Every Day a Fear
“He has not learned the lesson of life who does not every day surmount a fear.”
Seven days after I broke a man’s tractor, I mounted it to finish the job I told myself another would complete.
Strange how a moment might trigger at random a memory from the past. On a crisp September morning, I was sixteen again. Sixteen with a few months of driving experience behind me. Sixteen feeling like a pretty big deal. Sixteen not expecting a rock pile beside Ralph Anderson’s potato field. Sixteen and afraid to drive home with the pickup’s back fender crumpled. Sixteen and determined never to drive again.
I handed Dad the keys, gave voice to my resolution and braced myself for the lecture that never came. Instead, he handed the keys back to me, pointed to the vehicle and told me we were going for ride to I don’t remember where.
Seven days after I broke a man’s tractor, I arm wrestled that fear again and finished the job without my dad beside me.
I envy people with Texas size faith. Truth is, most days I lack even the mustard seed variety.
I’m afraid of failure. Afraid of not measuring up. Afraid of rejection. Afraid of appearing foolish. Afraid of not having enough money. Afraid of being irrelevant or unnecessary. Afraid of growing old. Afraid of a pain that won’t go away. Afraid that when I die, I won’t be missed. And on my really bad days, afraid the things I believe about God aren’t true.
“Therefore, since we are surrounded by such a great cloud of witnesses,” the unnamed author of Hebrews wrote, “let us throw off everything that hinders and the sin that so easily entangles and run with perseverance the race marked out for us.”1
The sin that easily entangles. Our “parasitic sins,” according to the enlivened language of The Message.
Fear isn’t sin, but it’s the soup in which my goose is most often cooked. Refuse to mount the tractor and engage the PTO and the fear would have tripped me. Drive my body as if it was 25 and my fear will do me in before my time. Foster a spirit of dependency so that I will live on in the minds of those I love and my fear erects an idol certain to inflate my sense of self-Importance.
Like me, David, Israel’s shepherd-sovereign experienced a sense of dread. After Samuel anointed him Israel’s monarch-in-waiting, he spent a good bit of time running from Saul, the current ruler. Sometimes a close encounter terrified him, but never more than when he found himself in the company of Achish, King of Gath. To escape, he pretended to be insane, “acting like a madman, making marks on the door of the gate and letting saliva run down his beard.”2
When reflecting on the experience, he wrote, “I bless GOD every chance I get; my lungs expand with his praise. I live and breathe GOD; if things aren’t going well, hear this and be happy: Join me in spreading the news; together let’s get the word out. GOD met me more than halfway; he freed me from my anxious fears. Look at him; give him your warmest smile. Never hide your feelings from him. When I was desperate, I called out, and GOD got me out of a tight spot. GOD’S angel sets up a circle of protection around us while we pray.”3
I don’t know if I will ever experience the resolute trust I covet. I don’t know if my anxious fears will ever disappear like ground fog in the warmth of the morning sun. I don’t know if facing tomorrow’s foreboding will ever be easier because I’ve kept a record of the tight spots God has delivered me from. I can hope.
For now, the best I can do — believe that when I pray God’s angel will set a circle of protection around me. And while I’m at it, quit hiding these feelings of angst from the God who saves me.
“So with today’s fear surmounted, Lord, bring on tomorrow — but no need to hurry.”
1 Hebrews 12.1 NIV
2 1 Samuel 21.10-15
3 Psalm 34.1-7 The Message