2024-06-05 A Meditation on Sourced Energies

“15 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, 2 and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain. 3 For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, 4 that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, 5 and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. 6 Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. 7 Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. 8 Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. 9 For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. 10 But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. 11 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.” (1 Cor 15:1-11 ESV)

Amped, fine. Good to go, check. But the soldier’s courage, here is where one fork appears in the road: the courage is easily attributed falsely. We suppose that our better spirits are the mashup of some caffeinated or otherwise enhanced reality. We suppose likewise our good cheer is a comment on some assessable encounter or friendship. But in both things, we encounter the weary would-be energetic one. We encounter the sadder tomorrow when no longer are the party lights flashing, no longer does the courage flow unhindered. That is, we encounter plain tiredness.

So no matter! The bite out of crime is the bite that understands life is both the spiritual and the—what might be called—the sacramental. The bite out of crime undoes categorizing pigeonholes of tangibly assessed intellect or brawn or socialization. The bite out of crime undoes that knowing glance: these folks must have some false, material, source of their good cheer and party spirit. The bite out of crime also recalls just who might be at the receiving end of our Words, and say, “No matter!”

We say no matter because that tired day is perhaps a point to consider, is perhaps also too true, is perhaps faithful to actual experience, but also we the weary ones sleeping fast and dreamily even moments after the caffeination… to speak only in concrete and named terms. That tired day, when the scripts and the bravado and the pugnacity, the sin repelled against, the Tomorrow aimed mightily for, the companionship Live and True; these things are choreographed by the dealer and by the commissary. Who knows the sacramental mental road map, or storyline, or attributed spirit and temperament fast, divine, amped, good to go. That is, that knows the glasses clinking against glasses over a welcome respite together. That is, that knows the hugs passed around after a drier little circle of people formed around folding chairs. That is, that chooses the correct fork in that metaphorical and story-telling road: something of Divine Spark lit up that Encounter. Something Mystery and Forsooth Untold ramped up the camaraderie, the road trip, the nervous energies met in social fountainhead.

So we submit, we repent and submit, to that potential tomorrow of chairs folded up and stacked away, of party tent dismantled and solo journey homeward, of “Oh yeah, that’s what it’s like to lose a battle…” reality. Yet lost we have not, at least not the big picture: that God is for us; that our precious owned reality is some mishmash of Christian ancestors who Created and Lived Into and Designed, some brandished liberal society and army. Not merely “God is good”; “Scripture is sufficient”; but Jesus for each person an in fact lived out Experience. Jesus is the answer, but that entails also some Benevolent and Benign, Beautiful and Praiseworthy Encounter with that Name. Not all have had this.