Afraid

What is this dis-ease,

This gnawing feeling in my gut?

These unsettled times

Do not be afraid.

Do I believe the angels?

Trust God is with us?

Take away my fear.

Help me put my trust in you

And breathe in your peace.

(Photo: Ridley Creek State Park)

Refuge

"Be to me a rock of refuge

A strong fortress, to save me,

For your my rock and my fortress."

I am woman fleeing the abuse of my husband.

(Be to me a rock of refuge)

I am a child who is bullied by my classmates.

(Be to me a rock of refuge).

I am the African American man pulled over by the police fifty times simply because I was driving while black.

(Be to me a rock of refuge).

I am the one who is living on the streets because I have mental illness and no money to pay for treatment.

(Be to me a rock of refuge).

I am the Syrian fleeing my war torn country trying to find a safe place to raise my children.

(Be to me a rock of refuge).

I am your child, God, living in a world that I don't understand, full of violence and hate.

(Be to me a rock of refuge).

God, my refuge is in you.

Even as I ask for sanctuary, 

Let me be a little light in this world

Offering safe harbor for those who need it.

Do not let me turn my backs on them

Out of fear for my personal safety 

Because you 

Are

My refuge, my home.

I need not fear.

Do Not Be Afraid

Today, my older son boarded a plane and headed to Bogotà, Colombia for a ten day vacation to stay with a friend he met while working at a local amusement park this past summer. I have never met this friend. I have never met his family. I only know what I have heard about Bogotà over the past several years. And I also know what I read on the state department's website about conditions in Colombia. I could rattle off a list of warnings that I found on the website - and I did rattle them off to my son - as he made his plans to go. Here are just a few gems:

• Watch out in the airport. Pick pocketers are looking for passports - especially at Christmas...

•  "Violence by narco-terrorist groups continues to affect some rural areas as well as large cities..."

• DO NOT take a cab. If you do, only take the cabs that are located in this particular area....

• Be careful what you wear; people have had jewelry ripped off from around their necks...

• US government officials and their families are only allowed to travel to major cities by air..."they may not travel by road outside urban areas at night..."

I could list about a half dozen more things.

My son just looked at me as though I were crazy. But, I told him, it is important to be aware of these things so that he can be wise.

Fear - What an interesting creature that is. It prevents us from meeting new people, from having conversations with members of the Tea Party and/or participants in the Occupy Wall Street movement, from seeing another person unlike ourselves as a child of God.

During the Bush years, fear was always at our doorstep and it made me angry that we were made to feel frightened. I fought this tooth and nail. Our conversations around the dinner table often addressed this problem. We saw people in our country giving up their rights just to be "safe." We discussed the fact that God is with us no matter what happens - and that means we can live with less fear in our lives.

I did a search of the phrase, "Do not be afraid" in the Oremus Bible Browser and discovered that these words appear 67 times in the Bible. The fact that these words are spoken so frequently in the Bible says something about our human condition. In the Old Testament, it's mostly God  and the prophets who issue this command, although the angels, Moses, Joseph and others say these words as well. Angels and Jesus are the primary ones speaking these words in the New Testament. Sixty-seven times! Imagine that!

It is Advent and I hear the story of Joseph and young, pregnant Mary. In Matthew, an angel appears to Joseph and tells him "do not be afraid." When Mary learns the news of her pregnancy, it is an angel who shares this news with her in Luke, starting with these same words. An angel appears to Zechariah as well to let him know that Elizabeth will have a child, too. Again, the angel's greeting begins with the words, "do not be afraid."

I am trying to hear the angels speak to me in this moment, in my experience of Advent -  as my idealistic son wanders off into a strange country that he doesn't know. I smile to myself knowing that he must have taken our family conversations to heart. And oddly, I am thankful for that, even now as I struggle myself to not be fearful. My son is teaching me again, "do not be afraid." He makes me proud.

So for now, I will keep him in my prayers and give thanks to God that nothing separates us from the love of God; that we are all held in the palm of God's loving hand. And, I will try to think about how the parents of my son's friend must have felt when he came to the United States to work for the summer. I bet they were afraid as well. (I wonder what their state department said about travel to the states!)

As I wait for my son to come home, I will also pray for the day when we all can live without fear:

Come, Lord Jesus. Come!

Judas

Then one of the twelve, who was called Judas Iscariot, went to the chief priests and said, "What will you give me if I betray him to you?" They paid him thirty pieces of silver. Matthew 26:14-15


When Judas, his betrayer, saw that Jesus was condemned, he repented and brought back the thirty pieces of silver to the chief priests and the elders. He said, "I have sinned by betraying innocent blood." Matthew 27:3-4

What possessed you,
Strange man?
One minute a follower,
A friend
Someone who walked
The same path
Told stories, laughed, cried.
Shared meals together on the road
Traveling from town to town.
Witnessed miracles
And heard wondrous
Stories about the kingdom.

    Was it not enough?
    Did the rabbi fail to meet your expectations?
    Or did you sense
    The growing dis-ease of the local leaders?
    Was it fear that drove you?

I know you
You are in me
During times
When I should have confronted those with power
Instead of giving into it -
Those life circumstances when I was complicit
In an obvious injustice
Because it was less of an annoyance
Than taking a stand -
Moments when it took less effort, frankly, 
To go along with the status quo.
And the bottom line:
Sometimes it is just easier to find
A scapegoat.

It is fear and then the guilt:
Watching an innocent
Fall victim
To a horrible betrayal.
It is not enough to say,
I am sorry.

    How amazing these words, then:
    Take, eat; this is my body...
    Drink - this is my blood of the covenant -
    Poured out for the
    Forgiveness
    The wondrous forgiveness
    Of sins.
    For you.
    For me.

    How can it be?
    How can it be?

Tears

"What makes God cry?"

This is one of Dave Daubert's questions he asks churches as they prepare to look at mission and what God is calling us to do in this time and place.

Eight years ago around this time, I sat at a dinner table for a Lenten soup supper prior to the worship service. I was feeling melancholy because our president indicated that we were going to engage in a preemptive war with Iraq. This made no sense to me.

We were Christians sitting around the table, sharing a meal before worship. A confirmation teacher was one of them. She was agitated and in the course of our conversation, she became very animated and she rose to her feet (I'm not kidding) and shouted, "I HOPE WE BOMB THE SHIT OUT OF THEM!"

That still haunts me today - and every Lent. I remember my tears in worship that night. I remember the "shock and awe" I felt.

"What makes God cry?"

.... maybe the fact that a senator took pride in blocking a bill that would have provided a short-term extension for unemployment benefits that expired March 1 without, apparently, thinking of what this would mean to families counting on this to survive....

....maybe that one of our senators had the audacity to say, "continuing to pay people unemployment compensation is a disincentive for them to seek new work....." when I know people who have been trying, TRYING to find work in this difficult economic climate to no avail...

....maybe that people would follow the rantings of a radio host that strictly focuses on his own self interests and who, just the other day, compared the Speaker of the House to mullahs and imams that encourage suicide bombers - when she merely suggested that lawmakers think about what's in the best interest of the people as opposed to what might happen to their own political careers....

....maybe that some carry around signs comparing our president to Hitler or make him look like a monkey or use racial slurs....

....maybe the fact that we are all so quick to name call, demonize the other, and make things more difficult for those who are poor....

....maybe the fact that many who do this call themselves, "Christian...."

"What makes God cry?"

- demonizing the other without realizing our own demons -

- name calling -

- perpetuating untruths to further your own personal gain -

- misleading others -

- using Christianity as a sword -
- fear mongering -

- idolatry -

We are all guilty.

Most merciful God, we confess that we are captive to sin and cannot free ourselves. We have sinned against you in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done and by what we have left undone. We have not loved you with our whole heart; we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves...

...have mercy on on...

...forgive us...

...renew us...

...lead us...

...so that we may delight in your will and walk in your ways...

(Evangelical Lutheran Worship)

May it be so.

May it be so.