Dragons

"So I started scratching myself and my scales began coming off all over the place. And then I scratched a little deeper and, instead of just scales coming off here and there, my whole skin started peeling off beautifully, like it does after an illness, or as if I were a banana ... It was a most lovely feeling. So I started to go down into the well for my bathe. But just as I was going to put my feet into the water I looked down and saw that they were all hard and rough and winkled and scaly just as they had been before. Oh, that's all right, said I, it only means I had another smaller suit underneath the first one, and I'll have to get out of it too. So I scratched and tore again and this underskin peeled off ... and I went down to the well for my bathe.

Well, exactly the same thing happened again. And I thought to myself, oh dear, how ever many skins have I got to take off? For I was longing to bathe my leg. Then the lion said-- but I don't know if it spoke-- 'You will have to let me undress you.' I was afraid of his claws, I can tell you, but I was pretty nearly desperate now. The first tear he made was so deep that I thought it had gone right into my heart. And when he began pulling the skin off, it hurt worse than anything I've ever felt. The only thing that made me able to bear it was just the pleasure of feeling the stuff peel off. You know-- if you've ever picked the scab off a sore place.

Well, he peeled the beastly stuff right off-- just as I thought I'd done it myself the other three times, only they hadn't hurt-- and there it was, lying on the grass: only ever so much thicker, and darker, and more knobbly-looking than the others had been. And there was I, as smooth and as soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then the lion caught hold of me-- I didn't like that much for I was very tender underneath now that I'd no skin on-- and threw me into the water." - C. S. Lewis, from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

This is as beautiful an allegory for sanctification as I have ever read in literature (and I hope posting such a large chunk of it online isn't some kind of copyright infringement). In this passage, The Pevensies, their cousin Eustace, Caspian, and Reepicheep have landed on an island that has a dragon's hoard. As a result of his greed, Eustace is turned into a dragon, and here Lewis describes his being turned back into a boy. Eustace is literally encrusted with the result of his sin, is unable to remove it himself, and must allow Aslan to complete the harrowing process of painfully removing his unwanted scales. Afterward, he is free to swim in the water and this turns him back into a boy (John 4:10). Afterwards, Aslan dresses him (Genesis 3), and Eustace's character is changed forever. Seeing as how this is New Years Day 2008, I think this message of sanctification and renewal is especially relevant. :)