As a Thursday bonus episode, here is the audio of my interview on the Talking Beasts podcast where Brian and I discussed the merits of Dr. Michael Ward’s Narnia Code.
S3E32: “Talking Beasts and the Narnia Code” (Download)
“We go to universities to be challenged, not coddled. Words are not violence. Try hard not to offend others, but try hard not to be offended either. Free speech – uninfringed – makes our society stronger”
[Verse 1] I wanna hear the people singing I wanna feel the walls come down I wanna start a new beginning Finding a freedom in the sound
[Verse 2] I know the power of resurrection I know the life within Your name I know You’re the author of salvation I will never be the same
[Chorus] There is no fear when I am standing in Your light Made me a promise, You are always by my side My hands are lifted to the One who changed my life I’m only free when I am standing in Your light Standing in Your light Standing, standing Standing in Your light Standing, standing
[Verse 3] I see the chains around us breaking I see Your people unashamed I see revival in the making All for the glory of Your name
[Bridge] Spirit burning bright (Burning bright) With me through the night Making all things right (All things right) Standing in Your light Spirit burning bright With me through the night Making all things right Standing in Your light
About six months ago I recorded another interview with Bear Woznick. This time we spoke primarily about C.S. Lewis and my podcast, Pints With Jack. This weekend the video was finally published:
Let me steward well, Lord Christ, this gift of homesickness—this grieving for a childhood gone, this ache for distant family, lost fellowship, past laughter, shared lives, and the sense that I was somewhere I belonged.
It is a good, good thing to have a home.
But now that I have gone from it, let me steward well, O God, this homesick gift, as I know my wish for what has been is not some solitary ache, but is woven with a deeper longing for what will one day be.
This yearning to return to what I knew is, even more than that, a yearning for a place my eyes have yet to see.
So let me steward this sacred yearning well. Homesickness is indeed a holy thing, like the slow burning of an immortal beacon, set ablaze to bid us onward.
The shape of that ache for another time and place is the imprint of eternity within our souls.
So let those sorrows do their work in me, O God. Let them stir such yearnings as would fix my journey forward toward that place for which I’ve always pined.
O my soul, have there not always been signs? O my soul, were we not born with hearts on fire? Before we were old enough even to know why songs and waves and starlight so stirred us, had we not already tiptoed to the edge of that vast sadness, bright and good, and felt ourselves somehow stricken with a sickness unto life? Hardly had we ventured from our yards, when we felt ourselves so strangely far from something—and somewhere that we despaired of ever reaching—that we turned to hide the welling of our eyes. We knew it, even then, as the opening of a wound this world cannot repair— the first birthing of that weight every soul must wake up to alone, because it is the burden of that wild and lonely space that only God in his eternity can fill.
And as we wait, this sacred, homesick sorrow works in us to cultivate a faith that knows one day, he will.
That is the holy work of homesickness: to teach our hearts how lonely they have always been for God.
So let these sighs and tears, Lord Christ, prepare me for that better gladness that will be mine. Let all your children learn to grieve well in this life, knowing we are not just being homesick; we are letting sorrow carve the spaces in our souls, that joy will one day fill. O Holy Spirit, bless our grief, and seal our hearts until that day.
