Honest Expectations

We know how Creation is wired; we know reality as a close friend and ally. While we do have a lore of this knowledge, it’s not confined to that lore. Rather, the lore is just a record of what heart-led people have experienced with Creation as an expression of divine moral character. Scripture is a big part of that lore; it’s the core of our lore.

And that lore includes a firm understanding that we live in a fallen world. So even if we know the ideals possible for fallen humans, the mere fact they are fallen guarantees we are not hypnotized by visions of Utopia. The very best possible for humans still includes war and pestilence, famine and injustice. That’s the best. We don’t make room for any calculus that aims for genuine peace and prosperity. It’s not possible in this world.

But even that best possible world is not going to happen. Instead, we have a mass of human idolatry that includes visions of Utopia defined in all kinds of ways, and always rejecting God’s revelation. You and I can sense ultimate truth directly via our hearts and can help people see a better way, but there can be no truly good way in our world. So within that shitty reality, the best you and I can hope for as heart-led followers of Christ is to breathe some life into the best possible existence via our tiny congregations of fellow believers.

Don’t seek to build a mission and ministry based on helping the world come to the truth. Don’t get lost in a vision of making things right in this world. Cling to cynicism, because that’s reality. Turn your depression and desperation into the holy cynicism that says it’s supposed to be shitty. That’s reality; that’s the world around you remaining hostile to reality. Get used to it. This is what we have to work with.

So your mission is just a measure of realization of revelation in your own existence internally. Get your heart right; that’s as much as God lets any of us do. Never forget that you can and should see clearly what is good and right and just in God’s eyes, and cling to that for yourself. As a part of that, learn to understand the limits of your dominion in Christ and defend His sovereignty within your domain. That’s a part of “you” that God made. But get it through your hard head that this is a huge goal all by itself. The battle between Heaven and Hell is in your own soul.

Don’t believe the lie from Satan that it’s in the world around you. The natural world isn’t fallen; we are. And there is not a darned thing you can do for anyone else — except show them your own testimony of truth in how you live. That doesn’t mean they’ll see it, and it surely doesn’t mean you can do one single thing to turn their eyes toward the light. There is only the miracle power of God, so don’t get wrapped up in doing it for Him. Just shine and leave it at that. That’s the Great Commission; go wherever God leads you and just be. That’s how we share the gospel.

The prophetic vision that draws me forward isn’t about a world changed, but just a few more folks walking in the light than did yesterday. But I’ll be glad if it’s just one every now and then, because that’s one more soul delivered from darkness, one more soul to share in the light and rejoice with me. Sure, I weep for the billions who could have so much more and just don’t see it. What a waste! But there is nothing — nothing — I can do to help them beyond just being who God made me to be.

I know that God says in His Word and in my soul that there can be a community of folks like that in this world. He says it’s possible to establish a lore of truth in current terms, a lore that could be absorbed into souls so that it continues to live as the current situation drifts along the path only God knows. That’s my task, to build that lore. I fully expect this blog, and my books and the forum and everything else to disappear in the future. Shoot, it could easily happen before I die. But what time and the Devil cannot take away is the Word of Truth living in hearts aflame.

I don’t care about a legacy that humans can remember. I don’t care because I can’t do anything about it. I care about seeing people set free and able to commune and fellowship. That’s something where God says He’ll allow me to be a participant. He has promised to let me see that kind of community. So I keep trying to bring that Flaming Sword to life for you through my personal narrative. At the very least, you should be able to see it as clearly as I do. Even better is you showing me things I can’t see by myself.