Articles - God

   The 80th anniversary of the atomic bomb attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, respectively (August 6 and 9, 1945) have caused me to again give thought to a 1948 C. S. Lewis essay. Titled “On Living in an Atomic Age,” the essay appeared in an annual magazine, Informed Reading (vol. 6, 1948, pp. 78-84). Today, it can be found in the book Present Concerns, which contains nineteen Lewis essays, edited by the late Walter Hooper.

   Early in the atomic bomb essay, Lewis asked the following questions: “What were your views about the ultimate future of civilisation before the atomic bomb appeared on the scene? What did you think all this effort of humanity was to come to in the end?”

   I am giving thought to the content of a song I first heard on Christmas Eve more than 40 years ago. The year was either 1982 or 1983. The impact of the words and their implications are evident whether it was the former or the latter year.

   In 1955, my father and mother opened what eventually became a successful florist business. Following Dad’s death in 1977, mother continued the ownership and operation of the business until her retirement in 2004. She passed away in 2019. Both of my parents are greatly missed. However, though Christian hope is undeserved, “but by the grace of God” (cf. 1 Corinthians 15:10), it is “as an anchor of the soul, both sure and steadfast” (Hebrews 6:19-20).

   When Alexander Campbell received the news of the death of Walter Scott, his “much beloved and esteemed” friend, he wrote a memorial tribute to Scott. Early in his literary tribute, Campbell stated, “Next to my father, he was my most cordial and indefatigable fellow laborer.” The piece was published in the May 1861 issue of The Millennial Harbinger for which Campbell served as Editor (1830-1864).

   God has established on Earth three ongoing institutions for the physical, moral, and spiritual well being of humanity. These institutions are 1) marriage and family founded in the heterosexual monogamous relationship, 2) civil government, and 3) the New Testament church. Furthermore, God has provided in the Sacred Scriptures, consisting of the Old and New Testaments, the revelation of content which includes divine principles that guide relationships within each of the above institutions (cf. Psalm 19:1-14; 2 Peter 1:2-21; 3:14-16; et al.). Correct thinking results in respect for these institutions and leads to honoring God’s revealed principles that guide and strengthen the institutions (cf. Genesis 2:18-24; Matthew 19:4-12; Ephesians 5:21-6:4; Mark 12:17; Romans 13:1-7; Proverbs 14:34; 29:1; 1 Peter 2:13-17; Matthew 16:13-18; 1 Timothy 3:14-15, et al.).

Consider the remarkable words of Jesus Christ spoken to the disciples of the Pharisees who were sent with some Herodians to entangle (Matthew 22:15, NKJ) Jesus in His talk; i.e., “to catch [Him] in a trap, to acquire information about an error or fault, with the purpose of causing harm, to catch [Him] off guard, to catch [Him] in a mistake” (Rogers and Rogers 49-50). Luke wrote, “. . . [T]hey watched Him and sent spies [“their disciples with the Herodians,” cf. Matthew 22:16] who pretended to be righteous, that they might seize on His words in order to deliver Him to the power and the authority of the governor. It was the last week of Jesus’ life on Earth before He was crucified on Friday. Luke summarizes what was happening: “And He was teaching daily in the temple. But the chief priests, the scribes, and the leaders of the people sought to destroy Him, and were unable to do anything, for all the people were very attentive to hear Him” [“were hanging on His words,” ESV] (Luke 19:48, NKJ).

      Mortally wounded, a soldier was lying on the battlefield. Realizing the end was near, a chaplain bent over the wounded young man and said, “My boy, you are slipping away. Shall I pray for you?” The soldier replied, “Yes, pray this prayer—‘I thank’—and, as those words were spoken, pain gripped the soldier, and he withered in agony. Moments later, as the pain began to subside, the soldier resumed speaking and said, “I thank thee God for my Mother and Dad.”

A while back, President George W. Bush released his book of memoirs titled, Decision Points. Each chapter of the book concerns some point of major decision in his life or presidency. Borrowing from his terminology, I suggest that “Decision Point” sums up the basic message of a passage from the Old Testament prophet Joel which says, “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision! For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision” (Joel 3:14). The statement is located in the context of an announcement of the judgment of God in time, and at the end of time. I believe Aebi to be correct in his conclusion that this “is [1] primarily descriptive of Pentecost, in which the gospel by which people are judged began to be preached; then [2] it is descriptive of the any judgments of God throughout the Christian era, and [3] finally descriptive of the day of judgment at the end of the world” (75).

In his 1948 essay titled “On Living in an Atomic Age,” C. S. Lewis wrote, “If Nature is all that exists—in other words, if there is no God and no life of some quite different sort somewhere outside Nature—then all will end in the same way. . . . [But] Nature is not the only thing that exists. . . . And that explains why we do not feel at home here. A fish feels at home in the water. If we ‘belonged here’ we should feel at home here” (Present Concerns, 93, 99). Lewis called this “the tyranny . . . of time” (Reflections, 201), by which he meant that “we are so little reconciled to time that we are even astonished at it! ‘How he’s grown!’ we exclaim, ‘How time flies!’ . . . It is as strange as if a fish were repeatedly surprised at the wetness of water. And that would be strange indeed; unless of course the fish were destined to become, one day, a land animal” (201).