Be Not Afraid

It is completely normal for human beings to feel fear. Our fears start in childhood – from the two universal fears of falling and loud noises – but most of us soon add to the list – fear of spiders and other creatures, fear of public speaking, fearing of flying etc etc. These are specific fears but most of us at times will also know more generalised forms of being afraid – the worries and anxieties that circle around in our minds, often not focussed on any one specific thing. As I explore this topic this morning I do want to acknowledge how dreadful it can be to feel fear, how anxiety is one of the most commonly experienced psychological conditions and how utterly debilitating that can be.

To be afraid is a very common human experience – no wonder then that fear is a subject often mentioned by the world’s religions. Calling on a higher power can be greatly comforting when we are afraid. You may have heard the joke of the child asked by his mum to pop out into the garden to fetch the sweeping brush. The garden is dark, the child does not want to go out there in the dark. His mum re-assures him by telling him that Jesus is out there and will protect him at all times. Then she spots the little lad standing by the open door calling out into the garden – ‘Jesus if you are there, can you bring the sweeping brush in for us’.

We know the biology of fear – we perceive a potential source of danger – the spider for example that dangled down over my bed only the other night – our body releases adrenalin – a hormone designed to get us going – we experience the fight or flight rush that can help us escape – out of the bed perhaps. Once the source of fear is removed, our body can return to a calmer state. We know that this fight or flight response was very useful to us in pre-historic times giving us the speed to escape from angry woolly mammoths or encouraging us to stand and fight those who threatened our loved ones. Our fear response is still useful in many situations today – it will get us quickly out of the path of red London bus for example. Our fear response is so sensitive that even talking or reading about fear will bring a slight increase in our heart rate. We are primed and ready because we never know what’s going to happen next. I am confident that if a sabre toothed tiger appeared here right now we’d all be out of that door in double quick time.

But we also know how some aspects of this physiological response can be troublesome in modern life. Adrenalin increases our heart rate – it can make us sweat and blush or smile inappropriately; it can make us freeze like a rabbit caught in the headlights of an oncoming car. Because fear is such a strong emotion it can have a remarkably powerful effect on us and how we live our lives. I suspect many of us here today will know the ways in which our fears have limited our lives, the ways we have held back at times, not stepped out into a new beginning or way of being in life. From our childhood days we’ll tend to be sent out into the world with a ‘take care’ message that implies the world is a scary, anxious making place. Interesting to imagine how different life might be if we heard more of the ‘take risks today, make mistakes, don’t worry about making a fool of yourself, it’s fine to fail’ kinds of messages from our earliest times.

And have you noticed how fear is used at times by politicians and the media? Policy changes we may yet regret are being introduced to deal with perceived threats from terrorism.  Our own economic anxieties become so interlinked with immigration and welfare issues that it becomes hard to think clearly about these important and complex issues of our time. Our newspapers give immense coverage to diseases such as Ebola yet tend to ignore the less dramatic diseases such as malaria, which kill and disable far more people yet are not deemed newsworthy because they are ever present. Fear does not seem a healthy position from which to make decisions for our society. And if our fears were rationally based we’d be most afraid of our own stairs, kitchens and beds since these are the places where most of us will have accidents and eventually reach the ends of our lives.

I was on a retreat recently where we talked in small group sessions.  One of the participants said that on the path of self-reflection she felt there was only one question that needed to be asked, and answered, and that was – ‘who would we be and what would we do if we were not afraid?’  This question became a useful tool to consider the many ways that we limit our lives through fear. It led to some deep and gently challenging conversations and perhaps it’s a question we can find ways to explore with one another. But I wondered about its implication – that fear can be got rid of, vanquished, overcome. Susan Jeffers in her famous book of the 80s Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway took a slightly different approach. One of her five truths about fear is that

“The fear will never go away as long as you continue to grow! Every time you take a step into the unknown, you experience fear. There is no point in saying, ‘When I am no longer afraid, then I will do it.’ You’ll be waiting for a long time. The fear is part of the package.”

I found her message helpful – that fear is part of being alive and by acknowledging it and accepting it as part and parcel of living life fully we can grow and develop further. But Susan Jeffers herself can for me sound a bit too jolly at times. Here’s another of her five truths about fear:

“Pushing through fear is less frightening than living with the bigger underlying fear that comes from a feeling of helplessness! This is the one truth that some people have difficulty understanding. When you push through the fear, you will feel such a sense of relief as your feeling of helplessness subsides. You will wonder why you did not take action sooner. You will become more and more aware that you can truly handle anything that life hands you.”

I don’t know about you but yes, there have been times in my life where I have ‘pushed through’ my fears and yes, over the years, I have felt a greater sense of being able to handle what life throws my way. But I’ve also come to appreciate fear for the messages it brings me – rather than pushing fear away, trying to brush it under the proverbial carpet – I’ve learnt to value and respect it. I’ve also been in situations where fear was a completely understandable response to being genuinely threatened with violence and I’ve known others whose lives have been forever blighted by terrible and completely understandable fear of all too real dangers. Our congregation’s Christmas charity collection this year will be going to the group Refuge, which runs a network of safe houses for women and children escaping from domestic violence. Their funding has diminished because of government cuts yet the need for the safety they can provide is ever greater.

So much as I love those Biblical messages of ‘be not afraid’ – especially when delivered by large numbers of hovering angels to a group of understandably cowering shepherds – I think the alternative message might be just as helpful. Be afraid. You’re human, life is scary and uncertain. Accept your fear, breathe with it, and then – then assess the situation. Reflect for a moment. Is this the equivalent of a red bus moment where we really do need all the energy that this adrenalin is giving us in order to get out of danger – quick. At such a moment fear can save us. Or is this a ‘goat in the back of the pick-up truck situation’ that we heard of in our reading earlier on. I agree with Meg Barnhouse when she writes that there are times in life when we might as well just “sit for a while and relax. Surrender to events. Don’t try to intervene at this time. Detach yourself from outcomes. May we be given the wisdom to know when to sit and just let our ears flap in the breeze.”

 Rev. Sarah Tinker

Sermon – 16th November 2014