C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkien: Ultimate Reality & The Purpose of Life
“’You would not have called to me unless I had been calling to you,’ said the Lion.” -C.S. Lewis
” No one can come to Me, unless the Father who has sent Me draws them; and I will raise them up at the Last Day.” -John 6:44
“No half-heartedness and no worldly fear must turn us aside from following the light unflinchingly.” -J.R.R. Tolkien
Ultimate Reality: "In the Blink of an Eye..."
“God cannot give us a happiness and peace apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.” -C.S. Lewis
“Even the smallest person can change the course of the future.” -J.R.R. Tolkien
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“And such were some of you: but you are washed, but you are sanctified, but you are justified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of our God.” -1 Corinthians 6:11
Salvation – Our Justification:
“As it is appointed to everyone to die once, and after this the judgment; so Christ was offered once, to bear our sins. And He shall return, appearing to all who wait for Him; this second time not to bear sins, but to complete our salvation.” –Hebrews 9:27-28
Salvation – Our Sanctification:
“By one sacrifice, He has made perfect forever, we who are being made holy.” –Hebrews 10:14
Salvation- Our Glorification:
“And we know that when Christ returns, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is.” –1 John 3:2
“In an instant, in the blink of an eye, at the last trumpet: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.” -1 Corinthians 15:52
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Can you not look back on your entire life to this point, and visualize it as if it had all happened: “In an instant, in the blink of an eye…”?
Might this not be how it may seem to you when your time on earth in this life has finally ended?
“A person’s spirit leaves their body, and their body returns to the earth; on that very day, all their plans shall cease.” -Psalm 146:4
On May 18, 1980 Mt. St. Helens erupted suddenly.
The ash from the volcano fell like snow on Spokane, Washington, where Lay Monk Linda was living at the time.
It fell like snow on Missoula, Montana, where I, Lay Monk Preston, was living at the time.
We would not meet each other for another nine years!
A car accident, a heart attack. Our life can end unexpectedly: “In an instant, in the blink of an eye…” None of us knows.
Suddenly it is too late to make out our Will, to say goodbye to loved ones, or to get right with God.
“In an instant, in the blink of an eye…” our life is over, and we are in God’s presence. The Last Day: the Day of Judgment.
But for those who have repented (being sorry for and turning from) their sins and receiving Christ into their heart and life, their sins have all been forgiven, paid for by the Blood of Christ.
(See our webpage: Christ’s Judgment for Believers is Only for Reward in the God’s Word Category of our drop-down Menu.)
“I tell you the truth: whoever hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life and will not be condemned; they have crossed over from death to life.” -John 5:24
“For other foundation can no one lay than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
Now if anyone build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble, everyone’s work shall be made manifest: for the Day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall test everyone’s work; of what sort it is.
If anyone’s work, which they have built, remains, they shall receive a reward.
If anyone’s work shall be burned, they shall suffer loss; but they themselves shall be saved.” -1 Corinthians 3:11-15
The only dividing line between all of humanity will be Christ: whether or not we know Him as our Lord and Savior.
Every division we now make between people will be meaningless.
Our race, gender, age, social class, wealth, power, or fame will be irrelevant to God.
Only one thing will matter: is Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior? Have we received forgiveness of our sins through His shed blood on the Cross?
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“And if it seems undesirable to you to serve the LORD, choose this day who you will serve…but as for me and my household, we will serve the LORD.”
-Joshua 24:15
The Perfection of God
“For all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.” – Romans 3:23
Most people are very aware that this is a true statement.
In the Bible, the Greek word for sin is hamartiya, an ancient archery term that literally means “missing the mark.”
Imperfect people cannot enter into the presence of a perfect God.
I have had a few people tell me that they “don’t believe in sin.”
But when I ask them if they are perfect, they will admit that they are not!
Reconciled with God
In Psalm 8, verse 4, we read:
“‘What is mankind, that you are mindful of us?’ and ‘What is the Son of Man, that you visit Him?'”
This verse is repeated in Psalm 144:3, and again in the New Testament in Hebrews 2:6, where it is quoted.
The entirety of Holy Scripture is the answer to these two questions.
The answers are: that God loves mankind; and that the Son of Man is Christ, the Messiah, the Second Person of the Trinity: God Incarnate, manifested in the flesh.
These truths are also found elsewhere in the New Testament. They are distilled down to their essence, and re-stated in John 3:16, the Key Verse of the Bible. It is the Key Verse of the Bible because it sums up the message of the entire Bible in one verse:
“For God so loved the world that He gave his only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”
And the very next verse that follows goes on to say:
“For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved.” -John 3:17
The Apostle Paul, in his second Letter to the Corinthians, explains that Salvation is being reconciled to God:
“Therefore if anyone is in Christ, they are a new creation: old things have passed away; all things have become new. And all things are from God, who has reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ…”
-2 Corinthians 5:17-19
Knowing Christ
Everything good, including love, comes from God:
“God is love.” -1 John 4:8
“Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father…” -James 1:17
Through Christ we can go to God, and have a relationship with Him now, and then also have love and everything good with Him eternally.
Here now in this life, we receive the good things that God gives to the entire world: on those who are evil and those who are good alike:
“He makes His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the just and on the unjust.” -Matthew 5:45
This will no longer be the case in eternity.
If we don’t want to be with God now, He gives us our choice to reject His Son Jesus, and we will not then be with God either now or in eternity, and the result will be the complete absence of all love and everything good…for all eternity.
Jesus said: “I am the way, the truth and the life. no one comes to the Father, except through Me.” -John 14:6
“Here is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation and atonement for our sins.” -1 John 4:10
“For He says, I have heard you in an acceptable time. In the day of salvation I have helped you. Behold: now is the acceptable time, now is the day of salvation.” –2 Corinthians 6:2
“…enter into the joy of your Lord.” -Matthew 25:23
Phillippans 2:5-11
C.S. Lewis & J.R.R. Tolkien: Ultimate Reality & The Purpose of Life
C.S. Lewis: Ultimate Reality
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“The only people who achieve much are those who want knowledge so badly that they seek it while the conditions are still unfavorable. Favorable conditions never come.”
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“I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept His claim to be God.
That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher.
He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell.
You must make your choice.”
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“For I was not writing to expound something I could call ‘my religion,’ but to expound ‘mere’ Christianity, which is what it is and was what it was long before I was born, and whether I like it or not.”
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“I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.”
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“Reality, in fact, is usually something you could not have guessed. That is one of the reasons I believe Christianity. It is a religion you could not have guessed.
If it offered us just the kind of universe we had always expected, I should feel we were making it up.”
J.R.R. Tolkien: The Purpose of Life
“Is there any pleasure on earth as great as the circle of Christian friends by a good fire?”
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“All we have to decide is what to do with the time that is given us.”
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“Eucastrophe (eu-cas-tro-phe): A sudden and favourable resolution of events in a story; a happy ending.” -Oxford English Dictionary
“The birth of Christ is the eucastrophe of Man’s history. The Resurrection is the eucastrophe of the story of the Incarnation.
This story begins and ends in joy.
It has pre-eminently the ‘inner consistency of reality.’ There is no tale ever told that men would rather find was true, and none which so many skeptical men have accepted as true on its own merits.
For the Art of it has the supremely convincing tone of Primary Art, that is, of Creation.
To reject it leads either to sadness or to wrath.”
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“The birth, death, and Resurrection of Jesus means that one day everything sad will come untrue.”
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“I am Christian and of course what I write will be from that essential viewpoint.”
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“If you do not believe in a personal God, the question: ‘What is the purpose of life?’ is unaskable and unanswerable.”
“Life’s purpose is to know, praise, and thank God.”
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