September 30, 2001
John 14
Psalm 27

Fear has a way of bringing out the best and the worst in human beings. Not all of us here this morning knew Franklin Roosevelt or were alive when he was President. He was a leader who understood this in his bones. Following the bombing of Pearl Harbor, as high security measures were being undertaken, a plan was introduced to surround the White House with armed forces and tanks in all the entries. Roosevelt immediately rejected the idea, saying that it would only deepen the fears of the people. Our greatest enemy, he reminded us was, "fear itself".

Perhaps our greatest enemy these past few weeks has been fear itself. There have been many feelings that we have moved through as individuals and as a nation. Strong waves of shock and unbearable sorrow. Deep rage and surprising anger. The darkness of despair and depression. Panic and sheer terror. And underneath and surrounding all these feelings is a powerful fear that pervades and informs all our thoughts and emotions. Perhaps fear is the feeling that most of us have come to know and identify with as we have processed the news, watched as the Trade Towers have become a burial ground and wondered where and when and who will strike out next.

Fear is a real and powerful human emotion and one that all of us, no matter how protected or strong, have experienced. We live in fear-ridden times, and many of us are experiencing acute anxiety these days. How can we handle our fears and anxieties?

We can deny our fears. You remember the T-shirts that were all the rage a while back? The brand name was No Fear! Even though the object of no fear was the big wave, lots of folks who never surfed or even lived near the ocean were proudly wearing these shirts. I once saw a bumper sticker on the back of a pick-up truck. It was in Old English script and read: Yea, though I walk through the valley, I will fear no evil, for I am the meanest SOB in the valley.

We can deny that we feel any fear at all and bluff our way through life. As in the case of the bumper sticker owner, we can attempt to overcome fear, through our own strength, or in this case, sheer meanness.

A second option is surrendering to fear. We can choose security, take limited steps and protect ourselves by leading very private, guarded lives. We can buy alarms for our houses, build earthquake safe buildings, move to gated communities, refuse to answer the phone and socialize only with people who are like us. With this response everything may become smaller and smaller, until we shrink to the size of our fears rather than moving within our freedom.

The third way we can pursue handling our fears is learning how to live with them and having the courage to be risk takers. It is here that our faith tradition informs us. Paul Tillich writes of the "courage to be" in the midst of modern fear and deep anxiety. He defines courage as the self-affirmation of being in spite of non-being: in spite of fear, doubt and despair. He writes that the key is not being fearless, but having the courage to live in the midst of our fears with strength and hope. Courage comes from being willing to stand-alone and also being willing to risk living in a community. It is in communities such as this one, and thousands of faith communities across our country and around the world, that we learn how to stand with others and invite them in. Please remember that we are speaking about people of faith who stand within their faith traditions, not faith as fanaticism or extremism. Our faith tradition reminds us to welcome strangers, not ostracize them, thereby we may be entertaining angels unaware. In our Gospel tradition, Jesus is also described as the stranger along the road. "Did not our hearts burn within us as we met him on the road?"

In the Biblical tradition fear is overcome by faith in divine grace that frees one to take risks and begin again. In the words of the Psalmist… "The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear? The Lord is the stronghold of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?" Our tradition doesn't promise that there are not fearful things, there is darkness and fear in this life…but also light and hope. The promise of Psalm 23 is real: Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death…you are with me!

Ernest Becker in his Pulitzer Price winning book, The Denial of Death argues that our fears–fear of failure, rejection, abandonment, separation, loss, sickness and to the list I would add safety–are actually manifestations of our fear of death. Not being able to accept with confidence the inevitability of our mortality, we fear every sign of the proof of its existence. And the events of these past weeks have certainly provided us with ample signs that we are not invincible, immortal or invulnerable human beings.

We live in a fear-ridden, grief stricken world, but that was true even before September 11. The Gospel of John reminds us that no one, not even Jesus escapes the tragic touch of the world. After urging the disciples to let not their hearts be afraid, he reminds them of what he has already told them; "I will not leave you desolate. I am going away and I am coming for you." The spirit will be with them to give them the courage they will need to go forward.

Fear and grief are not the whole story. The whole story tells us that on our depressing, fear-filled roads, we do not walk alone. The divine spirit of Christ is walking with us. We may not always recognize the Spirit, just as those two men walking to Emmaus failed to recognize Christ on the journey with them. But the Spirit of Christ is walking with us and in us today and always.

I recall the morning of Christmas, 1997. It was my Dad's last Christmas, although none of us knew it that day. We had gathered in the living room of beloved friends and spent some time sharing with each other what had happened in each of our lives in the last year. My father was silent until the last. As he spoke, his whole being changed. He sat upright and his face began to glow. Instead of recalling something from 1997, he went all the way back to 1943, when he was on an aircraft carrier in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, heading toward southern Italy. He talked about how scared the men were, but how courageous and hopeful, too. He said, "I have never forgotten their faces and how it felt to be with them on that ship at sea. We were so young! So scared. So hopeful and so alive!" I remember something I read about how in combat, all things become exquisitely precious and completely focused.

In these past days and weeks, fear has made me more fragile and so things become more precious. I have noticed how my life has changed, along with everyone's life. I feel a sense of aliveness and gratitude for each day and each moment I have been given to live. I have felt a renewal of my vocational call to ministry and mission, to word and witness. And I feel keenly and exquisitely, a deep joy and strong courage that comes from living, moving and having my being held in community. In the words of e e cummings, "You give me courage, so that against you the sharp days slobber in vain."

Our tradition reminds us that we have courage because we are en-couraged by each other. As Maya Angelou has written, "the horizon leans forward". We leaned forward last week as we heard Adam Blons preach a powerful sermon and called him to be our Minister of Family Life. We are encouraged this morning as we pray with Hamid and welcome him to our congregation and begin a new interfaith relationship. We lean forward in this time of great fear because we are determined not to be destroyed. We are determined to rediscover and confirm the fundamental values of our faith and the Republic.

I close with these words from my friend Jim Gilliom who wrote them after the Gulf War;