2024-08-09 A Meditation on Lockstep

“7 But we have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us. 8 We are afflicted in every way, but not crushed; perplexed, but not driven to despair; 9 persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed; 10 always carrying in the body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our bodies. 11 For we who live are always being given over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that the life of Jesus also may be manifested in our mortal flesh. 12 So death is at work in us, but life in you. 13 Since we have the same spirit of faith according to what has been written, “I believed, and so I spoke,” we also believe, and so we also speak, 14 knowing that he who raised the Lord Jesus will raise us also with Jesus and bring us with you into his presence. 15 For it is all for your sake, so that as grace extends to more and more people it may increase thanksgiving, to the glory of God. 16 So we do not lose heart. Though our outer self is wasting away, our inner self is being renewed day by day. 17 For this light momentary affliction is preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, 18 as we look not to the things that are seen but to the things that are unseen. For the things that are seen are transient, but the things that are unseen are eternal.” (2 Cor 4:7-18 ESV)

All in order, in league with, copacetic amongst, are deeds of Faith undertaken in Confidence of Divine sympathy, mandate, direction and code. We thrive to live on that cake baked, like Elijah who as a prophet was long fasting and simply hungry (1 Kings 19). We thrive to warm to the notion of a Father or a Mother Divine and Supreme, in Heaven and fond of us. We do all these things on the strength of some Belief or Believing Encounter, happenstance, compassionate commiseration, fond tutelage, overweening parental Faith in us.

Then there is sin, the sense of such brokenness as that the spell is broken, that we have no way to re-embrace or re-discover or re-acquaint with the suggestive and supportive closeness. We simply lost the Embrace. We delved into our own Tasks and Deeds, minus the faith they are undertaken in such Faith and on such Tab and with such Humble Submission. We fear to have charted simply our own course; we beg and wonder and query, is this still in His plan and His ways? Yet, all is not lost, for we know forgiveness Divine and patience Untold and direction Unhindered. Our direction in life is Uncurtailed and Unrestrained.

Therefore the Soldier of the Crown, of the Winsome Spiritual Hebraic “Father of Spirits” (Hebrews 12:9), is nourished on that Sustenance called “All-In”: “All-Embrace”; “All-Duty-Bound”. We literally find strange Courage divinely to lay down our lives, not because we are so pristine and holy and free of sin, but simply because it strikes a fond chord in our hearts. Simply because we had this Notion from a Divine On High dreamscape or waking Vision. Simply because of the beauty of Human Encounter, to impart the right notions and the holy anointings and the bodies prepared for indeed burial one fine day, but today prepped for the fasted March and homeless Wandering throughout the burdened city, the compromised walls, the yet humming-along Metropolis and Outpost and Enclave.

We are Soldiers therefore of this same Mandate that evoked pride in prophecy in Elijah, the proud composure and end to the grumbling, of breakage, of stitched-up injury, of outcast beleaguered frustration of a Jeremiah (“Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth” (Jer 1:6)). Living into Mercy, living into Plan, living into Purpose, these things are a gift and prophetic Word spoken over our lives as well, that Good Calling and Purpose is intended for us, for each of us; that God’s plans for our lives are far superior to anything we might dream or envision. Yes, the soldier is promised worriless Tomorrow blessedness, and Estate Holy and Together: to be in lockstep with a Heavenly Father, Mother, Brother and Sister called Christ. Not to know the depths of fallen-away depravity, but rather—no kiss-up, no people-pleaser, no unprincipled sot—to Serve and in this Service to Emote the final level of Gratitude we in fact were debtors to all along. We owed this much to Him. We received this much at His Hand. We knew so much and thus far by His lockstep patient coming alongside. We were Divinely Blessed to be knowledge and truth, of a Higher Power, of a boring obedience absent and Joyous inability to wander beyond the scope of His patient Mercy.