Intellectually speaking . . .

Why are those words such a HUGE turnoff?

When people say them, it is as if a fortress has just been erected into a space that was once open, green and verdant. Then, the ever increasing shadow of the fortress of personal wisdom and knowledge of the allegedly intellectual person gradually covers the growth of new ideas until all possibility for the desired speech has been rendered mute.

In a bit of fatal irony, the Lord of the Manor then wonders why the vassals are not thronging to his feet to share their giblets of microscopic intelligence which can be dwarfed by the superior skills of his golden tongue. It is a lesson that the true seekers of power for power's sake never seem to grasp.

Like the golden hind, it darts and dashes just out of reach of the pursuer until even the tongue of the vaunted intellect is silenced by the reproof. You cannot take by force anything that is not willingly sacrificed.

A delightful reminder of this came as we were watching "The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe" the other day. Regardless of the raging of the Queen (who knew no wrong in her own eyes), the children saw through her posturing brilliantly. Slow to catch on at first was the younger brother who struggled with issues of power and control within his own heart. He wasn't bad, he just hadn't learned what the true good of life really was, nor the source from which it sprung.

It was not until the full measure of the Queen's arrogant posturing came full force across his own face that he came to understand that no one, not even he, was above her reprisals and no one would be allowed to consider her contemptable for her actions. Everything to her was simply a means to an end that she didn't even comprehend.

Power seeking at its finest, the Queen needed to surround herself with those who were of a lesser light, so that her pretended brilliance would seem like a beacon of radiant light. Her intellectual need for superiority was fed by lackeys who couldn't have held the spit bucket for a kindergarten spelling bee. But the willing sycophants are always handily around to join into a battle, even when they don't understand what the fighting is for . . .

Aslan, willing to sacrifice dignity, comfort, safety and all pretence, offers himself as the choice between a relatively innocent child beguiled by the erstwhile serpent in the garden. Striding humbly and nobly into what he KNOWS will be a death scene, Aslan shows what true compassion and love is in an emblematic recreation of the Atonement of Christ.

Like Christ, Aslan suffers scorn and ridicule. And symbolically, with his mane (or glory) stripped from him in a cruel gesture of public humiliation, Aslan serves as a visible reminder that the Savior of All stood in totally and abject silence as those who mocked him were unworthy to hold his pencil box, yet considered themselves to be intellectually superior to the One who would forgive them all that they had done.

As mere mortals, we play with the terms 'forgiveness' and 'repentance' as if they were only shiney baubles for our amusement.

The true intellectual realizes a total dependence upon the mercy and blessing of God and Jesus Christ for ANY spiritual gift that allows him or her to speak, if only for a moment, with 'the tongue of angels'.

So the next time someone offers the opportunity to bask in the reflected glory of personal intellect, I think I am going to look deeply into their eyes, or perhaps, as the case has been all too frequently in my OWN life, I will look deeply into my own, and discover if there is any portion of Christ within.

Only then can true intellectual speech proceed. Because if there is a Light from within, it will not be mine that we are relying upon, but rather, the Intellect of the One who truly knows of what He speaks.