Author Archives: Dr Snyder

Only Two Kinds of People in the End

  

We love to talk about heaven. Hell, not so much. We get glimpses of both eternal destinations in Scripture, but not the full picture of either. C. S. Lewis is well known for perceiving both in imaginative ways. On the subject of hell, we naturally think of The Screwtape Letters, where in his preface he tells us, “We must picture Hell as a state where everyone is perpetually concerned about his own dignity and advancement, where everyone has a grievance,… Read more »

The Devolution of the Democrat Party

  

Democrats and Republicans have always disagreed about policy, but there was a time when the two parties weren’t as polarized as they are today. In my study of American history, the last Democrat president with whom I would have felt entirely comfortable was Grover Cleveland—and that goes a long way back. Yet Democrats weren’t always as radical as they seem to be now. The change in my lifetime has been rather dramatic, and I’m sure many others can attest to… Read more »

Heavenly Reality

  

We imagine images such as the one above: ethereal, somewhat fanciful, perhaps. We really don’t know. We’re so tied to this world; our imaginations are so limited. C. S. Lewis described it this way in his Mere Christianity: Most of us find it very difficult to want “Heaven” at all—except in so far as “Heaven” means meeting again our friends who have died. One reason for this difficulty is that we have not been trained: our whole education tends to… Read more »

Reflections on #68

  

Every year I mark my birthday with some reflections on the life that the Lord has given me. Today I am 68, and that’s kind of hard to imagine. In my mind, I’m much younger. But I feel closer to that 68 number at the moment because I had some surgery last Friday from which I’m still recuperating. There’s nothing like post-op pain to remind one that life on this earth is temporary. As I reflect back on those 68… Read more »

A New Name, Known Only to the One Who Receives It

  

“Your soul has a curious shape,” comments C. S. Lewis in The Problem of Pain. What does he mean? “It is a hollow made to fit a particular swelling in the infinite contours of the divine substance,” he explains. And if that explanation leaves you scratching your head, he tries another analogy: “Or a key to unlock one of the doors in the house with many mansions.” Lewis is pointing to the uniqueness of God’s creation of each one of… Read more »

The Graham-Eisenhower Connection

  

Yesterday in my “Religion and the Presidents” course, I shared the unusual relationship that developed between Dwight Eisenhower and Billy Graham. I say “unusual” because Ike was decades older than the young evangelist and had far more experience in the world. After all, he led the European Theater of WWII, including the daring and dramatic decision to go forward on D-Day. Yet Ike was being drawn by God into a closer examination of his religious beliefs. No achievement in this… Read more »

Crossing Rubicons

  

When I was young—very, very young—I was attracted to the Democrat party. One influence, of course, was my parents. They worked in factories and were members of a union. I particularly recall that they voted for Kennedy in 1960, and his assassination was a profound sadness in our home. As I went away to college, I leaned toward being a Democrat, but I had some rising misgivings, if for no other reason than the spectacle of the riotous events at… Read more »