Hello again everyone. A quick reminder, I’m one of the writers at a new variety magazine cranking out 4-5 pieces each week, every week. Variety and quality are our watchwords, and we hope you’ll incorporate our magazine into your relaxation routine!
Let's talk about cosmic war. Let’s define the struggle we are currently a part of whether we realize (or accept) that fact. Why do you feel so dissatisfied and afraid? Why can’t you accept your lot?
Because you were meant for something more. One of the great truths that still lingers in the bleaching bones of a deteriorating Christendom is the conviction that human beings, no matter our current corruption, were originally formed as perfection in the mind of God. This carries immense meaning and changes the way we ought to approach many things. Let’s start with your local and immediate life. Your present failures, the anger and discouragement you feel at the disfunction surrounding you, is are constant reminder of your destiny. You are a being born for war. Your last breath ought to be spent pushing back the tide of darkness. There is no managed détente with creeping Chaos. It cannot be held at bay. Whether the kipple in your closet or the sins in your soul, time only makes the situation worse. You need to start trusting the growing certainty that everything around you is broken; you must hang onto the equally persistent notion that it can and must be made right.
A lot of Christians (yes I get to speak for all of us, I’m the one with the Substack) are very engaged with the doctrine of Total Depravity but very hesitant to embrace the doctrines of Glorification. We know very well the explanations for why things are currently broken, but prone to dismissing our charge to seek the kingdom that will be. It is not sufficient to understand in detail your diagnosis if you utterly refuse to seek your cure. And we ought to expect that the process will not be a passive one. I think laziness has eternally killed more souls than vice ever could. Many will never lift their hands to lay hold of salvation.
In fact, it may be the one thing holding some back from belief. Perhaps laziness isn’t the right word. I suspect that many refuse the call of God exactly because they are fully aware of its vast meaning of hope. I think we all are afraid of just how perfectible our surroundings and our souls might be. You see, if I am irredeemably smashed then I can at least hide securely in the ruins. But I suspect that the upper limit of possible goodness in our lives and surroundings is far beyond what we dare hope. Mostly because we are terrified what this means about both our current situation and our past. Many might refuse to follow simply because the first step would be admission of their own potential and responsibility. If things could be made whole, then who let them get this bad?
Just so I’m not accused of peddling some sort of up-by-your-own-bootstraps boosterism: here’s a gentle reminder that the only way a human can receive the strength needed to wage this war is total death of self. But let’s not forget the promise of life that comes after that death. The Mind of Christ is given to make war. Draw up your battle plans, your blueprints for fortresses of goodness. Exercise that holy imagination a bit. You already know what might be, and that’s exactly why you cannot be satisfied with what is. Stop telling yourself it’s holy to sit still. Sweat and blood can be sanctified too.
Have a good day in the metaverse. Enter the fight.
You make everything feel half-alive
You make everything long for the light
You make everything feel half-alright
In me
When death comes a’knocking on doors
When my heart knows its been here before
In the house where the windows are boarded up with fear
When the moonlight is burning my eyes
And the only way out is too bright
When the worthiness of living life is far from dear
How do I walk into freedom with my limbs asleep?
How do I move through the finite, to eternal things?
How does my heart long for home that I’ve never seen?
How do I see past the veil of this body?
~ Comrades, “Half-Light”
"You already know what might be, and that’s exactly why you cannot be satisfied with what is. Stop telling yourself it’s holy to sit still. Sweat and blood can be sanctified too."
The mindset of being in a spiritual war has been resonating with me for a year or more at this point. For some reason (maybe the Protestat that I am) I've lived most of my life treating spiritual realities and physical realities as separate things when they clearly are not. Reality is reality and there is no true separating the material from the immaterial, no matter how much we may wish for that to be the case at times.
Thanks for this word of encouragement. I still need the push at times to remember that evil is very real and very present in this world, and in making disciples of Christ we must be ready to be opposed and ready to defend.
Cool song too! Looks like I have a new artists to check out.
Beautifully penned as always sir 🙏🏼