Gimli and Christ

As some of you know, I'm a fan of The Lord of the Rings.

In each re-reading, I am struck by Gimli's reaction to being asked by Galadriel for what he would wish from her:  a strand of her hair, as an heirloom to treasure for all generations in honor of the Lady of the Wood.  In the story, he actually refrains from asking her for the gift, but names his desire at her request.  She is so moved that she gives not one but three strands.

At their parting, she foretells that he will be a dwarf over whom wealth will hold no power.  In a throw-away line, Tolkien says of Gimli that he was thinking of gold—not to enrich himself, but to imagine how it could be used to best display the gift Galadriel had given him.

This is powerful:  all of his desires were subjugated to his worship of the lady.  His people's penchant for the mining of gold and jewels was transformed from a thing of perhaps miserly interest into a service to be rendered to the true object of his desire.

All idolatry is misplaced and misdirected desire.  The materialistic fire is quenched not because we have learned to somehow discipline ourselves (thereby exalting the will above its proper value—and so asceticism is also idolatry), but because we have properly valued Jesus Christ.  When we properly value him, all that he has given to us becomes a tool for properly worshiping and honoring him:  its value rests not in what it can do for me personally, but for what it does to honor and exalt Christ, to make him more precious and valuable to others.