If someone asks him, ‘What are these wounds on your body?’ he will answer, ‘The wounds I was given at the house of my friends.’ Zech 13 v 6

Tuesday, November 17, 2009

C.S. Lewis

"There is not safe investment. To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no-one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully around with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket --safe, dark, motionless, airless--it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is hell." ~ C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves


I was handed this quote from a good friend months ago....she warned me that it might be a tough one to read. It was. I read it and then neatly folded it back up. I have been carrying it around in my daily planner for a while now. Over the months I would occasionally run into the folded piece of paper with my name so nicely written on the outside. I am now in a place where I am able to have this quote open and facing me on a daily basis reminding me to open up. That closing off out of my pain will only kill me inside.

3 comments:

Unknown said...

Bless you, sweetheart.

freddyeddy said...

A great and challenging gift from someone who must be a good friend.

I'm still sneeking in and out of the casket.....

Danielle said...

Regina-Thank you for that!

Fred-I know, I know....I just don't want the enemy to win. I know he wins if my heart becomes "irredeemable." I hold a hammer now inside the casket to pop out the nails when I notice I am inside.