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Date:         Tue, 5 Jan 1993 11:20:30 EST
From:         Dan Harling <harling@ROADRUNNER.PICTEL.COM>
Subject: Re: CS LEWIS - SCREWTAPE REVIEW

> Date: 04 Jan 1993 15:54:16 -0500 (CDT)
> From: Ian Williams <iwilliam@AU.ORACLE.COM>
> Subject: Re:  CS LEWIS - SCREWTAPE REVIEW
> To: Multiple recipients of list CHRISTIA <CHRISTIA@asuvm.inre.asu.edu>
>
> >Ian, you object that the demons tempting humans in THE SCREWTAPE
> >LETTERS do not know whether a human they are tempting is one of
> >the elect. But suppose they did. Would they not spare themselves
> >the trouble of tempting anyone they knew was saved? And would they
> >not spare themselves the trouble of tempting anyone they knew
> >was damned? Given your premises, namely
> >   (1) eternal security, plus
> >   (2) knowledge by the demons of who is secure and who is not,
> >it seems to follow that demons will never tempt anyone at all.
> >Of course, many Christians who believe (1) will reject (2). I have
> >seen arguments for (1). Do you have any for (2)?
> >
> > Yours,
> > James Kiefer
>
> Well, Revelations tells us that Satan is preoccupied with accusing the
> bretheren, so obviously satan knows who to accuse and who not...

Satan accuses *everybody*, not just the saints.  Satan knows that Jesus
and his followers are a threat to him, and thus he is concerned
primarily with accusing the brethren, but that does not mean that he
knows exactly who they are, or that he does nothing else.

We hear a lot about him tempting Jesus and his followers because that
constitutes the battlefront, the focus of the conflict.  That does not
at all mean that Satan and his minions leave all non-Christians alone.
It is quite possibly the very opposite; finding people who have no
authority over them, demons might be *more* likely to exert their
influence in that direction, thus a widespread fascination with the
occult and other such activities.  The fact that these people do not
always have any idea as to what is really going on just means it is
more likely to be attributed to something else.


> Date: 04 Jan 1993 08:28:00 -0700 (MST)
> From: Steven Klepzig <SKLEPZI@SSB1.SAFF.UTAH.EDU>
> Subject: Re: CS LEWIS - SCREWTAPE REVIEW
> To: Multiple recipients of list CHRISTIA <CHRISTIA@asuvm.inre.asu.edu>
>
> Usenet mail forward.
> ******   START OF FORWARDED MESSAGE   ******
>
> From: gjm11@cus.cam.ac.uk (G.J. McCaughan)
> Subject: Re: CS LEWIS - SCREWTAPE REVIEW
> Date: Sat, 2 Jan 1993 01:31:52 GMT
>
> In article <9301010941.AA00475@a-hp.au.oracle.com>,
> Ian Williams <iwilliam@AU.ORACLE.COM> reviews "The Screwtape Letters".
> >Never throughout the whole book was any indication of any eternal security
> >noted (and I do not think to put it down to authors license).
>
> ...If your complaint is that you don't think
> Lewis believed in eternal security, you may well be right; but that's not
> the point.
> Anyway, what would you have Screwtape say about eternal security? Bear in
> mind that (in my opinion, and I think in Lewis's too) Screwtape doesn't
> know whether the "patient" will be saved or not.
>
> >It seems to me (and I may be wrong) that CS LEWIS had a rather shaky idea
> >of being saved. One was a christian when one gave in and believed in God,
> >and if HE was good enough to make it through to the end of his life, then
> >he was finally saved... It had a strong current of the human being good
> >enough, never Jesus being good enough... It seemed starved of Grace.
>
> It didn't seem so to me at all, except in so far as you wouldn't expect
> much grace in the words of one devil writing to another. It's certainly
> true that Lewis was no Calvinist, but (wretched pseudo-Arminian that I am)
> I don't think that this mars "Screwtape" one bit.

Since Satan and the demons are neither omniscient not omnipresent, they
have no more to go on than you and I in determining whether someone is
a Christian, unless that Christian exerts the authority over them that
he is granted in Christ.  Since the natural human viewpoint gives *at
least the illusion of* free will, it is not surprising that the book,
written from the perspective of a demon, would make similar assumptions
in its style of writing.


> "Screwtape" is not (I think) primarily intended to offer hope to anyone;
> rather, to warn of various dangers facing the Christian, and to offer
> advice on, errm, practical Christian life. I thought it did that very well.
> And I don't think it's as hope-less as you make out; certainly I didn't
> find it depressing reading.

Well said.
____________________________________________________________________________
Daniel A. Harling                        (harling@pictel.com)
PictureTel Corp.             Opinions expressed are not necessarily those of
Peabody, MA  01960                   PictureTel Corp. (so there!)
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