From Lewis’s letters:
I had a tooth pulled out the other day, and came away wondering whether we dare hope that the moment of death may be very like that delicious moment when one realizes that the tooth is finally out.
—————————
If we feel we have talents that don’t find expression in our ordinary duties and recreations, I think we must just go on doing the ordinary things as well as we can. If God wants to use these suspected talents, He will: in His own time and way.
——————————
(On too much self-reflection): A text you should keep much in mind is I John 3:20: ‘If our heart condemns us God is greater than our heart.’ I sometimes pray ‘Lord, give me no more and no less self-knowledge than I can at this moment make a good use of.’
——————————
Why can’t we say ‘I’ll be happy when God calls me’ without being afraid one will be thought ‘morbid’? After all, St. Paul said just the same (Philippians 1:21). If we really believe what we say we believe; if we really think that home is elsewhere and that this life is a ‘wandering to find home;’ why should we not look forward to the arrival? There are, aren’t there, only three things we can do about death: to desire it, to fear it, or to ignore it. The third alternative, which is the one the modern world calls ‘healthy’ is surely the most uneasy and precarious of all.
——————————
God’s presence is not the same as ‘the feeling’ of God’s presence and He may be doing most for us when we think He is doing least.
——————————-
(Lewis was asked if we will know each other in heaven) The symbols under which Heaven is presented to us are (a) a dinner party, (b) a wedding, (c) a city, and (d) a concert. It would be grotesque to suppose that the guests or citizens or members of the choir didn’t know one another. And how can love of one another be commanded in this life if it is to be cut short at death?
===========================
Three from Mere Christianity:
(Lewis was wounded in combat in WWI) Even while we kill and punish, we must try to feel about the enemy as we feel about ourselves—to wish that he were not bad, to hope that he may, in this world or another, be cured: in fact, to wish his good. That is what is meant in the Bible by loving our enemy: wishing his good, not feeling fond of him nor saying he is nice when he is not.
————————————-
Here is another thing that used to puzzle me. Is it not frightfully unfair that eternal life should be confined to people who have heard of Christ and been able to believe in Him? But the truth is God has not told us what His arrangements about the other people are. We do know that no man can be saved except through Christ; we do not know that only those who know Him can be saved through Him. But in the meantime, if you are worried about the people outside, the most unreasonable thing you can do is to remain outside yourself. Christians are Christ’s body, the organism through which He works. Every addition to that body enables Him to do more. If you want to help those outside, you must add your own little cell to the body of Christ who alone can help them.
————————————–
In the passage where the New Testament says that everyone must work, it gives as a reason “in order that he may have something to give to those in need” (Ephesians 4:28). Charity– giving to the poor– is an essential part of Christian morality. Some people nowadays say that charity ought to be unnecessary and that instead of giving to the poor we ought to be producing a society in which there were no poor to give to. They may be quite right in saying that we ought to produce this kind of society. But if anyone thinks that, as a consequence, you can stop giving in the meantime, then he has parted company with all Christian morality… I do not believe one can settle how much we ought to give. I am afraid the only safe rule is to give more than we can spare. In other words, if our expenditure on comforts, luxuries, amusements, etc., is up to the standard common among those with the same income as our own, we are probably giving away too little. If our charities do not at all pinch or hamper us, I should say they are too small. There ought to be things we should like to do and cannot do because our charities expenditure excludes them.
*********************************
I John 3:20 — If our hearts condemn us, we know that God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything.
Philippians 1:21 — For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain.
Ephesians 4:28 — Anyone who has been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with their own hands, that they may have something to share with those in need.
*********************************
O Lord, whose way is perfect: help us, we pray, always to trust in your goodness; that walking with you in faith, and following you in all simplicity, we may possess quiet and contented minds, and cast all our cares on you, because you care for us; for the sake of Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
–Christina Rossetti, English poet (1830-1894)
Related Posts
