“22 He went on his way through towns and villages, teaching and journeying toward Jerusalem. 23 And someone said to him, “Lord, will those who are saved be few?” And he said to them, 24 “Strive to enter through the narrow door. For many, I tell you, will seek to enter and will not be able. 25 When once the master of the house has risen and shut the door, and you begin to stand outside and to knock at the door, saying, ‘Lord, open to us,’ then he will answer you, ‘I do not know where you come from.’ 26 Then you will begin to say, ‘We ate and drank in your presence, and you taught in our streets.’ 27 But he will say, ‘I tell you, I do not know where you come from. Depart from me, all you workers of evil!’ 28 In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, when you see Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and all the prophets in the kingdom of God but you yourselves cast out. 29 And people will come from east and west, and from north and south, and recline at table in the kingdom of God. 30 And behold, some are last who will be first, and some are first who will be last.”” (Lk 13:22–30 ESV)

Choose your flavor of ambition, raring ambition, and see the Spirit curtail and shape it into Christian Witness. As though trapping our higher functions, the Spirit (He, or She) channels us down a route Holy and Mystical, metaphysical to a wondrous fault, of Coming to Terms with self-deprecating Activity and Christian caution. Metaphysical Caution meets metaphysical purview and Genius of enabled fructifying Action.

We work around the clock, but not to escalate our own perch, rather, because He is still working, madly ant colony-like, work camp-like, Uptight until Finished-like, to bring about a few Holy Things.

Things like a cautious Space for the child innocently to Query. A cautious lack of condemnation for he or she who Approaches the Saint (“bless!”). Indeed, all of us can go ornery and tired of the game, but when we shoo others away, God is using it as a Teaching Moment.

The ambition to be best in class, derives from an unsettled, reversed, undone Cultic Need we once held, to Prove Ourselves. We are now strangely Peace, though hemmed in on all sides, though frightened the very walls will close in on us. War does that, because our Creed is designed for the Unction and Estimation most Severe, of a warring climate. So we are not belligerents, not kerfuffles random and unneeded, but rather our New Normal is Strife. In said Strife, the colors brighten in the worked-over, washed-over Fabric. And we have found Peace precisely in the Honest Exchange wherein we notify the community of War. 

War? As in a Realization, Come-to-Jesus Moment, of new awareness: stark Dichotomies exist; strange Evils require not just calm polite rebuke, but dastardly heads-down Attack. These are evils inspired into the vision of the saint, and our youthful lancing-out is a bit humbling but funny, we nonetheless Coach and Arm and Equip the new saints, barely out of school perhaps, to go Personal and Agency, to Decide and Assess and Judge and Decree. Because myriad mistakes are made on the battlefield, but there is One we will not concede to: lackadaisical caution. 

We have had earthly fathers and mothers to help us with this, and this is the Fact of life springing eternal: that one’s particular style of educating those who come near, is unique and genius in its own right, but still: onwards and to the Mission Field. A field where we can Come Together finally as friends, perhaps, but certainly as Soldiers. Comrades in arms.