Tuesday 14 April 2009

We continue with facing our fears from "The Strength to Love" by Martin Luther King, Jr.

By bringing our fears to the forefront of consciousness, we may find them to be more imaginary than real. Some of them will turn out to be snakes under the carpet.
And let us also remember that, more often than not, fear involves the misuse of imagination. When we get our fears into the open, we may laugh at some of them, and this is good. One psychiatrist said, " Ridicule is the master cure for fear and anxiety."

The imagination of fear is one that leads us into a downward spin into places we do not need to go. Unfortunately, if fear leads our imagination we shut doors. When fears leads our imagination we can easily be locked into the three common responses when faced with moments of threat: freeze, fight, or flight. There's a time and a place for all of those responses but if our imagination is ruled by fear, these tend to be the only responses we can see for ourselves. It is not wonder we can be so easily drawn into war - we have given up our ability to imagine more than a world reacting to fear. This is particularly why I have always been drawn to Walter Brueggeman's use of "faithful imagination." It is the way the beloved of God look out at the world and the way in which we will engage the day. Faithful imagination takes note of threats and tight places and mounting anxiety but then it steps back and calls on us to wonder. When we go there - lift our eyes to wonder, the world takes on another face and we give ourselves space and time to become centered upon the promises of our God to be with us in and through all things. Fear may never leave...but we have the opportunity to face it with more real eyes and eyes that take us into the possibilities we have yet to contemplate - possibilities that really do set us free.

Connection: Take the time to release your life into the domain of wonder. It may be an odd experience - but so is the Shalom of God's Reign when it is put up alongside the fear-filled world that so often tries to gain our allegiance.

Lord of the Resurrection, there is so much that we let direct our lives. It can become so easy to forget that you promise to sustain us and support us and to encourage us even when the day is filled with more threat than assurance. Be for us - that blessed assurance. Amen.