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well two famous men died on November the
22nd 1963 the one in the most dramatic
way possible assassinated on the streets
of Dallas and full glare of publicity
the second in a much quieter way dying
in the upstairs room of his little home
on the outskirts of Oxford England
obviously john f kennedy's impact in the
culture has been enormous but i do
wonder now 50 years after their deaths
if CS Lewis's impact has not been even
greater at the time of his death
he was 65 when he died Lewis's
reputation was on the wane but in the
year since his death it's been
extraordinary revival of Lewis this
Turner evoke he's enjoyed as two
generations now have discovered his
literary criticism his novels but
especially his very clever and very
insightful Christian apologetics now
what explains Lewis's success as an
apologist and an evangelist I see first
of all something in his personal story
appeals to a lot of people today because
CS Lewis moved from dramatic non-belief
to belief he was born and raised a
Christian but it kind of lost his faith
by the time he entered the university
and so he had to go through a very
painful halting anguish struggle from
non belief to believe he was not someone
for whom religious faith came easily or
readily he had to battle his way to it I
think that makes him very appealing to a
lot of folks today who are going through
the same kind of struggle and trial but
the second reason why CS Lewis was so
effective as an evangelist and that was
he came at Christianity primarily as a
literary figure rather than as a
philosophical figure now I want to be
careful here because Lewis certainly was
a very smart man and new philosophy and
used us sometimes very creatively in his
apologetic work look at parts of
mere christianity or look at his
discussion in his book on miracles so he
didn't know how to use philosophy
nevertheless he was primarily a man of
letters keep in mind his first published
works were works of poetry his own
writing and then in his professional
life as a professor at Oxford Cambridge
he was a specialist in sixteenth and
seventeenth century literature in fact
one of his really great books is a
treatment of Milton they poet I think
was this literary approach that enabled
them to see something of tremendous
importance namely that Christianity is
primarily a story it's a narrative it's
the narrative of these great things that
God has done from creation through the
choosing of people Israel through the
sending of the Messiah and the
achievement of salvation
certainly abstract doctrine can be
distilled from the biblical story and
that's really much of what theology is
I've spent most of my life studying that
distillation but Lewis intuited
correctly that fundamentally at bottom
Christianity is a great story the way he
would put it is the story of creation
which is good sullied by sin and now
restored through the return of the
rightful king that's the narrative
rhythm if you want of Christianity and
once you see that you see it everywhere
in CS Lewis's writings again look at
mere christianity one of the real
masterpieces of christian apologetics
there he sees precisely this rhythm we
don't have a dualistic view of good
versus evil you have a good creation
which has become compromised but it's
through the return of God as the
rightful king that the world is set
right that's why he says it's a line
I've always savored that the Christ
child appears so quietly and
clandestinely in this little outpost of
the Roman Empire because he had to slip
quietly behind enemy lines
that's ingredient in this fundamentally
narrative understanding of Christianity
look at it - in the wonderful and much
celebrated Narnia chronicles in that -
fantasy story narnia is a fundamentally
good place but has come under the thrall
of the white witch who was now reduced
into a permanent winter time how is it
restored well through the return of
Aslan this great lion who's the Christ
figure who gives his life that the land
might be restored what is that but the
story of The Return of the King and then
bring it down to a much more kind of
pedestrian level the wonderful Screwtape
Letters telling the story of how a very
ordinary Christian is tormented by a
low-level devil what is that but the
story of this conflict the spiritual
conflict
what gives Louis the confidence to mock
the devil in that book is his confidence
that Christ has already won this great
battle so it all this is writings you
can see the same rhythm by the way you
see the same thing in toking as
well-known lewis and tokine were both
members of this writers group called the
Inklings that met on a very regular
basis for a couple of decades they read
their works to each other and Tolkien
too saw this same rhythm where you have
now a fundamentally good middle-earth
but under the influence of Sauron this
dark power symbolic of the devil and
then you have the Return of the King
Aragorn is through the return of the
king and his conquest of the dark powers
that the land is renewed not to mention
is I've argued before Frodo is a symbol
of Christ the priest just as Gandalf is
a symbol of Christ the prophet and
there's Aragorn the king and see what
both these men were doing and Lois I
mean very much here they were trying to
evangelize the imagination they wanted
to prepare the imaginations of their
readers for the reception of this great
story of of Christianity that's why
something I find wonderful and very
moving that in the last what 10 years or
so the most popular movies in the world
are
the movies based upon Lord of the Rings
and the Narnia chronicles stories that
were invented by these of Daanish
Christian gentleman in the back room of
a pub in Oxford these stories have
become the most popular of films in the
world that can only be described it
seems to me as a triumph of
evangelization but in this beautifully
surreptitious way that's I think part of
CS Lewis's legacy you know something
that the postmodern philosophers talk
about a lot is the fact that you don't
really convince people by arguing them
argument is kind of going through a
tough period right now you conquer a
position by out there rating it but we
have is own words competing narratives
think of communism as a great narrative
or even capitalism is a great narrative
how do you battle an opposing narrative
like secularism for example you have to
out narrate it you have to tell a better
story a more compelling story I think
with CS Lewis knew and his bones was
Christianity is the greatest story ever
told and that's despite all of the
excesses and sins of Christians up and
down the centuries we all know about
that Lewis knew about it he knew about
his own weakness personally nevertheless
Christianity is the greatest story ever
told
CS Lewis told it with a particular verb
and bravado and incisiveness and panache
and because of that it's all together
well and good that we celebrate him on
the fiftieth anniversary of his death
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