“12 For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God, and supremely so toward you. 13 For we are not writing to you anything other than what you read and understand and I hope you will fully understand— 14 just as you did partially understand us—that on the day of our Lord Jesus you will boast of us as we will boast of you. 15 Because I was sure of this, I wanted to come to you first, so that you might have a second experience of grace. 16 I wanted to visit you on my way to Macedonia, and to come back to you from Macedonia and have you send me on my way to Judea. 17 Was I vacillating when I wanted to do this? Do I make my plans according to the flesh, ready to say “Yes, yes” and “No, no” at the same time? 18 As surely as God is faithful, our word to you has not been Yes and No. 19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not Yes and No, but in him it is always Yes. 20 For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. 21 And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, 22 and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. 23 But I call God to witness against me—it was to spare you that I refrained from coming again to Corinth. 24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith.” (2 Cor 1:12-24 ESV)

On some decisions we have to go with Christ, He alone being strong and big enough to counter the attack. Oh, so our Savior Lord is a meek preacher and healer? One who invented Radical Overcoming of Death on a Cross, with His Resurrection? Be still, my soul: words unfurl a banner, repeated words, new words, adventurous words. Words that Serve to heal and to cleanse: cleanse and heal the odd misanthropic View of Man and his designs, his sins, his opportunism, his clash of mano-against-mano; two people Coming Together and, oh, is there any such thing as a sin-free existence? In Christ we are reminded we are free of sin now.

Because the Giver, the soul that manifests a nervous give-all personality, is this one Sainted? Or, is it just time and circumstance, mechanism to be cynical in regards to, dastardly “Obvious” sins: your genius, it is only party-spirit manifested, only an addict’s pathetic drawl? Addicted to self, to self-harm, to conniving attitudes towards others. So the Giver after all… he or she cannot lead the way quite like a Christ can… but as to that, some two thousand years ago: where, today, is our reassurance Man can be free of sin? Man can aspire to a higher moral perch? Man can share the love?

That last point is the catch-all solution, that sometimes—in the midst of our despair and feelings of having “ruined everything”—someone comes alongside us in genuine Love. A Love we dismiss, but secretly warm to, soul reassured, banter restored, our own half-crazed Perch of attitude now blanket revived, so that we can go right on Acting, but minus any fear Christ hasn’t absolved and reassured over our demeanor’s sin. That love, it comes from the addict as much as from the brother or sister in faith. Who are we to say who is a believing sister or brother, and who is not?

Our demeanor, it is leaving so much to be asked for. While others know the “right thing to say”, we languish. While others do the “obvious service”, we lounge. While others approach with a “sincere smile”, we question and deny.

Yet it was this mentalism that led to our Service, as well, that the Christian is called to rise to the occasion in his or her own special brand of Secret Work. Secret, because it involves itself first here and then there, in a patient and quieter manner, because Life, Society at large… way too much to take on: we will be Hated and Thrown Out, Killed and Hindered. Secret resolve, because we hold certain truths close to our heart, as motivational, as impetuses, as wise counsel.

Wise, because where we dwell… our spiritual remove… is a thing scarcely recognized until we come to our insightful senses one random day. Our dwelling place, is some special storefront or Experience of a church service. Here, we wrestled through some truths, a few things around here. Here we experienced a loving, if patiently awkward, dialog: awkward precisely because it was Fruitful and Seeking. Nervous, because it was not emphasizing downward tug of sin, but in blissful willing ignorance of the war front, until it turned out Entirely About the war front. It was some Idealistic Duty to create this Space, and some Shared falling in love or into lockstep, to walk through it for a few precious moments, together. 

Were we the star, the center of attention? Hopefully not; hopefully, in strange antithesis, Christ was mentioned, and He became the “Reason for the season”. His power arched over the nominal secularity of the event. His low talk or whispered check-ins, with a friend, with an employee, with a minister, sent the measuring rods bleary-eyed and thrilled, top marks, ring upon ring. Highly registered. Off the charts.

Because… not of a person, except of The Person, Christ. And we found this in the radio silence of a Factual Encounter in the trenches, that… in light of His Cross, all is forgiven… indeed, all need be forgiven, because suddenly Other Things are more urgent than our own self-deprecation and regrettable “ill decisions”. Other Things remind us, hey, a life is a life, and it is Essential to pursue holiness via service, in this our own Valued and Precious life. Go for the spiritual Battles. Go for the Service. Go for the End of Sin, not because of hard work, but because suddenly we Believe Christ lived and died to make it possible. The soldier lived and died to make it possible. His or her insanely prophetic Decision to die, or to Serve, it ratcheted up mega Socially-Progressive points. It scored mega heaps of Freedom. It was an insanely value-added, pennies on the dollar except that these pennies, they are forged in the furnace of affliction, in Service, in Duty, in Vision kept even private to the soldier, because no time to fantasize about tomorrow or to whisper treasured words. God calls us.

Three Christs, Trinity in one. The apparatus of faith, it is easily over-logicized and attempted to be made external. What the soldier serves is a Comprehensiveness all-powerful. We need the personal encounter in order to understand Christ’s power. We can then be emblems of that power, in our Hope-Filled poverty-stricken way. Christ mocks the proud, but patiently upholds the weary. Whether the final Judgment Day will feature Christ as we imagine Him, on the throne, or something different and wonderful because it just “makes sense”, “fits the bill”, “fulfills the dream”, that remains to be seen. But our faith will not have misled us: what we call Christ, what others dream of and call by their own holy names; He will have the power to make all things work together. And then to our querulous consternation: why, why was my platoon bombed, or my partner’s limb severed? We do not claim to go farther than Christ’s own disfiguration on the Cross, that God saw the Event. It was not without a Witness. Our losses, our disinheritance from the national Cause, it is just in imagination: true Faith is this, to Receive wealth untold, because of a determined Belief. And if we in our proud moments must see the estate disappear, must go a decade or lifetime of penitence, well, that is according to Man’s measure; according to Christ’s, we are already Restored and Forgiven. And until we learn to take that leap of faith, that trust fall, we will be chasing after a wind that He has completely removed—in the saving act—from our worldview. We are now addicted to Christ; we have tasted and seen that the Lord is good. Nothing else can duplicate this.