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In ten articles, released in a series of pamphlets titled The Instant, Kierkegaard argued, as Muggeridge says, that "the one sure way to abolish Christ's Kingdom, irretrievably and forever, was to make it 'of this world.'"

And this was just what Kierkegaard believed was happening in the Danish church. He cautioned believers to stay as far from possible from the Danish clergy, whose religion was, as he wrote, "just about as genuine as tea made from a bit of paper which once lay in a drawer beside another bit of paper which had once been used to wrap up a few dried tea leaves from which tea had already been made three times."

Of what the apostle Paul called "the world"—that is, humankind apart from Christ, the Danish philosopher-theologian also wrote with great insight: "Is not the truth of the matter really this, that man is just like a child who would rather be free from being under his parents' eyes? Is not this what men want? To be free from being under the eyes of God? . . . Christ, being an absolute, explodes all the relativity whereby we humans live. In order to live in the spirit rather than the flesh, as he requires, one must go through crisis after crisis. … "

But the floundering, compromised institutional church was failing miserably to bring people to this difficult freedom in Christ. And so Kierkegaard hoped "through my writings . . . to leave behind me so accurate an account of Christianity in the world that an enthusiastic, high-minded young person will be able to find in them, as it were, a map of Christian relationships."

This "weird Dane," as Muggeridge affectionately calls him, believed that the Church Fathers, while brilliantly and deeply theological, were not "in the world" enough to communicate well to today's worldlings. As a thoughtful person who had drunk deeply of the world, recognizing how susceptible he was to its allures, and who was a "person-watcher," constantly to be seen walking the streets of his town in conversation with others, Kierkegaard felt it was his mission to make the bridge from the Gospel to the world—in an age where the world had invaded the church to devastating effect.

And indeed, many "high-minded young people" and others have continued to study Kierkegaard to this day, appreciating both his critique of dead faith and his outline of living faith.

Among Kierkegaard's last written words were these:

"Christianity implies, unconditionally, that every man, every single individual, is equally close to God . . . Because Loved by Him. Consequently there is equality . . . between man and man. If there is any distinction, it is that one person bears in mind that he is loved, perhaps day after day, perhaps day after day for seventy years, perhaps with only one longing, a longing for eternity so that he really can grasp this thought and go through life with it, concerning himself with the blessed occupation of meditating on how he is loved—and not, alas, because of his virtue.

"Another person perhaps does not remember that he is loved, perhaps goes on year after year, day after day, and does not think of his being loved; or perhaps he is glad and grateful to be loved by his wife, by his children, by his friends, by his contemporaries, but he does not think of his being loved by God. . . . If there is an equality among us men in which we completely resemble each other, it is that not one of us truly thinks about being loved!"

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Muggeridge's Final Testament
I did promise to give you information about what happened to the film version of A Third Testament: it turns out that a Christian video company is pursuing rights to the film. If they get the rights and it looks like the film will be made available again, I'll let you know! Meanwhile, I want to let you know about a worthy film that is currently available: Gateway Films's powerful video, in its "Christian Catalyst Collection," of Muggeridge's "testament."

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April (Web-only) 2004, Vol. 48