Ransom Theory

Ransom theory is most likely our oldest understanding of the passion, held even by the earliest of believers. And, more importantly, it is how my wife best expresses her life with Jesus.

C.S. Lewis tells the story best in Lion, Witch, and the Wardrobe when the Witch comes to lay claim to the life of Edmund, who has betrayed not only his brother and sisters but Aslan as well:

"You have a traitor there, Aslan," said the Witch. of course everyone present knew that she meant Edmund. But Edmund had got past thinking about himself after all he'd been through and after the talk he'd had that morning. He just went on looking at Aslan. It didn't seem to matter what the witch said.

"Well," said Aslan, "His offense was not against you."

"Have you forgotten the Deep Magic?" asked the Witch.

"Let us say I have forgotten it," answered Aslan gravely. "Tell us of this Deep Magic."

"Tell you?" said the Witch, her voice growing suddenly shriller. "Tell you what is written on that very Table of Stone which stands beside us? Tell you what is written in letters deep as a spear is long on the fire-stones on the Secret Hill? Tell you what is engraved on the scepter of the Emperor-beyond-the-Sea? You at least know the Magic which the Emperor put into Narnia at the very beginning. You know that every traitor belongs to me as my lawful prey and that for every treachery I have a right to a kill . . . .

"And so . . . that human creature is mine. His life is forfeit to me. His blood is my property. . . .

"[Aslan] knows the Deep Magic better than that. He knows that unless I I have the blood as the Law says all Narnia will be overturned and perish in fire and water."

"It is very true," said Aslan, "I do not deny it. . . .

"Fall back, all of you," said Aslan, "and I will talk to the Witch alone."

They all obeyed. It was a terrible time this- waiting and wondering while the Lion and the Witch talked earnestly together in low voices . . . .

At last they heard Aslan's voice, "You can all come back . . . . I have settled the matter. She has renounced the claim on your brother's blood."

Edmund's betrayal subjects him to the authority of the Witch. The Kingdom of Aslan extends only to those subject to his just rule. Acting treacherously, Edmund makes the Witch his Master choosing the Witch's way. Because his life is forfeit his only hope for redemption is one who will become subject to the Witch on his behalf.

But something strange happens at the Table of Stone where Aslan will suffer and die to redeem Edmund from the Witch (I'd encourage you to dust off chapters fourteen and fifteen at this point, or pop in the DVD, which provides a graphic display of Aslan's slaughter at the hands of the witch.) (Note. I can hardly watch this scene without tears.). After Aslan died, Lucy and Susan keep watch over his body. Waking to find mice scrambling over the once proud lion they try to brush them away at first, but they soon discover the mice are releasing Aslan from the ropes forced upon him. When all seems lost, Aslan wakes from death, and they ask, "But what does it all mean?" Aslan says to them:

It means that though the Witch knew the Deep Magic, there is a magic deeper still which she did not know. Her knowledge goes back only to the dawn of time. But if she could have looked back a little further, into the stillness and the darkness before Time dawned, she would have read there a different incantation. She would known that when a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.

The Witch thinks she has conquered her enemy, but she does not know they deeper magic at work in the world, which overturns death itself. And so it was when our Brother lay down his life for us, redeeming us from the Kingdom of Darkness, into the Kingdom of his marvelous Light, buying us back through the sacrifice of his own life's blood.

This is the story of Abraham and Isaac. When Isaac was still a lad, the LORD came to his father and said, "Take your son, your only son, whom you love -Isaac- and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there on a mountain I will show you." Abraham got up early the next morning, woke his son, and began the journey towards Moriah. Along the way Isaac kept asking his father, "The fire and wood are here, but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?" And his father would reply, "God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son. God himself will provide the lamb." When they reached Moriah, God brought them to a mountain where Abraham and his son built an altar. There Abraham laid the one he held most dearly to his heart, his promised son. Isaac's life is forfeit. It is lost. He has been laid on the altar and now belongs to the LORD.

Suddenly an angel cried out, "Abraham! Abraham! Do not lay a hand on the boy. Do not do anything to him. Now I know that you fear God, because you have not withheld from me your son, your only son" Abraham looked up and there in a thicket he saw a ram caught by its horns. He went over and took the ram and sacrifices it as a burnt offering instead of his son. So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide.

There is a great deal in this story we could unpack. What is germane to our discussion is the life of Isaac which is no longer his own. It has been redeemed for a price. What is laid on the altar is laid on the altar to die. His life is no longer his own, but the God who redeemed it. This is redemption, the purchase of our lives at a terrible, awful price.