some ideas....

"If we ourselves reject, as did Lewis, our own age's "chronological snobbery," we might just find that the way forward is the way back. Lewis's welcome strategy was to be "in, but not of" the period in which he lived, aligning himself with a perspective outside that world--i.e., divine revelation.

This enabled him to discern the rules of the "game" while maintaining an equilibrium amid the endless undulations of time and culture, hence his maxim: "All that is not eternal is eternally out of date."

This is perhaps the best clue to the mystery of Lewis's continuing impact and influence. Owen Barfield, reflecting many years later on Lewis's career, once capsuled well Lewis's secret: "Somehow what Lewis thought about everything was secretly present in what he said about anything."

Since I was a kid, I've always felt like I wanted to follow God into uncomfortable or difficult places. (Not that this shows any piety or heightned religious instinct on my part. Quite frankly, I enjoy getting myself into trouble, as my Italian penchant for drama will no doubt attest.) I write often in my journal that, though the suburbs have a special place in my heart as the 'land of my youth', I was not built for them any more than I was not built for undersea life.

Pretty much, I want to follow God. He's the one I have to impress, not any particular system or person. If he goes somewhere that American culture or Western Culture or (please try to get my point before you seize on this) Western Christianity won't go, I would rather go with God then I would go with these systems. He's and fair bit nicer and I would hope that most see this as obviously a good Idea.

The point is, we are all searching for a God free of the systems around us. I think at it's most resonant level, this is what we mean by the "eternal God". We don't want "Christianity-and X" where X is what ever fad happens to be passing by at the moment, be it postmodernism, modernism or the strictist form of literalism or liberalism you can imagine. We want Mere Christianity (which is a phrase as you can tell, I stole from CSL), no matter how uncomfortable that could be.

How do we disembed ourselves from the systems of this world and engage with something real, profound and eternal? How do we connect with that which is not 'eternally out of date'? How do we get some roots, some profundity, so wherever we are, we are always living out of our center: the risen Christ?

My point is that we need our ideological roots to be in Christ, not in a system. Lewis understood that better than anybody. He was able to understand the chief vice of his age so people wouldn't get caught up in "guarding against chilbains so the devil could give them cancer". We all have values imparted to us by our culture. The trick is, to get so connected with God, that we start to value what he values and to connect with His "culture'. Are we willing to leave our lives to be caught up in something bigger than ourselves? Can we be tethers to the culture of God in a world gone mad?

What we will find out, like Lewis, is that our connection to the culture and values of God rubs off on the cultures of this world that we find ourselves in. When we see ourselves as adventuring ambassabors for the plans and concerns of God, we then realize that we effect our 'host culture' a lot more deeply than we realize. We value what God wants, we have His heart, and people see that and want that passionately. That is the work of Christ in our world today: using His people to download his redeeming heart to the world.

These quotes above were writeen by a Lewis scholar named Dr. Bruce L. Edwards, but and be read at http://personal.bgsu.edu/~edwards/newsarchive10.html. If he should read this, forgive me. I