Mr. Lewis has been the avenue in which God has chosen to speak to me (or perhaps the avenue I am able to hear God) many times. Today I stumbled across a few good thoughts that Lewis says much better than I could ever dream:

“‘Are you not thirsty?’ said the Lion. ‘I’m dying of thirst’ said Jill. ‘Then drink,’ said the Lion. ‘May I — could I — would you mind going away while I do?,’ said Jill. The Lion answered this only by a look and a very low growl. And as Jill gazed at its motionless bulk, she realized that she might as well have asked the whole mountain to move aside for her convenience.

The delicious rippling noise of the stream was driving her nearly frantic. ‘Will you promise not to — do anything to me, if I do come?,’ said Jill. ‘I make no promise,’ said the Lion. Jill was so thirsty now that, without noticing it, she had come a step nearer.

‘Do you eat girls?,’ she said. ‘I have swallowed up girls and boys, women and men, kings and emperors, cities and realms,’ said the Lion. It didn’t say this as if it were boasting, nor as if it were sorry, nor as if it were angry. It just said it.

‘I daren’t come and drink,’ said Jill. ‘Then you will die of thirst,’ said the Lion. ‘Oh dear!,’ said Jill, coming another step nearer. ‘I suppose I must go and look for another stream then.’

‘There is no other stream,’ said the Lion.”

The Silver Chair — Chapter 2

There are so many things this excerpt could mean… I love the idea that we want the good things in this life and they are certainly from God but we must commit ourselves to God to have them, to wholly have them. That is scary sometimes to really commit ourselves to God. It is dangerous because it does not seem logical to open ourselves up to the possibility of pain.

I’m not making any sense but again C.S. Lewis puts my thoughts into words (much more elegantly then I know how):

“The Christian way is different: harder and easier. Christ says, ‘Give me All. I don’t want so much of your time and so much of your money and so much of your work: I want you. I have not come to torment your natural self, but to kill it. No half-measures are any good. I don’t want to cut off a branch here and there. I want to have the whole tree down. I don’t want to drill the tooth, or crown it, or stop it, but to have it out. Hand over the whole natural self, all the desires which you think innocent as well as the ones you think wicked–the whole outfit. I will give you a new self instead. In fact, I will give you My-self: my own will shall become yours.'”

Mere Christianity — Chapter 8

What a thought, we are to surrender ourselves (both what we think the good and the bad) so that we may have a new self. This new self is not even our own, it is His; it is Him.

What a good God.

Selah