Without that holy glimmer, you aren’t going to understand.
The entire universe is under a curse. If you can’t at least humor me on that, I suggest you’ll waste your time reading this blog, because it’s the basic assumption behind all of my writing. A matching basic assumption is that Our Creator has offered some mitigation from that curse, but that it is all wrapped up in first embracing the reality, and then the very simple remedy as He revealed it.
The remedy is best characterized as reflecting His glory into a world of darkness and shadows. A fundamental element in the Curse of the Fall is deception. The fundamental antidote is otherworldliness. That’s no small demand, apparently, because most of our world fails to embrace it in varying degrees and for varying reasons. The problem is the failure to embrace itself.
So we face the world bifurcated between those with at least a glimmer of realization and those who operate without it. With that glimmer of recognition comes the ineluctable duty and necessity of participating in showing His glory. If you have the glimmer, you will also have a burning desire to share it — that’s the nature of the glimmer itself.
Our duty to reflect His glory is not reduced among those who remain blinded to it. The point is not the reception, but the utter necessity of shining.
At the same time, we cannot be heedless of that fundamental difference between the people we encounter. Not that we are always sure to know, as if we were even capable, but that we have a mandate from the Creator to estimate within our own glimmer of understanding what is required of us in the context. We don’t pretend to know who is in and who is out, only what their presence requires of us. However, we do operate with a theoretical concept that there is a difference and that the difference affects what is required of us.
If, for operational purposes, I estimate that you have that glimmer, I’ll hold forth a different set of expectations versus those who don’t show me signs of the glimmer. The difference is not in the fact of my service, but the thrust of it in terms of what I expect from you. Having the glimmer imparts a certain change in loyalty that gives me leverage I don’t have with those who are blind. I don’t offer the same set of services to both, but I still serve either way.
To complicate things further, most of the audience at any given moment is mixed.
Consider the deeper moral and symbolic implications of the Passover in Egypt. If you have the blood of Jesus on your soul’s door posts, I don’t have to worry about burying your bodies. If you don’t have that blood, then you are spiritually dead and I have to prepare a different operation for you. Our Savior taught us that there are times when we are forced to differentiate; He spoke in parables because those with a glimmer would get the message. Those without the glimmer would not respond the same. They might still hang around, but the sifting process made it easier to decide how to handle them.
My calling doesn’t include the same miracles Jesus performed in His ministry. Miracles I offer, but responding to a different context entirely. Jesus healed a lot of folks who remained morally dead and buried in their sins, whose maladies surely would return because of it. It’s that way in my computer tech support ministry. Some people will understand and change their ways, but a great many will call me again before long with the same problems. Yes, the work of Jesus and my computer work are related in that respect. I still reach out and help the fools for the same reason Jesus healed folks who would return to their sins.
It’s mostly a big difference in what I expect of them, not what God expects of me. It’s not a question of thinking less of them or their needs. It really has nothing to do with their needs, in one sense. It’s that holy cynicism that says it is my duty to help those who won’t benefit much. It’s the helping and shining His glory that matters, not some human grasp on efficiency. It’s a divine extravagance.
It’s not as if I am not accountable to God for His provision, but I am accountable in terms of His whims, and you are not Him, so I won’t explain it to you because I cannot. I can try to help you see if you have that glimmer, but I’m sure you catch on quickly when I suggest I cannot pretend anyone with political authority has any glimmer. Our political system presumes there is no such thing as a glimmer of spiritual truth.
When the Spirit guides my service in His Name, there will be an apparent inconsistency in human terms, but it will be rather more sensible to those whose reason serves the Spirit.
