2025-03-13 A Meditation on Figure-Ground

“5 Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. 2 Through him we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. 3 Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, 4 and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, 5 and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us. 6 For while we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly. 7 For one will scarcely die for a righteous person—though perhaps for a good person one would dare even to die— 8 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. 9 Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. 10 For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life. 11 More than that, we also rejoice in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, through whom we have now received reconciliation.” (Rom 5:1-11 ESV)

The actor is entwined figure-ground: our thoughtspace and posture is inevitably married to our environs. Figure and its ground ebb and flow.

In Lent it does well to dip into the “ground” or “environs” of others, the alien ones, the ones we discount when looking at these “other” figures: we take note of the figure, but don’t bless and attempt to meld with their “ground”. And we also believe in One Prophet (one at a time), our Christ, who convicted all, called all to account, pointed out the blame game.

In Lent, that is, it does well to do many things, including to mourn a lost friend or family member. But rightly to mourn… this involves figure-ground. We endeavor to take One Christian Step, a Leap of Faith, and like a math puzzle we’ve mastered, it suddenly all seems like a cup of tea, a matter viewed from a dozen angles, but gladsomely coming together in Service to this one whom we mourn, in service to the Celebration of Life Eternal, a Life we ourselves share in.

The fallen comrade, the injured relationship, the attempts to get up again, when one’s very limbs are broke and irreparable. One’s sins go before them. We have things that mark us, that we cannot ever, it seems, recover from. And Lent, or Christianity, is about some facing the facts, but without getting discouraged. We hold a candle as we wander the catacombs of our judged sins: we rise up, unhindered even though methodologically-speaking down for the count. Down in what formerly was hopelessness, now is a bright tomorrow in shared eyes making contact and wondrous expressions on the face.

And the escape velocity is this, that man, woman, ruins him and herself all the more the closer one gets to Salvation. We rebel, we counteract and react. We break things, we deny Christ, we politicize and play the blame game. But it is not by avoiding error, rather working through the swing, through the punch, that we arrive at Tomorrow, at Mercy, at Warmth.

So the law and gospel professor has literally cage-fought right on through any and all legalism, not even allowing for “just a few simple fasts” to impinge on her or his theology. And for it, we are called Heathen. For it, we are called Irreverent. For it, we are called Lossy or Truant or Deserter. As if we needed to be taught all over again man’s idolatry around the Law. Some simply haven’t courageously Fought right on through its every incantation and incarnation.

So in Lent we say “I shan’t go down the rabbit hole of legalism”, only then we end up post-Resurrection, wanting after all to do a bit of penitence. Holding it lightly. Honoring a fallen brother or sister rather than staring at only ourselves. In this we rise to the occasion: it always and only takes One Christian to levitate or inspire or convict the party. And people hold tight and fast to their sins, or their evil pantheon, or their smorgasbord of favoritisms and abuses, conceits and destitutions. Even whilst preaching about some grace-filled Savior. Conviction means that we have nowhere else to turn; it means we no longer have all the answers; it means writing as though each hour were our last; it means believing, not because of innate miracles seen as much as because we reached rock-bottom and whether God will miraculously raise us or only do so in eventuality, we can Celebrate Today in His reality. He is what we need, not the silver bullet, not the magical elixir, but Him. And the soldier’s mandate, then, is to fight even though he ain’t raising up—yet—the fallen comrade. It is to fight and fight some more, because we remembered after all the Gospel and just how radical, lacking in evidence by some measures, but fruitful “in the field” by other measures, it is.