Sometimes it is mind-boggling to realize that just one year ago the word ‘pandemic’ evoked pleasant images of a happy evening playing a co-operative board game with family and friends. During this past 12 months many, many ordinary people have demonstrated admirable qualities of passion, perseverance and personal sacrifice as they have risen to the demands resulting from the coronavirus. Most of us can put names to these neighbours and citizens who have made the challenges of these perilous times less daunting.

Perhaps it is my stage of life, but in spite of all those fine examples of praiseworthy behaviour, I have also been chagrined by persistent evidence of prominent folk acting in ways that can only be described as piecemeal, parochial and/or paranoid.  None of those behaviours nor their underlying motivations build healthy communities.

It is the last one though that has most often captured my focus. Paranoia —pandering to fear, using anxiety as a reason for action is not only psychologically damaging to all involved, it prevents hope from taking root. Since it enervates more than motivates, it is actually self-defeating as a means of inspiration.

In the realm of faith fear has no place.  When love holds sway, fear vanishes (1 John 4:18). When trust is put in God’s Sovereign Rule, hope not fear fills the heart (Psalm 27:1). Perhaps I’m overly sensitive about this because the beginnings of my faith journey very much identify with Newton’s hymn — ‘Twas grace that taught my heart to fear, And grace my fears relieved’. My journey from line one to line two was lengthy. Looking back, I regret the diminished joy and stunted love experienced during that delay. So maybe like someone in recovery, I over-react.

But I don’t think so. I survey the landscape in our culture and in our denomination and it is easy to find reasons to fear.  Our society seems to be increasingly divided with fault lines multiplying and widening — generational, regional, political, philosophical, racial and on and on. The PCC’s theological differences appear to be hardening with negative impacts on our congregations’ vitality, our conciliar cohesion and our capacity to want let alone to seek unity. Divisions rarely enhance life.  Thus, you hear undertones of fear in many conversations about the future.

I sometimes hear it in my own voice and sense it in my own heart. Don’t misunderstand me, these divisions are cause for serious concern and do summon us to action. But not motivated by fear. Rather we engage the darkness knowing that the Light of the World has come and the darkness can never overcome Him. We confront forces of disunity, knowing that in the Creator all things are held together.  We take on complexity and confusion knowing that the Spirit is constantly teaching and renewing our minds, enabling us to discern truth from error. We face the possible loss of much that is precious to us, knowing the promise ‘that what eye has not seen, nor ear heard’ will come into fruition.

Fear, deep-rooted in the human heart, comes from disobedience (Gen. 3:8-10).  Obedience in response to divine grace is the antidote. It is also the gift of God that will bridge the divisions and heal the hurts of those divisions. May such love-inspired faithfulness be the hallmark of our lives in these perilous days.