PHILOSOPHICAL WRITINGS
MERE CHRISTIANITY
CHAPTER 9: Counting the Cost
Before starting, number your paragraphs 1-11
Paragraph 1:
Lewis says that by this Jesus meant: "The only help I will give you is help to ___________ _____________. You may want something __________; but I will give you _____________________ ________________." In other words, your becoming perfect is Jesus' agenda, and it ain't gonna change!
Paragraph 2:
What do those dentists do whenever you ask them to look at one tooth?
Definition of an ell: An ell (from Proto-Indo-European *el- "elbow, forearm"), when used as an English unit of length, is usually 45 inches, i.e. 1.143 m (for the international inch). It was mainly used in the tailoring business but is now obsolete. It was derived from the length of the arm from the shoulder (or the elbow) to the wrist, although the exact length was never defined in English law.
Paragraph 3:
"That may be all you asked; but if once you call Him in, He will give you the ____________ _______________________."
Paragraph 4:
What is Jesus willing for this to cost you?
What is Jesus willing for this to cost Him?
"This I can do and will do. But I will not do anything less."
Paragraph 5:
What pleases a father when his child is little? With what only is he satisfied whenever his son becomes a man?
"God is easy to please, but hard to satisfy."
Paragraph 6:
What is one thing God knows perfectly well?
What is the one goal He has for your life?
What is the only thing which can prevent Him from taking you to that goal?
If we don't realize that this is His goal, what are we most likely to do?
What are we inclined to feel once Christ has enabled us to overcome one or two sins?
Now that Christ has taken care of these 2 or 3 sins we didn't like, we should be obliged if He did what?
Instead of being a saint, what is it that wanted to be?
Paragraph 7:
If Jesus is the inventor and the painter, what are we?
Physically we go from being little vegetables to little fishes to human babies and then finally into adults. If we had been conscious at each stage, we would have been happy to remain at those stages. Why didn't we stay at these earlier stages?
What is happening at the higher level?
"To shrink back from that plan is not ______________: it is ________________ and _________________. To submit to it is not ______________ or megalomania; it is _____________________."
Paragraph 8:
What is true on the other hand?
"The job will not be completed in this life; but He meants to get us as far as possible before ______________." We might as well give in since He isn't going to give up.
Paragraph 9:
Why does all this seem unnecessary to us?
Paragraph 10:
Although you happily thought that God was going to make you into a little cottage, He is actually making you into what?
Why would He make you a palace?
Paragraph 11:
If we let Him, what will He do to the feeblest and filthiest of us?
How does Lewis describe what it means to be a god or goddess.
"The process will be _____________ and in parts very __________________, but that is what we are in for. Nothing ___________________. He _______________ what He said."
Book Four
Chapter 9
How do some people misunderstand what Lewis means when he writes: "Be ye perfect"?
Lewis compares coming to Jesus with coming to your mother whenever you had a toothache. Why would he wait until his tooth really hurt before he would go tell her?
How is God like a dentist?
The moment you put yourself into Jesus' hands, what are you in for?
Although Christ will be contented with nothing less than your perfection, what also does He delight in?
Why shouldn't God's demand for us to be perfect discourage us in the least in our present attempts to be good, or even in our present failures?
We never intended for Him to make us into the sort of creatures He is going to make us into. But what is the real question?
On the one hand what must we never imagine?
Even though you've been doing well spiritually, why does God allow troubles to come along?
At first when God comes to rebuild your house, everything He does seems necessary and acceptable. But what does God do next to your house?
The command to be perfect is neither idealistic nor a command to do the impossible. God said that we were gods [not in the same sense He is]. What is God going to do about those words?