the gospel according to peter pan

whether he meant to or not, jm barrie captures some major truths of the human condition and the gospel in peter pan.

here is barrie's very striking description of the children who flew away from their parents to enjoy neverland with peter, believing all the while that their parents had left the window open for them to return home whenever they liked. i couldn't help but see human sin and God's love in this:

"off we skip like the most heartless things in the world, which is what children are, but so attractive; and we have an entirely selfish time, and then when we need of special attention we nobly return for it, confident that we shall be rewarded instead of smacked. so great indeed was their faith in a mother's love that they felt they could afford to be callous for a bit longer."

what struck me over and over again in this book is that while the movies portray peter pan as the hero of the story and the most likeable character, he is actually the most unlikeable character, perhaps even more unlikeable than the villianous captain hook. barrie goes to great lengths to emphasize that peter is cocky (his cockiness is actually the reason why hook wants to kill him), forgetful of others, and fearful of responsibility (which is why he never wants to grow up). and while we are led to believe that peter's flaws are rooted in his terrible experience with a mother who didn't leave the window open for him, barrie causes us to doubt peter's experience (and thus his belief about mothers) by stating: "i'm not sure that this (peter's story about his mother) was true, but peter thought it was true..." i see in peter pan the darkness that is in all of us -- how we care mostly about ourselves, how we reject the responsibilities that come with following jesus, how we lie to ourselves about who jesus is so we can excuse ourselves from truly following him. like peter, we are rather unlikeable people.

but there is the mother's love. God's love. when we are awakened to the true reality of who God is and how he loves us, we are like wendy declaring that her mother must surely be mourning the loss of her children who flew away from her to enjoy neverland. wendy decides to go home, and she declares to all the lost boys that her parents will adopt them. the window is open for them too! there is enough love to go around!

so they go home, and the window is open. as the children are reunited with their parents, barrie writes poignantly about the cost of peter's rejection of the mother's love:

"there could not have been a lovelier sight; but there was none to see it except a little boy who was staring in at the window. he had ecstasies innumerable that other children can never know; but he was looking through the window at the one joy from which he must be for ever barred."

peter had many adventures. he dictated the course of his own life. he didn't have responsibilities. he didn't have to endure real suffering. but he missed out on the one and only real joy -- the joy of the mother's love.

barrie goes on to write that the other children grew up. they had responsibilities like going to school, getting jobs, having children. at times, they missed neverland and wished they had never left it. but, in the end, they realized that growing up was really best for them. and so it is with following jesus.

if you ask me, peter pan is actually a pretty tragic story. in the end, i pity peter. and while the allegory breaks down in a lot of places (like when mrs. darling lets wendy visit peter in neverland once a year), i found this story to be a reminder of how we reject God and his good purposes for us over and over again for what we perceive to be better adventures. even the most well-meaning christians (me included) believe that God loves us and wants us to follow him with wreckless abandon, yet we spend most of our lives frolicking around neverland, running our own lives, refusing to "grow up" and take responsibility for what it really means to follow jesus.

but the window is always open. thank goodness for that.