Dr. Glaspey joins Matt to discuss his new book, “Not a Tame Lion”.
S7E29: “Narnia Month: Not a tame lion” (Download)
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Show Notes
Introduction
Quote-of-the-Week
For the wise men of old, the cardinal problem of human life was how to conform the soul to objective reality, and the solution was wisdom, self-discipline, and virtue. For the modern, the cardinal problem is how to conform reality to the wishes of man, and the solution is technique.
C. S. Lewis
Biographical Information
Dr. Terry Glaspey has a master’s degree in history from the University of Oregon and a doctorate in spiritual formation from Northwind Seminary where he now teaches Inklings studies, spiritual formation, and writing. He is listed in Who’s Who in America and has been the recipient of a number of awards, including a distinguished alumni award and the Advanced Speakers and Writers Editor of the Year award.
He has written over a dozen books, including “Discovering God Through the Arts”, “The Prayers of Jane Austen”, and the book we’ll be discussing today, “Not a Tame Lion: The Life, Teachings, and Legacy of C.S. Lewis”. He has two book of the year awards from Christianity Today in 2022 and 2017, as well as book of the year awards from Gospel Coalition and the Evangelical Christian Publishers Association. His most acclaimed book is “75 Masterpieces Every Christian Should Know”.
Chit-Chat
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Toast
- Matt and Dr. Glaspey both had a glass of water.
Discussion
01. “Life-Changing”
Q. Could you talk some more about your career and relationship with Lewis? What made you fall in love with his work?
- While Dr. Glaspey was in bible college, a friend recommended “Mere Christianity” to him, and it proceeded to change his life. Immediately upon finishing, he picked up “The Great Divorce”, which he read in one sitting.
02. “Settle the Debate”
Q. Maybe you can help us settle the debate. Which is Lewis’ best book: “The Great Divorce”, or “Till We Have Faces”?
- Dr. Glaspey believes that “Till We Have Faces” is Lewis’ greatest literary achievement, but “The Great Divorce” – and also the Narnian Chronicles – is Lewis at his peak of spiritual writing.
03. “Reason, Imagination, and Holiness”
Q. What would you say separates Lewis from other wonderful Christian scholars and authors that made him so wildly popular?
- Lewis combines three elements that few other authors do: reason, imagination, and an evocation of the sense of the holy, like his master, George MacDonald.
04. “Longing”
Q. The first part of the book is on Lewis’ life. Is there any takeaway from the book that you would like for listeners to have in order to understand Lewis?
- One of Lewis’ greatest arguments for the faith is the argument from longing. This started for Jack as a young child, and it was how he came to faith years later, a phenomenon that he wrote about in his autobiography, “Surprised by Joy”. Dr. Glaspey calls these experiences “intuitional apologetics”.
- One example of a momentous experience was Lewis picking up George MacDonald’s “Phantastes”.
What [Phantastes] actually did to me was to convert, even to baptize (that was where the Death came in) my imagination. It did nothing to my intellect nor (at that time) to my conscience. Their turn came far later and with the help of many other books and men. But when the process was complete – by which, of course, I mean “when it had really begun” – I found that I was still with MacDonald and that he had accompanied me all the way and that I was now at last ready to hear from him much that he could not have told me at that first meeting.
C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy
Make religion attractive, make good men wish it were true, and then show that it is. Worthy of reverence because it really understands human nature. Attractive because it promises true good.
Blaise Pascal
05. “Liar, Lunatic, or Lord”
Q. Let’s dive into the theology, beginning with Jesus. What were Lewis’ thoughts on the person of Christ? What did he think about people who took him to be just a great moral teacher?
- Unlike other “great moral teachers”, Jesus claimed to have the power to forgive sins. Even more significantly, He explicitly made the claim that He was God.
I am trying here to prevent anyone saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God. That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic — on the level with the man who says he is a poached egg — or else he would be the Devil of Hell. You must make your choice. Either this man was, and is, the Son of God, or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at him and kill him as a demon or you can fall at his feet and call him Lord and God, but let us not come with any patronizing nonsense about his being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
06. “Pain”
Q. Let’s turn to your section on pain. Give us Lewis’ take on the topic.
- In the introduction to this section, Matt highlighted a few quotes from the book, since he, David and Andrew were fresh off of “Letters to an American Lady”, “Letters to Children”, and “The Latin Letters”, where pain and gifts were big themes.
Lewis believed that we can, in a very real sense, participate in the sufferings of Christ by embracing our pains and difficulties for His sake.
Terry Glaspey, Not a Tame Lion
Sometimes we cannot be trusted with lives of pleasure and security. For when we posses these, we so quickly forget the giver of all good things, and trust in the gifts instead.
Terry Glaspey, Not a Tame Lion
- The Christian life is one of transformation; it is the eternal goal of God for humanity.
We can ignore even pleasure. But pain insists upon being attended to. God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains: it is his megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain
I walked a mile with Pleasure;
Robert Brown Hamilton
She chatted all the way;
But left me none the wiser
For all she had to say.
I walked a mile with Sorrow;
And ne’er a word said she;
But, oh! The things I learned from her,
When Sorrow walked with me.
07. “Morality and Virtue”
Q. Next, let’s talk about morality and virtue. What was virtue to Lewis, and how does it differ from values?
- Matt quoted Dr. Glaspey’s book again in the introduction…
God’s laws are not set up merely as a test of our obedience or as a way to control us, rather they are directions for living human life to its fullest potential. When we disregard these guidelines, the result will be a diminutio of our lives or character. God’s rules exist so that the human machine can function better. Every moral rule is there to prevent a breakdown, or a strain, or a friction in the running of that machine. ..the desire to remake the moral rules is one of the characteristics of the modern age.
Terry Glaspey, Not a Tame Lion
Virtue is not simply obedience to a set of rules. Right actions done for the wrong reason do not help to build the internal quality or character called a virtue and it is this quality or character that really matters.
Terry Glaspey, Not a Tame Lion
For the wise men of old, the cardinal problem of human life was how to conform the soul to objective reality, and the solution was wisdom, self-discipline, and virtue. For the modern, the cardinal problem is how to conform reality to the wishes of man, and the solution is technique.
Terry Glaspey, Not a Tame Lion
- Dr. Glaspey reasoned that it is easy to become a self-righteous and repulsive person who holds good values. Values are not as good as virtues, which change us from within.
- He also discussed the role of grace in our lives; to enter in, transform us, and make us into “little Christs”.
Every Christian is to become a little Christ. The whole purpose of becoming a Christian is simply nothing else.
C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
- Dr. Glaspey’s favourite sermon of Lewis’ is “The Weight of Glory”, which describes the eternity we are made for…
At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and purity of morning, but they do not make us fresh and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendours we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumour that it will not always be so. Some day, God willing, we shall get in.
C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory
08. “Pleasure”
Q. What were Lewis’ thoughts on pleasure? Was it something to be avoided, or indulged in?
- Although pain can be good for us, pleasure can be wonderful as well, as C. S. Lewis championed in his works.
The sins of the flesh are bad, but they are the least bad of all sins. All the worst pleasures are purely spiritual: the pleasure of putting other people in the wrong, of bossing and patronising and spoiling sport, and back-biting, the pleasures of power, of hatred. For there are two things inside me, competing with the human self which I must try to become. They are the Animal self and the Diabolical self. The Diabolical self is the worse of the two. This is why a cold, self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to hell than a prostitute. But of course, it is better to be neither.
C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
- Pleasure needs to be moderated though. Matt quoted Lewis regarding temperance…
One great piece of mischief has been done by the modern restriction of the word Temperance to the question of drink. It helps people to forget that you can be just as intemperate about lots of other things. A man who makes his golf or his motor-bicycle the centre of his life, or a woman who devotes all her thoughts to clothes or bridge or her dog, is being just as “intemperate” as someone who gets drunk every evening. Of course, it does not show on the outside so easily: bridge-mania or golf-mania do not make you fall down in the middle of the road. But God is not deceived by externals.
C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity
- Our ultimate pleasure is something that God wishes for us to have in heaven.
If we consider the unblushing promises of reward, and the staggering nature of the rewards promised in the Gospels, it would seem that our Lord finds our desires not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at sea. We are far too easily pleased.
C. S. Lewis, The Weight of Glory
09. “In the Works”
Q. Do you have any projects currently in the works, or any resources that you can offer our listeners to learn more about you?
- To get signed copies of his book, visit TerryGlaspey.com.
- Dr. Glaspey is also working on a paper to deliver to The Undiscovered C. S. Lewis Conference, called “Jack and Jane: Why C. S. Lewis Loved Jane Austin.
Wrap Up
Concluding Thoughts
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