C.S. Lewis The Great Divorce
“’Your thirst shall be quenched.’ ‘Well, really, you know, I am not aware of a thirst for some ready-made truth which puts an end to intellectual activity in the way you seem to be describing. Will it leave me the free play of Mind, Dick? I must insist on that, you know.’ ‘Free, as a man is free to drink while he is drinking. He is not free still to be dry.’”
I love this passage from The Great Divorce because it reminds me of our society. We get this feeling as if we are free to do whatever we want at any time. This thought is very sobering if meditated upon. Freedom comes at a price. Like Lewis is saying, it is literally impossible to be free in both of those ways. You cannot be dry while drinking. This is a parallel to Christianity in that when you accept Christ there are a few things that you are no longer to be free to do. For example, the Bible says that whoever is a friend of the world is an enemy of God (James 4:4). This shows the freedom dichotomy. A Christian is cannot be a friend of the world because that would make them enemies of God. It is literally impossible to be both.
No comments:
Post a Comment