I have a friend who mentioned that when she got home late at night, a guy in dark clothes was walking down her street, and it scared her. Someone said she should have called the police.
*****
I live in this place where we pick someone to be a part of our government, and I don’t have to ink my finger or worry that the box will be stuffed illegally, or stolen. I don’t have to worry that I will be shot for participating. Unlike some places where there are dozens of people to choose from, in my world there’s only 2 viable options.
When one person lost, his team lamented their perceived loss of place, their way of life. They spoke overwhelmingly of their fear.
*****
Fear is a very selfish emotion.
That doesn’t mean it’s always wrong. There are times we need to listen to it. There are times we need to put ourselves first.
But there are also many times when we let the fear control us. We let it blind us to the realities of the world. Usually what we fear is commonplace for millions of other people. People who live in places so different from our own.
If we let ourselves be ruled by fear instead of love, we become afraid of another person’s way of life, and by extension, the other person in that life.
If we are afraid of another person’s way of life, how can we befriend them, love them, do life with them?
Fearing people turns them into the ‘other’. They become, not image-bearers to be honored, but people to monitor, call the police on, guard ourselves against, opinions to be demonized.
Fear tells us to protect our way of life from their way of life.
The problem with all of this comes when John reminds us of the way of Jesus. “Perfect love casts out fear.”
What damage do we do to people when we dismiss them or cast them as a caricature? What harm is done when we assume our view of the world is the only valid one and assume our safety is the most important thing, all the time?
It’s dismissive to consider someone else’s viewpoint as invalid. It’s a failure of the imagination to not comprehend how they could think like that, behave like that.
We end up setting parameters, good behaviors and beliefs, and bad ones. And our definitions become the only valid ones. Anyone who defies our standard is suspicious, because we don’t want our happiness disturbed.
And so we lock our windows at night instead of letting the warm summer air in. We don’t let our kids ride their bikes around the neighborhood. We only buy houses on the good side of town. Only certain churches are acceptable. There is only one way to vote. Some of which I’ve done.
Learning to live a life that is not rooted in fear is hard, takes time, patience, and the willingness to accept that bad things may happen.
But love is worth the pain.
And isn’t that the beauty that Jesus offers? Love deeper than pain. Love worth the pain. Redemption of the bad; but there can’t be redemption without the bad.
Dismissing and demonizing fractures us all. It causes cracks in others and exposes the cracks in us. Our lack of love is self-injury, only we don’t have the visible scars, the wetness of blood to remind us of our pain, of our own vulnerability.
We walk around oozing, and we’re so unaware.
When we try to limit the scary, the unknown, the different, we limit the work of hope that changes perspectives, and of love that transforms the unlovable.
We don’t necessarily need to seek out dangerous situations. But we don’t need to shield ourselves from that which we don’t understand or agree with or seems foreign to our way of life.
In looking at Jesus as our model, the way of life we want to emulate, we have to remind ourselves of the welcoming posture he had.
If our lives are founded on, established and rooted in love, a love that redeems, reconciles, and renews, then we have to be open to places, to people, that seem irredeemable, irreconcilable, nonrenewable.
We have to be open to the likely possibility that our views and habits may be the ones in need of redemption, reconciliation, and renewal. We may find that we are the ones unable to give love to the lovable.
This should cause us to approach each other humbly, graciously.
Fear does not establish openness and love. Fear terrifies, and makes us retreat.
Perfect love drives out fear.
Love
Redeems.
Transforms.
Hopes.
Perseveres.
Let’s dance on our fears and make the world look different.
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I love this, Caris. It hurts. But I love it!
you are telling me. A situation triggered this yesterday and good grief. It’s so easy, even when you’re feeling like you’re the one being dismissed, to turn around and think all of these bad things about the other person, and just continue the cycle.
I’m kind of conflicted about warnings about “the bad side of town” and not going places alone, or at night, because we’re afraid of “those people”… like you said, all people are made in God’s image and are unique and valuable and something’s horribly wrong if we just caricature and fear other people. But at the same time, crime is real, and there should be some common-sense things to keep ourselves safe.
My conclusion is that we should try to look at the risks realistically and do what common sense says we should do, to keep ourselves safe (don’t walk alone at night, etc) BUT recognize that this isn’t the way it should be. With every warning about “that part of town” should come a sadness that we need to view it that way because of how broken the world is. And we pray and long for the day when we won’t need to take those kind of precautions, when we won’t need to fear.
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