Another dimension

I have no personal experience with the fierce loyalty of a soldier. I haven’t had the intense feeling of being willing to die for a cause or a person. It’s a thing I’ve read about in books, a thing I’ve felt the edges of in the “yes, ma’am,” of people involved with the military. It’s not something I’ve missed – my tendency is to be suspicious of obedience, wary of the blindness of following orders. Still, I’ve felt, from time to time, a wistfulness for the fervency such an allegiance could have. A book I read recently once again hinted at its power as an ordering principle and a giver of purpose in life. It left me thinking about what it would be like to have this kind of a relationship to God.

The intense eagerness to serve God wouldn’t have the pitfall of serving a person – the inevitable human failings – or of serving a cause, with the tendency of causes to get bogged down in process and co-opted by power-hunger. I felt a kind of swift excitement when I thought of being in service to Love – of dedicating all of my life to standing for Love, living it, acting according to its impulses. Though I think of God as Principle – as the creating, controlling force governing the universe, rather than an anthropomorphic entity, I found this sense of loyalty to be everything I hoped for it – galvanizing, ordering, purpose-giving. It added a dimension to my prayer. I thought, so this is the legitimacy of that whole allegiance concept. It is a thing we are meant to feel. It’s not a seductive but misguided way of having ones life ordered, or a great thing we miss out on if we are civilians. It’s part of the nature of love – part of my nature – to want to give myself in service. And service to Life, Love, is obedience to the great first commandment. Another compelling reason to give my allegiance to God.