PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS
MERE CHRISTIANITY
CHAPTER 2: The Three-Personal God
Before starting, number your paragraphs 1-17
Introduction
In the last lesson we looked at the way we can actually live the righteous life: it is by being transformed into being sons and daughters of God. Whenever we are truly being transformed into being God's sons and daughters, we start producing righteous acts, acts that God's Son Himself would produce.
You need to understand that Christianity is not the only system which says in order to produce good deeds, you must first be good. Both Aristotle and Confucius made this analysis. They both said that only the good person produces the good deeds. The only problem with their systems is that their systems don't produce good men, as the leaders of ancient China demonstrated during their reigns. Of all the philosophical and religious systems only Christianity truly makes the claim that it can transform you into good persons by making you truly sons and daughters of God. This chapter is helping us to understand the way that God is truly transforming us into His sons and daughters. One of the ways He transforms us is based upon the very nature of God Himself, the concept of the Trinity, one God who is three persons.
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Christians though are the only kind of people who offer any idea of what?
When all the other people say that God is beyond personality itself, what do they mean?
Why is it that whenever you are looking for something super-personal, something more than a person, it is not a question of choosing between the Christian idea and the other ideas?
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When they try to explain this, what do they seem to be thinking of?
How does a drop of water falling into the ocean illustrate this? What happens to that drop?
What idea do only Christians have though?
Lewis is actually contrasting Christianity with Hinduism. Hinduism claims that you and God are one, and that eventually you will be absorbed into God. For all practical purposes Hinduism claims that you will eventually cease to exist.
On the other hand, Christianity claims that you will retain your distinctiveness even after Christ has returned and raised you from the dead. In fact, in Revelation John says that the "nations," not "nation," will enter heaven. "Nations" refers to different ethnic groups.
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In the 3-dimensional world it's the same straight line you saw in the 1-dimensional world; however, it is part of something bigger than just being a straight line. It is a straight line but now more than a straight line.
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What do you have instead?
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What is true about persons on the higher divine level?
In God's dimension what you find "a Being who is ____________ ____________ while remaining ____________ ________________."
When Jesus claims that He is God, He is actually claiming that He comes from a higher dimension. What does He do to prove that He is from a higher dimension, that is, that He is God?
Why can't we truly conceive of such a Being?
We are now getting "some positive idea, however faint, of something ____________-__________________--something ____________ than a __________________."
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What then is it that matters?
Actually, we have to some extent experienced this in one relationship in life, our marriages. Gen. 2:24 says that God makes the 2 into ONE. In God' math of marriage, 1 + 1 = 1. It is like God takes 2 objects and superglues them together to make them 1 object.
Our relationship with our spouses differs from every other relationship we have. Whenever I am in a room, a woman may enter; she may catch my attention momentarily; however, when my wife enters, her presence for me remains heavy upon that room. There is a connection with her in that room that I don't experience with anybody else.
How one now are the 2 of you? Now if you superglue an object to a wall, what happens whenever you rip the object off the wall? You take a chunk out of the wall. That's what divorce does. Marriage makes you so one that if you destroy that marriage, you take a chunk out of that person.
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"The man is being caught up into the higher kinds of life--what I called Zoe or ______________ life: he is being pulled in ____________, by _____________, while still remaining ____________________."
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When they worked it all out they found they had arrived at what?
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What religions are the made-up religions?
In what way is theology NOT like the other experimental sciences, such as, geology?
In what way is theology NOT like the other experimental sciences?
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If God does not want to reveal Himself to you, what can you do to make Him reveal Himself to you?
Why does God show Himself to some people more than He does to other people?
How do sunlight and a dusty mirror illustrate this point?
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If a man's self is not kept clean and bright, what will happen to his glimpse of God?
Why have horrible nations had horrible religions?
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What does God want humanity to be like?
This is the key: being in committed relationships with other people. Now the purpose of these committed relationships is not that I can use them as emotional dumping grounds, as means to feel good about myself. God uses these relationships to surface within me those things who need to change. Moreover, these relationships give me the opportunity to become like God because they give me the opportunity to love. Diane Keaton's character in the movie Marvin's Room is dying. At one point she breaks down crying: "I've had so much love." The Meryl Street character says: "Yes, so many people love you." Diane Keaton replies: "No, I don't mean that. I mean I have had such a wonderful opportunity to love them." That's the attitude and character God is trying to develop within us.
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"People who turn up every few years with some patent simplified religion of their own as a substitute for the Christian tradition are really ___________ time."
What will happen to that person 2 years later?
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Book Four
Chapter 2
Lewis has been speaking about the difference between making something and begetting something. What happens whenever God begets God?
Do Christians agree with people who say that the mysterious something (God) must be more than a person?
What do some people think will happen after this life is over (or after they have lived several lives)?
Lewis says that theology IS practical. What is the whole purpose for which we exist?
Lewis here tries to explain what the life of God is like. In a 1-dimensional world there would only be a straight line. In a 2-dimensional world that same straight line would be part of a square. In a 3-dimensional world that same straight line would be part of what?
When you advance to higher levels, do you leave behind the things you found on the simpler levels?
Now Lewis contrasts persons on the simple human level with persons on the higher divine level. What is true about persons on the simple human level?
Since it is impossible to conceive of such a Being, is it any good talking about Him?
How does prayer illustrate the idea that we are being drawn into the 3-personal life of God?
How did Christian theology start?
Instead of being made up, theology is actually in a sense what kind of science?
Lewis now goes up one stage higher. In normal human relationships the initiative is "__________________ divided--it takes _________ to make a friendship."
Our relationship with God is different from our relationship with nature and with other people. In our relationship with God the initiative lies solely on whose side?
Whereas in other sciences the instruments are external to yourself, what is true about the instrument through which you see God?
God can show Himself as He really is only to people. Instead of showing Himself to just the individual person, who does He show Himself to?
What is the one really adequate instrument for learning about God?
If Christianity were something we made up, we could make it easier. We cannot make it simpler because we are dealing with fact. "Of course anyone can be simple" if it has what?