Nick Roark's Blog, page 26

“The echo of a tune we have not heard” by C.S. Lewis

“In speaking of this desire for our own far off country, which we find in ourselves even now, I feel a certain shyness. I am almost committing an indecency.

I am trying to rip open the inconsolable secret in each one of you—the secret which hurts so much that you take your revenge on it by calling it names like Nostalgia and Romanticism and Adolescence; the secret also which pierces with such sweetness that when, in very intimate conversation, the mention of it becomes imminent, we grow awkward and affect to laugh at ourselves; the secret we cannot hide and cannot tell, though we desire to do both.

We cannot tell it because it is a desire for something that has never actually appeared in our experience. We cannot hide it because our experience is constantly suggesting it, and we betray ourselves like lovers at the mention of a name.

Our commonest expedient is to call it beauty and behave as if that had settled the matter. Wordsworth’s expedient was to identify it with certain moments in his own past. But all this is a cheat. If Wordsworth had gone back to those moments in the past, he would not have found the thing itself, but only the reminder of it; what he remembered would turn out to be itself a remembering.

The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing.

These things– the beauty, the memory of our own past– are good images of what we really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself, they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers.

For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.

Do you think I am trying to weave a spell? Perhaps I am; but remember your fairy tales. Spells are used for breaking enchantments as well as for inducing them.

And you and I have need of the strongest spell that can be found to wake us from the evil enchantment of worldliness which has laid upon us for nearly a hundred years.”

–C.S. Lewis, “The Weight of Glory,” in The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses(New York: Harper Collins, 1949/2001), 29-31.

“C.S. Lewis had an amazing ability to write under the most trying of circumstances” by Harry Lee Poe

“C.S. Lewis had an amazing ability to write under the most trying of circumstances. His brother noted how Minto constantly interrupted his writing with little chores at the Kilns. Various of his pupils and friends observed his ability to pick up his pen immediately after an interruption and begin writing again as if nothing had intervened to shake his train of thought.

Alastair Fowler thought that Lewis’s writing ability had to do with the way he composed in his head before he ever began writing. We have observed how he first had developed ideas for books that he did not begin writing until later. Fowler speculated that he could do this because of his remarkable memory, which allowed him to quote long passages or to recall the substance of a page. Fowler told the story of how Lewis challenged Kenneth Tynan:

“to choose a number from one to forty, for the shelf in Lewis’s library; a number from one to twenty, for the place in this shelf; from one to a hundred, for the page; and from one to twenty-five for the line, which he read aloud. Lewis had then to identify the book and say what the page was about.”

George Watson said that Lewis had the opposite of writer’s block. The words always seemed to flow from his pen. Watson once asked him if he ever found it difficult to write. Lewis replied, sometimes “when I come back in the evening after dinner, I tell myself I am too tired and shouldn’t write anything. But I always do.”

Yet Lewis started many writing projects that he never completed. Sometimes he tired of them. Sometimes he did not know what would happen next. This would seem to be writer’s block, except it never kept him from writing.

Most remarkably, he worked on multiple projects at the same time in a grand literary juggling act. It had been that way for years. While writing The Allegory of Love, he wrote The Pilgrim’s Regress and several important academic articles. It had been that way with The Screwtape Letters, Perelandra, and A Preface to Paradise Lost. While he was writing Miracles, he also wrote That Hideous Strength.”

–Harry Lee Poe, The Making of C.S. Lewis: From Atheist to Apologist (1918-1945) (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 2021), 293-294.

“The Sundays of a man’s life” by George Herbert

Sunday

The Sundays of man’s life,
Threaded together on time’s string,
Make bracelets to adorn the wife
Of the eternal glorious King.
On Sunday heaven’s gate stands ope:
Blessings are plentiful and rife,
More plentiful than hope.

–George Herbert, from ‘Sunday” in Herbert: Poems (Everyman Library) (New York: Knopf, 1633/2004), 76.

“He demands our worship” by C.S. Lewis

“When we want to be something other than the thing God wants us to be, we must be wanting what, in fact, will not make us happy.

Those Divine demands which sound to our natural ears most like those of a despot and least like those of a lover, in fact marshal us where we should want to go if we knew what we wanted.

He demands our worship, our obedience, our prostration.

Do we suppose that they can do Him any good, or fear, like the chorus in Milton, that human irreverence can bring about ‘His glory’s diminution’?

A man can no more diminish God’s glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word ‘darkness’ on the walls of his cell.

But God wills our good, and our good is to love Him (with that responsive love proper to creatures) and to love Him we must know Him: and if we know Him, we shall in fact fall on our faces.

It is not simply that God has arbitrarily made us such that He is our only good. Rather God is the only good of all creatures: and by necessity, each must find its good in that kind and degree of the fruition of God which is proper to its nature.

The kind and degree may vary with the creature’s nature: but that there ever could be any other good, is an atheistic dream.

George Macdonald, in a passage I cannot now find, represents God as saying to men, ‘You must be strong with my strength and blessed with my blessedness, for I have no other to give you.’

That is the conclusion of the whole matter. God gives what He has, not what He has not: He gives the happiness that there is, not the happiness that is not.

To be God—to be like God and to share His goodness in creaturely response—to be miserable— these are the only three alternatives.

If we will not learn to eat the only food that the universe grows—the only food that any possible universe ever can grow— then we must starve eternally.”

–C.S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (New York: HarperCollins, 1940/2001), 46-47.

The Valley of Vision – “Joy”

“O Christ,

All Thy ways of mercy tend to and end in my delight.

Thou didst weep, sorrow, suffer that I might rejoice.

For my joy Thou hast sent the Comforter,
multiplied Thy promises,
shown me my future happiness,
given me a living fountain.

Thou art preparing joy for me and me for joy;
I pray for joy, wait for joy, long for joy;
give me more than I can hold, desire, or think of.

Measure out to me my times and degrees of joy,
at my work, business, duties.

If I weep at night, give me joy in the morning.

Let me rest in the thought of Thy love,
pardon for sin, my title to heaven,
my future unspotted state.

I am an unworthy recipient of Thy grace.

I often disesteem Thy blood and slight Thy love,
but can in repentance draw water
from the wells of Thy joyous forgiveness.

Let my heart leap towards the eternal sabbath,
where the work of redemption, sanctification,
preservation, glorification is finished
and perfected for ever,
where Thou wilt rejoice over me with joy.

There is no joy like the joy of heaven,
for in that state are no sad divisions,
unchristian quarrels,
contentions, evil designs,
weariness, hunger, cold,
sadness, sin, suffering,
persecutions, toils of duty.

O healthful place where none are sick!

O happy land where all are kings!

O holy assembly where all are priests!

How free a state where none are servants except to Thee!

Bring me speedily to the land of joy.”

–“Joy” in The Valley of Vision: A Collection of Puritan Prayers and Devotions, ed. Arthur Bennett (Carlisle, PA: Banner of Truth, 1975/2009), 292-293.

“Are you a Christian?” by Sinclair Ferguson

“I heard of a little boy who used to help his mum whenever she took part in the church-cleaning day. The congregation knew that as he moved around the building with his little duster, helping her clean, he would sing his favourite Bible song:

The wise man built his house upon the rock
The wise man built his house upon the rock
The wise man built his house upon the rock
And the rain came tumbling down

Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
The rain came down
And the floods came up
The rain came down And the floods came up
And the house on the rock stood firm.

The foolish man built his house upon the sand
The foolish man built his house upon the sand
The foolish man built his house upon the sand
And the rain came tumbling down

Oh, the rain came down
And the floods came up
The rain came down
And the foods came up
The rain came down
And the floods came up
And the house on the sand fell flat.

So, build your house on the Lord Jesus Christ…

Some time later, the little boy became gravely ill and died. At the end of his funeral service, as his casket was carried from the church, the organist began to play a familiar piece of music:

The wise man built his house upon the rock…

I think about that little boy, whom I never knew, quite often.

Through his short life the Lord was teaching everyone who knew him a wonderful lesson. Understanding the gospel and becoming a Christian is not a matter of age, or intellect.

It is a matter of being helped to realize that you have no righteousness of your own and that you need Christ, coming to trust him by God’s grace, turning away from the sin that has so mastered your life, and building your life on him.

A child can understand and do that.

And yet, sadly, many intelligent adults never do. They assume that at the end of the day being a Christian is about trying to get a pass mark. But that is the sure way to fail.

We can never find acceptance with a holy God on the basis of what we have done. Like Saul of Tarsus, no matter what our religious pedigree may be, the righteousness we seek to establish is inadequate.

We need the righteousness that God provides. And that comes to us only through faith in Christ.

So—if someone were to say to you: ‘Are you a Christian? I’d love to hear your story‘ —would you have one to tell?

It could begin in a very dramatic way, like Paul’s; or it could be comparatively undramatic, like mine. Either way, at its heart will be this:

I knew I could not stand before God as I am in my sin and failure.I learned that Jesus Christ is able to save anyone who comes to Him.I turned to and trusted in Christ– and now I am clothed in His righteousness.Now I want to know Him, love Him more, and serve Him.

So we end this chapter where we began, with the question, ‘Are you a Christian?‘

Is there something in your heart that responds “Yes! Yes! I am’?

If not, put this book down, think about the question, and ask the Lord to help you to see why you need a Saviour, and why it is that Jesus Christ is the Saviour you need.”

–Sinclair B. Ferguson, Devoted to God’s Church: Core Values for Christian Fellowship (Carlise, PA: Banner of Truth, 2020), 32-34.

“Awaken my restless heart, Lord, to Yourself” by Peter Sanlon

“Forgive me, O God, for the many times my heart has fallen down in wonder, worship and awe at things that are less than You.

Sometimes of my own volition, sometimes seemingly compelled from without, the end result is that I am painfully used to being impressed at things that are less than You.

Awaken my restless heart, Lord, to Yourself: Your infinite perfection, Your beautiful love, Your unique majesty.

The angels before Your throne avert their gaze from Your glory.

Moses took off his sandals.

The apostle John fell at Your feet as though dead.

Give me a sense of the honour due to You.

Enable me to think of You in Your perfect Godness, in ways that are more true to who You really are.

May that be one more step along the way, to that future day when You will let me see You as You really are, and permit me the honour of falling down before You, and laying all You have given me at Your feet.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.”

–Peter Sanlon, Simply God: Recovering the Classical Trinity (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2014), 81.

“Awaken in me a more passionate dependence upon You” by Peter Sanlon

“O God, I dwell in time and can barely express what time is.

My rushing around and constant search for the next thing is little more than a futile attempt to numb myself to the unbearable reality– time is slipping away from me.

I feel the claim on being that Your image grants me; I feel that my life should not fade away to nothing.

Yet every graveside I visit, every quiet moment of stillness, hauntingly mocks me.

Time marches on and, as You have said, I wither and fall like the grass in a field.

You are so different.

Always living, always there, all-knowing.

I have studied books and languages.

Sometimes paying attention, but often not.

You have never grown in wisdom, for You are wisdom.

I have forgotten and confused so many things; you are knowledge.

Outside time You know perfectly.

You never age or weaken.

And yet Your perfection is not a splendid isolation– surely the thing that surpasses all others in beauty is that You graciously deign to speak with me, one of Your mortal creatures.

Your perfect knowledge is shared with me, wills good for me, and is all-loving despite knowing my sin more deeply than I do.

Forgive me for not talking enough with You, for imagining that You are as little as me, and for my futile attempts to overcome my creaturely limits.

Awaken in me a more passionate dependence upon You, a more humble reverence for Your perfect knowledge.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.”

–Peter Sanlon, Simply God: Recovering the Classical Trinity (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2014), 102.

“Your love depends not on me, but on You” by Peter Sanlon

“God, at the centre of Your unchanging being is love.

Love that is so pure, so perfect, so infinite, so raw and alive that it pursued me to the cross.

Forgive me for ever wanting to hurt You, and for my doubting Your love.

Thank You that You sent Your Son into the world, and Your Spirit into my heart, to make me feel the supernatural reality of Your love for me.

Not love in general, not mere words, gestures or ideals.

But the intimate joy of heaven, poured out on a person such as me, who not only fails to understand it but who does not deserve it.

I praise You that Your love cannot weaken, fade or change.

I thank You that you are the source of Your unchanging love, for You are Your love.

It is with such relief that I realize Your love depends not on me, but on You.

I cast myself upon You, with love that is awakened by Your love, sustained by Your grace and bound for Your glory.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.”

–Peter Sanlon, Simply God: Recovering the Classical Trinity (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2014), 143.

“You have been, and always will be, the same perfectly good God” by Peter Sanlon

“O God, in times of suffering, life closes in.

My struggles and pain seem to surround me.

Please open my heart to You.

Lift my eyes to see Your goodness.

Help me to believe that You are not only all good, but good to me.

You have given me so many good gifts, which I do not deserve.

Even the pain and sadness are a gift from Your kind hand, though I cannot yet understand Your purposes.

When life seems out of control, help me to accept that You are in control.

I cannot see beyond today; I trust that You know the end before the beginning.

You have foretold Your saving plans in Scripture.

Your faithfulness and power have been proven many times.

Forgive me the times I have become so enveloped by my suffering that I have forgotten You, blamed You and doubted You.

Thank You that You have never changed: You have been, and always will be, the same perfectly good God.

Give my heart a sense and taste of Your sweet goodness: Your beautiful kindness and generosity.

I long to be refreshed by a sight of Your perfection.

When I look at this fallen world, twisted by sin and suffering, it is difficult to believe that it could ever be better.

Yet I know that You are all-powerful; You are able to bring about Your perfect purposes for Your people.

Please do so not as I, but as You, would have it.

As a sinful creature, limited in so many ways, I am content to trust You.

In Jesus’ name. Amen.”

–Peter Sanlon, Simply God: Recovering the Classical Trinity (Downers Grove, IL: Inter-Varsity Press, 2014), 121.