No More Fear: Peace, Love, and Confidence as a Witness for Jesus

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The LORD is on my side; I will not fear. What can man do to me?
—Psalms 118:6 ESV

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid.
—John 14:27 ESV

There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out fear. For fear has to do with punishment, and whoever fears has not been perfected in love.
—1 John 4:18 ESV

If you were to ask me what word described American Christians at this moment in time, I would not hesitate. That word is fear.

Fear of terrorists

Fear of homosexuals

Fear of whichever political party is not ours

Fear of someone who might take our means of defense away

Fear that America has been usurped by people who hate America

Fear, fear, fear, fear, fear, fear.

Social media is increasingly a fear fest, where the whole world can see American “Christians” publicly display their myriad fears of this or that.

Desperation undergirds that fear. Powerlessness too. People are flailing, looking for anything they can grab onto, as if they’re drowning. Which they are—in fear.

I was born near the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis. My father told me he was sure his soon-to-be first child would never see the light of day, obliterated in a nuclear exchange between the world powers of that time.

We can talk about whether this age is more rightful in its fear than that one, but that’s missing the point. We always seem to be missing the point, which is this:

For the Christian, there must be no fear.

Jesus commanded that we not be afraid. Is that not enough?

For the person who does not know Jesus, there is good reason to fear. But there is no good reason for the Christian to be afraid. If Christians fear, it is because we love our lives too much. It is because we fear punishment. It is because we are not perfected in love.

If that’s you, go to the Lord and let Him deal with that fear in you.

Every generation of Christians believes it is the terminal generation, the final one before Christ returns. Whether this generation is or isn’t changes nothing. The Lord says, “Don’t be afraid.”

Everyone is watching the news for more terrorism, more war, more natural disasters—more of everything that should cause fear.

The Christian instead responds with peace amid the turmoil, love amid the hate, confidence amid the questions.

The Christian is the one lost people go to for comfort because the Christian knows the One in whom she trusts is faithful.

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword? As it is written, “For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered.” No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
—Romans 8:35-39 ESV

Lost people watch us. They search for something, anything different about Christians that shows us to have something no one else possesses.

Standing on the rockThey look to find someone who loves his enemies.

They seek to find someone who models fearlessness.

They long to find someone who is a rock of peacefulness, unmoved by shifting tides.

People everywhere are dying for the Church to be unflinching in the face of fear.

Christian, if you refuse to give into fear because you rest on the finished work of Jesus and on His faithfulness, then the result will show in your words and actions. You will be an ambassador for Christ and for His Kingdom, which not only cannot be destroyed, but also cannot even be blemished in any way because it is impervious to anything that comes against it.

Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life.
—John 12:25 ESV

For if we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord. So then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.
—Romans 14:8 ESV

Even if you die, nothing can be taken away from you, because Jesus has already given you everything, and your life is hidden in Him. What is His cannot be taken away from Him—ever.

Be an instrument of peace.

Be a vessel of love.

Be the person who does not fear.

Be the person who comforts others when they do.

The world is watching.

Breaking out of Your Christian Ghetto

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Sometimes, you find yourself in the middle of a ghetto.

I have a friend who—God bless him—has given most of his life to minister to the inner city poor. Too long ago, he and I would occasionally, late at night, walk the streets of his new neighborhood to talk with people.

As two terminally white, bearded guys over 6′ 4″, we sorta stuck out. Because this was the “ghetto.” And all the stereotypes were in play.

Except they weren’t.

On one particular walk, my friend abruptly pulled up and turned around. When I asked why, he surprised me with his answer. “Down that street is Appalachian territory,” he whispered and motioned. “No one goes in there.”

Different ghetto, different hostility.

Ghetto is a word in transition. In the past, it simply meant a part of a city that was dominated by one ethnic group or one way of living. Harlem in New York City always comes to mind, but one could easily argue that Wall Street is its own ghetto, albeit a wealthy one. In the case of the word ghetto, over time, a poverty aspect crept into the meaning, but it hasn’t always been there.

In Christianity, we have built our own ghettos. We call them denominations. Or we add theological labels such as Reformed, Charismatic, Arminian, or Anabaptist. Because labels. Can’t be a good Christian without ’em, right?

Whatever our slant on our Christian ghettos, the same etymological transition is at work: a slide into poverty.

Except in the Christian case, the poverty is in the diversity of ideas. Or on the exclusionary focuses of the faith. Eventually, everyone within that ghetto winds up poorer theologically and relationally. In most cases, they don’t even see it happening.

I see in the modern American Church an increasing tendency to stop at the end of the sidewalk and say, “No one goes in there.” Whoever or whatever lurks there, we’re too afraid to deal with him/her/it.

One of the most insidious examples of this occurs in certain Christian communities often seen online. You probably know them. Certain individuals within a certain group run certain websites that espouse certain theologies. When one of those individuals writes a book, others within that group write the glowing reviews and recommendations. After a while, you see all the same names recommending each other’s books and sites and dissing every book, site, or individual that comes from outside that certain group.

I believe such incestuous, prejudiced thinking and doing borders on dangerous. It creates its own form of unteachability, an imperviousness to greater growth. People trapped within that ghetto never hear any different ideas. If anything, foreign ideas are rejected out of hand. It becomes scary group-think. And naturally, over time, poverty sets in.

Jesus said that we must become like children to enter the Kingdom. Perhaps a children’s book can teach us something about ghettos.

In Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, our kind, gentle, young hero gains admittance to a strange, off-limits ghetto: Willy Wonka’s candy plant. Once inside, Charlie finds the factory’s owner to be absolutely unhinged and perhaps even dangerous. The secluded factory bursts with nonsensical devices a rational person cannot envision. The invitees meet a bizarre tribe that lives in the factory. The tour participants witness things the ordinary person cannot understand and would likely reject for their oddity.

The problem with this and for everyone in the novel: As strange and scary as he and his factory are, Willy Wonka makes the world’s best candy.

Willy Wonka, HomeboyAt the story’s conclusion, Wonka gives his factory to Charlie. And it’s not simply because the boy is the last one standing on the tour but because of Charlie’s humble, gentle, others-centered spirit. Wonka realizes the boy has something he lacks. In the same way, Charlie not only inherits the candy plant, but he also must realize that to continue to make it great, it must retain its weirdness, and he must move beyond being just a destitute, simple boy to embrace some of Wonka’s madness. For the world to become a more wonderful place, both Wonka and Charlie must break out of their ghettos.

Like the Wonka factory, the Christian world has locations within it where too few go and thus never discover a place of genuine, if unusual, excellence. We are impoverished for our trepidation, for our clinging to our own ghetto, for being unwilling to see and explore. Our fear prevents us from becoming all that God would make us.

I think of the foreign-to-the-West thinking of Asian Christian Watchman Nee, who brings a unique Chinese perspective to the Church. Some would warn you not to read him, if only because he doesn’t read like your typical white theologian of any “respectable” bent.

Or Rod Dreher, who writes about ideas that seem liberal but are actually hallmark conservative, and from an Orthodox tradition.

Plenty of other ghetto-breakers exist.

I offer this:

If you’re a Nazarene, read a book by a Pentecostal.

If you’re Reformed, hang out at a few Wesleyan websites—and not just to slam people.

If you’re a Presbyterian, consider what the Medieval mystics wrote about union with Christ.

If you’re a white, American Christian, discover what black, African Christians think about the Faith.

Consider the possibility that everything you know comes solely from your ghetto—and that the Christian world is a much, much bigger place than you realize.

Weird and unfamiliar don’t automatically equal wrong. Sometimes, they form the sidewalk that takes you and me out of our comfortable ghetto to a place filled with utterly foreign wonders.

Sure, quicksand or tigers may lurk down that path, but you’re an adult. Be discerning. Test everything all the time.The presence of threats doesn’t negate what wonders might be discovered. If anything, wonders look threatening to the inexperienced.

Whatever your Christian ghetto might be, break out of it! You’ll be surprised what you might learn about yourself and about the Lord from someone who doesn’t look or think like you.

Therefore, We Will Not Fear

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God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.
Therefore we will not fear though the earth gives way,
though the mountains be moved into the heart of the sea,
though its waters roar and foam,
though the mountains tremble at its swelling. Selah
–Psalm 46:1-3

Broken mirror, fear“Therefore, we will not fear…”

I don’t know why so many Christians today live in fear. But then again, I do know.

It is American to want to be in control. Our national psyche reflects maintaining what we have accumulated for ourselves. Protecting. Guaranteeing.

You see it on days that celebrate our soldiers, both those living and those dead. We console ourslves by saying they made the sacrifice to ensure freedom. The oddity in this is that ensuring freedom is also ensuring control.

It is also true that one man’s freedom is another man’s control, and nothing drives fear into our hearts more than to see our control give way to what another man considers his freedom.

And then the mountains begin to move, and both men realize that control is an illusion. And now both fear.

I don’t know when Christians in America began to fear so much, but I think the postmillennialistic triumphalism that was the hallmark of the American Church of the 19th century was disabused by the events of World War I. That the world could descend into such madness despite all our positive work to better ourselves! We lost control and failed most inhumanly. I think that nothing has been the same for us as a Church ever since.

Here’s the thing: Christians, more than anyone, should be sober people. We understand the nature of fallen men. We understand evil. We have a Gospel that tells us that we were incapable of controlling ourselves in a way that could save us. Only God in Christ had that level of control. Our salvation, even though He looked like us, came from outside of us. We could not save ourselves. We are not in control.

There is something about the American Church of the last 50-60 years that has been loathe to admit that we are not in control, even though we should understand this better than others. The Culture Wars we waged were always more about maintaining control than they were about actual sin.

Even today, as we see God’s symbol of the rainbow co-opted by those who rail against Him, their victories portrayed as our supposed losses, we are as fearful about what this loss of control means as we are about the sin that fuels it.

Into this, God speaks to the Christian soul and reminds us that even moving mountains should not be a cause for fear. His perfect love casts out all fear. He reminds us that fear is, indeed, the opposite of love.

Christian, never fear.

I can tell you that with words, but what is true is that drawing closer to God is they only way to live without fear. Draw close and trust. God is never surprised, and He is in control. Only He remains unmoveable, and when we abide in Him, we are as well.