All Hallows' Eve and the Response to Grace

At the end of Charles William’s All Hallows’ Eve, one character is asked to take on a difficult task that will require pouring out the flood of grace that she has been given. As it is put in the story, “the extra grace involved an extra labor; without the labor, of what value the grace?” This puts forcefully the most striking thing about grace: that, though it is freely given, it takes everything that we have to respond to it, for the ultimate work of grace is to make us like God. Unless we are willing to let go of everything and pour out our lives in response, grace cannot complete its work. As George MacDonald put it in a line quoted at the beginning of C. S. Lewis’ The Great Divorce, “No, there is no escape. There is no heaven with a little of hell in it – no plan to retain this or that of the devil in our hearts or our pockets. Out Satan must go, every hair and feather.” Grace calls to obedience, like Abraham out of the land of his fathers, so that we can cut all the threads that hold us and come into possession of what is promised.

It is this that St. Paul means when he says, “For this slight momentary affliction is preparing us for an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison” (II Cor. 4:17). To what afflictions does he refer? “We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies” (II Cor. 4:8-10). Not light stuff, under most reckonings! But Paul sees that one must become capable of the divine life. Just as one would be crushed if they were to stand under the weight of Niagara Falls, so the infinite divine glory will crush us unless we are forged into persons capable of bearing this weight. Bearing with affliction as we let grace take its course in our lives allows us to become capable of sharing even the divine nature (cf. II Peter 1:4). “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me” (Galatians 2:20).

This is why anyone who contrasts the work of grace and our own labors is making a mistake. The two go together: grace is the principle and source of the labors and perseverance that transform us.

The novels of Charles Williams, by the way, are really worth reading. He, perhaps more than anyone else I have read, captures both the joy and freedom of grace as well as the demanding nature of our response to it. There are scenes in the middle of All Hallows’ Eve where asking and receiving forgiveness become the bridgehead for grace to flow into the lives of two women; the beauty and goodness of newly encountered salvation are stunningly described, and contrasted to a dark background of evil. But in both of these women’s lives grace demands much of them – for one, hard labor, and for the other, renunciation of all she held dear. It is Williams’ gift that he helps the reader feel the pain of the response while never losing the unbelievable greatness and tenderness of the gift.