#minister screwtape

[mustbealoosewire]

by MinisterScrewtape

[sorenthestoryteller]

February 8th, 2021 – In Which Soren Runs a Fever and Decides Now is a Great Time as Any to Start Kicking Over Money Changer Tables Being Operated by Arm Band Wearing Elephants

“what is mankind that you are mindful of them,

    human beings that you care for them?

You have made them

a little lower than the angels

    and crowned them

with glory and honor.”

-Psalm 8:4-5

                  In Milton’s “Paradise Lost” everything you need to know about the fall of Lucifer is summed up in the quote, “It is better to reign in Hell than to serve in Heaven.”

              Over the years I have had many conversations about the Fall in general and in specific with Lucifer being the instigator of this whole mess. C.S. Lewis, Frank Peretti, and a few other names that slip my mind have helped to formulate some thoughts on the nature of darkness and evil, but the chief characteristic of Evil and Heresy is Pride.

              I truthfully cannot grasp the level on which angels operate. Beings of pure spirit and intellect that are not limited by having to use physical processing powers. My best guess is that their thoughts, recall, and experiences are all hyper-aware.

              What do you think the angels thought of God’s plan for creating something beyond them? Creatures that were weaker than angels yet somehow deemed worthy of love, honor, and glory?

              After Adam and Eve are created what do the angels see? Furless monkeys with no tails that make noises when you talk to them. Maybe in Lucifer’s mind, he thought Jesus just made a bunch of pets he could train to pick up tools and make things.

              I cannot imagine the response of these beings when the Trinity keeps going on with creation and take the time to create this bizarre mixture of spirit and animal. Lewis’ “Screwtape Letters” has the title demon refer to us humans as being amphibians:

 “Humans are amphibians...half spirit and half animal...as spirits they belong to the eternal world, but as animals they inhabit time. This means that while their spirit can be directed to an eternal object, their bodies, passions, and imaginations are in continual change, for to be in time, means to change. Their nearest approach to constancy, therefore, is undulation--the repeated return to a level from which they repeatedly fall back, a series of troughs and peaks.”

- C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters

               Those who have the misfortune to sit under my teaching for too long will recall that I often refer to the human experience as being a series of paradoxes. This quote from C.S. Lewis is the root of that claim. We exist in two realms at the same time, which is of course a paradox in and of itself. In a sense we are all Schrödinger’s Cat, waiting for the transition of the box being opened and our reality being redefined by what the Eternal is and is not.

              Bearing in mind how much nonsense and insanity is produced by even the most well-meaning humans among us, multiple that by a few billion, and that is a typical day for God.

              Infinite as the Trinity is, I cannot grasp the love it takes to take care of me, much less the capacity to feel an emotion and intimately know the name of billions of humans going through various stages of pain, elation, terror, love, and wonder.

              That experience, that Loving Madness of our Lord is what drove Lucifer to the point of rage and quitting. Was it first child syndrome, a group of angels being angry that God continued creating after making a series of intricate and beautiful beings so intense Scripture often calls them stars (you know those giant glowy things in the night sky we take for granted? That are an endless series of self-perpetuating nuclear explosions? Those are the angel metaphors.)?

              If humans were the ones creating, we never would have created ourselves, we would have been content with making beings of a spiritual nature and creatures to inhabit the earth.

              However, the Trinity rolled up their collective sleeves and said to the archangels, “Hey fellas, checks this out.”

              And what does that mean?

              What does it mean to be created to be just a little lower than the angels?

              What does it mean to be found worthy by God? To be chosen to be His sons and daughters? For God to decide each of us is worthy of love not because we could perform or do something, but because we simply are?

“You come of the Lord Adam and the Lady Eve," said Aslan. "And that is both honor enough to erect the head of the poorest beggar, and shame enough to bow the shoulders of the greatest emperor on earth. Be content.”

― C.S. Lewis, Prince Caspian

                 At this point I would like to bring this to the practical and meaningful point, there is much sickness in how we hate and isolate others by naming and grouping people as “sinners”. Fellow miracles of life, beings who are as equally of a mad paradox as us, and somehow we think we have the right to judge them.

              This is pride, this is the root sin of Lucifer, and it is the cause of most of our current misery and the threat of a revised version of Nazism becoming ever more popular here in America.

              For too long people in the Church have existed on this prideful notion that to be Christian means to live in judgment of those we deem our inferiors. Jesus does not care about our fake attempts at piety when it comes to extending love to those who are broken. Jesus is not concerned with how noble we think we are when we hold our nose and associate with those, we later judge and murder with our thoughts.

              Evangelicalism is on the verge of plunging to its death and we who chose to be judgmental in Jesus’ name due to politics are the ones who have done this. We brought the entirety of this church culture to the altar of conservative politicians and sacrificed it to receive Donald Trump.

              Evangelicals will never be able to remove the disgusting stain of the association of Trump and the horrific human rights abuses of the Republican party.

              Why is this such an important point?

              Because the people the Church is supposed to deliberately minister to are hated and despised by those who have conservative politics. It is a prideful human who decides those who are addicted to drugs, those who are disabled, and the poor are all worthless. It is their politics that dictate a person’s value is whatever they can contribute to further capitalism. Whatever is not explicitly stated in the Republican party is sure as Hellfire lived out in action.

              That action says those who look different, speak a different language, have a different culture, and have a different religion are subhuman.

              The only thing Christians should not tolerate is intolerance.

              If we are not willing to open our arms to all of those, we deem unworthy of Love, then we are not Christians. Instead, we merely belong to a social club that likes to get together to talk about how great we are while judging those we think lesser of.

              Like Lucifer did.

[bibleteachingbyolga]

My Beloved Toviel,

I have received your most recent letter lamenting your man’s recent fall into sin. These are the letters no angel wishes to receive. He descended slowly into the pit, you report. Too much time given to noises of the world; too little time in quiet communion. The flame grew low; temptation arrived; now he lies in darkness.

I am glad you stood by, ministering to him, even though you admit fumbling a bit. The enemy stood by too, no doubt, hissing accusations, eager to crush his hope and hand him more poison to medicate his sorrows. From our heights, we can still overhear his assaults: “How could you pretend to be a child of God? You will never rise from this. . . . It is useless to go to God. . . . He has forsaken you.” Such lies must be met constantly on the field of battle. His sons will not be so easily snatched from the Father’s hands, no matter how ashamed they feel.

As Wrath Rained Down

Now, in your ministering to your man, I am grateful to hear that you have not downplayed sin to bring comfort to the guilty. It does no good to minimize evil, but rather we direct his gaze beyond his misery to one who hung for sinners upon the cross.

Cross. Toviel, I shudder to even write the word. He entered his own creation, and his people rejected him. And oh, what a rejection.

Do you remember it? When the betrayer led his enemies in the garden that night, we assembled ready to chop off more than just an ear. Twelve legions of our finest soldiers stood armed for war. But we awaited a command that never came. Christ bid us, instead, stand down. His plans — praise be to God — soared higher than ours.

And do you recall the horror you felt as sinful hands grabbed the ark of God and robed his mortal frame in anguish? Eternal strength — now with bloody back and brow — could not reach the hilltop with his cross. As wrath rained down upon him, the fountains of living waters dried up, crying, “I thirst!”

Behold him, the blessed God, half dead, stapled to the tree, accursed. We could not even recognize him as a man. As bait on a hook, he dangled over the mouth of the pit.

He Became Sin

Toviel, ask him why this Shepherd allowed himself to become a mangled mass of tilled flesh and raw wounds. Ask your pit-fallen man how such a Lord came to such a throne. And give our Master’s wounds a voice to reply.

Each gash, each stripe, each bloody pool upon the surface of his flesh, shrieked, in the first place, against sin. All questioning whether God might, in the end, sweep iniquity under the rug — “letting bygones be bygones” — was put to death. The arrows God’s people shot up at the stars fell back to earth upon his mortal frame, bringing heavenly violence upon his human head.

Here, at the most awful and wonderful of places, convened the terrible reunion of all his people’s lies and lusts. In attendance was every itch of their pride; hunched over him stood every sexual fantasy, every shy smile at the failings of others, every lurch for significance apart from God, every neglect of loving God with all and neighbor as himself. For every dare of God’s patience, every abuse of his forbearance, every exchange of his glory for passing pleasures, Christ died. “The Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all” (Isaiah 53:6).

Returning to Adam’s nakedness, the Holy One hung below this incredible caption: He became sin. Every filth long-forgotten by his people now emerged from the shadows, climbed from their holes to crawl upon the spotless Lamb. He embraced to his bosom the shame and pollution of their sin, invited the jagged tools of torture and the crushing wrath of his Father that their crimes had aggravated. He was “stricken for the transgression of my people” (Isaiah 53:8).

Here is the offspring God promised the woman — the fangs piercing his heel as he presses down upon the serpent’s skull. Here is Abraham’s ram caught in the thicket, struck by his Father’s flint knife to let Isaacs like your man go free. Here in pitch blackness, in a well so deep, in darkness so mighty, agonizing for every breath, flashes forth righteous anger as God extinguishes upon that horrid candlestick. “He bore the sin of many” (Isaiah 53:12).

His Wounds Speak Love

Yet the cross also manifests another momentous word, a word reverberating with hope, even in the darkest pits: love, Toviel, amazing love. His pierced hands dripped affection. His bloody crown glimmered with purchased grace. His flickering eyes reflected the Wedding Supper of the Lamb. His stapled feet traveled, with undeniable passion, after his wandering sheep. His lacerated back carried sinners from the depths of hell, bringing them safely to his Father.

Bid your man’s troubled soul to remember the cross, as the Lord himself directed them. Remember the blood of the new covenant poured out for his sins. Bid your man drink this sweetest wine to warm his faltering heart. Remember the bread of Christ’s body broken for him; remind him, over and over again, that his Shepherd laid down his life while he was yet a sinner. Here is the holy ground, upon which the best sermons of their most worthy preachers must remove their sandals and bow low in adoration.

Read to His Soul

Satan’s design against your man, of course, bids him to consider his sin more than his Savior; his disease more than the cure; his deformity more than his Redeemer’s beauty. When your man’s eyes fall to the ground, lift them to Christ. It does not honor the physician, nor restore the mortal gash, to stay away and let wounds fester.

Make no mistake: he must hear, “go and sin no more,” but first remind him of his Savior’s very name: “You shall call his name Jesus, for he will save his people from their sin” (Matthew 1:21). Bring his guilty soul to God’s glorious book to read:

“There is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” (Romans 8:1).

“As far as the east is from the west, so far does he remove our transgressions from us” (Psalm 103:12).

“By a single offering he has perfected for all time those who are being sanctified” (Hebrews 10:14).

“For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God” (2 Corinthians 5:21).

“Now the righteousness of God has been manifested apart from the law. . . the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe” (Romans 3:21–22).

“Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died — more than that, who was raised” (Romans 8:34).

“Christ suffered once for sins, the righteous for the unrighteous, that he might bring us to God” (1 Peter 3:18).

Should such words not glow the brighter rather than fade from view before his sin?

Not in Part

Though he lingers in the shadowy world where his children still sigh and groan over real corruption remaining in their flesh, day will break — Sunday followed that Friday. As he perseveres in the faith, your man will soon enter the realm where song flows more natural than speech, where steadfast love overwhelms as the waves do pebbles upon the shore.

There, happiness will ever swell as the lyric becomes more radiant, “Blessed is the man against whom the Lord counts no iniquity” (Psalm 32:2). And his voice will gain more vigor to sing, “Worthy is the Lamb who was slain to receive all glory!”

Direct your man’s fallen gaze to consider him — and keep considering him — who endured from sinners such hostility against himself that he might not grow weary or fainthearted. Let the sight refresh his lips to sing from his heart before his flesh and the devil:

My sin, oh, the bliss of this glorious thought! My sin, not in part, but the whole, Is nailed to the cross, and I bear it no more. Praise the Lord, praise the Lord, O my soul!

Your Dearest Uncle, Gabriel

In The Gabriel Letters, a senior angel (Gabriel) counsels a junior angel (Toviel) on how to assist a human against the temptations of demons and how to bring him home to heaven. This series is inspired by the classic work of C.S. Lewis, The Screwtape Letters.

[phoenixwrites]

If you're still doing Lewis questions... which story are you referring to that's his worst, if not the Space Trilogy? I'm genuinely curious, it's been years since I've read his works and I haven't read all of them.

I am always doing Lewis questions.

The worst short story C.S. Lewis has ever written–both in content, style, substance, AND gender–is a short story called “Ministering Angels”.  

Excuse me, while I pull up my 25 page partial-thesis on Lewis’ short stories.  

Ah, here we go.  So this short story was written in response to Robert S. Richardson’s article “The Day After We Land on Mars” which was published in “Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction” in 1955.  Richardson suggested that we send women to Mars to “relieve sexual tension” which will undoubtedly afflict the male colonists and scientists (FEMALE colonists/scientists on Mars?! PSHAW!).  Richardson wrote “My feeling is that space travel may force us to adopt a more realistic attitude toward sex than that which prevails at present. I feel that the men stationed on a planet should be openly accompanied by women to relieve the sexual tensions that develop among healthy normal males…Many will be outraged at the mention of such an idea…But it is ‘immoral’ only when viewed from the standpoint of our present social reference system.”

So obviously C.S. Lewis read this article and thought it was intensely stupid, which, in his defense, it is.  Lewis hated relative morality, he wrote several books combating the idea.  So Lewis decided to write a satirical short story in response to this.  

Unfortunately, the short story sucked.

Lewis’ best satire is “The Screwtape Letters”.  He should’ve stuck with demonic correspondence.  In “Ministering Angels”, Lewis imagines a Martian colony and two prostitutes who are sent there to entertain the men.  (Unfortunately Lewis does not think that there might be female scientists and colonists on Mars too, LET’S NOT GET CRAZY HERE, SPACE TRAVEL IS ONE THING, FEMALE SCIENTISTS IS QUITE ANOTHER).   The joke of the story is–and I use the term “joke” very lightly–is that the prostitutes are ugly.  One is very old and fat (called the Fat Woman–yeah, they don’t get names.) and the other is called the Thin Woman, who is described as androgynous with no feminine qualities at all.  She is analytical, prim, and not in the least bit sensual.  There is also a heavily coded gay male character that is an awful stereotype.  

Lewis’ point is that no woman in her right mind would go to Mars to become a prostitute, unless they were desperate and ugly, like the Fat Woman, or an emotionless robot, like the Thin Woman.  The truly infuriating thing about this short story is that even though it was Richardson’s dipshit article that suggested sending prostitutes to Mars, in the short story, Lewis thinks it’s women’s fault:  “Och, a pack o’ daft auld women (in trousers for the maist part) who like onything sexy, and onything scientific, and onything that makes them feeil important. And this gives them all thre pleasure at once,  ye ken”, says one character.  The story ends with the young men escaping Mars on the transport, stranding the other main characters with the prostitutes.  

So yeah, there’s no real defending this short story.  It is intensely sexist and misogynistic.  I don’t know what to make of it, especially since it was written around the time Lewis wrote Till We Have Faces–this is actually what my semi-thesis explores.  How could such a horrible short story be written at the same time as his masterpiece?  HOW DID JOY DAVIDMAN ALLOW THIS MONSTER TO SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY?!

I have theories.  But there’s nothing concrete that really explains it.  Lewis did write female characters better after he met and married Joy–Till We Have Faces proves this.  But people are complicated.  Everything has nuance.