"Enable And Facilitate"  [Reflections On Book  The The Book Of Philippians] (Phil. 1: 27-30)

I’d mumble too if I’d not seen
The Kingdom-layer as in between
The world below and heaven above
Provided by the Father’s love.

Cosmology of ancient folks
To us today seems like a joke –
Their world was flat, with dome above
Suspending sun, moon, stars because –

They called it like they saw it then,
As we do now; we all pretend
We know the “cosmos”, though we don’t,
Then act it out, such is our wont.

It’s not so much our metaphor,
As what, in Christ, we use it for –
As place from which God’s love fits in?
Or setting laid to practice sin.

So let’s take up their view of world,
And let Paul’s thought around us swirl –
He says, the Kingdom is a layer
Above all Babel’s grouped-up players.

The point is not “another group”,
But layer above world’s roiling soup
Of cultures, race, and gender-blocks
So we can live, and move, and talk.

The point is, “Come up – separate
Yourself from chunks of human race;
Not helping you go somewhere else,
But rather, help to be yourself.

For now you can in nation, race,
In gender-group with joyful face,
Be in that group with excellence,
No more hemmed in by sub-group’s fence.

As citizen on Kingdom-layer
With Jesus’ throne-room set up there,
Amidst the other joyful types,
You’re freed to do sub-group-life right.

It’s not that “being of the King”
Trumps all the groupings humans bring;
It’s Kingdom now facilitates
Your life in sub-groups – placed by fate –

Or choice, it matters not – you’re freed
To celebrate, with no more need
To stagnate in some racial box,
Or cultured, gendered, ceiling-top.

For you can be black, red, white, blue,
Be native – where God landed you
To live your days – no need to flee
But live such life triumphantly.

Enabled now to walk as freed
Within constraints confounding thee,
Is reason to rejoice in Christ!
(That’s far beyond “just being nice”).

“Our heavenly Father does invite
Us onto Kingdom-layer – light
Floods to our lives, above constraints –
We see renewed scene He now paints –

Of “acetate” or “lake’s clear ice”
On which to skate around – that’s nice!
Then settle in, where e’er we choose,
In victory, which cannot lose.

“Grace” carries us, like “Footprints” poem;
That’s not the point – it’s Kingdom’s home
Above all blockages of life
Where we engage in world, set right.

Now freed to leave – and freed to stay –
It matters not, the Kingdom’s way
Is up above the blocks and doors,
Else what on earth’s a Kingdom for?!

Thanks Lord for this.

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