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OBU—Oklahoma Baptist University

Radaker Brings C.S. Lewis to Life

February 28, 2011

The legendary Christian author and scholar C.S. Lewis came to life for OBU students during a weekly chapel service Wednesday, Feb. 23, in Raley Chapel. Dr. Kevin Radaker, professor of English at Anderson University in Anderson, Ind., portrayed Lewis during the service. His performance included passages from 13 of Lewis' writings and details about how Lewis went from an atheistic teenager to one of the 20th century's most acclaimed authors.

"I finally admitted that God was God, and I knelt and prayed that night, perhaps the most reluctant convert in all of England," said C.S. Lewis, portrayed by Dr. Kevin Radaker. Lewis noted his faith in Jesus Christ was not complete until years later. He said he didn't know how or why, but he knew when: while riding in a sidecar on the way to the zoo. "When we began the journey, I did not believe Jesus Christ was the Son of God," Lewis said. "When we finished that journey, I did."

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"Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken," C.S. Lewis wrote in his work, "The Four Loves." Dr. Kevin Radaker, portraying Lewis, shared from the work. To keep one's heart intact, a person must not risk love, he said. "Lock it up safe in the coffin of your selfishness. But be aware that when it is in that coffin -- safe, dark, and without air -- your heart will change. It will not only become unbreakable, it will become impenetrable, and even moreso, it will become irredeemable."


"God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains; it is His megaphone to rouse adeaf world," Christian author C.S. Lewis wrote in his work, "The Problem of Pain." In his portrayal of Lewis, Dr. Kevin Radaker conveyed the author's opinion that "pain hurts," and that it reminds people they are not self-sufficient but rather must rely on God. Lewis knew pain firsthand, having lost his wife, Joy, to cancer four years after they married.


"Without a doubt, intellectual ascent is very important to our faith," C.S. Lewis wrote. "But intellectual ascent is not enough. To live a life of faith is not to be presented with some argument that demands our intellectual ascent. To live a life of faith is to be confronted with an inconceivable God who demands our trust, who demands our confidence. To live a life of faith, you see, is a matter of the heart, as well as the head."