2025-02-19 A Meditation on a Peculiar Testimony

“3 O foolish Galatians! Who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. 2 Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith? 3 Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? 4 Did you suffer so many things in vain—if indeed it was in vain? 5 Does he who supplies the Spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law, or by hearing with faith— 6 just as Abraham “believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness”? 7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.” (Gal 3:1-9 ESV)

The ebb and flow of any testimony: any truth claim, any narrative, any statement of fact, these test our proficiency with the witness of it all, the courageous fact of making Christ front and center or… not quite sure what that would mean, to make some Principle front and center. Arrived at over the years, by looking to the left, and to the right: are we, after all, in a friendly setting? After all, we are in a friendly setting! Yet the feigned ignorance (“Who is Jesus”; “What a lark, that He says He is in the Father, that He is the way, that He is the Truth, that He is the Life” (John 14)) upbuilds in us a gentler Plea: Celebrate! Be Victorious! And the appeal to love on each other, the quieter set not excluded because, after all, we are in our element when we are telling of Lore, rather than grovelling.

Telling of a time of a certain Dynamic Duo, each pointing to the other. Telling of a time of a Trio, gladsome, chuckling, on a mesmerizing Expedition, of a foursome, playing the ropes, tending to the Game. And then the accusations they fly! For, the Law imprisons all things under sin! We are found to be criminal and avaricious, of troubled affections, careening through the Master’s wealth. For, we were raised in the Gospel Truth, and this does more than to License Behavior: it wrestles to the ground that uptight or fraught fear of offending.

So to the gathering, and to the gentler dutiful greetings, the politenesses, the invitation of All to participate… please, O man, O woman, do exclude us! Do let us wallow! Because the kindness of it all is due someone Else, not we ourselves. Who were manning the helm in a bygone era, and still in fact Today: we are claiming audacious things of which you have no part, no agreement, because they call on You to repent and be saved! Jesus in us, the fact a nominally Church-going friend in times past, was all these “I am” statements of John 14 to us, even if non-verbal about it. We are a scurrying tribe, a impolitic army, in Motion, Momentous around veering towards the Cross and away from the silliness, away from the pleasantries. We are finally celebrating an Acceptance for all, because Jesus talk is a light thing, no onerous or heavy-handed ritual, but licenses us to Live, to Get On with things: we are Him, and He is us. He, after all, is just a mild-mannered Friend to us, and loudly Vocal estranged inner-circle to the Pharisees and Scribes.

The soldier, then, has done her or his research. Has done her or his assessment. Has made holy Hajj to the curious and even admittedly Needy pilgrims. The Church body. The children of Faith. Who do not hate but rather love on the awkward nervous speech of a newcomer. In this assessment, she or he has finally concluded that it is a Gospel Mandate that mocks and diminishes the heavy Law. Law that liberates is this, to be protected from each other vis-a-vis a Law called Love. That we warm to the occasion because Love is in the air.