Trusting Our Creator

"My son, do not reject the discipline of the Lord,
or loathe His reproof,
For whom the Lord loves He reproves,
even as a father the son in whom he delights."
(Proverbs 3:12)


When discussing this passage on Sunday, I referred to a quotation by C.S. Lewis from "The Problem of Pain." Several people commented on this, and so I thought I would post the quotation here.

Lewis sets out to illustrate how God can both love us and yet allow (indeed, cause) troubles in our lives. He compares the painful work of God in our lives to the work of an artist:

Over a sketch made idly to amuse a child, an artist may not take much trouble: he may be content to let it go even though it is not exactly as he meant it to be. But over the great picture of his life -- the work which he loves, though in a different fashion, as intensely as a man loves a woman or a mother a child -- he will take endless trouble -- and would, doubtless, thereby give endless trouble to the picture if it were sentient. One can imagine a sentient picture, after being rubbed and scraped and recommenced for the tenth time, wishing that were only a thumbnail sketch whose making was over in a minute. In the same way, it is natural for us to wish that God had designed us for a less glorious and less arduous destiny; but then we are wishing not for more love but for less. (ch. 3)

Lewis proceeds to offer further illustrations from the relationship of a master to a pet (you really shouldn't miss that one!), a husband to a wife, and a father to a son.

During times of great pain, there are no easy answers. And we do not have to have marvelous answers. We need only to trust. God's word, and in this case Lewis's reflections on it, can help us be prepared for such times.


"For we are His workmanship..." (Ephesians 2:10a)