2023-11-19 A Meditation on Discernment
“7 For unclean spirits, crying out with a loud voice, came out of many who had them, and many who were paralyzed or lame were healed. 8 So there was much joy in that city.” (Ac 8:7–8 ESV)
“4 Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God, for many false prophets have gone out into the world. 2 By this you know the Spirit of God: every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ has come in the flesh is from God, 3 and every spirit that does not confess Jesus is not from God. This is the spirit of the antichrist, which you heard was coming and now is in the world already. 4 Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world. 5 They are from the world; therefore they speak from the world, and the world listens to them. 6 We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us; whoever is not from God does not listen to us. By this we know the Spirit of truth and the spirit of error.” (1 Jn 4:1–6 ESV)
Answering the call, we find it fine time to wax eloquent just on how the quality or skill called Discernment does launch us into the hereafter: some judgments, at our hand, in our mind, in our outlay, could have easily made of us the ultimate sacrifice, perhaps in an alternate universe. Perhaps just as we reflect on the call to discern, we are courageous because it is a blip on the radar, an anomaly on the screen, an end to the fear and embrace of the New Life. Post mortem. Postpartum, for those born again. Post dread, and in willing fashion. Unto the hereafter. Unto the symbology or voice that somehow eases us into a new imaginative sphere. Tears in our eyes perhaps, as to a quieter or lonesome time in our lives. Indeed, more, the realization all times were lonesome for the one branching out and seeking and trying to make something of this youthful life.
Calling all who discern, from the quarterback to her or his zone man or woman. From the soldier to her or his strategic teammate, posture, and location. From the parent to the would-be heir or ones prayed over, that they might—without spoilage or giving it away—grow into what we have for them, all morality somehow afforded in exact disproportion to the emphasis of good behavior: that they willingly falter or cope with nothing judgmental except the good love and presence of the parent. Through their testing hour. Through the sphere grown into. Through the endless, never-ending prayer that somehow, if they be caught in sin, that the Good Father would see through the clouds and rain to forgive.
Answering the call we find it fine time to exercise judgment, precisely because the judgment is not ours but rather our Father’s in heaven. The weaning hour, the meticulous moment, the trying time, these our us at our best regarding hunches or inclinations or inspired thoughts, yet always in deference to the commander at large. Our commander in arms has equipped us to lance sin and to operate in zen fashion regarding certainty that such-and-all is how good people do live, that all might benefit from a little pick-me-up regarding just how and what we see in them. Through discerning eyes. In discerning times. Because we are only shadows and portents of the One to Come, who shall winnow with a winnowing fork and equate life with something long persecuted in its instances thus far. Instances of occurrence thus far have led to thankless, even boring, continuance of those Acts rightly called Christian. Of those deeds habitual, for all of us enter an automatic pilot zone, a phrase or two, a bleak or beleaguered disconnect from that popular doctrine of Man’s prerogative and autonomy.
God leads us. God reckons us unto one brand or another of salvation life. God bewitches us, or rather sees us through the witching hour. And in that perambulatory automatic reactivity, the proof is in the product, that these are souls who Discern the Christ in one another, who Discern the goodness in the deeds all around us, who Discern in thankless ways, a vast gulf called Quality Christian living on one side, and deplorable yet usually seen similarly, rejectamenta on the other side. Welcome, we do, the waking concern, the waking discernment, the waking judgment. On one another, provided like Christ we conclude it to be our own responsibility and prerogative. Our own Cross to bear. Our own cautious and loving correction.