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It’s an obvious understatement
to say we live in a day of great fear. The language of
“terror” has become the motivating mantra of our day. I did
a Google search for the word “fear,” and I came up with a
fascinating site called “The Phobia List”—pages of phobias,
A to Z. Everything from Alliumphobia—the fear of garlic
and Lachanophobia—the fear of vegetables to
Zemmiphobia—the fear of the great mole rat. It even
lists Ecclesiophobia—the fear of church and, get
this, Homilophobia—the fear of sermons! You can even
get a poster of the “Phobia List” which will cover your
entire wall.
But the most interesting note is
the disclaimer at the top of the page. In big red letters,
it reads: “If you are looking for a phobia name that is not
on the list, sorry, but I don’t have it.” And then, in
smaller print: “Please don’t ask me about curing phobias.
I’m interested in names only.” (http:www.phobialist.com)
We all have
our own phobia list, and the list can be as fresh as the
morning papers:
-
A
questionable course in Iraq with no clear sense of how
long it will go on, when it will end.
-
Fear of
bird flu or bad weather or a bitter diagnosis from the
family doctor.
Add to that, fear-mongering TV
preachers and politicians who use talk of terror for
political gain until the fear of terror becomes its own
terror. And add to that, panic-driven newscasters who can’t
even give the weather without fear-filled, baited breath. It
all leads to what Jane Spencer in the Wall Street Journal
refers to as the “fear system” of our day. (Wall Street
Journal Online, April 26, 2003)
Into that maze of fear, we
have the audacity to read the word of the angel to Mary: “Do
not be afraid!”
The same
word came to Joseph in a dream: “Don’t be afraid.”
The same
word came to Zachariah and Elizabeth: “Fear not.”
The same word will ultimately
come to shepherds in a field keeping watch over their flocks
by night: “Don’t be afraid, for behold I bring you glad
tidings of great joy which shall be to all people.” The
angelic greeting comes with incredible monotony throughout
the Advent story, the same greeting, the same command,
repeated over and over again: “Fear Not!”
And the logical, sensible,
responsible, first century or twenty-first century response
is: “You’ve got to be kidding!”
1.
The command sounds perfectly absurd. Mary had every reason
to be afraid.
Just imagine…an angel, no less,
with word of an unexpected, unplanned and probably unwanted
pregnancy. I realize there is a time and place for all the
debates about abortion, but just for the moment, put
yourself in the place of a unwed teenager who hears the
word, “You’re going to have a baby.” Feel the emotions, the
shock, the outright, incomprehensible fear.
And of course, if Mary is
listening, it’s even more troubling than that. This is to be
no ordinary pregnancy or ordinary baby. This baby is to be
the Son of God! How would you like to take on that kind of
surrogate parenting responsibility?
And if she’s still listening,
this child is coming for nothing less than taking over the
throne of David, challenging the powers that be, confronting
the values and standards of his day, bringing in the kingdom
of God. All of a sudden this angelic visitation doesn’t look
and sound so much like a sentimental Hallmark greeting or a
Currier and Ives Christmas, it sounds like the overwhelming
challenge of a lifetime. She had every right to be afraid,
and so she was.
And
of course, so are we.
Again, to quote Jane Spencer:
“In contemporary America, the safest society in recorded
history, many people feel as though they have never been
more at risk.” (Wall Street Journal Online, April 26,
2003) Even when you cut through all the fear-mongering
rhetoric and divisive politics of our day, there is still
plenty of legitimate reason for anxiety.
And
yet…and yet…the message of the angel still comes.
It is the
most common command in the Bible, heard every time God’s
word comes to his people. From wandering Old Testament
Israelites to doubting New Testament disciples, the word
comes: “Fear not.”
2.
“Mary, don’t be afraid, because the Lord is with you.”
It’s so simple...so profound.
“The Lord is with you.” The antidote to fear begins with
faith in the God of the ages and the conviction that God is
actively involved in the lives of his people, a God who is
present, a God who is with us.
In one of my first sermons here,
I told you that one of my favorite verses is from Paul’s
letter to the Romans, chapter 8, verse 38:
For we know that God works, in
all things for good with those who love him who are called
according to his purpose.
Not that all “things” are good,
but rather, in the midst of whatever life may bring, God is
at work for good in the lives of his people.
Here’s another “favorite verse”
story about the old African-American farmer. He had lived
his life in the poverty of hard-scrabble farming, the
injustice of the Jim Crow era, the struggles for food and
dignity, but every Sunday he dressed up in the old suit he
owned and carried his worn-out old Bible to church with him.
One day, a newly-minted, seminary-trained aspiring
theologian and scholar came to visit that little country
church. Seeing the old farmer’s well-used Bible, he asked,
“What’s your favorite verse in the Bible?” The old man said,
“Ah, that’s easy: ‘And it came to pass.’”
The well-educated seminary
student didn’t mean to be condescending when he responded:
“But that isn’t a complete verse. It’s just an opening
prepositional phrase. There must be more to it than
that.”
The old man smiled and said,
“You see, every time trouble would come into my life, I
would read, ‘And it came to pass.’ Every time sorrow came
into my life, I could say, ‘And it came to pass.’ See,
sonny, I always knew trouble didn’t come to stay, it came to
pass.”
A proper response to fear begins
by recognizing it in all its reality, to look it square in
the face, to know it for what it is, but also to know that
in the end, fear does not have the last word…it only came to
pass. In the end, our lives rest in the presence of an
eternal God who is with us, who comes to us, who stands
beside us.
“Mary, fear not, the Lord is with thee.”
If you grew up in the kind of
Methodist church I grew up in, you will remember some old
hymns which are not in the current hymnal. One of those is
the stirring hymn from the pen of James Russell Lowell.
Scholar, lawyer, statesman, he served as ambassador to Spain
and England in the 1800’s. He wrote it in 1845 as a protest
against the American war with Mexico:
Once to every man and nation
comes the moment to decide,
In the choice of truth or falsehood for the good or evil
side.
The last
verse acknowledges the power of evil in his day, then gives
the promise:
Though the cause of evil
prosper, yet ’tis truth alone is strong,
Though her portion be a scaffold and upon the throne be
wrong,
Yet that scaffold sways the future and behind the dim
unknown;
Standeth God within the shadows keeping watch above his own.
(U.M.
Hymnal, 1964, page 242)
Faith for times of fear begins
with the rock solid conviction that God is still with us,
and that behind the blaring headlines and heated debates of
our day, the eternal God is present, standing in the
shadows, keeping watch above his own.
“Mary, don’t be afraid, the Lord is with you.”
God is still present and
active in this world.
3.
Mary, don’t be afraid, because God keeps his promises.
Here is the word of hope for
tomorrow, the word which helps us to see beyond the present
into God’s good future. Faith for a time of fear looks
beyond the immediate and the present and claims the
assurance of God’s kingdom coming, God’s promise of a
future.
Remember the story about the guy
who hated his wife’s cat? He just hated that cat with a
vengeance, but his wife loved the cat. One day, the cat
disappeared. His wife was grief-stricken, so the man put an
ad in the newspaper: “$500 for information on the missing
cat.” His friend saw the ad and said to him: “Wow! $500 for
word on the cat that you hated…that’s pretty risky, isn’t
it?” With a sly, knowing twinkle in his eye, the man
responded: “It’s not so risky when you know what you know.”
We
know the end of the story. Life is not so scary when you
know what you know.
We know God keeps his promises
and sends a Savior.
We know Jesus comes and his name
is called Emmanuel, meaning “God With Us.”
We know the word has become
flesh and dwelt among us full of grace and truth and we have
beheld his glory, glory as of the only begotten of the
Father.
And better yet, we know God
promises that one day the lion will lie down with the lamb
and a little child shall lead them.
We know one day they will beat
their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning
hooks, nation will not lift up sword against nation, neither
shall they study war no more.
We know that one day God’s
kingdom will come on earth as it is in heaven; that one day
every knee will bow and every tongue confess that Jesus
Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father.
Life is not so scary when you
know what you know, when you know the end of the story.
Remember the closing scenes in
the beautiful and well-loved musical, Fiddler on the Roof?
It’s yet another pogrom, another forced exodus from the
little village of Anatifka. Tevia’s daughters have gone
their own way, the villagers are scattering, and in the
midst of the sorrow and darkness of the time, a young boy
turns to the old Rabbi and says, “Rabbi, wouldn’t this be a
good time for the Messiah to come?” And the wise old Rabbi
says, “I guess we will just have to wait for him somewhere
else.”
That’s faith…faith for times of fear.
A faith that can face an
uncertain and difficult present because of a hope for the
future.
A faith which enables one to
deal with today because of an assurance of tomorrow.
When I first went to Ann Arbor,
Michael Lindvall was pastor of First Presbyterian Church. He
is now serving Brick Presbyterian Church in New York. He
wrote two novels about a small town Presbyterian pastor
named the Rev. David Battles, The Good News from North
Haven and Leaving North Haven.
Dave had served this small
church for ten years when he accepted a new call to another
town. The population of North Haven had declined; the church
could no longer afford a full-time pastor and would probably
have to merge with the also-declining Methodists in town
when Dave left. Everyone’s future was uncertain—the
pastor’s, the church’s, the people’s—and they all knew it.
On his last Sunday, David
baptized his first granddaughter in the little church. Old
Minnie and Angus, two of his closest friends, were unable to
be there. Minnie had been sick numerous times and had
thought she was dying more than once, but this time it was
the real thing. On their way home from church, they took the
baby to see Angus and Minnie.
His
daughter, Annie, carried the baby up to Minnie in her bed.
He writes:
Annie laid the baby into the old
woman’s eager arms. The baby was waking and starting to
wail. Minnie folded her arms around the child, still
resplendent in her christening gown. “There, there,” I heard
Minnie say. The baby stilled and Minnie looked into her eyes
and said, “There’s nothing to be afraid of.” Then she looked
from the baby to the mother and said, “There
isn’t...really.”
The pastor goes on….
Two weeks later as I looked down
from the pulpit over Minnie’s casket, I thought, Is there
really nothing to be afraid of? Have all the mothers who
ever cooed those words to their sleepless babies been
telling lies?
Minnie, it occurred to me, had
not been afraid, but not because there was nothing to be
afraid of. There is so much to be afraid of. The truth, and
Minnie knew it, is more subtle. There is plenty to be afraid
of, but in spite of it, you don’t have to be afraid.
To the shepherds, the angels
sang, “Do not be afraid.” To the women at the tomb, the
angel said, “Do not be afraid.”
Do not be afraid, not because
there is nothing fearsome. Do not be afraid because the
fearsome things do not have the last word.”
(Michael Lindvall, Leaving North Haven, page 232)
In this day, a day of great
fear, hear the word of the angel. Don’t be afraid, not
because there is nothing to fear, but because God is
present, the Lord is with you. Don’t be afraid, because the
Savior will come, God keeps his promises, and in the end,
the fearsome things do not have the last word.
Mary,
fear not….the Lord is with you.
Mary,
fear not…the Savior will come.
Notes: The James Russell Lowell
hymn was dropped from the new edition of the United
Methodist Hymnal for a variety of reasons, but those of us
“of a certain age” remember it as one of those hymns which
stirred our spirits. The full text reads:
Once to every man and nation,
comes the moment to decide,
In the strife of truth with falsehood, for the good or evil
side;
Some great cause, God’s new Messiah, offering each the bloom
or blight,
And the choice goes by forever, twixt that darkness and that
light.
Then to side with truth is
noble, when we share her wretched crust,
Ere her cause bring fame and profit, and tis prosperous to
be just;
Then it is the brave man chooses while the coward stands
aside,
Till the multitude make virtue of the faith they had denied.
By the light of burning martyrs,
Christ, thy bleeding feet we track,
Toiling up new Calvaries ever, with the cross that turns not
back;
New occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good
uncouth;
They must upward still and onward, who would keep abreast of
truth.
Though the cause of evil
prosper, yet tis truth alone is strong;
Though her portion be a scaffold, and upon the throne be
wrong:
Yet that scaffold sways the future, and behind the dim
unknown,
Standeth God within the shadow keeping watch above his own.
If you
would like to know more about Rev. Dr. Michael Lindvall and
his writings, check out www.brickchurch.org, or you can find
his books at www.amazon.com or www.alibris.com.
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