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BELIEVING IN Narnia
A Kid's Guide to UNLOCKING SECRET SYMBOLS OF FAITH in C. S. Lewis's
By Natalie Gillespie Thomas Nelson
Copyright © 2008
Natalie Gillespie
All right reserved.
ISBN: 978-1-4003-1282-5
Chapter One The First Key
Unlocking the Secrets for Reading This Book
The first thing you need to know about this book is that it is full of twists, turns, and surprises-a lot like the adventures in Narnia. C. S. Lewis actually talks about Jesus a lot in these seven books. You just have to know where to look to find Him. Hopefully, by the end of this book you will know that believing in Narnia means believing in Jesus, the Savior of the whole world. The hope and joy He will bring to your life is like the hope and joy He brought to the characters in these seven books.
The Chronicles of Narnia are full of secrets that point to Jesus and the Bible. Sometimes the secret is in a name; sometimes it is in what a character says or how he or she acts. Sometimes it is in the way C. S. Lewis describes Aslan. After you read this book, you will be able to experience The Chronicles of Narnia again (or for the very first time) and see some of these hidden symbols. It's kind of like putting on the special glasses that help you see a 3-D movie. Before you put on the glasses, the movie screen looks flat and the images are fuzzy. After you put on the glasses, the action on the screen jumps out at you.
Before you get started, you'll need to recognize some symbols for the journey.
When you see one of these symbols, it means that this is a quote from one of The Chronicles of Narnia. Sometimes a quote is followed by the abbreviation of the book so you can hunt for it yourself. The abbreviations and symbols used in this book look like this:
The Magician's Nephew (MN) The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (LWW) The Horse and His Boy (HHB) Prince Caspian (PC) The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (VDT) The Silver Chair (SC) The Last Battle (LB)
When you see this symbol, it's like discovering treasure, because you have found one of the secret places where C. S. Lewis hints at something you can find in the Bible. The Bible verse will be marked with this symbol.
When you see this page, you are entering a secret door where you will learn one of Narnia's Greatest Secrets, just like the characters in the Chronicles did. These are real-life lessons that Aslan taught and that God wants you to learn too.
Each section of this book is a "key" to unlocking some of the most important secrets in the Chronicles. The first one will help you if you have never read The Chronicles of Narnia or need to refresh your memory. The first key includes a short summary of each of the seven books so you'll know what's going on. The next keys will help you discover how some of the people, places, and things in Narnia hold secrets about real-life faith, and you can uncover the secrets of your own faith by answering the questions you find at the end of each part.
Finally, you can also unlock secrets in the life of the author, C. S. Lewis, and find other books and Web sites to learn more about Narnia in the last keys at the end of this book. So, brave seekers, now that you know how to unlock the doors to the mysteries of Narnia, go to the next section and get ready to turn the second key ...
(Continues...)
Excerpted from BELIEVING IN Narnia by Natalie Gillespie Copyright © 2008 by Natalie Gillespie. Excerpted by permission.
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