A high, cold voice whispered in the gloom: a voice of shivers, a voice to raise the dead. "Come here," it said to something that lurked unseen in the room. "Come close to me, my pet. Tell me where you have been—what you have seen and done this night."

As if in response, a sinuous form emerged through the shadows. Silently it approached the owner of the voice, then climbed up to rest near his shoulder. Lord Voldemort's slitted eyes regarded those of the animal. As always, his eyes showed cruelty and purpose—yet now they also harbored something like fondness. He scratched the creature's chin with his long, sharp fingernails, and in moments a gentle purring emerged from the animal's soft throat.

"Nothing to report, Delilah?" said Lord Voldemort, his thin grey lips curved in a twisted grin. His gaze penetrated that of the small cat at his shoulder. It bent its chin into his palm, arched its back, and rubbed against his skeletal wrist, purring loudly. "Nothing to say, as usual. Stupid creature," he said, but the softness of his gaze belied an uncharacteristic lack of malice. "You are half the conversational partner Nagini was." His expression turned sour. "How I miss her," he said, gazing into the darkness. "But she shall be avenged. Yes, sorely avenged."

A figure appeared in the doorway opposite the place where Lord Voldemort sat. "Good morning," it called cheerfully, then moved swiftly through the room. Lord Voldemort glowered at the intruder as she passed, his eyes widening in threat. She was a teenage girl dressed in Muggle clothing, with a pale complexion, handsome features, and long, dark hair. She gazed back at him with a placid, slightly defiant expression, and walked through to the kitchen. "The Dark Lord hasn't had his coffee yet today, I see," she said. Voldemort's eyes widened even more, then he let out a snort of disgust and sprawled back on the throne. "Such insolence," he snarled, turning again to Delilah and continuing to scratch her chin. "At least you do not openly defy me." At that moment she turned her tail toward his face. He sniffled and spat out a mouthful of fur.

All at once another creature emerged from the door and raced toward Voldemort with blinding speed. Almost before he could respond, it burst into the air and landed on his chest with a deafening squeal. "Daddy!" it screamed, clinging to the front of Lord Voldemort's robes. "Give us a cuddle," the creature said, laying its head on his smooth, gray face. She was small and sprightly, the size of a house elf, and wore a bright yellow dress and a bow to match. Lord Voldemort's lip curled in an expression of bemusement and revulsion, but his hands slowly enfolded the girl's narrow back. "Good morning," the Dark Lord grunted. She popped up, put a finger to his nose—which was little more than a pair of slits—and stuck out her lip in a truculent expression. "You haven't forgotten your promise, have you?" Voldemort looked confused for a moment, then remembered something and turned his head away. "No, I haven't forgotten," he said, sinking lower in his chair. The small girl climbed down from his knees and ran toward the kitchen. "Good!" she said, and tossed her golden hair as she looked back at him. "I knew you wouldn't. I knew you'd keep your promise."

"You little liar," said the older girl. "You fretted all night. ‘Daddy won't forget will he?' ‘I just know he'll forget.' ‘He never keeps his promises.' Little whiner. I barely slept a wink."

"You're the liar," said the smaller one, taking a bowl from the cupboard. "I knew he'd remember. How could he forget? You're just jealous."

"Jealous of what?"

"Jealous ‘cause you know he loves me best," said the little one, smiling smugly.

The older girl's reply was cut off by Voldemort. "Silence!" he hissed, sitting forward in his chair. The kitten, startled, leapt down. Voldemort growled for a moment before calming himself. "Your squabbling annoys me," he said at last. "Tabitha, fetch me my coffee."

"Get it yourself," said the older girl, not bothering to look at him. Lord Voldemort's pupils grew large as he watched her pour milk into her cereal. His lip trembled, and his right hand twitched as if grasping for some object it dearly missed. At last Voldemort fell back once more, covering his eyes.

A small dog skittered into the room. It panted its way over to Voldemort and placed its paws on his leg. Then it spied the cat licking itself nearby, barked sharply and gave chase. Voldemort gave no sign of having seen the dog, but re-adjusted his robe—which resembled a velvet smoking-jacket—and crossed his legs. The cat soon climbed where the dog could not reach, and the dog lay down beneath it. The only sound was the occasional clink of spoons from the kitchen.

After a few minutes, a short, middle-aged woman came into the room, her head to one side as she fiddled with an earring. "Good morning, honey," she said to Lord Voldemort, then paused and looked him from head to toe. "Why aren't you dressed?"

"I only just arose," he replied.

She rolled her eyes. "Another late night, I guess?" she asked, and began collecting mismatched shoes from the floor.

Lord Voldemort grimaced and looked at the ceiling. "Violet, you have no idea the importance of this research in which—"

She interrupted. "Yeah, well we need to get a move on. Your suit's in the laundry room. I pressed it last night."

"Slytherin's Beard! I abhor these Muggle clothes you insist on donning—" Voldemort began.

"Don't curse, dear. If you want to look like some kind of hippy you can wear whatever nightclothes strike your fancy. But if you want to look respectable, I'd suggest you—"

Lord Voldemort's voice emerged at a shrill pitch. "You dare speak so to the Dark Lord? I have killed children for less offense than I have borne this morning in my own castle."

Violet looked taken aback, then cocked an eyebrow and said, "This is no castle, Your Deviousness. News Flash: We live in a terraced house in Islington. And you need to get ready now or we're going to be late."

"The Death Eaters would never have spoken so to me," said Voldemort, slumping his shoulders and staring into his lap.

"Your Death Eaters all bit the dust, as I recall, and your various other toadying lackeys moved on to greener pastures. We're the best you've got now, Your Worship, and the best you've ever had, some might say. Anyway, stop sulking and go shave your head. We have to be out the door in ten minutes."

Lord Voldemort continued to fume as Violet hurried the girls off to finish brushing their teeth. After a few moments, she reemerged carrying a small baby. "This one's done the dirty," she said, placing the child into his unwilling hands. "Why don't you hoover it up with your little wand thingy—makes a quick job of it. And get a move on!"

Lord Voldemort slowly lowered the baby onto its back, drew his wand and placed it on the floor while he fetched a fresh diaper and wipes. By the time he returned, the baby had picked up the wand and was using it to shoot small flowers across the room. Voldemort smiled as he began changing its diaper. "That's my boy," he said, admiring the spell. "Not a filthy Muggle like the rest of them. You'll be a true wizard like your old man, won't you?"

He wiggled the baby's nose, and its giggles erupted in a volley of daisies and dandelions. Voldemort laughed as well—a cruel, mirthless sound, like bricks being rubbed together—then let out a long sigh. "How did I ever get myself into this—mess?" he asked the baby, who responded by dimpling his cheeks.

"By saying, ‘I do'," said Violet, reemerging from the hallway. "Or don't you remember—the candles, the cake, the vicar with the hip flask?" Voldemort looked up at her and saw her expression soften. She knelt beside them and helped clasp the little overalls. "Strongest magic ever made—isn't that what you said?" she asked.

"‘Till death do us part'," Voldemort said, looking into her eyes, his expression unreadable. "‘Let no man put asunder'. What madness overtook me?"

"I think we both know the answer to that," said Violet, lifting the baby and standing up. "Come on, we need to go! You can put your suit on in the back seat."

Voldemort stared blankly for a moment, then rose and followed her toward the door. Violet turned. "Come on, girls!" she called, then looked urgently at Voldemort. "You haven't forgotten you're taking Jenny to the fun fair after church, have you?"

"Church?!" Lord Voldemort spat.

"Yes. Church. That place we go on Sundays?"

"Sunday?!"

"Are you daft? If you wouldn't stay up till all hours you might have enough brain left over to remember what day it is. You do remember that pastor asked you to say the opening prayer this morning?"

Voldemort stopped, looked to the sky for a moment, then let his face fall into his hands. His voice, when it came, was a gurgling wail like the sound of a drowning banshee. "Oh God!" he cried.

"That's the spirit," said Violet, and strode off to unlock the car. The baby over her shoulder swished the wand back and forth a few times, then babbled something indistinct. With a flash of sparks, a small viper sprang from the end of the wand and landed at Voldemort's feet. He regarded it for a moment as it writhed over his patent leather wingtips, then picked it up and looked it eye-to-eye. It hissed menacingly, baring its fangs, then lashed out in a futile attempt to bite his face. The Dark Lord's bitter expression lifted as a gleam came into his eye. "Perhaps all is not yet lost," he murmured. Looking quickly up and down the street, he placed the snake in his pocket and drifted down toward the car.

Once there was a shepherd boy who tended the village flock. The villagers had charged him with grazing the sheep, guiding them, and protecting them from harm. They kept the sheep for clothing and food, and relied on the boy to keep close watch.

One day as the boy's mind emerged from a delicious daydream, he heard one of the flock bleat wildly for a moment, then go silent. He looked for the source of the outburst but saw nothing. Later, when he counted the flock, the number came up short. He decided he must have miscounted—his abacus was missing a bead.

The next evening when the boy numbered the sheep, he realized that two were missing. He looked all over but found only a tangle of blood and wool where the flock had last been grazing. He felt alarmed at first, but when he brought the flock into the village, he told no one about what had happened.

The next afternoon he saw a black shape racing among the sheep and heard terrified cries pass through them. He dismissed the shape as a bird or badger, but later when he counted the sheep, another five were gone.

That night the man who tended the barn asked the boy about the flock. "It looks one or two short," the man said. "Are you sure they're all there?" The boy gave a toothy, uncertain nod before going into the house.

The next evening, as the boy played his flute to the sunset, he noticed an odd silence coming from the flock behind him. When he had finished his song, he looked back hesitantly, then quickly turned away, not wanting to believe his eyes. After a few shuddering moments he looked again at the flock.

Half of the sheep were missing. Half of those that remained lie groveling on the ground or stumbling aimlessly from place to place. As for the rest—at first the boy couldn't understand what was wrong with them. They seemed to be standing up and lying down at the same time. Their wool had turned black and white. They sat eerily still, and breathed either not at all or with rapid heaving gasps. Occasionally one of them shook violently, then became still again. They seemed to have two sets of eyes.

It was then that the boy grasped what he was seeing. The black-and-white sheep were not sheep alone, but wolves and sheep clutched together in a cruel embrace. Each sheep had the jaws of a wolf clamped onto its neck. More than a dozen wolves were scattered among the flock, their eyes shifting furtively, their lips peeled back in a guilty grin, each quietly crushing the life from its victim.

The boy snapped to his feet with his voice clenched in his throat and his flute dangling from his fingers. He hesitated, unable to take his eyes from the horror in front of him. He knew he had to get help, but fear stayed him: fear of what the villagers would do when they found out; fear that the wolves might let go of the lambs and turn their hungry eyes upon him.

I wish I could tell you what happens next, but I can't because it hasn't happened yet. As of July 21, 2007, that was the last we had heard of the Boy Who Wouldn't Cry Wolf.

Christianity Today posted an article this week about a split between three evangelical groups in Britain. The split ends a 14-year partnership responsible for the largest annual British evangelical gathering. The reason for the split: disagreement about exactly how Jesus saves.

Three parties are involved—Spring Harvest, Keswick Ministries, and the Universities and Colleges Christian Fellowship (UCCF). The Spring Harvest conference—the gathering they put on each year—brings together 55,000 Christians including a great many youth. Now its future is uncertain.

What makes this a particularly sad split is its cause: the doctrine of atonement. Atonement is the question of how Jesus' death and resurrection brings about salvation. It is a terrible subject to pick a fight over, for more reasons than one.

The question at the heart of the doctrine of atonement intrigues Christians of all stripes. We all believe that Jesus saves us, but how exactly does he do it? Some people think about it this way. Although God was angry at us for our sins, Jesus drew that anger upon himself and satisfied it when he died. We are saved from punishment because Jesus has experienced the punishment we had earned. We call this idea the "penal substitution" theory of atonement. God had good reasons for feeling angry with us, and that anger had to go somewhere—so Jesus took it into himself.

The Lamb of God

The penal substitution theory has its upsides and downsides. On the upside, the Bible says that something like this took place. Jesus is described as a sacrificial lamb that takes away the sin of the world, and if we look at the idea of sacrificial lambs in the Old Testament, we see that they were thought of us substitutes right back to Abraham and the Passover—dying in place of human beings to take away their sins. Paul says, in a profound and beautiful statement, "God made the one who did not know sin to be sin for us, so that in him we would become the righteousness of God." (2 Corinthians 5:21, NET)

But the penal substitution theory has problems too. First, it explains nothing about how we opt into or out of Jesus' sacrifice. If Jesus absorbed God's anger, why would God still send some people to hell? It's as if Jesus absorbed God's anger conditionally, so that each of us has the chance to "sign up" for forgiveness or not. Well, most Christians believe that, but it doesn't really explain much. There's nothing quite like it in normal human law. How can God's anger be satisfied—but only on a per-person basis?

Christus Victor

The other theory of atonement at the heart of the Spring Harvest split is Christus Victor, otherwise known as the ransom theory. According to the ransom theory, Satan "bought" humanity when we sinned. Atonement means that Jesus bought us back with his blood. We had sold ourselves to Satan, but Jesus ransomed us.

Jesus himself said that he came "to give his life as a ransom for many" (Matthew 20:28), so the ransom theory rings true. But like the penal substitution theory, it gives an incomplete picture. Did Satan really enter into a bargain with Jesus, trading souls for blood? The Bible doesn't tell this story, and we're left to speculate. And again, how is it that Jesus paid for some people but not for others?

It's tempting to hammer out all the upsides and downsides to both theories, to debate their strengths and weaknesses, and to dredge the Scriptures for supporting evidence until one theory defeats the other in hand-to-hand combat and strides forth as the victor. The trouble is that life isn't that simple—God isn't that simple—what Jesus did on the cross isn't that simple.

Christianity's Dark Secret

I'm about to utter the dark secret of Christianity, the Fact that Dare Not Speak Its Name, the truth we are embarrassed to admit. Here it is. Christians believe that Jesus died for our sins, but we haven't the foggiest how it actually works. The gospel we package up and sell each week is something we only dimly grasp ourselves. We have a few theories—images really, mere metaphors—but we haven't got a clue how Jesus' blood dealt with sin. We know that in some cosmic way, Jesus' death plus our belief makes us pure in God's eyes. But as for the mechanics of that transformation—the technicalities of divine jurisprudence—we are out in the cold. We have only the dimmest glimmer of insight.

It's sad that Christian organizations would split over this question. How can you split over something you don't understand? Why part ways over a mystery?

The Mystery of Salvation

In the Christianity Today article, J. I. Packer is paraphrased as saying, "Penal substitution, Christus Victor, and other Scriptural views of atonement work together to present a fully orbed picture of Christ's work." In other words, picking a theory of atonement is not an either-or thing. Christ did something profound when he died for our sins. His death worked on many planes, in many ways—some of which we can begin to understand, others of which we cannot. Anyone who has read or seen The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe has glimpsed the richness of atonement. Did Aslan die as a substitution for Edmund's sin? Yes. Did he negotiate a ransom payment to buy Edmund back from the witch? Yes. Did he fulfill the cosmic law concerning traitors? Yes. Did he transcend the cosmic law to fulfill the divine, creative law? Yes. C. S. Lewis understood that atonement is multifaceted. It cannot be boiled down to a party political statement, a theological soundbite.

Fundamentally, whatever other consequences it may have had, Christ's death was an interaction between Father and Son. In some mysterious way, the Father and the Son conspired together—and yet strangely in opposition with each other—to make sinful people utterly sinless. How can we understand what words they exchanged, what commodities changed hands, what legal precedences were invoked? Their negotiations, whether by whispers or shouts, are out of our earshot. We cannot comprehend the magnitude or method of what they did. So why would we argue about the mechanics of grace?

Who or What?

It's this word "faith" again. In recent years, Christians have got it into their heads that saving faith has to do with what you believe. It never did. It has to do with who you believe. Who do you think is trustworthy? Who will you bank on? Who will you invest in, spend your time with, imitate? "...That whoever believes in him will not perish..." Believes in his existence? No. Believes in the correct nature of his atonement? No. Believes in him—trusts him. Reckons he can get the job done. Dallas Willard suggests the word "confidence" instead of "faith": Do we have confidence in Jesus?

That's not to say confidence doesn't involve doctrine. Jesus can't get the job done unless he is fully man and fully God, and that's a doctrinal statement. But in the Bible, faith is not fundamentally about logical propositions—it's about who we decide to follow.

Salvation, then, is not about the technicalities of atonement, but about the Person who gives it to us. There is no point in arguing about the mechanics of grace; the only thing to do is to receive it. This is one gift horse whose mouth is best left unexamined.

So when I come before the throne of God and he asks me why he should let me into his kingdom, I don't plan to give him a treatise on Christus Victor or the penal substitution of atonement. I'm planning to say, "I don't know how it all works, but I trust Jesus to have made my way." It's like they say in business: It's not about what you know—it's about who you know.

My son's new autobiography, Around 8 Times, is now available through lulu.com. Previewers report the following emotions during and after reading it:

• Delight


• Amazement


• Amusement


• Bemusement


• Disturbance


• Denial


• Acceptance

Bottom line: this book will make you laugh.

All proceeds go to Liam himself. He plans to use them to buy a Wii.

Last Thursday I announced my new game, Phit, which the web community received with incredible acclaim. I'm happy about that. But the load on my server has made my site unreliable (it often fails to come up when you visit it) and my service provider is threatening they may have to "take action" if my site keeps being so popular.

What I need is a dedicated server to host my site. The cheapest dedicated server I could find is $40/month. That's more than I can afford. Do you know of anyone who might be willing to donate a dedicated server to host my site? If so, please contact me.