Reflections on God … Man … Life
“Every one says forgiveness is a lovely idea,” C. S. Lewis famously remarked in Mere Christianity, “until they have something to forgive.” People then balk at forgiving someone when they think whatever has been done is unforgivable. Yet Lewis reminds us, “It is made perfectly clear that if we do not forgive we shall not be forgiven.” Not that’s a quandary. It appears we have no choice. Lewis returns to the topic in an essay called, quite plainly, “On Forgiveness.”… Read more »
There are some days that I’m nearly overwhelmed by the sinfulness of man. The more one appreciates the holiness of God and the absolute “rightness” of His laws, the more our deviations from His ways appear ludicrous and—well—downright stupid. C. S. Lewis dissected this abominable foolishness of sin in chapter five of his The Problem of Pain. From the first moment a creature becomes aware of God as God and of itself as self, the terrible alternative of choosing God… Read more »
“Christianity asserts that every individual human being is going to live forever, and this must be either true or false,” C. S. Lewis states in Mere Christianity. “Now there are a good many things which would not be worth bothering about if I were going to live only seventy years,” he continues, but concludes, “but which I had better bother about very seriously if I am going to live forever.” The problem is that most people don’t want to think… Read more »
As a Christian, I believe what Scripture tells me about mankind—that sin abounds. Even if I were not a Christian, the testimony of man’s sinfulness is everywhere, and that, in itself, should be enough to convince anyone of the truth of what Scripture says. Sin is heinous. It’s also stupid. Its stupidity manifests itself in many ways. Some would not call what I’m about to highlight “sin,” but I insist it is because anything that goes against God’s created order… Read more »
Christians are to be the leaven in society that permeates the whole. We are to be the salt that preserves the taste for God and His ways. We are to be lights that reflect the greater Light to show others the path to knowing the One who loves them and seeks to bridge the sin gap that separates. We cannot do that, though, if we become just like the society and fit into the culture. We fail in our mission… Read more »
American Christians have had it pretty easy for the past few centuries. Whether or not the majority of the population was actually Christian at any time (only God knows for sure), the society, as a whole, always recognized the value of Christian belief and held a certain degree of respect for it. Even during the debate over slavery that led to the Civil War, both sides were claiming to be following Scripture and used the Bible to argue their points…. Read more »
What’s perhaps the biggest deception in our day that keeps people from getting their lives right with God? I want to draw from three C. S. Lewis writings to offer one possibility—a possibility that I think is far closer to a probability. In Lewis’s classic Mere Christianity, the path to establishing a relationship with God is clearly laid out: Christianity tells people to repent and promises them forgiveness. It therefore has nothing (as far as I know) to say to… Read more »