CS Lewis on Two Errors re: Devils

“There are two equal and opposite errors into which our race can fall about the devils. One is to disbelieve in their existence. The other is to believe, and to have an excessive and unhealthy interest in them. The devils are equally pleased with both errors, and hail a materialist as much as a magician.”

A Bright Stainless Mirror....

If we let him... he will make the feeblest and filthiest of us into dazzling, radiant, immortal creatures, pulsating all through with such energy, joy, wisdom, and love as we cannot now imagine; a bright stainless mirror which reflects back to God perfectly, though of course on a smaller scale his own boundless power, light, and goodness. That is what we are in for, nothing less.

— C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

God is not fond of intellectual slackers

"God is no fonder of intellectual slackers than of any other slackers. If you are thinking of becoming a Christian, I warn you: you are embarking on something which is going to take the whole of you, brains and all."

- C.S. Lewis

CS Lewis on Trying to be more spiritual than God

“There is no use trying to be more spiritual than God. God never meant man to be a purely spiritual creature. That is why He uses material things like bread and wine to put the new life into us. We may think this rather crude and unspiritual. God does not: He invented eating. He likes matter. He invented it...”

- C. S. Lewis

CS Lewis: God incognito

"We may ignore, but we can nowhere evade, the presence of God. The world is crowded with Him. He walks everywhere incognito. And the incognito is not always hard to penetrate. The real labor is to attend. In fact, to come awake. Still more, to remain awake."

~ CS Lewis

CS Lewis: We are far too easily pleased...

Our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling around with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us. We are far too easily pleased.

C.S. Lewis

CS Lewis & the Rebel

Fallen man is not simply an imperfect creature who needs improvement: he is a rebel who must lay down his arms. Laying down your arms, surrendering, saying you are sorry, realizing that you have been on the wrong track and getting ready to start life over again from the ground floor - that is the only way out of a "hole." This process of surrender - this movement full speed astern - is repentance.

- C.S. Lewis

C.S. Lewis on his conversion...

"I never had the experience of looking for God. It was the other way around: He was the hunter (or so it seemed to me) and I was the deer. He stalked me like a redskin, took unerring aim, and fired. And I am very thankful that this is how the first (conscious) meeting occurred. It forearms one against subsequent fears that the whole thing was only wish fulfillment. Something one didn't wish for can hardly be that."