2024-01-13 A Meditation on Patiently Pressed

“9 Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. 10 He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. 11 You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many.” (2 Co 1:9-11 ESV)

As for our line of defense, we are haggard. The military mind abides close to a capitulation that shall never occur, for we race to the altar around so much human error and lapses in judgment, yet never forget our war is real, our placement and body-on-the-line the stuff of classic literature and of poetry… if only we had a moment thus to appreciate it. If only we weren’t hindered on every side, would-be victims of the broader thought or patterns of life, of society, dastardly clever at neutering the one thing that matters. We matter, regarding our walks of faith. Regarding our precision of thought. Regarding our intellectual arrival at a bodily war present and that comments on all this fine society we dwell within.

Invite to situate oneself in a broader, for-real battle: this invite matches us head-to-head with the scoffer. It invites to situate amongst the comedian who has long appreciated a decision come day’s end simply to get along and to acknowledge the impossibility and untenability of the present repose, present situation, present gathering.

We live on a tether, imagined at some points and attributed by those outside our immediate networks of trust at times, a tether wherein it is said we shall go so far and no farther. Wherein it is said that illness or malaise, lived experience or competition, shall dispel our lofty spirituality and reason. Strange then to find the God of all comfort, who says that the gifts of God are irrevocable (Ro 11:29). Who says that the wild-eyed fear borne in socializing with the uninitiated, does cause us to pinch ourselves and ask if it is all real, after all. Such is the fighter’s mental assignment, home to would-be lapses that never actually take root. Home to an unacknowledged confrontation: we are those who were near to Christ’s blood. We are those near to Christ’s moment of silence. For the many brought to fruition amongst the comedic-at-times and reverent-at-times communion together of social Enablers. Situational Assessors, Correctors, Implementers. Jesus’ blood is our overcoming of all errors past. Jesus’ blood immediately identifies the lazy alternative spirit: we are no layabouts but alight upon a job and a Calling, on a reluctant us-and-them modality: peace is made on the basis of a lived fight, in order that the helm shall one day radiate across even former foes. That is, evolutionary surge that leaves some laggard and leaves some behind, does roost and bear fruit ultimately tenable to All Comers.

Such is our mental gymnastics played out in a world of less-than-clever words. Shared words. Shared evocations, of that genre called Fellowship, called Repentance, called Confession. Tangible deeds brought to light: these are the fulcrum, the sacramental, the concrete Presence of a Spirit who came in the flesh. He came to walk quietly or with a shout of victory, of resolution, of dominion. Our so-called “dominion theology” is intended to heal of the desire for power: God’s power is in servant-leadership. God’s power is in living and let live: see the power of an idea? See the power of a quiet stand? See the power of something that informs and shapes and delineates: so that eel sprung from placid lake, is a lightning rod and Invite for all to shape up and walk on new feet. So the Christian, evolutionary theorist or such, reassesses every hour as to how to make a buck, how to earn something Moral and something with wings, how to be apropos of a nimble placement that others only covet, for the fact that they are harboring or clutching or failing to release, so much pride and scarcity of peace. These will bring many sad casualties, in the grand scheme of things. The peace that passeth, understanding that reigns, is at the expense of so much goodness, lives put on the line, yet a glimmering Hope and a firm Resolve that this our Project is well-earned by Man’s Anointed One’s and his or her Inspired Ones.