With only a month and day till the opening of The Voyage of the Dawn Treader, I have somehow managed to miss a week of our countdown. I might have been in a fog much like the one in which the Dawn Treader finds itself in the next adventure contained in the book. Chapter Twelve is titled “Dark Island” and it tells another great story with strong spiritual themes.
The chapter begins twelve days after the Dawn Treader has left Magician’s Island. The weather has been beautiful and Lucy and Reepicheep have passed the time playing much chess on deck. The calm is disturbed when from his lookout position Edmund spots what appears to be a dark island rising out of the sea.
Without wind to aid them, the crew of the Dawn Treader rows their way toward the island. But as they come closer, they discover that this is no island at all. Instead, it is sheer and utter Darkness. As the ship nears the darkness, Caspian must make a decision. Do they enter the utter blackness or turn around and avoid it. Although most on board prefer the latter option, it is Reepicheep who questions such a decision and convinces the others that avoiding such a challenge would defeat the entire purpose of their journey. Sometimes, it is only as we venture by faith where logic suggests we should not go that we learn the lessons “Aslan” wants to teach us.
As the crew slowly rows into and through the darkness a cry rings out from someone “in such extremity of terror that he had almost lost his humanity.” The stranger cries out for mercy and Caspian offers him refuge on the Dawn Treader. A wild, white face appears out of the darkness and the crew hauls Lord Rhoop on board.
The minute Rhoop lands on deck he begins to plead with Caspian to flee out of the darkness. He explains that this is the “land where dreams come true.” Initially, everyone thinks that they would love to stay in such a place until the reality dawns on them that some dreams are nightmares, and sometimes the worst that could happen would be for our dreams to come true. It reminds me that sometimes our dreams do come true and do turn out to be nightmares!
All on board begin to row furiously to escape the darkness, but their efforts appear to be in vain. Despair begins to set in as dark dreams creep up on all aboard the ship. What a great image! Think of life this way. Sometimes we feel so hopelessly lost in the darkness that there seems to be no hope. The rowers cry out, “We shall never get out, never get out.” But Lucy has hope. She whispers a prayer:
“Aslan, Aslan, if ever you loved us at all, send us help now.”
Lewis writes that even though the darkness did not diminish, Lucy began to feel a little bit better about things. She even has the ability to reason, “After all, nothing has really happened to us yet.” The spiritual lesson contained here is that even when it looks like prayer has not changed our circumstances, it can still change our attitude and perspective about them. But in this case, prayer accomplishes both.
One of the crew spots a tiny light. Then from this tiny speck of light a broad beam of light falls on the Dawn Treader. The light comes closer, and once over the Dawn Treader casts the shadow of a cross. The light is coming from an albatross. Landing on the prow of the ship, the albatross cries out in a sweet, but unintelligible voice and then begins to lead the Dawn Treader out of the darkness. Only Lucy has understood the voice. It said, “Courage, dear heart.” It is Aslan, who has come in the form of the albatross. He has answered Lucy’s prayer. He leads them out of darkness and back to the light. Once free of Dark Island, they look back to see that the darkness is totally gone. Aslan has not only set them free from the darkness, he has destroyed it. The Dawn Treader sails into the open sea, and the albatross vanishes.
There has been much speculation and discussion concerning this appearance of Aslan in the form of an albatross. There will be other times in the Chronicles where Aslan takes shapes other than that of a lion. At the end of this story he will be seen as a lamb that transforms back into a lion. We know that the albatross was considered a good-luck symbol to sailors. Some have referenced Coleridge’s use of the symbol in “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner.” As far as I know, Lewis himself never commented on this.
Aslan again sets the Dawn Treader on course for the east – the direction of Aslan’s Country – their ultimate destination. Fear, faith, darkness, light, prayer, divine intervention, and spiritual guidance are all packed into this little chapter.
As the countdown continues, let me share a few ways you could use the film in ministry. As a church, we are having a special Narnia night for families one week before the film opens. Group Publishing has developed special materials for this kind of event and we are taking advantage of them. (check it out at http://familyhour.group.com)
The following weekend (opening weekend) we are working with a local theater to take our entire church to the film as a group. I also am encouraging our church family to use this an opportunity to take friends to the movie who might not be ready to go to church. I view the film as a tremendous gift to the church and want to utilize the amazing opportunity it provides in any way I can.
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