thankful #13 - a peek into hell

 

m and i recently joined friends for a show at the paramount, a one-man production of c.s. lewis' classic the screwtape letters. it's a humorous, insightful work on spiritual warfare, revealing the devices the enemy uses to discourage, sidetrack, neutralize, and ultimately defeat christians, all in the form of advice given by senior (and mentor) demon screwtape to his nephew wormwood, a junior tempter who is doing his best to ensure that his 'patient' walks the broad way to hell.

one interesting feature of the evening was the chance to do about ten minutes of question and answer with max mclean, the one-man show himself. mclean is apparently a believer, and treats this role as a ministry opportunity. in this regard, he was prescient. amazingly (to me anyway), some audience members had not read the book or even heard of it, prior to the show. and while the production was not able to cover the entire book, it still captured the flavor, wit, and wisdom of the original:

• a moderated religion is as good for us as no religion at all—and more amusing!
• it is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out.
• the safest road to hell is the gradual one--the gentle slope, soft underfoot, without sudden turnings, without milestones, without signposts.
• do not be deceived, wormwood. our cause is never more in danger than when a human, no longer desiring, but still intending, to do our enemy's will, looks round upon a universe from which every trace of him seems to have vanished, and asks why he has been forsaken, and still obeys.
• all the healthy and outgoing activities which we want him to avoid can be inhibited and nothing given in return, so that at last he may say, "i now see that I spent most my life doing in doing neither what I ought nor what i liked."

not surprisingly, i felt like the Holy Spirit was speaking to me throughout the show. i made a number of mental notes of both things to look out for and of ways i need to live differently. i'm guessing that maybe more than one of us had that experience.

even better than the show was the fact that we got to spend the evening with good friends, eating good food -- a delicious ethiopian dinner at altaye near the church where m is interning. we always enjoy hanging out with v and r (though we do it too seldom, a fixable issue that we should... well, fix). our special guests were b, in town for her final undergraduate spring break and pastor d, a former intervarsity colleague who is now a long-time pastor (of the church he planted, no less!), who spent the last weekend of his sabbatical with us; it was a treat to spend time with all of them. we even enjoyed spending some time conversing with the not-yet-christian owners of the restaurant. pure gift!