Leave the cathedral. Shun the narrative – I Sam 23.

This morning’s first conversation and first web search was for street repairs and closures. We were considering if the roads blocked by the storm yesterday were open and if we can get to church. We shall leave early: the commentary today will be brief.

What shall the elite do? How shall they live?

The elite belong to a secular cathedral that claims to have the power to bless and curse, to set the moral code, and define the narrative or shared mythos of the West. Their narrative is postmodern, intersectional, and sees the world through the filter of power, social justice, and ecological sustainability. It cares not for facts. It cares not at all for salvation of the people, seeing salvation instead in the destruction of modernism, and the Christendom that borne it.

What shall we do? Jonathan gives us one clue: Paul the other.

1 Samuel 23:7-18

7Now it was told Saul that David had come to Keilah. And Saul said, “God has given him into my hand; for he has shut himself in by entering a town that has gates and bars.” 8Saul summoned all the people to war, to go down to Keilah, to besiege David and his men. 9When David learned that Saul was plotting evil against him, he said to the priest Abiathar, “Bring the ephod here.” 10David said, “O LORD, the God of Israel, your servant has heard that Saul seeks to come to Keilah, to destroy the city on my account. 11And now, will Saul come down as your servant has heard? O LORD, the God of Israel, I beseech you, tell your servant.” The LORD said, “He will come down.” 12Then David said, “Will the men of Keilah surrender me and my men into the hand of Saul?” The LORD said, “They will surrender you.” 13Then David and his men, who were about six hundred, set out and left Keilah; they wandered wherever they could go. When Saul was told that David had escaped from Keilah, he gave up the expedition. 14David remained in the strongholds in the wilderness, in the hill country of the Wilderness of Ziph. Saul sought him every day, but the LORD did not give him into his hand.

15David was in the Wilderness of Ziph at Horesh when he learned that Saul had come out to seek his life. 16Saul’s son Jonathan set out and came to David at Horesh; there he strengthened his hand through the LORD. 17He said to him, “Do not be afraid; for the hand of my father Saul shall not find you; you shall be king over Israel, and I shall be second to you; my father Saul also knows that this is so.” 18Then the two of them made a covenant before the LORD; David remained at Horesh, and Jonathan went home.

Romans 8:12-25

12So then, brothers and sisters, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh — 13for if you live according to the flesh, you will die; but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. 14For all who are led by the Spirit of God are children of God. 15For you did not receive a spirit of slavery to fall back into fear, but you have received a spirit of adoption. When we cry, “Abba! Father!” 16it is that very Spirit bearing witness with our spirit that we are children of God, 17and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ — if, in fact, we suffer with him so that we may also be glorified with him.

18I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory about to be revealed to us. 19For the creation waits with eager longing for the revealing of the children of God; 20for the creation was subjected to futility, not of its own will but by the will of the one who subjected it, in hope 21that the creation itself will be set free from its bondage to decay and will obtain the freedom of the glory of the children of God. 22We know that the whole creation has been groaning in labor pains until now; 23and not only the creation, but we ourselves, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, groan inwardly while we wait for adoption, the redemption of our bodies. 24For in hope we were saved. Now hope that is seen is not hope. For who hopes for what is seen? 25But if we hope for what we do not see, we wait for it with patience.

If you are in government or have authority, you lead. You can minimse the damage. You can expel the entryists: you can defund the degenerate, you can do some good. But politics is the art of compromise. Johnathon did his duty: he went home and remained a prince of Israel in a doomed dynasty.

But this he did, and for this he is remembered: when his father was seeking to kill David, he encouraged him.

For, like Paul, he considered the suffering he had in this life to be but a small cost for the reward that awaited him.

If you are in power, do not assume that you have the voice of God. You are to listen to the LORD. There is a reason the the law of Moses commands a king to copy the law himself and read it. Do so.

If you are in power, encourage the church, and shun the narrative and associated signals of virtue. Don’t wear their white and pink and black and purple ribbons. Do not give them encouragement.

Instead support those who speak truth, those who preach the gospel. It is only in these fallen times that most of them are outside the church.