Aliens

Today in Sunday school, the teacher read an excerpt from C.S. Lewis’ “Mere Christianity”. I had read it before, but once again found it very interesting. Lewis is writing about a Christian’s hope for heaven and eternity while he or she is on earth. So often I forget that  earth is only temporary and that my focus and hope should not be in this earth or the pleasure I can find here. I was made for something greater. On pages 135 and 136, Lewis writes:

“Most of us find it very difficult to want ‘Heaven’ at all – except in so far as ‘Heaven’ means meeting again our friends who have died. One reason for this difficulty is that we have not been trained: our whole education tends to fix our minds on this world. Another reason is that when the real want for Heaven is present in us, we do not recognize it. Most people, if they had really learned to look into their own hearts, would know that they do want, and want acutely, something that cannot be had in this world. There are all sorts of things in this world that offer to give it to you, but they never quite keep their promise.”

Lewis goes on to state that there is only one correct way to respond to this truth:


“The Christian Way –The Christian says, ‘Creatures are not born with desires unless satisfaction for those desires exists. A baby feels hunger: well, there is such a thing as food. A duckling wants to swim: well, there is such a thing as water. Men feel sexual desire: well, there is such a thing as sex. If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world. If none of my earthly pleasures satisfy it, that does not prove that the universe is a fraud. Probably earthly pleasures were never meant to satisfy it, but only to arouse it, to suggest the real thing. If that is so, I must take care, on the one hand, never to despise, or be unthankful for, these earthly blessings, and on the other, never mistake them for the something else of which they are only a kind of copy, or echo, or mirage. I must keep alive in myself the desire for my true country, which I shall not find till after death; I must never let it get snowed under or turned aside; I must make it the main object of life to press on to that other country and to help others to do the same.’”

I know this is a rather long excerpt, but I thought it was so good I wanted to share it. So much of what I’m searching for here on earth can only be found in the character of God and in Heaven, my eternal home. I’ve realized lately how earthly focused I am, and how much more heavenly focused I need to be. As Lewis states, “I was made for another world”.