I am very excited to be going through "Orthodoxy" by G.K. Chesterton again. This, however, is my first time"reading" it on audiobook. This is, overall, my third time through it since purchasing it back in 2016. It's return on investment -- C.S. Lewis' ultimate consideration for what constitutes a "good" book -- is exponential and only one chapter in, I'm already grinning from ear to ear.
CH 1 - INTRODUCTION IN DEFENCE OF EVERYTHING ELSE
The only possible excuse for this book is that it is an answer to a challenge. Even a bad shot is dignified when he accepts a duel.
What a great opening gambit. I'm writing this because I was asked. If it's not what you were hoping for, you can't blame me, I'm only firing back as best as I can, the way any gunslinger with integrity would try to do given the circumstances. Dignity is achieved by walking the paces in acceptance to the challenge, not in necessarily delivering deadly accuracy, although in all fairness, I suspect the challenger was not cheering for Chesterton to be a sureshot in this situation.
But I have a peculiar reason for mentioning the man in a yacht, who discovered England. For I am that man in a yacht. I discovered England.
I adore this opening illustration -- a man is pictured, bold and courageous out to discover foreign lands, arriving and planting a flag in what turns out to be his own familiar backyard. Coming to Christ is like that. It is searching for meaning and purpose and big things we assume must be somewhere out there in the land of adventure and is found only by returning to the basic principles of life which were always there at work. Finding Christ requires the adventure of stepping outside yourself and the comfort of discovering yourself in the process, a willingness to give up all comfort and the discovery of the greatest comfort known to man, a perfect blend of foreign and familiar in Jesus Christ alone.
But nearly all people I have ever met in this western society in which I live would agree to the general proposition that we need this life of practical romance; the combination of something that is strange with something that is secure. We need so to view the world as to combine an idea of wonder and an idea of welcome.
I love the word play for this phenomenon: wonder and welcome. Christianity scratches both itches. The paradox of being in awe and being invited, realizing the otherness of it all and then being asked to enter into it all at once. That is Christianity, Jesus Christ, in flesh, among men, but God offering divinity to humanity by becoming human.
It is one thing to describe an interview with a gorgon or a griffin, a creature who does not exist. It is another thing to discover that the rhinoceros does exist and then take pleasure in the fact that he looks as if he didn’t. One searches for truth, but it may be that one pursues instinctively the more extraordinary truths
The reason so many miss Christianity is because they have it in their minds that truth, whatever it is, must be a particular way. Like a rhinoceros which is a real thing, but looks as though it shouldn't be. We assume meaning and purpose must be like griffins, elusive and imaginary, rather than giraffes which are tangible, yet unrealistic. We believe Christianity is unbelievable and exchange that truth for a lie which we find more believable.
It may be that somebody will be entertained by the account of this happy fiasco.
Describing conversion as a happy fiasco is brilliant.
'Twas grace that taught my heart to fear
and grace my fears relieved.
Salvation is found in being undone and finding yourself put back together, in being leveled and yet raised up, lost and yet found, dead and yet alive.
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