I’ve never done this before, and I don’t plan to make a habit out of it, but this week has been nuts. Chances are you have a busy life too, so I’ll spare you the list of events, both planned and unscheduled that sapped my energy this week.
So honestly, I was beginning to wonder if I’d be able to come up with a half way decent blog post today. And since there’s not much more boring than reading a guy’s thoughts about how he decided what to write, I’ll stop this train of thought and keep things moving.
After reading something he wrote recently, I’ve decided to bring in a guest blogger. He’s a little more accomplished as a writer than I am; fella by the name of CS Lewis. You’ve probably heard of The Chronicles of Narnia series. Maybe you’ve read Mere Christianity or The Screwtape Letters. When I read things that Lewis wrote 60 or 70 years ago, I often feel like he understands the world of 2010 better than I ever could. I figure if I’m going to have someone fill in for me, I might as well go with one of the greats. Anyway, the following is an excerpt from Mere Christianity, which is actually a book adapted from a series of radio talks that Lewis recorded from 1941 through 1944.
The title of this passage is “The Rule of Love”, and I’m convinced it pretty much speaks for itself.
The rule for all of us is perfectly simple. Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbour; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him. If you injure someone you dislike, you will find yourself disliking him more. If you do him a good turn, you will find yourself disliking him less. There is, indeed, one exception. If you do him a good turn, not to please God and obey the law of charity, but to show him what a fine forgiving chap you are, and to put him in your debt, and then sit down to wait for his ‘gratitude’, you will probably be disappointed. (People are not fools: they have a very quick eye for anything like showing off, or patronage.) But whenever we do good to another self, just because it is a self, made (like us) by God, and desiring its own happiness as we desire ours, we shall have learned to love it a little more or, at least, to dislike it less.
Nuf sed. Think about it.
80’s Lyric