I thought I would write a few journals tonight since it has been a little while from the previous one. There hasn't been any crazy things that have changed or happened since the last time I wrote a journal online, but I thought I would try to stay in touch with anyone who reads this thing. I have been reading a book called "A Grief Observed" by C.S. Lewis and so the few different thoughts I have for you to read come from this book.
May 3rd, 2010
"We were even told, 'Blessed are they that mourn,' and I accepted it. I've got nothing that I hadn't bargained for. Of course it is different when the thing happens to oneself, not to others, and in reality, not in imagination. Yes; but should it, for a sane man, make quite such a difference as this? No. And it wouldn't for a man whose faith had been real faith and whose concern for other people's sorrows had been real concern. The case is too plain. If my house has collapsed at one blow, that is because it was a house of cards. The faith which 'took these things into account' was not faith but imagination. The taking them into account was not real sympathy. If I had really cared, as I thought I did, about the sorrows of the world, I should not have been so overwhelmed when my own sorrow came. It has been an imaginary faith playing with innocuous counters labelled 'Illness,' 'Pain,' 'Death,' and 'Loneliness.' I thought I trusted the rope until it mattered to me whether it would bear me. Now it matters, and I find I didn't. Bridge players tell me that there must be some money on the game 'or else people won't take it seriously.' Apparently it's like that. Your bid- for God or no God, for a good God or the Cosmic Sadist, for eternal life or nonentity- will not be serious if nothing much is staked on it. And you will never discover how serious it was until the stakes are raised horribly high, until you find that you are playing not for counters or for sixpences but for every penny you have in the world. Nothing less will shake a man- or at any rate a man like me- out of his merely verbal thinking and his merely notional beliefs. He has to be knocked silly before he comes to his senses. Only torture will bring out the truth. Only under torture does he discover it himself."
There were many things about this particular reading that struck me. One of the things that stuck out from above was the talk about the bridge players only playing with money because they want to take it seriously and having something on the line is the only way most people will be serious about anything. I wonder how many of us walk throughout this life like the bridge players who don't lay any money down. There is nothing to lose...nothing also to gain...just playing it safe. If I win...then I win; and if I lose...I lose. This game really doesn't matter...I am just having some fun here...I'm still warming up. The thing about the game of life- really- is this...EVERYTHING is on the line! This game does matter!
May 1st, 2010
"On any view whatever, to say, 'H. is dead,' is to say, 'All is gone.' It is a part of the past. And the past is the past and that is what time means, and time itself is one more name for death, and Heaven itself is a state where 'the former things have passed away.'" "A Grief Observed" C.S. Lewis
Becoming a Christ- follower allows us to be transformed into new creatures. At this point, we constantly transform each day- by growing in faith and Christ- likeness- into new creatures. With each new transformation, that part of you dies and Christ is allowed to live in that part of you. When death occures, I believe another total transformation takes place and brings you to a place of total perfection. You are finally what you were intended to be. But, in order to be what you were intended to be, the part of you that isn't you has to die. I believe this is why death has to happen...there is something that is a part of you needing to change- in order to make you who you were meant to be- but it can't occur while you're still here. If only we could see Kaydence the way she was meant to be- maybe we wouldn't miss her as much...or maybe we still would. Thanks again for all your prayers and support out there. The strength of God working through His church is simply amazing!
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