John-Paul's Kiwi Adventure Blog

Prince Cor and Sonship

In a spur-of-the-moment decision right before I left the States, I purchased a 7-in-1 “omnibus” edition of Lewis’ Chronicles of Narnia series. So far I have hungrily devoured the first three books. Currently I am reading the fourth, Prince Caspian.

<EDIT: At actual time of posting, I’m already on the fifth book. Crazy, I know!>

I read them all back in elementary school, but now that I’m older I am noticing so much more of the rich theology that Lewis packed into these books. In this post I wanted to share one of my favorite parts so far: the restored identity of Prince Cor of Archenland. 

In the book The Horse and His Boy, Lewis introduces us to young boy “called” Shasta. (Notice how Lewis never writes “named Shasta”) Shasta is the adopted son/slave of a poor fisherman and lives a miserable life, constantly looking for more from life and wondering about the land to the North. If you’ve read the book, you know that most of the story involves Shasta’s journey towards Narnia, his encounters with the Great Lion Aslan, and the desperate message that he carries to save the kingdom of Archenland from destruction. 

The brilliant part is when Shasta finds out his truest identity. It turns out that his real father is King Lune and his friend Prince Corin is actually his identical twin. But the real theological depth is just subtly hinted at when Prince Cor (Shasta’s true name) is catching up with some old friends:

“…‘I’d rather have come in my old clothes, but they’re burnt now, and my father said-’ ‘Your father?’ said Aravis (his friend) ‘Apparently King Lune is my father,’ said Shasta. ‘I might have guessed it, Corin being so like me. We were twins, you see. Oh, and my name isn’t Shasta, it’s Cor.”

In being restored to his true identity, Cor (Shasta) gives up the only life and identity he’s ever known to embrace the identity that’s been his since the beginning of time. He becomes a prince and heir to the throne (as the firstborn of the twins) and most importantly a son greatly loved and a brother for shared adventures with Corin.

The part that struck a cord for me is the shift in identity that Shasta goes through to become Cor. In high school I did a research paper on adoption theology. My favorite research find was the rich history of how adoption took place for noblemen without heirs around the time of Jesus. 

If a man of important position did not have an heir, he would often chose a servant boy from his household to become his legal son and heir to continue his legacy. In the legal process, the man would bring the servant and a set of clothes befitting a nobleman’s son before a justice. The adoption would be legal once the servant had discarded his servant robes and put on the robes of a son.

From that moment on he was “the son.” His past was of no consequence, his future was that of a son and heir. Legally he was as good as blood. The adoption was a life-altering, future-shaping moment in the boy’s life. 

As Christians, we are offered the robes of a son (or daughter). All too often though we try to keep our old robes on and try to fit the new ones on top. The problem is that it just doesn’t work out. God wants the son or daughter His heart longs for, not the person that this fallen world has molded us into.

The entire point is to discard the false identity (the servant robes) fully to find our true identity more completely (the robes of a son). To accept the truth that God speaks over us as final, to allow it to define us to our core and to humbly and gratefully accept the sonship and live it to the fullest.

Today during our last lecture of the week, the speaker asked us to spend some time with God and seek His heart about sin in our lives and boundaries and strongholds that are holding us back from God’s best. Standing in the tree house I could feel the Deep Magic (Narnia-talk) - the Holy Spirit was so strong! He gave a decent-sized list to take back to pray over. The crazy part was when I got back…

I expected to pray through each of the issues, but as soon as I got on my knees I began to feel like, at least for this time, the issue at heart was my identity not my issues. I prayed through stripping off all of my servant robes (false identity issues) and accepted the robes of a Son in a more defining way. 

His love is amazing!