2024-05-23 A Meditation on Patient Advancement

“2 We give thanks to God always for all of you, constantly mentioning you in our prayers, 3 remembering before our God and Father your work of faith and labor of love and steadfastness of hope in our Lord Jesus Christ. 4 For we know, brothers loved by God, that he has chosen you, 5 because our gospel came to you not only in word, but also in power and in the Holy Spirit and with full conviction. You know what kind of men we proved to be among you for your sake. 6 And you became imitators of us and of the Lord, for you received the word in much affliction, with the joy of the Holy Spirit, 7 so that you became an example to all the believers in Macedonia and in Achaia. 8 For not only has the word of the Lord sounded forth from you in Macedonia and Achaia, but your faith in God has gone forth everywhere, so that we need not say anything. 9 For they themselves report concerning us the kind of reception we had among you, and how you turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God, 10 and to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, Jesus who delivers us from the wrath to come.” (1 Th 1:2-10 ESV)

“30 What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith; 31 but that Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law. 32 Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone, 33 as it is written, “Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”” (Rom 9:30-33 ESV)

Reasonably assessed, dreams come up empty; what we bring to the altar therefore is both the futility of what once were grand prayers, and the certainty that emerging from baptismal waters is a New Level of Energies, of Purpose, of Determination, of Resolve.

And herein lies the marks of salvation: the love for the brethren and the sistren; the strange ways we walk carefully—mindful of the vulnerability—and bold, together and in company with one another. We are less concerned and more proud of feelings of friendship; we are also however knowledgeable: this daydream is futile; this hope is unmet; this Progress is not allocated a habitat.

The missing habitat is nonetheless our Prayer: in some form, we are assured, our prayers—for someone out there, for some soul—are answered and are true to form. Our prayers are reflective of Real Substantive Informational get-up. We adhere near to the flame, a flame that causes wincing in its absence, so endeared to it we are; we adhere near to the flow, a flow that like the tree in Revelation brings healing in its branches (Rev 22:2); we adhere near to the mellifluous words, words that sparkle with a New Tomorrow.

Post-war. Post inevitable obtuse Attack: we are attacked because we self-discovered some New Level of consciousness, of Prayer, of Resolve, of inoffensive (really?) guile. We lack pretense. We lack antagonism. We are peace and joy in believing, yet this causes an enemy to grab his cap and bluster at the inanity, at the capacity, at the rich offense, at the patent perspicacity. We are perspicacious as to doggedly working, doggedly self-improving, doggedly bringing to the Altar that sum of All Things, both our seasoned joy around the brethren, around the sistren, and our Hopes Dashed over the rocks, breaking like waters over the breakwater, swirling with an offended enemy’s aghast facial expression. The enemy is horrified. The enemy is militantly opposed. The enemy is hating most of all, listening in on the wiretap of Life, public prayers made, open conversations had, broad research published, the enemy is appalled most of all at the selflessness, at the Self Overcome, at the genuine endearing gestures one to another. We gesture, and it brings the rafters down from above. We gesture, and it shocks and awes the more ambitious or self-promoting set. We find our enemy takes advantage, thus we are no innocent fools, but wise as serpents we anticipate that our Discovered Peace is cause for war from a tomorrow enemy. Tomorrow arriving nigh, tomorrow soon with us, tomorrow the sum total of Cruciform Life Together.

So to the altar with the love for each other, paucity, poverty of Gifts, of Friendships, a meek or meager handbag of Stuff: and on the altar these gifts promote a Self Patient, Richly Endowed, Discerning of some Good Works, one or two, that might be done. Yet by the Altar, also, is meant an end to our good works. It means an end to our need to prove anything. And somehow—for the waters are indeed stirred up a bit longer than wisdom would counsel us—those waters turn a testimony rather than a good deed, turn it into a Plateau on which to live. Turn it heavenward, the soul of the believer; turn it to things impossible for they would not be believed if put to pen, put to word.

The far vision, then, is that obliquely opposed spirits would drink from One Font. It is the realization we are not all things to all men, but rather that our personal perch is one modest and even apologetic: we are not the wisest nor the most hearty and courageous in the land. Others play their own rigamarole, while we try to do the “Faith thing”. Others… the world is counseling to some “patient affront”, “dictums of war”, “no-go zones”. That is, the world counsels others simply to the pragmatic rather than to the dreamworld. We are instead those yes consigned to death like the apostles, a spiritual death for sure, but also hope-built with the right and duty to dream big, to see around corners, to plead for a more Pacific Circumstance.

We aim for a boldness that obviates the need for the sword. We aim to shout if needed, and to embrace if called upon, and to preach if so inspired. All these things in the service of the Body, the armed forces of the Spirit, who know that to be brave is to invite opprobrium, it is to invite militarized enmities, it is to be called upon to stay firm even as all the world revolves around and mocks and harrasses us in our faith’s earliest stages. So the new believer: just as informational and useful as the seasoned saint. The new stages of faith nonetheless encounters with ignominy and persecution, with daring composure the Gift God gives, with punctilious and timely arrival the strange Witness. We arrived just in the nick of time. We arrived just as soon as we learnt the war is not to the bold nor the race to the swift, but that we are now inducted into God’s Own Family, doing things rightly in His Name, though feeling meek and jocular, though feeling a gentler set than the set rightly called to War. We therefore defend the good humor and the compassion. We defend those deeds so innocent as to make us mourn the oncoming persecutions: of our friends; of our neighbors; of our new acquaintances in the pews. We bring to the altar our discouragement and our dreams that come up abruptly short; these things then Resurrect, and the litany goes on, the dreamworld persists, resuscitates, awaits its fulfillment.