Don't Be Afraid! (midweek)

Fr. Tony’s Mid-week Message

December 9, 2015

Don’t be afraid!

This coming Sunday, the third Sunday of Advent, is Gaudete (“Rejoice”) Sunday, one of the two “Rose Sundays” of the Christian year where pink vestments may be used. The other is Laetare (“Be Joyous”) Sunday, the fourth Sunday of Lent.  The idea in both is to make a small oasis of joy and refreshment in an otherwise longish season that some might find oppressive.

The readings for this Sunday continue on the theme of prophetic speaking forth in advance of the coming of the Lord.  Though many might think that the prophets were harbingers of disaster (“The end is near! Repent, or get ready for Doom!”), it is important to remember that more often than not they announced joy and the setting of things right for the oppressed.   One of the basic messages is “Do not be afraid!”  Given all the “bad stuff” happening around us (think terrorism, climate change, gun violence, political polarization, along with the regular stuff of old age, illness, and dying), it is a message worth paying attention to. 

“Don’t be afraid!” is also a basic message in the preaching of Jesus. Before Jesus raises the daughter of Jairus from the dead, he says “Don’t be afraid, just believe!” (Mark 5:36). Barbara Brown Taylor writes the following: 

“‘Do not be afraid,’ he says, ‘only believe.’ Only believe what?  He does not say, but those are the two choices, apparently, when human beings discover that they are not in charge after all.  They can fear, or they can believe.  They can panic and fall overboard, or they can ride out the storm.  They can despair, or they can wait, very quietly, for sanity to return.…   Fear is a small cell with no air in it and no light.  It is suffocating inside, and dark.  There is no room to turn around inside it.  You can only face in one direction, but it hardly matters, since you cannot see anyhow.  There is no future in the dark.  Everything is over.  …  Belief is something else altogether, although it is not what some would have us believe.  It is not a well-fluffed nest, or a well-defended castle high on a hill.  It is more like a rope bridge over a scenic gorge, sturdy but swinging back and forth, with plenty of light and plenty of air but precious little to hang on to except the stories you have heard: that it is the best and only way across, that it is possible, that it will bear your weight.  All you have to do is believe in the bridge more than you believe in the gorge, but fortunately you do not have to believe in it all by yourself.   There are others to believe it with you, and even some to believe it for you when your own belief wears thin.    … It takes a lot of courage to be a human being, but if Jesus was who he said he was, the bridge will hold.”  (The Preaching Life, pp. 93-94)

Grace and Peace, 

Fr. Tony+