Gardening revelation

This past autumn, I was cutting down annual plants which had finished producing and placing them on top of the soil to eventually decompose. 

I was rejoicing that this decomposition process would improve the soil.

I thought to myself "Decomposition into existing soil improves it so that it is much better than soil that has never been used." 

This struck a memory for me of a quote from C.S. Lewis:

"For God is not merely mending, not simply restoring a status quo. Redeemed humanity is to be something more glorious than unfallen humanity would have been..." - C.S. Lewis, Miracles 1947, in Chapter 14 "The Grand Miracle".

In other words, C.S. Lewis believed that man who is redeemed through the death of Jesus is somehow intrinsically better than unfallen man.

I found it a bit easier to see this viewpoint using the gardening analogy. It's not a great analogy, but it was concrete enough to help me. Soil that has never been used is never going to be as good as soil that has been enriched by decaying matter. Likewise, man who had never fallen would never be as good as a fallen man who has been redeemed by the death of Jesus. Again, this does not perfectly analogize spiritually, so don't use this analogy if it doesn't help you. But it was interesting for me to see this.

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