Hi Sweet Friends,
I recently came home from church and flopped on the couch while eating left-over spaghetti. I mindlessly flipped through the television channels looking for brief escapism. I had been running steadily, but joyfully, the last couple of weeks attending to two new grandbabies. My heart was alive with the blessing of new life, and my body was feeling every minute of my 64 allotted years. I would be teaching an early morning class in a couple of days, and I was dry. I asked God for direction, insight, and words. And there it was, as if presented on a silver platter. As I was flipping through the channels, I went past the 1937 release of Disney’s Snow White and went on to check out how cringy the Hallmark movie was. I felt curious about Snow White and flipped back to find it. I tried to name all seven of the dwarfs, and I couldn’t remember if I had ever seen the whole movie in one sitting. The scene that I came in on was of the evil, narcissistic queen disguised as a needy beggar woman coming to Snow White with a deal, actually a lie disguised as a promise of happiness. I realized the reality of the fairy tale in all of us. I’m sure Disney had no idea of his presentation of the gospel in his retelling of the ancient story. But all great stories mimic the one great story of war and rescue, death and life, our need for a savior, and God coming after us. I present to you the gospel according to Snow White.
You know the story. Snow White is the daughter of the king who remarries after Snow White’s mother dies. After the king’s death, Snow White is left in the care of her step-mother who is now queen. The queen is evil and self-serving. She looks into a magic mirror every day and asks who is the most beautiful and fairest in the land. The mirror tells her daily that she is, until he doesn’t. One day, he professes that Snow White has grown to be the fairest in the land. Being dethroned from this vain position, the queen sets out to kill Snow White. What the queen has isn’t enough, she has to be the most.
It hearkens back to Ezekiel 28 where God sends a message to King Tyrus through the prophet Ezekiel. In verse two, God says to the king, “Because your heart is lifted up, and you have said, ‘I am a god, I sit in the seat of God…’” And God reminds the king that he is a man, not God. He tells him his heart has been prideful because of his riches and success. It will all be stripped from him because he became his own god. The prophecy continues but takes on more than just being about the arrogant king. God is talking about an angel in the garden of Eden. This angel was created and appointed and given extraordinary status. Verse 17 tells us that his heart was lifted up because of his beauty. The angel is cast out and cast down, stripped of his beauty and favor. There is one God, and He does not share power or glory. It would be untrue to his nature. Only He is worthy.
You don’t have to think too deeply to get the similarities here. Snow White runs into the woods to hide from the queen and stumbles onto the cottage of the seven dwarfs. The dwarfs soon love her and adore her. They will offer her a home and protection from the evil queen. They give her stern warnings about protecting herself. She is not to talk to any stranger or let anyone into the cottage. In our words, don’t invite Satan in for tea, and stay with your herd. This is for her protection. While the dwarfs are away working in the mines, a haggard old lady comes to the cottage. Snow White forgets or ignores her friends’ warnings and talks to the queen who is disguised as an innocent granny needing help. The granny says she wants to repay Snow White for her kindness, and she offers Snow White a beautiful apple. The apple has been dipped in poison and will inflict immediate harm, but Snow White is too naive to know that. The granny tells Snow White that it is a magical apple, and with one bite, all of her dreams will come true. The granny pretends to understand and sympathize with Snow White. She says, “You do have a dream, don’t you? There must be something your little heart desires. Perhaps there’s someone you love. Old granny knows a young girl’s heart.” Snow White confides that she does dream of being with the prince she met once and that she wishes he would carry her away to his castle and they would live happily ever after. The queen’s promise sounds believable to Snow White. The Granny pretends to understand Snow White’s deepest longing to be deeply loved, wanted and happy. She accepts the apple. Snow White’s forest friends are ignored when they try to warn her of the danger she is in. They run to the mines to get help from the dwarfs. The dwarfs and animals race to Snow White to save her, but they are too late. She has believed the lie, she has bitten the apple, and now she lies in a comatose state from which she may never awaken. Her friends are inconsolable and keep watch over her day and night hoping for a miracle.
Kevin and I have watched several documentaries and bio-pics on historical figures and celebrities recently. The celebrity stories often begin the same, with a parent pushing a child into performance and perfection. Once the success and accolades pour in, it becomes like a drug they can’t live without. They are offered many poison apples on their journey. Success can bring unreasonable demands. You can’t live with it, and you can’t live without it. Soon, you don’t want to live at all. We watched movies made about the lives of Michael Jackson and Whitney Houston. You can see the eagerness to take a bite out of the apple that promises fame and fortune that will surely lead to happiness. They both lived sad lives and died young from drug dependency. They were the best at their craft, and they believed a lie. Countless performers and sports figures have died young chasing the promise of happy. I see it in store windows and advertisements. I was recently at an American Girls store and marveled at what was available and the cost of it. What little girl wouldn’t want that? But I recognized the lure of the offering of happy with the ownership of the merchandise, and it would never be enough. There will always be a longing for more. We’re all being offered a better deal every day. A lotion, a coffee, a supplement, a car, a drug, a friend, alcohol, a relationship, a career, sex, even church or a Bible study. Satan doesn’t care what you’re chasing, just so it isn’t the truth.
Snow White just sounds too much like where our story of humanity began where we walked in unity and fellowship with God in Genesis 2. God gave Adam and Eve a truth and a warning about their lives in the garden. God said to enjoy, eat, work, fellowship, name the animals. Adam and Eve brought no baggage into their relationship. Nothing hindered them in relating intimately with God. They were told to eat freely from any tree but one. Eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil would lead to their death. Satan comes to Eve disguised as a serpent and offers her a better deal than the one she has going. Satan lies and tells her they won’t die and, furthermore, she can be like God by eating from the forbidden tree. Why did she look when he pointed? Why did she talk to him at all when he blasphemed against the character of God? Why did what satan offered sound like a better deal than unhindered fellowship in complete dependence on her Creator? She believed the lie. She bit the fruit. Adam joined her, and we’ve been at war ever since.
I’m eternally grateful that our story doesn’t end there. Neither does Snow White’s. While Snow White was helpless and lying in a stupor, a prince was looking for her. He was coming after her. And she had friends loving her and attending to her in her weakness. Remember how the dwarfs warned her and had guards in place to protect her from the witch? Never underestimate the power and the graces offered to you in the offerings and prayers of friends. Don’t buck against the warnings, rules, limits, instructions, curfews, and disciplines that you have placed yourself under. You have no idea what God may be protecting you from. When God-seeking friends are running to rescue you, take it seriously. It is the voice and heart of God to you. You may be able to stop a habit or addiction through willpower and determination, but being sober is different than being healed. Snow White was sober, but she was as good as dead. It took the prince coming for her and claiming her as his own that awakened her heart that led to her rescue. She couldn’t save herself. Neither can we.
We all long to be loved, to matter, to feel chosen and wanted. Sometimes we get a clear picture of the apples we have bitten to try to make that happen. There is only one offering that is the truth and gets us back to God’s original offering to us in the garden, unhindered relationship with our Creator and the lover of our soul. There is no magic involved, only miracles, something that only the payment for our sin by the blood of Christ can do. There is no other deal that can deliver. In John 4:16, Jesus said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life. No man comes to the Father except through Me.” Acts 4:12 says, “There is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.” And if this were a movie, this is where the standing ovation and cheering come in, for eternity. And happily ever after.
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