shadow of what was.  The Pelt’s current home is simply a shadow of what will be.  Even when they finally get to move back into a newly built home, it too will simply be a shadow of what is to come.

So then, where should we look?  If these be but shadows, where can I see light?  Lewis again, has something to say on that:  “Aim at heaven and you will get earth thrown in. Aim at earth and you get neither.”    Jesus too, reminded us of this in John 14:  1″Let not your hearts be troubled.Believe in God; believe also in me. 2In my Father’s house are many rooms. If it were not so, would I have told you that I go to prepare a place for you? 3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and will take you to myself, that where I am you may be also. ”(John 14:1-3)

Knowing this, I remain fearful of becoming so comfortable in the shadows that I begin to believe that my present life is satisfying.  C.S. Lewis again once said, “We are halfhearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.”
 Father, please don’t let me be content, living in the shadowlands.

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