...we
must take it or leave it...
Another possible objection is this. Why is God landing in this enemy-occupied
world in disguise and starting a sort of secret society to undermine the
devil? Why is He not landing in force, invading it? Is it that He is not
strong enough? Well, Christians think He is going to land in force; we
do not know when. But we can guess why He is delaying. He wants to give
us the chance of joining His side freely. I do not suppose you and I would
have thought much of a Frenchman who waited till the Allies were marching
into Germany and then announced he was on our side. God will invade. But
I wonder whether people who ask God to interfere openly and directly in
our world quite realise what it will be like when He does. When that happens,
it is the end of the world. When the author walks on to the stage the play
is over. God is going to invade, all right: but what is the good of saying
you are on His side then, when you see the whole natural universe melting
away like a dream and something else—something it never entered your head
to conceive—comes crashing in; something so beautiful to some of us and
so terrible to others that none of us will have any choice left? For this
time it will be God without disguise; something so overwhelming that it
will strike either irresistible love or irresistible horror into every
creature. It will be too late then to choose your side. There is no use
saying you choose to lie down when it has become impossible to stand up.
That will not be the time for choosing: it will be the time when we discover
which side we really have chosen, whether we realised it before or not.
Now, today, this moment, is our chance to choose the right side. God is
holding back to give us that chance. It will not last for ever. We must
take it or leave it.
an excerpt
from Chapter
5 in Book II (What Christians Believe) of
Mere
Christianity
by
C.S. Lewis