Remembering C. S. Lewis (29 November 1898 – 22 November 1963)

Though he rarely left his home in Oxford, England, Clive Staples Lewis was far more than a staid and proper Englishman, more than even a scholarly, popular, and effective professor of medieval literature and intellectual history at Oxford and Cambridge Universities.  It was his half-century contribution to the spiritual awakening of a war-torn, disenchanted and skeptical Western world that was the hallmark of his popularity and lasting influence.  It was Lewis’ simple but powerful writings on the transforming nature of Christian faith that endeared him to so many.  He was, I believe, the most trusted and widely-read Christian author of the 20^th Century. 

Following the death of his mother from cancer, ten-year-old Clive became angry with God and eschewed his childhood upbringing in the Anglican church.  Lewis entered a period of atheism before regaining his faith at age 33.  Although he became a communicant in the Church of England his faith was not in the trappings of that religious denomination but rather the result of a conversion to the bedrock tenets of Biblical and revelatory Christianity. Example and patient personal persuasion by good Christian friends plus the influence of enlightened writers such as George MacDonald and J. R. R. Tolkien led to repentance and spiritual submission and consequent confirmation of faith in Jesus Christ. 

Lewis’ personal conversion and quickly gained insights were put into print in the 1930’s and ‘40’s and he became a very popular apologist for the Christian faith.  Probably his most influential book (at least for me) was a compilation of talks he had given on BBC radio during WWII,  first published as Broadcast Talks and later, in 1952, as Mere Christianity. 

Lewis’ prolific output of very readable non-fiction and fiction works and extensive correspondence were, in his words, “a defense of Christianity” and clearly “evangelistic.” Yet his writings were never dry, pedantic, or histrionic.  He never claimed that he or his church had all or even most of the answers, but instead invited sincere investigation of the Christian truth that was somewhere “out there.” 

Here, indeed, was an insightful, enthusiastic and joyful Christian –witty, fervent, non-sectarian and apolitical –a man whose confident focus on Christianity shows us how a faith in Christ and knowledge and application of His gospel gives meaning to everything we experience, think, crave, are and do.

Your New Vessel (a poem) by Ron Miller

Only when a lifetime has whitened your hair

Only when sorrow and pain and joy have etched themselves upon your  countenance

Only then will you come to see yourself whole.

Yea, only when you have loved, and lost, and loved again

Only when you have travelled many roads

And left a hundred projects unfinished

Only then will you come closer to seeing yourself whole.

Only when you have bared yourself before the gaze

Of one who has seen you naked all along

Only when you have cast off the covers in the bed of your own self-deceits

and self-defeats

Only then will you come to your Maker

to be made whole.

Only when the wind and the water have weathered the edges of you

Only when you seem to yourself but a remnant of what you once were

Yet find to your surprise you are so much more

Only then will you behold yourself whole.

Not as arms and legs

Not only as thoughts and feelings

Not simply as deeds and accomplishments

But as something wholly transparent

            A new / old vessel

            A clean vessel 

            A filled vessel.

Only then will you find your new name

Forever etched upon the face of your new vessel

And find yourself whole

And holy

And more beautiful than ever. 

My Essays

As the perennial reader may have noticed, when November—the month of Thanksgiving—rolls  around I begin to wax reflective about things for which I am grateful. The contemplation of funerals and the deaths of good people who are ready to move on to the next life, or who have moved on, as macabre as it may appear, fall into that category.  One man who died 50 years ago this month, November 22, 1963, was such a person who exerted a profound influence upon me. 

Scholar, essayist and novelist, Englishman C. S. Lewis was the man.  I have twenty-seven books written by or about him from which I have gained and I peruse regularly. I believe, but feel constrained to repeat it once again—C. S. Lewis was perhaps the most insightful Christian apologist and essayist of the last century.  His ‘mentor,’ and another giant in my pantheon, was Scottish preacher George Macdonald, a man Lewis never met in person,  but whose sermons and essays influenced him as both men did me. (Macdonald did not die in November but both men are of the ‘same cloth’ and so I think of them together.). A third highly influential essayist with whom I typically spend time with in this month of remembrance is the American philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson, born in May of 1803, (neither did he die in November). 

These three great men wrote essays and gave addresses that, at least in times past, influenced thousands for good.  I, too, write essays, but acknowledge that many are pale reflections of the insights of these spiritual and intellectual giants.  Nevertheless, I write, hoping that some thought or insight I have had, will influence for good some reader as these men have influenced me.  

So that the reader does not expect too much from a 500 - 700 word  essay or opinion piece, let me explain what I think an essay is and what it is not.  An essay for me is not a dissertation or a treatise.  It is not an article.  It is not an explication or carefully reasoned and supported argument. But it is an introduction or exploration of a theme.  It is an idea, a tone, an attitude, what has been called ‘a spiritual signature.’  It has a flavor or quality or bent of thought that shows up in subsequent essays. It is part of a pattern—a communication of belief that is consistent with an overarching world-view. 

My essays are not poetry, although I have put in a piece or two, but they define my identity.  To use Lewis’s words, “In poetry the words are the body and the ‘theme’ or ‘content’ is the soul.” Literature is an art whose medium is words. For me, the voice of an educated conscience must speak. 

  

I hope the reader can appreciate the expression of these counter-point views, not contemporary or necessarily (or even usually) ‘politically correct but views that I find, upon rereading my own essays, are often an echo of a voice crying in the wilderness or twilight of a collapsing culture. 

Three cheers for the ‘old’ literature.   Thanks for reading this.

Celebration Days

The celebration of national holidays, I think, tells much about the values of a people.  It seems obvious to me as a Christian and a patriot, that certain days such as Easter, Christmas, Independence Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Memorial Day—all traditional American holidays—clearly should continue to be celebrated in this country as we remember the significant contributions of certain noble individuals or groups of people associated with that day or time in history.  There are other days, of course, that commemorate noble or noteworthy individuals or classes of people (e.g., Mother’s Day and Father’s Day; formerly Washington’s and Lincoln’s birthdays in America but now—overly generous in my opinion—‘President’s Day’) who contributed to our country’s greatness and  stability and security. 

There are also days that vested interests have promoted that are noted as worthy of remembrance by more limited segments of our population. 

But then there are some days, such as Halloween, that seem to have (to borrow a legal phrase) ‘no redeeming social value.’  And it has become, perhaps, our biggest national (non) ‘holiday.’

I bring this to the attention of the reader because I have seen, in my lifetime, a definite shift in emphasis pertaining to certain celebration days.  Halloween, again, has gotten much more emphasis and Easter (truly for Christians a ‘holy day’) has been devalued as America has slid to a much more secular state. Schools no longer have an Easter vacation, but rather a ‘spring break.’  Christmas vacation, likewise, is now ‘winter break.’  And Thanksgiving Day is ‘turkey day’ followed by ‘black Friday,’ to emphasize, I guess, gross materialism. 

For America’s schoolchildren the celebration of the traditional holidays provided a focus for recognizing the lasting significance and historical value of those events/people/times.  Now, by contrast, attention has been refocused on ‘fun’ or ‘escape’ or a legitimizing of a time of ‘letting down,’ usually of morals. 

As a moralist, I encourage parents, teachers, and other responsible adults to hold to the traditional and not cave in to the de-emphasis of things/times/people of real value.  I, for one, do not buy in (literally) to the moral shift and decline of our culture and great American heritage. 

If You Could Turn Back Time

Last Sunday I turned back time, and it was really quite easy.  From March 10 through November 13 this year we were on Daylight Savings Time.  Now we are on standard time through the winter months.  Making the change was painless.  But it is not their clock that concerns people when this thought crosses their mind. 

Pop singer Cher not long ago did a song titled ‘If I Could Turn Back Time.’ In the song were the lyrics, “I don't know why I did the things I did; I don't know why I said the things I said.”  Or she could have said, ‘I don’t know why I took the path I chose, for now oh how I regret it.’ Her (our) message was/is, ‘If I could turn back time I would do it.’ The assumption is that we would do it right this time. What a blessing it would be to have a ‘new beginning.’ It is to that observation that this commentary is addressed.

I think everybody could probably say about some stage or decision in their lives, ‘I don't know why I did the things I did; I don't know why I said the things I said,’ such as saying ‘yes’ when I should have said ‘no,’ or saying ‘no when I should have said ‘yes.’ Hindsight is indeed 20-20, but at least hindsight can be a springboard to growth.  In short, many wish they could turn back time in their lives.  Is it possible? Could 'turning back time go by another name? Let’s look at this.

As noted in an earlier weblog commentary, Yogi Berra, that genial American sportsman/folk philosopher,  is reported to have said, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.”  I think the implied assumption that could be drawn from this ‘advice’ is that when one sees that they are on the wrong road and a different one presents itself, take the new alternative.  And that is exactly what often must be done.

But what more likely must be done, if you could, is to somehow go clear back to where you left the original path that was taking you in the most promising direction and instead of taking what then looked like an attractive-looking fork in the road or made the decision that got you in trouble, make the decision and take the necessary time, this time, and necessary steps, this time, to hold the course. 

C. S. Lewis, in his inimitable way, used the analogy of going wrong in trying to solve a mathematics problem. You don’t make it right by just trying harder and going on from where you are.  Instead, you have to go back, as far as it takes, to the point at which you made a mistake and then start your calculations again at that point and move forward.

Now the problem is, many people become so habituated in continuing to make the wrong decisions, continuing the one or more behaviors that got them into trouble in the first place (e.g., developing an addiction to some counterproductive life-style habit: food, drugs, behavioral patterns, etc.) that they feel they cannot change.  Or they are persuaded that they are genetically locked in—that they were ‘made that way.’ Or their horizons have become so limited that they cannot see outside of the prison of their own making to a truly productive ‘alternative lifestyle’ (to use a phrase that once was appropriate but that in the present time has become contaminated to rationalize sin). 

I dispute the hopeless attitude.  The negatives of a lifetime can be changed; a new direction can be taken, hope can be restored, but it will take help.  A ‘doctor,’ so to speak, will need to be employed.  On our part it will take humility and submission to change.  A wound can be sewn up, but it must first be cleaned out, and the cleansing must go at least as deep as the wound.  The doctor must be allowed to do his work.   And then it will take time to heal and therapy to restore proper function.  Damage done is damage done, but restoration can also be done.  That’s why, to change metaphors, we have car repair shops.  In fact, a good restoration shop will make the vehicle look, and depending on how far you want to go, perform even better than when it was ‘new.’ Or a house can be renovated. Or a person.  

This all leads to my last metaphorical shift—one which I believe is not a metaphor at all, but the most profound of all realities.  It is that there is a God in Heaven and He has made provision for all of us to make the changes that will need to be made, for we all have need to ‘turn back time’ and that there is, indeed, a Way. The way is to believe in God our Father who loves us and to come unto our Redeemer and Savior, His son, Jesus Christ.  The way is faith in Christ, repentance, and baptism and then, this time, learning and keeping the commandments found in the Holy Scriptures.  That is why all these things were given.    

Now there is hope, but who knows how much time?