“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)

The Christian counsels him or herself, even when ostensibly correcting others. Lost in the analysis is the fact, genius is an episodic, fleeting, vulnerable phenomenon. Every day and every hour we act and counteract against strange worldviews and personal outlooks, rooted in “calling” in the Calvinistic sense, that no amount of meditating in the world can bring us to see eye to eye upon. We presume to pray ourselves into some even-handed, meditative, submitted, and receptive Zone, but always it is knee-jerk reaction, hackles unfortunately raised, immediate lancing out against such would be “genius”. Or, riches increase: we accumulate good will and camaraderie, our circle of friends grows and pulsates and ebbs and flows, our ideas are purity and grace, they are of Eternal import, they value not themselves so highly as to be rigid, but are fleeting and ephemeral, not Proud, not self-aware and therein falsely humble, but Comedic and Brave, intrinsic and fair, rambunctious and staid.

Lost in the analysis, the fact it teaches us something having for a few months or tens of days, deliberately put aside this luxury or that: never again, though having ended our fast, will we be so incorporated and vulnerable to the indulgence. We externalize and it becomes separate from our inner being.

But to the fast prescribed by Scripture, a fast of doing good works and adoring the theologically-profound Gospel truths: any one Principle can be a lifetime of service. See the radical nature that all would-be Christians fuss and make much of their pursuit of goodness, but see the voice capable of effecting Change: the voice of repentance, of submission, of not promising to try a little harder, to stay close to the cloth, to for real this time be about the Master’s business.

No, we are never so self-congratulatory as to think ourselves on some measuring rod or scale of partway there. Either we have our own sincere Conversion experience—how we externalize this and communicate it to the assembly remains to be seen—or we languish in some catch-up game trying to heal ourselves, trying to be responsible and cogent fellow-traveler to the community. That is, the non-converted is just as adherent to good works as the ostensible “Christian”. He or she, what changes, is he or she becomes Rich: spiritually Profound, possessed of the treasure trove called Scripture, and the rather rat-race competitive environs called Church.

What all this means, is, to correct others, is in fact an invite to reflect on our own soul. Do we fast? Well see that a sincere fast, it causes us to forget the alternative. We become innocent of sin, impossible even to recollect that it resides in others. And this is for the better: we are dastardly and cunning creatures around anything self-righteous or laudable in ourselves. To correct others is to play on the level of Grace in the exchange, in the relationship, the invite to air out our thoughts, this invite does challenge us regarding how we ourselves can have a Come to Jesus moment anew.

The pastor is right: his or her frustration (“They’ll hear this much, since it is an appeal to strive for good works, but I do hope they might also hear that much, the appeal to accept Cruciform thinking”). The pastor is rightly patient, jaded a bit, but patient. To bring to mind that the Cross is not a final icing on the cake of Good Works, rather it promises no self-righteous boast, only this, that Christ died for us, the worthy for the unworthy, and we can resume our Day’s Business around this fact. We can be people lazy, hungry, having a sweet tooth, lustful, stultified, greedy, impatient… the list begins itself to inspire pride that of some things we feel ourselves innocent. But at the last day we will be guilty on all counts, if only so we can breathe out and rest our frames, our mortal cages of body and mind and soul, on Him who loved us and who Died for us.

What, then, should we “Do”? SImply to have faith that in our fast from too much, then any circle of friends is a circle to Keep. Any social togetherness is a union to Adhere To. Any new-fangled Courage is a lance to go forth with. Some writers—Gerhard Forde, for example—almost sound despondent in the call to “just be”, but for all the genius in that rhetoric, we also go beyond the Depressive and come out Energized, Militant, Soldiering On, Rambunctious. Our faith… it is about a Person, but about what that Person in fact Did. And all Christians… all are flawed by Original Sin, and all are miasmic, myriad, miracle-working, in the patient, convicting to the onlooker, good deeds that their Exercised, Submitted, Prayerful daily routine does engender.

God is in the interpersonal, and God is in the Hope of a one day dance, even as conversation falters, as ideas are too straight and downward, as humor is absent, as too much is unspoken. Indeed, all of us have a kumbaya moment of insight as to some, formerly drunken embrace and comment, we now make in all sobriety. Some ability to Lead with a remark most flattering or reassuring, the unspoken so tempting to leave unspoken. So much… would that we had the outward allegiance to Fidelity and to Humor, as to address the unspoken, the elephants in the room, the fact, “I haven’t forgotten you!”.