Beyond What We Can See

• Reason is the natural order of truth; but imagination is the organ of meaning.

• Reality, in fact, is always something you couldn't have guessed. That's one of the reasons I believe Christianity. It's a religion you couldn't have guessed.

• 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.

Perhaps you can find a running theme in these quotes from CS Lewis. There is something within us as humans that draw us away from the everyday reality we experience. It's said in Ecclesiasties this way, that God has put "eternity" into our hearts. As much as I know that Christ's teachings are immediately applicable to any situation in our daily life, there is something about having an intimate relationship with Jesus that is simply transcendent--the more time I spend with Him, the farther I am lifted from ordinary life. Now, this doesn't mean that I can now escape the realities of being human. Yet, I find comfort that living isn't bound by my own reason, that I can truly live without having to figure out all the philosophical meanings of life (even though I personally love thinking about these things on occasion). It is awesome that God has given us the ability to imagine and to create such amazing things through our Art. If you needed any evidence that humans are really the daughters and sons of God, just consider this single attribute.

Both Lewis and JRR Tolkien held the personal belief that main story of the Gospel--that God came down in the form of man, was crucified for our sins and rose again on the third day with the promise of His return--was truth, but also a true myth. If you think back to many myths from the Greeks and Romans, this story resembles these pagan myths in some ways, but, especially to Tolkien, what set the Gospel apart was that it is the only true myth or fairy story because it has to be lived out in our daily lives.