https://www.cslewisinstitute.org/God_Invites_Us_to_Enjoy_Him
Reflections May 2012
God Invites Us to Enjoy Him
Early in his Christian life, C.S. Lewis struggled with the idea that God demands our praise and commands us to give Him glory. However, he soon realized that this “stumbling block” was due to his misconception of God and a misunderstanding of what praise really is. He writes in his book, Reflections on the Psalms,
"The most obvious fact about praise—whether of God or anything—strangely escaped me.
I thought of it /in terms of compliment, approval, or the giving of honour.
I had never noticed that all enjoyment spontaneously overflows into praise
unless …shyness or the fear of boring others is deliberately brought in to check it.
* check ; stop or slow down the progress of (something undesirable). 막다
The world rings with praise—lovers /praising their mistresses, readers their favourite poet,
walkers /praising the countryside, players /praising their favourite game
–
praise of weather, wines, dishes, actors, motors, horses, colleges,
countries, historical personages, children, flowers, mountains, rare
stamps, rare beetles, even sometimes politicians or scholars.
I had not noticed how the humblest, and at the same time most balanced and capacious, minds,
praised most, while the cranks, misfits, and malcontents praised least...
Except where [intolerably adverse circumstances] interfere,
[praise] almost seems to be inner health made audible.…
* 전치사로 쓰인 except (preposition) ; not including; other than.
전목인 의문사절/명사절 ; where [intolerably adverse circumstances] interfere,
I had not noticed either that just as men spontaneously praise [whatever they value],
so they spontaneously urge us to join them in praising it:
“Isn’t she lovely? Wasn’t it glorious? Don’t you think that magnificent?”
[The Psalmists in telling everyone to praise God] are doing [what all men do when they speak of what they care about.
[My whole, more general, difficulty about the praise of God] depended on my absurdly denying to us, as regards the supremely Valuable, what we delight to do, what we indeed can’t help doing, about everything else we value.
* 전치사구 ; as regards. : in regard to : with respect to
* 동명사 denying 의 목적인 의문사절 ; what we delight to do about everything else we value.
to do 의 목적인 의문대명사 what
대명사 what 수식인 형역전구 about everything else we value.
we delight to do (what) about everything else we value.
* 동격인 삽입절/명사절 what we indeed can’t help doing 앞 명사절을 재설명하는 역할
I think we delight to praise what we enjoy because the praise not merely expresses but completes the enjoyment; it is its appointed consummation.
It is not out of compliment that lovers keep on telling one another how beautiful they are;
the delight is incomplete /till it is expressed…
If it were possible for a created soul fully… to “appreciate”,
that is to love and delight in, the worthiest object of all,
and simultaneously at every moment to give this delight perfect expression,
then that soul would be in supreme beautitude…
* 삽입절/형절/계속용법 ; that is to love and delight in, (that = a created soul)
be to~ 하기로 되어있다
* for a created soul to “appreciate” the worthiest object of all, and to give this delight perfect expression,
* The Beatitudes are eight blessings recounted by Jesus in the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospel of Matthew.
The Scotch catechism says that man’s chief end is “to glorify God and enjoy Him forever”.
But we shall then know that these are the same thing. Fully to enjoy is to glorify.
In commanding us to glorify Him, God is inviting us to enjoy Him."
While God as our Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer certainly deserves our praise,
isn’t it amazing again to realize His lovingkindness towards us, as in commanding us to give Him praise,
He is offering us the supreme in joy and fullness of life.
It makes you want to shout out loud and share the goodness of God with others.
* 삽입어구
isn’t it amazing again to realize His lovingkindness towards us, as in commanding us to give Him praise,
* 종절While God as our Creator, Sustainer, and Redeemer certainly deserves our praise,
* 주절 He is offering us the supreme in joy and fullness of life.
I delight greatly in the LORD; my soul rejoices in my God. For he has clothed me with
garments of salvation and arrayed me in a robe of his righteousness, as a bridegroom
adorns his head like a priest, and as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.
Isaiah 61:10 (NIV)
1 C.S. Lewis, Reflections on the Psalms. (New York: Harcourt, Brace & Co., 1958), pp. 93–97
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