Fear can be a legitimate response to an actual danger, but often fear grows out of an overactive imagination. If you stand at the edge of a ledge with a severe drop, you should feel trepidation. As a boy, I feared the dark and some of that fear carried into my adult years. Fear, though, can bring on the incapacity to act. Action suggests commitment. Commitment may demonstrate belief, but belief may reveal something about one’s identity that you might prefer to keep under wraps.
In the early days of my spiritual awakening, when I began to read Scripture on a daily basis, I would often take a Bible to read while on the commuter train into New York City. In those days, I was acutely aware of being in a public setting. I would discreetly keep my Bible from the view of others. It was a foolish fear, but my desire to keep my Bible hidden bespoke what was taking place then in our culture, particularly in the east where I lived. And it wasn’t just me.
Jesus Walks on Water by Ivan Aivazovsky (1888)
Whether the message came from the universities, the media, business or the political culture, Christianity in the 1980s had become less respectable among the ruling classes in America. Many important leaders within mainstream denominations had found fortune and notoriety by ridiculing important tenants of the faith. One had to keep one’s faith in Christ Jesus private. Jesus was acceptable if you said nothing about Him, but otherwise He was not very welcome in polite society. The culture was listening more to the words of Jesus’ enemies.
On the other hand, much has happened in the culture since then. Social media, music, certain evangelical leaders and even movies like the Passion of the Christ have stood up against the high tide of secularism and agnosticism.
For me, it has been a long journey from fear of ridicule to a passion and commitment to the Word of God. Most recently that outward expression of my faith has come in the form of my new book, Getting To Know Jesus and the new web site GettingToKnowJesus.com
The book grew out of daily podcasts recorded with Pastor Chuck Davis that we at first called In the Footsteps of Jesus. The intention was to introduce the Jesus of the Gospels in a way that would invite people into a deeper understanding of who Jesus is and why it matters. Our conversations were unrehearsed but focused. We presented the life of Jesus in the context of the entire biblical narrative and we happily depended on the truth and beauty of the story as told by the witnesses to the events that unfolded in Galilee and Judea over two thousand years ago. These conversations continue today as the daily Getting to Know Jesus podcasts.
Jesus Walks on Water by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld
The world was hostile to Jesus in His own time. His own family, His closest followers and the leaders of the ruling religious class all either abandoned or attacked Him. Even so, Jesus was not afraid because He knew the Father as the Father knew Him. While He was not afraid, Jesus was alert and vigilant and He constantly prayed to the Father. After the resurrection of Jesus Christ, Peter, who, out of fear, had denied the Lord three times, told Jesus’ followers that dangers lurked everywhere and to be on guard: “Be alert and of sober mind. Your enemy the devil prowls around like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour. Resist him, standing firm in the faith, because you know that the family of believers throughout the world is undergoing the same kind of suffering.”
Sometimes it is appropriate to experience fear. But Christians are not called to hide. Rather, as Peter counsels, be alert, be strong and be courageous because Jesus promised He would never leave us, even to the very end of time.