There have been times when I think we do not desire heaven but more often I find myself wondering whether, in our heart of hearts, we have ever desired anything else.
Looking for God-or Heaven-by exploring space is like reading or seeing all Shakespeare’s plays in the hope that you will find Shakespeare as one of the characters...
If you picture Time as a straight line along which we have to travel, then you must think of God as the whole page on which the line is drawn.
Our problem with desire is that we want too little.
We treat our dogs as if they were “almost human”: that is why they really become “almost human” in the end.
The prayer preceding all prayers is ‘May it be the real I who speaks. May it be the real Thou that I speak to.’
A cold, self-righteous prig who goes regularly to church may be far nearer to Hell than a prostitute.
In our own case we accept excuses too easily; in other people’s, we do not accept them easily enough.
Faith in Christ is the only thing to save you from despair.
You must have a capacity to receive, or even omnipotence can’t give.
Youth and age touch only the surface of our lives.
I never fully understood it till my friend Professor Tolkien asked me the very simple question, ‘What class of men would you expect to be most preoccupied with, and hostile to, the idea of escape?’ and gave the obvious answer: jailers.
Jesus produced mainly three effects: hatred, terror, adoration. There was no trace of people expressing mild approval.
All your life an unattainable ecstasy has hovered just beyond the grasp of your consciousness.
As image and apprehension are in organic unity, so, for a Christian, are human body and human soul.
On the whole, God’s love for us is a much safer subject to think about than our love for Him.
Our desire is not only to SEE glory, but to participate in the glory we see.
Education is only the most fully conscious of the channels whereby each generation influences the next.
Precisely because we cannot predict the moment, we must be ready at all moments.
That fierce imprisonment in the self is but the obverse of the self-giving which is absolute reality.