2024-10-31 A Meditation on Intrigue

“5 When Silas and Timothy arrived from Macedonia, Paul was occupied with the word, testifying to the Jews that the Christ was Jesus. 6 And when they opposed and reviled him, he shook out his garments and said to them, “Your blood be on your own heads! I am innocent. From now on I will go to the Gentiles.” 7 And he left there and went to the house of a man named Titius Justus, a worshiper of God. His house was next door to the synagogue. 8 Crispus, the ruler of the synagogue, believed in the Lord, together with his entire household. And many of the Corinthians hearing Paul believed and were baptized. 9 And the Lord said to Paul one night in a vision, “Do not be afraid, but go on speaking and do not be silent, 10 for I am with you, and no one will attack you to harm you, for I have many in this city who are my people.” 11 And he stayed a year and six months, teaching the word of God among them.” (Acts 18:5-11 ESV)

Intrigue and reliance, the functional organization is not so much hierarchy, so much laud and honor, but rather we get things done, we are the effective organization, by some gratitude for what plain structures are in place, by some Love for one another, by some Recognition of a kindred outfit “out there”; intrigue, honor, reliance, sooth, the simple assignation of task to cadet, of calling oneself up to such a title as cadet, this is the Successful Headship, the Organization writ large, the Hand and Feet myriad and miraculous, for, “I didn’t even need to know that” we say of each other’s contributions.

Goodwill contributions. Goodwill locked in, embedded, punch and circumstance. Circumstantial awareness, situational awareness, all this such that there is indeed a Divine Judgement underway. On some level, did we err and tickle a funny bone a bit too successfully? Did we err and ape someone? Did we exhibit loserdom and our own pride or fantastical thinking? Either all the sidewalks will be rolled up and put away for the season and the decade, or the city’s streets shall be crowded with people. All our momentary in the moment excitement shall one day roll up and go the way of emptiness. And where will we be? Saddened, yet that only insofar as we have Faith in a Tomorrow. Lonesome, yet that only insofar as we arrive at the solo crossing, for this season. Curious, and that insofar as we hear the magic unpacked and dissipated and wonder as to God’s role in it all.

For to serve God, this is to evade all churchy judgments around good works. Church, initiating upon a Judgment, is in error for seeking and trying to reassure one’s own pride, that the underling is being properly judged. The innocent one, they must have “something” wrong with them, some error in discipleship, some presenting sin… for why else would we speak in faulty tones around their name in the privacy of a closed-door church meeting?

All this to say that we Ramp Up, having Arrived: today we have those throngs on the streets ready and willing, we have the Mission and Base a regular Grand Central Station for the anonymous servants and busy bees, innocuous by appearance but capable of changing the world, intrigue and reliability, they represent the Good Organization, one that still jibes or jokes with the stranger (friend) passed by on the street: we are kept sharp, because we have no regality or mighty works-righteous throne room of hierarchies and of paychecks matching each and every role top to bottom.

God works in wonderful ways, to take that cadet and give him the shot-in-the-arm of just one Relevant Experience, one addled and vivid, loquacious and myriad, kaleidoscopic and pleasure-centered Day in the Spotlight. In the Sun, we once spoke into a void because we were all that the Spirit had left in place, all that the Spirit so maddeningly had banked on: we, us, to Rise Up, and where we look back with regret at all those convicting experiences where we failed to Rise Up, to these we submit not for a second, but know God is constantly rewriting the script, constantly humbling us by our missed missional times, only so that having matured in the Faith we may still have that newcomer’s elation to take strides upwards and on the clouds above.