Lewis: beauty as an anesthetic

Thursday, May 3, 2018
Meditation:
    As the rain and the snow come down from heaven, and do not return to it without watering the earth and making it bud and flourish, so that it yields seed for the sower and bread for the eater, so is my word that goes out from my mouth: It will not return to me empty, but will accomplish what I desire and achieve the purpose for which I sent it.
    —Isaiah 55:10-11 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We must sometimes get away from the Authorized Version, if for no other reason, simply because it is so beautiful and so solemn. Beauty exalts, but beauty also lulls. Early associations endear but they also confuse. Through that beautiful solemnity, the transporting or horrifying realities of which the Book tells may come to us blunted and disarmed, and we may only sigh with tranquil veneration when we ought to be burning with shame or struck dumb with terror or carried out of ourselves by ravishing hopes and adorations.
    ... C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), included in Letters to young churches, J. B. Phillips, Macmillan, 1960, preface, p. vii (see the book)
    See also Isa. 55:10-11; Deut. 32:2; Matt. 24:35; John 6:63; Rom. 10:17; 1 Thess. 2:13; 5:19; 2 Pet. 1:20-21
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, let my heart be swept away by Your word. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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