2023-03-17 A Meditation on the Key of Gospel

“But now we are released from the law, having died to that which held us captive, so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit and not in the old way of the written code.” (Ro 7:6 ESV)

There’s a key to a lock that is by no means a given. It is by no means a certainty that we shall discover the truth of Grace, just by thinking deeply, by waiting, by seeking all thoughts unified. For these meditative outlets are good, but the key to the lock is external and invasive in a best sense: it comes to us from outside of ourselves. It is Christ who lived the Law rather than preaching the Law, though He did preach good works when to hear these would be healing. But mostly, He discovered the doctrine zealously boasted of by Paul, who likewise fasted, who likewise found the apple cart of legalism so easy to marry and then to be unable to change course. For the Gospel, Grace, is a changed course. It is summoned in so many words, but when it comes to us it is as a gift, or a memory of a gift.

That is, we are laying down our weapons of uptight rule-bearing. Yes, we know that it soothes the soul to have a “project” of zeal for those good deeds. For those abstinences. For that explanatory device; in truth, however, the explanation fails. We need Grace near to a soul’s center, a center that is only abused by Law, is only harangued in futility by legalism, is only mocked by good deeds.

Grace is a more complete union of heart to action. The heart has given up. The heart is saying more, not less, than what the legalist is saying: the heart acknowledges utter need for the Law, and utter failure at the hands of this, this cruel taskmaster. But the heart at that stage of the game, simply accepts Peace, offering, gift, satiety. The heart has no better “plan” to resurrect from a soul winnowed and destroyed by demand, by efforts to prove oneself, by a lying device of explanation, yet a lie so easily addicted to. For we begin to go down that path, and like a drug it refuses to let us go. It becomes harder and harder to change course.

Today, if we hear His voice, we will go the full track of Gospel truth: namely, not only do we avoid the Law, we actively demote it. We actively wrestle with its bald truth claims, so erroneous and hated by our good souls. We hate the effect Law has on those who, in innocence, are baring a bit more on account of that context called “Religion”: who are trusting; who are open; who are vulnerable. We attack and hate what the Law does to such a soul. And we reckon with our own fast in like audacity and manner: there was no opportunity to do “a little fasting” alongside a Grace outreach. No, that fast demanded obeisance. It demanded our humble souls become proud. It demanded we use such words of fasted submission to reassure our peers: “No, I’m not bandying about any of this ‘Grace’ stuff!”

So to recap, revealed is the oblong good cheer of a neighbor around whom we genuinely feel unjudged. Who greets us with gladsome tidings. Who is themselves product and living flame of witness to a soul utterly overtaken by sin and by sin’s demands, and has this day accomplished one or two good things: that heartsome greeting; that mystical or magical walk as though on burning coals of judgment, that strange reliability they bespeak, even if these our heroes and forerunners all of a sudden seem judged by life, an arrest, a public charge of sin, etc. They saw both knowingly our deepest fears of personal faultlines, nervousness, public awkwardness, those “sins” that most tempt us to despair; they saw these, and they overlooked. Just like we must know what the Law is saying in order to attain to Grace, they had a knowing attitude, but still an overlooking, forgiving, genuine demeanor. It was sincere.

We expect no less. We keep eye peeled for the simple aspect called amenability: this soul is amenable because it is a soul vulnerable, that knows its vulnerability, that has the recollection of Gospel acceptance healing and encouraging. Like kids with older role models, we are soldiers to one another for this external, “invasive”, but patient doctrine. A doctrine not at all a “given”. A doctrine that sounds to some a loud fuss over nothing, but likewise requiring all our love and care, because in an instant, one doubt from a wild-eyed enemy, and it is crushed. For a season it ducks out. Our hope is more vulnerable than we thought. It interviews with an invite to deeper partnership, if only we can put aside the deadening addiction to the norm of Law. And hear something of truth, of persistence, of zeal for what lives on the flipside of legalism. What lives bursting forth, excited, tenacious, a locus we long to find compatible with our better selves, for that will reassure we are vouchsafed unto salvation.

“Having died to that which held us captive.” The Gospel is experiential, and experientially gifted vantage point unsimulated: the vantage of all-in dying unto Law and living unto Grace. Here, if we’ve read this far in Paul, we’re probably saved. If we’ve heard the joyful plea for comprehension of a “thing”: poetry? Rhetoric? Foolishness? All these things, and more: this is the power of good deeds being brought to bear on Gospel determination: the deeds hollow shells of their former selves, and we, proud for Christ Jesu, carried forward by miracle of faith.