Meditation in a Toolshed

In his essay, "Meditation in a Toolshed," C.S. Lewis discusses the differences of looking along an experience and looking at one. He first uses a light beam in a toolshed to describe it. Looking at the beam it looks like just light hitting dust but when you look along the beam you see the trees and sun outside. If you only look at or along it, you cannot fully understand the beam so you have to look at both. Lewis says this has not been followed though. "It has been assumed without discussion that if you want the true account of religion you must go, not to religious people, but to anthropologists; that if you want the true account of sexual love you must go, not to lovers, but to psychologists; that if you want to understand some “ideology” (such as medieval chivalry or the nineteenth-century idea of a “gentleman”), you must listen not to those who lived inside it, but to sociologists." Then Lewis goes on to give some practical examples of what this looks like in everyday situations. Love is one of the examples he uses. Someone may say they are in love but a scientist looking at the experience will say it is just in his genes and mind. Lewis also mentions how it is almost impossible to describe something accurately if you have not experienced it. Lewis' example of pain works well here as it would be very difficult to describe pain if you had never felt it. All of this is perhaps why C.S. Lewis is such a captivating Christian writer. He was an atheist so he looked at Christianity for a long time before becoming a Christian. Lewis, having looked both along and at Christianity, can more easily describe it to others and put it into his writings whether they be fictional stories or theological books. As Christians we need to be sure to look both at and along things and then determine if either view is right, and if both are right we need to be able to balance the views to form the complete picture.