Fear Not

If you have sat near the kiddos in our service or been to a fellowship hour in the last few weeks, you may have noticed that my kiddo, Mac, is strongly embracing his independence these days. We get a lot of NO’s, a lot of sneaky smiles that he is learning to use to his advantage, and a lot of bargaining. I am not too proud to admit that while I am a pretty calm and patient person most of the time, my son’s strong will can test that patience in a way that other things don’t. Add to that the experience of being a parent and feeling, fairly viscerally, the expectations of other people, parents, society in general, of how my child “should act”, or really how I as his parent “should” be responding, and that pressure becomes fairly heavy. More so than when Mac was a fairly good-natured infant, I find myself holding on to some feelings, rooted in fear, about my own ability as a parent, as a good parent.

Throughout our texts today, there is a theme of “fear not”. The first reading ends with “Fear not. Strengthen your hands (for the work to come)”; God is with us in the psalm, therefore we shall not fear. In the second lesson, we hear “There is no fear in love, rather perfect love casts out fear….” And in the Gospel, we hear the angel Gabriel say to Zechariah, “Fear not, Zechariah, for your prayer has been heard.”

As we begin the season of Advent, the season of waiting or being surprised for a special, or important thing to arrive or to happen, in this case, the incarnation, of Jesus as a small baby, “Fear Not” is an appropriate catch-phrase, an appropriate mantra for such a time. In the weeks to come, we will hear of Zechariah and the prophesy of the birth of John the Baptist, of Mary accepting the call to birth the child Jesus, Elizabeth and Mary rejoicing in their shared miraculous pregnancies, of the shepherds, the wise men—all of whom might have some cause for fear, but who step into their calling, their part of God’s story, embracing the words “fear not”. And as appropriate as the phrase is for a season we call advent, ‘fear not’ is fitting—perhaps even more so for our more personal, intimate advents.

Advents like the arrival of snow, that will excite us and weary us. Advents like illness or loss within our families, that will upend us, cause us to refocus, or cause us to just try to get through the day. Advents like friends or families visiting. Advents like new jobs or new homes or new commutes, whether we hoped for them or not. Advents like newly independent toddlers. Advents as small as an unexpected meeting for which we were not prepared, or as large as death or birth, marriage or separation.

We are often encouraged to observe the season of Advent by doing our best to actively slow down, by countering, in whatever way we can, the busy-ness of the season. We might notice a few things that happen when we make that decision to slow down. One: that our fears, our worries, our anxieties become exposed. Things we keep at bay because of busy-ness, overworking, over-compensating, or over-functioning, come to the forefront. When we slow ourselves down, we may at first find ourselves feeling more anxiety—which is neither healthy nor productive. Or perhaps, slowing down allows more time to think, more time for fears or hurt that we are holding onto to reveal themselves. Sometimes I wonder if we hold on to our fear or our hurt because we think if we were to let go of it, it might go unacknowledged, unseen, unwitnessed by anyone but ourselves.

But—the second thing that happens, if we allow it to, is that we are invited to make space for the voice that says “fear not”—The breath that allows the anxiety to settle back into expectation. That allows us to recognize the fears for what they are, recognize the God present and beside us in those moments, recognize those fears as opportunity for community, connection and relationship. And I want to name, that as much as we might want it to be different, I believe that God rarely works in a way where all of a sudden a fear we hold is gone over night, simply because God says fear not. Releasing our fear to God is a process, a practice, a habit. One that we are not particularly good at.

In parenting right now, there is a movement towards a “style” of parenting called gentle parenting. It admittedly gets some flack for being a kind of permissive approach to parenting, which—like any “approach” to anything—is because it can go wrong. But what I have found is that it is actually an approach for parents, to learn how to better regulate themselves when they feel caught up in the throws of toddler tantrums or challenging kid moments. It’s a reminder to take a breath. To recognize the emotions or needs within the situation. To not get overwhelmed with frustration or anger and react in a way we don’t want to.  For all of us, there have been mistakes that the people who raised us have made—because we are all human— and this approach is meant to address both the struggle in the child, or person in front of us, as well as heal or begin to heal some of the ways we might not have been treated when we were children. To me, when I work on responding this way, and it is hardly all the time, it feels like a moment when God is saying:

Fear not. I see your hurt and your struggle and your pain, and I want you to release it, so that something new can happen. Or, fear not, I want to share your burden. Or fear not, I am witness to your hurt, and it will be hard to let go of, but I will be with you as you do. Or, fear not, what I am calling you to is hard, but I will be with you.

As we enter this season of Advent, this season of slowing down, this season of “fear not”, I want to invite you to think on, in this moment, a fear that you are holding. I’ll take just a moment for you to do so. PAUSE. With that on your heart, I want to give a reminder that the phrase “Fear not” is the most used phrase throughout the Bible, showing up something like 360 times. We hear of it in Advent because there are big things on the horizon— the infant birth of the savior of a world that is worn down and weary from fear and grief. We are being reminded of God’ presence with us in, through, and after the fear. As we step into this season, I encourage you to invite God to that fear you are holding in your heart. Allow the slowness of this season—even moments of slowness—to influence you to stop keeping the fear at arms length, but instead to acknowledge it, name it, and then hand it to God, over and over and over again. Zechariah’s wife, Elizabeth will still bear John the Baptist in spite of his fear; Mary will still bring Jesus into the world in the face of her’s; the shepherds will share the news of Jesus’ birth;  what might God be calling us and you to, in the midst of your fear? In the midst of the practice of handing that fear to God? What is God longing to accompany you through? “Fear not, prepare yourself for the work ahead…Fear not, I am with you always…Fear not, for my love will cast out fear…Fear not, have faith in me…Fear not, your prayer has been answered. Fear not…”