By JC
A chessboard is sixty-four squares, thirty-two pieces, two armies with exactly the same equipment, and one piece nearly everybody treats as spare parts. I’ve looked at this board my whole life and never once asked what it was trying to tell me. Today I’m asking. We’ll go in order and save the best piece for last, because the best piece is always the one people give away early.
The Board
Thirty-two light squares and thirty-two dark, alternating so neatly that nobody has ever won a game by refusing to step on one color. I’d prefer a board with nothing but light squares. I’d also prefer that the other fellow let me know what he’s planning. So far, nobody’s agreed to either arrangement.
“Yea, the darkness hideth not from thee; but the night shineth as the day: the darkness and the light are both alike to thee.” (Psalm 139:12, KJV)
What gets me is that the Psalmist is talking about being found. You can get to a place where you can barely see your own hand, and God can still see you. The shadow squares are on the board, and God is on them too.
The Armies
Sixteen pieces a side, the same pieces in the same places facing each other. White moves first. After that, both players have to deal with what the other one actually does, a rule I have occasionally wished to appeal.
From my chair, trouble can look like an even match, or worse. I start counting everything that could go wrong as if the Lord were one more piece I needed to locate before I made a move. John gives me a better way to take stock. “Greater is he that is in you, than he that is in the world.” (1 John 4:4, KJV)
The King
The whole game turns on a piece that usually moves one square at a time. The king can do some useful work when the board thins out. Early on, the rest of the army spends a good deal of effort keeping him out of trouble. You can give up a queen and play on. When your king is in check and has no legal way out, the game ends right there.
On a Friday, one King let them take him. The people who’d followed him had every reason to think it was over. By Sunday, the tomb was empty. When I look at the board, I keep coming back to how little those disciples could see from where they stood on Friday. I know what happened on Sunday and still catch myself calling the game early.
The Queen
Straight lines or diagonals, as far as she has a clear path. A beginner sees all that freedom and brings her out to solve every problem on the board. Before long the other player is developing pieces while the beginner spends three consecutive turns getting his queen out of trouble. I recognize the impulse. Give me a strong opinion and a little room to move, and there’s a decent chance I’ll make somebody else’s job easier.
“He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty; and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.” (Proverbs 16:32, KJV)
There are days when ruling my spirit amounts to letting a reply sit until morning. By morning, some of my finest sentences have lost their appeal.
The Rooks
The rooks start in the corners and move in straight lines. Give one a clear file and suddenly a piece you’ve hardly thought about has something to say. The rook also takes part in castling, when the king moves two squares toward it and the rook comes around to the other side. You have to arrange it before trouble arrives. The rules won’t let you castle out of check.
“The name of the LORD is a strong tower: the righteous runneth into it, and is safe.” (Proverbs 18:10, KJV)
I like that the verse has somebody running. I can picture him finding the door and getting inside while the trouble is still outside. There’s a certain humility in admitting you need somewhere to go.
The Bishops
Bishops move diagonally, so the square a bishop starts on tells you which color it will spend the whole game on. Put one bishop on a light square and the other on a dark one, and between them they can reach places either would miss on its own.
“The eye cannot say unto the hand, I have no need of thee: nor again the head to the feet, I have no need of you.” (1 Corinthians 12:21, KJV)
I’ve spent enough time in bands to know how this works. You can spend the whole soundcheck asking for more of yourself in the monitor. Then the drummer drops out for half a measure and everybody finds out who was keeping the song together. Paul’s list is handy when I catch myself deciding which people I can do without.
The Knights
The knight moves two squares one way and one square across, and it can jump over the pieces in between. A crowded board that gives a bishop nowhere to go may suit a knight just fine. You can stare down every open line and still miss the piece that lands beside you.
“By my God have I leaped over a wall.” (Psalm 18:29, KJV) I used to hear that and picture David halfway over it. Lately I picture him standing at the bottom, looking up. That’s the part I recognize. “For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways, saith the LORD.” (Isaiah 55:8, KJV)
The Pawns
Eight of them, front line, and usually the first pieces anybody is willing to trade. A pawn can take two steps on its first move if the way is clear. After that it gets one square at a time. It captures diagonally, and it never moves backward. A pawn can spend a good part of the game waiting for the piece in front of it to move.
If it makes it all the way across, the rules require it to become a queen, rook, bishop, or knight. Most players choose the queen. You can do that even if your original queen is still on the board. Imagine the poor fellow who spent the afternoon keeping an eye on your queen looking up to find that now you have two.
Philidor, the great eighteenth-century player, called pawns the soul of chess. I think he saw it. Every other piece is already what it is. Only the pawn becomes something.
That’s the Gospel in miniature. The meek inherit. The last are first. When Samuel came to Jesse’s house, David was out keeping the sheep. They had to send for him. I wonder what it was like to walk back from the field thinking somebody needed a hand with something and find Samuel standing there with the oil.
I think about the squares in between, too. From the other side of the board, a pawn’s progress looks tidy. From where the pawn is standing, there’s a piece in the way and no telling how long it’ll stay there. The little moves count anyway. Make the phone call. Keep your word. Get up the next morning and do the piece of the work that’s in front of you. Most of that will happen while somebody else is watching the queen.
So here’s my advice, from one longtime board-watcher to another. Watch the pawns. They’re the only ones on the board going somewhere.
He raiseth up the poor out of the dust, and lifteth up the beggar from the dunghill, to set them among princes, and to make them inherit the throne of glory: for the pillars of the earth are the LORD’S, and he hath set the world upon them. — 1 Samuel 2:8 (KJV)
