Thought for the Week – Screwtape and Wormwood

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In 1940 C.S. Lewis, wrote a book about conversations between two devils. In one conversation, Screwtape, a senior devil is advising his young nephew, Wormwood, on the best way to win souls away from God.

Wormwood is determined to be clever and invent his own ways of seducing people away from God. Screwtape is not impressed and becomes impatient and finally loses his temper.   “Listen”, he says,  “I have been doing this for years – I know what works and what doesn’t – you don’t have to reinvent the wheel”.

The simplest way to win those souls for us, is to block their attention – create so much noise and distraction that the only voice human beings hear is their own – and above all make sure you block out the voice of God or the Holy Spirit in their lives.

At one point Screwtape proudly announces, “we will make the whole world a noise and in the end and win every soul away from God.”

And today,  they seem to be winning – with our addiction to technology we are making it a whole lot easier for Screwtape and his nephew – they can’t believe their luck – all they have to do is sit back and watch us addicts unable to resist the next ping on our phones or iPads – we are full on addicts,  our attention compromised – seduced away from life.

The truth is….. that our attention is one of our most precious gifts and we need to mind it – don’t let it be hijacked too easily – our relationship with our environment, with people and with God are based on it……if we don’t mind it and continue to give it away cheaply  we WILL miss out on many of the riches that life has to offer.

Let’s not make life too easy for Screwtape or his nephew or google or Facebook. 

 

Murroe Website EditorThought for the Week – Screwtape and Wormwood