“3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 5 For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. 6 If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation; and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer. 7 Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that as you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort. 8 For we do not want you to be unaware, brothers, of the affliction we experienced in Asia. For we were so utterly burdened beyond our strength that we despaired of life itself. 9 Indeed, we felt that we had received the sentence of death. But that was to make us rely not on ourselves but on God who raises the dead. 10 He delivered us from such a deadly peril, and he will deliver us. On him we have set our hope that he will deliver us again. 11 You also must help us by prayer, so that many will give thanks on our behalf for the blessing granted us through the prayers of many. Paul’s Change of Plans 12 For our boast is this, the testimony of our conscience, that we behaved in the world with simplicity and godly sincerity, not by earthly wisdom but by the grace of God, and supremely so toward you. 13 For we are not writing to you anything other than what you read and understand and I hope you will fully understand— 14 just as you did partially understand us—that on the day of our Lord Jesus you will boast of us as we will boast of you. 15 Because I was sure of this, I wanted to come to you first, so that you might have a second experience of grace. 16 I wanted to visit you on my way to Macedonia, and to come back to you from Macedonia and have you send me on my way to Judea. 17 Was I vacillating when I wanted to do this? Do I make my plans according to the flesh, ready to say “Yes, yes” and “No, no” at the same time? 18 As surely as God is faithful, our word to you has not been Yes and No. 19 For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not Yes and No, but in him it is always Yes. 20 For all the promises of God find their Yes in him. That is why it is through him that we utter our Amen to God for his glory. 21 And it is God who establishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, 22 and who has also put his seal on us and given us his Spirit in our hearts as a guarantee. 23 But I call God to witness against me—it was to spare you that I refrained from coming again to Corinth. 24 Not that we lord it over your faith, but we work with you for your joy, for you stand firm in your faith. 2 For I made up my mind not to make another painful visit to you. 2 For if I cause you pain, who is there to make me glad but the one whom I have pained? 3 And I wrote as I did, so that when I came I might not suffer pain from those who should have made me rejoice, for I felt sure of all of you, that my joy would be the joy of you all. 4 For I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you.” (2 Co 1:3–2:4 ESV)

Hectic and persistent waves of severity appear and disperse especially in the monastic retreat: such was Luther’s observation, his experience that the more he fasted, the more he sinned. To the soldier, the odd wish is almost that he or she be wrong: wrong to have gone paranoid and preparatory; wrong to have curtailed relationships to a select “in the know” few; wrong to have blindly followed some belligerent spirit.

Waves of severity revolve around Instincts meet Factuality and Intervention: life intervenes, with friendships most salutary and new, with dilemmas most educational and cherished, with the strange Imprint our Decisions have made, have made for all time, have notched up in what seems like an Eternity, deeds and misdeeds.

Full on mode, amped and Aggressive to a point, engages the Christian fighter with scenarios and Testbeds. The soldier in us is weirdly uncompromising yet harassed on all sides. Weirdly betrayed, weirdly discounted, if our Plans are overly ambitious, our schemes overly Epochal, delayed, subject to ebb and flow of Time… then our Plans reveal Wisdom, patience, that sufficient for the day are the small things.

Sufficient for the day are the Giftedness of our social lives, the ways we suddenly know how to Swoop In and address Unspoken Need… need for faith, for certainty, for realization: need, altogether, for some Recognition across the aisle or the picnic table. Sufficient for the day are the mild healings and Return to Normal of the sickliness, of the harassed-on-all-sides Factuality, of the discomfort as felt by those never quite feeling they’ve pleased the parent or ingratiated themselves into the social scene.

Special claims are therefore Subject to On Watch agency and personnel invisible or all too Visible: something is behind all this solo crossing! Each of us, solo in our Faith Walk, yet faith-filled regarding the ability to Share Something. And like meets like: the weaker or more poverty-stricken lower classes do have an In with the monied classes, if the latter only would pray, appeal to the spirit for Understanding, for all of us sinners in this Together.

The invisible personnel, the Duty to be On Watch, is boring at times and windswept at times, persistent waves of distraction, of denials, of wrestling matches of the Spirit. God don’t make no junk: we have learned outwardly to predispose ourselves unto Blessing the miscreant or Invader. Because the air castles dreamt upon, these meet cold Factuality of entrenched Lifestyle, of Behind-the-Enemy’s-Line Blase weariness and ghostly invasion of Malaise and Evil empty spirits. To the soldier who is Ambitious, is a level of Attainment not always shared: go Bold on your own initiative, rather than wait for the group-think to catch up. Stay in the milieu of Doing Battle, Negotiating, of Readiness and On Watch persistent thought.