Loose the Fear & Live

April 18, 2012

I had the strangest feeling as I was walking home from class this morning. I felt for a moment the sadness of estrangement wherein one seeks any alleviation that might dull the pain that I believe every human feels in the depths, in the quiet, in the secret space of the soul. I felt it, for a moment. I watched the students, and in my mind, I saw the frantic race of people trying to escape all the sadness. I saw the moments spent alone in fear, I felt the aching heart after a relationship lost, I smelt the liquor on their lips, I heard the voices in their heads that paraded around telling falsehoods, and I watched as little hands grasped for anything that might fill the emptiness. I knew it for that moment, and it made me want to cry for every human experiencing this feeling. Whether you are jumping ship like Jonah or you’re drowning out the voice that tells you there’s something more, we are all running in some form or fashion. That’s what humans do: we run. When I feel myself running: I listen to far too much music, I lose sleep over my thoughts, I use the future to feel secure, I count the days of the calendar to exert some type of control over my life, I make phone calls to silence the fear, I write to alleviate the pain, I ignore the pain, I act as if everything is fine, and lastly, I begin to seriously doubt the existence of all things good in this life. I wallow.

It takes courage to confront the fear we all feel. I am beginning to believe the opposite of love is not hate, nor indifference, but rather, fear. Most of us feel fear in some form or fashion on a daily basis, whether it comes in the form of anxiety, stress, depression, despair, loneliness, you name it—I believe all these arise from the origin of fear. In order to rid ourselves of the fear, we must face the fear. We must give it up, let it out, confess it like a secret long kept hidden. And there is no fear in love, but perfect love has the power to cast out fear, to throw it out and give it no place in our lives. Love, then, hates fear.

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I am sweating and the stream of my tears feels cold on my face. I am crying the tears of my momma. They weren’t mine. They were hers. I do believe I have just shared a real pain in my spirit, so closely, so tenderly. I walked in the little cement kitchen with a loaf of bread to tell her I could fix myself a peanut butter sandwich. As I glanced up, I watched as tears began falling down her face. I wondered what I should say or how I might be able to give her a timely word or some form of comfort. I claim no mastery over the Spanish language, and I stumble through sentences and can’t find the words to say, but in that moment, it didn’t matter. She didn’t need words. She needed someone to feel with her, to say it hurts, to know the pain and to let her cry and be small again. I told her I wanted to pray for her in that moment. Since tomorrow will be the 5-year anniversary of the death of her eldest son, the house has been heavy with a sadness that seeps through the walls, leaks out the vents, and crawls on every piece of furniture he once knew. The boys don’t say a word, and the father has been on the computer all day. Only she chooses to feel and let God do his work in her. She chooses to let the sadness in, to let it change her, to allow it inside. As I prayed for her, looking for the words in Spanish, I began to weep. I could hardly speak. I held her trembling body against mine, and I let myself feel, if only for a moment, her sorrow.

As I write, I still cry. I cry because it is the same sadness I felt earlier this morning, the place of fear and of solitude. What balm might provide a salve for that? For her, it is more than just sadness; hers is the termination of memories and of a life once lived and shared. Though I can’t begin to imagine the pain, I know it in the strangest place inside. I feel it like I felt it this morning, except, there’s something different about the outcome. I don’t see her running around frantically. I see her bowed, knees on the floor, head in her hands. I see her asking God the whys and hows, wondering if she will ever be able to go on, and yet, standing up in the midst of it all. I smell the rich aroma of trust, of faithfulness, of belief, and of love rising from her prayers. I believe she is getting closer and closer to Jesus himself in every prayer, every act of service, every loving word spoken. I believe God wants to tell her “Well done my child, you are faithful, you believed, and there are crowns of gold awaiting you. I see you. I feel your pain. I am with you in all of it. I cry with you there in your little room. If you could only see…”

She’s been chipping away at all the walls inside of her since he passed. I see them coming down, and I see God building a new home inside of her. It bears great treasure and peace. It is holy and sweet to my soul. It gives me new life each time I walk through that little iron gate. It is a dwelling for God himself.

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We are all knocking on the doors of eternity, waiting to get in. To those that are chipping away at the walls, removing the bricks that we have all laid to self-protect and hide, I am walking with you. I want to say this: he is making a home out of us, but we must make the conscious decision every single day to allow him entrance into our little houses. The doors don’t unlock by themselves. So turn the key, swing wide the doors, loose the fear, and live.