Ben’s October Letter
Dear Friends in Christ,
October is the one time of the year where we like to be scared. We go out of our way to decorate with skeletons and tombstones; we take ghost tours and visit haunted houses; we watch horror movies and listen to The Monster Mash. It’s the kind of macabre fun that helps us deal with our own mortality. Halloween is amazingly popular for a day so concerned with death and dying. Maybe the candy and costumes make the scares easier to take.
I’ve been thinking a lot about the things that scare us. Because I’ve decided they aren’t always what we expect. I read once that a large minority of Americans are less afraid of dying than they are of public speaking. One chart I saw recently indicated that Americans are more likely to be afraid of clowns, needles, and visiting the doctor’s office than they are of nuclear war. If we think that fear is for death, airplanes, and snakes—we’re really missing the whole picture. We’re afraid of so much more than that.
Our listening sessions for Evergreen 2030 revealed that our congregation is afraid of both evangelism and engaging conflict. Afraid isn’t a word I’m using rhetorically here—fear was specifically mentioned in multiple groups! Talking about our faith to people who might not be receptive is scary. Risking a relationship that matters to us over a disagreement is scary. And so we don’t do it.
But as Christians, we encouraged not to fear. Angels often begin their messages to people by proclaiming “do not fear…”. Jesus says “do not be afraid…” to his disciples dozens of times. In 1 John, we are told that “perfect love casts out fear”.
As Christians in the month when we engage with scary things…what if we added evangelism and engaging in conflict to our list of scary movies and haunted hayrides? What if, over coffee with a friend we mentioned the time our faith got us through a difficult time? Or admitted to a coworker that we forgave a slight because Jesus told us to? What if we said “I’m not sure I agree…” to someone at church? Or dredged up the courage to say “I love you, but you have done something harmful” to a person we aren’t sure will react well? If there is ever a time to do something scary, it is now—in the month when we celebrate the things that scare us, and spend our time with them.
I’m going to try to do it. Maybe you’ll join me. Things are less scary when we do them together—and we’ve got each other, and our God.
See you soon,
Rev. Ben