One of the blessings I’ve received over the past few years is the opportunity to share with my church many of the key writings of C. S. Lewis. I began with The Screwtape Letters, then Mere Christianity, followed by a two-semester in-depth treatment of Narnia. In quick succession after that, I taught the Ransom Trilogy, a course on Lewis’s views on life, death, and eternity, followed by a selection of his best essays, and then a look at writers that… Read more »
On this day, I will be speaking at a Good Friday service at my church. Here is what I will say. Jesus called out with a loud voice, “Father, into your hands I commit my spirit.” When he had said this, he breathed his last. In Psalm 31, David wrote, “In you, Lord, I have taken refuge; let me never be put to shame; deliver me in your righteousness. … Into your hands I commit my spirit; deliver me, Lord,… Read more »
This week marks the one-year anniversary for going to the Marion E. Wade Center at Wheaton College to share about our book, Many Times & Many Places: C. S Lewis & the Value of History. We are grateful for the invitation we received from David and Crystal Downing, who were then the co-directors of the Center. Not only did we have the privilege of sharing with an audience in the Bakke Auditorium, but we also went to the Downings’ home… Read more »
While researching my latest C. S. Lewis book, Many Times & Many Places: C. S. Lewis & the Value of History, I had the opportunity to take advantage of the Wade Center’s collection of books that Lewis himself owned and read. So, in the process of working on the book that was published in 2023, I also realized that the research I was doing for it would make for a good journal article. I’m more than pleased that the Wade… Read more »
I’m currently teaching my university course on C. S. Lewis. We have traversed the Lewis universe by reading Surprised by Joy, Mere Christianity, The Screwtape Letters, The Great Divorce, and his superb sermon/essay, “Learning in War-time.” We are now deeply embroiled in the third installment of his Ransom Trilogy, That Hideous Strength. Coming attractions: The Last Battle, A Grief Observed, and Lewis’s greatest—in my estimation—sermon/essay of all, “The Weight of Glory.” I wish I could have given them even more;… Read more »
Rev. T. R. Milford, rector of Oxford’s University Church of St. Mary the Virgin, wanted an authority to speak on the importance of continued education in a national crisis. That crisis was the Second World War, which Britain entered in September 1939 after the Nazi invasion of Poland. Why was this topic on the rector’s mind? Some would undoubtedly question—and perhaps some already were questioning—why a university such as Oxford should continue to prioritize academics at a time when all… Read more »
I chose the title “Pondering Principles” for my website because I believe that we are called by God to be principled people. I’ve taught hundreds of students the distinction between being principled and being pragmatic. Definitions are essential. Here’s how I have explained what it means to be principled. Principles are what I would call the “big truths” out of which other truths naturally should flow. Truth must be our foundation for all things, and we must not give only… Read more »