“3 Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you. 2 Look out for the dogs, look out for the evildoers, look out for those who mutilate the flesh. 3 For we are the circumcision, who worship by the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh— 4 though I myself have reason for confidence in the flesh also. If anyone else thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more: 5 circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; as to the law, a Pharisee; 6 as to zeal, a persecutor of the church; as to righteousness under the law, blameless. 7 But whatever gain I had, I counted as loss for the sake of Christ. 8 Indeed, I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things and count them as rubbish, in order that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which comes through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith— 10 that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11 that by any means possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead.” (Php 3:1–11 ESV)

Truth in the Spirit, the subconscious seat of reason, engine of decision, cultivates those soldiers who shoot from the hip: a moment of fifteen minutes of drawing near in scripture and prayer, then a day’s labors in aligning, introducing, negotiating, sending, and healing. To run well the race set before us. The deep faith that, hey if a dream can be inspired, prophetic, revelatory, well so-too can be waking Decisions. And the life experience therein dictates: clean the entire vessel, the entire cup, that the eyes may be opened and the limbs unburdened, to lance forth Free and Innocent of ill design.

To obtain a Mission of higher status than that mission of simply vexing and undoing: pride may be injured, skillsets may be discarded or underutilized, we may invent “Games” that in fact play helter-skelter and ill-licensed with Holy Things, things that should not be tolerated in a free society. But if we are injured in our Pride, are we Competing rather than solemnly discerning? Are we hiding or afraid of Coming to the Light because of presenting sins (though None too great for Christ’s mercy)? Do we owe the community some reasonable explanation that what is plausible—namely, our competitive, taking others’ sins “to bank”, building our careers on someone else’s failure—is reason to demure, even if the truth is we are whistle-clean and straight-shooting: give them a Priest in someone other than ourselves. Because it is too plausible we are in it for the money.

To wit, truth in Spirit and hopefully some gymnasts grace in the Ecstasy of Drawing Near in repentance. The Joy of being able rightly to fess up and be Certain our on-the-record confession will not be used to spread the gangrene of rumor and accusation. Cancer is real, and a cure for cancer, for the cancer of plain murder in the spirit, is elusive. All of us need some copacetic Spiritual sense of being on the same page, of being in fellowship… and all that can dissipate because of Cancer. We can cease to feel buoyant or have levity in the Spirit. We can feel explanatory or of ill musicality, flatlined and flattened.

The cry, “Convert us”, the cry, “Isn’t this game fun?”, the spotted opening to pose an endless, infinitely repetitive, answer-less Question, is no genius move, but rather simply an age-old Legal Trick of accusing people of precisely those things that in fact they are strong about. Literally Believing in the mark’s prophetic gifts (insofar as all of us are the best testators of our own situation) and turning every truth Claim against itself. Crying “First post” and thereby going for the jugular: smelly and uncouth… well, uncouth can come across as Cool, so smelly and rude.

We do Heal and Christ has gifted us with a straight-shooting-from-the-hip Guile and Skill, to waltz through Waking Dreams, reverie of an hour or two pacing or regal in our couch sitting posture, wherein truly Revelation unfolds iteration after iteration of who and what is Occurring “out there”, “Down the street”, “in the community”. And the ecstasy—earlier it was posed that Repentance is ecstatic, to know that this lingering doubt or error zone is washed clean in the “Of course!” of Christ’s forgiveness—the ecstasy is in seeing social tendons and connections made “just work”. Sometimes society “just works”. We get “turned on” in the mind by the fact of a good report made for a friend or peer, of so-and-so vouching for so-and-so, “Oh, sure, we know him, know her”. And the advance guard, sweeping the room, not for hidden arms but for inimical spirits, hey, scout’s honor, any one present feeling jealous or angry about so-and-so…?

Because all of us are post-mortuary on some level, clouds of rumor and gossip of sin storm in and Ruin… leave us pleading, “Hey…”. As in, “unfair”. As in, “I forgot this is war, and my enemy will lunge at Anything meaning errors made”. We forget that our deeds in the body and mind and spirit will be the Undoing of the careers of others, even. So are we surprised people when caught red-handed, will turn to Crime? To cover their backsides? To hide the Truth? To normalize the ill-at-ease malfeasance?

We are those always preaching that Man, Woman can come to the altar and Repent… not in the hearing of some scoundrels of measurements and perma-logs, but in the hearing of Christ’s Spirit, a Spirit Saddened that truth isn’t more available and here-and-now, the Truth He didn’t die in Vain. We see evolution, we see customs and familiar tropes that are anything but Perfect or Elegant, down-and-dirty neighborhood gatherings and shouting-fests or musical serenades. We see evolution of ideas, inventing, even, according to the credo that Christ is revelation, is intervention, is a coming-into-the-world of Alien ideas, of Alien righteousness.

Amped and readied, the community strangely gazes askance a bit, corner-of-the-eye a bit, at each Member and the reality of War Now is some brand of accelerant to the distant-from-the-front War Room of a neighborhood. Amped, and readied, the community suddenly is Wise and Possessed of Ideas, Ideologues speaking and commanding and running things behind the scenes, now bursting forth into the Scene. 

All systems Go, all systems Ready, the day of prayer has netted Fruits of “quiz me, grill me” I’m ready. And ready, indeed, except to see the forest for the trees… we Forget to go Baseline, go Bedrock, just a little Evangelistic Juice for the men, for the women, this hour. Fructifying Juice wherein no Apples yet are bitten in the Garden, wherein no Sin has scourged the unity of men and women in the Garden, wherein safe passage… we’re in a generous Mood! Safe passage, welcoming to the Crew, to all comers. Because all of us are faulted a bit for not thinking outside the lines and outside the Box: could have, should have, been more ingenious. Been more radical. Why doesn’t this encampment simply invite in a few fellas or gals from the “mark”, from the “adjacent neighborhood”, to talk Peace and to talk Shop? We need some modeled and replicated Exchange of friendship most sublime, perhaps. We need to know some totem or idol, faulted for idolatry no longer, however, of Peace is upheld, the peace pipe passed, the ra-ra-ra of society at work, now Inspiring because those of Reformers’ zeal spoke of all things bound in sin, of society Not working, because they were less blessed than us? In liberal democracy? Or because they were more Blessed than us and hadn’t had the harsh upbringing, personal failures or faultlines Civil and Broad to become familiar with, unto that point that any Labor is welcomed as reverie and Peace, fascination and love for the Job.