Imagination Leading to Faith

by Ed Derby
If you read Lewis, the idea of imagination leading to faith is richly woven into nearly all his work. He certainly imagines Heaven in The Great Divorce and hellish battles in Screwtape Letters. The idea of holding at bay all you know in order to believe afresh, could be, in some ways, the Twitter line for the entire Narnia series.

Lewis at Stonehenge (Read more)

But I was struck again by the obvious. If you read The Weight of Glory or Mere Christianity or any of his non-fiction, he gets to the conclusion of Jesus and a God-centric world through imagination. Sure, there is logic and doctrinal claims, but his main defense is to basically lead you into the story of faith.

For if we take the imagery of Scripture seriously, if we believe that God will one day give us the Morning Star and cause us to put on the splendour of the sun, then we may surmise that both the ancient myths and modern poetry, so false as history, may be very near the truth as prophecy.  (The Weight of Glory)

The story of faith is something Lewis connects with the ancients myths as pale reflections to the true God-man who came and fulfilled all the longing in those texts. In his discussion of modern science and all its exactness and clean lines (or want for them), Lewis says that we are "inveterate poets." who are awakened by the massive amount of stars in the sky and strike cords of reverence because we must.

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