2024-08-31 A Meditation on Resilient Faith
“13 But we ought always to give thanks to God for you, brothers beloved by the Lord, because God chose you as the firstfruits to be saved, through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth. 14 To this he called you through our gospel, so that you may obtain the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ. 15 So then, brothers, stand firm and hold to the traditions that you were taught by us, either by our spoken word or by our letter. 16 Now may our Lord Jesus Christ himself, and God our Father, who loved us and gave us eternal comfort and good hope through grace, 17 comfort your hearts and establish them in every good work and word.” (2 Thess 2:13-17 ESV)
“12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— 13 each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 14 If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.” (1 Cor 3:11-15 ESV)
Post-event. Post-quarrel. Post-crucifying our gods. We arrive empty-handed to a religious edifice so-called plain and simple, but to us a nightmare, a foreboding or cautionary mindset, a fright that indeed the good times shall not roll, the frontispiece of Christ Himself our advocate and witness, nonetheless makes of us scampering fools, looking for some escape from the mindset of self-sufficiency, from the hell of beleaguering thoughts. Somehow, all this and more: licensed, expensed, strangely a New and Unique religion untired unbored and unsolemn in its excitement.
Only so that we ourselves can turn a righteous leaf over whensoever we ourselves are lazily encroached upon by a Satan. We ourselves can wake up and pinch ourselves a bit: Real Life always in our experience included forlorn miasma, wandering and lost thoughts, friends unhitched, friendships tried and tested, unpopularity, unforgiveness, spoken down to, ridiculed, seeing all things coming to their ends vis-a-vis evolutionary efficiency and utilitarianism: we were useful, and that is all; that is why if ever we were popular, that is why.
Already and Now, our Gospel is already and now Mature: it is already and now Licensed; it is already and Now valued; it is already and now Prepared. To face down those scary haunts that our first confession sought tearfully to escape once and for all. To wake up to a stronger mindset of fight and pluck and soldiering strength: no, evade no longer; go down that route, with Christ by your side. Become Willing and Able to serve in the temple of frights and foreign gods rampant. And to serve on the flipside of your own restless attacks, pluck for God, but pluck too for escapism and antagonism; we must learn to coexist, to put down our immature boasts or cute outlay, to surrender to a milieu and miasma and peace and elysium called Well-Bred, called Well-Socialized, called Responsive and Reflective, first responders to a flashpoint and we… we so quick to escape and evade, now in Christ we are submitted and copacetic, coping and living vividly.
That we crucify our gods, is indeed that we go for the jugular of even that soul, parent or aunt, friend or employer, who became for us Witness and Authority of Pointing towards Heaven. That parent who we knew in our heart of hearts we for once were pleasing to. That friend who tamed the antagonistic competition for affection, and was just there for us. The cousin or aunt or uncle who gave all of themselves and more, upping even the ante of our flesh-and-blood parental unit.