Elon Musk Wouldn’t Mind Being “Saved” Session # 5 of 10.
The Weight of Glory, We Are Too Easily Pleased.
“At present we are on the outside of the world, the wrong side of the door. We discern the freshness and purity of morning, but they do not make us fresh and pure. We cannot mingle with the splendors we see. But all the leaves of the New Testament are rustling with the rumor that it will not always be so.” C. S. Lewis [1]
If I was standing next to Elon Musk on a beautiful sunny day, I would ask him how long he supposes it will take for the sun to fizzle out. You know, burn out, lose its power, and go away. He would probably throw out a figure something higher than a billion years.[2] Then I would say, “Elon, when the sun burns out, you will still be alive.” He might smirk and call me stupid. I would retort however, “Elon, a saved person will reside in a new heaven and a new earth in which to frolic with pleasures unimagined by any human. It will be glorious, a glory whose weight is much more than any human can carry or comprehend.”
What is greater than religion?
When I gaze at the universe, I see something much greater than religion. The religious establishment has always been afraid of losing power and their market share. This was certainty true in the first century. But God is much greater than religion, greater than Christianity, even greater that the prevailing institutions.
As the sociologist Peter Berger penned, “The Revelation of God in Jesus Christ…is something very different from religion.” [3]
But God has spoken exclusively and completely in the person of Christ Jesus—what we call incarnation. God created us in his image, positioned himself as a Father, and humans who seek him, as his family. That does not however, mean that God himself is limited to personhood alone. We must allow God to be even more than we can imagine, far weightier than our minds can understand or even embrace. The heavens do indeed declare the glory of the Lord, and that is what most people see. At the same time however, they become skeptical of the church as an institution. The logos, or Jesus, is a word or communication to us much more profound and penetrating than any holy building or church tradition. That is what I want Musk to see, that is what God wants us to see.
Let’s go to Mars!
I think Elon’s vision of populating Mars and outer space with billions of people is too small. Next to God, Mars is small potatoes, it’s child’s play. Most, at first blush, think Musk’s plans are very visionary and bold even though those same people think him crazy, zany, and out of this world. I would accuse him of being too easily pleased. Too easily pleased with what he can imagine or think up in his own head. There is some humor—God even laughs at the limitations of his creatures. A Sunday evening sermon given by an Oxford professor in 1942, even today, presents possibilities that reveal our limits. [4]
Lewis’ most famous passage from the sermon puts it plainly. “Our Lord finds our desires, not too strong, but too weak. We are half-hearted creatures, fooling about with drink and sex and ambition when infinite joy is offered us, like an ignorant child who wants to go on making mud pies in a slum because he cannot imagine what is meant by the offer of a holiday at the sea. We are far too easily pleased.” [5]
Where does a person go from here?
There are so many angles and options to consider. Haven’t we all heard that being hard to please is a negative? One of the most negative aspects of Musk’s personality is he is almost entirely unpleasable. Being unpleasable is off putting—no one can work with him—only the desperate survive. I doubt that is what Lewis meant. Isn’t it equally confusing because Lewis is saying we need to be harder to please, and yet we desire to please God. I recall the verse in Hebrews 11:6, “Without faith, it is impossible to please God.” I think what Lewis is saying is that there is a weight of glory, that Musk’s ambitions and our ambitions are too light; they lack the gravitas needed. The Hebrew word for Glory means “heavy.” Real glory is not fame, it is that the salvation of human-kind and its results are the ultimate weighty reality. The act of discipleship then, is to follow Jesus and learn from him. He will teach us.
The schoolboy.
Lewis uses a simple idea to explain how we move forward. Please allow me to summarize: The school boy begins Greek grammar. He cannot imagine reading or even liking the great Greek classics. At first, he is dedicated to parsing verbs, declining nouns, memorizing vocabulary, and remembering rules. He gets rewarded step by step and then enjoyment begins to creep into his life. He can’t remember exactly when it took place, but drudgery left, and joy began. He grew to love Sophocles, or as in my case, the Greek New Testament. And as Lewis states:
Poetry replaces grammar, gospel replaces law, longing transforms obedience, as gradually as the tide lifts a grounded ship. [6]
Jesus as your teacher.
How many times have you started getting serious and attempting to practice the ways and means of Jesus—and you didn’t last long? It can be drudgery at first; memorizing scripture, trying your hand at fasting, scheduling thirty minutes a day to read and pray. Even going to church regularly can be difficult, especially since people there annoy you. But if you keep it up, the process changes you and transforms your drudgery into a new desire. There is a passage of invitation to all of us that puts this together:
Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle of heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light. [7]
Jesus had just made a claim to the people of Capernaum that despite the fact that they were corrupt and had lost their way, they could follow him and he would be their teacher. The burden of keeping the rules and being right weighed upon them. He promised them relief, that they could take his yoke.
His yoke, he claimed, was easy to bear and light. Many interpret the yoke to be a simple illustration of the agrarian life that was familiar to them. Two oxen yoked together. It probably is true that while oxen were literally yoked together, Rabbis and disciples of that era were metaphorically yoked together as well.
It is just a more comforting way of saying, follow me, learn from me, and your drudgery will be transformed into longing. New desires that are of more significant, infinitely more weighty, true glory. Take another look Mr. Musk, what do you see now?
Bill Hull
February 2024
[1] C. S. Lewis. The Weight of Glory, (Preached as a sermon in Church of St. Mary the Virgin, Oxford) on June 8, 1942. Published in THEOLOGY, November 1941, Page 8.
[2] Science tells us about 5 Billion years. Then it will go through the phases of star death. But then the ancient book called the Bible says this, “On that day, he will set the heavens on fire and the elements will melt away in the flames. But we are looking forward to the new heavens and the new earth he has promised, a world filled with God’s righteousness.” I Peter3:1213. NLT
[3] Peter Berger, The Precarious Vision (Garden City, NY: Doubleday, 1961), page 163.
[4] C.S. Lewis was the Oxford professor, and The Weight of Glory cited above was the sermon.
[5] Ibid page 1.
[6] Ibid page 2.
[7] Matthew 11:28-30 NLT.
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