“10 Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” 11 And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away. 13 This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says: “ ‘ “You will indeed hear but never understand, and you will indeed see but never perceive.” 15  For this people’s heart has grown dull, and with their ears they can barely hear, and their eyes they have closed, lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and turn, and I would heal them.’ 16 But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. 17 For truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” (Matt 13:10-17 ESV)

Twilight, on the horizon, a figure emerges: our Savior is not so constrained but appears as a visage, a vision to the assembled battalion, no longer perhaps mounted on a donkey but still, still of humble import, humble to twenty-first century means and shining bright lantern to the human soul. His donkey is our prayers, that His mission would be carried through to its rightful, desired End. His medium is our message, that the donkey-style be the Epic modes and vaunted appreciation of a People longing and hungering, thirsting and seeking, if not this throwaway or that detritus, then Something from the speech of the King.

Because He succors the needy and undiscerning ones. Our words… we irk or shy away from certain Confessions of Faith, until such time as we have gotten back into our own saddle, our own modern-day variant on the Mule, to Hear, to Listen, to Accept: Christ for us, and We His people. It is a teamwork rooted in the thankless labors of the clamoring classes, the undiscerning ones, the scavengers and the ones who ease into the manner, manor, and the love.

To discern, is to be appalled at some Behavior that we own up to; but also it is to race to the Throneroom of that passenger upon a donkey. We laud and honor, cheer and whistle, and He bears up under the foreboding Knowledge it shall lead to His Cross. Palm branches, and applause suitable for a King, for a Herod-replacement, a Pilate-replacement.

The shadowlands, twilight hour, of the soldier at prayer is a defended retreat to holier climes, where he or she—the soldier—finds Nurture and Comfort for his or her soul. And sharing, things to attest to, that Christ must have gone through exactly those things that we go through… in the trenches, saddened by a friend elapsed and passed on to Tomorrow’s better life only early. Still, the new friend and the old alike, somehow nurse and peek out of the mother’s cradling arms, Safe, and therein Grateful. We are Grateful for the peaceful streets and the wildstyle of its citizens.

We are Grateful: because He attempted a modest twenty, say, thirty year gap until He come again… bless you, He seemed to say, but some shall not perish before they see the Son coming again in glory. What was the Opponent’s guile, that centuries would elapse, and millennia? Only this, that satan was Maddened and Christ was Made More, made solvent, elixir, thirst-quenching agua, to countless more than even He envisioned. Victim of His own success, did He underestimate the Power of the prophets, set against the sad lossiness of the Enemy?

We fight because all things are True in Christ Jesus. Belligerence, native action, head-scratching forays, twilight marches into the unknown: we follow no script any longer, but Rejoice to know ourselves to have a fellow traveler in the sad pain but a Hero in the March. He is our License to Be, and to Be More. He came not to condemn the People but to chart a course that Saves the Person. Each one individually and each one permanently: we are Married already, and delight to the Heavenly end to all jealousies and screaming frustrations. Time was, we were easily aped and saddened or maddened: now, we are madly Sanguine and responsively (responsibly) fighting forth.