The Christ Centred Cosmic Civilisation

Episode 119g - Further Up, Further In

• Paul

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A donkey in a lion’s skin shouldn’t fool anyone—yet when we forget the true Lion, costumes start to look convincing. We close our Narnia arc with The Last Battle, following the trail from deception and power-grabbing religion to judgment that clarifies everything and a new creation that feels more real than stone underfoot. Along the way, we meet Shift’s manipulative theatre, Puzzle’s naive complicity, and the dwarfs’ tragic cynicism, and we press into why Lewis insists Aslan and Tash cannot be blended into a polite “Tashlan.” That clarity doesn’t cancel mercy: we wrestle with Emeth’s startling welcome and what it says about sincerity, goodness, and the King who reads the heart.

We talk about counterfeit Christs, why cultures and churches grow weak when they trade the biblical Jesus for a fashionable one, and how discernment becomes a form of love in an age of spin. Judgment arrives not as an arbitrary decree but as exposure to a face—some look and love, some turn and hate—and the results are simply the truth about what we want most. Then the door opens. Colours intensify, distances call, and the cry goes up: further up, further in. Lewis refuses the thin clichés of heaven, instead sketching resurrection life as a world renewed around the presence of the good but not safe King—solid joy, deeper home, and an endless adventure.

If you’ve ever wondered how to spot a false lion, how to live hopefully with judgment in view, or how to imagine eternity without flattening it into clouds and harps, this conversation is for you. Listen, reflect, and share it with someone who loves Narnia or needs a bracing vision of the real. If the wardrobe door is still open for you, step through—then subscribe, leave a review, and tell us what “further up and further in” means in your life.

The theme music is "Wager with Angels" by Nathan Moore

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to the Christ-centered Cosmic Civilization podcast, and we're at the last book of the Narnia Chronicles, the last battle. And this is the end of the world, and it's all about well the magician's nephew was creation and fall. Then the Lion The Witch in the Wardrobe has the cross and the resurrection. But this is really Judgment Day and New Creation. And the end of the world in Narnia is both terrible and glorious. And for many of us, it's one of the best imaginative explorations of Judgment Day and the New Creation that there's ever been written. It is the darkest of the chronicles because there's such deception and betrayal and wickedness. But it is a story of justice, judgment in the sense of justice, renewal, and this wonderful stirring of the hope of uh I nearly said heaven, but it's not so much heaven as this resurrection, new creation, future. So we'll look at these three films about deception and false Christs, the Antichrist. That's the first theme. The second is this idea of judgment and the end of the old creation. And then the third is this new creation home. And there's that wonderful phrase, further up and further in. So it's actually not just the end of Narnia, it's a vision of the end of all things and all the worlds, including our own. So all those many worlds that were glimpsed in the wood between the worlds, perhaps it's the end of them all, really, and the beginning of a totally different kind of cosmic order. The beginning of eternity. Well, let's set the stage of what's what the book's about. It begins, the story begins with a lie. There's a cunning ape named Shift. Even that name Shift, the idea of Shifty, and he's not uh like not stable. Uh well the the cunning ape named Shift dresses a donkey who's called Puzzle. Again, the name uh suggests not uh straightforward, but the donkey is is a kind of um good or or naive soul, simple soul, and is manipulated by this cunning ape named Shift. Uh and and the donkey dresses up in a lion's skin, and Shift using Puzzle dressed in a lion's skin, convinces the Narnians that this is Aslan. In this is a kind of Aslan, and that this false Aslan is the true king. And uh through this deception, and it's the most uh evil of all deceptions to be a false Aslan, uh but using this shift gains power. Now the Narnians are not completely convinced by by this, it's because we know in the earlier books when Aslan does reveal himself, there's such clarity and this overwhelming uh awareness of who he is, and he sort of projects his presence and identity such that it's unmistakable who he is. The only person who kind of is uh unimpressed by his presence is the wicked witch. Jadis, and then the wicked witch, they kind of um defy him in a but normally if Aslan's present, there's a kind there's nothing ambiguous about it. But shift through and puzzle uh claim this, and so the Narnians are confused, they're divided, they become enslaved, and even the faithful are shaken, and and it's difficult to know what to do and how to uh understand it. And as the story unfolds, the deception deepens, and Narnia is invaded by the Kalmorene. Uh the Calamines, they invade, and that's important because uh, if you remember in the horse and his boy, the whole story was designed around avoiding or preventing this invasion of the Calamenes, but now they do invade, and the last of the faithful Narnians are besieged, and the world itself begins to unravel. Everything that seemed to be certain is no longer certain, and even the concept of Aslan has become something hard to know if it's real, and everything is dark and deceived, and uh Narnia itself appears to be ending, and everything it's the twilight of Narnia, the last battle, the end of the age. That's the book. So this first theme, Deception and False Christ, the false Aslan, it is one of C.S. Lewis's most striking images: a donkey in a lion's skin, a parody of the true king, and this donkey is not an impressive sp uh soul at all. Um, but there is something enduring about this, and I I can remember when I first read this story and being uh deeply impacted by this false Aslan, the donkey and the lion skin. And it is C. S. Lewis's warning about false Christs, about those who claim to speak for the living God, but do not the danger of deception. And we've seen already that C. S. Lewis is very aware that there are other gods, like creatures that pretend to be God, uh Tash, and so on. And that's important because for C. S. Lewis, it's not like there is just this generic concept of God. No, God is specific. God is as Aslan, and or Aslan is the son of the Father, and he has come from this far country, this heavenly country. So the like God in the Narnia world is Aslan, and that there are others, there are others that claim to be God. There are false gods, and those here in this book that claim to speak for Aslan but do not. So C.S. Lewis, there's I like this about him that he's not naive, and he's warning us, just as the Bible warns us, that the greatest dangers are not so much from external enemies, the Calamines and things. They're not the worst enemy, the worst enemy is from within, and that Narnia is unraveled not so much by the external enemies, but by this false Aslan. And that when when people don't have a clear perception of the true Aslan, uh nothing they're weakened, that they can't defend, they can't do anything. Everything unravels, and that's true to life that when we can't see Jesus, or we have a false Jesus, or we're following a false Jesus, a Jesus that has been invented by false prophets, then we're powerless. And like there's a lot of people explore this. C.S. Lewis does in his non-fiction books as well. The fact that if like the modern Western church is so weak, so powerless, why is it? And there's this skin, why can't we win our nation, our continent, our culture to back to the Lord Jesus? Because if you go back hundreds of years, like European culture was very, very strongly Christian in its foundations and structures and assumptions, and although not everybody actually followed Jesus, Jesus dominated the culture, and many, many people did follow him, and now it's uh Christianity is kind of a lunatic fringe, really. And why is that? C.S. Lewis really is a word that there's false Jesus, the Jesus that is presented is doesn't bear any resemblance to the biblical one, the cosmic Christ. That the Jesus that is offered is conditioned or it is a product of human culture, really, in so many ways. He's like a donkey with a lion's skin. And that does it doesn't really anyone who's seen the real Aslan can see this is obviously not real, and same for us. If you if we've encountered the real Jesus, all these fake Jesuses of uh institutional churches and well, not just institutional churches, it's sometimes people say to me, the problem is institutional Christianity. I'll say, okay, but what's the reason for the total failure of non-institutional Christianity then? No, it's it's more widespread, isn't it, than that? So the false Aslan is this I f I find it them like the most horrendously disturbing thing in all of the Narnia stories. And the Narnians are confused. Some follow this false Aslan out of fear, others out of cynicism, and others out of despair. But the sense of how it's a parable of our own world, and I mean Jesus himself warned, didn't he? Many will come in my name saying, I am the Christ, and they will lead many astray. So, of course, that has been literally true that there have been prophets, people who've claimed to be prophets of the living God and set up whole religions and deceived millions, if not billions. But also there are those who preach false Christ. They don't necessarily say they are the false Christ, but that they preach a view of Jesus that is is just um completely false and doesn't connect people to the real Jesus. So the false Aslan reminds us that discernment is essential. Not every voice that claims authority is true, not every leader who wears the lion's skin is the lion. People can and again, not everyone who claims to speak on behalf of Christ is doing so. And but we must notice the deception works because the Narnians have grown forgetful, they no longer know Aslan well enough to tell the difference, really. And that is this challenge that I know we've said it, but I want to say it again. Do we know the real and living Lord Jesus Christ well enough to recognize him? Or are we vulnerable to the counterfeits? And be it's important to take that question seriously, don't answer it too quickly, because no, you know, everyone thinks, oh no, I definitely can tell the true from the false. But is the Jesus that we believe in or follow is that exactly as he is described by the prophets and the apostles? Or even think of it in a uh more simple way um would the our Christian ancestors of say 200 years ago or 300 or 400 or 1500 years ago, would they think the Jesus we follow is the is the real one? And that's a deep question. Because uh, you know, sometimes I I we we sort of think, wow, yeah, actually, Christians from an older times, if they came into our Christian inverted commas, our Christian gatherings or Christian culture, they would probably be quite horrified and and think of it as false Christianity rather than true Christianity. Well, that's the thing, faithfulness begins with knowing the true lion, um and this there's Tash, the false god, and Aslan, and this there's a central theological conflict that this idea that Tash and Aslan are actually the same god, and Aslan explores that the idea that uh oh well these gods they're all ultimately the same thing, but this book, Last Battle, is arguing no good and evil, truth and falsehood, true the real and living god over against false gods, other gods, none these things cannot be blended. Aslan explains that he and Tash are opposites, and Aslan says, No service which is vile can be done to me, and none which is not vile can be done to him. See, this means that a good deed, even if done in Tash's name, is perhaps maybe that is is is Aslan's maybe, and that does come out in the book in a way. C. S. Lewis believes that it's possible that people who are genuinely good but think they're worshipping these other gods may actually be serving Aslan in the world of Narnia, or in the real world, he might say a really sincere follower of another religion who's really good may actually turn out to be a follower of Jesus. And that is uh one of the more controversial claims of C. S. Lewis that that comes out in this book. But conversely, cruel deeds, wicked deeds, even if they are done in Aslan's name, they're actually in service to Tash. So C. S. Lewis is effectively kind of refuting religious syncretism, asserting that they're not all the same, they're not all blended to form just like one like cosmic religion that, and and Jesus is just one manifestation of this kind of religious unknown. No, C. Lewis is saying, though the real and living God is Aslan, is the Lord Jesus with the Father and the Spirit, these other gods are false gods. If you serve them, you're not serving the real and living God. But then C.S. Lewis leaves this door open that people who are genuinely good and are deceived into following these other gods, that Jesus may yet own them. Um but this idea of faith and deception in this novel, The Last Battle, repeatedly shows how deception corrupts and destroys faith. The lie of Tashlan, Tashlan is the idea, blending Aslan and Tash to form as if they're the same thing. The lie of Tashlan and the false Aslan causes widespread confusion and fear, and many Narnians turn away from the truth. And uh the dwarves are the the ultimate example of this. We'll we'll we'll examine them um next, I think. That these dwarfs cynical dwarves, because the dwarves embody there's these dwarves that embody the dangers of complete cynicism and a loss of faith. And they don't believe anything anymore. They become so cynical by for all sorts of reasons that they can't trust anything, they can't believe anything, and so they can't nothing, um, they're so determined not to be fooled again that they reject good and evil. And they say the dwarves are just for the dwarves, and they don't believe in anything beyond themselves. And even when they enter Aslan's country, they can't see it, they can't see its beauty, they can't see a glorious feast waiting for them. It all appears to them as filthy stable litter, they are trapped in a self-created prison of their own minds. I mean, Aslan says this to Lucy about the dwarves, that their prison is only in their own minds, and they're so afraid of being taken in that they cannot be taken out of their prison. And I find that the dwarves really powerful because there's so much of a certain age of person, older people, who maybe grew up in at the tail end of modernism and so on, maybe them. Although others too, but there's this kind of feeling of like I don't believe, I don't believe in anything beyond what is kind of absolutely immediate to me and my senses, and I there is nothing, everything's mumbo jumbo, superstition. I don't believe in anything beyond the absolute minimum of materialism, and yet it's the dwarves are like that, and the fact that dwarves like shortened, I guess C.S. Lewis is talking about that. Um, whereas Shift the ape as the main villain, he he's cynical in a different way, in that he he does sort of grasp a larger reality, but uses it for himself, a worldly materialistic pursuit of power. Um and it his he invoke, well, I suppose he doesn't he invokes a God he doesn't believe in, only to ultimately be consumed by that god. And there is then those that use religion for selfish gain, and the Bible warns us about those. And going right back to Exodus 18, that church leaders, one of the very few criteria and essential for a church leader, is they cannot be in it for greedy gain. That's in Exodus 18, and then all subsequent criteria for church leaders in the Bible, right the way through into the New Testament in Timothy and so on, Titus cannot be in it for greedy gain. That's shift the ape. He's only he's kind of sees religion as a way of gaining for himself, and there's something about that that is so vile to the true and living God, because of course the true and living God, who is at the core of true religion, he dies a godforsaken death, gives up everything he's got in order to serve those who need him, his enemies serve his enemies. He's he's like not in it at all for himself. So for those that kind of use Christianity to gain money, power, popularity, there's something vile about them. And we when we see them on television or the the kind of you know, you might see like a mega church, and there's a figure at the centre of it who is is kind of worshipped, and they they love the adulation, they love the money, they love the influence, and they keep themselves separated from it from people because they don't want to be caught up in serving people and loving people and sharing life with people. There's something vile about them, and they are shift the ape in in the novel. I mean, puzzle the donkey, he's a simple soul, humble, kind of kind, but foolish, easily manipulated, and he shows that uh we can't be like that. We have to be discerning and wise, that uh well-intentioned naivety is easily co-opted for evil. We've seen that a lot in our own day. That people who believe in something good and they want justice or they want freedom or things like that, but they're trying to do it without Jesus and church. We see how quickly that can easily become something quite evil. Uh, but he he is co-optive for evil, but his genuine remorse and confession ultimately leads to his redemption, and that's why we'll just mention this guy, Emmet for Calamine. He's a crucial character who represents this idea of that he's overtly a follower of the cruel god Tash, but he's a brave and honest warrior, and his he wants to look upon the face of Tash, and that's sincere, he's not cynical, and he's willing to die for his faith. Um, and then when he meets Aslan, the great lion, um Aslan tells him, Child, all the service you have done to Tash, I account as service done to me. So that's again this this more controversial idea from C.S. Lewis, that followers of other religions who are genuinely sincere with integrity and goodness, that they are secret followers of Jesus. Well, let's move on to the next theme: this idea of judgment, justice, the end of the end of the old creation. Because as the story reaches its climax, the world of Narnia comes to an end and the stars fall. And of course, we've seen those stars being created in the magician's nephew, and now at the end of the age, uh they fall, the sun dies, the land is rolled up like a scroll. And this is S. C. S. Lewis's vision of judgment. The old creation or the old order of creation passes away. Every creature is brought before Aslan. And the only criteria of judgment is how they respond to him. It's fascinating and so powerful and so true to scripture. See, some look into his face and love him, others look away and hate him, and that's it. They either come into his world or are directed away and separated away from Aslan forever. And the just the simple criteria is what do they think of Aslan? Aslan is the dividing point between the new creation future and the outer darkness of exile. So then heaven and hell in this sense are not arbitrary uh assignments, they are outworking of our own hearts. Those who love Aslan find joy in his presence, those who hate him cannot bear his presence. The end of Narnia is sobering. It does remind us this world too will pass away, and all of it must end. Even the sun, moon, and stars must be uh brought down and recreated in some other form. And and that judgment, there is this day of judgment, it's real. Eternity matters. We will all in a way be like that, standing before, well, not Aslan, but the Lord Jesus Christ, and this division between sheep and goats. Uh, and it doesn't matter whether we thought we were good or not, like with the sheep and the goats. It's really about are we or do we know him? Because his point in the parables of Jesus, the most ominous words Jesus says are, I never knew you. So people may preth they know the real Jesus, but the question is, does he know you? And that is what deter is this determining factor. Do you really know him? If you really know him, then he knows you. Um but this day of judgment and justice, this separation, that's not really the end of the story, because there's this doorway, of course, into something greater. The end of the old creation is the beginning of the new creation, and that takes us to this final theme about the new creation as as the final home, and this wonderful phrase further up and further in. Because after this day of judgment or this moment of division, the faithful find themselves in a kind of new Narnia, which is really a whole new creation, a truer Narnia, a deeper Narnia. It's like everything is more real, more solid, more alive. The colours are brighter, the mountains are higher, the joy is deeper, and the cry goes up, come further up, come further in. And this is C.S. Lewis's vision of that new creation, resurrection, future. It's not some ethereal place floating around with harps and clouds. It's not that ghastly vision that you get in some medievals where it's kind of everyone is surrounding God as in this kind of intellectual exercise of contemplating uh God and and in that vision, that ghastly sort of um I think it's ultimately from a pagan background the idea that God uh can't really think about anything that isn't worth thinking about, and and only he's worth thinking about, so he just thinks about himself, and the final state is for everyone to stand around God, also just thinking about him, and then that is so satisfying, everyone forever and ever and ever will be ecstatically, deliriously happy in this contemplating God, just as God contemplates himself. Now, even as I describe it, I know many of you will be recoiling in horror at such a pagan thing about a God who is so self-obsessed that he demands everyone else be obsessed with him. Um, and of course, it doesn't, there's nowhere in, there's no vision like that in the Bible. And C.S. Lewis has nothing of that. No, it's not floating around thinking about just like an an infinitely long church service. Somebody said it that's that that's is is it is the is this future just the kind of infinitely long. Church service in heaven. And um no, it's this renewed creation with with Christ Aslan at the center of it all, and it's not detached from him, it's centered on him, and it's for those who love him and want Aslan or well, the Lord Jesus, to lead us into all that he has for us. He's our Lord, he's our leader, well, and even husband in scriptural vision. So this renewed creation, it's not less real, but more real. In a way, it's not an escape from earth, but the fulfilment of earth. And C. S. Lewis is, of course, echoing Revelation 21. I'm making everything new. And so this journey is the never-ending journey that does not end, it continues, and there's ever this kind of cry of further up, further in. Uh for C. S. Lewis, eternity is not this static, timeless um abstraction, but it's an endless adventure, an ever-deepening joy. And getting to know Aslan, well, the Father, Son, and Spirit ever more deeply. And that's why the Last Battle story, it's not just an ending, it's a beginning, the beginning of the great story in which every chapter is better than the one before. So it's good to think of that eternal life as further up and further in, depicting this as not a static life, but a dynamic, progressive journey that is going on and on and on. And Aslan's repeated call to go further up and further in is this idea that even in that new creation future, there's constant growth and joy, deepening joy, and so on. So that's it. Why does this story matter? It warns us about deception, it calls us to discernment, it reminds us that judgment day is real, eternity matters. And this story, The Last Battle, I find it immensely awakens our hope of that new creation future. Not as an escape, but as the home, our home, the home of righteousness. It's not just the end of Narnia, it's the vision of the of the end of all things, and it points us to the wonder of the fact that it's the one who created us, is the one who redeemed us and takes us on into all that he dreamt of when he created all things. So, have you read The Last Battle? If not, let me invite you to do it. And as you read it, let's think about these things. How are we vulnerable to deception? Are we clear about the real Christ? Do we need to remember the true Lion? To get back in touch with the real Lord Jesus, the real Lion who is the Lamb? And are we living in the light of that eternal future, this hope? All these moments in the story with the lies, the deception, the faithful Narnian's courage, and that cry of further up, further in, all of that. So as we close this series, remember then that the Chronicles of Narnia, I think we've seen they're not just children's books, the windows into the Christ-centered cosmic civilization. And the reminders, this gospel is rich and deep and sparks our imagination, opens our hearts and minds. It's not just dry doctrine, but living truth that uh it stirs us, stirs us in the depths of our emotions and uh lights our mind on fire, I find. Myth become fact, the roar of a lion who is not safe, but good. Well, 75 years on, that's it. Um the wardrobe door is still open. The invitation still stands. Come in. Further up, further in.