The Beautiful Above
Book Club | Mere Christianity: Book 3 (chap. 8-12)
Pride. Charity. Hope. Faith.
These are the grand ideas of this last section, bringing Book 3 to a close.
I was wandering around New York City last week, and I came upon a church with it’s doors open. I peeked inside to find a sign that welcomed visitors to look around and take pictures if they’d like. I obliged.
My eyes were immediately drawn up. The floors and the pews and even the lower section of the pillars were not where my attention was meant to be drawn—the building was calling me to look up.
“as long as you are looking down, you cannot see something that is above you.” (p. 124)
Lewis says this is the proud man: a person always looking down on things and people. And, he says, “as long as you are proud you cannot know God.”
The architecture and design of this church was intentional. It’s purpose was to direct our attention from what is below to what is above. Why?
Because what is above is beautiful. What is above is higher. What is above is worthy of our attention. It is trying to teach us something: God is beautiful beyond measure, God is higher than all else, God is worthy of our undivided attention. To know this deeply is freedom and joy.
But as long as we are looking down—consumed by our pride—we cannot see what is above:
“the Lord sitting upon a throne, high and lifted up; and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2 Above him stood the seraphim. Each had six wings: with two he covered his face, and with two he covered his feet, and with two he flew. 3 And one called to another and said:
“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts;
the whole earth is full of his glory!” (Isaiah 6:1b-3)
“The real test of being in the presence of God is, that you either forget about yourself altogether or see yourself as a small, dirty object. It is better to forget about yourself altogether.” (p. 125)
The “test” Lewis makes a case for here proves true for Isaiah:
“5 And I said: “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Isaiah 6:5)
Isaiah doesn’t experience the “better” of the two options, he experiences the seeing “yourself as a small, dirty object.” In the face of Holy God, Isaiah sees his true state: hopeless, lost, sinful, unclean.
It is this sort of experience which Lewis says must be had to kill our pride and foster it’s antithesis: humility. To realize we are sinful and prideful, we must catch a glimpse of the One who is sinless and prideless—the Perfectly Holy One, high above us. After this, God can get to work in us.
6 Then one of the seraphim flew to me, having in his hand a burning coal that he had taken with tongs from the altar. 7 And he touched my mouth and said: “Behold, this has touched your lips; your guilt is taken away, and your sin atoned for.”
8 And I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, and who will go for us?” Then I said, “Here I am! Send me.” 9 And he said, “Go, and say to this people…” (Isaiah 6:6-9a)
Isaiah sees the High & Holy God. Isaiah confesses his sin. God atones for Isaiah’s sin. God needs a servant for His mission. A humbled, forgiven Isaiah volunteers. God uses him.
Isaiah transitions from painfully aware of himself in the presence of Pure Goodness to one of those Lewis describes at the end of chapter 12: people not thinking of whether they are good or not—people not thinking of themselves at all—for “they are too busy looking at the source from which it comes.” (p. 150)
To be free from pride, trying to elevate self, degrading others—to forget yourself because you are completely capture by Another. This is freedom. This is rest.
I want to enter more and more into that freedom. I see where pride captures me now, see it even more clearly after reading Lewis’ chapter on it, and want it eliminated. I want to forget myself and be captured by the Source of goodness.
Lewis goes on to talk of love and charity. How a person’s feelings, natural likings, and moods don’t “cut them out from the chance, or excuse them from the duty, of learning charity. The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbor, act as if you did.” (p. 130)
Our natural dispositions, personalities and temperaments do not excuse us from faithfulness to God’s word. Just because a person isn’t particularly social doesn’t mean they don’t have to engage in church life & just because a person has a high capacity and likes to engage socially doesn’t mean they are excused from rest, private meditation, and personal devotion to God. In Life Together, Bonhoeffer says along these lines:
“Let him who cannot be alone beware of community... Let him who is not in community beware of being alone... Each by itself has profound perils and pitfalls. One who wants fellowship without solitude plunges into the void of words and feelings, and the one who seeks solitude without fellowship perishes in the abyss of vanity, self-infatuation and despair.”
Christian obedience requires a properly balanced pursuit of faithfulness. This is another way we are called to forget ourselves—faithfulness regardless of one’s feelings, moods, convenience, or temperament.
This is faith and hope: to love the Lord God with all of our selves, regardless of how we feel, keeping our eyes fixed on the eternal joy He has promised is coming.
This is charity: to love our neighbor as ourselves, even when we don’t “feel” that love for them.
May we keep the eyes of our hearts up, gazing eternally at the Beautiful Above.
Lots more to say, but I’ll stop there.
Your turn:
Lewis says on p. 127, “we shall not be well so long as we love and admire anything more than we love and admire God.” Are there things you’re loving and admiring more than God? Sobering question.
Lewis says in chapter 8 that pride leads to every other kind of vice and that it is the “anti-God” state of mind. Do you agree with those claims?
Where does pride have a grip on you? How could you begin rooting it out?
What do you think of Lewis’ theory in chapter 10 of the unsatiated longings of our hearts actually being longings for something we can only get in another world?
Did the relationship between faith and works in chapter 12 makes sense?
Share your thoughts in the comments!