“17 I appeal to you, brothers, to watch out for those who cause divisions and create obstacles contrary to the doctrine that you have been taught; avoid them. 18 For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by smooth talk and flattery they deceive the hearts of the naive. 19 For your obedience is known to all, so that I rejoice over you, but I want you to be wise as to what is good and innocent as to what is evil. 20 The God of peace will soon crush Satan under your feet. The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you.” (Rom 16:17-20 ESV)

Aversion is a little different from religion. To be frozen in place, this is aversion. Hateful, non-negotiable, inflexible and unwilling to acknowledge a Peace intended not for our glory days but for our internal turmoil and putrid, outright, aversion. That is, religion is a more thought out concept, thought out by our King and Lord, as a means to achieve the inner coexistence and copacetic Reign of His Lordship as over and against our wild hangups and sinister joking around.

And the glory days, these separate out, these terminate, the inner nothing-to-lose impossible enmities. The worst enemies, these are those with nothing going for them. The worst caprice is that which latches on and fears ever to let go, of something we ourselves have converted away from. From pride, vainglorious days, from so-called Authority bequeathed upon our quieter frames. We have authority, but it is never to be confused with omnipotence: to gape and point in mock horror at someone else’ Authority, is perhaps to a bit weak on the dutiful Existential scope of any would-be do-gooder. Anyone who would make a difference, well there’s no confused talk about omnipotence around here. Indeed, the greatest amongst you shall be like submissives. They shall of all people be the ones up late finishing the dish washing, and out meekly making the rounds.

The aversion, then, based on mock horror, or based on an inner perceived—not real, but perceived—slight: this is an experience all of us can benefit from. Indeed, it invites us all to hear the worst levied our way: the worst doubts and seeds of dispute, that we can’t, after all, make it in this dog-eat-dog world, we are too shy or weak or pained. We are too… is the right word “Socialized”? We flatter ourselves, to call ourselves servant-minded, but only so much. Each of us is in an urgent bind needing to go against the grain, to ape the naysayers, and this is never easy. To be shy around evil and bold around goodness, this is to literally Dare to believe even though the feng-shui alternate and overwhelming texture of things is saying No.

To those who invent sin because of boredom, to these we ask, do you see the maniacal obsession with small deeds at the expense of corporate Reform? Things the so-called unbeliever deals with just with a sense: sometimes to be free of legalism, is itself a freedom from Sin! And in this guise we lived most of our days, formerly. We made little fuss about certain things now obsessed about. And so we check our ticket: passed. But are astonished at the dreamt up imagination of those with little better in mind to keep thinking over.

Nevermind that, let us have a sincere faith that the diligent laborer is the one the Godhead will restore and reward. That we do well to ignore fantasies about evil, our own or that of an enemy, of an Other. We are to work as though the right King will reign in the end, either in this lifetime or a subsequent one. We are to be grateful each day for the scope and breadth of thought, for the Faith in the unknown and innocence, shy-minded nature towards evil.