Memorial Day Meditation

May 26, 2025May 24, 2025Todd R 5 Comments

In an essay in The Weight of Glory[1], C.S. Lewis wrote: “the sun looks down on nothing half so good as a household laughing together over a meal, or two friends talking over a pint of beer, or a man alone reading a book that interests him.” As we celebrate Memorial Day here in the United States, I pray you can enjoy what matters most to you and give thanks for others who sacrificed to made it possible.

In the same essay, Lewis says “all economies, politics, laws, armies, and institutions, save insofar as they prolong and multiply such scenes, are a mere ploughing the sand and sowing the ocean.” These cannot deliver our salvation, yet they are absolutely necessary in this life. These institutions have “no higher end than to facilitate and safeguard the family, and friendship, and solitude.” Therefore, give thanks whenever peace and fellowship are possible, and pray for those living in places where they are not.

The essay also includes this quote: “do not let us mistake necessary evils for good.” What did Lewis mean? That when things that exist to provide “family, and friendship, and solitude” become an end in themselves “what was undertaken for the sake of health has become itself a new and deadly disease.” While these things are absolutely needed, we should think of them “only in order to be able to think of something else.” On the other hand, “a sick society must think much about politics.” Therefore, give thanks for those who faithfully serve, and for preservation of the freedoms you enjoy.

Most importantly on Memorial Day, give thanks for those who gave up their lives so those they left behind could enjoy “family, and friendship, and solitude.” Without their sacrifice, we could not celebrate Memorial Day, or any other day. “Great sacrifices of this private happiness by those who have it may be necessary in order that it may be more widely distributed.”

Jesus said: “Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.” (John 15:13) As He gave His life for you, pray also for the ability, willingness, and freedom to sacrifice your own time and talents for others.

[1] Lewis, C.S. The Weight of Glory (1941). P. 161-162.

Strength in Trials: A Quint of Quotes

February 25, 2025February 24, 2025Todd R 3 Comments

Dear fellow travelers,

Here is another “Quint of Quotes” from my collection, on the theme of suffering and trials:

“God had one Son without sin; but He has no son without temptation.” – Charles Spurgeon, on Luke 11:4

“When God permits His children to go through the furnace, He keeps His eye on the clock and His hand on the thermostat.” – Warren Wiersbe, on 1 Peter 1:6-7

“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: It is His megaphone to rouse a deaf world.” – C.S. Lewis, in The Problem of Pain

“Some things in the economy of grace are measured; for instance our vinegar and gall are given us with such exactness that we never have a single drop too much, but of the salt of grace no stint is made” – Charles Spurgeon

“Cheer up; you’re a lot worse off than you think you are, but in Jesus you’re far more loved than you could have ever imagined.” – Jack Miller

Popular Opinion: A Quint of Quotes

November 5, 2024Todd R 1 Comment

Dear fellow travelers,

Here is another “Quint of Quotes” from my collection, five quotes on the theme of popular opinion when it goes wrong:

“Those who call for Nonsense will find that it comes.” – C.S. Lewis

“We find that whole communities suddenly fix their minds upon one object, and go mad in its pursuit; that millions of people become simultaneously impressed with one delusion, and run after it, till their attention is caught by some new folly more captivating than the first.” – Charles Mackay

“The struggle for freedom is ultimately not resistance to autocrats or oligarchs but resistance to the despotism of public opinion.” – Ludwig von Mises

“At any given moment there is an orthodoxy, a body of ideas of which it is assumed that all right-thinking people will accept without question. It is not exactly forbidden to say this, that or the other, but it is “not done” to say it… Anyone who challenges the prevailing orthodoxy finds himself silenced with surprising effectiveness. A genuinely unfashionable opinion is almost never given a fair hearing, either in the popular press or in the high-brow periodicals.” – George Orwell

“Woe to those who call evil good
            and good evil,
who put darkness for light
            and light for darkness,
who put bitter for sweet
            and sweet for bitter!” – Isaiah 5:20

When We Are Faithful, All Failure is Temporary

September 6, 2024September 5, 2024Todd R 2 Comments

In the Marvel movie Avengers: Infinity War, Doctor Strange uses a powerful Time Stone to watch millions of possible future outcomes and find one where the Avengers win. The solution involves huge, almost unconscionable losses, including giving the villain, Thanos, exactly what he needs to commit genocide. The movie was part one of two, and the second wasn’t released until a full year later. Infinity War ends with Thanos victorious, and audiences had to wait to see if Strange’s decisions and sacrifices would work. Would the trust the Avengers put in him be rewarded and lead to their deliverance? It didn’t look good at the time, and it was actually a pretty grim movie.

Marvel’s story had cast Strange in the role of a prophet, except that Strange himself saw the future, and decided himself what to report back to the others, who had to trust what he said he saw, his judgement in what to share, and be willing to stick with it no matter what. In the Old Testament, Jeremiah’s call from God to be a prophet in Jeremiah 1:8-10 has some interesting comparisons with Marvel’s story line. The verses are:

“Do not be afraid of them,
            for I am with you to deliver you, declares the LORD.
Then the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth. And the LORD said to me,
            “Behold, I have put my words in your mouth.
See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms,
            to pluck up and to break down,
            to destroy and to overthrow,
            to build and to plant.”

Unlike Doctor Strange, Jeremiah did not have the big picture; he could not pick and choose what to say. God would “put…words in your mouth,” words specifically chosen from perfect and infinite knowledge to be exactly what was needed. Strange was able to act on his plan, although the others didn’t understand and resisted. In Jeremiah’s case, Israel did not listen to him, and God actually told Jeremiah they wouldn’t, but he prophesied anyway. He was created for that purpose, and in the verses above he was assured to “not be afraid of them.”

While Strange promised that his plan would work, we had to wait for the sequel to see it. God promised Jeremiah, who also told the people, that his plan would work, and that the words God gave Jeremiah would determine the fates of “nations” and “kingdoms”, who God would “pluck up” and “break down.” But Jeremiah died waiting for the sequel. During his lifetime, Israel was plucked up by the Babylonians and sent into exile as punishment for their rejection of God, which was also a rejection of Jeremiah. His life was like a pretty grim movie, but his story was not finished, as we now know.

In his lifetime Jeremiah may have looked like a failure, but in the years after and in eternity, his work as a prophet and also his personal experience of God has provided invaluable lessons for millions. God knew this from the beginning because He didn’t have to wait a year to see the sequel. He has already seen them all. Therefore, we can trust what He sees, His judgement in what to share, and be willing to stick with it no matter what, because His story and ours does not end in this lifetime.

“It is not your business to succeed, but to do right. When you have done so the rest lies with God.” – C. S. Lewis

(Prior posts on Jeremiah’s call are here and here)

Will Green Be Greener in Paradise?

August 2, 2024August 1, 2024Todd R Leave a comment

Psalm 98:7 declares: “Let the sea roar, and all that fills it; the world and those who dwell in it!” In Romans 8:19 Paul adds that “the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the sons of God.”

Pastor James Montgomery Boice connects these ideas and says, “The world will one day be renewed.” Nature already shows God’s glory, but it also, like mankind, is not yet as it shall be. Boice adds: “I think of the way C.S. Lewis developed this idea in The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. In the first section of that book, when Narnia was under the power of the wicked Witch of the North, the land was in a state of perpetual winter. Spring never came. But when Aslan rose from the dead, the ice began to melt, flowers bloomed, and the trees turned green.”[1] Creation shares the hope of mankind – regeneration in a future paradise at the coming of its Lord!

Even now, we get an occasional glimpse of nature that’s somehow better than what we’re used to, and perhaps it is a glimpse of the paradise beyond the renewal of all things. We were recently in Wales, on Mount Snowdon and a nearby trail in Llanberis, and below are some pictures from that day. Some of these show the many brilliant shades of green, which seemed more glorious than the greens near our home in the U.S. We don’t often see rocks interact with the greenery like this here.

So, will paradise be even greener than this? Will it seem like a perpetual winter has finally lifted? I’m eagerly waiting to find out someday. In the meantime, enjoy these: