A Good Thing Turned Bad

I have this book that contains daily readings from various C.S. Lewis works (A Year with C.S. Lewis), and this one struck me. This is a quote from The Screwtape Letters:

Thus is would be a good thing to make the patient decide that 'Love' is 'good' or 'bad'. If he is an arrogant man with contempt for the body really based on delicacy but mistaken by him for purity...by all means let him decide against love. Instil into him an overweening asceticism...If, on the other hand, he is an emotional, gullible man, feed on him the minor poets and fifth-rate novelists of the old school until you have made him believe that 'Love' is both irresistible and somehow intrinsically meritorious (you feel you have the right to have it). This belief is...an incomparable recipe for prolonged, 'noble', romantic, tragic adulteries, ending, if all goes well, in murders and suicides. (page 106)

With this particular of love, Screwtape explains how love can be misconstrued to 2 different extremes to harm an individual: the ascetic, and the "love-a-holic."

(1) The ascetic thinks of himself as not needing of love, and if any emotion, thought, desire, or pleasure arises, he thwarts it off as unnecessary or even to the extreme of beating himself up physically to make the desires go away.

(2) The "love-a-holic" feels that because he feels the desire to love, he will go to any extreme to make it happen. He will settle for any girl that winks her eye or blows a kiss. Nothing else matters but to obtain love; if it isn't reached, then he worries and worries, desperate to be satisfied, and could take him to the extreme of killing himself because that desire has got to be fulfilled.

How could this happen? What would push a man to push off love as if it's for sissies and hide his emotions? What would push a man to desperate measures just to get a girl to be attracted to and to love him? We must look at the source of where things first went wrong, and then from there look at solutions.

Adam and Eve, before the first sin, experienced a perfect relationship with God and with each other: no problems, no pain, no nagging, no loneliness. But, when Adam and Eve disobeyed God's command, at the first moment of sin and shame they were instantly frightened of another and God. One act of disobedience led to two breaches:

1. God and man were no longer intimate. A holy God could no longer dwell with unholy people.
2. Man and woman were no longer intimate. Now, every friendship and marriage experiences imperfection.

And with sin clogging our thoughts, minds, words, desires, things don't make sense in our world: the good we want to do--we don't do it, and bad we know we shouldn't do--we do it anyway.

"God is love, and in him is no darkness at all" - 1 John 1:5. When we look at how the Bible describes God, we see two things in this particular verse: He is loving, and He is holy. And this will lead the rest of what I'll say.

The supreme expression of love that God shows us is in the death of Christ and him being our substitute on the cross: "In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation of our sins" - 1 John 4:10. The punishment that we deserve for our sin was placed on Christ at the cross, so that you and I would have a restored relationship with God through Christ. A relationship with God is the ultimate thing that must be settled here and now, and is the anchor of understanding love and how to deal with it. Do you have an intimate relationship with God through Christ? I recommend you read John and 1 John to clarify.

In lieu of Christ's redeeming love, we see the perfect expression of love--so how does this apply to the ascetic and to the love-a-holic?

(1) The ascetic must realize he has made an idol out of himself, pride, and that the desire to love and be loved isn't a bad thing. Men, you can be honest about your emotions with other guys, and noticing the beauty of women isn't a sin (unless it's wrongful lust). Women, this goes for you too: be open with other women, and if you're looking for a godly man, nothing wrong at all--same warning though.

(2) The love-a-holic must realize he has made an idol out of himself also, pride and love are worshiped and not God. Instead of looking to God for his ultimate sources of security, significance, and satisfaction, he looks to himself (this applies to the ascetic also). It is more important that he feel loved from an individual rather than God. Men and women, we must realize that we were created for the primary reason to glorify God and enjoy Him forever--He is our utmost treasure. Only in Him can you really find the love you are looking for. God has given us friendships and marital relationships, but they can never surpass or become more important than our relationship with Him.

I hope this was clear, if not let me know and I'll elaborate more.

T-rav
Colossians 1:17 "And is before all things, and in him all things hold together.