Scott Gill's Blog - Posts Tagged "c-s-lewis"
Struggles in Faith, Part 1
My faith, at times, and by that I mean my religious fervency, jostles between Mark Twain and C.S. Lewis. One man opted for skepticism, sickened by Christian hypocrisy while the other, despite disappointment in God, continued an ardent path.
Mark Twain, or Samuel Clemens, was raised a Presbyterian and was rarely religious. He was asked; however, to speak at John D. Rockefeller, Jr.’s famous Bible class on a number of occasions. In those classes, Clemens expressed his troubles with Christians’ naïve understanding of what was good and glorifying to God. His favorite example was the Joseph account when Joseph interprets Pharaoh’s dream of future drought and, as a result, is promoted to viceroy, the chief-carrier-out-of-all- Pharaoh-wants position (he was a big deal). Joseph makes an offer to all the people that they cannot refuse; he gives out the stored up grain to the starving in exchange for their money, livestock, and land. He charged an exorbitant price, and leveled on them an eternal tax. Even Scripture says, “Joseph reduced the people to servitude” (Genesis 47:21). Clemens didn’t view Joseph as a hero, acting in faith and saving the people, which is what the majority of all Christians (including me) have believed; he saw him as a shark that “skinned them for every last penny they had…” After four years of seminary study (which I crammed into eight) and reading that very passage in the literal Hebrew, I had never heard such an idea.
Joseph was placed in that position for that particular moment. His faith overcame long terms of isolation and false accusation and he rose to the top. He was a hero, that is, unless you come to him for grain and leave homeless. That’s how Twain saw it, from the “little guy’s” perspective. The farmer was left with little choice; buy grain or starve, and they hocked everything. Twain’s point was that Christians justify and glorify what they read in the Bible without looking at the entire situation. He was troubled with the sections of Scripture where God commands genocide (the entrance into the Promised Land) and he had the guts to voice his troubles. Honestly, I can sympathize with him because I struggle with it too. I’m not saying I no longer believe Scripture, but think about those families; would any of us in our right mind be able to obey the command to “destroy all the peoples the Lord God gives over to you. Do not look on them with pity…?” Would I be able to kill every last man, woman, and child so I could move into a piece of land and build my farm? I have enough trouble reading my Bible every day so, probably not, and that is what Mark Twain meant in his skepticism.
He stayed angry with Christians mostly because of their uncanny ability to stand against smoking, drinking, and cussing, all the while ignoring commands to “love thy neighbor.” He saw this hypocrisy largely in the practice of slavery. He grew up in a land of slaves and even played in their quarters at his uncle’s farm. He went to church and listened to sermons that not only justified the practice, but declared it a kindly act—a better existence—for the slaves, that they were better off in chains than in Africa. He responded to the issue in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn where Huck contemplates his soul’s smoldering future because he assisted the escape of his friend, Jim, a neighboring slave. Huck decides to choose the way of “wickedness” and stay loyal to Jim, knowing that by doing so he sealed his eternal fate (at least according to what he learned in church).
Clemens witnessed and recorded instance after instance of Christians showing hatred while boasting a standard of righteousness. It had embittered him so, that near the end of his life, upon hearing of a friend who had a scare with chest pains, he wrote the following advice on what to do when standing before St. Peter at the pearly gates:
Leave your dog outside. Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and the dog would go in… Sunday afternoons, when you go with the rest of the redeemed to lean over the balusters [the walls looking down] and see the little unbaptised Presbyterian and Roman Catholic children roasting in the red fires, don’t crowd; remember, others want to see, as well as you. And you must rub your hands together, and laugh a little, and let on to enjoy it; otherwise people will suspect you are not as good a Christian as you look… (emphasis mine)
This is the first religious piece I’ve written in nearly 5 years because, honestly, I’ve had little to say. After nearly 15 years in ministry, I had my fill of the cruel hands that named Christ as Lord, and the final straw was when it involved my wife and kids. I remember praying, begging Jesus to get me out of the pastorate and in a profession where my family is off limits (in the church, that is not the case). People ask if I’d ever go back and preach again of which I give a hardy, “NO.” Why would I do that to my wife and kids? The infamous fishbowl is a lonely and hot stage. No, we are happy as I teach and Angie works as a medical assistant. I’m sure some have wondered that my departure from the pulpit was a bit Jonah-esque, a called man running from his call, but if I’d stayed in much longer I would have ended up just like Sam Clemens—bitter, angry, and a skeptic. Instead, I have callused hands from holy work as C.S. Lewis would say and, hopefully, in time, those hands will soften.
Mark Twain, or Samuel Clemens, was raised a Presbyterian and was rarely religious. He was asked; however, to speak at John D. Rockefeller, Jr.’s famous Bible class on a number of occasions. In those classes, Clemens expressed his troubles with Christians’ naïve understanding of what was good and glorifying to God. His favorite example was the Joseph account when Joseph interprets Pharaoh’s dream of future drought and, as a result, is promoted to viceroy, the chief-carrier-out-of-all- Pharaoh-wants position (he was a big deal). Joseph makes an offer to all the people that they cannot refuse; he gives out the stored up grain to the starving in exchange for their money, livestock, and land. He charged an exorbitant price, and leveled on them an eternal tax. Even Scripture says, “Joseph reduced the people to servitude” (Genesis 47:21). Clemens didn’t view Joseph as a hero, acting in faith and saving the people, which is what the majority of all Christians (including me) have believed; he saw him as a shark that “skinned them for every last penny they had…” After four years of seminary study (which I crammed into eight) and reading that very passage in the literal Hebrew, I had never heard such an idea.
Joseph was placed in that position for that particular moment. His faith overcame long terms of isolation and false accusation and he rose to the top. He was a hero, that is, unless you come to him for grain and leave homeless. That’s how Twain saw it, from the “little guy’s” perspective. The farmer was left with little choice; buy grain or starve, and they hocked everything. Twain’s point was that Christians justify and glorify what they read in the Bible without looking at the entire situation. He was troubled with the sections of Scripture where God commands genocide (the entrance into the Promised Land) and he had the guts to voice his troubles. Honestly, I can sympathize with him because I struggle with it too. I’m not saying I no longer believe Scripture, but think about those families; would any of us in our right mind be able to obey the command to “destroy all the peoples the Lord God gives over to you. Do not look on them with pity…?” Would I be able to kill every last man, woman, and child so I could move into a piece of land and build my farm? I have enough trouble reading my Bible every day so, probably not, and that is what Mark Twain meant in his skepticism.
He stayed angry with Christians mostly because of their uncanny ability to stand against smoking, drinking, and cussing, all the while ignoring commands to “love thy neighbor.” He saw this hypocrisy largely in the practice of slavery. He grew up in a land of slaves and even played in their quarters at his uncle’s farm. He went to church and listened to sermons that not only justified the practice, but declared it a kindly act—a better existence—for the slaves, that they were better off in chains than in Africa. He responded to the issue in The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn where Huck contemplates his soul’s smoldering future because he assisted the escape of his friend, Jim, a neighboring slave. Huck decides to choose the way of “wickedness” and stay loyal to Jim, knowing that by doing so he sealed his eternal fate (at least according to what he learned in church).
Clemens witnessed and recorded instance after instance of Christians showing hatred while boasting a standard of righteousness. It had embittered him so, that near the end of his life, upon hearing of a friend who had a scare with chest pains, he wrote the following advice on what to do when standing before St. Peter at the pearly gates:
Leave your dog outside. Heaven goes by favor. If it went by merit, you would stay out and the dog would go in… Sunday afternoons, when you go with the rest of the redeemed to lean over the balusters [the walls looking down] and see the little unbaptised Presbyterian and Roman Catholic children roasting in the red fires, don’t crowd; remember, others want to see, as well as you. And you must rub your hands together, and laugh a little, and let on to enjoy it; otherwise people will suspect you are not as good a Christian as you look… (emphasis mine)
This is the first religious piece I’ve written in nearly 5 years because, honestly, I’ve had little to say. After nearly 15 years in ministry, I had my fill of the cruel hands that named Christ as Lord, and the final straw was when it involved my wife and kids. I remember praying, begging Jesus to get me out of the pastorate and in a profession where my family is off limits (in the church, that is not the case). People ask if I’d ever go back and preach again of which I give a hardy, “NO.” Why would I do that to my wife and kids? The infamous fishbowl is a lonely and hot stage. No, we are happy as I teach and Angie works as a medical assistant. I’m sure some have wondered that my departure from the pulpit was a bit Jonah-esque, a called man running from his call, but if I’d stayed in much longer I would have ended up just like Sam Clemens—bitter, angry, and a skeptic. Instead, I have callused hands from holy work as C.S. Lewis would say and, hopefully, in time, those hands will soften.
Struggles in Faith, Part 2
I think many envision seminary as a monastic-like existence; silent, peaceful grounds dotted with men in contemplative prayer, or hunched over solitary desks interpreting ancient texts—a place of study and deep faith and… doubt.
At Dallas Theological Seminary, I crammed 4 years of study into 8 (an over-achiever, I am). During the course of those years I examined the mysteries of the Holy Trinity, the nature of man, and the eternal existence. I poured over all of Scripture, learning Greek and Hebrew, peering into Holy Writ in the language of its writers. Some days I strutted on campus, full of faith, eager to reach a dying world while on others, I lurched in doubt unsure of anything I believed. How much of the future does God know and control? If God is good and all powerful then why is His world dominated by evil? Are we free or is everything pre-determined? How does suffering factor in God’s plan? Or the “big kahuna” for me: did God cause the Holocaust or sit back flippantly and let it happen? Or was He unable to do anything? Or, even tougher, why did He let it continue? The more I sought answers, the more I wondered.
My struggle intensified when Winfred died. Winfred was a gifted student from Africa. He came, against all odds, to DTS to study Scripture in hopes to return to his tribe and translate the Bible into their language. He knew it was God’s will for him to be at DTS and he worked toward that end for his people. He was the epitome of a man on fire, burning to give his life for the mission of Christ. One evening on a dark Dallas street, a drunk driver weaved along and hit Winfred, killing him just blocks away from the seminary, extinguishing the bright flame.
When tragedies strike people like Winfred, we grope for answers, often finding silence. I remember debating a fellow pastor who constantly claimed that he knew God’s will for his life. I would cite Winfred as an example of our actual lack of knowledge. Winfred was just as godly and just as confident and Winfred was dead. I questioned everything. Is God’s will knowable? Does He still speak to us as so many of my mentors had claimed? Can His will be thwarted? Had Winfred been mistaken, or, had God led him to DTS to allow his life to be taken? For all my $50.00 questions, I received $5.00 answers. The only voice that seemed reasonable was one that had a British tone and a sharp wit. That voice belonged to the old Oxford professor, writer, and Christian apologist (defender), C.S. Lewis.
I heard the other day that comedian, Joy Behar, chided Sarah Palin about C.S. Lewis being her favorite writer, making light that the former Alaskan governor’s choice of literature was a children’s writer. Since the renewed popularity of The Chronicles of Narnia, I’m sure many people have made the same mistake in thinking that Lewis was this guy who did nothing but pen kid adventures. But that was only one a small facet to the man that everyone knew as “Jack.”
Lewis was an expert in Medieval Literature, teaching the subject in both Oxford and Cambridge. During World War 2, he was a regular voice on the BBC answering some of the toughest questions on God, Jesus Christ, and the plausibility of Christianity. The Chronicles actually made up a small portion of his writing, the other being books on faith, pain, and the defense of Christianity.
And although he had been dead since 1963, the former atheist turned Christian thinker became a major influence in saving my faith from failure—a kind of patron saint I’ve been able to lean on when the way of Christ was cloudy.
Lewis had a way of bringing things down to what was most important. He had no time for petty theological arguments or church debates, for Lewis it all came down to one issue… the person of Jesus Christ.
And during those dark nights of the soul, during those times when I hear yet another instance of church or pastoral corruption or I’m forced to face those “scary” Biblical passages which preachers have either skipped or divvied out silly, penny-ante solutions, I revisit some of Jack Lewis’ most powerful words on our Lord:
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to…We are faced, then, with a frightening alternative. This man we are talking about either was (and is) just what He said, or else a lunatic, or something worse. Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God. God has landed on this enemy-occupied world in human form.
Those words are my ground zero, pointing me back to what is most important, what and who is most real.
This is the second part of my blog where I have come clean, I took a chance and revealed my struggles in faith. So many responded to my musings on Twain and, honestly, I meant every word. There are times when I want to say that faith and church and spirituality are all bunk, especially when I see another hurt soul, devastated by misguided or even false Christianity.
But, in those dark moments I revisit those words of Lewis; I come back to Jesus. I realize that all of the other stuff: the debates (Creation or Evolution, Predestination or Free Will, and on and on and on) the fighting, the comparison we make with one another, and oh, the judging, is all noise—static, television snow. The real picture is the One who was called Christ, the One who was called, “The friend of sinners,” which is comforting, because I could always use a friend.
At Dallas Theological Seminary, I crammed 4 years of study into 8 (an over-achiever, I am). During the course of those years I examined the mysteries of the Holy Trinity, the nature of man, and the eternal existence. I poured over all of Scripture, learning Greek and Hebrew, peering into Holy Writ in the language of its writers. Some days I strutted on campus, full of faith, eager to reach a dying world while on others, I lurched in doubt unsure of anything I believed. How much of the future does God know and control? If God is good and all powerful then why is His world dominated by evil? Are we free or is everything pre-determined? How does suffering factor in God’s plan? Or the “big kahuna” for me: did God cause the Holocaust or sit back flippantly and let it happen? Or was He unable to do anything? Or, even tougher, why did He let it continue? The more I sought answers, the more I wondered.
My struggle intensified when Winfred died. Winfred was a gifted student from Africa. He came, against all odds, to DTS to study Scripture in hopes to return to his tribe and translate the Bible into their language. He knew it was God’s will for him to be at DTS and he worked toward that end for his people. He was the epitome of a man on fire, burning to give his life for the mission of Christ. One evening on a dark Dallas street, a drunk driver weaved along and hit Winfred, killing him just blocks away from the seminary, extinguishing the bright flame.
When tragedies strike people like Winfred, we grope for answers, often finding silence. I remember debating a fellow pastor who constantly claimed that he knew God’s will for his life. I would cite Winfred as an example of our actual lack of knowledge. Winfred was just as godly and just as confident and Winfred was dead. I questioned everything. Is God’s will knowable? Does He still speak to us as so many of my mentors had claimed? Can His will be thwarted? Had Winfred been mistaken, or, had God led him to DTS to allow his life to be taken? For all my $50.00 questions, I received $5.00 answers. The only voice that seemed reasonable was one that had a British tone and a sharp wit. That voice belonged to the old Oxford professor, writer, and Christian apologist (defender), C.S. Lewis.
I heard the other day that comedian, Joy Behar, chided Sarah Palin about C.S. Lewis being her favorite writer, making light that the former Alaskan governor’s choice of literature was a children’s writer. Since the renewed popularity of The Chronicles of Narnia, I’m sure many people have made the same mistake in thinking that Lewis was this guy who did nothing but pen kid adventures. But that was only one a small facet to the man that everyone knew as “Jack.”
Lewis was an expert in Medieval Literature, teaching the subject in both Oxford and Cambridge. During World War 2, he was a regular voice on the BBC answering some of the toughest questions on God, Jesus Christ, and the plausibility of Christianity. The Chronicles actually made up a small portion of his writing, the other being books on faith, pain, and the defense of Christianity.
And although he had been dead since 1963, the former atheist turned Christian thinker became a major influence in saving my faith from failure—a kind of patron saint I’ve been able to lean on when the way of Christ was cloudy.
Lewis had a way of bringing things down to what was most important. He had no time for petty theological arguments or church debates, for Lewis it all came down to one issue… the person of Jesus Christ.
And during those dark nights of the soul, during those times when I hear yet another instance of church or pastoral corruption or I’m forced to face those “scary” Biblical passages which preachers have either skipped or divvied out silly, penny-ante solutions, I revisit some of Jack Lewis’ most powerful words on our Lord:
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: "I'm ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don't accept His claim to be God." That is the one thing we must not say. A man who said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic--on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg--or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut Him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to…We are faced, then, with a frightening alternative. This man we are talking about either was (and is) just what He said, or else a lunatic, or something worse. Now it seems to me obvious that He was neither a lunatic nor a fiend: and consequently, however strange or terrifying or unlikely it may seem, I have to accept the view that He was and is God. God has landed on this enemy-occupied world in human form.
Those words are my ground zero, pointing me back to what is most important, what and who is most real.
This is the second part of my blog where I have come clean, I took a chance and revealed my struggles in faith. So many responded to my musings on Twain and, honestly, I meant every word. There are times when I want to say that faith and church and spirituality are all bunk, especially when I see another hurt soul, devastated by misguided or even false Christianity.
But, in those dark moments I revisit those words of Lewis; I come back to Jesus. I realize that all of the other stuff: the debates (Creation or Evolution, Predestination or Free Will, and on and on and on) the fighting, the comparison we make with one another, and oh, the judging, is all noise—static, television snow. The real picture is the One who was called Christ, the One who was called, “The friend of sinners,” which is comforting, because I could always use a friend.
