Irresistibly Drawn
It was a dull, drowsy autumn afternoon. Lucy sat on the hard wooden bench in the little country station, listening to the buzzing of a fly and staring alternately at her shoes, the empty tracks in front of the platform and the grayish-green blur of gorse bushes on the hill beyond the tracks.
Summer gone, she thought, giving her big black traveling case an idle kick. Holidays over. There was a lump in her throat and a flutter in the pit of her stomach: Lucy had never been to boarding school before. She sighed and cast a furtive glance down the bench at Peter, Susan and Edmund. They all looked as if they hadn’t a care in the world.
Turning away, she squinted out across the fields. Was that a hawk wheeling in the distance? Was that a rabbit on the ground, trying to evade the predator’s penetrating eye?
“Oh!” Lucy jumped. Someone—or something—had touched her.
“What’s wrong, Lu?” said Edmund as she turned to face him. “Anyone would think you’d—OW!” And he, too, jerked violently to one side and gave a startled cry.
“Susan!” shouted Peter at the same instant. “Let go!”
“I’m not touching you!” objected Susan. “But I feel it too—as if some invisible person were pulling on me—as if I were being dragged along!”
“Exactly!” agreed Lucy. “And it’s getting worse. I can’t stand it!”
Edmund was on his feet. “It’s magic!” he shouted. “Everyone join hands. We’re in for a ride!”
“I believe you’re right!” agreed Peter.
Suddenly, everything went black. An instant more and the darkness gave way to a swirling eddy of light and shadow. A moment later they all opened their eyes (for of course they had shut them very tightly) and found that the bench, the platform, the railroad tracks and the hills had all vanished.
“Look!” said Peter. They were standing in a thick wood or coppice. Through the treetops bright yellow sunlight shown down out of a brilliant blue sky. Between the white trunks they could see a smooth, sandy beach and the gentle swell of a tranquil inlet of the sea.
“Narnia!” cried Lucy. “We’ve been pulled into Narnia!”
They looked at one another in amazement. It was true.
And somewhere in Narnia at that very moment, across the crystal bay and the dark green woods beyond, a long, clear, musical note was fading into silence—the note of a silver horn sounding the cry for help.
Drawn Into Adventure
Prince Caspian: The Return to Narnia. Such is the title under which the second of the seven “Chronicles of Narnia” was released in 1951 and by which it has been known to enthusiastic readers ever since. What most of those readers don’t realize is that the author wasn’t entirely happy with the name. If Lewis had had his way, this story would have been called Drawn into Narnia.
Thereby hangs a tale, a tale that is something more than just a bit of historical trivia. For Lewis’s original title preserves and underscores one of the driving concepts behind the engaging sequel to The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe: the idea of an adventure undertaken in response to an irresistible summons or call.
The notion of passageways between parallel worlds is essential not only to the dramatic interest but to the spiritual significance of Lewis’s imaginary universe. Prince Caspian begins with a striking variation on this theme. In every other case, it’s a question of someone seeking, finding or stumbling upon the door or the otherworld. Here, by contrast, it’s a matter of being dragged or pulled through.
“Jack [C.S.] Lewis wanted the reader to sense immediately the idea of being drawn or pulled into another world,” said the author’s stepson, Douglas Gresham, in his introduction to Focus on the Family Radio Theater’s dramatic adaptation of Prince Caspian.
Lewis observed that in many fantasy stories characters were summoned by magic, and that these stories were told from the point of view of the magician, or the one who had done the summoning. He wondered what it would be like to be on the receiving end of the summons, to be suddenly pulled from our world into another world. That was the beginning of the idea for Prince Caspian.
Out of that initial idea grew the details of the book’s opening scene. Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy sat in an English country station, waiting for a train that would take them to school. Suddenly, without warning, they were supernaturally seized and snatched away—“drawn into Narnia” in response to Caspian’s sounding of Queen Susan’s magic horn, the horn that was said to bring help to anyone who blew it.
The King Summons You, Too
What would it be like to be on the receiving end of such a summons? We all have a personal interest in the answer to that question. As a matter of fact, if we belong to Christ, we already know the answer. Everyone who has had an authentic encounter with the living God understands what it means to be snapped up out of the mundane world of everyday existence and hauled willy-nilly into the kingdom of heaven. In one way or another, it’s a part of every Christian’s life.
The apostle Paul was certainly familiar with the experience. Allegiance to a crucified carpenter was the last thing he had in mind when he set out on the road to Damascus. His plan was to annihilate the hated sect of the Nazarene. But God had a different idea. And so, in a blinding flash, Paul’s goals and orientation changed. He was knocked down and dragged, kicking and screaming as it were, into a whole new world.
There are plenty of other examples, of course. Gideon was attending to business as usual when the angel of the Lord nabbed him and said, “Go. . . . Am I not sending you?” (Judges 6:14). Isaiah’s life took a radical turn when a vision gripped him and a voice cried, “Whom shall I send?” (Isaiah 6:8). Peter was snagged in the Great Fisherman’s net (Mark 1:16-18). Levi was snatched out of his tax booth and lured away by the magnetism of the Master (Luke 5:27-28).
The message is plain. We approach God, not because we decide to, but because He reaches out and draws us to himself. We follow Him because He pulls us along. He woos us by the compelling, constraining power of His irresistible grace. We love Him because He first loved us (1 John 4:19).
No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him, and I will raise him up at the last day. (John 6:44)
I have loved you with an everlasting love; I have drawn you with loving-kindness. (Jeremiah 31:3)
Message Behind the Masterpiece
The life of faith is a pilgrimage that no one should undertake lightly. Indeed, no one can. And this, believe it or not, can be a comforting thought. There is a tremendous reassurance in the reflection that we enter upon this adventure only because, like the Pevensies, we are specially chosen and called, because we are hooked, caught and reeled in by the irresistible power of the Savior’s love. Out of that foundational truth flows the strength to accept the challenge, the energy to accomplish the mission and the endurance to reach the journey’s end in triumph and joy. 
MORE GOOD READING
Get the entire collection of The Chronicles of Narnia from Breakaway.
BEYOND THE BIG SCREEN
The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian was a blockbuster movie release, but C.S. Lewis’ epic tale has already played countless times on an even larger screen: your imagination. Relive the adventure again with Focus on the Family Radio Theatre’s “The Chronicles of Narnia” series.
