Till We Have Faces

June 2009

Wrestling with a Hidden God

Arch-atheist Richard Dawkins was once asked what he would do if, at death, he discovers that God exists. A fidgeting Dawkins replied that he would ask Him why He didn’t make Himself more evident. The author of The God Delusion is not alone. Throughout the ages, many others have been bewildered, if not maddened, by the hiddenness of God. But perhaps no one expresses that bewilderment more than God’s servant Job.

Job was a man of moral rectitude without peer. But suddenly, without warning, he becomes the object of supernatural attentions that claim his wealth, children, and health. In the crushing aftermath, several friends attend him, but, in the end, their efforts to comfort fail to comfort and all their answers fall short. Overcome by his loss, Job directs his voice heavenward with the tortured question: “Why do you hide your face?”

The same question issued off the lips of Habakkuk, David, and the psalmists in their dark night of the soul. The absence of God in a hurting and unjust world can be outright exasperating, even among believers.

Whether it’s the woman abandoned by her husband after a 20-year marriage, the man left jobless after corporate downsizing, or the couple grieving the death of a child, the person caught in the grip of sudden loss raises voice—and sometime fist—pleading: Where is the restraining hand of God? Where is the Advocate of righteousness? Where is the Father of all comfort?

Frustration with hide-and-seek deities is central in C.S. Lewis’s acclaimed novel, Till We Have Faces.

TWO SISTERS

The story is about two princesses: one beautiful, the other ugly; one whose love is selfless, the other whose love is self-serving; one who lives by faith, the other by sight; one named Psyche, the other Orual—two sisters whose lives are punctuated by transformational moments.

Through her beauty and goodness, Psyche wins fevered devotion throughout the realm. But after a string of woes is visited upon the kingdom, public opinion turns. It is determined that Psyche has enraged a jealous goddess and, for her offense, must be abandoned to Grey Mountain as an appeasement offering.

Psyche faces her sentence with uncommon courage. Recalling her childhood dream of being married to a mountain king, Psyche wonders if it was a presage of her impending ordeal. Could it be that her whole life has been a run-up to this glorious event? Imagining the possibility, her expectation overcomes her doubts and concerns.

Orual, believing that the gods are “lies of poets,” fears that her sister will be ripped apart by wild animals, ravaged by a deranged mountain man, or merely left to die from hunger. Hoping to persuade Psyche to escape, Orual, in cunning sophistry, suggests that the gods are real, but are given over to evil things. Psyche shoots back that perhaps the gods are real, but those “evil” things “are not what they seem to be,” adding, “How if I am indeed to wed a god?”

Wed a god she does.

TRANSFORMATIONAL MOMENTS

Psyche is led up the mountain, bound to a tree, and left to the fates. But before she succumbs to the elements, the mountain god swoops down and whisks her off to his castle.

Days later, Orual journeys out to find Psyche, or her remains. Instead of a corpse or emaciated figure, Orual finds her sister in good health and spirits. Psyche gushes as she tells Orual about her castle and her husband. Orual is dumbfounded—she sees no castle, no husband; only rocks, trees, and brush.

Psyche goes on to tell Orual that her husband visits her only in the dark of night, forbidding her to look upon his face. Orual bristles, what sort of god is this “that dares not show his face”?

Convinced that Psyche is out of her wits, Orual tries to coax her off the mountain. When Psyche declines, Orual becomes angry and jealous. Angry with those poetic immortals for stealing her beloved sister and jealous that Psyche would choose a phantom lover over her.

Desperate for her sister see the truth, Orual convinces her to bring a lamp into her husband’s chamber. When she does and gazes upon him, Psyche screams in horror, not by what she sees, but by what she feels—overwhelming guilt for her betrayal. Psyche goes into exile, and an ineffable Visage flashes before Orual’s eyes, renting open her heart.

In that transformational moment, Orual’s conscience is quickened and her doubt dispelled. She now knows that the gods exist and that she bears blame before them; still there is anger. Anger, as Richard Dawkins might argue, with Immortals who keep hidden. Had they made themselves, and their will, more plain, her offense and its consequences could have been avoided. Miffed by their detachment, Orual proceeds to write out her grievances against them.

Before she is finished, she has a jolting self-revelation. Peering deep into the mirror of her soul, Orual sees a devouring, life-quenching narcissist for whom people, even her sister, are means of personal gratification rather than as objects of unsparing love.The wretched image brings on the next revelation:Before she dies, she must die.

Orual realizes she can’t accomplish that on her own; but frustrated that the AWOL gods will not assist her, the princess-now-queen completes penning her grievance.

TILL WE HAVE FACES

In a dream (a vision or near-death experience?) Orual is brought to “court” by an ethereal being and invited to read her accusation. After reciting her litany of charges, she is asked, “Are you answered?” Without hesitation, Orual responds, “Yes.” As the queen would explain shortly before her death, “The complaint was the answer. To have heard myself making it was to be answered.”

Orual got it. In our present condition, questions and answers are but structured collections of words—human devices that are often inadequate in expressing our own thoughts and feelings, much less for understanding the thoughts of God.

Beyond vocabulary, we lack the faculties for pure dialogue with God. Indeed, a divine utterance falling on human ears would be as unintelligible as tensor mathematics to a rhesus monkey.As Orual rightly concludes, "How can the gods meet us face to face till we have faces?"

To enjoy full communion with our Creator, we await for the day when we will become who we are created to be. What that is, we do not know, save for the inspiration of John: “But we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3). Sharing in His nature and His vocabulary, we will be equipped for intimate, unbroken fellowship with our Lord and Savior.

Until that day, our comprehension of heavenly things is as vaporous as a pet’s comprehension of his master. While “now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror,” Paul writes, “then we shall see face to face.” And though “now I know in part,” he continues, “then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known” (1 Corinthians 13:12).

JOB’S CONCLUSION

When Job is finished with all his “whys,” God responds, not with answers, but with His own cannonade of questions, beginning with the scorching, “Who is this who darkens my counsel with words without knowledge?”

Singed by the blast of God’s utterance, Job is reminded of who is Creator and who is creature, and of the yawning chasm between them. At this point, Job could have pressed his grievances or slumped and withered.Instead, he “mans up” and, in one of the most humble affirmations in scripture, submits to God’s sovereignty, trusting that history will unfold according to his perfect will:

“I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted. . . . Surely I spoke of things I did not understand, things too wonderful for me to know. . . . My ears had heard of you but now my eyes have seen you.” (Job 42:1-5)

The same choice is ours. We can pound the gates of heaven for answers to our anguished questions, or we can surrender to the process of dying before we die to prepare for the communion for which we were created and have long awaited.

Of that process, Paul writes, “We, who with unveiled faces all reflect the Lord's glory, are being transformed into his likeness with ever-increasing glory” (2 Corinthians 3:18), and later, “You died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God. When Christ, who is your life, appears, then you also will appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:4).

Then, we will have faces.

Reproduced within the Link-Zone pages with the kind permission of the author: GE129/06

Regis Nicoll is a freelance writer and a Centurion of the Wilberforce Forum. His "All Things Examined" column appears on BreakPoint every other Friday. Serving as a men’s ministry leader and worldview teacher in his community, Regis publishes a free weekly commentary to stimulate thought on current issues from a Christian perspective. To be placed on this free e-mail distribution list, e-mail him at: centurion51@aol.com.