John Tyler --- C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory (4-17-13)

C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory -- Outside reading

“The books or the music in which we thought the beauty was located

will betray us if we trust to them; it was not in them, it only came through them, and what came through them was longing.

These things—the beauty, the memory of our own past—are good images of what we

really desire; but if they are mistaken for the thing itself they turn into dumb idols, breaking the hearts of their worshippers.

For they are not the thing itself; they are only the scent of a flower we have not found, the echo of a tune we have not heard, news from a country we have never yet visited.”

― C.S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory

There are beautiful things all around us. The world is full of pleasure and delight.  C.S.  infers that all of these things share something in common, longing.  There is a subtle yet ever present longing at the center every created thing.  We all desire beauty, pleasure, and fulfillment yet are often times fooled by the images themselves making them into idols instead of letting them point us to the source.  The world tries to fabricate divine beauty by claiming to be source when really it is not.  Everything around us is hinting at another reality, a better place.  The fullness of pleasure and joy are found in the presence of the eternal and true God.