Imagine fighting a battle; you alone against a single foe.  This foe, however, is crafty, cunning and has defeated countless thousands.  You are wearing a suit of armor, protection from the strikes of your enemy, a shield from the mortal blows.  And yet you grow weaker bearing this heavy load and your enemy is undaunted, seeming larger with each encounter.  You have brief reprieves from the battle when your enemy withdraws—not retreats, just withdraws.  During these times you tend to your needs, drinking water and consuming nourishment, but always wary, always keeping an eye toward the attacker, always considering what may happen if you are not on guard.  During one reprieve you seek to put greater distance between you and your enemy and you come to a great and deep chasm.  There before you is a small suspension bridge of old wooden planks and frayed rope.  Your heart beats with hope as your eyes look to escape.  Behind you, you hear the footsteps of your enemy approaching.  You step onto the bridge and the first plank snaps in two like a matchstick under your weight.  You feel the utter burden of this moment like the heavy armor you wear.  You know what you must do to cross the bridge—strip yourself of your protection, become vulnerable.  Yet without the armor you know you are easily dispatched with one swipe of the enemy’s sword. 

Do you seek another option, scurry along the edge of the chasm hoping to find a better escape, hoping that your strength won’t give out, hoping your enemy will grow weary of this pursuit?  Or do you strip of your armor and cross this bridge? 

You drop your weapon and shield, remove your helmet, unfasten your chest-plate and leggings.  You take a single step and feel almost as if you could float away.  You feel a relief, but it is brief as you remember your foe.  You look at the bridge and consider taking your sword and shield, but you need your hands free to cross the bridge.

You begin the crossing.  The boards creak under your weight, but do not break. The bridge swings as you step further and further out.  Your heart beats quicker, but the breeze feels soothing to your skin, too long unexposed.  You hear the huffs of your foe standing at the edge of the chasm behind you.  You imagine your enemy’s sword hacking through the rope and the bridge dropping into the chasm, your fears realized as you feel foolish for having chosen this course of absolute vulnerability.  You continue to cross, though you believe it is fruitless and returning is certain peril.  Below you, you see things that fill you with dread: humiliation, loneliness, rejection, disapproval, failure, loss, and so many other perils.  Remarkably, through persistence and because of that blessed bridge, you step onto the other side.  Before your eyes are people you hadn’t seen from the far side of the chasm, though you have heard of them.  They are the free, the saints and they look like angels—solid bodied, but light and fluid and unweighted.  You turn and look back to the other side and there where you had been so alone before, you see hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of armored people each fighting and fleeing a foe, like the one against whom you contended.  And remarkably, your eyes see beneath the visor of the foe’s helmet, not the face of a demon with fangs and bloodshot eyes, but the face of fear itself.  This foe pursues each soul, keeping each occupied, requiring false security in order to continue the pointless fight. 

God said “do not be afraid.” Gen. 15: 1; 26: 24; 46: 3

The angel said “do not be afraid.”  Matthew 28: 5; Luke 1: 13; 1:30; 2: 10

Jesus said “do not be afraid”   Matthew 10: 31; 17: 7; 28: 10; Mark 6:50; Luke 5: 10; 12: 7; John 6: 20; 14: 7

Many, many more references to fear and not being afraid!

© Stephen Carl