The Long Marches of Kingdom Free-men

Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure… than to rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy nor suffer much, because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory nor defeat.” – Theodore Roosevelt

~I want deliberately to encourage this mighty longing after God. The lack of it has brought us to our present low estate. The stiff and wooden quality about our religious lives is a result of our lack of holy desire. Complacency is a deadly foe of all spiritual growth. Acute desire must be present or there will be no manifestation of Christ to His people. He waits to be wanted. Too bad that with many of us He waits so long, so very long, in vain.
~ Teddy Roosevelt

Moses said to the LORD, “See, You say to me, ‘Bring up this people,’ but You have not let me know whom You will send with me. Yet you have said, ‘I know you by name, and you have also found favor in My sight.’ Now therefore, if I have found favor in Your sight, please show me now Your ways, that I may know You in order to find favor in Your sight. Consider too that this nation is Your people.” And He said, “My presence will go with you, and I will give you rest.” And he said to him, “If Your presence will not go with me, do not bring us up from here. For how shall it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not in Your going with us, so that we are distinct, I and Your people, from every other people on the face of the earth?” … And the LORD said to Moses, “This very thing that you have spoken I will do, for you have found favor in My sight, and I know you by name.” Moses said, “Please show me Your glory.” And He said, “I will make all My goodness pass before you and will proclaim before you My name ‘The LORD.’ And I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show mercy on whom I will show mercy. But,” He said, “you cannot see My face, for man shall not see Me and live.” And the LORD said, “Behold, there is a place by Me where you shall stand on the rock, and while my glory passes by I will put you in a cleft of the rock, and I will cover you with My hand until I have passed by. Then I will take away My hand, and you shall see My back, but My face shall not be seen.”
~ Epic Discussion between a tired Moses, and The Tireless One

Oh beloved, it is true.

There is, for a true follower of Christ, a series of long marches. Each of us goes through a series of purgatorial trudges that tear away the dross of the old man, and make us more into the likeness of the One we are following.

However, what does begin to happen as the fetid flesh falls away is a lightness of being that could not have ever existed before. People who have not been through this process cannot comprehend what this fool of a writer is talking about. So, if you are one who understands, read on. If not, read on and see if any of this foolishness seems attractive to you.

The first battles and marches begin with us giving up behaviors and unbelief.

The next march is inwards. We see that an enemy needs to die: me.

The campaigns continue. We fight against our failure. And we fight against the source of our failure. We begin to reckon the the battle is beginning to be won… And it is.

But then…

Can we see it?

There is another battleground, that we never expected. Not only can we not trust ourselves to be ok. We cannot trust those who are marching with us, either. It is disorienting. And, at first we think we need to fight against the fratricide they are intending to inflict upon us. But, we realize that if we do, we will just create more damage. So, we keep moving forward – until we can’t.

Moses was in this conundrum. He had people all over him – criticizing his every move and word.

But, there is a deeper truth here. Moses kept after the One Who could give him what he needed. And, even though Moses never made it into the promised land, he did deliver some 1.8+ million people to the edge of the Jordan river at the end of his march.

Where is all of this talk of lightness and heaviness going? As we get torn free of our failures, and our flesh, we get unburdened enough to go further into enemy territory. And though we think we are going to make it all the way through each march, there may be times where we won’t.

But, if we have gotten light enough, we will have had the strength to pull and help others forward, and to go on beyond us on a given campaign. As Yoda said at the end of The Jedi Age, “We are what they grow beyond.”

So, are you getting the hell beat out of you? This fool of a writer is. But, in my considering how clear the path was to this point, it does feel weird that I may not make it through in my current position. But thankfully, I was able to bring a few along that will have much greater impact than I ever could.

Could be the same for you. Tonight is your night. Time to let your marches end in defeat, that others might march on past you.

I’d rather be killed fighting for Narnia than grow old and stupid at home and perhaps go about in a bath-chair and then die in the end just the same.
~ C.S. Lewis, The Last Battle