Bible Study on The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and the Voyage of the Dawn Treader (BBC)

The Chronicles of Narnia:

Prince Caspian and

The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

           

(British Broadcasting Company Movie Edition)

Authorship: The Chronicles of Narnia were written by C.S. Lewis, a Christian English professor at Oxford College in England. The first volume was published in 1950 and was a story meant to remind us of the greatest story of all, the Bible.

Setting: 1941, England, during World War Two: one thousand years later in Narnia since the children first visited the land

Discussion Points

*(0:12:00) Most people in Narnia did not believe in the old stories about Aslan and the history of the royal children. Most people thought that they were just myths and fairytales. Did you know that most people today believe that our stories about God are just myths?, that most people today think that the Bible is just make-believe? What are some of the reasons why you think people don’t believe the Bible is true?

Open your Bible to any random page in the Old Testament or the Gospels. Try to find a page that doesn’t give a name of a place or a year. The Bible is very detailed in geography and time frame. This tells us that the Bible was written to be a history book for us, a history of what God has done for His people and us. God and the people who wrote the Bible want us to know that this is a true story. These things really happened. They’re not just myths. All those boring parts where it says, “This guy begat this guy,” is to tell us that we’re reading real history.

Okay. So we can read about what God did in the past, but it’s still hard to believe it actually happened. It’s hard to imagine God flooding the whole world or parting the Red Sea. The people in the Bible actually saw that stuff, but we didn’t. They have an advantage over us, right? That’s where faith comes in.

See John 20:29

Hebrews 11:1

2 Corinthians 5:7

*(0:31:00) Lucy says she saw Aslan. But it was only for a moment. Then the rest of the children see Him, but Peter says that it’s tricky in this light to really see Him clearly. Just like it was hard for the children in the movie to see Aslan, it’s hard for us to see God while we’re here on earth.

See 1 Corinthians 13:12

We can’t see everything that we want to see now. We can’t always see God. It’s like we’re looking through a really dirty window. Sometimes we can make something out, but most of the time it’s just too hard to see through the dirt. But if we keep looking, we will catch glimpses of God from time to time.

See Matthew 7:7-8

Jesus promises that if you seek for God, you will find Him.

See Jeremiah 29:11-13

But we’re not talking about just some ho-hum casual seeking. If you want to see God, you have to seek with all your heart. And here it tells us one of the ways to seek. It says that if we pray, God will hear us. Prayer is one way to seek God.

See 1 Chronicles 15:1-3

The second way to seek God is by reading the Bible. This verse tells us that the people of Israel did not know God for a long time because they weren’t reading His Word. God gave us the Bible for a reason. The Bible is where God chooses to show Himself to us. The Bible is the place where God wants us to seek for Him.

If we want to see God, if you want to find Him, look for Him in the Bible and pray to Him, and He promises that you will find Him.

*(1:05:00) Eustace’s tongue gets him in trouble, doesn’t it? He has a bad attitude and makes a lot of nasty comments. He even openly insults people! Of course, we don’t always watch what we say as much as we should do we? It’s hard to control what we say!

See James 3:3-12

Our mouths have a way of running away with us, don’t they? We find ourselves lying, insulting people, backtalking, gossiping, telling dirty jokes, cursing. We do all of these things, and then, we say that we believe in God! As Christians, we need to really try to control what we say.

See James 1:26

If we’re saying things that we shouldn’t then the Bible tells us that we’re not taking our religion seriously enough. Religion has to make a difference in our lives. If it doesn’t, then we don’t really have religion. What we believe has to affect what we say.

See Psalm 15:1-3

One of the things that will make us acceptable to God is watching what we say. This passage tells us that God will be pleased with people who speak the truth, that God will be pleased with people who don’t gossip, that God will be pleased with people who don’t insult others.

*(1:35:00) Eustace has been selfish from the moment we met him. Along with being selfish, he’s also greedy, isn’t he? He sees something that he wants, and he wants to keep it all to himself. Let’s see what the Bible has to say about selfishness and being greedy.

See Luke 12:13-34

These verses tell us that although people want to have a lot of money and want to have a lot of nice stuff, that isn’t what matters in life. Being rich toward God is what matters, right? Because God will provide us with everything that we need if we trust in Him. Not only will He give us food and clothes, but He’ll also give us the Kingdom of Heaven if we believe in Him. So money and stuff in this life don’t matter. Jesus says that where our treasure is, that’s where our heart is. What is your treasure? Is it your cell phone, your iPod, your CDs, your video games, your clothes? If those types of things are what you value most, then your heart is not going to be right with God. But if what you value most is spending time with God and reading the Bible and praying and doing things that please Him, then your heart will someday be in Heaven with God. People in this world care way too much about things and not enough about God and other people. The Bible tells us to give and give, not want more and more.

See 1 Timothy 6:7-10

When we want more and more money or things, we make money or things our idol. We let money or things distract us from God and the things that really matter.

When Eustace allowed himself to be tempted by greed, he was turned into a dragon, wasn’t he? He was turned into an ugly monster. What do you think happens to us when we sin? People who are selfish and greedy and sin all the time have ugly personalities, don’t they? Next week we’ll see how Eustace and we can be healed from our sin.

*(1:52:00) Eustace was turned into a monster because his soul was ugly and sinful. He was selfish and greedy, and a curse caused him to appear on the outside what he looked like on the inside. Eustace’s personality shows us that he was definitely someone without God in his life, right? He was lost. But what did Aslan do for Eustace? Did Eustace go try to find Aslan or did Aslan come to find Eustace? Aslan came to find Eustace, right? Close your eyes and listen as I read to you.

See Luke 15:3-7 and Luke 19:10

Okay, open your eyes again. You see, there was a point in our lives, when we, like Eustace, were lost from God. But Jesus came to find us, just like Aslan came to find Eustace. We weren’t lost in the sense that Jesus didn’t know where we were. God always knows where we are, right? He knows everything about us. But we were lost in the sense that we didn’t know what road or path in life to take to lead us to Heaven. Jesus knew where we were, but we didn’t. We were just going along on our merry way, thinking that we were doing fine, but really we were so lost that we didn’t even realize that the path that we were on was leading us straight to Hell. We were so lost that we were heading away from God instead of to God and didn’t even know it.

We were trying to find our own on the road of life. We were trying to do things by ourselves. Just like Eustace was, right? When he was a dragon, he thought that he could fix his problem himself? Did you see him trying to claw his own skin off? But no matter what he did, he was powerless to help himself. Just like we are powerless to fix our own spiritual problems.

See Romans 5:6, 8

Aslan told Eustace that He would have to do it for him. And that’s the same way it is with us. We can’t fix our spiritual problem. We can’t get rid of our sin by ourselves. We can’t save ourselves. God has to do it for us.

See Ephesians 2:4-9

Close your eyes again. I want you to take a minute to think about God’s incredible to grace to you. That He sent His Son to come looking for you when you didn’t even know that you were lost. That He took away your sin when you were powerless to help yourself.

*(2:15:00) Aslan says that he calls all times soon. Remember that Aslan symbolizes God in this series. How can God call all times soon?

See 2 Peter 3:8

How can a day be like a thousand years? How can a thousand years be like a day?

God stands outside of time. God created time for us. Time does not matter to God. God lives in a place where there is no time. It is called eternity. God enters our time and our world from time to time, but He is also free to leave it and reenter it whenever He chooses.

*(2:45:00) Aslan appears here as a lamb and a lion. We know that God is like a lion because He’s strong and He’s the King. Just like the lion is the king of the jungle, God is the King of the Universe. But why do you think He appears here as a lamb?

See Exodus 12:21-23

During the exodus, God ordered His people to show their faithfulness to Him by sacrificing a lamb and putting the blood of it over their doorways. When God saw the blood of the lamb over His people, they were protected. Today, we still do the same thing to show that we are God’s people.

See John 1:29

Jesus has become our Lamb.

See Isaiah 53:7 

When we have the blood of Jesus covering us, when we believe in the sacrifice that He made for us, we are identified as God’s people. We are protected from God’s punishment. The blood of Jesus, believing in Him, is the same as putting blood over our doorway in the time of the exodus.

*(2:45:00) Aslan says that there is a door to his country in our world and that we must learn the name that he has in our world. What do you think Aslan’s name is in our world? What do you think is the door to his country in our world?

Through our study, we have come to recognize that Aslan symbolizes God and Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The way that we get to God in our world is not by believing in a magical lion but by believing in the true story of Jesus Christ.