Dragon Skin

Image Source: theholyschmitz

Dragon Skin

Ornamental suits come in all fits and

forms, and even when we know they’re just show,

we’re often still hypnotized. A friend’s swirly

lavender scales may gleam gloriously

in the moonlight, making my own green tint

look tarnished in comparison. Yet when 

others mention our flaws, we’re inclined to

shoo them with a wave, scoffing, Fool, I’ve been

this way my whole life. Some things won’t be changed,

for a dragon is a dragon. Keep your

head in your own den. In a huff, we leave

to find more sympathetic company. 

Yet still, the Lion waits with loving eyes,

calling, Children, do you want to be healed?

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I wrote "Dragon Skin" as a reflection on the idea that all of us want to find hope and peace, but often prideful facades and stubborn roots of deep spiritual and emotional pain keep us from experiencing these things. The transformation process Holy Spirit leads us through is often painful and humbling, but also so necessary. I resent having my faults pointed out by God or people because this often causes shame to bubble to the surface. However, admitting our brokenness is often the first step to healing. Jesus, with perfect Love and no ulterior motives, urges us to let Him in so that He can set us truly, fully free. In other words, God wants to rip away our "dragon skin" so we can be formed into the fully-alive creatures He created us to be.

The inspiration for this piece was drawn from a scene in The Voyage of the Dawn Treader by C.S. Lewis. Aslan the lion appears to Eustace, a boy who has turned into a dragon as a result of his own selfishness. Here's the narrative that follows:

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. So I just lay flat down on my back to let him do it. 

The very 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. It hurts like billy-oh but it is such fun to see it coming away.

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 I was as smooth and soft as a peeled switch and smaller than I had been. Then he 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. It smarted like anything but only for a moment. After that it became perfectly delicious and as soon as I started swimming and splashing I found that all the pain had gone from my arm. And then I saw why. I’d turned into a boy again.” 

Wow.

Honestly, my mind has been swirling with doubts and worries this week. It's hard to believe that anything will change for the better. But I'm choosing to trust, for the both of us, that He really is making all things new. In the meantime, I'm learning to yield to the transformation process. ❤️

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 Now there is in Jerusalem by the Sheep Gate a pool, in Aramaic called Bethesda, which has five roofed colonnades. In these lay a multitude of invalids—blind, lame, and paralyzed. One man was there who had been an invalid for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had already been there a long time, he said to him,

“Do you want to be healed?”

John 5:2-6 (ESV)