2023-03-29 A Meditation on Edenic Curse

““For the kingdom of heaven is like a master of a house who went out early in the morning to hire laborers for his vineyard.” (Mt 20:1 ESV)

To be vigilant is to narrow our search. We have found a horizon promised and engaging, the calling, the cause for joy. It is to trade in all self-indulgence and dwell near to patient engagement. We do this in a fresh manner, one that stops endlessly searching, stops distracting; we have found a winsome manner of life, even as we harbor pains that in this life are unresolved. We pick up and write, or pick up and study, or discharge our soldiering duties, picked up and done with prep work, with the office routine. We are solemn yet with a distant horizon on the radar, we are hopeful here and now.

Is this the Gospel that you feel in your heart? We maintain that it is: to have calling and labors, is to grab by the horns the Edenic curse: “By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread, till you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; for you are dust, and to dust you shall return.”” (Ge 3:19). We grab by the horns regarding labor, and accept that Christ has redeemed the labors, giving them over unto joyous example, joyous illustration, joyous exchange. All this joy even as we have longings unmet. Even as we have finally concluded only a finite amount of work will we accomplish this side of Heaven, and we had best get to it.

Therefore, to have expectations of a future joy, is to minister to the person Now. It is to discover the life of prayer, as a vigilant manner of life and one that far from narrowing our purpose, enlarges it (Is 54:2). We may invite more challenging material, because we are in autopilot mode: simply sitting down and writing, or ministering love to the downtrodden in our company, or standing in amazement at the dedicated Christian community, that does do these deeds of love. We produce. We enlarge. We dwell in a distant Hope that our deeds undertaken in faith are not in vain. We give glory to the One on High, for the technique and enabling Spirit, the designs for good and not for evil (Je 29:11).