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This is a sermon I wrote after I read John Eldredge's book Epic. and Sarah Arthur's Walking
with Frodo.
Today you are called up into the Adventure.
The true Adventure, when compared to other tales, appears – at least on the surface – as … mundane,
ordinary, not really adventurous at all. Perhaps, though, that is partly the fault of those like me who
were called and ordained to call you up into the adventure in the stead and by the command of our
King. I do not do a good enough job describing the Adventure.
But the Adventure is magnificent. In it, the King entrusts you with a treasure beyond measure and
worth. He asks you to carry it, though it can be a burden requiring more strength than we suppose we
have. But with the treasure comes the strength to carry the burden. It really isn’t a burden at all, for
the treasure is our faith in the King. But it can be burdensome because it is more than just an ethereal
philosophy or ideology. This treasure is real. It is tangible. It is something that we can hold, see, taste
like the sweetest wine. It is as real as bread on our tongue.
It also calls us to be real.
The Adventure the King has invited you to join is a lifetime adventure. Some choose to decline the
invitation of the King altogether. Those who do forever spend their lives seeking adventure that they
know is missing in their lives. For we have been created for the Adventure, and when we do not live it,
we do not really live our lives. Our lives are empty and there is a void that we try to fill with shadow
and smoke that appear to be the adventure but in the end fade like all shadows do.
Some accept the invitation to live the adventure that I, and others like me, call you to. You are excited
and you invite your friends to journey with you. And at first it is an adventure like those you’ve heard
or read or seen. Fun, exciting, fulfilling.
But as the adventure continues, the dangers start to show themselves. First they are whispers in the
dark, drums in the deep. They hint of a less-than-safe adventure. Then companions may fall. The
danger becomes real. You’ve heard rumors of an evil enemy out there. Now, the evil that has rallied
against you is real. It is formidable. It is deadly. This Adventure is no longer a walk in the forest, a
holiday with friends.
You see, you have been called to an adventure. Do you know what that means? The King who has
entrusted you with His Good News, His Gospel, is calling you to an adventure, “an undertaking of a
hazardous nature, one that involves intervention in another state’s affairs.” Yes! The King has called
you to an exciting experience that is an invasion of the Enemy’s dark and barren territory guarded by
frightening things.
This will not be easy. Your fellowship, while at first are your closest friends, will also grow to include …
shady characters – whose intentions may not be recognizable at first. Companions join the fellowship
who are wild, rough, but also indispensable. Some will fall during the adventure, brought down in the
battle against the Enemy. But in doing so they may impart to you their wisdom and experience that will
be essential to seeing you to the end of the adventure.
Some companions will not be as they at first appear. You will know them by one name. But in time it
will be revealed to you that they are actually to be known by another name. Some will be revealed to be
princes, some prophets of the King, and yes, some maybe even kings themselves allied with the King
who has called you to this Adventure.
Now, it is important for you to realize that this Adventure doesn’t begin with you. No, you are now this
age’s members of an Adventure that has been going on for many ages. It began in the time before
time, in the shadows of the past. Its beginnings are shrouded in mystery and myth. It began so long
ago that at times its beginning has been misunderstood and at other times its beginning as been
dismissed as a fable made up to either scare little children or inspire fools.
The Adventure included tales of flood and fire, death and destruction, plagues and promises, slavery,
freedom and prophecy. Then, when the time had come to pass, the prophecies were fulfilled. While
there were many sons – and daughters – of the King, sons and daughters like yourselves, there was
One Son of the King that was to come and so He did.
As one son of the King wrote, “But when the fullness of time had come, [the King] sent forth his Son,
born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might
receive adoption as sons” (Galatians 4:4-5) and daughters.
He grew, lived the life we could not live. He lived the adventure to the fullest and then He took all your
sins and failings upon Himself and died. The Enemy thought that he had killed the King’s Son and thus
had won the war. But what happened was that the Enemy was defeated! The only power the Enemy
had was the power of death. The King’s Son took that power away with His own death. After three
days the King’s Son rose from the grave, and soon after ascended to take His rightful place as King.
Sounds like a good story, doesn’t it?
But it is neither a fable nor myth. It is real. It is old, as old as the stars. It is epic. This adventure is
real. It has been lived by many who – like you – have been called. There are many elements of the
Adventure that you probably will never even know about – for there is so much to this Adventure that
your lifetime is not enough time to hear about it all. There are parts of the Adventure that are
mysterious, baffling, and, yes, frightening. But that’s part of what makes an adventure an adventure
isn’t it?
Today, you may take your first steps out the door into the Adventure. As a wee but wise person once
said, “It's a dangerous business … going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep
your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to…” Where, I wonder, will that road
take you? I pray it will take you back here to this very rail many times to find strength for the
adventure. I pray it will take you back here to this very house many times to find out more about this
adventure you are on. I know that if the road you take leads you back to this place over and over
again, then the odds are good that you will keep your feet. But even then, you still may not know
where you might be swept off too.
For that, too, is part of the Adventure. The Adventure, for many of you, begins here. For many of
you, the Adventure will continue to include here. Someday soon, I, or one called as I, will have the
privilege to stand with you as you form a Fellowship and take on an Adventure companion for life.
For some of you sons of the King, you have a beauty in your future, a beauty that needs to be
rescued – for that is also part of the Adventure, is it not? Your beauty to rescue is your greatest
companion on this Adventure. Your beauty that you will rescue is beyond compare. And your
Adventure will be your lifetime together.
For some of you daughters of the King, your rescuer will one day come. A son of the King who, as he
takes your hand, will feel as if he has wandered into a dream. A dream that he would not wake from, if
it were his choice to make. But the life of the adventure shared is more exciting – and sometimes more
frightening – than any dream.
Someday, perhaps sooner than I would like and than you would realize (both of which means that time
is passing quickly), Sons and Daughters of the King, you will start your Adventure together here
before the Altar of our King. You will bind yourselves in Fellowship by covenant to the promise of the
King – whose blood makes your bond stronger than the strongest steel.
Together you will journey on your adventure. You will together come to this altar to renew your
strength on the body and blood of our King. Your covenant of love with your King will, if it be His will,
produce heirs to the adventure and your Fellowship will grow. You will together bring them to this
water – where the living Word of the King calls all of us to the Adventure.
What the Adventure exactly entails for you is not for me to say. There are some general aspects of
the Adventure that all of us in the Fellowship experience and endure. But the Adventure is such that
each one who is in it experiences many different things.
But there is one thing that is the same about the Adventure for all of you. Finally, for all of you, the
adventure will end.
All adventures come to an end, don’t they? The princess is rescued, the dragon is slain, and … they all
live happily ever after to the end of their days. The End.
Or so it seams.
“End? No, the journey doesn't end here. There's another path; one that we all must take. The gray
rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and it will change to silver glass, and then you see it.
See what?
White shores; and beyond them, a far green country under a swift sunrise.”
When your Adventure seems to end, loved ones will gather with heavy hearts and tears, sing songs,
and say goodbye. When the Adventure takes the last bit of strength out of you, it is time to lay down
your head.
[At this point I sang the song Into the West from the movie The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the
King.]
That, from an adventure that, like many of the adventures you’ve heard, read, or seen, are glimpses of
the place that even now our King is preparing for us.
I imagine that I’m at that point in the adventure that Lucy found herself in the very last chapter of the
Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis:
Then Aslan turned to them and said, “You do not look so happy as I mean you to be.”
Lucy said, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world
so often.”
“No fear of that,” said Aslan. “Have you not guessed?”
Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose with them.
“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are—as
you used to call it in the Shadowlands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream
is ended: this is the morning.”
And then C. S. Lewis adds this post-script that really sums up the adventure that you and I have been
called into by Jesus Christ.
And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they lived happily ever
after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their
adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning
Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which
every chapter is better than the one before.
The Adventure. Today, in the Shadowlands. But it is only the beginning, my friends. Soon, the
Adventure will be in the far off country that is now being prepared by the King – an Adventure that
forever leads further up and further in.
Till then, prepare yourself for the next step of the Adventure and the Return of the King. In the name
of the King, Jesus Christ. Amen.
with Frodo.
Today you are called up into the Adventure.
The true Adventure, when compared to other tales, appears – at least on the surface – as … mundane,
ordinary, not really adventurous at all. Perhaps, though, that is partly the fault of those like me who
were called and ordained to call you up into the adventure in the stead and by the command of our
King. I do not do a good enough job describing the Adventure.
But the Adventure is magnificent. In it, the King entrusts you with a treasure beyond measure and
worth. He asks you to carry it, though it can be a burden requiring more strength than we suppose we
have. But with the treasure comes the strength to carry the burden. It really isn’t a burden at all, for
the treasure is our faith in the King. But it can be burdensome because it is more than just an ethereal
philosophy or ideology. This treasure is real. It is tangible. It is something that we can hold, see, taste
like the sweetest wine. It is as real as bread on our tongue.
It also calls us to be real.
The Adventure the King has invited you to join is a lifetime adventure. Some choose to decline the
invitation of the King altogether. Those who do forever spend their lives seeking adventure that they
know is missing in their lives. For we have been created for the Adventure, and when we do not live it,
we do not really live our lives. Our lives are empty and there is a void that we try to fill with shadow
and smoke that appear to be the adventure but in the end fade like all shadows do.
Some accept the invitation to live the adventure that I, and others like me, call you to. You are excited
and you invite your friends to journey with you. And at first it is an adventure like those you’ve heard
or read or seen. Fun, exciting, fulfilling.
But as the adventure continues, the dangers start to show themselves. First they are whispers in the
dark, drums in the deep. They hint of a less-than-safe adventure. Then companions may fall. The
danger becomes real. You’ve heard rumors of an evil enemy out there. Now, the evil that has rallied
against you is real. It is formidable. It is deadly. This Adventure is no longer a walk in the forest, a
holiday with friends.
You see, you have been called to an adventure. Do you know what that means? The King who has
entrusted you with His Good News, His Gospel, is calling you to an adventure, “an undertaking of a
hazardous nature, one that involves intervention in another state’s affairs.” Yes! The King has called
you to an exciting experience that is an invasion of the Enemy’s dark and barren territory guarded by
frightening things.
This will not be easy. Your fellowship, while at first are your closest friends, will also grow to include …
shady characters – whose intentions may not be recognizable at first. Companions join the fellowship
who are wild, rough, but also indispensable. Some will fall during the adventure, brought down in the
battle against the Enemy. But in doing so they may impart to you their wisdom and experience that will
be essential to seeing you to the end of the adventure.
Some companions will not be as they at first appear. You will know them by one name. But in time it
will be revealed to you that they are actually to be known by another name. Some will be revealed to be
princes, some prophets of the King, and yes, some maybe even kings themselves allied with the King
who has called you to this Adventure.
Now, it is important for you to realize that this Adventure doesn’t begin with you. No, you are now this
age’s members of an Adventure that has been going on for many ages. It began in the time before
time, in the shadows of the past. Its beginnings are shrouded in mystery and myth. It began so long
ago that at times its beginning has been misunderstood and at other times its beginning as been
dismissed as a fable made up to either scare little children or inspire fools.
The Adventure included tales of flood and fire, death and destruction, plagues and promises, slavery,
freedom and prophecy. Then, when the time had come to pass, the prophecies were fulfilled. While
there were many sons – and daughters – of the King, sons and daughters like yourselves, there was
One Son of the King that was to come and so He did.
As one son of the King wrote, “But when the fullness of time had come, [the King] sent forth his Son,
born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might
receive adoption as sons” (Galatians 4:4-5) and daughters.
He grew, lived the life we could not live. He lived the adventure to the fullest and then He took all your
sins and failings upon Himself and died. The Enemy thought that he had killed the King’s Son and thus
had won the war. But what happened was that the Enemy was defeated! The only power the Enemy
had was the power of death. The King’s Son took that power away with His own death. After three
days the King’s Son rose from the grave, and soon after ascended to take His rightful place as King.
Sounds like a good story, doesn’t it?
But it is neither a fable nor myth. It is real. It is old, as old as the stars. It is epic. This adventure is
real. It has been lived by many who – like you – have been called. There are many elements of the
Adventure that you probably will never even know about – for there is so much to this Adventure that
your lifetime is not enough time to hear about it all. There are parts of the Adventure that are
mysterious, baffling, and, yes, frightening. But that’s part of what makes an adventure an adventure
isn’t it?
Today, you may take your first steps out the door into the Adventure. As a wee but wise person once
said, “It's a dangerous business … going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don't keep
your feet, there's no knowing where you might be swept off to…” Where, I wonder, will that road
take you? I pray it will take you back here to this very rail many times to find strength for the
adventure. I pray it will take you back here to this very house many times to find out more about this
adventure you are on. I know that if the road you take leads you back to this place over and over
again, then the odds are good that you will keep your feet. But even then, you still may not know
where you might be swept off too.
For that, too, is part of the Adventure. The Adventure, for many of you, begins here. For many of
you, the Adventure will continue to include here. Someday soon, I, or one called as I, will have the
privilege to stand with you as you form a Fellowship and take on an Adventure companion for life.
For some of you sons of the King, you have a beauty in your future, a beauty that needs to be
rescued – for that is also part of the Adventure, is it not? Your beauty to rescue is your greatest
companion on this Adventure. Your beauty that you will rescue is beyond compare. And your
Adventure will be your lifetime together.
For some of you daughters of the King, your rescuer will one day come. A son of the King who, as he
takes your hand, will feel as if he has wandered into a dream. A dream that he would not wake from, if
it were his choice to make. But the life of the adventure shared is more exciting – and sometimes more
frightening – than any dream.
Someday, perhaps sooner than I would like and than you would realize (both of which means that time
is passing quickly), Sons and Daughters of the King, you will start your Adventure together here
before the Altar of our King. You will bind yourselves in Fellowship by covenant to the promise of the
King – whose blood makes your bond stronger than the strongest steel.
Together you will journey on your adventure. You will together come to this altar to renew your
strength on the body and blood of our King. Your covenant of love with your King will, if it be His will,
produce heirs to the adventure and your Fellowship will grow. You will together bring them to this
water – where the living Word of the King calls all of us to the Adventure.
What the Adventure exactly entails for you is not for me to say. There are some general aspects of
the Adventure that all of us in the Fellowship experience and endure. But the Adventure is such that
each one who is in it experiences many different things.
But there is one thing that is the same about the Adventure for all of you. Finally, for all of you, the
adventure will end.
All adventures come to an end, don’t they? The princess is rescued, the dragon is slain, and … they all
live happily ever after to the end of their days. The End.
Or so it seams.
“End? No, the journey doesn't end here. There's another path; one that we all must take. The gray
rain-curtain of this world rolls back, and it will change to silver glass, and then you see it.
See what?
White shores; and beyond them, a far green country under a swift sunrise.”
When your Adventure seems to end, loved ones will gather with heavy hearts and tears, sing songs,
and say goodbye. When the Adventure takes the last bit of strength out of you, it is time to lay down
your head.
[At this point I sang the song Into the West from the movie The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the
King.]
That, from an adventure that, like many of the adventures you’ve heard, read, or seen, are glimpses of
the place that even now our King is preparing for us.
I imagine that I’m at that point in the adventure that Lucy found herself in the very last chapter of the
Chronicles of Narnia by C. S. Lewis:
Then Aslan turned to them and said, “You do not look so happy as I mean you to be.”
Lucy said, “We’re so afraid of being sent away, Aslan. And you have sent us back into our own world
so often.”
“No fear of that,” said Aslan. “Have you not guessed?”
Their hearts leaped and a wild hope rose with them.
“There was a real railway accident,” said Aslan softly. “Your father and mother and all of you are—as
you used to call it in the Shadowlands—dead. The term is over: the holidays have begun. The dream
is ended: this is the morning.”
And then C. S. Lewis adds this post-script that really sums up the adventure that you and I have been
called into by Jesus Christ.
And for us this is the end of all the stories, and we can most truly say that they lived happily ever
after. But for them it was only the beginning of the real story. All their life in this world and all their
adventures in Narnia had only been the cover and the title page: now at last they were beginning
Chapter One of the Great Story which no one on earth has read: which goes on forever: in which
every chapter is better than the one before.
The Adventure. Today, in the Shadowlands. But it is only the beginning, my friends. Soon, the
Adventure will be in the far off country that is now being prepared by the King – an Adventure that
forever leads further up and further in.
Till then, prepare yourself for the next step of the Adventure and the Return of the King. In the name
of the King, Jesus Christ. Amen.
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