2025-02-27 A Meditation on Pressure Cooker

“39 And he came out and went, as was his custom, to the Mount of Olives, and the disciples followed him. 40 And when he came to the place, he said to them, “Pray that you may not enter into temptation.” 41 And he withdrew from them about a stone’s throw, and knelt down and prayed, 42 saying, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me. Nevertheless, not my will, but yours, be done.” 43 And there appeared to him an angel from heaven, strengthening him. 44 And being in agony he prayed more earnestly; and his sweat became like great drops of blood falling down to the ground. 45 And when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow, 46 and he said to them, “Why are you sleeping? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.”” (Luke 22:39-46 ESV)

“10 According to the grace of God given to me, like a skilled master builder I laid a foundation, and someone else is building upon it. Let each one take care how he builds upon it. 11 For no one can lay a foundation other than that which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. 12 Now if anyone builds on the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw— 13 each one’s work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed by fire, and the fire will test what sort of work each one has done. 14 If the work that anyone has built on the foundation survives, he will receive a reward. 15 If anyone’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.” (1 Cor 3:10-15 ESV)

Any number of responses obtain from the pressure cooker. Lore is built on some of them. Because our trials occur amidst, especially, a semblance of peace, nonchalance, no biggie. Yet each Witness is tried, each Christian is mocked with the myriad pressure cooker centralities. We go central, and there find suddenly: wealth being coveted, prestige being competed over, doubts rampant, and even that sensation that we are not the sort of folks to long survive the trials. Each of us has our standard notions of just what we are and aren’t fit for. And we self-sabotage upon reaching our nominal limits.

The pressure cooker of life sees wild outpourings, gushing spirits riding the decentralizing waves, going to their own compromise and their own estate, their opportunity then—did you learn anything the first time around?—to weather the storm. Because there in fact is no such thing as accepting second best. Our second best is itself a pressure cooker; indeed, after all, it was all first things, prime movers, to each their own, that no mock submission can escape us from the trials. As if simply to say, I don’t have ambition, I simply accept my digs in life…

Wise up, O servant ones! The outpourings of current taking Away from the centralism, these have many a surfer and many a despondent ones, crux beheld, crux adopted, crux failed. We failed again, so many times again, as to wonder why we can’t just crawl into a hole and be satisfied with what we’ve gotten accomplished in life. The pressure cooker. The forged steel. The invite, “Lean heavy on reality, on me being real, on your Father in Heaven imbued with a direct line to Him”.

Therefore we want to rise up nobler and sanguine, myriad dependents looking upwards to find us, to discern our being, to recognize our estate, in the heavenly places. A miasma of wild embrace and Ambition for His duty-bound activities, His example, His day’s labors. They look, because they themselves are facing pressure cooker numero uno. And we learn to operate in the heat, in the pressure, in the mocking “Who goes there?”. We are by now accustomed to voices that say, “Demure”, “Be less proud”, “Look how ambitious you are!”. We are by now accustomed to immediate repugnance from a peer, because once—accidentally—we trod upon coveted and contested lands. We began to make an income. We started to assemble a circle of friends. We emerged from a negated estate. We gained fame and fortune and companion, companions most sublime.

Lore is built on a strange double-take brand of something in the air: halos did appear, to the eyes of the tale teller, God on Earth was heard to the ears of the witness, Pressure was not denied and belittled: it was a pressure cooker in which the cry of one in the wilderness was heard, the one who—formerly silent—weighed in. More like that, they cry! Learn to hand over all the heavy air to Him who spoke to the Father even as He was being crucified. Learn not to mind the heavy air. Learn that you Belong there, in the heaviness, in the solid movements as movements against a gravity and a lethargy, against a hypnotic temptation to give up. Recall only this, that of all the times you “gave up”, God did not deny you a reprise. You are there… again! This time… if you fail again, it will be all good and okay, but do try! Try and alight upon the peace-walk amidst the heavy Responsibility and the heavy Judgment, the fright of how our own souls shall be assessed. In all these things embrace Him who knew no pain so great that it could silence His plea to Understand, to Bear Witness: Christ’s sacrifices for our sins, for our Invitation and sense of Belonging in high and heavenly places, as demonstrated in our low and middle-earth realms. Whatever we did, be not ashamed of the Cross, of the heightened pressure zone: you wanted to hide from it in your good deeds for the poor, in simpler things, but it followed you there. The temptations. The accolades that tempt, too. The personal pride and sly grin. The feeling suddenly you are a trusted confessor, to hear someone else’s pain and their remorse. Pray we do it well! All these things, as we together reach individual levels of maturity, and all that it entails.