C. S. Lewis’s essay “Learning in War-Time” concludes with some sobering thoughts on the subject of death. We all know death comes to each of us, but we don’t often face up to that reality.
Those who are without Christ are without hope in eternity, and they tend to ignore the fact that they will have to answer to the One who is the Ultimate Judge.
Christians have hope, yet don’t always think seriously about the moment they will enter eternity because they are too focused on the things of this world.
Lewis’s observations, written in his inimitable style, awaken us to the reality of our approaching death:
But there is no question of death or life for any of us, only a question of this death or that—of a machine gun bullet now or a cancer forty years later.
What does war do to death? It certainly does not make it more frequent; 100 percent of us die, and the percentage cannot be increased.
Written during WWII, this essay had that backdrop to make readers more alert to his message. Today, we have the threat of terrorism and a terrorist state developing nuclear weapons. While we may attempt to make a distinction and say we are not “at war,” we close our eyes to the truth. War is a constant in the human experience. What can it teach us? Lewis continues:
War makes death real to us, and that would have been regarded as one of its blessings by most of the great Christians of the past. They thought it good for us to be always aware of our mortality. I am inclined to think they were right.
War gets in our face and lets us know that life on this earth is only temporary. It gets our attention.
All the animal life in us, all schemes of happiness that centred in this world, were always doomed to a final frustration. In ordinary times only a wise man can realise it. Now the stupidest of us knows.
We see unmistakably the sort of universe in which we have all along been living, and must come to terms with it. If we had foolish un-Christian hopes about human culture, they are now shattered.
If we thought we were building up a heaven on earth, if we looked for something that would turn the present world from a place of pilgrimage into a permanent city satisfying the soul of man, we are disillusioned, and not a moment too soon.
This life is a pilgrimage. As the old gospel song says, “This world is not my home; I’m just passing through.” Permanence is not the nature of this world. Rather, we await the eternal city where the pilgrimage will be over and real life will begin.
That is the reality we need to embrace.