“1 The elder to the beloved Gaius, whom I love in truth. 2 Beloved, I pray that all may go well with you and that you may be in good health, as it goes well with your soul. 3 For I rejoiced greatly when the brothers came and testified to your truth, as indeed you are walking in the truth. 4 I have no greater joy than to hear that my children are walking in the truth. Support and Opposition 5 Beloved, it is a faithful thing you do in all your efforts for these brothers, strangers as they are, 6 who testified to your love before the church. You will do well to send them on their journey in a manner worthy of God. 7 For they have gone out for the sake of the name, accepting nothing from the Gentiles. 8 Therefore we ought to support people like these, that we may be fellow workers for the truth. 9 I have written something to the church, but Diotrephes, who likes to put himself first, does not acknowledge our authority. 10 So if I come, I will bring up what he is doing, talking wicked nonsense against us. And not content with that, he refuses to welcome the brothers, and also stops those who want to and puts them out of the church. 11 Beloved, do not imitate evil but imitate good. Whoever does good is from God; whoever does evil has not seen God. 12 Demetrius has received a good testimony from everyone, and from the truth itself. We also add our testimony, and you know that our testimony is true. Final Greetings 13 I had much to write to you, but I would rather not write with pen and ink. 14 I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face. 15 Peace be to you. The friends greet you. Greet the friends, each by name.” (3 Jn 1–15 ESV)

Flocks, like the homing pigeon, find their way back. Risk-averse or risk-prone, we do a dance that circles around the Main Matter. The question of always seeking a more “Authentic” experience, something “More”, a ne plus ultra “Outlet”, “Encounter”, “Realm”: so in this frame of longing mind, do we circle and soar, act and react, do and respond.

The Longing Mind is attuned to carry Burden upon Burden, not in judgment as to said risk-aversion or risk-proximity but because All Life is a gamble, all life is risk-taking, all Gambit lies On the Table as up for discussion, for headstrong Future-Oriented rewriting and writing of History. We Make History, together, in our half-crazed Jaunts and Dalliances Forth. Whether in sanity, safety, caution, or in helter-skelter, amazement, writing most Large, God is our Surety. God is the one Authorizing the Expedition. 

And fathers we have many, but to thereby Understand a Heavenly Father: this is ratcheting up alongside Dutiful Equipping, alongside Teammate Gladsome Greetings, alongside Caution but Energy for the Course. We do it all for the sake of the knowledge, of a Creator who is Himself Yearning and Completely Refusing to judge us. We are not Judged unworthy; we are not Judged frantic or over-the-top, we are not Judged careless or without due diligence, Fiscally Responsible, we also know that weird and wonderful Expeditionary Jaunts make the Victory beyond the comprehensible. Beyond what is simply Obvious or tit-for-tat.

Sometimes to Love on an Enemy, to Pray for an Enemy, does miracles and wonders in the sky and on the land or sea, the coastlands ripe, rife for Encounter with Ideas birthed in worlds unmilitarized, or secretly so, the arts world, the academy, the politically astute sphere.

To the ramparts we go! Our Peace is a germane variant on our Lack of Worry: we consider it our duty and diligence to be Peaceful and Contented, notwithstanding the societal expectation that all life and work should be forced and painful. On the contrary, we allow ourselves the strange Floating Peace, and when prompted to list our losses or sadnesses, we really have to point out, in Christ already we are Victors; all Creation is ours to appreciate and wander childlike through. Rather, we are Content with our bunkmates and teammate as Assigned. It indeed is a Horizon longed for, the ultra life, the Next Step of drawing near, the Copacetic Horizons of a Tomorrow War already waving across our shores.