Is the world enchanted?

Is the world enchanted? Or merely natural? Deterministic? Are we just chemical processes that have been wound up and will wind down? Or, is there a “ghost in the machine”?

Is there something before and beyond? Can everything be coolly explained or is there an Unexplainable? Could it be that fantasy and fiction are tapping into something true? Something fantastic and far beyond us?

Are there spells and spirits, or are we mere decomposing skulls with sinews?

The world we inhabit: is it wondrous, consisting of beauty, mystery, as well as sad irony? Or is the world a mere and meaningless blip before the heat death of the universe?

Is “the cosmos,” as Carl Sagan has famously said, “all there ever was and all there ever will be”?

If so, what explains the wonder and wild nature of life? What explains the science fiction like rhinoceros and the beauty and rapture of art? What explains those moments, those brief moments, with family or friends that feel so right?

Most people today, believe it or not, believe in some form of Higher Power.[i] Yet, that should bring up various questions. Like who or what is this Power? Is the Higher Power good or bad or indifferent and are their other powers? I believe we’d be wise to ask and pursue answers. This seems especially true for those who do believe in some form of Higher Power. If such a being exists, or may exist, wouldn’t it make sense to care?

I believe there are subtle hints all along the road of life that point us to something out of sight. Markings or tracings of something; distant echoes of a not distant presence; the quiet speech of the spirits.

Those moments of silence under the glow and vastness of the sky, the moon reflecting the glory and splendor of the sun, speak. Those moments speak not to our heads but reverberate in our hearts. Those moments awaken. They call us beyond, they say there is more.

We must ask: what if there is more? If so, what good, what beauty, and yet what hideous evil might there be? And, if there is more, if there is the equivalent of witchcraft and evil, what spells might be possible and cast?

Perhaps a sort of blindness? A dullness to what is real?

If there is more, and evil, beyond the great beyond, might there be a battle? A cosmic battle? A Saruman and Sauron? A Voldemort? A Frodo? An Aragorn?

Could our lives have cosmic significance?

Is the world enchanted?

There are many ways to contemplate and answer this question. And we all answer it one way or another. We just may not think it through as intentionally as we should. I propose we that’s not a good way forward. If the world is “enchanted” in some way, it would be good to know. Perhaps very helpful to know. Because, to use The Lord of the Rings as an example, what if we are in the equivalent of Hobbiton, but there is a hoard of raging orcs on their way?

The Bible says the World is Enchanted

If the world is enchanted, it is more wondrous and wonderful than we could possibly know. But it may also be more dangerous.

That’s actually what the Bible teaches about the reality of the world we live in. It is, so to speak, “enchanted.” It is “placed under a spell.” Like the witch in C.S. Lewis’ The Chronicles of Narnia that made an enchantment over the whole country so that it was always winter and never Christmas. What if there truly is “an evil power loose in the world, independent of human beings, a power that has an agenda of its own, and this power can only be defeated by another power greater than itself”?[ii]

What if there is a spiritual realm? What if there is more than the merely physical? Curiously, Christians talk about fiction made real. Christians talk about a hideous dragon set to destroy and deceive. They talk about an enemy that is crouched low like a lion ready to pounce and attack (1 Pet. 5:8). And they talk about a “god of this world” (2 Cor. 4:4) that is subtly influencing the world to lead it astray (Rev. 12:9). Satan’s influence is often less perceptible than the wind but with all the devastation of a furious tornado.

Isn’t it True that the World is Filled with Wonder?

The world, not just the hills, are alive with the sound of music. The universe roars with echoes of life. Sometimes we are just not quick to notice, perhaps we’ve become callous to the call of creation. G.K. Chesterton once said, “Fairy tales say that apples were golden only to refresh the forgotten moment when we found that they were green. They make rivers run with wine only to make us remember, for one wild moment, that they run with water.”

A quick google will return wonder: Walakiri beach sunset, Halong Bay, Huangshan. Most images will do. Or think of the amazing ability of a chameleon or the weird wiggles of an octopus or just look at a peacock spider. What a world we inhabit! What a surprising and often beautiful world we live in. C.S. Lewis wisely said, “Reality is very odd, and… the ultimate truth, whatever it may be, must have the characteristics of strangeness.”^[iii]

There are some things in nature that you would never expect to happen and yet they do. Wildly, wood frogs freeze and die, then thaw out and come back to life. Or consider this, someone in a one-dimensional reality would have trouble conceiving of a two-dimensional reality, let alone what that reality would be like. Someone in the two-dimensional reality would have a greater likelihood of conceiving of and pondering a three-dimensional reality because they already know that there are more than one-dimensional realities. They know things that seem impossible to the one-dimension reality are very much possible.

We live in reality that sometimes doesn’t feel like reality. Should we speculate that there may be a spiritual reality; something different than the dimension that we are so used to? And what if that reality is more real than our current reality, and what if that reality is actually more present than we can conceive?

Leanne Payne shares an interesting thought,

Our eyes cannot see cosmic, gamma, or X-rays, nor ultraviolet, infrared, radar, television, or shortwave radio waves—not to mention other known and unknown wavelengths of light… Man’s other sensory organs are just as limited. What we ordinarily speak of as ‘the supernatural’ may consist of those parts of creation beyond our narrow sensory capacity.^[iv] 

The True Fantasy?

The Christian story—the true myth—is similar to many amazing myths in literature. But with a big difference: The Christian story claims to be true. “The heart of Christianity is a myth which is also a fact. The old myth of the Dying God, without ceasing to be myth, comes down from the heaven of legend and imagination to the earth of history.”^[v] Similarly, Nancy Pearcey says, “The great events of the New Testament have all the wonder and beauty of a myth. Yet they happen in a specific place, at a particular date, and have empirically verifiable historical consequences.”^[vi]

And is it not clear, that in most myths the evil person/force of the story would be happy if people thought that evil did not really exist? It seems to me that would be a worthy goal of evil, to make people think evil and enchantment weren’t real. Imagine the spell one could wield on the world if the world couldn’t imagine that there was such a thing as spells?! As Johann Wolfgang von Goethe said, “None are more hopelessly enslaved than those who falsely believe they are free.”

The world is enchanted. In the original use of the world enchanted. The world is ‘under a spell;’ ‘bewitched,’ ‘utterly delighted,’ ‘captivated,’ ‘fascinated,’ and ‘charmed’ by someone or something. I believe this someone is Satan, and the spell is sin. The curse and fall of humanity have long since happened. The fall was not just the fall of humans but encompasses the fall of angels. We are in a cosmic story. The Christian Bible tells us that the myths are not magical enough for the reality of the truth.

We may not wish for the world to be this way. But that is not for us to decide. As Gandalf said, “All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”

Of course, that’s not to say that all is bad. The story of the Bible is a wonderful, almost unbelievable story, that starts with a beautiful couple in a bountiful garden paradise and ends with a host of their descendants in an eternal paradise. The Bible is a comedy, not that it’s funny—though it has its funny parts—but because it has a U-shaped plot. That is, it starts out great but then a terrible seemingly insurmountable problem is introduced, but thankfully it doesn’t end in that sorry state.

As in any good fantasy there is a hero. And, as any good hero, He has many names: Lion of the Tribe of Judah, Son of God, Immanuel, Redeemer, Alpha and Omega, First and Last, Good Shepherd, Creator, Great High Priest, Holy One, King of kings, Lamb of God, Light of the World, Prince of Peace, Savior, and Jesus of Nazareth. Jesus is the truemythic hero. He is Aragon and Frodo. He is Luke Skywalker and Harry Potter. He is Aslan and Ransom. He is Iron Man, Black Panther, and Captain America. He is Avatar Aang. The God/Man, the Hero, offers rescue to the whole world.

The Bible is a big, amazing story. It surpasses Marvel and the Lord of the Rings. It tells us about God making the universe. It tells us about angels rebelling against God and starting a cosmic battle. It tells us about deception and romance.

It tells us that God became man and that this GodMan—Jesus Christ—had superpowers. And He used His superpowers for good. He fought the evil enemy, He defeated and cast out the great dragon’s evil henchmen.

It looked like the GodMan was going to win. He was going to defeat all the bad guys and even rule the world. He had a large, loyal following.

But, something happened. The GodMan, the all-powerful One, died. He died. He that brought people back from the dead, died.

That, that was unexpected.

damp, dark, cold, and silent
enveloped in a shroud in the earth
the Life lay lifeless

the only thing that truly is,
is not?
the Life lay lifeless?
the Immortal Infinite slain?

With the GodMan’s death, hope died. The GodMan’s followers fled in fear. They didn’t know what had happened… they hid in fear, hid for three days.

But the GodMan returned. He defeated death. He rose from the dead.

damp, dark, cold, and silent
from life’s surmise
but from a different gaze
outside of life’s maze
Life lay not lifeless
but death is now dead
defeated!

in violence He brought victory!

enveloped in mystery
the great God of history
was slain, for you, for me
the foil was sprang
it brought Him great pain
our sin is the hand that bore it
yet He took our blame
to purchase our name
He bore the frame of our cross

through vile, the victory
in wrote woe, to wonder

The Bible claims and shows us that this really happened. It’s not a “once upon a time” story. Although, for all those who trust Jesus as the Hero and Lord that He is, they will live “happily ever after.”

From Genesis, the very beginning of the Bible, through Revelation, at the end, we see one unified true cosmic story. We see God making a very good and beautiful world. But we see the serpent enter the scene and humans depart from God’s good plan and we see the devastation it brings. The world is torn in two. Relationships are ruined and rebellion spreads. The whole world whirls.

But, as God promised, He was not done. He loved the broken world and would be broken Himself to fix it.

The Bible tells the story of a terribly fierce dragon set to destroy the entire world. It’s really not so different from the Marvel myths in some ways. But it claims to be true, and it recounts the tales of one hero. A hero that loves the planet, the whole world, so much that He died for it.  He, however, didn’t stay dead. He was so great and powerful that even death itself couldn’t defeat Him.

The story of Scripture is different from Marvel and other myths in various other ways. For one, it claims repeatedly to be true.

So, is the world enchanted? If you have suspicions that what you see in the physical world is not all there is, the Bible says that your suspicions are correct. The Bible says there is more. A lot more.

Jesus’ resurrection proves to us, the world is indeed enchanted. There is more to the world than we can see with our mere eyes.

But, just as there was fear and trepidation by the first brave souls aboard a boat, there is a healthy type of fear that we should have. These are very uncharted seas.

Life is not something to take lightly. There are spirits, and angels, and fallen angels. There is a dragon set to defeat us all. We may not see him breathe fire, but what comes out of his mouth is deceptive lies.

The enchantment of this world is all the more dangerous because it’s elusive. We don’t see the spell. Many disbelieve. But the reality is, there is more than meets the eye.

Christianity gives an answer for the strangeness that we sense in the world. Christianity gives a solid reason for believing in the spiritual realm and for us ourselves having a spirit.

Humans are not robots or automatons. At least that’s what the Bible says. Our actions matter. Our lives and decisions matter, even eternally. They ripple through the corridors of time. There was and never will be a meaningless moment.

In Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis said, “There are no ordinary people. You have never talked to a mere mortal. Nations, cultures, arts, civilizations—these are mortal, and their life is to ours as the life of a gnat. But it is immortals whom we joke with, work with, marry, snub, and exploit—immortal horrors or everlasting splendors.”

Friends, our lives matter, our actions matter, our voices matter. That, at least, is true from a Christian perspective. If, however, as Carl Sagan said, “The cosmos is all there ever was and all there ever will be,” then this world is not enchanted and meaning is limited to what you make it.

I believe, however, if we knew a millionth of the magnitude of our lives, we’d be moved to wonder and crippled by the significance of it all. Our lives, every action, has significance because this world and this life is not all there is. So, friends, let’s live fierce, purposeful lives because we have purpose. Our lives matter more than we can fathom.

If there is more than the material, more than meets the eye, then what are we? What then are humans?

Are there Reasons to Believe in Enchantment?

Yes, beyond the fact that most people think there is more to the world than meets the eye,[vii] there are practical reasons for believing in enchantment. There are good reasons for believing in the existence of God. As the philosopher Alvin Plantinga has said, there are some very good arguments for believing in the existence of God, “arguments about as good as philosophical arguments get”^[viii] (see chapter 3 on God). “If God is, what he is has far-reaching consequences for our lives—who we are, how we live, and what happens after death,”^[ix] and I would say, what’s possible.

In other words, if God exists, then it seems clear that spirits and thus the spiritual realm exists. If this is true, as it seems to be, then there is a lot unseen and unknown that can act in and on the world, as we know it. This, at least in some ways, is a rather frightening reality.

There are different ways of being on a beach. If you confuse them, it won’t be good. Taking the day off to play in the sand and the ocean with your kids calls for relaxation, a good book, boogie boards, and sand toys. Being on the beach on D-Day during WWII is obviously a much different experience. War and relaxation are very different. If the two are confused it won’t turn out well. The Bible tells us that the earth we are on is not just for rest and relaxation because we are also at war. We have an enemy seeking to kill, steal, and destroy (Jn. 10:10).

If we are on the “beach of life” and we see it merely as a vacation and a day in the sun but it’s actually D-Day, then we will get utterly destroyed. If we are in an unseen battle then we should anticipate opposition and adversity. We should expect subtle and sneaky attacks.

The problem is not just out there, however. Yes, it’s in the world but it’s also in our own flesh. Sin is “bred in the bone,” it’s in our DNA.[x] And there’s also a devil. There is an external evil acting in the world, acting on our hearts. So, it seems we must “take a fearless inventory of our own hearts. No one is free from the Power of Sin and Death. No one has power in himself to help himself. No one can say to herself, well, I’m not a murderer, so I’m not so bad.”[xi]

We are very likely to be outwitted by Satan and his fellow conspirators when we are unaware of their schemes, let alone their existence.[xii] We live in a magic world. Satan lies, hinders travel (1 Thess. 2:18), and even appears as an angel of light (2 Cor. 11:14). At least, that’s what the Bible says. The Bible says we are in a world where sinister evil lurks. But it also tells us about God’s rescue mission in Christ Jesus.

The world is at war. There is an enemy always seeking to do harm. We are in a world of magic, good and bad. As C.S. Lewis has said, “There is no neutral ground in the universe. Every square inch, every split second is claimed by God, and counterclaimed by Satan.” But the Bible says that the boss of the universe is good. And that’s a good thing. The Bible says that at the name of Jesus every knee will bow in heaven, on earth, and under the earth (Phil. 2:10-11). The sinister Satan will finally and decisively be defeated, never to work his woe again.

What do you think? Is the world “enchanted”? Is there an unseen spiritual realm? And if so, what ominous evil might lurk and unknowingly influence the world? If there are unseen evil spiritual forces at work, are there good forces at work as well? And what side are you on? Who or what are you being led by?

Questions to Consider

• Are there things that lead us to expect that the world is enchanted?
• What if the world is enchanted and “a great dragon” actually exists?
• If it’s possible the world is enchanted, is it also possible that our lives have significance beyond our physical lives?
• Fleming Rutledge, once said, “Unaided human beings can make no lasting headway against evil.”[xiii] What do you think about that? Is that true? How does history seem to answer that question?

Notes

[i] Jeffrey M. Jones, “Belief in God in U.S. Dips to 81%, a New Low” June 17, 2022

https://news.gallup.com/poll/393737/belief-god-dips-new-low.aspx

[ii] Fleming Rutledge, Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ, 93. Eerdmans. Kindle Edition.

[iii] C.S. Lewis, “Christianity and Culture.”

[iv] Leanne Payne, Real Presence: The Christian Worldview of C.S. Lewis as Incarnational Reality (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1988), 23-24.

[v] C.S. Lewis, “Myth Became Fact” 58 in God in the Dock (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1970).

[vi] Nancy Pearcey, Saving Leonardo, 211.

[vii] Jeffrey M. Jones, “Belief in God in U.S. Dips to 81%, a New Low” June 17, 2022

https://news.gallup.com/poll/393737/belief-god-dips-new-low.aspx

[viii] Alvin Plantinga, Knowledge and Christian Belief (Grand Rapids: Wm. B. Eerdmans, 2015), x.

[ix] Esther Lightcap Meek, Longing to Know (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, 2006), 17.

[x] Rutledge, Advent: The Once and Future Coming of Jesus Christ, 96.

[xi] Rutledge, Advent, 97.

[xii] See 2 Corinthians 2:11.

[xiii] Rutledge, Advent, 93.

*Photo by TOMOKO UJI