Week 10: Chapter 9 — Patches of Godlight

1.Yancey borrows C. S. Lewis's phrase "patches of Godlight" to describe those moments when grace breaks through the ordinary — beauty that stops us, kindness that undoes us, a story that lodges in the heart. Have you experienced moments like this? What did they feel like, and what did they point toward?

2.He argues that art — fiction, music, film — can sometimes carry the truth of grace more powerfully than a sermon because it sneaks past our defenses. What stories, songs, or films have functioned that way for you — illuminating something about grace or God that propositional teaching alone couldn't reach?

3.Yancey draws on a variety of literary and artistic sources throughout the book — Tolstoy, Dostoevsky, Dinesen, Hugo. What do these secular (or at least non-evangelical) artists have to teach Christians about grace? Is it possible for truth about grace to be present in art made by people who don't claim the Christian faith?