7
Apologists Every Christian Should Know PART 1
C. S. Lewis Must-Reads
H I G H E R T H I N G S __ 12
Mere Christianity: An absolute classic. ————————— The Screwtape Letters: Belief in the devil is hardly old fashioned. ————————— The Great Divorce: The doors of hell are locked from the inside. ————————— Miracles: Confronts modern arguments against the supernatural. (Heady but worth it.) ————————— The Chronicles of Narnia (starting with The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe): For kids and adults alike. ————————— For the most recent, helpful book on what we can learn from Lewis, see Alister McGrath, Deep Magic, Dragons, and Talking Mice: How Reading C. S. Lewis Can Change Your Life.
The Lasting Legacy of C.S. Lewis:
Why Imaginative Imagine a world in which it is always winter
but never Christmas. Imagine a place where Deep Magic from the dawn of time requires the blood of the guilty to be shed. Imagine a story where the hero is an all-powerful lifegiving Being who enters this dark wintry realm and humbly accepts the punishment of death on behalf of his enemy . . . yet because of the Deeper Magic from before the dawn of time, this selfless sacrificial act ends up redeeming the whole world while the hero himself does not remain dead but astonishingly comes back to life. Sound familiar? Welcome to Narnia...or...to the real world and the Christian faith. Though not all the details line up, at their core The Chronicles of Narnia are a sort of retelling of the Incarnation. It is C. S. Lewis’ wonderful attempt to teach us that the story of Christ is more vibrant, accessible, engaging, and meaningful than perhaps we ever realized. And this goes for unbelievers, too. Those who think they despise Jesus often love Aslan, who is just about the most obvious Christ-figure there is. And those who are outraged or bored by the Bible can sometimes be found reading (and re-reading) the narrative of Narnia well beyond childhood. Why is this? What did Lewis manage to do so well that is done poorly or not at all by many Christians—even many apologists—when presenting and defending the faith? In short, the writings of C. S. Lewis effectively engage the imagination. dragons Sneaking Past Watchful Dragons There is much to be said for a robust, tough-minded, intellectually satisfying Christianity. We want reasons to believe God exists and evidence that the biblical events really happened. Lewis agreed with this, and made many clear and rational arguments in favor of the truths of Scripture. But
this alone is not the reason for his immense popularity and success as an apologist. Indeed, even a faith founded on facts can leave a person unfulfilled. Lewis, therefore, repeatedly appealed to the human imagination as a way to help his audience grasp and absorb the meaning of the gospel message. Because it’s not enough that it’s true— it also needs to be for you. “Imagination” here does not refer to wishful thinking or mere creativity. Rather, it identifies the meaning of something even before judging it as true or false. It is in this sense that Lewis sought to “steal past those watchful dragons” of the modern mind that are so quick to dismiss claims about Jesus as outdated or unscientific before considering what they mean. Lewis thus saw it as his calling to point out the unmatched imaginative qualities of the Christian story. It is a message so profound that it is able to change the way we see ourselves and our entire world. It resonates with our suspicions that there is something more to life than what our own experiences can teach us. And if true, the Christian story, the Gospel in particular, can ultimately satisfy the desires of our hearts like no other story.
