In 1973, in the midst of the Watergate crisis, I visited the home of a friend who read to me from Mere Christianity. In that book, I encountered a formidable intellect and a logical argument that I found utterly persuasive. That night in the driveway of my friend’s home I called out to God in a flood of tears and surrendered my life to Christ.

Since November 1963, the years have diminished both John Kennedy and Aldous Huxley. Later disclosures about Kennedy’s habitual immorality have diminished his place in history. Toward the end of his life, Huxley retreated into drugs. He urged his followers, “Ignore death up to the last moment; then, when it can’t be ignored any longer, have yourself squirted full of morphia and shuffle off in a coma.”

By contrast, Lewis offered a muscular faith. “In Christ,” he said, “a new kind of man appeared; and the new kind of life which began in Him is to be put into us.”

“God,” he contended, “cannot give us peace and happiness apart from Himself, because it is not there. There is no such thing.”

Today, because of Lewis, there are millions of readers like me who can attest that they too have found God. And Lewis’s influence in the marketplace of ideas spreads daily. Of him it can be truly said: “Now he belongs to the ages.”

For further reading and information:

Peter Kreeft, Between Heaven and Hell: A Dialog Somewhere beyond Death with John F. Kennedy, C. S. Lewis, and Aldous Huxley (InterVarsity, 1982).

C. S. Lewis, Mere Christianity  (Touchstone, 1996).

C. S. Lewis, The Problem of Pain (HarperSanFrancisco, 2001).

C. S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (Harvest, 1975).

C. S. Lewis’s space trilogy includes Out of the Silent Planet, Perelandra, and That Hideous Strength.

C. S. Lewis, The Chronicles of Narnia  (HarperCollins, 1994).

Read this past speech by Chuck Colson on C. S. Lewis .

BreakPoint Commentary No. 030812, “ One Night in a Driveway .”

Armand Nicholi, The Question of God: C. S. Lewis and Sigmund Freud Debate God, Love, Sex, and the Meaning of Life (Free Press, 2002).

Richard John Neuhaus, As I Lay Dying: Meditations upon Returning (Basic Books, 2002).