Maturity with Innocence

I love author C.S. Lewis and his works. Recently, I finished the Chronicles of Narnia, and, if you have not read them, beware: I am going to spoil a little bit of it. (To my credit, it has been out for nearly 80 years in its entirety, so if you’ve not read it, it’s your fault, not mine. Go get yourself a copy, and enjoy it!). I am sad that Susan, one of the four Pevensie children who had visited Narnia and become Kings and Queens there, thinking she was too grown up, abandoned Narnia for grown up things like make up and social engagements. In many respects, I think Lewis, allegorically speaking, was considering how, in our desire for maturity, we can become something worse than an adult: we can think of ourselves as intellectually, morally, and in all other ways superior to what we know to be true, to the point, sadly, of denying truth to fit our own image of what things should be.

In Mere Christianity (Book 4, Chapter 7), C.S. Lewis said something quite profound about this:“Why? What is the good of pretending to be what you are not? Well, even on the human level, you know, there are two kinds of pretending. There is a bad kind, where the pretence is there instead of the real thing; as when a man pretends he is going to help you instead of really helping you. But there is also a good kind, where the pretence leads up to the real thing. When you are not feeling particularly friendly but know you ought to be, the best thing you can do, very often, is to put on a friendly manner and behave as if you were a nicer person than you actually are. And in a few minutes, as we have all noticed, you will be really feeling friendlier than you were. Very often the only way to get a quality in reality is to start behaving as if you had it already. That is why children's games are so important. They are always pretending to be grown-ups-playing soldiers, playing shop. But all the time, they are hardening their muscles and sharpening their wits, so that the pretence of being grown-up helps them to grow up in earnest.” This got me thinking: we think we’re mature, we act mature, but we’re plodding around in clothes much to big for us. Someday, unless our physical growth does not match our maturity, though, we may fit in to those oversized garments, and we will attain the adulthood we desire. As we mature, we ought to seek knowledge, and in seeking knowledge, seek the wisdom to use it, and once we have the wisdom in using the knowledge, we ought to seek discernment on when and how to apply the knowledge. And through it all, we ought to, as Jesus says, be adults in our wisdom and discernment (wise as serpents), but innocent in our ways (innocent as doves).

Let us, then, in wisdom, seek to be innocent as children, but adult in our reasoning. Let us, in wisdom, count ourselves fools, seeking Christ to be our compass, walking in joy, and reasoning through His word, instead of in our own heads. Let us put on the new self, whom Christ died to make us, and walk with the newness and knowledge that Christ has risen from the dead, victorious, and that, through Him, we have reconciliation with God.

Ephesians 4

I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all. But grace was given to each one of us according to the measure of Christ’s gift. Therefore it says,

“When he ascended on high he led a host of captives,

and he gave gifts to men.”

 (In saying, “He ascended,” what does it mean but that he had also descended into the lower regions, the earth? He who descended is the one who also ascended far above all the heavens, that he might fill all things.) And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.

Now this I say and testify in the Lord, that you must no longer walk as the Gentiles do, in the futility of their minds. They are darkened in their understanding, alienated from the life of God because of the ignorance that is in them, due to their hardness of heart. They have become callous and have given themselves up to sensuality, greedy to practice every kind of impurity. But that is not the way you learned Christ!— assuming that you have heard about him and were taught in him, as the truth is in Jesus, to put off your old self, which belongs to your former manner of life and is corrupt through deceitful desires, and to be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and to put on the new self, created after the likeness of God in true righteousness and holiness.

Therefore, having put away falsehood, let each one of you speak the truth with his neighbor, for we are members one of another. Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger, and give no opportunity to the devil. Let the thief no longer steal, but rather let him labor, doing honest work with his own hands, so that he may have something to share with anyone in need. Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. Let all bitterness and wrath and anger and clamor and slander be put away from you, along with all malice. Be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, as God in Christ forgave you.