Friday, November 12, 2010

Lewis on the Legalistic Temptation

C. S. Lewis has a helpful quote below on a temptation I think all of us struggle with—mandating rules for others on areas that are not mandated in Scripture. In context Lewis is discussing teetotalism in particular, but it has wider application:
One of the marks of a certain type of bad man is that he cannot give up a thing himself without wanting every one else to give it up.
That is not the Christian way. An individual Christian may see fit to give up all sorts of things for special reasons—marriage, or meat, or beer, or the cinema; but the moment he starts saying the things are bad in themselves, or looking down his nose at other people who do use them, he has taken the wrong turning.
Mere Christianity, pp. 78-79.
Justin Taylor

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