“13 Therefore, preparing your minds for action, and being sober-minded, set your hope fully on the grace that will be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ. 14 As obedient children, do not be conformed to the passions of your former ignorance, 15 but as he who called you is holy, you also be holy in all your conduct, 16 since it is written, “You shall be holy, for I am holy.” 17 And if you call on him as Father who judges impartially according to each one’s deeds, conduct yourselves with fear throughout the time of your exile, 18 knowing that you were ransomed from the futile ways inherited from your forefathers, not with perishable things such as silver or gold, 19 but with the precious blood of Christ, like that of a lamb without blemish or spot. 20 He was foreknown before the foundation of the world but was made manifest in the last times for the sake of you 21 who through him are believers in God, who raised him from the dead and gave him glory, so that your faith and hope are in God. 22 Having purified your souls by your obedience to the truth for a sincere brotherly love, love one another earnestly from a pure heart, 23 since you have been born again, not of perishable seed but of imperishable, through the living and abiding word of God; 24 for “All flesh is like grass and all its glory like the flower of grass. The grass withers, and the flower falls, 25  but the word of the Lord remains forever.” And this word is the good news that was preached to you.” (1 Peter 1:13-25 ESV)

Hiccups will come, precisely as the tone shifts or the front emerges: the Front as it emerges one the one hand dastardly, regrettably, and on another hand with great Joy that a Cause is emerging. We do well as Believers to stay near to our Creed, namely that Christ has gone before us and faced the shame, faced the personal inadequacy, faced the hypocrisy of those who say “peace, peace” when theirs is “War, war”.

In mind, notwithstanding that Platform we may stand on called Righteous, in mind of personal contrition and submission to Authority, we emerge the Elder on the scene: more wise, more aged, more practiced, more heroic, than the naysayer. But all this… it comes with Elder status… without a dime of Pride nor of Self-Satisfaction. As Christians we literally learn to mourn even our high points of contention, for the sake of mourning rightly that there is any casus belli at all.

Casus belli, Christus the Head, riding His fine steed of Evangel and with His armor of Truth, we labor so as not to misrepresent this our meek and unwarring Compatriot. Yet do battle He did… the righteous for the lout and for the unrighteous. We therefore Mourn our own errors, though too we try to point out: all things are coming together, please accept a little Pentecostal—speaking in foreign languages, in legalese for the Spirit-led, in spirit for the Law-giver, in art for the curmudgeon or cynical, in beauty for the frustratedly plain—a little Pentecostal sharing. But too we are the first to resume Daily and Hourly and Moment-to-Moment prayer around the ministry to the saints, and to put off all the little notes of support.

Because the soldier in us Rides High on the waves of Progress: the right man or woman for the job being a bit of a mystery or enigma. When Truth, of Letters of Recommendation go before us, it is a marvelous Day to witness the sharing and the warmth. But too this is a project so long in the making, it behooves us to remember: always we are of different stock, perhaps only by some holy Few taken in or understood, and yet to those Few is all we worry about, the frontline being dastardly and ripe for ambition or for youthful Pride around being there stationed. We are not Proud, not Ambitious, but Mature in our confession and in our willing Submission to Law and Order, nay, to Revealed Truth, its own flavor of Law and Grace, of Law and Order.

Peered in upon, also, it is any old day of the week we may be Counted Upon, and Trusted to be the ranking Christian in the room and to pass on a message… the ranking Soldier in the room… the one under Mature Discipline and possessed of an Elder Status. Peered in upon, we only thank God for our basic training in simpler things, ours perhaps not so much the ropes course and slaloms, but some Living in Compromised Community wherein One tutelage holds water: speak nothing out loud, you are not a resource to delve into and to mine for Truth, but rather a whole and Holistic Individual Decision-Maker: anything you might have to say, do it when called upon, in appropriate Guise, in trust you are… no, not compromised when God Above doesn’t intervene to stop the micro-aggressions dispersed about, but rather that All is a simulacrum and test tube, what works in one church… it will work Pan, in the Global Movement called East Meets West. More, it will teach and upbring the Soldier in ways most sublime, to be Spirit unto spirit, to reflect on that Pentecost wherein all tongues are in unison to Proclaim a Christ-Event, a Reiteration of Him from Nazareth whom we worship and Follow. Will it be Post-Religion a second time, down the line, Tomorrow? Post Judaism? Post Evangelicalism? Or will it be like the book of Revelation says in its concluding verses, that Nothing shall be added, nor taken away? Praise God, then, who has promised to Return in Strength.